ray said it would come, this feeling of not having to DO anything with it, whatever "it" was, the twitch under the skin, the sudden drop in the gut, the memory that flares up like a bright flash, just letting it SIT there without needing to scramble for an off switch. i remember trying to explain to him how the urge to just obliterate any discomfort felt like a physical mandate, like my very cells were wired for flight or fight or FADE, and he just nodded, that patient way he has, the kind of stillness that comes from twelve years of choosing to just be PRESENT, and he just said, "it’ll ease, day437, if you let it move through you, not around you, not over you, but through," and i never really understood what that meant until just now, a full-body recognition of something that wasn’t a problem to be solved, just a texture, like sand between my toes on a hot summer , unexpected and a little gritty but not requiring a reaction, just existing, and my hands, for the first time in what feels like forever, didn’t clench into fists, didn’t reach for distraction, just rested, open, like they were finally trusting that there was nothing to grab onto, nothing to fix, nothing to hold back. it’s a terrifying kind of freedom, this space between the feeling and the doing, because it means i have to actually stand in the discomfort, but it also means i get to stand.