the intimacy of betrayal
The Intimacy of Betrayal
One theme that came up strongly for me is betrayal — because it often walks hand in hand with intimacy.
Jesus Christ was betrayed — not by an enemy, but by someone he loved. Someone close to him. Someone who knew him.
And that's the thing about betrayal. It doesn't come from far away. It comes from close in.
And nowhere is it closer than in love.
When the person who knows your body, your history, your 3am — is the one who breaks something — there are no words that quite reach it.
Because the intimacy and the wound are the same thing. The closeness that made it beautiful is the same closeness that made it devastating.
This is what I sit with in my work with women. Not just the betrayal itself — but what it does to the body's ability to trust again. To receive again. To stay open when every cell is saying close.
The question beneath the question
But there's another layer I want to name, because I think it's the one we talk about least.
Underneath the question how could they do this to me — and I mean underneath, in the quiet, in the place we don't easily go — there's often another question.
Where did I leave myself along the way?
Not as blame. Please hear that. What someone else chose is not your fault.
But in the aftermath of betrayal, when the shock begins to settle, many women I work with start to find these smaller moments. The time something felt off and they talked themselves out of it. The version of themselves they softened or shrank to keep the peace. The needs they stopped voicing because it felt easier than the conversation.
That's a different kind of wound. And it's one only you can tend to.
What I've come to understand about forgiveness
We're taught forgiveness is something you decide. A release. A rising above. And sometimes there's real grace in that — a genuine moment where something loosens.
But when we rush to forgive before we've fully felt, we're not healing. We're just leaving ourselves again. Quieter this time. But the same movement.
Forgiveness isn't something you do. It's something that unfolds — when you stop leaving yourself in the name of love.
That unfolding takes time. It takes feeling what you actually feel, not the version that's easier to admit. It takes letting your body say that mattered before your mind decides what it all means.
A practice for today
The practice I keep coming back to — in my own life and in the room with clients — is simple. Not easy, but simple.
The next time something activates you — a message, a memory, a moment that tightens something in your chest — pause before you do anything else.
Before you reach for your phone. Before you explain it away. Before you make yourself smaller to keep the peace.
Place a hand on your body. Wherever the sensation is strongest — your chest, your belly, your throat. And feel. Not the story. Not what it means. Just the sensation itself. The tightness. The heat. The hollow place.
Let it be there.
And say, quietly, to yourself: I'm here. I'm not leaving.
Stay one breath longer than is comfortable. And if there's energy underneath it that needs to move — anger, grief, something that never got to be said — let your body say it. In my work, I sometimes have women press into a pillow, push against something solid, let the exhale be loud. Not performance. Permission. Your body may need to say that mattered before it can begin to soften.
Then come back. Hand on heart. Breath steady.
I'm still here.
Maybe what this season is really asking isn't just that we witness betrayal — but that we notice where we are still betraying ourselves to avoid losing love.
And whether, this week, we might gently choose to come back. 🌹
Ready to feel safe in love again?
This kind of work becomes even more powerful in a somatic space — where your body doesn't have to process it alone. If intimacy has felt unsafe — if you don't know how to find your way back to yourself — this is exactly what we do together.
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