"There is no initiation without a death."- Francis Weller Hello friends, We humans share a fundamental need. It's the need to honour major life transitions with formal rites of passage. The presence of "initiation" experiences is one of the most persistent observations across cultural history. Traditional societies have all developed mechanisms to usher individuals through existential thresholds, such as: from adolescence to adulthood assumption of high-stakes leadership navigating major...
8 days ago • 3 min read
“I describe myself as a philosophical minimalist. That is, I believe in as little as possible… Jettison all the baggage, all the new age claptrap, all the bullshit, all the spiritual bypassing. And just believe in as little as possible. But you get those things right, they are entirely sufficient. I’m putting my money on the redeeming power of love—in all its forms”- Bruce Tobin, founder of Therapsil Hello friends, I've been thinking a lot about what it takes to jettison the baggage and the...
15 days ago • 8 min read
“The greater part of the soul lies outside the body.” - Michael Sendivogius The Architecture of Initiation Hello friends, My first introduction to the formal conception of initiation was during a 5-week course with the depth psychologist Francis Weller. It was mid-covid, and it coincided with my own initiation journey, although I wouldn’t have used that word at the time. Burnout, anxiety and a lifetime of seeking something deeper had led me to a healing journey. A journey fuelled by ritual,...
29 days ago • 4 min read
Hello friends, If chronic pain and stress are holding you back, here’s a story to inspire you.(*Names have been changed to maintain confidentiality.*) Rachel came to me when she was struggling to move forward. She was preparing to transition her career, and she also wanted to improve her fitness (and her dancing), but physical limitations and psychological challenges were holding her back. She first heard about me through Tai Chi classes, which she thought could help with nervous system...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
"Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls. The most massive characters are seared with scars."- Khalil Gibran Hello friends, When you’re the one others depend on, your default strategy might be to push harder or muscle through challenges. While this can be effective for professional pursuits, the state of being “always on” eventually runs you down. In my practice, these folks show up with chronic physical bracing and a constant buzz of anxiety. When they turn to conventional physical...
about 2 months ago • 4 min read
Move Heal Awaken Newsletter Gabriel Shaw “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.”- Dr. Wayne Dyer Hello friends, Most caring achievers treat chronic pain like a mechanical failure. As a broken part that just needs to be fixed. But when mindset shifts and standard physical therapies hit a plateau, the root cause is rarely structural. It is an internal disconnect. Your body is generating pain to send a message that your mind is actively trying to ignore. Our...
3 months ago • 3 min read
Move Heal Awaken Newsletter Gabriel Shaw "The art of progress is to preserve order amid change and to preserve change amid order." — Whitehead Hello friends, I spent years practicing Tai Chi in traditional spaces where secrecy was a badge of honor. Master lineages guarded their methods cautiously, defending their positions from the outside world. It felt sacred, but it also felt isolated. Tai Chi has spent hundreds of years cultivating deep wisdom on nervous system regulation, somatic...
3 months ago • 2 min read
Healing Pages Newsletter Gabriel Shaw “Everything we let go of has claw marks in it.” - Anne Lamott I’ve spent years learning from Tai Chi master and lineage holder, Sifu Michael Paler. He used to always refer to Tai Chi as “the art of letting go”. This was such a major focus that I still have an old t-shirt from his school with that phrase emboldened on the back. Then just this week, a friend shared this video from another Tai Chi instructor about the importance of letting go. While this...
3 months ago • 4 min read
Move Heal Awaken Newsletter Gabriel Shaw “Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.” — Lao Tzu Hello friends, Almost everyone who comes to my Tai Chi classes has heard about the health benefits. But it’s rare for anyone, even the average instructor, to point to specifics. General claims of health end up sounding either “woo-woo”, unsubstantiated or attributable to any form of exercise. To the contrary, a growing body of clinic research on Tai Chi represents a unique convergence...
4 months ago • 6 min read