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During my hiatus from social media, I’ve been enjoying some much needed ‘me-time’. ‘Me-time’ consists of long soaks in the bath, walks along the sea shore, cooking family meals, dreaming on paper as well as reading novels.
For some reason, I never seem to have the time to read for pleasure, unless I take time away from social media. Getting through the pile of books that are at the side of my bed just illustrates to me how much time I waste refreshing my twitter feed, pressing hearts on Instagram and commenting on stuff on Facebook
I know I need to find a way to have a much healthier relationship with these means of contact with the outside world, but as of yet I haven’t found a viable solution except from turning them off for weeks at a time.
It’s not an ideal situation, as I do miss the connection, contact and opportunities they present but I’m prepared to take this hit if it means I turn them off in order to hear my own voice again.
I do find social media very noisy at times and distracting. As well as enriching and inspiring. Still a work in progress I think; my relationship with the beast.
But one book that I’ve been engrossed in for the last couple of days is The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton. I’ve has my eye on this debut novel for a few months now, but haven’t managed to read it until now. And it’s such a good read.
It’s historical fiction and very poetic in it’s descriptions of people and places. Based in Amsterdam in 1687, it follows the progress of one family as they thrive through the trade routes opened up for merchant explorers. A new bride receives a cabinet sized replica of her new home as a wedding gift. Upset at first, she soon becomes involved in decorating this house through a mysterious miniaturist. This book weaves a magical spell as I’m drawn into this family’s world were secrets and lies are the currency of exchange as money and sugar takes a backseat.
If you can, read it, take a break from social media if you have to in order to do so. It’s well worth it!
Family Dinner
This week saw the end of one series of tensions and worries to make room for a whole new set of other ones.
Our eldest, Nathan, got his ‘A’ level results this week. He did tremendously well. A* in Psychology and Business Studies, A in his extended project and B in Geography. He is going to his first choice University, Liverpool.
He’s been working hard for this next step for years. And we have supported him all along the way, no pressure just love. We are so proud of his achievements. Not just academically, but with the remarkable young man he has grown into.
So today we went out for a family meal to celebrate his success. We only went locally to a pub but it was lovely to sit down together and talk about the next steps. Until I realised that he would be leaving home sooner than I anticipated. Within a matter of weeks, Nathan will be off to University, living alone in the halls of residence, studying Geography. I can hardly believe it. I knew this day would come. But I’m not sure I’m ready for it.
I thought we had him till October at least. Of course wishful thinking. I know I pushed for this to happen too. I always said for him to get out of home, and go away to University as that’s the time you really grow up and stand on your own two feet. He knows we’ll always be here, we’ll always have his back. But he also needs to experience life out there, alone, take on more responsibility, continue his development into the most beautiful man inside and out that I have ever know. And I might be biased, but I call it as I see it.
I wish him luck and love as he enters this next stage of his life. I will miss him greatly but I know this has to happen for him to become an adult, I have to let my baby go.
Breathe ( and make time for yourself)
I picked up this new magazine by chance. Not sure what I was looking for. Maybe I was looking to ‘breathe’, to gain some space in my day, in my life.
I’ve sworn off all those glossy women’s magazines, those that carry the images of perfection; white skinny beautiful women. The money I must have spent on them, trying to fit the ideal, and knowing fine well that I’d never would. But that didn’t stop me buying into the construction.
It didn’t seem to bother me that I never saw women in there that looked like me. Or did it?
As I also went through a phase of buying Pride Magazine, Oprah, Ebony to see black women in magazines.
But they still didn’t look like me, as they were still skinny, well styled and looked like they had their lives all together, nice and sweet.
I suppose when I buy magazines now, like this one, I am still trying to find myself, to better myself, but from the inside out.
I am working on my soul, my spirit, my true self when I pick up a magazine like Breathe because I am looking to take care of myself by taking the time to slow down, to try yoga ( again), to start back up with my gratitude journal etc. Magazines like this make me think, make me assess what I am doing in terms of self-care, self-love and how am I working within this world to make it a better place?
I would highly recommend this magazine if you are looking to make time for yourself, for your true self.
Lunar Wisdom
Hypnotised by the moon … I found the more I dwelt with her, the more I became conscious of her tides, and all my life began to move with them. – Dion Fortune
It was a full moon last night. A beautiful sight in a clear dark sky.
I’ve taken to paying more attention to the moon’s rhythms recently. Starting to believe in Her wisdom as well as becoming connected to her as a woman.
For example, the phrases of the moon are matched each month by a woman’s bodily functions. Just as the moon is full, my womb waxes full and then wanes, empties with each menstrual bleed, just as the moon wanes to nothing, to the dark moon, when She is no longer visible.
Before, I never really knew anything about a woman’s natural connection to the moon. There’s energy and power to be enjoyed if we as woman chose to use Her light as a indicator of when to be in action and when to be still. When to gather and when to release. Once we align ourselves with Her natural energy and movements, things could start to flow much more easily within our individual lives.
So I’m finding out through my recent readings, and I look forward to learning more about lunar wisdom, lunar phases as well as lunar rituals and becoming more in touch with my own natural rhythms.
Love Yourself Friday
Yes I know today isn’t Friday. But I want to share with you something that happened to me a few months ago which I am proud of.
I had the pleasure of being interviewed by Phoenix Rising Collective, for their Love Yourself First Friday.
The aim of this special feature is to shed light on various ways we as women are practicing self-care, making it a priority in our lives.
After a couple of years of being in the doldrums and not being able to look myself in the eyes in the mirror, I feel I’ve come a long way to the point of actively practicing self-love. Maybe going through situations and experiences that others might recognise and gain insight from by sharing this way.
