Are the voices in my head too loud for you?

Re-framing my Experiences

There are some 24 hour periods when I wish we could simply press the rewind button and start again.  Today is a case in point - it can only get better.  As I write a step-grandchild is recovering from one of our dogs biting her.  As I write she is in the day children's ward at the local hospital.  Stitches under general anaesthetic and some time to come round and be checked out.  The dog in question very nearly saw the condemned cell today - but her defender was my step-granddaughter's mother - who felt it had been an awful accident - but an accident never the less.  The poor child attempted to cuddle a large Newfoundland half way through her breakfast - and the dog bit her lip.  I could weep for the little girl on her first big trip to stay with her Grandpa with her Dad, Dad's partner and her big sister.  First day of the holiday she has got to know the local A & E.  Welcome to the Highlands.

The Newfie has a reprieve - but we need to look at the dynamics of the situation that occured and guard against a child full of life and curiosity - and a dog who is middle years and rather set in her ways particularly when it comes to eating!

There are no excuses; some lessons to be learned and a horrible sense that always accompanies an accident that we all wish hadn't happened.

In amongst the anxiety of the day - I had a joyous and inspiring letter and card from a person who I have worked alongside.  She is gifted, funny, original and her own person.  I commisioned a banner some months ago from a local amateur artist and priest and, quite unexpectedly, as we began the usual rather long-winded negotiations about style and emphasis, she withdrew and no longer wished to create the piece.  I was very disappointed, her work is often beautifully crafted and intricate in ways that would work well in St. Columba Chapel, here at the retreat space.  However, this morning a drawing arrived with the letter from this person I have come to admire and respect very much - and I suddenly saw exactly the sort of hanging/banner/collage I was looking for in the chapel.  It was beautiful.

Today's events have felt random but somehow congruent - all one.  In a moment of wild possessiveness our dog pack leader lands the youngest member of the family in need of stitches - by another turn of perception there have been moments in the day when new bonds have been forged through phone calls and updates and conversations over coffee while some of us waited at home for news.  It all added to the sense that all this can only build towards a greater understanding and more confident relationships.  In another turn I have heard, in a form I can still hear in amongst mounting anxiety, that there are some things I do well and excel at.  Encouragement and acknowledgement that we all need, but that I am particularly appreciative of at this time.

Somehow today we all worked as a team; we communicated well and we recognised we all had a little girl's best interests at heart.  We lived community and we experienced family - and not just those present here - but also from those connecting from a distance.

After the Dog BIte

For my Step-Granddaughter K.

For in the moment

When I saw blood

stain the cloth

and you were whisked away,

I knew the pain of

what cannot be done

when mayhem reigns.

I caught within

the strongest sense

of personal attachment to

your wellness and being.

For as you hurt

and went in search

of healing

I named a love that

is the touching fullness of protective shame.

If only time could be returned

and a pause inserted where violation once was flamed.

Vulnerable and impressively

present,

your arrival in our life

has transformed and changed.

I am sorry for the pain

your enthusiam unleashed,

but know, my little one and be assured,  that you are beautiful

and wonderfully made.

When wounds have healed and life goes on

you will know

you are surrounded by a circle of support

which is life and love itself.

JEWG

Friends and Webs

Friends.  Nothing better than an evening spent relaxing with friends old and new - especially ones where it's been a while since you have been able to settle down and have a good blether.  Great to catch up, in fill and just be.  Last night was such an evening and as it came to a close I thought to myself I really must do this more often!

I often miss retreatants when they go and my last retreatant was no exception.  Working one to one for anything from 5 to 10 or more days builds an intense, committed relationship quickly, often with a high level of mutuality as worship is shared and experiences explored.  Sometimes there are connections and connectedness based on comparable outlooks and aspirations that can be profoundly exciting but also especially challenging because it becomes even more important to preserve the person's space to pilgrim and journey.  In a way there are similarities with good enough parenting.

I was caught this morning as I went over to air The Sanctuary ready for guests arriving later today by the most beautiful spider's web which intricately laced a large shrub, which against the pale light was almost a petrol blue.  The dew still sat on the web and it took my breath away.  The fragile beauty; the precariousness of it's position and the play of light on the crystal dew drops.  Magical.  A reminder of the fine balance of life:

In rare moments

when I am at home to myself,

my heart is still,

my pulse a psalm.

I know obscurely

I receive my life

from a power beyond me,

live by a life not my own.

