Deepening Self-Intimacy

This is a love letter to the long, messy, beautiful path of self-intimacy. It’s also an offering. A space I’ve been slowly shaping, rooted in everything I’ve learned. If something in here stirs you, I’d love to invite you on a journey.

I

In late 2020, I stumbled into a part of twitter where a bunch of kind, intelligent and neurodivergent people were nerding out on self-exploration. I was instantly enamoured by their curiosity, rigor and aesthetic sensibilities. Not to mention their courageous vulnerability. This was also a time where I was wrestling with my demons and was desperate to resolve my emotional hang ups. So I spent tens of hours every week hanging out in this space, getting on calls and diving into rabbit holes. I had found refuge.

There was so much to explore — therapeutic modalities, meditation, altered states, developmental theories, interpersonal intricacies, somatic practices, and tons of liberating perspectives. Folks were non-dogmatically running experiments in their bodymind, helping each other and sharing their learnings in public. It felt alive, playful and deeply sincere.

Immersing myself in these conversations was magical. They blew open my existential overton window — expanding the possibility-space of what it meant to be alive and how much richness was available within all of us. I was discovering powerful tools and ways of seeing that encouraged me to wander the wilderness within. And I started poking at assumptions I’d never questioned before, deliberately stepping into territories that had felt off-limits and scary.

A lot came apart. Old defenses crumbled. It was messy and often unpleasant, but it was also fun. I was coming undone (and still continuing to) in ways I didn’t even know I had been held together. Feeling feelings I had tiptoed around for years. Something potent took root within me along the way — a sense of empowerment, a grounded feeling, that I could meet whatever showed up. And that’s what “agency” started to mean to me — intimacy with what is, embracing life’s intensity (in contrast to “control” or “mastery”). I found an enchanting freedom in relaxing into deeper contact with everyone and everything, within me and around me.

II

My journey started in dialogue with people, with ideas. It deepened into self-exploration. And over time, it looped back outward, becoming something I could offer in return.

Around 2022, I began guiding IFS sessions for folks on Twitter. At first, I was just following my curiosity, offering what I could, experimenting as I went. To my surprise, the work resonated. People felt seen and held. They then enthusiastically shared their experiences and kept sending others my way. I had no formal training, and still feel quite lucky to have been trusted like that.

What started with IFS slowly took on a life of its own — weaving in threads from other practices and spiritual traditions, whatever felt alive in the moment. And because each person brought their own flavor of experience, my approach kept evolving in response. Over the last three years, I ended up guiding explorations for a wide range of minds and phenomenologies. More than 2000 hours of 1:1 sessions, across personalities, sensitivities, nervous systems, worldviews.

It’s been transformative, for me as much as for the people I work with. I’m tending to a vast, messy, beautiful body of learning. And a lot of cool questions, insights and ideas continue to emerge through it.

III

Along the way, I did a call with my friend Tasshin — he was trying to explore a particular self-inquiry practice on his own and wanted a bit of support. So we felt it out in real time. He stayed in the lead, I just offered nudges, perspectives, little tweaks in how he could move his attention or experiment with his imagination. Something about that exchange felt joyful for both of us. He wasn’t relying on me to hold space, he was stepping into his own process. And I was able to transmit something I’d absorbed from all those hours of sitting with people. It was playful and co-creative.

He encouraged me to offer it to others, and I did. The same spark kept showing up. I leaned into it and experimented with others, refining the format over time. The work kept evolving with each person, shaped by what they brought and what we discovered together.

I’m scared of taking on the identity of a “teacher”, and even writing all of this brings up some self-doubt. But I really enjoy teaching. I love attuning to people, getting a sense of how they see the world, and offering them experiments. I love exploring alongside them, sparking new connections, making things click. I love spontaneously creating metaphors and weird associations, making sensemaking delightful. It’s all quite satisfying and fun, and I’m grateful I get to keep following this thread.

IV

A space not for being guided, but for learning to guide yourself. To learn to hold space for yourself in a way that’s tender, skilful, improvisational.

