Lavinia Plonka | thesofiamagazine

The Precious Present

by Lavinia Plonka | Nov 30, 2020 | Asheville, Body Language, Feldenkrais Method, Holidays

“We almost never think of the present, and when we do, it is only to see what light it throws on our plans for the future.” Pascal

Many years ago, I passed a New Age gift store with a sign outside proclaiming, “Remember the precious present,” cleverly being pithy and exhorting me to buy at the same time. I would drive by it and mutter, “Commercialism, blah, blah, exploiting new age psycho babble for blatant consumerism, blah blah, useless chatchkes to clutter up our already cluttered lives blah blah.” Not once did I actually remember to be in “the precious present.” I was always so obsessed with my self righteous pontification that the present came and went and became the future and I missed the whole thing.

For years I wrestled with the meaning of giving and receiving gifts. For a few years, as my sisters skyrocketed to financial prosperity, a “can you top this?” enterprise emerged, with everyone in the family insanely buying absurdly expensive gifts for each other. It peaked the year my sister bought me a new electric range, because she “couldn’t bear us suffering with that old thing anymore.” A range? For Christmas? What was next? A car? Not that I wasn’t grateful mind you. I did need a new range. It’s just that I was kind of expecting ….a sweater. Or maybe a new wok. The stove sent our family into a frenzy that finally ended when we realized it took a year to pay off the Christmas gifts.

At that point, my sister agreed, “You’re right. Let’s make lists so that we can buy what is in each sibling’s price range. That way, no one ever wastes shopping time, and the receiver is always satisfied, since the gift was on the list.” I would receive these lists: Liz: A new scuba watch, Le Creuset cookware, an underwater strobe, a Kitchen Aid mixer, an HDTV, new socks. Krysia: A new Ipod, Czech crystal jewelry, Size 9 Pumas, the entire works of Joseph Campbell, a Bose stereo system, and some Gap T shirts. How could I get Liz socks when I knew in her heart of hearts she wanted a scuba watch? (Good to 300 feet of course.) I fantasized that she threw in the HDTV as a joke. Only later did I discover that she had harbored a secret hope that the entire family would chip in to get her the “one big gift.”

One year I tried homemade gifts. The sight of me cursing as I sewed satin purple ribbon to a sleep pillow stuffed with lavender, or cursing as I cut myself with the mat knife struggling to make a hand bound scrap book, or cursing as I attempted to decoupage small boxes made my craftsman husband giggle. His family long ago had taken to sending centerpieces with candles surrounded by Styrofoam angels and gift certificates to J Crew. He would merrily go off on a power walk leaving me struggling to separate my fingers from another Crazy Glue mishap.

I tried one year of no gifts. Don’t try this. I wondered if the compulsion to give gifts at Christmas was in our DNA. I did a Google search for Christmas gifts and DNA. Instead of research, I found a site that said “Have you had enough of socks and ties or similar gifts and are you looking for a gift idea that is extraordinary, personal and really uniquely original? Something that only you can give away?

You found it. Your own DNA! A gift that is extraordinary, unusual, special, personal and individual. We pack your DNA (your genetic material) and your BLOOD in glass tags . As a DNA pendant, earrings, key chain, heart. As jewelry in gold and silver.” Hmmm. Let me think. Who would just love to own some of my mucus membranes packed into a charm?

Then I found it. In his book, Mushrooms and Mankind, mycologist (mushroom specialist) James Arthur has presented this startling proposal. The Christmas present is the recreation of an ancient Siberian Shamanic ritual involving the amanita muscaria, a potent hallucinogenic mushroom. “They (the shamans) enter through an opening through the rooftops, traditionally, (sic) and bring these mushrooms with them in sacks. They traditionally wear Red and White (The colors of the Mushroom). Reindeer are native to Siberia, and eat these Entheogenic Mushrooms, which grow in a symbiotic/mycorrhizal relationship under… ready? Christmas trees.” Arthur goes on to explain that these mushrooms are strung together and hung on the mantle to dry – a precursor to our popcorn and cranberries.

