The plan for 2023
I have Five goals I wish to achieve this year.
One: Digitise my work so far.
I've already been working on this since July 2021, so you can imagine I have a lot of information to manually type into the Wiki I've created. I have hundreds and hundreds of body points that need their own page.
Two: Find the gaps in the information.
Mostly I have worked with middle class Australians. I want my body map to represent everyone. EVERYONE.
Children, men, women, the elderly, the rich the poor, those of different castes, social standings – all of it. I want to capture the rich diversity that is living in different parts of the world. I am certain the emotional experience of living in Europe in the Dark ages vs Incan cities would be different to our modern world. However, I can't time travel, so, I will likely miss some data there. I can, however, travel the globe, so that will have to do.
My wish, my prayer is that I get to sit with people of all walks of life and different ages and stages.
Three: Illustrate the patterns like maps.
I also suspect there are large patterns in the way emotions are expressed in the body. It is hard to explain without a picture. I am not ready to show this yet, but here is a simple example:
Dread may show up on the back of the head, around the kidneys, and on the belly (I made this example up).
As the digitising finishes and the "fill in the blanks" occurs, what looks like a pattern will either be revealed, or not. I continue to ask: are there patterns?
Four: Cross check the maps against other systems.
I have at least five modalities to cross check the map against. That means meridian points, trigger points and fascial release work – aka Anatomy trains. There's more, but I need to keep something back to share with you later!
What do I mean by cross check? My thought process: Does the GV 20 emotion relate to the emotion that is located in the same spot? Does the gall bladder meridian have the same emotions in my system? Do the muscle trigger point referral patterns mimic/ relate to the pain pattern I have noted? There are a few years worth of work there, I suspect. I have deliberately not looked at these systems before now so I don't muddle up the work.
Five: Get the work tested by my peers.
That's hopefully for the end of the year. I feel scared and vulnerable putting this down as a goal. The idea of someone looking at my work and judging it... yuck. Anyway, I may talk more about this towards the end of the year. I need to know if this map of mine is useful to other people. If it leaves my hands and is used by someone else – will it hold up? As my hubby said "Are you the secret sauce?" If the work is dependent on me, and I am the secret sauce, then it is useless to share it with anyone.
This brings me to my beyond-2023 goals.
IF it can be a tool for others, I will consider sharing it.
I have ideas about how that may happen, but I am so happy to have a better plan present itself to me!
Just last week someone suggested I travel interstate to a different city every few months and work there for a day or two... happy for invites in the future! In my mind I thought travelling to Asia for a week or two next year for data collection could work... but with a high-needs child at home, that may not work.
In the meantime, I will continue to observe, record, and map what I see.
As you can guess from what I have said… there is a lot of work to do. Three years ago I thought I would already have finished! Ha, what a joke. I am guessing it will be 10 or more years. Yes, I mean it. I confess I am not a patient person, so this is somewhat hilarious. It will be a matter of version one, version two and so on. At the very end, if I get it to a "finished " state, the last thing I will do is publish a book. So... I have a lot to do this year!
xx Mary-Anne