One of my favorite parts of this journey is attuning to how you experience your life. I attune to where you are, what comes easily to you, what feels nourishing, what kind of language your inner world speaks. I then offer you frameworks, tools, ways of seeing and relating, etc to tinker with. We explore all the moves you can make — with your breath, your attention, your imagination — that change how an experience lands. Together, we feel into what resonates, what feels natural, what unlocks deeper access to your own inner wilderness. You start to expand your vocabulary of inner gestures. And with that, more degrees of freedom. More contact. More play.

We strip things down. We go granular, first-principles. We also zoom out and talk about meta-practices — how to relate to your own exploration as a living, evolving thing. It’s less “do this, now do that,” and more “what happens if we play with this lever, or shift the tempo here”. It’s collaborative, experimental. It’s casual, yet rigorous. But not in the way school is rigorous. It’s rigorous like… jazz?

Somewhere along the way, many of us turned self-exploration into another kind of labor (parts “work”, inner “work”, etc). Another set of problems to solve. Another thing to optimize. Another metric of worth. That’s boring and a little tragic. What if self-exploration could feel like wandering through a forest you’ve always lived in? What if meeting yourself could feel like art? I want to help you reclaim that — the wonder, the intimacy, the joy of meeting yourself.

We dance through the mind. We play with imagination. We befriend difficult sensations. We soften around resistance. We learn how to be with ourselves with more sensitivity, more tenderness, more awe. There’s a spirit of adventure to this. Of improvisation. Of reverence. Less fixing, more unfolding.

Cultivating this kind of intimacy and trust within our experience doesn’t mean that challenging emotional experiences go away. They still show up, but they start to feel different. They become portals to deeper connection. Slowly, cautiously, one might even begin to look forward to them. And inevitably, the self-intimacy we nurture within, ripples outward. It shapes how we hold space in our relationships. It softens how we meet conflict. It colors how we show up for the world. When we stop flinching from our own experience, we stop flinching from life.

(I don’t want this to sound like some final state I’ve arrived at, from which I write to you. I see it more as a beautiful stance, that one can learn to inhabit more deeply, with a lot of wobbling, forgetting, and finding your way back)

I also love calling this approach “bootstrapping your own spiritual practice”. Not one handed down to you, but one you craft yourself. Based on what feels true, what brings you into deeper contact with life.

V

I want this to be an immersive, structured, and playful learning experience. Here’s what the container looks like:

We do three 2-hour calls, spread out over the course of a month. That gives us time to dive deep, let things breathe, and build some rhythm.

Between sessions, I’ll be inviting you to spend some dedicated time playing with what we explore — experimenting, noticing what shifts, what feels challenging. I’ll be there between calls, supporting you through text and voice notes. I’ll help you debug, stay in touch with your process, and gently offer structure without boxing you in.

I’ll share a handful of curated resources — readings, practices, maybe the occasional weird rabbit hole — to help enrich the space we’re creating. I’d also like to add you to a small group of fellow explorers who are on the same journey.

There’s no linear curriculum here. Everyone brings a different rhythm. Some people come in fluent in parts work; some are just beginning. Some are wordcels; some are shape-rotators. Some are thinkers; some are feelers. Some people need structure; some need room to wander. I’ll meet you where you are.

My writing above is pretty polished. I’ve waxed lyrical, and perfectionistically cared a lot about crafting beautiful words. Because this offering is close to my heart. But the journey itself isn’t very polished. There are things I don’t fully understand and know yet. There are edges I haven’t discovered. Maybe we’ll find them together. Consider this page a well‑swept trailhead leading into unmarked woods.

What do I want from you?

• Time investment: 6 hours for our calls + 10-15 hours for your personal practice (over a month)
• Monetary investment: $750 (I offer a sliding scale between $600 and $900. You’re welcome to choose what feels right based on your capacity and access. If this range still feels prohibitive for you, reach out and I’ll try to help.)

If you’re feeling drawn to this, I’d love to hear from you. You don’t need to be in a specific place or have a clear goal. Just some curiosity, a willingness to explore, and a bit of time to show up for yourself.

If we haven’t met yet, a good first step would be scheduling a 2hr intro session (pay-what-you-want) with me. If we have already met, please reach out via our usual communication channel. Feel free to ask me any questions or voice any hesitations.

Some words from fellow explorers: