App aversion

The words, ‘have you got our app?’, are amongst the least favourite words to come out of anyone’s mouth and into my ears. I have an ongoing dislike for technology. I’ll admit, when it works, it can be great. But it seems to me that the levels of consistent reliability of app’s in particular, are lower than that of the average human, including this one.

Recently, I was horrified to discover that the local pool has introduced an app for booking a swim. I have always loved the water with its stress relieving benefits and time out from tech. The instant exasperation and escalating sense of stress that the app news evoked in me, saw me miss my swim for the past month. This is because my forte is people whereas life is becoming increasingly full of machines, app’s and passwords/codes. These feel like they stand on guard as frustrating, time stealing, blood pressure raising obstacles in between me and what are often supposed to be relaxing, stress relieving activities.

My trips to the pool have already been taxing my ability on the fathoming machines / tech front. If I drive, I must engage with the parking machines that sometimes work and sometimes don’t while the patrolling parking man always seems to be working. If I can succeed in working the machine and avoiding a fine from the ticket man, there is a gate that blocks your entry to the pool, just inside the reception. This gate requires you to hover your card above the reader to activate it opening. However, this occasionally works but mostly it doesn’t. I end up hovering my card half a millimetre in every direction before standing on one leg, reciting a poem and doing a jig before finally admitting defeat/exasperation/diminishing will to live and asking the humans for assistance. ‘Is it me?’, I ask them. ‘No, they assure me, it’s the machine’. Given the accepted unreliability of these machines, I thought I had been doing well to navigate the parking machine and the ‘I like playing silly buggers’ gate, every week before getting anywhere near the pool. But the introduction of an app was more than I could cope with and I lapsed in to total avoidance.

However, following an uplifting weekend away and a little encouragement from my partner, I decided that today was the day. I got a handle on myself, psyched myself up, put my big girl pants on, prayed, asked a friend to also pray and then started this dreaded task. I was very relieved that when I called the pool, 1) someone answered, 2) they were extremely helpful and 3) assured me of their assistance upon arrival at the pool. Phew. Encouraged by this exchange, I got myself down to the pool, faced off the car park ticket machine without incident and proceeded to the pool reception. I was then pleased to discover the helpful individual I spoke to on the phone was there as per their word. Their presence, professionalism and patience helped me through the twenty minutes worth of problems in between me, the gate and the water. During this time, several others came and went with various other issues that also needed resolving. But, I was finally granted access through the gate and to the pool. Halleluyah! I was re-united with the water and one of my favourite forms of movement. Winning, finally!

Encouraged as I was by my success, I decided to have another go at adulting/tech navigating by attempting to book a restaurant table online. Having succeeded in doing just that for this restaurant a week ago, I felt what turned out to be prematurely confident. Two attempts, a bit of head scratching and a lot of huffing and puffing later and I gave up. A little later I rang the establishment in question who confirmed that, ’yes their tech was playing up today.’ This was said in a relaxed tone as if this was perfectly normal and to be expected.

In both scenarios, the humans have been extremely helpful for which I am grateful. But I am concerned that it is becoming increasingly difficult to do anything anymore without first having to engage in the sort of technology that is about as predictable and reliable as a middle-aged woman’s hormones, especially mine. Which reminds me, it’s been a month now since I’ve attempted to get my HRT prescription. That’s 4 phone calls, 2 online requests and 2 in person conversations and still counting and still no prescription. I am the first to admit that if anything is going to give me a sense of humour failure, (aside from hormones), it’s technology, or rather, unreliable technology. The progress above has all been despite technology not because of it. It’s been the humans who have got things done.

And all of this is before I get started on the manslaughter motorways with their missing layby’s, that this weekend reacquainted me with. I can’t help but wonder how much the ‘powers that be’ sold their souls for, to allow these.

I am aware that I can be a moaning, middle-aged dinosaur but …is all of this really progress?

Eyes, ears and the consumer of cake

How grateful I am to have finally granted myself permission to take my foot off the gas. Or rather, I have been forced to over these past few years and eventually, I have accepted the need for less speed. I have even begun to overcome my initial shocking attitude of anything but gratitude.

Anyway, one of my growing reasons for finally appreciating doing less and being more is the issue of maintenance. It feels to me that ever since the mayhem of middle-aged hormonal havoc began its reign of life altering activities, it has become something of a part time job to maintain my system. And that’s not just trying to get a GP appointment and then another one with someone trained on menopause and then get a prescription for something that is then out of stock. That’s a separate story that I can’t be arsed to tell right now as it would dampen my mood more than these January, February, March and April showers.

So, back to the eyes, ears and cake gnashers; this year I have had them all cleaned, unblocked and checked for signs of anything sinister. I am pleased to report that aside from the expected wear and tear associated with middle age, I’m apparently looking healthy. I am very pleased to hear this as I am a very visual person and one who listens for a living. Tick, tick. And I’ve even stopped complaining and getting the hump about the ever-diminishing size of the font on anything that I really want or need to read. Upon seeing me squinting at a menu through one eye in the way I used to watch the TV back in my inebriated days, my partner offered me his glasses. To my surprise and delight, I could then read the menu using both eyes minus the need for squinting or winking. Subsequently I had to relent and buy myself some of those supermarket stocking magnifying glasses that I always swore I would never wear. Oh how things change! I once said I’d never own one of those awful garden gnome things yet somehow there is one looking right at me as I type, from my own garden. I know, I can only assume I bought it in one of my many moments of madness. I blame hormones; the more I learn about them, the more I understand they are responsible for virtually all the body’s functioning, or in middle age, malfunctioning. True story. But, if I ever hit the three birds on the wall stage, someone have a word.

Anyway, I can now see and hear again which is a big bonus as per the above. And of course, as a baker and consumer of cake, I need to keep my gnashers in good shape. Even more so now that I have recovered my ability to bear them in a smile rather than a grimace or growl. I find it ironic that I have such super strong teeth that I’ve never had a filling (honestly, despite the cakes), yet I’ve always been prone to weak gums. If these are not maintained sufficiently, they can recede so far that my teeth, irrespective of strength, will fall out. Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humour. Either way a set of falsies does not appeal. Of course, should these gnashers of mine do the off, I suspect the desire for cake will cause me to change my mind about this too.

However, what I do apparently need is a protector for nightly gnashing. Like many of us, I am a serial clencher and grinder of gnashers. Apparently, my back canines are no longer so sharp having been ground down by a lifetime of poor stress management. I know how they feel! While I have reduced stress, I cannot know or control what my body may still be doing at night in this regard. The outcome of my need for a tooth guard was an invoice that I was presented with upon departing the Dentist. Fortunately, the instinctive teeth clenching manoeuvre prevented the words, ‘Ow much?’ from flying out loudly. It was the price of an overseas holiday. Last year I wasn’t well enough to go overseas and this year I may not be well off enough! Luckily for me, I’m still revelling in the gratitude of feeling way better this year than I have in recent years!

All in all, maintaining this aging system of mine is now my new part time job, which isn’t overly enjoyable but is utterly essential. This despite the pay being crap and the cost being high. I suspect the cost of not accepting this job, would be higher still.

According to an older friend of mine, this maintenance business becomes a full-time job in retirement. I’ll need a pension then so I can retire and accept that job should God grant me those years.

The keeping of cool

How easy it is to look back after a trying time and wish that we had known back then what we know now, ie how the trial will end. If we had, we may not have lost our sleep/peace/mind/cool/sh*t or anything else that comes in handy during a trial. Typically, we only really relax when we know how things work out.

As humans, we are generally a bit crap at not knowing. This could be not knowing how things will work out, not knowing what to do or say or not knowing anything else that we want to know.

Just this week, a friend remarked how they know from experience that things usually work out. However, last week while going through some challenges, they got stressed because they forgot that things have a way of working themselves out. I could totally relate! How easy it is to wonder what we were getting in a state for, after we know how things work out. At least when they work out how we want or in a manageable way.

It is of course a different story when things don’t work out how we want or do work out how we really don’t want.

The following statement jumped out at me this week,

‘Fate leads us on a winding path and despite how bad a situation may appear, we can never really know how it will turn out. I’ll try to remember that, then maybe I won’t get so upset when things don’t go my way’.

This is from The cat who taught zen, by James Norbury.

The fact is that sometimes things go our way and sometimes they don’t. And when they don’t, we may learn things we don’t learn when they do. These may be things we wish we didn’t have to learn and yet we do learn and we do come through. Or we don’t learn and the lesson comes around again (and again). One way or another (short or long), we continue to come through. Until we don’t because we will all die in the end. Keeping our heads up our derrieres about this doesn’t make it any less true, it simply stops us seeing, savouring and actively choosing how to play whatever cards we continue to be dealt.

Life is a series of beginnings, endings and middles. In the middle we know only what has been before and not yet what is to come. How we navigate the not knowing that precedes the new knowing will determine how enjoyable or otherwise, these middle times of transition will be.

Like all other muscles, the only way any of us can develop and strengthen our ‘keeping our cool’ muscle is by being in situations that challenge our cool keeping capacity.

Practice doesn’t make us perfect but it can make us calmer during the trial. Allegedly!

Easter; a timeless three-part template for modern living

As I reflected on the significance of this day, I noticed a few things. When life looks and feels like it’s turned to crap, it can be extremely hard to remember the life generating powers of fertiliser. During the hardest times of my own life, I easily forget that I have come through many dark tunnels before. That’s because when I’m in the middle of a particularly long tunnel, I can’t see anything in any direction, let alone the light that could otherwise direct me. This means I forget about all the tunnels I’ve been in before or what I thought I learned in them. And when I can’t even see which way is forward it becomes incredibly difficult to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

These tunnel traipsing times require me to exercise a faith that can evade me when I need it most. One that goes beyond the words of my lips or my laptop, to reach the steps of my feet. This is a faith in myself, my lived experience and the God I can’t always see, hear, feel or understand.

As I often forget any helpful truths while deep within a tunnel, I am grateful for the annual reminder of Easter. Not for what Jesus endured but for the truths it reveals that still stand today. On Easter Friday it looked like a serious case of game over. Yet by the Sunday it became apparent that God is indeed a man of His word. He is also the unseen worker behind the scenes, no matter how grim the front stage looks. And he turned the ultimate low into the ultimate high within three days. Three really is a magic and holy number.

Back to our own present day lives where the tunnels can last a lot longer than three days. This in turn can make it a lot harder to keep trusting that things will change or that we will feel something other than sorrow when it looks and feels like we never will.

Therefore, every Easter reminds us that no matter how bleak any situation is, God is working in ways we cannot see or know, to help us come through to a new reality. That’s all well and good when the new reality is one that we’ve longed and prayed for. These instances are easy to follow up with celebrations.

But if it is a new reality that we did not want or even actively and fervently prayed not to have, it requires a whole different level of faith. Fortunately for us, in the face of the unfortunate, the story of Easter reminds us that God promises through the act of Jesus, to always BE with us. We don’t have to go it alone. And there’s no better teammate than the Almighty. He doesn’t promise to always DO what we want him to and even warns us that we will have trouble. But he also encourages us that he overcame the worst experience imaginable. He offers to help us do the same by trusting His promise to always BE with us; as the unseen source of strength and support. I know when I’ve been stuck in the murky depths of despair, I haven’t always wanted to trust Him or turn to Him. This is because I have felt hurt and confused that He had allowed a situation that broke my heart to happen. Yet whenever I come through a tunnel and turn to look back, I see a myriad of ways in which He was with me every step.