The morsel of life

its ephemeral beauty,

its searing sorrow,

is on loan,

marginal to a greater agency

that always, all ways

engages the darkness

brings life from death.

My own gratuitousness

itself is a gift,

liberating me

to live in this moment,

to be at peace in the world

that, like me, is passing away,

to love it fiercly,

to let it go.

Bonnie Thurston

Amen.

Taking Time

The reality of taking some space is that the space seems to have taken me.  This morning my meditations focused on a poem by Bonnie Thurston:

Prayer is not

scribbling together

a few paltry words,

flinging them like stones

at the windows

of ineffability.

It is Gelassenheit,

letting go,

being carried on a current

toward a vast ocean

deep beyond imagining;

sitting silently,

gaze firmly fixed

on one golden,

inscrutable face,

waiting,

with the patience of love;

pouring out life,

that alabaster vial

of costly ointment,

at the feet of One

Who washes others with His tears.

Prayer is

asking nothing,

desiring nothing

but this, only this.

[De Waal, Esther, Lost in Wonder: Rediscovering the Spiritual Art of Attentiveness (2003) Norwich: Canterbury Press page 52]

I thought alot about how I have been washed and wash others with tears.  The tears of tenderness and sometimes frustation as a lover, carer and parent; the tears of pride and love; the tears of joy at some ridiculously small thing that finally comes together; tears of transformation and vision - seeing a situation or person for what the person can be and is rather than how the individual sees themselves.

"Wicked"

I am recalling the teaching of Jesus when he invites the enquirer to remove the plank from his own eye.  I feel I am excavating elements of mine as I take my self-care seriously once more.  I must have been nuts.  I have worked six weeks on the trot with no day off.  Firstly getting loads of things done before our son returned home for the summer and then - a summer of a mixed diet of retreatants and friends coming to stay.  I probably invested far too much emotional energy in the visits of friends which I anticipated would be feeding and refreshing - and in many ways they were - but they still retained many of the facets of the hospitality we award to strangers and pilgrims.  To treat someone as Christ with us means exercising the gentlest and most affirming of hospitality.  I loved doing this, but I was bonkers not acknowledging that I needed more space for me.  I thought I could defer my own emotional needs - I would be giving a retreatant a gentle nudge to re-frame if I heard them utter such a misguided intention.  Indeed I was truly brought to my knees (metaphorically) when I reflected that the words I said to another recently are exactly what I need to hear myself.  Paraphrased:  being taken seriously begins by taking myself and my needs seriously.  I need time to be fully me - and much of what is fully me is exercised in silence and alone.  It's a pain because, like many I would love to conform and just be friendly and people-focused 24/7 but the reality is I need the space for the creative pulse that makes me, me to throb and produce the work which feeds the more extrovert presentation of myself.  When I dismiss the inner need for this space I am very quickly diminished and time, which would normally be a pleasure in the service of othere becomes a little harder.  The balance; the nuanced subtlety of a life lived with open hands, enquiring mind and heart is reduced.

So prayer this morning focused on silence and simplicity.  Instead of ploughing into the inevitable tasks that need to be completed I pick up my escape of the moment - a brilliantly simply written but crafted with little less than genius - Jilly Cooper and had two cups of tea and marmite toast delivered courtesy of the W-G room service!

The novel takes me straight back to supply teaching in a school in Putney!  Wicked is a smashing fantasy romp - very amusing especially for ex-teachers!

So the day now has a different colour, texture and hue.  I feel fully present - but I am not going to assume too much.  I need to in-fill and rebalance - and not assume the equivalent of an emergency spiritual and emotional elastoplast is enough.  I am relieved I am feeling better, but anxiety is there.

Today is therefore mine.  I am claiming it.

 

Authenticity

I made a pact with myself when I first started blogging that if the blogs became opaque and started to 'smoke screen' the reality of my life I had two choices - stop blogging (avoidance) or be honest (authenticity) even if it's hard for a fervent introvert to believe firstly anyone is interested and secondly that it isn't just self-indulgent twoddle sharing on-line.

I am still blogging - so I am claiming that in the name of authenticity I need to say it as it is - for me.  The accident I had a few months back seriously dented my confidence - and I have been in such pain since that distraction seemed the best counter attack - and constantly putting energy into re-framing my experience in positive terms.  It was hard work on top of all the other things going on - every day life things - but I thought I was coping - no, better than that, I thought I was doing pretty well.  Then gradually I could feel some familiar symptoms from the now fairly distant past returning - the symptoms of depression.  Churchill was right when he said that all depressives live with the haunting memory and fear that The Black Dog will reappear at some point.  I have long been comfortable with seeing myself as a depressive - but like most reasonably capable and generally upbeat people - my bigger fear is becoming a burden to others or being seen as somehow wanting or utterly inadequate.  The reality is, of course, that bog-standard, uniquely and wonderfully made, standard issue with minor modifications - human.