So basically, my need to place something under the tree for my family is the result of my Paleolithic relationship with hallucinogens. I like it. Christmas shopping is after all, was one big, consensus hallucination, “Wow, look at this. Dad would look so good in these pajamas!” “Hey, did you see this? A corkscrew shaped like a rabbit!”

“No way, let me see. Whoa, you’re right.”

When you’re shopping, there is no past or future, just the precious present…..

I’ve decided this Christmas to enroll my family into The North American Mycology Association. They’ll receive free issues of The Mycophile, NAMA’s bi-monthly newsletter, and McIlvaine: The Journal of Amateur Mycology, I think it was most interesting that when I went to their website, their logo mushroom was…the amanita muscaria.

Body language expert, Lavinia Plonka has taught
The Feldenkrais Method for over 25 years.

For more information, visit her at laviniaplonka.com

What Would You Give?

by Lavinia Plonka | Nov 1, 2020 | Asheville, Body Language, Feldenkrais Method, Positive Change, Women

Sometimes we only focus on one definition without realizing a word’s myriad applications in our daily speech. In recent years, we’ve been conditioned to think “give” means material goods: giving gifts, money, stuff. But we use the word and idea of give in countless ways without ever noticing our boundless generosity.

I give up!

I gave her so many chances, I’m just not giving in this time.

I give her another month on this job before she gives me an ulcer.

I give you my word, it will give me great pleasure to see what gives when the boss sees how she gives new meaning to the word useless.

In an economy based on consumerism, suddenly products like tooth whitener for teeth no one will see, designer jeans you can’t flaunt, floating picnic tables with no guests and fruit shaped silicone coasters (whatever!), have become irrelevant. Some of us are actually getting rid of stuff, literally giving it away. As we purge, we may realize we also no longer need that potato ricer, the tennis racquet we haven’t touched in ten years, or the gold lamé jacket from our disco days. (Some things are harder to give up than others.) And we don’t need to buy another LL Bean jacket or orchid pot or giclée of a Tuscan sunset. If we don’t return to “normal” soon, stores and online merchants will drown in low rise yoga pants, Subaru Outbacks, wedding china and Louis Vuitton bags. I find myself thinking about Black Friday, the societal pressure to buy more stuff, and how to find a new way to give. Wouldn’t it be nice if I could inspire the quality of “thanks -giving” by actually inspiring gratitude? I have decided to start with my family.

To one sister with whom I often compete, I’m giving up my need to be right. And to my youngest sister I give my word that I’ll never try to give her advice, (a double give that will be hard to fulfill!) I can’t wait till I tell my husband Ron I am officially giving in on our forty-five year battle as to who loads the dishwasher better. I am spilling with generosity.

Neurologist Antonio Damasio, in his book Descarte’s Error, wrote that altruism is a neurological survival strategy. When we give to others, they love us more and so therefore probably won’t kill us. It’s nice to know that we are wired to give.

What would it be like if all of us intentionally gave up, gave in, and gave promises we actually kept? It’s interesting to note that if you trace the etymology of our English word “give”, that it travels eastward where the root word actually means “take”, and finally lands in India where the Sanskrit root means “hand”. When I give up or give in, my hands are open, and when I give you my word, I give you my hand. And when someone smiles at me and says, “I’ve got to hand it to you, you are awesome,” I feel like I’ve received a gift more precious than a pair of skinny jeans. What do you say, shall we give it a go?

Body language expert, Lavinia Plonka
has taught The Feldenkrais Method for over 25 years.

For more information,
visit her at
laviniaplonka.com

But Do I Deserve It?

by Lavinia Plonka | Oct 2, 2020 | Asheville, Body Language, Feldenkrais Method, Self-Discovery

By Lavinia Plonka

I have a jacket I call God’s jacket. There was a period in my life where it seemed like nothing went right. I was in debt, my practice was not growing, in fact, it was almost non-existent and I needed a jacket. I saw one in a trendy catalog that seemed unaffordable. It was $275, which seemed exorbitant in the 1990’s. I would look at that jacket. And stress about my life. And look at that jacket. And bemoan my fate. Then I caught a cold. Ever since my childhood asthma, my respiratory system had been my teacher. Whenever I was in denial about my life situation, unhappy, stressed, broke, frustrated, I caught a cold. If I ignored the cold (because each time I totally forgot that my body was trying to talk to me and I assumed I was merely sick), it quickly either turned into bronchitis, a sinus infection, or some other dreadful, dramatic outpouring of mucus that put a new meaning on the term “phlegmatic.” Once again, I ignored the cold.