Like the disciples, I often don’t believe what God says about Himself until I begin to see and sense it for myself! And even then, I can give that great doubter Thomas a run for his denarius. When my own Day 1 hits in whatever form, I can easily get stunned into a state of stuckness in the tunnel of Day 2.  In there I lose sight of the God who promises me that Day will 3 come. And so, I think my own challenge now is to try and actively take God at His word during the equivalent of my Day 2 tunnel experiences. Maybe then I would lean on Him enough to let Him carry the load. Maybe that way, together we could utilise His tunnel vision and even reach day 3 a little earlier. Time will tell.  Hopefully quite a bit of it before the next tunnel please Lord!

The fun of the firsts

The sun is shining! It’s not the first time this year but it sure has spent a lot of time hidden behind the rain dropping clouds. Sometimes such prolonged periods of sun obscuring cloudiness can make it hard to keep trusting the sun will shine again. Until it does.

I love this time of year. No matter how many times I’ve seen it all before, the firsts of the season never fail to elicit involuntary gasps of excitement. From the first time I finish with a client at 6pm to discover upon opening my cabin door that it is still daylight, to the first green shoots of new life, to the masses of other sense stirring sightings. I simply love to watch the world awaken.

I’ve now had my first trip of the year to the sea which did not fail to deliver on the scenery or the restoration front. Instead of pushing myself to do big walks, I allowed myself to do much meandering. I sat on a conveniently placed log on the beach where I selected various coloured stones for use in my practice. When I wasn’t on the beach, I sat directly in front of it in various food serving establishments. Within the comfort of these I relished all that I saw and all the scoff that I ordered. What bliss.

Back home, I’ve had my first brew in the garden and my first meal in the garden both while enjoying the sun’s warmth on my skin. I’ve also had my first sighting of the flowers that I planted as seeds last Autumn as well as the return of the hosta I feared I had killed off last year. I love witnessing new life.

On the not so fun but fulfilling-on-completion front, I gave the lawn its first haircut. It’s already grown back with a vengeance and a large smattering of daisies. This means I can now engage in one of my favourite resting activities; watching the daisies grow. I want to indulge in more of this during my year of learning to rest better.

I’ve now had not only my first but also second and third bike rides of the year all of which reminded me that I love surveying the scenery as I cycle.

While it’s not the first time it still gives me an embarrassing amount of enjoyment to watch my washing dancing itself dry on the line. Boring but true!

I’ve also spotted a super large bumble bee that feeds from the flowers just outside my window. Today is the first time that that I’ve swapped my inside table for the outside table, to act as my workstation. While working outside, I also spotted my first butterfly of the season; a pale yellow one. And I’m wearing a hat for shade rather than warmth.

How I love the great outdoors with all its reminders of beginnings, endings and the bits in the middle.

Unblocked

Last Friday as I lay in bed, I became aware that I was anticipating the alarm minus the dread that had accompanied me over the past few months. While savouring this new reality, I noticed a beautiful chorus of birdsong just beyond my window. It sounded so clear and beautiful. This has been one of my favourite sounds for a long time as it always makes me think of God. I can’t remember how this association came about. I just know there have been multiple times when I’ve been struggling, and the sound of birdsong has somehow reminded me that God is ever-present. This makes me feel less alone even when I am, or if I’m with others but feeling alone. Despite not remembering the reason for this, the comfort giving connection between God and birdsong, remains.

As I reflected on this during my morning run, I remembered a time when I was in a dark place internally, yet on a bright sunny beach. As I fought back the tears that were threatening, I suddenly noticed the birds singing. This baffled me as there were no trees in sight. I don’t think a bird has to be in a tree to sing (although I’m not entirely sure of their multi-tasking abilities) but I couldn’t even see any birds. Yet, I could clearly hear birdsong which in turn, settled something inside me. This reminds me of the God I can sometimes hear but usually can’t see, aside from his artistry in nature.

While birdsong reminds me of God’s presence, I remain acutely aware of the times when it seems like God is absent, deaf or has gotten too competitive during a game of hide and seek. I’ve felt this a lot in recent years. And no matter how much I have complained/whined/begged/sulked or prayed for Him to speak to me and tell me what to do, I’ve often heard nothing back. And it’s taken longer than I would like to admit that I may have been guilty of that thing us humans can do when we are so convinced we know what someone is going to say, that we fail to hear their actual words (especially when strong emotions are present). But eventually, as my desperation settled, I sensed Him say,

‘I’m not asking you to ‘do’ more, I’m asking you to ‘be’ more.’

