I would like to buy a bench, said my husband’s Mum.
My husband is a headteacher and had sent out a request for donations towards a lovely garden area for students. It would be a place for them to meet, chat, and enjoy a few moments during break and lunch.
My mother-in-law was very clear that her donation was to buy a bench. It meant a lot to her and I questioned why it had to be a bench in particular?
There was an entire story in her response
We have many choices. More resources than ever for whatever we might need. There is an option saturation that keeps us looking and depletes our time.
Finally settling for one choice would help. Only if this didn’t keep us worried about keeping our options open since we might be missing out on something even better.
I was very lucky recently when a friend offered me the use of her woodland lodge for a night. I arrived early and left in the evening the next day. As I stepped onto the balcony and found myself engulfed by trees and birdsong, the emotions that spun through me were palpable. Totally alone, immersed in nature, I could almost hear an almost silent tinkle of fairy-dust showering me with lightness and clarity. The rush of excitement danced with the calm of tranquillity and the blend was a perfect partnership.
If you feel that you will not measure up to your own expectations, be kind to yourself. You may be clinging on to lies about your abilities because that is safer: if you allow yourself to acknowledge positive truths about your potential, you simultaneously risk experiencing the shame of failure if things do not go to plan. So we step back and stay in that safe place. Often, we are our harshest judge and jury, but please hear that someone else will drive that car and have that amazing trip, regardless of whether or not we put the key in the ignition.
What do I want from my life? Have you asked yourself that question lately? You despair that you have not ticked all the boxes in life, or that you have ticked them all, and what now? How do you feel? Are you happy with where you are in life, career, relationships, accomplishments? Are you still waiting for your life to begin?
Oh my wordicles! Everyone appears to be decluttering, minimalising, scandivising and just generally chucking their lifetime’s accumulation of stuff into the metaphorical and often actual bin - yikes! Surely I will need that incomplete set of twelve cocktail glass stem rings that aunty whoever bought me for my twenty first?
Still Doing It After 50? Ooh la la! What could this be I wonder? Is this too much information? Of course not my lovely readers. I am, of course, referring to the practice of ‘Body Brushing’. This is something I have executed on a regular basis before showering, since my late teens. Apart from the odd blip, this has been part of my regular routine almost like brushing my teeth.
Are you in your 40’s or 50’s and feeling just a little lost? What is expected of you now? Maybe you have had a successful career so far or maybe you are finally ready to launch one but feel guilty investing time in yourself? Do you look at photos of a younger you and think ‘this is it, I’ll never look or feel that good again, just have to stumble on as best as I can’? Or are you optimistic about your future but wonder what is acceptable to pursue?
Who wants to age? When we were children, we could not wait until our next birthday to be a year older, a year nearer to being ‘all growed up’. At what point do we say ‘actually, next year I would like to start counting backwards’? What makes us say that? Is it anything to do with how we feel, physically or mentally? Is it how we look? Is it how society makes us feel?
Well that's three posts under my belt and the world hasn't stopped turning! See? What have I lost? What is the worst that could have happened? Sounds easy doesn't it? But wait …. was it really easy? Whilst the end result of the three posts seems pleasing enough, what about the journey? What about the moment you press 'publish'?
So, I’m supposed to write. Having acquired a laptop, finally, I am sitting in a trendy café that is bustling with life. Easy chatter permeates the atmosphere with infectious good humour and limitless optimism. My attempts at invisibility are thwarted by the incessant yapping of my dog, who’s agenda is somewhat in conflict with my own.