The question that struck home the most was; Is there an obstacle or challenge that you’ve overcome that lead you to a deeper love for who you are? In answer to this question, for the first time, I revealed my dirty secret. And it felt good to finally speak out about it.
Here is my answer and read the rest of the interview here.
“What would happen if one woman told the truth about her life? The world would spin open.” -Muriel Rukeyer
There comes a time in everybody’s life when the unspeakable happens. To say it hasn’t happened or won’t happen to you is a lie. You’re kidding yourself. Believe me.
In May 2015, the unspeakable happened to me. There was a public shaming. My whole world fell apart the day I was accused of being a plagiarist on Facebook by a ‘so-called’ friend and fellow poet. He wrote that he’d found whole scale “borrowings” from other writers’ words, phrases, and structures within my latest collection of poetry. He said that he was just doing his duty for the poetry community by bringing it to everyone’s attention. What followed was what I chose to call a public lynching of me as a writer, poet and person. This was the unspeakable that happened to me. But funny enough, I am speaking about it here, as well as writing a creative non-fiction book about this whole experience. Everything I knew, all I was, how I thought myself to be was taken from me in that public posting. I issued an apology regarding my unintentional mistakes and withdrew from the public realm. At one point, death looked a very promising course of action, but I had my family and some supportive friends who helped me.
Within the Chakra system there is a heart center called Anahata Chakra. In Sanskrit, Anahata means “Unstruck.” For me this speaks to the resilient nature of the human heart. I believe, wholeheartedly, that there is a place within my heart that is absolutely unbreakable. Thank you Chris Maddox for this wisdom.
This experience did break my heart, stopped me from loving, and shut me down and out. However, there was a minute part that kept pulsing, kept the light on for me. Maybe it was my belief in self, my self-love that got me through each day.
Each day has not been wasted. I have taken this experience as a wake-up call, a wake-up to explore and claim my authenticity. Afterwards, I had nothing. I couldn’t even look myself in the face at one point. But writing my book and starting to take photographs of myself have supported me in my climb up. I can’t say climb ‘back’, because who or what I am becoming, I do not know. I have never met this woman. I do know that love and self-love, first and foremost, are at the center of this journey.
How to express gratitude
Gratitude is defined by the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘The quality of being thankful; readiness to show appreciation for and to return kindness.’
I’ve been trying to keep a gratitude journal for most of 2016, off and on. I usually have this little book by the side of my bed so I can capture three things that I am grateful for after each day. I know when I do this practice religiously, that I feel better about the day that has passed and I feel better about my life in general. But why do I find it so hard to keep up with this practice. Five minutes out of my day shouldn’t be such a big stretch. But I have found more times than not that I have missed days, weeks, months of expressing gratitude in this little book.
I don’t usually struggle in expressing my emotions, thoughts and feelings. I’m not usually reluctant to let those people around me know how much I care for them and appreciate them. I am thankful that they are in my life, just as much as I am thankful for this life I am living, creating. But there seems to be some kind of disconnect between the way I feel about my life and expressing gratitude for this life I’m living.
I know that showing gratitude naturally makes me more thankful and grateful for my life. It’s like a knock on affect, or a natural fertilizer. Sprinkling thanks upon my life, means that it grows even more brighter and satisfying. But there is something somewhere inside me resisting this practice.
Maybe there is some thought, some feeling inside me that believes I have nothing to be grateful for or that thinks I do not deserve to have the life I have. Really when I say thank you to someone, even to myself, do I really mean it?
I’m not sure I know the answers to these questions. I just know that I need to get back to my little book at the side of my bed and just start practicing. Maybe then all will be revealed.
From the WSW vault: the sea is my medicine
September 2015, I write:
“People who know me would say I am a positive person. Usually a positive person. Lately, my moods have been dark. In the past few months, disastrous things have happened which have left me feeling worthless, victimised and suicidal. I will start to document the experience here over time. But I understand why people haven’t wanted to be with me. Hell, I haven’t wanted to be with me either
I’ve been walking the line around the edge of depression. My husband suffers from depression and low self-esteem. Has done so for years. So there’s no room in our household for me to be sick also. I cannot go down there as it is I who holds our family together. I’m not trying to big myself up. It has been the truth, until now.
Now, I’m just falling apart, been doing so gradually over the last few months. At the same time, I’ve been attempting to build my life, myself back up. I see now my mistake has been to hold on too tight to how things were in the past, how I was in the past, resisting change at the same time as wanting these difficult times to pass.
Robert Frost wrote:
Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
I first came across this poem in the film, The Outsiders. Ponyboy recited it to his friend Johnny. Then on his death bed, Johnny told Ponyboy to ‘stay gold.’ I loved that film. I think Johnny was trying to tell Ponyboy to stay good, stay innocent and pure, to not let the harshness of this world change him. That’s a difficult request to fulfill. There is more ugliness in this world than ever I feel, but I have to acknowledge that there is also beauty.
I have to remember that how I behave, act or speak originates from me. No one else can or should control how I act and behave. I do want to be a positive person but I know that person has gone. Changes occurred. They had to. I want to be whole. So more changes will have to come. I’ll be a positive and good person but a wholly different positive person than before.
Why the image of the sea to accompany this post? Because I got back into the sea today after weeks of avoiding it. The sea is my medicine. I’ve been refusing to take my medicine. Maybe because I didn’t have the energy, or maybe because I didn’t want to heal. Today, I dived into the cold sea releasing a little of my pain. I smiled while I luxuriated in her cold watery embrace reminded why I love being in the water, that feeling of freedom and what I’ve been been missing. The sea saved me.”
Living Wild Studios 