It's perculiar that a person who can be so affirming of others and supportive of them as they celebrate and embrace their needs and wants is often reluctant to reach out in ways that will enable her own needs to be fully met.  So, as the symptoms were spotted and owned, I decided I was going to do something I have never done before and take my mental health as seriously as I always encourage everyone else to take theirs!!!  I've kicked in contact with my local Community Psychiatric Nurse who is a well of useful self-care advice and utterly respectful and supportive of the personal energy it took to seek intervention early.  I have started a tiny dose of medication to stabilise mood - and I have taken advice and cleared my diary of any commitments which could challenge my judgement or emotional fragility more than it needs to be just now.  The reality is that I have spent a few days being gentle with myself and I have enjoyed a gorgeous day today mostly reading and having a good blether with my partner.

I feel a bit of a fraud right now because just putting the support in there seems to have lightened my mood and empowered me to take better control of my stress levels.  I guess at base level I am a very independent and proud person.  As a consequence owning how I really feel deep inside myself, to a soul friend or therapist is not a problem - much harder to share this information with a wider group of people.  Why?  What am I scared of?  Maybe that some won't rate me any more; or those who don't understand depression and its many possible causes will judge me as weak and useless. 

Fortunately my mood is up enough to recognise with my head and my heart that this is utter tosh.  Those who know me will recognise the authenticity in what I am sharing and the necessity in doing so because it speaks to all our experiences of desolation and abandonment.  It's just that mine are sometimes fairly acute 'episodes' in the sense that I can't just snap out of it.  I can't always just keep going.  Those who think it's another eample of Jane W-G fallibility then I probably want to agree with you - but not too hastily and only partially - it is my vulnerability which gives me a compassionate heart and my experience of disability which helps me to know the reality of the experience of the mercy of God and the loving companionship of others.  I am learning that I can share the dark and the light.  The sky doesn't fall in and there's even the chance others will resonate with my experience.

For now I am doing just beautifully all things considered.  This level of symptom feels like a wake up call and I am waking up and smelling the roses.  Realising that there are many things depression teaches me about living and enjoying life.  So it's been over five years since I was in therapy - far too long - so time to get back in and do another good long stint.  Five years off  probably means the next ten years on!  Taking relaxation seriously and time to process.  These are musts not optional extras - and I know this in my bones. 

And while all this is falling into place I sit here typing in a howling gale and even I can see there's a funny side - I am wearing my t-shirt with "I have issues" printed on it.  Many a true word spoken in jest!

Attention to Detail

There are moments in life when we need to stand up and be counted.  Not often just now and again - and sometimes it's just a quick stand up and then sit down again quickly.  Today was such a day.

As I reflected on the day at Evening Prayer I was surprised it was the minor rather than the major key changes of the day that had remained with me.  Moments on the phone chatting with a potential community member;  time playing with the dog and a few moments in the fresh air soaking up the ever changing landscape.  The big happenings had their place.  The little things make the day have worth and lasting resonance.

People are all Christ and Christ is all People

My world continues to revolve around visits from friends and family - and retreatants staying.  I am grasping practically and spiritually that there is no real distinction here - and that the process of being present and offering hospitality, service and companionship is pretty much the same - whatever the reason for the visit.  I have been amazed by the diversity of experience, personality and temperament that have been sitting at our kitchen table in recent weeks.  It has been a joy to behold - but also a testing time.  Not in the sense that some of the individuals would try even the patience of a saint!  If that were my honest analysis anyone with even half a brain would tell me that says much more about my tolerance levels and prejudices that it does about the integrity of my visitors!  No the testing part has been continuing to develop ways of being present with people which are real, honest, loving and also utterly true to them and me.  I can only liken it to the rhythm of prayer.  The more stable and conscientiously the daily ritual of worship is honoured, the more essential it becomes as a replenishing resource for the psyche.  It becomes like cleaning your teeth or having a shower.  So it feels there's a rhythm to making folk feel welcome and at home whilst also not so debasing my own identity, needs and wants that I become virtually invisible in the process or unknowable because there isn't much of me left.

