It’s been a challenging few weeks. A good, though tiring school holidays in which sadly my husband and I were at odds for a large part of, coupled with family drama sweeping me into the heart of some strong and conflicting emotions, left me feeling, by the end, discombobulated. A week back into school, a bit more sleep within, my husband and I in a more buoyant space and a growing inner-peace around my family issues, and I’m feeling more ‘back’ into myself. Less flighty. Less confused. Less reactive.

There were things that arose during this time, thoughts dawning, connections made, that I wanted time to pursue, in reflection and in writing, but I was in amongst the processing, up in the air, down in the maelstrom, re-combulating. And I knew I needed to be there.

I am landing now. Here are some of my meanderings along the way:

A tender heart. During an intense week, feeling immensely raw in the aftermath of the dealings with my family, these were the words I kept coming back to. As old wounds were resurrected, as my mind charged with historical arguments, I kept coming back to my more recent understanding; a tender heart. When I could, I would let the mutterings continue but return quietly, to holding my heart tenderly in amongst the fire and my fury. In compassion. And, with cultivating this space, my heart opened to tenderly see the hearts of those also in pain in my family. I am still fragile and I still hold gently, softly my heart but there is a glowing warmth, aliveness and peace in scars that once I held so tightly. I’m not going to throw myself back into the lions but, as I’ve travelled through the last few weeks, I can see their bite isn’t personal. It’s because of their hurt too, recent and from long ago.

How in these moments can I grow? Despite peace starting to establish within, my thoughts still revisited the battling landscape between my brother and sister. In moments I would catch myself feeling caught, physically fixed, fraught. And then the question popped into my mind. How can I grow in these moments? Simply asking myself this seemed all I needed, as if the question itself needed no answer. The question seemed, seems, to automatically, invite a recognition, an acknowledgment, of growth. To not focus on my sense of stuck-ness but where instead I was blooming. And so I have been coming back to this question in the last week or so. In moments of tangled-ness, just to ask and witness my flow. I love the question. And appreciate I don’t have to go searching for an answer. My answer is here, within me. It helps me refocus, very simply, and it brings me to our plants at home. I’m great at watering them but it was only in the last year that I learned the significance of feeding them too. I’ve been pretty good at watering myself for a fair while but I’ve been missing the feed. I’m learning this now. In these moments.

Embrace your inner-queen. With a sore throat for a week or so over the holiday, I used our cat as a reminder to help me stop. Whenever he sought attention I tried my best to stop and meet him. And myself. There weren’t many windows to do this alone but in those that I could an inner-dialogue with God began, spread over a couple of days. With the kids out with my husband one weekend, I lay on our bed with our cat, and ventured in. Listening, I suddenly felt myself deep within as if a queen. I felt an assertion in myself, of my inner-authority. Knowing a command of my inner-land, my core-needs and how fluidly they exist. And suddenly, touching upon my inner-queen, I tried to shove her away. Gosh! How dare she say with such pride what she needs? How dare she think she is worth this much? Golly, as I saw her, at once, I wanted to dismiss her. So proud, so beautiful, so clear, I couldn’t see the space in which she deserved to be recognised. It was a powerful moment of acknowledgment, both her appearance and my pushing away. And made me think in the afternoon that followed of our societal obsession with princesses. How young girls are encouraged to aspire to them, despite much womanly wisdom over the years to assuage this. Culturally we’re STILL intent in our persuasion for them to be princesses waiting for their man. Yes, even in the guise of Anna. One half of the Frozen sister-duo, she seeks her man throughout, finally ‘complete’ in the arms of Kristoff in her quest for love. And the negative image of the queen prevails; either passive and indebted to her king or wicked and evil and out for revenge. Princesses are the Queen-lite. Sweetness, but the diet version. And I think of our daughter and how I want her to be her own queen, her own goddess. In command of her ship, knowing her land. Authorative. Yes!

“For when you are truly loved, when you are entirely seen, when you are fully held, it is the end of your world as you know it. Life is always seeing you in this way.” These are the words of the wonderful Matt Licata, whose wisdom inspires me daily. In the midst of the sadness that surrounded my desire to dialogue with my family, these particular words helped me remember what’s underneath the veil. Of each and every single one of us. He talks in great depth too about the precious moments between sleep and waking. He talks about how in these moments we are in our richest connection with the Beloved. He speaks to me profoundly in how he describes this space. It is one I have cherished for many years but, now with our two early waking young folk, find it difficult these days to linger there as I used to. I need to connect to this space, I have known it for long, and his presentation makes me realise why I have valued it, why I felt it’s been so significant to my sense of balance, my being.

An open skyline. I lived for years in East London. It was my spiritual homeland in many ways for a long time. But, my husband and I moved a few miles away five years ago, in a need to upgrade from one bedroom to two. However, in moving, even though in distance so close, we downgraded in skyline. Part geographical, part architectural, we loose here the open sky. Open sky and the direct eye-line that it enables; that with head poised forward and up, can throw a gaze straight forward and see ahead without craning eyes upwards. Daily, for years, having this at my fingertips for my vision (external and in), was music for my nervous system. It was effortless nourishment for my soul. I now, daily, have to crane. To throw my sight can only happen, this side west of the Kingsland Road, when I pull my head back and gaze up at the sky. It creates a simple tension and changes my mindset. I miss the immediacy of my former luxury and look forward to finding it afresh somewhere new.

