The Self Love Portal

Embodiment, desire, and the practice of self relationship

Throughout my 30s, I consciously chose periods of celibacy because I felt a deep calling to come home to myself.

I had spent much of my adult life in romantic relationships, loverships, and situationships, and I genuinely love the depth, intimacy, and companionship that partnership can bring. At the same time, I began noticing how easily I could look outside myself for reassurance, connection, or a sense of being enough. I also came to understand more about my attachment system and how easy it can be for me to stay looped into something out of fear of loss.

It has been a practice to become curious about what it means to stay close to myself while being in relationship with someone else.

I have learned to notice my desires without immediately needing to act on them. I have become more familiar with the difference between longing and attachment, and I have learned to recognize when I am moving toward a connection because it feels alive and when I am moving toward it because I am afraid of being without it.

Choosing periods of celibacy gave me a different kind of space to listen to myself. I began to notice where my erotic energy wanted to move when it wasn't being directed toward another person. I found it moving into my creativity, my body, my relationship with nature, my art, my sensuality, and the ways I experienced pleasure in my everyday life. There was something deeply nourishing about allowing desire to exist without making it necessary for desire to lead somewhere.

“The erotic is a resource within each of us that lies in a deeply female and spiritual plane.”— Audre Lorde

This kind of space also taught me that celibacy could be an invitation into intimacy rather than a withdrawal from it. I had more room to feel my body and notice what was actually happening inside me. I became more aware of my rhythms, my desires, my boundaries, and the subtle places where my body would tell me yes or no before my mind had caught up.

“There is a place in the heart that no other can reach.”— John O’Donohue

I have also had to become more intimate with loneliness. There have been moments when I wanted to reach for someone simply because I didn't want to feel alone. Sitting with that feeling has shown me the doorway into a deeper relationship with myself. I can feel the ache of wanting connection without immediately making that ache someone else's responsibility. And watching the feeling transform into more life force and eros.

Over time, I began to recognize some of the ways I had been leaving myself in order to maintain connection. I could see how easily I could shape myself around another person's availability, desires, or needs when I was afraid of losing the relationship. I started to notice the difference between choosing someone from a place of genuine desire and moving toward someone because being chosen by them helped me feel secure.

I remember moments when I thought I was deeply longing for a particular person, only to realize that underneath the longing was desire to feel wanted, chosen, or reassured. That recognition has been humbling, but it has also pointed to freedom. When I can stay present with what is actually happening inside me, I have more choice about how I respond.

“In touch with the erotic, I become less willing to accept powerlessness.”— Audre Lorde

This kind of inquiry and attunement has brought me into a deeper relationship with my own sensuality, creativity, solitude, intuition, and, at times, loneliness. It has helped me understand that my relationship with myself is something I have to keep tending, especially when I am deeply in love with someone else.

I still find this to be an ongoing practice. I still have moments when attachment gets loud, when I want reassurance, or when I feel the pull to reach outside myself for something I am longing to feel within.

For me, self love has become the practice of becoming a person I can trust to stay in relationship with myself while also allowing myself to deeply love and desire another person. I want to be able to experience the fullness of partnership without disappearing inside of it. I want to remain connected to my own body, intuition, creativity, desires, and inner knowing while making room for another person in my life.

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”— Anaïs Nin

There is something incredibly beautiful about learning to stay present with myself through desire, uncertainty, loneliness, pleasure, and longing. Over time, I have come to know myself in a different way, and I think that deeper knowing is one of the most intimate relationships I will ever have.

This is the foundation of

Somatic Ritual Sessions:

Creating a compassionate relationship with the parts of yourself that have shaped your life, while using ritual to honor the moments when something is changing, being released, or beginning anew.

Ritual might support you through leaving a relationship, moving through grief, or stepping into a new chapter of your life. These moments can become opportunities to consciously mark what is ending, honor what has been, and make space for what is ready to emerge.

Apply here

For those wanting a longer communal journey,

The Devotional Body... 

Weaves somatic practice, plant medicine - microdosing, ritual & embodiment into a group container for women returning to a deeper relationship with themselves.

Join the waitlist here

Ceremony and Psychedelic Integration...  

Offers support in navigating expanded states of awareness with grounding, intention, and integration.

You may leave feeling...

• Less weighed down by anxiety, fear, or sadness.

• More spacious and at ease in your body.

• Clearer about what you need and what comes next.

• Less caught in old patterns and emotional loops.

• More connected to your desire, vitality, and sense of possibility.

• More able to meet yourself with compassion rather than overwhelm.

Apply here

If you are curious about developing a deeper relationship with your body and its changing rhythms, you may also enjoy The Feminine Body Temple.

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