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Melissa McManus

@iamzendora

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Half forest creature. Half disco ball.
Photographer • DJ • Embodiment guide
For women remembering how damn alive they are.

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A free woman?

She is a woman who belongs to herself.

She trusts her own voice.
Honors her desires.
Stops shrinking to make others comfortable.

Wild enough to be authentic.
Soft enough to stay open.
Rooted enough to stand in her truth.

A free woman remembers who she was before the world told her who to be.

❤️ by @iamzendora

When was the last time you danced just because it felt good?

Mark your calendar for Sunday, August 16th 4pm-5:30pm

Join us in COLLEGEVILLE for an unforgettable Dance Medicine experience led by Melissa McManus and Lacey. This free-form movement workshop is all about letting go of expectations, connecting with yourself, and rediscovering the joy of movement. No choreography. No pressure. Just music, presence, and permission to move however feels right.

If you've been curious about trying something completely different, this is your invitation! @iamzendora will show you a side of movement that leaves you feeling weightless.

Register through the Y6 app, or email Lacey.schmidt@yogasix.com

#comedancewithus #moveyourbody #dancemedicine #yoga #movementismedicine by @iamzendora

People often describe me as “bohemian.”
And while I understand why…
that word has never fully fit me.

Because bohemian feels like an aesthetic.
A style.
A recognizable image people can place in a box.

But free-spirited?
That feels closer to truth.

A free spirit is not attached to one identity, one look, one version of herself.
She shifts.
She evolves.
She listens.
She becomes.

And honestly, this is so much of how society works.
We try to place people into neat little boxes so we can understand them more easily.
Bohemian. Alternative. Classic. Feminine. Masculine. Reserved. Too much. Too wild. List goes on…

But human beings were never meant to be flattened into fixed categories.

We are dynamic by nature.
Living things change.
The soul changes.
The body changes.
Our expression changes when we allow ourselves the freedom to truly live.

Part of my work, both for myself and the women I hold space for (behind the deck and camera), is to gently shred those boxes.
To remember that authenticity cannot fully bloom inside rigid labels.

Some seasons I feel earthy and wild.
Some seasons soft and romantic.
Some seasons fiery, sensual, grounded, elegant, undone, messy, playful, rooted, expanding…
And some seasons I feel like a punk.

I don’t want to stay the same just to be easily understood by others.

I want to honor the honest rhythm of my spirit.

To me, being free-spirited means allowing yourself to change without abandoning yourself.
It means not performing an aesthetic, but embodying what feels alive and true in the moment.

Maybe we are not here to become a fixed identity.

Maybe we are here to become fully alive. Just a thought ❤️ by @iamzendora

18 goddesses 😻 gathered around the bonfire this past Tuesday, intentionally releasing & then with that new space, welcoming new horizons and opportunities.
Connection, conversation, and community around a big bonfire, with a nourishing potluck afterwards.
@iamzendora leading us on a dance journey. @arose.blooming setting the container and my adhd energetic self just fired up to be surrounded by such powerful and amazing energies ! welcoming it all with open heart and open arms. Giving supreme gratitude to what brought me to this moment and all the moments to come and the ways I am blessed to share my dream come true🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻🩷thank you to all who were a part of it.
Together we danced, howled, laughed and transmuted. All my fav things combined!
Mandyland in the making 🩷💃🤗🌟#sneakpeak by @iamzendora

One day, I’ll be old. And I hope I look back and remember a woman who wasn’t afraid to be wildly alive.

Because I know life can be hard. Sometimes heartbreakingly so. There will be seasons of grief, uncertainty, and heaviness. Seasons when joy feels a little harder to reach.

But I also know that even in the midst of it all, we can choose to invite little pockets of joy into our lives.

We can jump into cold oceans.
Dance barefoot.
Laugh until our bellies hurt.
Play for no other reason than the pleasure of playing.

I don’t want to wait for life to be easy to enjoy being alive.

I have never been that person and never plan to be.

Grateful for it all. 🌊🤍 by @iamzendora

You don’t have to carry them. They walk beside you. 🤍

This weekend, I was at a dance workshop where a woman shared something that landed so deeply in my heart.

She had lost her mother and was carrying a tremendous amount of grief. During the experience, she received a message: “You don’t have to carry your mother. She walks beside you.”

Oof.

Those words moved something in me. Because I know that grief. I know the ache of missing someone so deeply that sometimes all you want is one more conversation. One more hug. One more ordinary moment with them.
I lost my dad several years ago, and there are still moments when the longing for him feels so heavy.

But those words offered me a different perspective.
What if we don’t have to carry the weight of their absence to honor their presence in our lives?

What if we don’t have to hold on so tightly to our grief to hold on to our love?
What if they were never meant to be carried, but simply remembered as walking beside us?

And then something happened.

As I was driving home from the workshop, Stand By Me came on. The very song my father and I walked down the aisle to on my wedding day. Of all the songs. Of all the moments.

There it was.

And maybe it was coincidence. Maybe it was synchronicity. Maybe it was my dad reminding me that he’s still here, just in a different way.

I don’t need to know for certain. Because the message was enough.

Grief is not the price we must continually pay to prove our love. We are allowed to loosen our grip on the heaviness without loosening our connection.

We are allowed to laugh, to dance, to experience joy, to live fully, even when someone we love is no longer physically here.

And we are allowed to miss them. Deeply. Both can exist.