And so I keep meandering whilst I re-combulate. I’m enjoying this space. Happy Monday folks!

Image: American Children’s Illustration 

I have been working with my younger self this week. Not intentionally. But have felt her strong presence. Standing in the middle. Urging for fairness and equality. Blood fuming through her system. Knowing what she is experiencing around her is not right. Trying to use everything in her power to create balance. Learning what integrity is, and isn’t, from a very young age. Knowing the hurt from when words are not met with action. When words are twisted. When the truth is hidden.

She has been loud and present this week and I have so valued being with her. I have so valued being with her pain and sadness. And her strength. I am so proud of her. For continuing to fight for a worthy cause. Even those around her won’t hear her. I love this about her. And I love the fact I have had an opportunity to revisit the rawness of her heartache, as crazy as that might sound. I love the fact that I have me, now, to sit with her, feel her rage, feel what she has been fighting for, for what seems her whole life. It is a mighty privilege to be able to witness her. And to side along her side.

I understand the hope she invested because of the love she felt and I admire that we have chosen to put me first now. To not love me more than them, but prioritise my needs for self-care.

It has been a rocky road this week but the intensity in my tear-ducts that spoke so vociferously NO!!!!!! has lessened from the cascades of salt-water I shed. I feel the breadth in my heart as I arrive to the other side (for now). It beats with deep, rolling gratitude to those who offered gentle words and kindness in my darkness. Today, as I thoroughly enjoy my time so far still in bed, I’m aware of a new inhabitancy in my being. As if I am truly stepping into the driving seat. Connections are firing in my energetic body that first took the form of relief and are now charging with an enlivened-ness. That perhaps come with ownership, perhaps self-ownership. I am with a new inner-command. Or perhaps less new, just stepping into my six-year self’s shoes, rather than abandoning her in a battle of many.

Thank you sweet-child for revealing your plight this week, revealing your torment, for feeling brave enough to LET IT OUT. I hear you.

Yesterday I had a wretched day. Last Saturday was the first anniversary of my mothers’s death and in these last few days since, it has felt like no time has passed at all. I’ve been right back there, in the midst of the initial loss, sadness and pain. And, on top of it, in the last few weeks, I have been dealing with feuding family, behaving as mercenaries, in the handling of her will. Yesterday I was fuming after reading a gamut of emails between my sister, brother and one of the executors. So, with summer holiday kids in tow, in a bid to change my mental scenery and pause my limbs for a moment, I took our son and daughter to the cinema at lunchtime and, slightly regrettably, headed straight afterwards to the supermarket to buy new school trousers.

It was like a jumble sale in the kid’s clothes selection. The uniforms were all over the place and I had to burrow my head to search for the right size boys trousers. Leaning down to forage, I bashed my forehead into a pole jutting out carrying school shirts. I hadn’t seen it. It hurt like hell and I yelled a mighty OWWWWW! A woman with her daughter turned around and asked if I was all right. Indignantly (towards the pole, not her) I spouted a hefty NO! She stared, turned to her daughter, commented, said no more then walked away. It triggered instantly the hurt and rejection I felt from my family and consequently was the straw that broke my camel’s back. I complained to the manager about the pole and, as we left the shop, tears started to fall. I felt too I was starting to fall, physically. The kids and I sat in the car as I tried to gather myself. When we returned home I realised I was mildly concussed.

Thankfully my husband was soon back from work and I went upstairs to rest with ice on the bump. He kindly put the kids to bed after supper whilst I recovered from the pain and the shock. Yet, in my retreat from the day, it meant I didn’t properly say goodnight to them until I got ready to go to sleep myself later in the evening.

I had bitten emotionally at our son during the afternoon, in my overwhelmed sense of unjustness with what I had been reading through that morning. He had grabbed one of his sister’s toys from her just after demanding one of his back earlier in the day, which, in my blinkered eyes at the time, I swiftly judged as unfairness and inequality. Yet rather than talking to him calmly and offering a conversation, I barked and snapped. And thereafter, it was like opening a can of worms. I continued to bite. Usually, I feel more capable of empathy, patience and fair-mindedness, but even on waking in the morning, I felt not myself, mentally eschewing in the background of my mind the volcanic landscape of my family.

I was grateful for my husband’s hand with both our son and daughter during the evening. It gave me a chance to find my breath and internally reconnect. But I knew too there was a little conversation I needed to have with our son, even though by then he was asleep. So, resting my head beside him, I lay my hand on his belly and explained where I had been during the day. I apologised for my harshness, telling him how much I have been struggling lately. And, as I spoke, suddenly I became aware of an incredible light shining forth from the top of his skull. OH MY DAYS! The light that was shining was so, SO bright. It’s force so, SO strong, so, SO powerful.

I stayed with what I saw before me and it didn’t stop. He kept shining and shining through. And then I realised, this light, his torch, is always there. It has been me that has not always been seeing it.

