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Written by Bhav Nancherla I'm inspired to use this space to have some of my colleagues, clients, and friends share some of their own writing. Below we have our first guest post by Luminosity alum, Bhav Nancherla*.  Where does love go when shame swallows it? Here are two moments when eros and shame danced together in my life, and what I’m learning about their entanglement…
A few months ago, sitting on a plane just before take off, I suddenly and very unexpectedly felt this huge effusion of sexual energy, as though I was feeling the thrust of the plane as a force in my own body, translated through the erotic. This had never happened to me before, and I was surprised and frankly, a little aghast. As I sat there, wedged way too close in space to two other passengers’ bodies, something else in me took over with the energy of “this is so deeply inappropriate, it cannot be allowed to happen,” after which I watched a powerful energy within me fold these sensations up, so completely disappearing them as if they had never occurred. How exacting a force is shame: how deeply it can entwine and contain these powerfully evocative impulses towards generativity, towards risk, towards pleasure. Many years ago, in a season of significant chaos and messy boundaries, I made a choice that caused a lot of hurt to someone I loved. On the other side of this transgression, in the remorse of the hurt I’d caused, I used shame as incantation: sitting in front of a mirror, I cast a spell of shame to call myself back into a shape that was more coherent than the messy reality that was unfolding. I’m not saying if it was a good or bad thing - but it was extreme and effective. It called me back into containment. Was it the right move to fit back into that shape? I don’t know; it certainly didn’t undo the hurt, nor could it stop what had unfolded, even if it did change the course going forward a bit. I think a lot about the role of shame in the complexity of its heavy medicine and its powerful ability to close in around the unfolding of life. From somatics, I’ve learned how life pulses through existence - a series of expansions and contractions: the inhale and exhale of breath, the beating of our hearts, the tightening and softening of muscles and organs in every movement we make. The same phenomenon guides energy between bodies: life unfolds as enlivening expansion into new possibilities, and then orients to (re)containment, as we integrate and make sense of what has happened, and feel out how this growth fits into who we know ourselves to be. This pulsing feels in relationship with life and death, with love and grief, with movement and stillness, and I’d invite, with the energies of eros and shame. Where eros invites us to unlock and move into new possibilities, shame brings us to contain and integrate back into oneself. This is how life tangles with the individual ego, this small and precarious container of self, present in the question that shame can often ask: “who do you think you are?”
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 I’m leaving The Outside. After nearly a decade of amazing work and friendship, June 30 will be my last day at the organization I have loved hard and that has loved me back in kind.
It’s time. I've been doing two kinds of work for a long time: the more visible strategic work and a quieter, deeper practice that's been growing underneath it. Now, I want to let what's been growing come forward. It’s time. My decision didn't come with a perfectly mapped road ahead. What it came with was the clarity that something in me has been growing that can no longer be secondary. It deserves a front and center role in what I’m offering to the world. It’s time. And because I am who I am, I’m thinking about all of the “lessons” I am learning from this leave taking. So that I can truly learn them, and also so that I can share them with you. But a funny thing has happened - probably because I’m still in the middle of this life changing shift! - all I can really capture is what NOT to learn from my leaving. So I’ll share that instead.  We've been told the spiritual path is lonely. That transformation means leaving people behind. That to grow, we must lose.
We've each heard this about the spiritual journey - that you will have to make hard choices, shed relationships, outgrow the people around you. That you will be like the snake shedding its skin, and that it will hurt. And it's not that this isn't true. It certainly can be true. The reason this story has taken hold - to grow you must lose - is that there are elements of truth to it. Moving into alignment often means loss. But I want to pause us here and wonder if we're telling ourselves the wrong story about what is actually happening. Not to deny the loss, but to shift our lens a little when we talk about transformation, alignment, and grief. And this matters! As long as we hold "to grow you must lose" as the main story, we cut ourselves off from a lot of growth. We can't go after transformation full-stop. We can't really be in it if we're scared of outgrowing others. We can't do what it takes because we're so afraid that we will lose people, that we will leave them behind. A Problem of Contortion In this pause, let's look at what happens when transformation begins. Often, we arrive here after a long period of fitting ourselves into our circumstances. Like a pair of jeans we've outgrown - who am I kidding, I'm talking about leggings here, I haven't worn jeans in years! - we've squeezed ourselves into a role, identity, or relationship that no longer fits. We can keep wearing those leggings, but the waistband digs in. The fabric strains. We're working really hard to hold a shape that doesn't want to be held anymore. When we feel this squeeze, we begin to realize that we are out of alignment with our truest selves. The size we were is not the size we are now. We're contorting our body into a shape it no longer wants to hold. By Tuesday Rivera To make the most of this article, please first read The Risk of Feeling Safe. There I explored how "not feeling safe" has become a habit for many of us—a psychological and spiritual pattern that keeps us from real, deep transformation, our own and the world's.