Soon I noticed it wasn’t leaving. That constant discomfort in my nose, that constant feeling of not being able to breathe, that pressing in my head persisted. Finally I recognized it. I was getting a sinus infection. “Oh no! “ I moaned. I envisioned the doctor bill, the prescription cost, cancelling the few classes I had, cash register bells started ringing in my head alongside the throbbing. The last time I had a sinus infection, it had ended up costing me over $200. And then as I passed the coffee table, I saw the catalog with my jacket calling to me.

I burst into tears. I sat down on the couch and began to pray, to everyone and everything: Mr. God, my “higher” self, the Universe, the etheric field that some scientists say creates reality, even Tinkerbell. “PLEASE! Don’t make it a sinus infection! Please, please, please. If it’s not a sinus infection I promise to buy the jacket!” There was silence. Of course, what did I expect, a voice coming from the clouds? A gust of wind? Glinda the good witch? I sat there, and after a few minutes I was completely overwhelmed with a shocking feeling. It wasn’t words, no voice talked to me. But I understood that I literally had to put my money where my mouth was. I had to buy the jacket first. I had to believe, really believe, not sorta kind believe, but in my core, believe I deserved it.

I bought it. You’d think I was buying a house, I was so afraid to spend that money. The next morning I woke up, and the sinus infection was gone. Did I create the sinus infection to justify buying the jacket? Did the adrenaline from putting $275 on my charge card knock out the irritation? Was I already recovering and didn’t know it? Or was the universe talking to me?

It slowly, (and I mean slowly, like years) dawned on me that I had been living with a series of core beliefs that destined me for a lifetime of the same poverty I had grown up in. I had spent half a lifetime running in place, like Elmer Fudd trying to catch Bugs Bunny.

God’s jacket woke me up to the simple truth that the universe hears every word I say. I learned to catch myself saying self-sabotaging things like, “Well, things are going well, I wonder when the other shoe will drop,” or “Wow, I made this month’s bills and have money left over, what disaster will strike next?” Not just words, but thoughts: you don’t deserve success, you’re not working hard enough, be careful, this can’t last.

My Mother, a Russian pessimist, used to sneer at my dreams and say, “May all your dreams come true, and may they come to haunt you.” Spiritual teachers often tell us that we pick our parents before we are born for the lessons we need to learn. My biggest lesson was learning that nothing is
impossible – it’s only my beliefs that keep from my dreams. If my parents had simply been wonderful and supportive, I might never have learned the power of intentional thought.

The jacket is no longer as hip as it was then. But it’s still in my closet, a reminder that as Shakespeare said, “ . . . there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”

Time is on my side

by Lavinia Plonka | Jun 5, 2020 | Asheville, Body Language, Feldenkrais Method, Women

What’s today? It’s been six weeks since I shut my studio doors due to the pandemic. At least I think it’s been six weeks. Without an appointment book full of clients and classes, the days have blended into a temporal soup of drifting. I search my mind for familiar touchstones to guide me. Hmmm. Nothing comes up. What did I wear yesterday? Right. Sweat and a t-shirt. Is it Sunday? No. Wait. What was yesterday? My mind desperately sorts. Was yesterday the day I binge polished the chrome fixtures in the bathroom? No, that was two days ago . . . I think. Yesterday I rearranged all the cords from my computer, printer, modem, phone, lights that were a tangle under my desk for the last ten years. Now, where was I? Right. What day is it? I have entered the zone an unemployed friend once dubbed the no-day week. No more anticipation of a Sunday hike. I can hike every day, and Sunday feels
like . . . wait? Is today Sunday?