Returning to our bedroom, I held this in my thoughts and started to make connections. Despite choosing to learn him through listening as a newborn, I realised I had also listened to others. When he wanted the breast all the time, I heard their negativity. When he barely slept at night, I heard their negativity. When he scratched other children or wouldn’t share his toys, I heard their negativity. I had felt so keenly the connectivity of his mind to the universe in the first few months of his life, but as I became, learned to be his mother, I realised how my sight of him, over the years, had been dampening down his light. People had been quick to judge, pass comment. He’s a bit of bruiser. He’s a nightmare…. And, slowly, tragically, unknowingly, I took this onboard. Despite wanting to honour the fullness of his being, I realised increasingly, over the years, I failed to see him shine as radiantly as he so effortlessly does. And I see now how he has been calling me to witness his radiance. For myself, but truly, fundamentally in my eyes, for him. For I know how fundamentally my perception is so vital and integral to his sense of self-worth, for now and the future to come.

And so, as I lay in our bed, I decided to make a pledge to him. It is thus:

I am sorry my beloved that my eyes narrowed, my mind dimmed, my heart grew closed to YOU. You deserve my whole, everyday, to say yes and embrace your incredible luminosity. You shine so magically and I have been putting you in shade. I will change this. From now, I seek to reframe my thinking, my viewing and endeavour to hold your brightness, in it’s magnificence, in my vision.

And I made a pledge to myself; to open my eyes again and keep the image of his torch each day alive in my mind. I know my patterns of mentally and emotionally shutting him down. I may not voice them aloud but I know the energetic detriment they can carry. And I know he can’t grow fully, as he deserves to, if I continue to critic him, even in seeming silence.

For now, this is all I can write about our son’s truth that I had the privilege to see last night. I am deeply grateful, in amongst all the heartache and pain from the day yesterday, I was able to witness this gift. And I know each of us has our own torch that glows with greatness and each deserves recognition and to shine in it’s fullness and breadth. I know I will continue ruminating on this and write more soon as my pledge to him, and the one to myself, unfold. For now, I am curious.

Image: Brad Goldpaint

When our eldest was born I was the ripe, not so old, age of 37. I had spent my adult life until then predominately pursing my passions and my dreams. I felt fortunate to be in this position, this privilege, and too was aware of how much of what I had created was of my own making. I hadn’t received a golden spoon to enable my path. I was working from my heart and, to actualise my imaginings, I knew I simply had to listen to my truth.

From my early twenties my purpose had been clear: to work with people in the water. I knew it’s power and it’s ability to reveal, nourish and heal. I’d had a vision and it stayed fresh in my mind, in my body and soul, until one day I stood in the water and, behold, my arms were extended with someone lying, resting in my hands. My vision was manifest and, not only this, I was standing amongst a group of others doing exactly the same. There were others that spoke my language and I felt, at the time, I had begun to arrive home.

Part of this privilege before our son was born was being able to meet my physical needs. I was self-employed, earning enough to get by and free to work my hours largely around me, which felt enormously indulgent. I LOVED being in the water, I craved it and spent as much time, when not working in it, just being in it. Playing, swimming, lying at the bottom, floating… I loved too dancing, yoga, Capoeira…. I knew how much physical-ness harnessed me. It fed me. I learned so much about myself through it. I met my breath through it. It caressed my nervous system. I could discourse with my energetic body. And I felt strong, bound and empowered through it. But I also knew within my connection to it, in part was addiction. As greatly as it gave to me positively, my sense of self also depended on it.

A few weeks before our son was born, poignantly I remember standing in the shower at the pool after a swim and play, wondering; How will I be not being able to come to water whenever I want? Throughout all my adult life, every window I could create, in every country, city, land I visited, I would find water to go find myself in. I was curious how, with the very soon to be prospect of motherhood, I could create these opportunities with a young baby in tow? And part of me wanted to experiment with life without my frequent go-to friend, to discover who I was without her.

My first swim, after our son was born, was when he was six weeks. My husband sat on the side whilst I nipped into the lido, swam a handful of lengths and jumped out. Our son wanted a feed. He wanted them frequently, hourly, throughout day and night. I had an overabundant supply of milk and, with so much fore-milk, he wasn’t receiving the sustenance he needed. He and I were also trying to fill a hole. He had been in neo-natal shortly after birth and we spent the following year calling out for each other, both needing to arrive deep in connection and heal those first few nerve-wrecking days.

At the time, I met other new mothers, keen to get their ‘bodies back’, their ‘lives back’. But I found less I needed, wanted to swim. I wanted less my old life. I didn’t want to go backwards. I wanted to be in here and now and, then, my here and now, was learning and responding to our son. I dived instead into him. And despite the increasing sleep deprivation, I felt full, confident and buoyant, perhaps because of the years prior feeding and nourishing myself. Despite too my upbringing, it’s cold brutality and the scars it had left within me, I felt daring. The imprint of my past left no desire to repeat and I dared to trust my instincts, my gut, and parent how I felt true.

