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Writer's pictureBrenda St Louis

Speaking My Needs Feels Like Self-Devotion

Updated: Jan 11, 2021

When I was in clown school, my teacher said to me, “To have the full range of connection, you need to have the full swing of emotion.”


Our process over the next three months was to navigate the swing from agony to ecstasy and be able to stay fully present in it.


Imagine a wheel of emotion. At the top is ecstasy then joy and love, and as you move to the right, lust, longing, excitement, desire … into loss, grief, sadness, fear, anger, terror … and more sadness into agony.


Now you are at the top of the wheel, and agony and ecstasy are right next to each other. So you spin into ecstasy again.


We would work with this spectrum and then be thrown on stage to see what happened. The powerful navigation was to have your “ringmaster” or your witness or your god-self awake and aware and taking care of you throughout it all.


What I know for sure is that ever since clown school I have been nurturing my ringmaster, and I now see the strength she has—the courage to be messy and live in the unknown.

My edge right now, my unknown edge is “What do I need?”


Having a need that I speak aloud has been so hard to do. But I am starting to do it even if I feel needy or foolish or like I’m being a pain in the ass to someone else. Even if my need doesn’t get met or I lose face.


Speaking my need feels like kneeling in devotion to myself. It’s self-devotion.


“I need to process aloud.”

“I need to be a priority.”

“I need to be understood.”

“I need to be seen (by me especially)”

“I need to be loved.”

“I need to feel love.”


I am curious how all this spoken need will shift me. It’s crazy how much it makes me cry. But I will continue exploring it.


It’s amazing that I have chosen to do it so publicly!


But for some reason, it feels like doing it here allows me to be witnessed more. So thank you for doing and being that for me, beloved reader!!!





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