Researching Aliveness

I’ve often said ‘I’m feeling alive’, especially in expressive arts spaces. In other moments, in the throes of disconnection and dysregulation, I’ve deeply longed for a sense of aliveness and wondered what it means and how I might come back to it. 

This led me to begin researching the experience of ‘aliveness’ for my masters thesis, and my inquiry and practice of aliveness has only grown since. It has become my pathway back to health and connection, and it continues to lead me towards greater agency and connectedness. 

In order to share what I’ve learnt about aliveness, I first immersed myself back into the research and began to sense what now lives in my body - exploring memories and ideas through movement, visual art and poetic response. Here is what emerged:

I find a safe warm space

Within me or outside somewhere

I begin to relax into myself

I can sense myself here

My breath, my skin, my energy

I allow all the layers of me

To unfold, to be, to show themselves

As I continue to move forward gently

Listening and connected with my emergent being

I feel more anchored within myself

As this inner ground develops

I begin to move more fluidly

Flowing into the world around me

Engaging, connecting, and able to play

I feel alive.

I feel expressed, I feel like me, in the presence of others

I feel resourced, held by the earth and waters of life

I am here, I am alive, and I can feel it

I am touched.

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My current definition of aliveness is as follows:

Aliveness is an experience of oneself, of one’s life energy, sensations, feelings and inner knowing in the present moment. It arises from a sense of safety and deepens as one speaks, moves or acts in the world from a place of congruence with one’s insides. 

This definition points to three key elements that comprise and contribute to the experience of aliveness. Each is represented by a symbol. While my research of aliveness has been in the context of the arts, these may be applied to diverse contexts. 

A sense of safety

I am safe: Safety as the ground or container for aliveness

There are many reasons for why we disconnect with ourselves and our bodies, including trauma, oppression, developmental experiences and cultural conditioning. We live from our minds or live in chronic states of survival, stress, numbing, distraction, and disconnection that leads to a loss of access to our life energy, to our aliveness. 

We start to experience a sense of safety in the presence of warmth and openness, in spaces where all parts of us are welcome, where there is predictability and consistency, where there is a sense of nurture and resource-orientation. We feel like we can land on the ground and in our bodies, where we are held and we can be as we are. A felt sense of safety is the ground on or container within which we can begin to feel our aliveness. 

Embodied presence / Self-connection

I am home: Spiralling inwards to come home to oneself

As we begin to feel safe and land in our bodies, we begin to meet what’s here in the present moment. We come home to ourselves and our bodies, noticing the sensations such as pain or tiredness or flowing energy, noticing the ebb and flow of our feelings and thoughts, beginning to sense ourselves in the moment. 

As we explore, express and create in non-verbal and non-linear ways through movement, art, poetry and imagination, we are able to step out of our usual narratives and thoughts. We feel alive as we experience ourselves in the act of being, creating, flowing and allowing. We sense ourselves and what we know deep in our hearts through experience not analysis, and this embodied presence is at the heart of aliveness. 

Embodied action / Authentic expression and connection 

I am connected in action: Flowing outwards with congruence within

Our experience of aliveness is felt more deeply as we begin to engage and connect from this place of embodied presence. When we move or speak or take action from being intimately aligned and true to ourselves, our life energy flows and expands. 

Our sense of ourselves grows in connection with others, when we are seen, known, accepted and engaged with, in our authentic expression. We feel alive in our experience of spontaneity, our capacity to flow and play, to use our voice and to be ourselves while also being in connection with others. 

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In researching aliveness, I also began to understand its relevance and significance in our journeys of growing, healing and becoming. Based on the research and my lived experience, this is what becomes possible in the sustained practice of coming home to ourselves and feeling alive: 

• Consciousness: We begin to see more clearly, what is me and what is not me; we begin to see the external norms, expectations and messages placed on us that don’t feel true to us and we begin to anchor in our own truth, in our own yeses and nos, which contributes to a sense of our inner power.

• Empowerment: When we see more clearly, we are able to step into our agency, take action and move towards what we want and in the direction of our choosing, to say no to what does not serve, to actively shape our lives and be self-responsible rather than victims to our circumstances. 

• Connectedness: As we become more present and able to connect within, we are also able to become more present and connect with others; our capacity to open our hearts and feel and sense others increases as does our capacity to respond and engage in connection rather than stay disconnected or isolated. 

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What is your experience of feeling alive?

How would you describe it?

Under what circumstances does it emerge?

How does it impact you and others around you?