And then, somewhere along my path into motherhood, I lost my cord. Twenty-four months of sleepless nights, ongoing health problems, years of financial stress, several broken friendships, minimal familial support and engagement…. Things heavily took their toll. In retrospect, it’s easy for me to say I wasn’t looking after myself enough, but in the windows I took, I intently tried to nourish and meet myself. It felt like miniscule drops in a mighty ocean but I knew I needed to start somewhere. Yet I spent years angry. With myself and others around. Aggrieved with family for their lack of support. Frustrated with my husband for not feeling held sufficiently. Furious at myself for not being what or who I used to be. I was too depleted and exhausted to start working again and, because of my own childhood, wanted to be present for our children in their early years.

I started to feel formless. My identity shifted from something greatly affirming to something non. Part of me knew this was the very essence of my journey but in the currency in which we live; of supposed ‘certainty’, fixed points of reference, of the crippling definitions of career, home, family, body, holidays, I felt voiceless. I saw engagement evaporate from people’s eyes when I said I was a stay at home mother. I didn’t want to talk of what I had previously done. I wanted to talk of now but suddenly I found myself fighting internally, following my heart and this unknown territory on one hand and wanting to find connection and resonance in my day to day on the other.

Oh what a tricky land to negotiate within, this morphing, evolving identity. That is at once so personal and so unique yet is sold to us as a one-set, fits all, perfect shape. (Just like our physiques). Our cultural journey into motherhood regrettably thrives on nursing our insecurities. Heralded as a must do, an apparent right of passage for women, yet simultaneously wholly undermined and devalued. Our instincts, so valid and integral as mothers, are thrown around a bull-ring, chewed, spat out and ‘re-packaged’ from not voices of ourselves but the seemingly ‘correct’ do’s and don’ts and how to ‘fit’ in, for us a mothers as well our children. And whilst we fret about the should’s and should not’s, competing with our sisters rather than supporting, the source of our power, so magnificent in our being, time and again is extinguished. It’s incessant and deeply tragic.

Personally I don’t want to fit in but I do want to connect and find kinship. My village. And my power. I have been slowly making inroads into the oceans that lie within me. I have torn myself to pieces over the years for not being super. Not being able to be an all-singing, all-dancing mum. I blamed myself for falling apart and realise now, with gentleness and generosity, I was sinking because my resources were low. We moved when our son was 18 months old. I felt like an incoherent, sleep-deprived mess making new friends. Our son started biting and scratching other kids and I stayed on full alert trying to prevent bloody spillages and harsh words and glares from the new parents I met. We were living hand to mouth financially whilst neighbours around donned three storey townhouses, with playrooms, guest rooms, attic rooms and summer holidays in chateaus in France that spanned months not weeks. We stayed with our stay-cations, we had no choice for other. I could have gone back to work. Maybe then we could heed a lifestyle of similar degrees but my underlying choice was to stay and create healthy roots for our children. My unstable health underpinned this too. And I wanted to learn and re-shape what had been handed to me as a child and, despite myths, I’m none too great at juggling.

Then to cap a giant snowball, I departed from myself after our daughter was born. Radically. The panic of being hospitalised so soon after she was born and being separated, triggered deep wounds of trauma I had experienced as a child. Yet ironically, in all my soul-searching, pre-motherhood, trying to crack the tightly held nut inside me, the internal blind-spot that refuted connection, even a little conversation, I began to converse with. Ironically, in all my ‘awakening’ in seeking to meet this dark truth inside prior to children, it had been met with resistance all the way. But, putting what I now recognise as my coping mechanisms aside – my water work, the yoga, mediation, healing work…. I was able to reveal some more innate, older mechanisms, that were so uncomfortable, so painful, they necessitated me inwards in a way in which I wasn’t able to access before. In my un-anchoring, from the things that had fed and sustained me to a certain level, I was called to meet the terror of my past. Breaking down, filled to the brim on anxiety and nervous energy, petrified within, desperately wanting to find my ‘strong’ self again, wanting, like my teenage self, to clean the shitty feelings out, with support, I started to touch upon the abuse that I had disassociated with for as long as I have known. Given a choice, I still pull back from going there. But in finding the courage to name it and speak it aloud, I feel more assured, more comfortable in my acknowledgement and more able to tenderly meet what arises. And too, I enjoy the freedom from the fear that had pervaded me for so long.

And so this crazy, contradictory journey of motherhood. Wanting to move forward, I left behind what had kept me afloat for so long. In distress, I even abandoned myself for a while. But yes, I still tried to make inroads. Maybe it’s because it’s seven years since I was pregnant and a new cycle is beginning. Maybe it’s because I have listened to whispers. Maybe it’s just because. But I have begun to swim and play enough in the water that once more I’m starting to experience my energetic body. Yes! I’m starting to re-claim my physicality, although this time, with less dependency but more lightness and curiosity instead. I know now part of this dependency before had been entwined with the abuse I experienced and a need to feel physically strong enough to push away what I didn’t want. I didn’t know this before having kids. And I’m so grateful I do now. I have too begun to practice some yoga and enough to re-connect with my core-power, which I’m quietly reveling in.

