It’s a warm Sunday afternoon in Phoenix, and I’m making my first pot of beans in over a year. It’s been that long not because I don’t love beans, because that’s absolutely not true being brought up on Mexican food that will fill your soul.

It’s been that long because I adore the recipe, and the specific way that these beans taste, and this brings everything back. This is my grandmother’s recipe. It’s short, and simple, but it’s generous. And every step of it requires my attention and care.

And this afternoon, as I was separating the beans and checking its water, I was reminded of this saying – hold it loosely. And until today, I always thought that it meant to not get too close. To back off when you see change, or when it hurts, or when you feel scared. To just let go. And for me, it meant to go on without it.

Because it is too much.

That maybe the way that I connect to these things, and these people, is too much.

That there is something wrong with the way I love.

That the hurt means I’ve messed up.

But as I tasted this pot of beans, it didn’t hurt. I smiled, and maybe my tears welled up for a few moments, but it felt good. To sit in the place where I know there’s hurt, because there’s also abundance there. And I could sit there as long as I wanted.

As I brought the spoon to my lips, again and again, the food told a story to my body. One that it knew it wanted, and one that it missed very much. And I felt freed. And it was like nothing had changed, while also feeling that everything could change, and there would always be this.

If I am to go back the place that I’ve spent so much time avoiding, because I thought it would hurt too much, or it wouldn’t be the same, I also find that hold it loosely means to keeping holding it.

In a way that will allow change.

Hold it, loosely.

Dance with it.

Let it be brilliant, and it always will be.