potty training as a spiritual experience
pee and poo are sacred now, I guess
We’ve all found god in the bathroom.
Shitting so violently that you start praying just to make it stop, making promises you know you won’t keep: I swear I’ll never eat cheese again! (*narrator voice* she did, in fact, eat cheese again)
Sitting on the toilet lid while you wait an eternity to find out if you’re pregnant or not. Praying with all your heart that you either are, or you aren’t, and feeling the heaviness of either outcome.
Vomiting up your guts after drinking way too much, promising you’ll never drink this much again to any god that will listen (*narrator voice* she did, in fact, drink way too much again)
This week, I found god while potty training my toddler.
I’ve been putting it off all year, dreading this milestone that has always felt so insurmountable (I know! I know it’s not!)
Dreading the disruption to our routine, the resistance to change (mine and his), the bodily fluids, the mess, the cleaning up, the gallons of patience so I can be a good mom during this messy, messy process.
And while I fully expected to be covered in pee and wet-vacuuming shit off the rug (and did), I did not expect to be confronted by some deep spiritual truths.
There’s just something about being accosted by bodily fluids that reminds you of our ephemeral condition. That our weird and wonderful bodies tether us to this plane of existence, and to each other. We may be impermanent, but we’re alive.
So many religions and spiritualities tout the idea of ascension as finding god, but I’ve always felt the most connected to the divine during the deeply humanizing and humbling moments.
Bodies are beautiful—and also (and this is discussed less often) bodies are kinda gross. And I mean that as neutrally as possible, no value judgment, just… facts.
We shit, piss, vomit. Kinda gross. Totally normal, but a lil gross.
We sing, and laugh, and orgasm. Kinda marvelous.
And just as our embodiments of beauty are sacred, the disgusting is also sacred. But I think we forget that. At least, I did.
We poop and pee in privacy, hide away from others that sometimes we forget that we all do this.
We are all gross.
And the gross is also divine, even when we try to hide it or feel ashamed of it, because it means we’re alive.
And aliveness is sacred as fuck! Perhaps one of THE most sacred things.
In astrology, the 8th house is the house of deep bonds, of the contracts we make with one another, the debts we owe, psychic gifts, trauma—and also poop. The gross stuff. The taboo.
The 8th house is an intense place because it embodies the darker parts of our aliveness, the parts we don’t want to shed light on, the taboos we’re taught not to talk about.
That we carry trauma. That we have credit card debt. That we poop!
Potty training is a living embodiment of the 8th house. And as an astrologer, I’m taking notes.
It feels like we’re going into the underworld, being confronted by the stench of humanness that we all live with despite the ways we sequester it away.
Confronted by my own limitations as a parent, by what I owe this child.
And as with any trip to the underworld (I’m a seasoned traveler at this point) I do know there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, but it’s dark and stinky and I don’t know when I’ll get out the other side.
All I know is that my toddler is here to be transformed—and so am I.
I’m learning how to creatively communicate, to manage my reactions, to be a responsible steward.
I’m learning how to hold his grief and anger and sadness and frustration—the total eruption of emotions that this colossal milestone triggers in him.
I’m learning how to witness another human being in his wholeness, poop and all.
And that is what finding god feels like to me. That feels incredibly sacred.
To behold someone in their humanness—even the shitty parts—and still feel that they are miraculous. To be reminded that each of us, our mere existence, is miraculous.
Our wholeness is holy.
And maybe I didn’t need to be covered in someone else’s pee to be full-body reminded of this, but I’m an alchemist! I can’t help it! I turn shit into a spiritual experience. Try it some time.