Yes. I am feeling an arrival in my body that feels at once familiar yet, magically, new. I have aged. I turned forty when our daughter was born. I grew curvier, heavier, less lithe, less bendy. I mentally resisted and fought for a while gravity pulling my flesh and skin downwards. As we all do. But a new language is becoming my body as I re-engage. I feel as if I have traveled to foreign lands and returned home, full of new and old wisdom. Redefined. Newly formed. Newly, wonderfully, informed. It has taken me years to fully embrace the amorphous province of motherhood, the one in which communication resides so significantly in the non-verbal. The one we so often grab a parachute to jump out of and fall back into life where we are less challenged by small folk. It’s challenged me more than I could have ever imagined and unwittingly, despite intently wanting to move forward, made me yearn at times for my old younger self. But I am starting to feel less alien. I’m starting to understand how I can exist within this realm and, feel, sense, an umbilical cord of my own making, looping in and around itself. It is it bounding me immensely. And it is a wonderful feeling; to feel once more I can face the world knowing I’m working in the unknown but feeling strong enough to worry and care far less about the definitions, constraints and constrictions.

I know coming into my body, for me personally, still carries weight to enable this. And energetically this is vital. I know well the work I have done as a mother, inspired, invited by my children, excavating one of the loudest blind spots from my past has brought me to the place also. As well as the love of beautiful souls who have met me in my pain. And perhaps too, this new verve and inward swagger, comes with the grace and beauty of being 44.

Image: Oliver O’Brien

Last Saturday evening I had the privilege of listening to Mac Macartney, founder of Embercombe, speak. It was the second time that I have been fortunate to have this opportunity. Both times I have found him, so eloquent, so gifted in his ability to communicate, completely mesmerising. Both times, however, I have found it tricky to stay awake. His words flow like gold and, as they speak to other parts of my brain and being, I have fallen into quite a soporific state.

On Saturday, I tried to catch the full meaning behind his sentences, his gems of wisdom, but, suspended in the delight of simply hearing him speak, I found it nearly impossible. By the time he would reach the end of one, I had forgotten where he had begun. And so, as I have learnt to do when listening to others in the past, I decided my best way ahead was to stay in the moment and take home with me after just one or two of his pearls, those that resonated with me the most.

And there were two. Even now though, trying to recall them, I struggle. I know they are singing their way through me. I am aware of their presence and how they are informing me whilst I digest in these last few days, but in a deep part of my reflection which is mostly non-verbal. Yet today, in their significance, in helping me out of a hole where I have been caught, I feel a desire to coax them into words and write.

He presented us with his first question, in a quest to awaken, of what do we love most deeply. Whilst he continued to speak, so I asked myself, ‘What do I love most deeply? Loudly, resoundingly, without hindrance or hesitation, my answer was my family. And then, as he spoke about integrity, he invited us, in his unfolding story, to stand by that which we love most deeply. This was my AH HA! moment. This I recognised as such a vital, integral key. So simple, so full of weight and immeasurable power when we act in this way. AH HA! I thought to myself and then drifted in and out, trying to listen in my sleepiness and awe.

The second subject that anchored me right in, bringing tears to my eyes, as he recited the possibility that our soil stands to have only sixty harvests left within it. I was overwhelmed with a heavy sadness on hearing this. What brought us to this place of such criminality to this earth? Why do we continue to reap and reap and reap and not love and love and love? Why are we so blind to the consequence of our activity? What drives us to such greed and ignorance? His words have haunted me and momentarily paralyse me as I try to gather my breath once again from this shock. I am angry inside for my own blind eye but, unequivocally, I can only step forward with forgiveness and a commitment to greater responsibility for my choices and how they impact on this earth.

On returning to our yurt that evening after the talk, I ruminated on both this and the question; what do I love most deeply? As I ventured within in my enquiry, I was surprised at the second response that arose. I found myself saying, I love my heart. Wow! This felt amazing to acknowledge but also, my doubting mind, worried; Am I arrogant to feel this? Is this self-importance at play? And so I dialogued with myself. It is my truth. Yes, I  do truly and deeply love and cherish my own heart. I am so proud of the one I was gifted with. It has served me through pain and adversity. It has served me profoundly through the torment that was my childhood. I love that within my heart, my heart just as all in which God occupies, I haven’t completely closed down. I haven’t followed the path, that could have been so easy to take, and continue to shove out pain to the rest of the world. I have come time and again to the truth that shines in my heart and speaks to me: There IS another way! I am so grateful to this guidance. It is not separate of me. It is part of me but I know how deep down inside it is a voice of this world and it is for me, in my own heart, to listen to and share.

And then, as I stepped down further into my expedition, I considered do I, and how can I, stand by that which I love most deeply. With my family, my answer came easily. Yes, it feels effortless to stand by them. And I saw the parts in which I don’t and how I can strengthen and harness so much to stand by these. With my heart, with my initial doubtful, learned mind whether this was OK, whether it was acceptable, it actually came in an instant. YES! YES! YES! Stand by the beauty that which is inside me. Stand by what my heart sometimes whispers, sometimes yells and screams at me. Stand by my heart in uncertainty. Stand by my heart in pain and sadness. Stand by my heart just as I would and do for my children.

