The Somatics of Scarcity is a 6-part exploration of how scarcity lives in the body, drives our obsession, shapes our relationships, and keeps us from what we truly need—and how turning toward it can begin to teach us abundance. I decided to talk about this specific topic because for many (perhaps ALL) of us, the subject of money invokes dread, fear, tension and a lot of SHAME, as if we did this to ourselves.
The problem with shame is that, it often drives more avoidance, because shame tells us that there is something inherently wrong with us. By talking about this openly, by speaking from the ‘I’, I want to show you that:
You’re not alone!
That means this is not a personal fault but structural patterns that were imposed on us (maybe before we were born)
And it is our responsibility to change those (even if it’s just a tiny bit!)
The first step for me is to write like no one will read and publish when it feels really scary. I want to SAY. IT. ALL. The truth is: I am so done with being scared and ashamed.
This is the third essay of a six-part exploration of how scarcity lives in the body, drives our obsession, shapes our relationship to ourselves, others and money, and keeps us from what we truly need—and how turning toward it can begin to teach us abundance. In this essay, I look at how emotional scarcity impacts our relational scarcity.
Ok, deep breaths !
Relational scarcity begins long before we ever date or desire. It begins in how we first learned to be held. It begins in the unpredictability of early care—the adult who was loving one day and distant the next, the parent who was physically present but emotionally unreachable, the household where tenderness appeared sporadically, like weather shifting without warning.
When care is inconsistent, the body learns a choreography of vigilance:
reach > retreat > monitor > anticipate > brace.
As adults, this choreography becomes our relational reality. We want closeness, but closeness feels like stepping into a room with a trapdoor we can’t see. We crave intimacy so intensely that the craving itself becomes unbearable. We make it a problem that sounds like “I am too much” or “I am not enough (to deserve this)”. We make ourselves the problem. We oscillate between longing and fear, between drawing people in and pushing them away, between “stay with me” and “don’t get too close.”
Folks who have gone through emotional neglect are the perfect prey for emotional intensity disguised as love. The perfect target for someone who exploits longing. The perfect match for someone who thrives on imbalance. The perfect opening for manipulative affection. But the truth is: they become great at initiating it, too.
I have had to call myselves out/in about my over giving tendencies being disguised as care and love that truly are about control.
