loving void

What am I afraid to let myself feel? I wrestled with this question in one my earliest blog posts, after I couldn't muster up the courage to approach a girl at my favourite book cafe. Two years of constant motion and vicious dating app cycles later, the prime mission holds true: find genuine connections with strangers in the wild, largely considered a foreign battlefield to many.



I realized I haven't written too much about love, partly because there haven't been too many people that have stirred my emotional pot. The comforting thing to know is that there have been tons of quick wins along the way. Ever since I banished dating apps from my life back in October, my approach has dramatically shifted to a low-volume, high-touch model vs. the 7-dates-a-week madness that used to fill up my summers. While the difficulty is greatly increased at the added expense of low frequency, I find way more fulfillment in genuinely connecting in an initial pseudo-date in a public space, or a facilitated event (contact improv, blindfolded dance, tea tasting, etc).



Last night I attended a mystically-named event “into the void”, branded as a somatic-based singles experience. On the surface, this sounds like a glorified dating mixer designed as a rebellion against the sterility of modern love seeking. Dig a little deeper and you realize that the whole ethos of the event is around the practice of conscious connecting and relating, as a precursor to thriving relationships. The only goal would be to plunge into this petri dish of practice, to know that the stakes are low but the potential gains are high.



With a sprinkle of spontaneous mingling at the start, the night quickly devolved into an increasing ladder of intimacy — eye gazing, hand-holding, back-to-back and heart-to-heart touching, and a warm lengthy hug, all masterfully facilitated by our host Allie. The void is scary, but at least there's good company!



What made the experience trickier to navigate was that you would make a connection with someone through a vulnerable question-answer volley, enter into the specific physical touch exercise, and then depart in the span of ~10 minutes. After the first match, we frolic around the room like Here's a quick play-by-play of my matches and other field notes from the event:



There was Diana. We matched purely by coincidence after the circle first formed as my next door neighbor. Hailing from Poland, she had these glimmering blue eyes accentuated by a sharp facial structure. I could only pick up on these extremely minute details because we had to do a 5-minute eye gaze with each other. After synchronizing our breath patterns, Diana and I held such intense space with each other - no laughs, no breakaways, no awkwardness. Her feedback to me was how powerfully "magnetic" my energy was, strong yet stable. 
There was Karen. This was the round where the girls had to approach the guys and ask for an invitation — I pranced around the room like a gleeful grasshopper filled with curiosity. She came up to me with such genuine kindness and a sugary smile; I was caught off-guard for a split second. After riffing on boundary setting, we were asked to put our palms on each other's heart spaces. Intimate in a very different sense, I learned that aligning the heartbeat is definitely an underutilized method of intimacy.  
There was Stacy. One loooooooong hug, two bulbs of warmth, three minutes of holding and being held. Sometimes, the simplest act is the most powerful. 
And then there was her. Someone who caught the corner of my eye the moment she walked in. We'll call her T. My dramatized articulation of her aura: 
She had some quality that could send a tremor through your heart. It was nothing forceful, but it was galvanic. The power she exerted was a subtle thing, but it called forth a deep bubbly feeling in me, like the surging mouthfeel after the first sip of a crisp Diet Coke. 
I'd like to think that my most significant growth spurt in the Nomadic Years is my sharpened intuition. So there was no added pressure in my gait, no uneasiness on my brow. I knew this was a test of patience: I didn't need to approach T in that instant, and I could carve out enough space to get ready for the main exhibition, the labyrinth of live matchmaking.
Fast forward, I found myself prancing after the eye gaze activity, truly into the fray of hunter-gatherer instincts. We were tasked to continue the musical chairs-esque movement, and then stop when you feel called to make the invitation to someone. In my mind, the plan was clear. In reality, I saw as another Asian man tried to go in to catch T — boom, crack, fizzle. Straight rejection in the kindness sense of the word. Ouchies!
My mind goes into vertigo, slammed and scrambled like a bowl of whisked eggs hitting a fiery pan filled with fragrant avocado oil. But I wasn't going to abort this mission halfway through the advance; no, that would be equivalent to an army making it to a viewpoint of the castle and saying, "Nope, we ain't gonna make it brethren."
I step forward and gingerly, yet confidently come in with: "I love your bouncy energy, would you like to pair up?" A moment of brief hesitation flashes through her face in recognition of something not quite nameable. Then with a cheeky smile, she says: "Hey, let's do it!" 
I guess the rest is history after that: back-to-back, vulnerable stories, contacts trading. Into the void. I remind myself: the void is where all the magic and possibilities exist. Now the game is totally in my court, with an automated ball launcher spitting out opportunities left and right.* I just need to tough it up, take the shots, and trust the process, especially where things look the bleakest. 



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These hyper-stimulating meet-and-greets definitely give me some mental whiplash as I transition from wandering solitude in South America back to the concentrated stimulus of New York. But unlike the past two summers which were steeped with a manic undertone, the only mood that comes up now is a deep-seated, internal peace. Complete emotional equilibrium. That no matter what happens with my love life — or even more pressing, my amateur artist adventures — I can breathe through it and keep myself in motion.



From the oh so charming Booritney's recent piece titled juice, egg, bagel:



At my core, I’m a doer. I push, I strive, I produce. I work hard and I play hard. And I always, always follow through. None of that is going to stop, because it’s what makes me me, and I like me. But I am looking forward to experimenting with being me against the backdrop of a slower pace of life. Saying “yes” is fun, but saying “probably, but let me get back to you” is wise.

Soon, my life will be less adventurous and dynamic. But, if done well, it will be no less fulfilling. When I left home, I was searching for beauty. Now, having received adequate reassurance that it’s all around, I can stop looking, satisfied with the knowledge that it exists wherever I choose to find it.

The constant need for search and discovery is just another cozy part of the void. Look long enough, and you'll start to see the love show up. As the inimitable Lin-Manuel Miranda shares in his Tony's speech: love is love is love is love is love is love is love is love. After all, the combination of beauty and terror is one of the most worthwhile adventures to have. 



Broadcasting a beacon of love,

Sam