In the days that have passed since hearing Mac, I have kept coming back to this dawning. In the days that have passed too, I have been mad and angry. On retiring to bed that evening, I felt ripped inside with exhaustion. Our family had spent a six-day road trip around Devon in the week preceding our visit to Embercombe. It had been glorious. My husband and I had watched our children unfold in each space we visited. With friends on their farm. With visits to the Moor, to the sea, with pub suppers, with otters and butterflies…. In the rain and the blue skies. We saw them grow hugely and shine brightly. Our travels gave them both so much and so too at Embercombe. But the other side of the coin, was unpacking and re-packing at every destination we arrived. We had over-filled our plates and, by Saturday night, I was done and entered into a funk. By the time we arrived home, late Sunday evening, I wanted to push everyone away and just hang out with me. I needed to come inwards and stop. And I became angry and resentful that I couldn’t immediately find that. In truth I had needed it for weeks over the school holidays and my efforts to try to create it had been thwarted. BAAAAAAAH!!! I felt, I raged.

Yet, whilst internally I tightly held my fury, I also kept reminding myself to stand by that which I love most deeply. In these moments, I kept reminding myself to stand by my heart and, now with some space and time today to reflect, it has opened up a mirror within. Suddenly, in a fleeting moment, I was able to recognise my perfectionist self. And suddenly, my unresolved and on-going anger made sense. With swiftness and light, it felt far easier to release and I could realign myself away from the intensity of my battle.

In perfection I have hid from myself. From life. In perfection I have created protection. From pain and hurt. I have clung to it, as if a ballast of a shipwreck. I have lost myself at times, in, to perfection. Yes. It has been necessary. For a while. Whilst I knew no other way. Somewhere to take shelter, whilst so scared, so terrified. But then it became my nom de plume in times of uncertainty. In times of fear, of feeling threatened. If I could stick on that railroad, cling to that ballast, I would be alright. Everything would be alright. For had I so, so needed it to be.

I can look back now and see. Why certain things I held dear and wanted to welcome into my life, fell away. Because I wasn’t wholly engaged. Living. Because I grew angry when everyone else wasn’t striving for a righteous path, dedicated to the better good for all, rather than for themselves. It had been a coping mechanism, a survival strategy. If everything around me was perfect, I could not be accused. I stood less to be attacked. If everything was clean and crisp, in my conscience, in my surrounds, no one would scream at me. Or at least, if they did, I could say how hard I had tried. To be good. To be perfect…

What a bitter pill to swallow. More so to admit and accept. How hard and harsh I have been on myself, on those around. Today feels an invitation to wave an amiable nod to perfection. And when in future I find myself in a troubled cul-de-sac, I now know to ask; Is perfectionism raising it’s manicured head? Do I need a little conversation?

And then I come back, in my mind, to Embercombe. From how I have grown since we first visited in May. To what I have learned, to what I have been able to recognise and let go of. I am deeply grateful. It is now in my heart a home. Somewhere to retreat into, to witness my self, the easy and the less so. To not judge but instead to gently hold and nourish within. And too an immense home for my children.

I saw our son, without words from me, embrace it in a different way this time. On our first visit, he seemed to remain at times distinct from it, like I think I did myself too. But this time, he fell in. He found his place, his role. He played with his mates but too he chose to serve lunch, then dinner, then lunch again. He helped feed the chickens, stack wood, help others. This time he intuitively grew more part of Embercombe. As well our daughter. She climbed merrily into a bubble of fun and mischief with other elves, big and small. I have watched her play with her buddies at her playgroup, peers of all the same age, kindly guided by the grown-ups. The giants. And then I watched her over the last weekend with newly found friends at Embercombe, roam freely and create magic in the beatific space. Like musical notes, in height and age, her ‘sisters’ and ‘brothers’. No clean lines to delineate, to de-mark. Just great happiness in the songs and mayhem they instigated, unedited, together.

I know which play space, which sight, my heart prefers to witness our children in. It is this one. Yes. It feels perfect but here, at Embercombe, ‘perfection’ inhabits a different form. Not cultivated in minds or engineered through fear or a desire to control. It manifests, for children and adults like, in the impermanent dance of joy and bliss. In connection. Here, it finds us wildly. There is no need to seek, to hanker, to try to cement. It comes and goes as we are encircled with the abundant love and warmth that Embercombe consciously cultivates and nurtures. As a slice of heaven meets us on, in earth.

I look forward very much to the next time I have the fortune to hear Mac speak. I know there will be more gems to ruminate upon, to allow to sink into my understanding, to facilitate gentle transformations in my being. I feel humbled to sit in his insights and thoroughly, thoroughly recommend, if you ever have the opportunity, to go and listen to how he sees us in the world. It may only hypnotise you and lull you into sleep, but it will fill your dreams with old memories, forgotten ways of being, lost connections and, most importantly, new pathways of discovery.

Since our son broke up from school for the summer holidays a few weeks ago he’s generally shown a significant level of internal disquiet whilst adjusting to the stopping and undoing. Some days his needs have felt impossible. Some days everything has seemed insufficient to him and he’s requested more, more, MORE! I’ve managed to hold the space and allow him to fall apart safely in my arms as I’ve put my boundaries in place but I found it exhausting.