You’re reading this in June, but I wrote it in May to meet the publication deadline. For all I know, there will be no magazine in June. Or by some miracle, I’ll be back to work. Or the entire world will have entered some Matrix like virtual reality and all of us will be sitting in our rooms lost in simulated environments and eating Soylent. There may be Mad Max type bandits roaring up and down NC 20 trying to break into people’s homes to get their toilet paper. Or we may find ourselves standing at the ends of our driveways, at least 6 feet apart, singing “I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony” together as we raise our faces to the startlingly blue sky and breathe in gratitude for having been passed over by the angel of death.

Or . . . while I can’t predict the future, I can marvel on a revelation that occurred since our confinement began. For at least 20 years, I have used the fact that I work every day as a reason to say I don’t have time. I don’t have time to write the novel I think about. I don’t have time to study Chinese. I don’t have time to sew that button on my pants (thank god for tunic tops). And of course, my favorite answer to my long suffering husband, “I don’t have time to talk to you about that now!”

So now I’m not going to the studio. I wake up in the morning, and the next thing I know, it’s lunchtime. Besides re-arranging the linen closet, what did I do? (Gosh, everything looks so nice, now.) Lunch, which used to be a ten minute shoveling of leftovers at my desk, has become a subject of conversation and debate. Should I make some tempeh reubens? Maybe today is the day I’ll go out and harvest the dandelions to make that dandelion fritter recipe my sister sent to me. While picking dandelions, I am knocked speechless by the exquisite palette carpeting my unmowed lawn of the yellow dandelions, pinkish blooming horsemint and delicate purple violets. Hey, wait, violets are edible too. Maybe I should really start the foraging process now in preparation for Armageddon. Or at least before Ron mows them all down. I grab a bunch of violets and start to snack. Wait. Why did I come out here? Right! Dandelions! What day is
it anyway?

By the time I’ve cleaned the kitchen from lunch (who knew one could spend an hour clearing after lunch) it’s time to think about dinner. One of the cats comes in begging for love. I usually never have time to indulge them, but now . . . we pet. We bond. And suddenly, it’s dinner time. And I still haven’t learned Chinese. But I have created another cool recipe for leftover beans.

Perhaps the gift of this pandemic is that I will learn more what I really want to do, instead of what I think I “should” be doing. Maybe my husband, who has been saying he doesn’t have to go back to oil painting will finally admit that it’s not that he doesn’t have time to go back to painting, he just doesn’t want to. I may finally admit that it’s not that I don’t have the time to create live Facebook videos to promote my practice. I just don’t want to. And in that moment of being liberated from the shoulds, I can take a big breath, grab some plastic bags and go out by the river and harvest the abundantly growing nettles, as I dream about a better world, and I won’t worry about how long it takes to pick, sort and hang them. Because I have all the time in the world.

What day is it anyway?

Body language expert, Lavinia Plonka has taught The Feldenkrais Method for over 25 years.

For more information, visit her at laviniaplonka.com

I Feel Pretty

by Lavinia Plonka | Apr 3, 2020 | Asheville, Body Language, Feldenkrais Method, Self-Discovery

By Lavinia Plonka

I remember when it began. I was standing on a crowded subway, hanging onto the bar, when I felt a tug. A young man sitting in front of me said, “Ma’am, would you like to sit down?” “What? No, I’m just fine,” I replied. Then it washed over me. After all, there were lots of other women standing up. But he had offered the seat to me because I looked old.

I stared at myself in the mirror. For most of my life, with the exception of an especially ridiculous period between age 13 – 17 when I was trying to figure out how to look like Twiggy (I know, if you’re under 50, you have no idea who that is, which makes me even OLDER!) I really never paid much attention to my face from the beauty perspective. My mother, bless her Russian heart, would often tell me, “You should cultivate your brains because no man will ever marry you for your looks.” Makeup was something I wore on stage, in order to become whatever character I played, not an ornamentation. I actually have the same container of eye shadow I bought over 30 years ago.