Maybe healing our grief isn’t about learning how to live without them. Maybe it’s about learning how to carry their love differently.

Not as a weight on our shoulders.
But as something that walks beside us.
And perhaps, sometimes, even dances with us.

🤍 by @iamzendora

Dearest Goddesses. Three opportunities to get wildly in your body with me.

10/24 The Witches Ball // Easton, Pa. 9pm-1am
10/27 Witches gathering at Mandyland @radiantconsciouslight @arose.blooming
11/8 @yogasix_collegeville

More info to come.

🪩 by @iamzendora

Apparently I have a type when it comes to books. 😂

These are a few I’ve read and loved, and ones I recommend to women all the time.

They’re all different, but there’s a thread that runs through every single one of them: women remembering who the fuck they are.

Before we were taught to be good.
To be likable.
To be agreeable.
To make ourselves smaller.
To take care of everyone else first.
To disconnect from our bodies, our pleasure, our anger, our intuition, our wildness.

These books, in their own ways, are about reclamation.

Reclaiming our voices. Our bodies. Our power. Our desire. Our instincts. Our stories.

Some are more spiritual. Some are about power and conditioning. Some are mythology. Some are about sexuality. But all of them have made me question something, remember something, or see being a woman a little differently.

On Our Best Behavior- @eliseloehnen
Untamed- @glennondoyle
Unbound- @realkasiaurbaniak
Pussy: A Reclamation- @mamagena
Women Who Run With the Wolves-@clarissapinkolaestes
Circe- @madeline.e.miller
The Book of SHE- @saraavantstover
Burnout- @enagoski
The Great Cosmic Mother- Monica Sjöö + Barbara Mor
The Heroine’s Journey- @murdockmaureen

I think so much of this life isn’t actually about becoming more.

But instead peeling away all the shit we were told we had to be and finding our way back to what was already there.

And I am very, very interested in that journey.

Also, if you have a book that belongs in this pile, please tell me because apparently I need 700 more books on my nightstand. And i’d prefer if they were written by kick ass women. ❤️

#books #womenempowerment #womenliberation by @iamzendora

River rotting because living in the US is exhausting.

And no, I don’t want to look away.

I think it matters that we pay attention, care about what’s happening around us, and refuse to let comfort make us indifferent to someone else’s suffering.

But we also have to be honest about the conditions we’re living in.

We live in a society that expects us to constantly produce and consume, a capitalist hamster wheel with little time left to simply be human.

Everything is for profit: our time, attention, bodies, rest, and health. Even wellness is packaged as something to buy, optimize, track, and perform.

No wonder so many of us are exhausted. No wonder it’s hard to feel well in a society structured around extraction.

I feel this deeply in the wedding industry, where burnout is real. We’re constantly giving to others and often ignore our own well-being until our bodies force us to stop.
My wellness doesn’t always look like productivity, perfection, expensive routines, or becoming more efficient.

Sometimes it looks like rest, slowness, boundaries, community, pleasure, and remembering I’m a person, not a machine built to produce.

Sometimes it looks like coming back to the Mother.

I put my body on the earth. I get in the water. I listen to the birds, river, and wind through the trees. I let myself be held by how fucking beautiful this place still is.

Why wouldn’t I be devoted to her? She is free, generous, alive, and there is so much to learn from her.

I remember what’s worth protecting: the goodness, beauty, people, and love that still exist here.

We’re allowed to hold both: to be devastated by what’s happening and enchanted by this world. To stay awake without drowning in despair. To give a shit and still experience joy.

To care for ourselves not so we can return to the hamster wheel more efficiently, but so we can become more present, connected, and capable of building something different.

❤️

#weddingindustry #thisisamerica #burnout by @iamzendora

I dance every day. Sometimes for an hour, sometimes for a song, sometimes for 20 seconds because that’s all I have.

I dance when I’m joyful. I dance when I’m anxious, angry, restless, tender, overwhelmed, or completely uninspired.

Dance has become one of the ways I come home to myself. It moves energy. It helps me feel the things I’ve been thinking my way around. It’s helped me soften where I grip, explore my sensuality, build confidence, and feel more at home in my own body.

Some days it’s medicine. Some days it’s play. Some days it feels like prayer. And some days I’m literally just shaking my ass in my kitchen. 😂 still counts and actually twerking is SOOOO good for you ladies!

But I keep showing up.

After dancing every day for more than six years, I can tell you that you don’t need to “know how to dance.” You don’t need choreography. You don’t need an hour. You don’t even need an entire song.

Put something on that makes you feel something and let your body move before your brain gets involved.

See what happens. ❤️

And if you want to dance with me, my next Medicine Dance at @yogasix_collegeville is 11/8. 🔥 by @iamzendora

I don’t believe in having a prime.

I don’t want to look backward someday and decide that was the version of me that was the most alive, the most interesting, the most worthy.

I want to keep meeting new versions of myself.
Keep learning things I’m terrible at until I’m not.
Keep following curiosity.
Keep finding new ways to play, create, move, and surprise myself.

Today that looks like sitting at Kimberton Whole Foods, headphones on, working on my latest DJ set for an all-women’s pool party. 😂🪩

Who knows what it’ll look like five years from now.

I have no prime.
I’ll keep evolving until I’m dead. 💅🏼

And damn, what a privilege that is.

#dj #dancemedicine #dancemedicinephilly #midlife by @iamzendora