Think UP!

Wiggling  your ass is a great way to use your body to shift your mood. Pam Grout talks about it and the science behind it in E-Cubed, one of the books that saved my life.

However, people might have blocks, both mental and physical, to wiggling their asses.  I will address these in this and later posts.

Mental Blocks

One might be loth to wiggle one’s ass if one is in the process of escaping a culture — family, religious, or snooty-bourgeois-wannabe — that prohibits such spine-limbering, chi-awakening, snorting-laughter-inducing activity.

Perhaps the block has its roots in being body-shamed by people who wish to control your most basic bodily movements.

Perhaps your ass has been traumatized by being the butt of such epithets as fat, flat, flabby, dimpled, or skinny. Worst of all, you may have been told that you have no ass.

The condition of literal asslessness is possessed by only a very few people who have been injured or who were born different from the standard from-the-factory model.  Nick Santonastasso is one of these. A bodybuilder, athlete, and motivational speaker, Nick was born with one arm and one finger, a result of a rare genetic condition, Hanhart syndrome. Against the conventional wisdom that their child would never be able to care for himself, Nick’s parents took him home and treated him “like a normal kid” (Preston, 60).  He figured out ways to get around and to write, went to high school with his brother, and made the varsity wrestling team. Later he got a million-plus followers on Vine. He figured out how to train and became a body builder. Now he works with Tony Robbins as a motivational speaker. “I want people to walk out of the room and look at the world differently,” he says (Preston, 60). Nick may be gluteally challenged, but he is the definition of a complete badass.

Back to you and your ass, and shaking it.

1. Do you currently possess feet?
2. Are you able to stand on them?

Good! You have an ass, and this exercise will be easy for you. You can put on some ass-shaking music, or just hear the beat in your head. (Right now, I’m listening to BrownPrider Funk’s Old School Funk Mix on their YouTube channel. Try Bootsy Collins’ “Undercover Funk.”)

1. Stand on your feet. Feel your feet planted firmly on the floor. Feel the support of the Earth via the foundations of the house and the floor joists. Know that the Earth will support you in this endeavor.
2. Bend your knees and lean forward with your butt sticking out, like a baby just learning to stand, or a sumo wrestler.  (You can hold onto the back of a chair or a kitchen counter for balance).
3. Feel really, really stupid.
4. Stay with this feeling for a moment. Breathe into the gratuitous ridiculousness of your posture. (It’s OK to giggle).
5. See? You didn’t die. Feeling stupid won’t kill you.
6. Slowly and carefully, shake your ass from side to side by moving your spine into a “C” shape and then into a backwards “C.” Like the Chanel logo.
7. Wiggle your ass at the Chanel logo and all it represents, both taunting (snooty bougie wannabes) and also admiring: Chanel herself said she designed to maximize the sex appeal of her hot little boyish body. (GO, Coco!) By designing largely in black and white, she metaphorically shook her ass at the convent where she grew up. (I’m sure that was pleasant).
8. Shake your ass thoroughly, slow and fast.  Shake your ass in ways you’ve not tried before.  Experiment.  Shape your C left, forward, right, and finally, backwards, shaking your ass.
9. Address all those in the past who have minimized, or otherwise insulted, your ass. Shake your ass at them, wherever they are. Address all four points of the compass.
10. Allow your shoulders to join in, and shake your boobs, belly, and any other body parts at the asshats who have called you fat-ass, lard-ass, scaredy-ass, stupid-ass, or smart-ass, for the entire history of your life.  Do it. Mean it.

Finally, remind yourself never again to disparage your own ass. That shit is toxic. Because anyone listening will assume that you are dissing their asses, too. And we want to free our asses to be the powerful, goofy, sexy parts of us that they are.

Preston, Devon. “No Excuses (Interview with Nick Stantonastasso).” Inked, Mar. 2020, pp. 58–61.