And then it hit me. It wasn’t God who had gone deaf, done a runner and, or needed His ears syringing! 

As I looked back over the previous few years, I began to recognise that my body’s repeated pleas for rest had fallen on my ‘unwilling to hear them’ ears.  I knew that I kept hearing about the business of ‘being’ but I wasn’t really registering it. In fact, after a retreat last year, I had what was clearly a fleeting realisation that I needed to update my motto of, ‘I’ll just do that job and then I’ll stop and be’, to ‘I’ll just leave that job and practising being now’.

Unfortunately, new insights rarely travel down far enough to reach the feet or thus the steps when I fail to allow any time for them to settle in enough to come out in practice. Ugh.

As a conversation with a fellow counsellor highlighted, we may well be professional noticers in the lives of others, but we can be equally professional non-noticers in our own lives. Hence the importance of surrounding ourselves with others who notice what we resist noticing in ourselves, even if we then refuse to hear them!

Although my system was trained in excess doing at a young age, I am now attempting to become a recovering ‘over-do-er’ and a practicing ‘how to be-more-er’. Or in more honest words, my body has reached the point where it will no longer take no for an answer when it needs to rest. It has made repeated interventions during the past few years to force me to slow down and at times, stand still. Last year I imagined I’d got the message about reduced doing and increased being, but what followed suggested otherwise.

Just after I wrote about the need to slow down, I was forced to do just that by long covid. I hadn’t even realised that this could occur two to four weeks after an initial covid infection, especially when the body’s reserves are already depleted. This meant I was totally blindsided by the sensory-dulling, joy-culling, cognitive functioning quashing symptoms. I was dumbfounded and desperate to know what was going on and more importantly, how to make it stop. Yet no matter how hard I resented and resisted the debilitating symptoms, I eventually realised that it was me, who had to stop, if I wanted to recover.

After weeks of enduring the misery inducing symptoms of long covid, I relented and began to give my body the rest it needed. It is now rewarding me with the re-awakening of my senses to the wonders of the world around. How grateful I am.

However, perhaps my body wasn’t convinced I had heard it for just as I got back on my post covid feet, I experienced a knock-me-off-my-feet-nausea. Apparently, this was probably due to a blocked ear although it could also be part of perimenopause or long covid. Time will tell.

Either way, now that the blocked ear has been unblocked, my awareness of birdsong has been heightened. And my capacity for appreciation, enhanced.

When the ear was unblocked, I couldn’t resist looking at the cause of the blockage. It was a surprisingly small, hard, plug that had hindered my ability to hear. I wondered whether I had a also hardened my heart to block hearing God or my body saying something I didn’t want to hear… STOP, BE, REST & RECOVER. Afterall, I had so many plans for these past few years, virtually none of which have materialised. As a serial overdo-er, this left me feeling like a failure. And yet my real failure was not listening to or giving my body what it needed.

Perhaps I need to listen better and put what I hear in to practice especially around mastering the art of this thing they call pacing. As a friend recently reminded me (over tea and cake, obviously), when we approach or pass the half century mark, we must recognise that our bodies can no longer do what they used to. Neither can we continue to ignore their needs, limitations or warnings in the way we may have got away with when we were younger.

As my partner reminds me,

‘Every day is a school day Jo-Jo’.

If only I could learn to be a better, more consistent student.

Ps, God, as I know you are listening even it feels like you’re not, this is NOT a request for more problems!

Stop right there

Although the Christmas season has not yet begun, most people are incredibly busy. I am no exception.

What is going on?

As a self-confessed over-do-er and under-be-er, I know from bitter experience that over busyness is a costly and counter productive way to approach life. I also see this as one of the greatest current threats to our collective health. Did we fail to incorporate the lessons of Covid?