Now let's consider what it looks like when we risk feeling safe. When might we face this choice? What might be happening for us as we take this risk? And what words might help us make the leap? Of course, we might take the risk to feel safe at any moment. But I want to talk about three particular times when it comes up: at a beginning, when it's time to claim a truth, and in endings. Allowing a Beginning When something new is happening in our lives - a burgeoning relationship, a new client or fresh project, any kind of door opening - we can feel especially at risk. And since we're going to feel at risk anyway, I suggest that we consider taking the risk of feeling safe. To risk feeling safe as we place our foot on a new path really changes what we're able to walk into, what we're able to accept, and how much newness we'll allow. It changes both the scale of what we do and the felt experience of the new beginning coming our way. Let me give a personal example. By Tuesday Rivera  A colleague and I recently supported a group of women in a "Wilderness Wander” - a day of fasting and exploring the land in a remote area of Maine.
In our council circle after the women's solo time on the land, I heard myself say to one of the women, "I want to thank you, not for the risk you took in going out into the wilderness. I think the real risk you took was the risk of allowing yourself to feel safe." The room stopped. There was a collective intake of breath. "Can you say that again?" someone asked. "The real risk you took was the risk to feel safe," I repeated. "We don't often let ourselves do that: feel safe." In fact, we almost never let ourselves do that. And of course, there are good reasons for that. The world is a scary place at all times, but especially now. And the world is certainly scarier for some people, especially now. I do not deny or ignore that. But we've become so focused on the language and practice of "feeling safe" that we've come to believe the safety we're seeking is outside of us. That we must feel safe at all times to do what needs to be done in the world. That our bodies must be in a certain state of rest for us to be okay.(1) And I want that! I want well-regulated bodies living in a just world. It's just that we don't have much of that right now. And I've come to see that we're wearing our "I don't feel safe" as a badge of honor—a way of signaling to others that we're awake to what's really happening around us. After all, how could we feel safe when the world is burning? That would be absurd. To feel safe would be to deny our awareness of the very real suffering around us and the risk to so many people in the world. To not feel safe is to be a just, caring person...not a neurotic, self-obsessed one. But I wonder: where did this expectation of feeling safe come from? By Tuesday Rivera This is the third in a three-part series that Tuesday has written about transformation (revisit Part 1 & Part 2 below). In hindsight, this could actually have been the first instalment of the series, but that is not how it flowed from her. In fact, she says that it feels like this could only be written at this specific moment in her own transformation. She reflects on staying in the liminal space of transformation far longer than she anticipated. This extended period has allowed her to uncover and articulate long-held patterns that we all experience in our lives that make our own transformations both slower and more necessary. When I began to get a strange sense about my work in the world coming from inside me, felt the gentle rumblings of “not this”, I was able to ignore them. I’m just working too much, I thought. I’m burnt out. I’m sore from the ongoing effort of trying to make change in the world. I need to slow down.
And then, through a huge effort of will (and many months of therapy), the support of loved ones, and a global pandemic, I did slow down. Work slowed down. And while there was always more than enough to do, my work somehow became manageable, and that felt A LOT better. But interestingly, the quiet “not this” that seemed to emanate from my very bones continued. And now, I had time to pay attention to it. Maybe this is how transformation started for many of us as we came out of the pandemic. The little niggles of not-quite-aligned were now able to be noticed, investigated, and more deeply considered. The pace of our lives made the quiet doubts and discomfort of how we were spending our days unable to be ignored. What we had tolerated - onerous tasks, unrealistic schedules, objectionable people - now became, if not untenable, then at least undesirable. And we had the time to notice. And to desire more. We started to desire meaningful work, reasonable schedules, and people pulling in the same direction as we are. We understood that our time, our lives, are valuable beyond production even if what we’re producing is good for the world, were fused to be complicit in a grind that no longer made us feel accomplished, let alone happy. Fortunately for many of us who are making change in the world, meaningful work and admirable people are part of the job, but I found that, even when I rearranged my calendar to be more sensible, the feeling of “not this” continued. In fact, it became more insistent. By Tuesday Rivera and 4 tips as everything dissolves.At The Outside, we used to talk about the need for transformation. “Old systems are failing,” we’d say. “We’re being asked to do more with less; we are facing issues more complex than ever; etc.” Now, however, we don’t talk about that much because there is no longer a need for transformation. Instead, there is only the reality of transformation: happening at all times and seemingly unstoppable.