I was unprepared for how disconnected he might feel as he had seemed so buoyant and cheerful in the preceding weeks before school finished. And this past weekend I collapsed, utterly shattered, from the emotional intensity I experienced with him during the last week. I had not felt fully resourced within myself in my parenting shoes as the holidays approached. I had in fact been feeling raw and vulnerable whilst processing some deeply held emotions as we near the first anniversary of my mother’s passing. Last night however, as I whispered sweet dreams into his resting ear before I went to bed, I told him how much I had enjoyed our day together. I said I see how confused he is at the moment and how I want to help him. And then the following words came from my mouth:

I will meet you with everything I can tomorrow in your frustrations.
I won’t give you everything I can. 

They felt powerful words to speak, resonating deeply inside me as I quietly took charge, and a very timely reminder as I try to tenderly look after myself whilst caring for him and his sister. A good mantra to bring forth for the coming weeks.

He was in good spirits on waking this morning. So far he, his sister and I have flowed like honey in our connection together. The three of us are sitting at the dining table whilst I write, they both drawing, colouring and creating. I don’t know how the rest of our day will unfold but I recognise where my boundary is and what I can give. It won’t be in his endless requests for TV (we had a completely screen free day yesterday which felt wonderful and so far today too!) or another trip to the playground or some ice-cream. It will be instead as he yells and gnarls and possibly wants to bite out at the world. This I know I can do. And most importantly, I know I can do it whilst honouring my own heart.

I cherish these two incredible gifts I have before me. Happy Tuesday!

Image: Mary Cassat

This is Not Personal; My Introduction to NPA’s

I first met Gulara Vincent at a family camp called Grow the Grown Ups at Embercombe in Devon, earlier this summer. I was in the midst of processing a bevy of heavy emotions that were arising during the week and consequently tried to keep my head down throughout the time to avoid distraction. In turn, I only briefly spoke to Gulara. She sang at an open mic night towards the end of the week and I was spellbound, drawn into the depth of her energy that she seemed to contain so imperceptibly. We shared a few words after this but it wasn’t until after everyone returned home and folk started re-connecting on social media, that we really hit it off.

Alongside others, her profile photo kept appearing on my page. Despite not having chatted significantly face-to-face, again there was something that drew me in; her Cheshire Cat smile full of warmth and contentedness, the lightness in her eyes, the joy in her face. We began to discover a resonance between us as we started to share, through our individual writings, our experiences at Embercombe. It was then I realised why I felt so moved to connect with her; I felt in many ways she was a kindred spirit.

As we opened up to each other, I explained how I sometimes felt blocked in my writing, which I knew was to do with childhood trauma. She very kindly asked if I would like to receive an offering; a one-to-one on the telephone or through Skype, using techniques to help release blocked emotions and energy. Without knowing too much about exactly what she did, with much gratitude towards her, my intuition said YES. And so, a few days later, we did just that.

She had outlined how the call would run but I didn’t know quite what to expect in the content of the work. It did not matter. Instantly, as she lead me through the Deep Listening and then introduced the NPA work, I felt safely bound in her sense of knowing. Gulara possesses an immense energy. At once calm and still, she’s like the warm autumn sunshine, glowing through in golden-ness. Yet she also carries a full-bodied charge, as if a storm brewing, inviting, ushering in, the gentle winds of change. I absolutely love this about Gulara; they are rare qualities to inhabit, especially to embody side by side and I have an enormous respect for who she is.

My time spent with her on the phone that Monday morning was powerful and intense, in a way in which I felt deeply comfortable stepping into the work. As she tenderly guided me, a dawning began in understanding the significance of the process and the heart of which it was seeking to connect to. At the end of our call together, she advised me to continue the NPAs for the following 30 days and emailed shortly after the ones to particularly focus on.

Prior to speaking with her, I knew nothing about this kind of work but soon learned this: NPA stands for Non Personal Awareness and involves a simple of sequence of phrases to repeat daily for difficult emotions that people are seeking to release. It does, wonderfully, what it says on the tin, enabling us to create space from the attachment we constantly, and mostly unknowingly, intertwine with our emotions. A key phrase is applied to each emotional state, ‘This is not personal’ as the sequence is worked through to help us as we begin to free ourselves from the feelings we might be experiencing. This phrase, so simple and effective, for me I found simultaneously revolutionary in my thinking in it’s intention and yet, too, I completely ‘got it’, where it was coming from, what is was and how it sought to reveal.

Gulara gave me the option to combine the phrases with EFT, the Emotional Freedom Technique, which she explained can make the work more powerful. EFT uses an approach called Tapping in which you tap certain meridian point on the head and upper body to again help the process of releasing. I had heard of tapping before and knew of people singing it’s praises but this, together with practicing the NPAs was my first actual experience of it and I decided to use them both.

And so my journey began, creating 20 minutes within my day, to stop and internally focus with the four NPA’s Gulara had recommended. Still buzzing from my telephone session with her, the first week was incredibly dynamic. I felt hugely inspired and both valued and appreciated the de-personalisation of emotional states, whether ‘positive’ or ‘negative’. It reminded me greatly of the Peaceful Parenting approach I practice with my children; providing space for them to really, fully feel their feelings within safe, loving and non-judgmental arms. Only using the NPA technique on myself, it was myself holding this space for me to work through the intensity and difficulty of some deeply held, old emotions. The intention within Peaceful Parenting is to enable our children to release their feelings, in the present, and help them return to their natural equilibrium and flow. Possibly because of my work with our children in this way, I could see instantaneously, whilst practicing the NPAs, how, yes, the energy of our emotional states is truly and fundamentally a fleeting experience. And it is our human nature, perhaps intrinsically or perhaps because of how we are socialised, that our tendency is not to fully acknowledge this. We instead loose their very essence, their motion, whilst we weave in attachment and ownership of ‘our’ feelings and, as we begin to embody them, in the embodiment, we unwittingly bind ourselves to these transitionary states.