Last weekend a quote from my pastor spoke straight to the heart of this matter.

‘Sometimes we need to slow down enough for our soul to catch up with our body’.

Wow.

I would take this a step further by adding,

‘Sometimes we need to still the mind enough for the body to rest, recover and recognise what it needs for the soul to catch up.’

I am painfully aware that my own mind is prone to racing around all over the shop at a ridiculous speed, dragging my poor knackered body behind it. When I ignore the pain and protests of my body for any prolonged period, I pay the price with my psychological and physical health. 

The body, mind, heart and soul are not made for non-stop doing with non-start being.

The slogan of the old Mars advert comes to mind:

‘Work, rest and play.’

When the balance and interplay of these are out of whack, malfunctioning occurs.

And so, before I get lost in all the activity surrounding the wonder, magic and Jesus-ness of December (Nb – Jesus is not just for Christmas), I am giving my body permission to take time out from doing. Then, instead of storing this knowledge in some already overstuffed cupboard of my mind, I will be still enough to reflect on what steps I need to take and what steps I do not need to take, to re-dress the balance.

Our individual and collective physical and psychological health depend upon our willingness to do this and keep doing this, by taking time out from doing everything else.

To know, but not act upon this knowing, could cost us more than any budget blowing Christmas ever could.

Practising Paus-ing

I am excellent at running at life at 8000 miles an hour before eventually and inevitably tripping up, falling face down and then needing time out to recover. The second I get back up, I race off to repeat the process again. My recent recovery from a particularly challenging period resulted in the urgings of multiple friends all saying the same thing, ‘Jo, pace yourself, don’t rush, go easy’. This is because they all see more clearly than I do that I am not excellent at learning to slow down to a sustainable pace that doesn’t require me to recover by stopping or standing still, quite so often, or for quite so long. Friends who tell you what you don’t want to hear (when it’s true and comes with good intent) are a priceless gift. I hope you all know who you are. NB to self to tell you all more often so you do.

I put my fast paced, grab everything along the way approach, (see blog on blackberries), down to my huge and greedy appetite for life combined with the loss of all the wasted years of anesthetizing myself from the pain of my childhood. I have missed out on a lot in life and I don’t want to miss out on anymore. I want it all and I want it all now. At the latest. But I also realise this is a really rushed, rubbish and self-defeating approach, hence I am trying (and regularly failing) to do things a little differently. I can accept this flaw of mine so long as I remain committed to trying one more time than I fail.

To this end, I have treated myself to time out and away, to practice the art of the pause. I am enjoying the beautiful gift of time and space in a Shepherd’s Hut in Suffolk, surrounded by fields and trees and accompanied by the noises of nature. It is relaxing and liberating to be free of the never ending to-do-list that calls me repeatedly when I am at home. Here at this hut, I can breathe deeply, survey the beauty of my surroundings, watch the Master Artist at work with his paintbrush across the sky, especially outstanding in the early morning and late evening, listen to the birds and be still enough to feel utterly grateful for it all.

The word ‘pause’ is appearing more and more these days, perhaps becoming something of a buzz word as an attempt to re-balance all the crazy, fast paced, no-pause allowing approach to life so prevalent in our culture. There is a wonderful place on the outskirts of Cambridge by this name, spelt ‘Paus’. It offers a beautiful outdoor café serving homemade, healthy, colourful food, overlooking the fields as well as a selection of hot tubs, ice tubs, an ice bath and a sauna. Quite the selection and at times quite the challenge for a woman whose internal thermostat is shot, thanks to the havoc experienced during perimenopause. (I was most encouraged by a lady at Pilates this week who assured me that the body’s thermostat does recover the ability to regulate temperature. I will certainly be relieved when my internal fire stops roaring quite so regularly or ferociously). But that aside, Paus offers a stunning, natural space in which to stop, pause and satisfy the needs of body, mind, soul and spirit; the whole shebang. This is especially enjoyable when shared with a good friend, as I did, who’s own life is just as ridiculously busy albeit for different reasons, but who was therefore as ready, ripe and rewarded as I, by the whole ‘paus’ experience.