I suspect that this awareness that we need to pace ourselves and retain something of the uniqueness of our own being in reserve sometimes makes us rather dull company for some folk - as I listen to busy lives re-told and hear about future hopes and aspirations - but I love what we are able to do here.  Even the busiest visitors seem, after a few days, to succomb to the place - all we need to do is care - God, the natural beauty of the place and a willingness to slow down do the rest.

Our world is a tiny one compared with many though - and we love it like this.  We have time to be imaginative - in my case to write; time to sit and listen; time to think huge unimaginable dreams and time to be there for others in need.

It feels very holy and precious work - but dull to an observer because so very little can ever be talked about.

We don't seem to need many of the things others thrive on and sometimes I question which reality is better - to meet society's expectations or to be to some degree counter-cultural.  Maybe this is simply and extrovert verses introvert thing.  Not much to do with personal taste - more a matter of temperament.

I think, over time. we have so simplified our living in many respects that we are no longer 'turned on' by many of the rather more conventional aspirations society encourages us to have.  Maybe we are just eccentrics - but we seem to value authenticity in relationship over politeness and friendliness; we love people who care passionately about something - and seem to struggle with folk who think it's always someone else's problem or fault - and we delight in being rather than lots of doing.  That means we are not very aspirational in a conventional sense because we have both seen how much power corrupts the intellect, integrity and spiritual rootedness of individuals.  We see ourselves as Barnabas'.

I found again a wonderful reading this morning:

I will begin to ask questions.  I hope that curiosity will be a propelling force during this time.  if our religion is to be alive in our lives it must be a matter of both comfort and discomfort.  I must go on asking questions.  Rilke made the connection between loving the question and living into them, and it is important to return again to this familiar passage for it is very apposite at the start of this time:

     I want to beg you as much as I can ... to be patient towards all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves ... Do not now seek answers which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them.  And the point is to live everything.  Live the questions now.  Perhaps you will then, gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into answer.

De Waal, Esther, Lost in Wonder (2003) Norwich: Canterbury Press pge 32.

Make it so - to quote a well known star ship captain.

Maybe I am just a nerd after all.

Consolation

Up early this morning to see my son off on his sleepover and visit to the Edinburgh Tattoo.  As I watched him busying himself packing and re-packing our smallest and most loved family rucksack, I remembered similar outings I had been on as a child to The Royal Tournament at Earl's Court in London.  Watching gun carriages career around the ring and shouting myself hoarse supporting the Portsmouth Team - my mum's favourite as a former WRN.  We rarely watched the Tattoo on TV, but I remember the long summers spent in Great Eccleston in Lancashire while my father worked in Blackpool - and our neighbour (a primary school headmaster) on the static caravan park who would 'allow' neighbours children in to watch on his rather super TV as long as we were quiet.  We were.  For at least three minutes.  Then lost interest and left.  Extraordinary the difference watching something live can make.

Busy first thing ironing and preparing The Sanctuary for the retreatant arriving today.  I was caught quite unexpectedly with a sense of how extraordinarily privileged I am.  It was shocking and humbling.  I tend to get caught up in the day to day and so when I do catch the big picture it is, in the correct sense, awesome.  Ironing duvet covers isn't the most scintilating way to spend the early morning hours of Saturday - but I couldn't help but reflect that I have been incredibly lucky to have the chance to realise some of my dreams.  My prayers this morning have been ones of consolation with an open-handed sense of deep gratitude.  In amongst the utter randomness of the life experiences we encounter, there are moments like this morning when some of the usually disparate themes and threads seem to have a visible linkage and purpose.  I am reminded to hold these moments of consolation and remember them.  Treasure in my heart.

Hold Fast to That Which is Good

An amazing few days. 

Friends I haven't seen for years have come and stayed at The Sanctuary.  There was a remarkably good level of connection given the time span and the fact that we have inevitably taken very different paths in terms of the out-working of our lives. 

I remember a gifted young girl who was an able musician (some things don't change).  Popular - with a wide circle of friends.  I attended the same school as her for a few years and it was amongst the unhappiest period of my life.  The school just didn't work for me and it became an emotional endurence test.

I remember attending a reunion years later - walking into the hall - meeting a couple of teachers - and needing to leave.  The whole experience got under my skin and made me deeply uncomfortable. 

These days I think a Reunion would make me smile, but then I desperately wanted to believe the whole ghastly experience of being at the school had been somehow worthwhile - and I realised instead how angry I was to be back in the building and amongst teachers who sounded just as patronising as they had when I was 11!