Transformation is happening around us, between us, and within us. It may be personal, organizational, or systemic, but there is no doubt that everything is up in the air and we are floundering to catch the pieces as they fall. In the prevailing conversation about transformation, the concept of liminal space is often invoked to help us to understand the middle phase of transformation, the “space in between” - where we are neither what we were nor what we’re going to be. We don’t know what we are becoming but we know we are not what we were. It is that space that feels full of both uncertainty and possibility. The example of the butterfly can be very helpful in understanding this space. The cocoon is an actual physical “liminal space” - the place where the caterpillar goes to dissolve and then reform into the butterfly. It’s quite miraculous. One kind of being enters a space of deep unraveling - even on a cellular level! - and comes out of that space something entirely new. It is a perfect metaphor for our transformation fable. One can only imagine that the caterpillar is driven by some powerful instinct to create and enter the chrysalis with no real understanding of the transformation about to happen. In fact, caterpillars enter the cocoon with the express purpose of transforming into a butterfly. And as far as we can understand, after dissolution, those cells just “know” how to reform into a beautiful winged creature. Using the butterfly as an example, we can begin to see the failing of our systems and organizations - and even our personal lives - as the necessary precursor to our own evolution. Our own caterpillar to butterfly hero’s journey. We can trust that we will know what to do once we come apart. That the very laws of nature will support our transformation. It is a hopeful orientation to the unceasing transformation around us. But I’ve recently entered that chrysalis - and haven’t emerged yet if I’m honest, and I have to tell you nothing feels normal or natural or evolutionary about it. It feels hard. And scary. And uncertain. And I DO NOT THINK MY CELLS KNOW HOW TO DO THIS. By Tuesday Rivera 6 things to do that bring clarity in the midst of uncertaintyIn our ongoing series about navigating transition (Part 1 here), Tuesday explores what to do when we don’t know what to do next. What happens when we aren’t sure of our next step? What do we do when we don’t know what’s next or how to get there? Where do we turn when all we really want is a crystal ball to tell us something, anything, about the future that stretches out before us, and crystal balls are in short supply?
Many of us are in transition right now. Or, rather, many of us want to be in transition right now but we actually feel stuck right where we are. Or maybe, it’s fairer to say that our minds are in transition though our bodies may be right where they’ve always been. We know that we don't want what we have - be it our current job, our primary relationship, or perhaps the place we live - but we also don’t know what we want. We are stuck in the NOW which is unsatisfying, unfulfilling and perhaps even toxic, but we can’t imagine where to go next or can’t see a way to get there. We know that we have to take steps but don’t know where we want to go or how to get there, so it’s hard to know where to place our feet. This is why the idea of “visioning” is so attractive - it gives us a direction, a goal. We imagine a future where we are clear and living our best life. And once we have an idea of that target, we can begin to build a path to get there. But in these wild times, many of us are failing to even have a vision. We’re ready to let our arrow fly toward our targeted vision but the fog is so deep in front of us that we can’t even see the direction of the bullseye! Sometimes it’s because our vision is vague - we want a slower pace, a quieter life, to be in nature, to write, or we just want something different - and it’s hard to know whether to point ourselves left or right. Sometimes we know what we want - to be a teacher, to get a divorce, to move to the country - but we can’t imagine how to possibly get there. When that’s the case, I suggest that we put away our vision boards, forget the ideas of targets and arrows and bullseyes, stop looking for that crystal ball that will tell us the future and, instead, remember who we are. Remembering who we are, means that we are never truly stuck or lost. Uncertain, sure. Plagued by doubt, absolutely. But lost, nope. We can’t get lost when we remember that we have a home right here within ourselves. All we have to do is remember ourselves, and we are there. Spiritual leaders will tell us that we can remember who we are with every breath. I believe that to be true, but I also know the feeling of being unable to catch my breath because I am so uncertain about my future. So, how do I remember who I am at any given moment - especially if I’m anxious and breathless? I have started engaging in small, but contradictory behaviors. When I want to remember who I am, I have a set of actions that are in opposition to each other, that help me find myself. Each of these help me to reacquaint me with myself. And while I don’t necessarily do the below in any kind of sequence, I have noticed that doing them regularly is a sure way to remember who I am. BY TUESDAY RIVERA