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ALEXANDRA C. B. - INTERVIEW #6
HOW TO ENGAGE: WATCH by clicking the video up top, LISTEN by clicking the audio link below, or READ the interview by clicking here.
THE BREAKDOWN:
0:00 - Human Design. Deep dive here and here and here.
1:54 - Remote work.
7:30 - The field of architecture.
16:00 - Engineers make good business people.
23:30 - She is ATHLETE & ARTIST.
26:00 - Autoimmune disorders. Difficult and isolating.
34:52 - Flow state. Practice, discipline, and joy.
39:00 - Work: an ancestral curse.
42:00 - The answers are within you.
49:00 - Council from many equals victory.
DEBRIEF:
I’m going to be turning 40 in a little over a month and the most remarkable thing about it for me is the massive discrepancy between what I thought that age was supposed to mean and what it currently feels like. Since we live in a society that hates the old and venerates the youth, appreciating aging has not been something that I was raised with. Desperately racing up the ladder of success as quickly as possible and living in fear of becoming irrelevant and physically unacceptable is quite common in our day and age. What is less common is the idea that there is something to value about the real wisdom that comes from aging.
I can’t tell how trite this sounds but being older and living through a wild sloth of failures, disappointments, and rejections, and still being here - not being WHERE I WANT TO BE - but just being here, still, is kind of fucking amazing. Not because I am healthy and have my basic needs met (although that’s certainly a privilege and a blessing) but because I’m a much more evolved bitch simply for putting in my time and doing the hard and thankless (and never ending) work of growing up.
The truth about being young (let’s call it the first half-ish of your life) is that you are still engaging in the Dance Dance Revolution era of your existence. This is a fantastic era and we should be so lucky to live through it, but it’s just the first half of the story. Things really do get exciting when the machine breaks down, when the lights change color, or stop working entirely, and you are forced to find your own rhythm. But hey, maybe that’s just me?!
I am saying all of this because this is not the traditional life frame that most of us have grown up with, and we can see this reflected in the kinds of life stories that we personally are comfortable sharing and consuming (the ones where you/the protagonist ultimately wins the game and clarity is found - by the age of 30, lol). This is why most interviews or profiles of people in the media are either promoting a celebrity or an expert. Both disseminate socially sanctioned forms of success, which are accompanied by a set of implied socially sanctioned standards and values.
Nothing is wrong with these success stories obviously. I love them. I’m fascinated by them. It’s wonderful to aspire. It’s just that most of the time they offer a somewhat delusional or misleading perspective/narrative that leaves out a lot of important information and encourages a kind of displacement of our own power. Overall, I have found these fantasies detrimental to supporting a frame of mind for living consciously in reality as an emotionally regulated, and dare I say, confident and healthy human being.
As such, me, and many of the people I know and love, were raised by our family and the culture around us TO BE DELUSIONAL and to have DELUSIONAL EXPECTATIONS of ourselves and the world. This is not a wild and crazy statement, this is simply the result of human evolution. Moving beyond and through these shared delusions and allowing for the complexity of our stories - getting comfortable inside that mess, holding the mess, exploring the mess - this is growth. It’s what has helped me not just accept myself but it has helped me to see myself, and other people, so that I could begin to live in the world and not just continue to dissociate on some schizophrenic fantasy planet.
There is a statistic that has been going around which states that 80% of autoimmune disorders disproportionately affect women. Scientists and doctors have not all come to a consensus on why that is, however, there are some strong theories that link the stories that we are born into (ie. our histories, our culture, and our environment) to how our bodies function and process being on this earth. In fact, there is an enormous amount of research that has and continues to be done on the relationship between our bodies and our minds when it comes to processing trauma - or more generally - processing SIMPLY BEING A HUMAN IN THE WORLD.
Alexandra is a strong, smart, and courageous human being who has been forced to come face to face with the stories (be productive! be the best! COMPETE!) that have made her the remarkable person that she is. However, those same inherited narratives will keep her from being who she can become if she does not sit with their complexity. And so sitting (and healing) is what she is doing. Or maybe not sitting, maybe she’ll take a few classes, build a business, and harvest a garden - she’ll “sit” in the ways she knows how. She’ll listen to her body and adjust, whether she likes what she’s hearing or not, because she is resilient as fuck.
The rebalancing that she is going through (and that the world is going through) is seemingly unavoidable and it’s a core part of her actual journey to success. In fact, maybe it’s less a journey to and really, this is the success. Growing up, becoming conscious of the process, the breakdowns and breakthroughs, and the endless cycles of recalibration - this is the (frequently infuriating) structure and foundation of life. This is the build. You are the architect.
Anyways, her power is obvious. Her strength is undeniable. And I’m excited for whatever she builds in this world. As a fellow manifesting generator, I see you. Thanks for sharing Alexandra.
LIST OF THINGS & THOUGHTS:
QUEER: Saw it. Enjoyed it. Appreciated the ghost hands. Generally looking forward to more movies that bring the sexiness and explore desire in its many forms. Psyched for this one.
*FIRE* Holiday Movie Double Feature suggestion: Elle & Benedetta.
Also a fun watch, and more appropriate for children: John Mulaney & The Sack Lunch Bunch.
Finally watched The Family Stone last night. A star studded apparent Holiday Classic that is a true 2005 time capsule. Hats off to Craig T. Nelson who wins the award for most grounded and nurturing father character I have maybe ever seen.
And in honor of Alexandra dubbing 2025 “THE YEAR OF DISCOMFORT”, this:
TO CONCLUDE:
Well, I did it. I started a thing and it would be no thing without your ears and eyeballs to receive it so THANK YOU. The plan is to keep building and being openly and grotesquely honest and earnest next year - so if you like what’s going on here and are excited for the fun and vulnerable things to come then please consider supporting my work! You can do that by upgrading to a paid subscription or simply by liking or sharing the posts - it is all tremendously appreciated.
HAPPY HOLIDAYS! Have fun doing whatever it is you enjoy doing (or not doing) and take care.
Thank you for reading A LIFE BASED LOOSELY ON REALITY! Please LIKE or comment on this post below and share it with a friend who you think would enjoy it. Right now all of my posts are free, so any paid subscriptions will go towards helping to support my work and develop this project. More about me here.
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