I guess, in hindsight, I had recognised this from previous experiences with mediation and healing work, but for the first time, through practicing the NPAs, I found an anchor into tangibly seeing this from the inside out. For the first time I could see the connectivity of these energies and how, depending on our state of being ~ or possibly not being, we would pick up and inhabit them, with very often hooking and locking into them. And, depending on our state, we could either continue to hold onto them or allow them to pass. I could see my own pattern, alongside the potential patterns of my children, in how this occupation manifests. I could see too how liberating it is to undo ourselves from this ownership and allow our beings instead to experience and feel the magnificent connectivity of flow between all, whether we deem it good, bad, joy-giving, painful, easy or difficult….

So, I attentively continued, happy as a bunny, with my eyes growing wider until I hit a wall of resistance a week later. Suddenly the work felt too much. Suddenly it felt too overwhelming and exhausting letting go of these of big old feelings. Everyday day, whether positive or negative, we let our emotions define us and internally part of me started to panic; Who am I if I no longer consider myself happy, angry or sad? Who am I without these definitions, these fixing points? I began to find whilst using the approach, I was not only releasing some less healthy emotions, I was also unknowingly un-hinging old identities of and within myself and for a moment, and a small voice within me, felt uncertain about this adjustment. Thankfully however, a slightly more confident part, the part that wholly got the how and the what of the work, knew I needed to surrender to this and Gulara, in her soulful wisdom, helped me through. Affirmingly, she suggested doing an NPA on resistance, going gently with myself and reminded me that when heavy past feelings are released, it’s common to feel very tired as we work through their energy. Hearing and thinking about her words, I realised, with my enthusiasm, I had been very keen and super-intent throughout the first week of practicing, perhaps searching for results too quickly, and that I could be more gracious, allowing and less outcome driven as I continued.

Wow! It is now five weeks since I started and my 30 days have finished. I am almost speechless about the process that has unfolded within me during this time. Writing about my experiences usually comes relatively easily, with happily swimming in the depths, but this, how I have shifted with the new-ness of my mind(un)set and flow of emotions, I am still processing so much. Still evolving so much. My being is in a space that I don’t yet entirely recognise BUT it is powerful, so, so powerful. I feel able, incredibly able with an openness and a new understanding of how I can travel through uncomfortable emotional states, to go right through to the heart of them and move through to the other side. Before this, I had felt brave enough going in but I didn’t have the interior tools to know how to come out and often found myself ‘over’-experiencing them. But now I feel maneuverability. And should I re-coil into an ‘older’ state of being, I find myself, rather than falling back into a mindset with it, able to position myself and sit in between. With this growing awareness, I feel I’m discovering and creating the beginnings of a potentially marvelous capability to poise myself in relation to emotional states. They are no longer ‘my’ emotional states, they are simply states that I am experiencing and I feel an invigorated freedom to enjoy the dance between them. And it is, in fact, simply this: a dance and I am developing an increasing ability to consciously choreograph and inform the relationship between myself and these non-personal energies.

Probably my greatest revelation during this time has been my NPA on love. Supposedly, I imagined, straight-foward but, I noticed how whilst practicing this one in particular, when I allowed myself to feel it, how quickly I wanted to give it away. Fascinatingly, I found easier staying power with the other more seemingly awkward emotions, the ones I knew too well, yet love, felt like a slippery eel, in my hand one minute and gone the next. I know part of this is historical within me but, appreciating the nature and intent of the work, it makes me wonder how common this is within us all. Do we all possess a struggle, to smaller and greater degrees, to allow our beings to experience love? Gracefully, with this self-acknowledgement and my learnings through the work, despite my tendency to too swiftly let love go, I now see how I can more purposefully cultivate a wider and more generous invitation internally to permit love in. I see now too very much how I am the key-holder to this; from what I had learned as a child I had believed otherwise.

Gulara has been lovingly present with me on every step on my journey as my mind has been re-setting, whilst new synapses have been forming. She has held me in uncertainty, encouraged me in my resistance, celebrated with me as I welcomed change and, in receipt of her generous offer, my energy grows more buoyant, bountiful and stronger as the weeks pass by. I feel so hugely blessed that our paths crossed earlier this year and to have met such a beautiful, courageous and inspiring being. Her wisdom astounds me every time we connect and I’m profoundly grateful to her for her heartfelt kindness, warmth and guidance in her offering and support whilst learning about the significance of that which is not personal.

Nameste dear Gulara and thank YOU!

You can learn more about Dr. Gulara Vincent’s work through her website on: www.gularavincent.com

And about the founder of the NPA work, Joel Young, on: www.joelyoungnpa.com

Image: Frans Lanting