Let me assure you. If you are seeking Her, She is seeking you. That is just the way it works. If you have a sense that Goddess may be calling you, you are right. She is longing for you to come to Her. Like a mother reaching out her hands to a toddler, encouraging it to take its first steps, Goddess has Her arms raised to you and wants you to come near. Come closer. Fall into Her arms so that she can tell you how beautiful you are. And also so that She can tear you apart and remake you into even more of who you are. What you are seeking is seeking you. And now, maybe you are wondering if the feeling you get sometimes could be a call from Goddess. Or maybe you haven’t felt anything yet but you are beginning to recognize a longing for a relationship with the Divine Feminine or one of Her specific forms. A real relationship. One you can lean into. One you can depend on. One you can turn to as you shift your own shape and meet your new fate. She will come to you in many ways. Some ways may be loud and unmistakable - I am here She says and chills run through your body! Or they may be soft and easily missed- I am here She says with a gentle light dappling through the trees. There is nothing to do besides stay alert and open and know that if you miss one call, She will return. She can’t help it. She wants to claim you as Hers. Goddess has favorites and you are one. Pay attention to your dreams and visions. She may speak to you while sleeping - coming as herself, a strong feeling, an ancestor, or as a symbol that is associated with her. You may also have a vision while waking - a color, an image, a sign that comes to you repeatedly. Especially if these images or sensations are strong or persist over time, they may be meaningful. A call. Find Her in nature. She often calls through Her creatures. Many Goddesses are associated with specific animals or plants. Do you notice something new on your walks these days? Does a particular animal cross your path or flower attract your notice? Do you feel called to lakes or rivers, mountains or oceans? Different aspects of Her can be found in these places. She may call you through her land or water. Read stories of myths and archetypes. Listen for those stories that especially resonate for you. Those stories that have you leaning in and wanting to hear more. To learn more. Follow these threads to your Goddess. Look to your own lineage. There may be a Goddess that has called your line through the ages. One that your grandmother’s grandmother knew how to court. One that was raised on the land that was of your people. Tune in to how you feel. Sometimes the call is just the gentlest nudge in a particular direction - look at that bird. Listen to that song. At times it comes with a feeling of wonder or awe. Sometimes, happiness or bliss. At other times it comes with a sense of overwhelm or uncertainty. There is no one way She calls. She calls in the way you need to hear Her. Most importantly, be open and be foolish. It may feel silly at times to wonder if that bee or butterfly has a message for you. To imagine that you heard a voice guide you or that the image you see in your mind’s eye is meaningful. You may be self-conscious or start to cry when you hear a story of Goddess or a dream wakes you in the night. You may get chills for no apparent reason. Doubt is part of Devotion… In some moments, Her call will be unmistakable. You will receive a message or a blessing, a visitation or an awakening from Her. You will feel overwhelmed by Grace and be so clear that She has called you. At other times, her call will be the barest brush against your skin. The gentlest opening of your heart. You will come to know these as Her, but it may take some time. Either way, afterwards, you will doubt. You will question whether you made it up. Whether it was your own mind speaking to you. Whether you really just imagined the encounter. You will ask yourself: Who am I to receive a call? I am not special or talented or gifted. I am just me: flailing, flawed, and human. I am not a mystic or especially spiritual. I am just me. Yes. You are just you. And that is beautiful clay for Her to work with. You are the perfect object for Her love. She is the perfect object for your devotion. What’s important is that you are open to Her. That you understand that the moments of doubt are part of coming to know Her. That you allow the doubt and know that She does not begrudge you your resistance or your fear. Your uncertainty or your reticence. She already knows you and loves you. She is already calling you - even before you knew to seek Her. At times, the “touch” from the Divine is unmistakable: You will receive a message or a blessing, a visitation or an awakening from Her. You will feel overwhelmed by Grace and be so clear that She has called you.  |
TUESDAY RIVERAHello there! This resource page is a space for me to share inspiration, insight, and connection. Here, I’ll offer reflections and practical guidance related to personal transformation, intuitive practices, and embracing the divine feminine as well as other topics that have my attention. Whether you’re seeking insight, a bit of encouragement, or tools for transformation, I hope you find meaningful content here to guide your journey. CategoriesArchives
May 2026
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