a contemplation over articulation
and the existential dread of expression
There’s been a word circling my mind lately. As I write, it haunts me. When I send voice memos to friends, it winces whenever I ask, “Do you know what I mean?” In yoga class—teaching or practicing—it lingers between every cue. As I read Joan Didion, it bleeds effortlessly onto the page.
Articulation.
And with it, comes a second ghost—less precise, more pulsing. As I write, it fuels me. In voice memos, it carries every “Lately I’ve been feeling…” In dance class, it moves through me without much thought. As I read Sylvia Plath, it bleeds poetically onto the page.
Expression.
They are both within me like two ghosts trying to use the same pen, the same breath, the same body.
One wants to get it right. The other wants to get it out.
One sharpens. The other softens.
One edits. The other spills.
Lately, I’ve been wondering: Do I have to choose?
One makes you feel. The other makes you understand.
Which one wins the battle?
There’s only one way to find out.
*enters scene: boxing square and roaring audience*
Let the games begin.
Dance vs. Yoga
There’s a popular phrase in the yoga world: “Dancer to yogi pipeline.”
I would bet you a million dollars that out of every ten yoga teachers, seven of them were dancers. We’re easy to spot. Pointed toes, casual splits, balancing without blinking, remembering the flow after one run-through, and hands that always look relaxed, even when we’re dying inside.
It makes sense, though. We gravitate toward what we know. Strength. Flexibility. Grace. Sweat. A mind-body connection. A sense of choreography, a rhythm. A need to move with both intention and aesthetic.
But lately, I’ve wondered if something gets lost in that transition — something raw. Less about the bones, and more about the beauty. Less about form, more about feeling.
My friend Robbie said something the other day that I haven’t been able to unhear. He said the real phrase should be “dancer to yogi to dancer pipeline.”
And honestly, I think he’s right.
Throughout March, I traveled to different cities to watch young dancers perform. There was so much freedom in their movement, so much emotion it almost knocked the wind out of me. It reignited something in me that I didn’t even realize I had put down. This part of me that wants to break the rules. To be a little messier. A little more myself.
Because yoga is articulate. Every movement is building toward something. Every cue is layered with purpose. You stack bones. You engage your core. You breathe with precision. You find stillness. You align.
And sure, dance has technique too. But it also permits you to bend the rules. There’s a sense of wildness to it. You’re not confined to 84 shapes. Instead, you move through each moment with freedom and sometimes those movements don’t even have a proper name! You let your fingers flutter. You let your heart lead. You let your face show something. You tell a story.
Yoga and Dance have both been the most prevalent forms of movement in my life and because of this, I had the opportunity to do a real-life study and comparison of the two.
This week in yoga, I was told to flex my feet, not point them. To let go of my “ballerina arms” because they could damage my shoulders. To square my hips even when it made me feel stiff and robotic.
This week in dance, I was told to give it all I’ve got. To point my toes. To lift my leg higher. To make the choreography my own. To feel the music. To have fun.
While both practices hold articulation and expression within them, I can’t help but crave what dance gives me: creative liberty. Emotion. A kind of freedom I can’t find anywhere else.
Because expression is about risk-taking. And lately, I think I’d rather live sorry than safe.
Which brings me back to the ghosts.
Articulation vs. Expression. One wants to get it right. The other just wants to get it out.
Sometimes they feel like opposites. But I’m starting to think they’re just different ways of telling the truth.
One polishes. The other bleeds.
Which leads me to the next study conducted:
Joan vs. Sylvia
Now, I truly hate the idea of putting two women against each other—but let me spoil the outcome for you: neither of them wins or loses. This is purely a literary love note comparing the works of two brilliant women. (Editor’s note: I swear I’ll move on to new authors soon. I’ve just been in a Joan + Sylvia spiral for all the best reasons.)
Allow me to put things into context with the quotes that have been living rent-free in my Notes app:
“Somehow I have to keep and hold the rapture of being seventeen. Every day is so precious I feel infinitely sad at the thought of all this time melting farther and farther away from me as I get older. Now, now is the perfect time of my life.”
and
“Nothing is real except the present, and already, I feel the weight of centuries smothering me. Some girl a hundred years ago once lived as I do. And she is dead. I am the present, but I know I, too, will pass. The high moment, the burning flash, come and are gone, continuous quicksand. And I don’t want to die.”
-Sylvia Plath
“On this question of fear. When I began writing these pages I believed their subject to be children, the ones we have and the ones we wish we had, the ways in which we depend on our children to depend on us, the ways in which we encourage them to remain children, the ways in which they remain more unknown to us than they do to their most casual acquaintances; the ways in which we remain equally opaque to them. The ways in which, for example, we write novels “just to show” each other. The ways in which our investments in each other remain too freighted ever to see the other clear. The ways in which neither we nor they can bear to contemplate the death or the illness or even the aging of the other.”
and
“I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.”
-Joan Didion
What I found particularly interesting about these quotes is that even though these two women are at completely different stages of life, they are both expressing and articulating grief onto paper.
Sylvia mourned her younger self. Her fleeting youth. Her inability to slow time down. She bleeds onto the page—not looking for a polished sentence but a gut punch. Her words aren’t just read; they’re felt. A bit mysterious, a bit chaotic, deeply human.
Whereas Joan (I love acting like I’m on a first-name basis with my new friends here) was grieving the death of her husband and daughter. I love her use of repetition to drill a notion into your head. She is surgical with her words. Sharp. Purposeful. There is no fluff, no whimsy, but somehow still—so much weight. So much realness. She gets to the point and lands it with full force.
Both of these women are legends.
Both of them strike emotion.
Both live at the intersection of articulation and expression.
But it’s clear who leads with what.
And if movement and writing are both ways of saying something—then what about the ways we “speak” when words aren’t even part of the picture?
We continue this dance battle with:
Verbal vs. Body Language
Which brings us to our final round: the unspoken.
This one may feel obvious—body language as expression, verbal language as articulation—but the lived experience of that contrast has been surprising and rich.
Since moving to LA, some of my neighbors have become good friends. We hang out daily, laugh, eat, and gossip in the front yard at sunset, but some speak only Spanish, while I speak only English.
Sometimes, we’ll call in Google Translate like a ref in the middle of a heated match. But mostly? We’re relying on tone. Energy. Vibes. We speak to each other in our own languages and still… we understand.
They know when I’m tired. I know when something’s bothering them. They can tell when I’m about to head home just by the way my eyes drift or how I stand up slower than usual. We’ve built fluency not in language, but in presence.
I’ve learned the power of a nod. A shrug. A spark in the eye. The way a certain laugh means thank you, and a lingering hug means stay a little longer. I've learned that your hands, your eyes, even the way you shift in a chair—these things speak.
Body language is an ancient form of storytelling. It doesn’t require translation. And yet, it tells everything.
This shows me that expression can live without articulation.
Can articulation live without expression?
Or maybe expression and articulation aren’t at war after all.
They're dance partners. They take turns leading. Sometimes one steps forward while the other softens behind. But when they’re in sync? That’s when the magic happens.
When you can articulate the truth and express the feeling behind it? That’s wholeness.
That’s poetry. That’s movement. That’s voice memos and yoga flows and front-yard sunsets with people who don’t speak your language but somehow still get you.
So instead of clawing for the right words this week, I’m letting them simmer.
I’m letting them float. Twirl. Tremble. Maybe I’ll bleed. Maybe I’ll polish. But I won’t hold back.
Because sometimes, getting it out is getting it right.
I love you forever and always and I’ll deem that my most expressive and articulate thought of the moment.
XoXo
-Amy