tess oakland
“I think if there’s anything we can offer right now, it’s ourselves and our art.”
I started this exploration (of health) about a year and a half ago. I was in this place in my life where I just wasn’t happy. I was having a lot of anxiety and didn’t have much direction.
I was at the doctor’s a lot and I realized - i HAVE TO JUMP OFF THIS TRAIN.
I’m just going . . . I’m on the same road . . .
Something has to change
and I have to be the one to do it.
So when I made that jump, what that looked like for me was researching and learning about my body and mental health and what all those connections are.
And it gave me my power back.
It took about 4 or 5 months to get my health back on track but I did it on my own and I’ve never felt better. I just immersed myself in learning and I felt empowered because I felt like I wasn’t putting my future into other peoples’ hands. It gave me a new lease on life.
I think it’s really easy to get stuck in what feels like a box.
But the moment you take a step out,
it changes its shape.
I knew I wanted to share that knowledge.
The way you feel now - the headspace you’re in - is not permanent.
It is passing.
WHEN I WAS 21, I went through a pretty devastating break up along with some other life stuff going on and I started to have really bad panic attacks.
I didn’t know what was happening.
I had 3 weeks where I actually thought I was dying - it was just debilitating.
I’ve always been pretty weary of doctors so I avoided going until the 4th panic attack.
I called my mom and she said I needed to go to the doctor. I actually had an anxiety attack in the middle of the visit and that’s when the doctor told me that that was what I was experiencing. And I had of course heard of anxiety but I never realized I was experiencing it.
Once I started researching, I realized I’d always had it. It was just at a constant and low level state so I never noticed.
The doctor wrote me 6 different prescriptions.
At the time, I wouldn’t even take Advil so the whole thing just seemed counterintuitive.
As I was driving home, I was passing a yoga studio in my neighborhood that I’d driven past probably 50,000 times in my life. And that was the first time I was really seeing it.
I IMMEDIATELY PULLED IN. IT WAS LIKE A FORCE IN ME.
I walked in and they were having a special - like $20 for 4 classes or something - and I signed up. And that really is where my journey started. I took (what felt like was) my first real breath in that class.
These options are there.
There are little gifts around us.
I invite anybody that is feeling in despair to just try one thing different. Even taking a different drive home because you don’t know what you’re going to see.
Just doing one small thing has the potential to change the trajectory of your life. Had I not done that one thing differently, I might’ve taken those prescriptions. Or I may have continued to have anxiety and be so closed off from my own spirituality.
I think there’s a lack of empathy of self that so many of us have.
Like a disconnect to the body. We take it for granted.
There’s a lot of variables that go into health.
I like to tell my clients to think of your body as working for you. You are not necessarily your body. So all those nights I used to be out til 4 am and my body’s like. . please I want to go home . . .
It’s fighting off disease and threats and cancer constantly for me. And I’m hurting it and abusing it when I don’t give it what it needs. And it makes me sad now to think about.
I want to hug my own body. I want to reward IT for helping me, keeping me alive and healing me when I do get hurt or don’t feel well.
i want to at least know that i tried.
Tess Oakland is a holistic health coach, actor and model
photography by Chauntice Green
interview and direction by Lauren Pierce-bautista
2020. Los Angeles, CA.