'The Layers Of Life'

The yogic tradition describes the self not as a single thing but as five nested sheaths — the koshas. The outermost is the physical body. Inside that, the energy body. Inside that, the mental body. Inside that, the wisdom body. At the center, the bliss body — the anandamaya kosha — which cannot be accessed from the outside in. Only from the inside out.

Geologists read rock strata the same way: each layer is a record of a different time, a different world, compressed and preserved under pressure. The deepest layers are the oldest. The oldest are where the most pressure lived. The most pressure is where the most transformation happened.

Every life is stratigraphy. Everything that pressed down on you is now part of what you are made of.

This is for the woman who has finally stopped apologizing for her depth.