LIVING LANGUAGE GLOSSARIES
Language shapes what we can notice, feel, and understand. What we can name, we can recognize. What we can recognize, we can work with.
Some of the words in this section are familiar. Others were created because the existing language wasn’t enough to describe what was actually happening in the body, in relationships, and in real experience.
These terms come directly from the work—from patterns that showed up again and again but didn’t yet have names. Once named, they become easier to see, track, and respond to.
Over time, this language becomes lived, not just understood.
Index of Glossaries
Alchemize
To transform an experience through awareness and integration so it becomes something different than it was before.
What once felt limiting or disruptive can become supportive, meaningful, or energizing.
Attune
To bring attention into alignment with what is present in the body, system, or another person.
Attuning supports clarity, connection, and a more accurate and responsive way of relating.
Bracing
A pattern of holding or tension in the body in anticipation of stress or impact.
Bracing can limit movement, sensation, and responsiveness until it is released or reorganized.
Close
To reduce openness or engagement when needed for safety, rest, or stability.
Closing is a natural and supportive response, not a failure or avoidance.
Clear
To release or reduce what is no longer needed so the system can function more effectively.
Clearing creates space for new awareness, movement, or integration.
Coherent
A state in which different aspects of the system are working together in alignment and communication.
When the system is coherent, there is a sense of clarity, stability, and ease in thinking, feeling, and responding.
Contract
To reduce openness or draw inward in response to experience.
Contraction can be protective and supportive when it happens in a responsive and flexible way.
Devotion
A steady, self-directed commitment to awareness, truth, and what matters.
It reflects a willingness to remain present, engaged, and responsive over time, without relying on external pressure or validation. From this place, connection and action arise with clarity rather than obligation.
Drop
A movement from a more active, effortful, or elevated state into a deeper or more settled one.
As the system drops, there is often increased access to sensation, awareness, or underlying patterns.
Ease
A state in which the system functions with less effort, resistance, or strain.
As ease increases, movement, awareness, and response become more natural and available.
Enmeshment
A state in which boundaries between people become unclear or blurred.
In enmeshment, it can be difficult to distinguish one’s own experience from another’s, which may reduce clarity and responsiveness.
Embodied
A state in which awareness is connected to the body and lived experience.
When embodied, thoughts, sensations, and responses are integrated rather than separate or conceptual.
Expand
To increase openness, space, or capacity within the system.
Expansion often brings greater access to sensation, awareness, and possibility.
Extractive
A way of relating that takes energy, attention, or resources without supporting balance or reciprocity.
Extractive dynamics can reduce capacity and disrupt the relational field over time.
Feminine Energy (Yin)
The aspect of the system that receives, senses, and allows awareness to emerge.
When balanced, it supports openness, intuition, and the ability to take in and integrate experience. It provides access to information and depth.
Hold
To maintain attention or presence with something without interfering.
Holding allows experience to unfold without pressure or direction.
Land
To allow an experience, insight, or shift to fully register in the body.
When something lands, it becomes real and integrated rather than just understood.
Intuition
A direct knowing or sensing that arises without deliberate analysis.
Intuition often becomes more accessible as the system settles and awareness increases.
Inner Union
A state of wholeness in which internal Yin and Yang energies are balanced and in communication.
This supports alignment between thought, sensation, and response, allowing for coherence, stability, and reduced internal conflict. In inner union, this coherence is sourced from within rather than sought externally.
It is an ongoing process of awareness and rebalancing.
Let Go
To release effort, control, or holding that is no longer needed.
Letting go creates space for natural shifts and reorganization within the system.
Limiting Belief
A pattern within the system that influences perception, expectation, and response.
When limiting, it can narrow awareness and reduce available choices until it is recognized and integrated.
Masculine Energy (Yang)
The aspect of the system that organizes, directs, and sustains action.
When balanced, it supports clarity, boundaries, and the ability to follow through. It provides structure and continuity to what is initiated or received.
Move Through
To allow an experience to unfold and pass without resistance or interruption.
Moving through supports completion and reduces the likelihood of patterns becoming stuck.
Metabolize
To process and integrate an experience so it no longer remains as active stress in the system.
As something is metabolized, the energy within it becomes available to be used in new, more supportive ways.
Meet
To come into direct contact with an experience as it is.
Meeting something reduces avoidance and allows the system to respond more accurately.
Open
To become more available to sensation, awareness, or experience.
Opening increases access, but does not require forcing or effort.
Orient
To recognize and relate to what is present internally or externally.
Orientation supports safety, clarity, and the ability to respond appropriately.
Parrhesia
The act of speaking or expressing truth directly and honestly.