So I hadn’t noticed that my face had lost its battle with gravity. My loving husband Ron had not seemed to notice. When I asked him if I looked old, his first response was, “Huh? No, honey, you’re as beautiful as ever,” trying to dismiss me so he could go back to figuring out how to put LEDs behind one of his pictures. “No, seriously! Take a look!” He could tell from the tone of my voice that I was not going to leave him alone. He regarded me and shrugged. “You look the same.”

“Put on your glasses,” I insisted.

He put on not one, but two pairs of glasses, peering at me as if I was a museum subject. “Hmmm. You’re right. I never noticed all those spots. And your cheeks….” He put his hands on my cheeks and pulled them up and back. “Maybe just a little lift and tuck?”

I regaled him with a few chosen unprintable words and stormed out. In the distance I heard him say, “Well you asked….”

As I critically examined myself, I realized that I had inherited my mother’s crepey, wrinkled cheeks AND my father’s wealth of age spots. My lips were disappearing and what I soon learned are called marionette lines around my mouth were as deep as any wooden dummy.

The inner struggle began. The feminist crone spoke. “Think of the wrinkles as wisdom lines. Embrace your inner beauty, don’t buy into our consumerist propaganda that tells you how you should look! You never did before. You should be celebrating each hard earned age spot. And while you’re at it, why are still dying your hair red? With that face you’re not fooling anyone about your age. Be the wise woman, dance your wild, gray self!”

“But . . . I’ve been dying my hair since I was 16 – red hair is my brand! It’s not just about gray. It’s how I define myself. And I exercise, eat right and feel great. Why not do something to look great as well?”

“You mean younger.”

“OK, fine, what’s wrong with that?”

I consulted my sisters, who live in LA where it is a law to look 26 forever. “Fillers and botox,” they recommended. I made an appointment.

The doctor’s face reminded me of a kewpie doll – smooth, swollen, and frozen. It was clear she had drunk her Kool-aid. Nonetheless, she convinced me to try their intro special to at least get control of my marionette lines. $300 later, I walked out wishing I was wearing a mask to cover the injection holes on my face. For weeks after, I’d ask people, (including Ron), “Notice anything different?”

“New sweater?”

“New hair color?”

“Lost weight?” (That’s another article.)

Not one person had noticed my diminished lines. Wrinkles are in the eyes of the beholder.

I let a few years go by, trying new anti-aging lotions and potions, facials and even a period (recommended by a friend who always looked fabulous) of putting banana peels, avocado and whatever else was left on the chopping block on my face. I reminded myself of those crazy portraits of people made out of vegetables. I stood on my head, hoping the wrinkles would fall upside down. All for naught.

Another doctor. At first she recommended a special filler that was “guaranteed” to make me look younger after a couple of months. Made from bovine cartilage. I envisioned this herd of cattle sacrificing their cartilage just to satisfy my vanity. Oh, and it was $8000. For $8000 I could take a trip around the world, who cares how old I look?

Then she said, “How about threading?”

“OK, I’ll bite, what’s involved?” The doctor numbs your face with novocaine, injects you with a plastic thread that has barbs on it that pulls your face up. Then she injects your cheeks and saggy chin with a web of more plastic threads. I went home and watched a YouTube video of the procedure. I imagined my brain thinking I was either undergoing scientific experimentation or some sort of torture, and paying for the privilege.

Now that everyone is freaking out about facial recognition and privacy invasion, and masks are selling out to ostensibly protect people from coronavirus, I’m thinking of starting a new/old fashion trend. Veils. They could come in different colors, there could be half-veils revealing the eyes (although of course my eyes are nothing but squinty points surrounded by laugh lines. I have to find that eye shadow.) They could come in a multitude of colors, decorated with sequins, semi-transparent, or gold lame´. They would be a triple threat delight: Protection from deadly virus, defying facial recognition technology, and providing mysterious allure.

I’m going to set up my Etsy page right now because I know the orders are going to come flooding in. You read it here first.

Body language expert, Lavinia Plonka has taught The Feldenkrais Method for over 25 years.

For more information, visit her at laviniaplonka.com

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