Hello dear ones,
As many of you know, this weekend I launched my newest offering: anchored: a deck for healing.
I’m so grateful for all of the support that has come in — and, doing this launch on Pride weekend here in LA was, well, exhausting. So I wanted to share some writing from the guidebook with you.
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With love,
Margeaux
Within the world of trauma healing, there’s a lot of emphasis on the practice of grounding. On a literal level, grounding is when we move out of states of nervous system activation – fight, flight, freeze, submit – by feeling the ground underneath us; on a metaphorical level, grounding is feeling calm and rooted. In my experience, grounding has all too often felt totally inaccessible. Perhaps because there is no earth in my astrology chart. Perhaps because I’ve always felt my calmest when I’m in or near water.
I needed different language, and so I came to the word “anchor.” In their tarot practice, Lindsay Mack explains that
“Anchoring is when we intentionally develop a root system of safety around a practice, or a tool—the breath, a certain person, deity, phrase or mantra, prayer, scent, etc–so that we can call upon it in moments of distress. Anchors help us to stay in our center when the inner storms rage. They can act as a foundation in moments when we feel that the bottom has dropped out of our lives, an experience and feeling that is shared by many trauma survivors.”
What I love about anchoring is that it doesn’t require us to fully come back into contact with the ground. When I imagine a ship’s anchor, I think about how the ship floats above on the water, knowing that the anchor is keeping it safe and connected to the floor beneath. Deb Dana, a trauma specialist in polyvagal theory, shares similar reflections in her book Anchored: How to Befriend Your Nervous System Using Polyvagal Theory:
“I grew up around the water, understanding how anchors are essential to staying safe in response to changing conditions. An anchor digs into the ocean floor with enough line between it and the boat to hold the boat safely in one place but with enough leeway to move in response to changes in the sea and wind. Safety comes with a firmly embedded anchor and the right amount of line. When we are anchored, we have a sense of being safely held so we can venture out without becoming adrift. We are connected to a state of regulation and have room to explore the world around us.”
I lost my anchors when my mother died when I was 11. Her death (one anchor lost) led to another as my father pulled away, too deep in his own grief to tend to the impact of this traumatic event on my brother and I. At that time, I became a surrogate anchor for my brother who was 8. As my father lost the use of his arms due to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS or Lou Gehirg’s disease), I too became his anchor.
Left unmoored, I reached out for whatever tools I could find to help me survive: drugs, unprotected sex, alcohol, and other high risk behaviors. I no longer knew what safety was, as the very person who should have kept me safe became the person I needed to be protected from. When I started somatic therapy at age 31, I had no concept of what safety felt like. With the support of my therapist, we created new anchors together.
I know that therapy is not accessible to everyone, which is why I wanted to bring this deck to the world. It can so often feel like our healing happens in isolation. With this deck, each time you pull a card, know that you are connected to me and all of the other humans who’ve also chosen to bring this deck into their lives. Connection is not just a physical experience: it is a spiritual one too. We’re all little ships, floating on the water, being jostled by the sea, with our individual anchors that help us feel safe. Collectively, with each new anchor, we become moored to one another.
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Thank you so much for being so open about your process in terms of representation with this deck. You echo so many of my own concerns and thought process and all the back and forth I have experienced along the way with very similar questions, without ever really coming to consensus or answer. It's so helpful to know that even if there isn't an easy, neat and tidy answer - there are other people grappling with an answering the same questions.
The deck is so beautiful and i will absolutely be purchasing.