Yes, Your Circus. Yes, Your Monkeys.
“Not my circus. Not my monkeys” is a saying that deeply contradicts what my dream analysis was from last night. Its takeaway was, frankly put:
“Yes, your circus. Yes, your chaos.”
In the dream, I lived in a house with many people (co-living), and we’d host events. I invited a friend over for one of ours, and it was a business workshop, along with meditation and breathwork offerings.
The first session I joined her, and I was fairly disengaged. The next session was notable though.
Two people sat across from one another in a negotiation. It was a business strategy session hosted in the pen of a rodeo.
Then, after their negotiation took place, a small woman lay down in front of the business people and began leading a meditation while lying down in shavasana (corpse pose in yoga). The session continued for a bit.
Then after things felt settled, in a strange contrasting way, a giant-sized and obese naked Black woman was introduced to the rodeo pen.
She was going to jump over these people and circle the pen again, keeping her high jumps going.
The first time she ran around, her body swayed and bounced. With her weight, it seemed impossible she’d jump over the two business suits’ heads and the meditator lying down, but sure enough, she did.
She was powerful and deeply embodied strength.
Then she went for her second lap and semi-crushed the meditator laying down.
Just when this rodeo felt wild enough, animals were introduced.
I reached my hand out to graze the body of a massive rhinoceros as it passed by the fence and into the rodeo. Then 30-some-odd wild animals went in. Like an African safari was introduced to the pen. They circled the rodeo.
And then a sprinkler system was triggered, and it became a chaotic stampede of animals still circling the rodeo pen, but like the wild creatures that they were.
The naked lady kept jumping.
The meditator kept still.
The business people kept negotiating.
All of it was my circus.
Before I get any further into the dream analysis, I’ll share this:
A life well lived is an expansive life. One that invites all parts of yourself to the rodeo.
I have tried time and time again to compartmentalize these parts of myself-chapters of life, versions, titles, identities-and over and again they show me “You don’t get to define yourself neatly.”
No part of us is ever gone.
Maybe more healed. Maybe less prioritized. Maybe hobbies shift. Along with people and settings…
But don’t be surprised if old parts of you make a comeback with full force.
I recently wanted professionalism to not have so much personal life bleeding into it. To be private and keep my lived experiences vague.
There was some value and learning from that chapter.
Then the messiness of my inner world wanted out again.
It wanted to write about myself and dominate my Substack with stories, which were meant to be cleanly Somatic Coaching-centered.
Poof!
Because here we are, talking about my chaotic dreamscape.
So like with most dreams, we are reflected in everything our psyche conjures up. No matter how dark, disturbing, etc., similar to our imagination, that dreamscape is infinitely expansive.
Going back to the dream analysis:
This rodeo in my dream was showing me that I can’t create the neat separation of myself.
My business chapter after 10 years of working as a Marketer in big corporate settings, being a content creator, being a meditation guide, being an actor ,and dancer, being a wild woman, a sexual human, Somatic Coach…
All of these sides of me can coexist.
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But it’s not easy or without injury to other parts of me.
I remember losing brand partnerships opportunities once I went from marketable meditation guide in Brooklyn to Kundalini awakened nomadic spiritual wild woman. Maybe it cost me some financially, but it enriched my life ten-fold.
We cannot alway be neat during transitions from chapter to chapter. There will be bleed between our paradoxical sides of self.
Rather than compartmentalizing them. Some boundaries are necessary. The dream symbolism of rhinos reflect this too.
When I reached out to touch the rhino, as the wild animals entered the pen of the rodeo in my dream, I remember how soft its skin was.
Rhino skin would usually be perceived as thick, leathery, and tough… I interpret this as an opportunity to thicken my skin. Not to be mistaken with making my life safer or smaller.
Every time we make ourselves settle for a smaller life, we kill our spirit. The feminine energy (creativity, emotion, spiritual connection…) within us all wants to be set free.
To run wild.
To high-jump over obstacles, or at least be given the chance.
It is the part of us that has ambitions and follows desires. It is a part that feels deeply. Who will rest satisfied on their deathbed because they tried for everything their heart was calling them toward.
Not because they achieved it, but simply for feeling liberated enough to try.
We only get this one life in this body.
Living for greater aliveness, not simply coping and accepting numbness, is a graduation for many of us.
Sometimes we try to compartmentalize life or make it feel more simple or comfortable because the messiness is intense. It creates ruptures and endings.
We want to reduce variables of uncertainty around us.
“There’s enough chaos without me adding THIS to it,” one might think.
So they date the okay option, choose the deadening job, make the same dinner each night…
We have so many opportunities to release fear of uncertainty. Make room for thrill. The fear that keeps us believing that we can’t hold more.
That we don’t have the capacity.
It is a skill to manage the circus, this is our expansive inner landscape along with the outer landscape.
It is a skill that we all can develop-to have resilience. A deep feeling of safety and security. That we are worthy, grounded, have a system of support, and can move forward in life from a rooted place of love, not fear.
This is what somatic coaching cultivates…
Quick plug: Self-Coaching with Somatics is launching soon! An affordable education on Somatic Coaching for you to apply to yourself. Leave me your email here if this is something you’d be open to experiencing.
Anyway, rather than turn your back on your circus: suppressing desire, hiding messy sides of yourself, taming yourself…
Building capacity to be with the unknown, be with paradoxical sides of yourself, and set needed boundaries is a healthier way forward.
To not shy away from it not making sense.
To experience this wild rodeo we call life.
And have a blast doing it.
Yes, fear will arrive.
But ride we must.
Embrace all sides of self we must.
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Originally published at https://anisabenitez.substack.com on September 16, 2026.