In the work, parrhesia often emerges from clarity and self-noticing rather than force, and can shift both internal state and relational dynamics.
Recalibrate
To return to a more accurate or supportive internal state after stress, disruption, or misalignment.
It often involves subtle shifts that restore clarity, responsiveness, and direction.
Receive
To allow something to be taken in without resistance or effort.
As receiving increases, the system becomes more available for support, change, and integration.
Sacred
An experience or state that is recognized as meaningful, important, or worthy of care and attention.
What is sacred is often felt in the body as something to be honored rather than rushed, ignored, or overridden.
Settle
To allow the system to slow, organize, and become more stable without forcing change.
As the system settles, clarity and responsiveness often increase.
Settle In
To become more fully present within the body or current experience.
As settling in occurs, awareness deepens and the system becomes more available for integration.
Soften
To reduce tension, effort, or holding in the body or system.
As softening occurs, more sensation, movement, and integration become possible.
Shift
A noticeable change in state, sensation, or awareness.
A shift may be subtle or significant and often signals that the system is reorganizing or integrating.
Stabilize
To support the system in becoming more steady, organized, and consistent.
Stabilization allows changes to hold and reduces reactivity or fluctuation.
Stay With
To remain present with an experience without trying to change, fix, or move away from it.
Staying with allows the system time to process and integrate naturally.
Threat
The perception or experience of danger within the system.
When threat is present, the system prioritizes protection, which may limit openness, integration, or responsiveness.
Threshold
The point at which something becomes noticeable, accessible, or able to change.
Crossing a threshold often brings increased awareness, sensation, or readiness for integration, and may shift what was previously unavailable into experience.
Unwind
To allow patterns of tension, stress, or organization to release or reorganize over time.
Unwinding often happens gradually and without force as the system returns to a more natural state.
Yin and Yang (Feminine and Masculine Energy)
Complementary aspects of the system that support awareness, action, and integration.
Yin receives and senses. Yang organizes and acts. These aspects are not opposites in conflict, but functions that continuously adjust in relationship to support balance and responsiveness. Balance is the system’s ability to move between and integrate both.
SIGNATURE TERMS
These terms describe common relational patterns that can reduce clarity, autonomy, and responsiveness if not recognized.
Collapsed Choice (Signature Term)
A condition in which available options feel reduced or inaccessible due to pressure, threat, or relational dynamics.
When choice is collapsed, the system may respond automatically rather than from awareness, reducing clarity and agency.
Energetic Extraction (Signature Term)
A pattern in which energy, attention, or responsiveness is taken from another person without mutual support or reciprocity.
It often feels like being used to stabilize or fulfill another’s need rather than being met in connection, and can reduce capacity, clarity, and openness over time.
Inner Warrior (Signature Term)
The system’s capacity to mobilize to protect, respond, and take action when needed.
When balanced, it supports clarity, boundaries, and appropriate response. When overactive or underactive, it may show up as urgency, reactivity, or difficulty engaging.
Performance State (Signature Term)
A state in which the system responds based on expectation, pressure, or perceived demand rather than authentic desire or awareness.
In this state, behavior may appear engaged or responsive, while internal experience remains disconnected or unexpressed.
Recognition Surge (Signature Term)
A moment in which the system recognizes something true, meaningful, or previously unprocessed all at once.
This often comes with a noticeable increase in sensation, emotion, or clarity, and may signal readiness for integration.
Relational Override (Signature Term)
The moment when one person’s needs, pace, or expression supersede another’s, causing the second person to adapt or reorganize themselves.
This can happen subtly and may reduce autonomy, clarity, and mutual responsiveness in the relational field.
Regulating Through / Directional Regulation (Signature Term)
A pattern in which a person stabilizes or manages their internal state by using another person’s attention, energy, or response.
It reflects regulating through another person rather than with them, and can reduce autonomy, clarity, and mutual responsiveness in the relational field. This differs from mutual regulation, where both people remain responsive and self-directed.
Sexual Compliance Testing (Signature Term)
The use of sexual energy or behavior to assess how willing someone is to override their own boundaries, timing, or awareness in response to another person.
It often appears early in interaction and can create pressure or momentum before trust, connection, or mutual desire are established.
Self-Abandonment (Signature Term)
The act of overriding one’s own awareness, boundaries, or internal signals in order to maintain connection, avoid conflict, or meet external expectations.
Over time, self-abandonment reduces clarity, capacity, and access to authentic choice and response.
Truthing (Signature Term)
The act of noticing and naming what is true in the moment, without distortion, avoidance, or performance.
Truthing is often simple, direct, and grounded in present experience.