My recollection was that this sense of our school days was not an experience shared by my friend - who I think gained a great deal from the diversity of the other youngsters we encountered and from many of the teaching staff - not least the music department.

Having an old school friend around has made me reconsider why I hated that particular school so much.  Ironically, when I moved schools for the sixth form I loved my new school and have the happiest memories of school friends and an incredibly gifted teaching staff.

I think in reality I was an awkward customer.  Articulate and insightful with an off the wall sense of humour.  I can remember is that I was devastatingly bored at school.  Somehow I was left under stimulated with the exception of English and to some degree - Art.  I had an extraordinarily gifted English teacher called Rosemary Smith - who went on to become the Headmistress of a Girls Public Day School Trust Independent School in Wimbledon.  She had a passion for language and literature but was also a very anecdotal teacher.  She taught the set I was in - The Grotties - for four years and over that time we learnt all about her family and her life outside school.  Some of the more extrovert members of the set became very adept at setting Mrs Smith off on a family reminiscence as this was often much more entertaining than ploughing our way through the poetry anthology set for our O'Level Literature examination.  However, Mrs Smith taught me the importance of learning by rote - and I can still recite some of the poems and quotations from texts we studied.  She taught me to become a confident creative writer - to believe I had something to say.  I don't think she ever particularly 'approved' of the content or style of my stories - but she rewarded a wide vocabularly - and eventually agreed that the two girls in the class with quite a passion for writing and reading could sit together.  I sat with Pauline New Year for a while.  Pauline introduced me to black soul - still a love;  Jazz; and the writings of James Baldwin - an author I return again and again to down the years.  We'd meet at Tooting Library sometimes.  I have maintained a passionate respect for black American authors ever since and cannot resist test driving anything that catches my eye.

My art teacher was Mrs Owen and she was Scottish, gifted and mildly eccentric.  She taught us nothing formally and I failed O'Level Art - but she let us experiment.  I learnt to be fearless in artistic terms and to see my efforts as work in process.

My old school friend's visit brought back memories of school which were good to revisit; to test if old wounds have healed in terms of memories of school days - which they seem to have - not even a twinge.  Now I don't feel angry - just sad.  I suspect a number of girls at the school did not realise their full potential.

I discovered how different life could be for me  when I went to a new school and grew in confidence and my sense of self.  The school my friend and I attended wasn't intrinsically bad - it was perhaps a little dated in it's approaches and expectations - and retrospectively I can see with the eyes of a teacher myself that there were many of the staff who were not gifted at inspiring young people.  In our examination years many staff were at a low ebb as the school prepared for amalgamation and to become a comprehensive.  The days of selective education in London were over and many of them did not have the skills to teach a truly mixed ability intake.

For all my negativity about the quality of the education I received between 11-16, I recognise that there were some seeds sown at that time which have shaped the whole of my adult life.  Amongst them are friendships experienced and enjoyed during this most formative of times.

As a consequence it was tremendous to have the opportunity to spend time with someone who had been an important part of that formation.  I met this week the woman that the young girl had become.  I wish we had had more time - just to natter and mull - but we both had families with us and things to do and be -  but it was good to reflect and to check out and learn about the now in each of our lives.  I am sure we will do this again.

Funny too the tricks my memory had played and the way I could challenge my own assumptions made all those years ago when we met and made friends as 11 year olds.  I always thought I was so thick and unskilled as a youngster.  I believed I was clumsy and without any noteworthy gifts, whilst my friend was a rising star as a musician and the life and soul of the party (or at least our social set of kids who didn't really fit in the more conventional groupings).  It's been fun growing up - and loving that young girl inside me who thought she did not belong and had no real ability into life.  Encouraging her towards laughter and sitting light on the many things that cannot be changed but must be owned for healing to take place.  Life is about being me becoming me and you becoming you; enjoying being what we are; becoming content in our own thoughts, feelings and skin.

New Life

Our fostered daughter has told us she has had a baby son.  I am so pleased for her and thrilled that one of his middle names is after our adopted son, his uncle!  Much celebration.

I am now a fostered grandmother.  I think we should be called Grandiose and Grandimose!  Realistically I think I will most likely be Jane!

Mum and baby sound as though they are doing really well.

My son and I were talking about whether to buy a small gift for the new baby.  He favoured a tiny set of combat fatigues.  I can see he will want us to check out Mothercare tomorrow!

New life and such opportunities.

So much to give thanks for.