And the other day my fabulous hairdresser told me that nowadays you can get away to places called ‘Unplugged’. As the name suggests this is a place that prohibits being plugged in to technology, even locking away phones and laptops for the duration! I think this is a fantastic idea and much needed. But I can’t help feeling somewhat concerned that we seem to struggle so much to give ourselves permission to unplug, disconnect and step away from all the time thieves competing for our attention, whether phone/TV/social media et al. I for one, want to practice permitting myself to disconnect from all these more frequently to consistently give more time to re-connecting to all parts of myself, my mate and my surroundings.

And so, I am doing just that having taken time out to be still, savour the scenery and reawaken my senses as I sit on my balcony drinking it all in with my eyes, heart, mind, body and spirit. And I have to say, it is utterly delicious, deeply satisfying, refreshingly restorative and quite simply, all that the soul Doctor ordered.

Bliss with a capital BL.

PS there is a swing in the garden which I giggled away on as I swung higher and higher feeling free and full of fun … until I started to feel nauseas! Perhaps my stomach is too sensitive for such shenanigans these days!

Shifting seasons …

No matter how many times I see the shift in the seasons they never fail to inspire me with their beauty or encourage me with their wisdom. I prefer the longer days of spring to the shorter days of winter, but every season offers its own reward. As we leave the longer days of summer behind, the shorter days of Autumn see the trees beginning to shed their leaves ready for their season of rest and renewal. 

It is neither new nor original but remains true that the trees remind us that to enter a new season we must first relinquish our grip on the old. Whenever I feel afraid to let go of the old and familiar, nature reminds me that letting go, resting and trusting in what is to come is a pre-requisite for the new and unknown. The world around me displays this natural order of life whether I am watching the trees shed their leaves, to allow a winter of regeneration or noticing my house plants calling me to remove their old leaves so they can focus their resources on making new ones. 

Even my wardrobe recently reminded me that I needed to move my lighter clothes to make space for the warmer ones. Wherever I look, I see the need to move or let go of one thing to make a space for a new thing. This is as true for us humans as it is for nature. To remain alive is to grow, change, navigate endings, beginnings and the transitions between them, by continuing to say ‘no’ to one thing to say ‘yes’ to another.

When it comes to the seasons of the soul, some are definitely more enjoyable than others but all still have their place, time and purpose. Our ability to engage with these seasonal shifts determines the degree to which we grow, heal and retain our vitality.

Bouncing back with blackberries

Following a year of injury and illness, leading to insight and inspiration (eventually), I am now ready to write again.

Last week I was thrilled to have my first proper run in almost three months. I had been forced to stop running by a rather unfortunate incident with the lawnmower. I have since recovered and the lawnmower has not.

On this run I spotted some blackberries offering too good an opportunity to pass by. I like to pick them, fling them in the freezer for safe keeping, then dip into this stock throughout the Winter to make crumble and the likes. Yum.

While I was relieving the bushes of the biggest, best and juiciest of berries, I was careful to avoid the thorns, wasps, nettles and spiders. As I continued to search with my eyes and grab with my hands, I had the same thought I always have whenever I pick blackberries. Instead of simply focusing on the berry at hand, my eyes were constantly scouring the surrounding branches convinced that there would be a bigger, better-looking berry just over there to the left or the right or too far up, or deep in, for me to reach.

As always, this led me to reflect on the parallels with my approach to life where I am just as greedy for everything I love as I am for the biggest and best berries. However, when I become distracted by exciting looking things to my left or to my right, I cease to fully focus on what I am doing. It is only when I say ‘no’ to all the ongoing temptations that I can continue to say the biggest, fattest ‘yes’ to staying on task enough to begin to bear fruit. I also become more adept at spotting and avoiding life’s equivalent of wasps, nettles and the like!

As a wise friend recently remarked, ‘Jo, sometimes you even have to say ‘no’ to things that you love doing’.

I will now attempt to go forth, stay focused and become more fruitful.