My BFF, Isabel
By Joanne Porzio
Founder, Playing Ground
I wasn’t always the happy, joyous, sexy, fulfilled woman I am today.
At first glance, my life appeared fine. Against my parents’ advice to graduate high school, move down the hall from their Brooklyn apartment, get married and make babies, I instead went to college, landed a good job that paid well and moved across the bridge to Manhattan.
Then came the two-year period when like dominoes seven people in my family died including Mom, Dad, and my sister, Catherine. But the most devastating of all was my niece, Isabel, who died at the age of six. Isabel was my BFF, my soul sister, my surrogate daughter and my greatest teacher. The day before she died amidst all her pain Isabel had one request: “I wish I could have a playdate.”
I didn’t feel much like playdates after I lost Isabel. Raised in an Italian Catholic family in which mourning and suffering is an art form, I was ready to shroud myself in black and dive in. I had all the evidence I needed that life was unfair and not worth this pain.
But I couldn’t get Isabel’s voice out of my head that what I really needed was playtime.
I began to study with teachers, coaches and practitioners who seemed to know the secrets of living life full out. I learned just how much I had closed my heart in order to avoid ever feeling the pain of losing someone again the way I did with Isabel. Each person told me in their own words that if I wanted to live an ecstatic life, I was going to have to start taking some risks to increase the level of love and intimacy in my life. But before I would be able to truly connect with someone else, I would have to reconnect with myself.
Aunt Mary (bottom right)
I had been approaching sex and relationships the way society and my family, including my aunt Mary the nun, had modeled for me: burying my feminine power and life force. The result was an unsatisfying sex life and unfulfilling personal and intimate connections with others.
And that is when my life turned around. I started to listen to what I was paying to hear. More importantly I took action. I placed my attention on awakening the sleeping goddess within me through sensuality and play. I learned to be grateful for who I was and for the course my life had taken. I began to search for what was right rather than what was missing. I began to laugh again, every day, out loud. And I fell in love with every inch of my inner and physical being. Imagine that!
I’m no saint, and I’m no guru. But I am a smart woman who knows when something works. And I’m perceptive enough to look around me in the world and see a lot of folks suffering from some version of what I know all too well—feeling dead and shut down inside, utterly disconnected from their purpose and passion.
C'est Moi
I know I’m not alone.
I created Playing Ground to be a community where people could come together and learn from the best teachers, coaches and facilitators in the world. Where men and women can experience true evolution in their capacities for intimacy, meaningful relationships and personal growth.
Playing Ground is simply that: a place to play, laugh, break through our fears and expand our capacity for love and intimacy so we can evolve into the people we always wanted to be.
So, whatcha doing? Want to make a playdate?
