November

Tags

plans, seasons

November is Nigh. Autumn is well and truly here and we’ve turned the heating on in our house. The English mornings make me huddle under my covers and re-set my alarm. The gloves and scarf are out, ready to face the icy frost of Winter’s promise.

In October I found myself a routine for dealing with the new season, meditated on my future and cleaned the house at every chance I got. My instincts to clear the rubble and check the flue are active at this time and the only thing more important is a constant stock of Chai Tea; the most wintery of drinks.

I entered another poetry competition, did NOT send my manuscript off to publishers [it’s so not ready] but did try Qigong [painful much!] and joined the creative writing society. We had a Halloween Housewarming party and I attended the open ritual for the Sabbat of Samhain. I also completed my 150 hours of volunteering and am hoping to apply for the Vimpact certificate soon.

And now, November is here and she promises many an experience beneath the leaves of holly.

tradition:

~ Celtic New Year November 1^st
~ Full Moon 21^st November

food:

~ pears!

~ raspberries!

~ carrots

~ potatoes

~ parsnips

~ swede

~ leeks

~apples

home:

~switch to winter wardrobe

~make gifts

~art ^_^

~writing!

~incense

~ cook with spices

writing:

~ NANOWRIMO

~ November poetry contest [yes, another]

~ consciousness portfolio, philosophy essay, biology assignments x2

field trips:

~ possibly pub moot 17^th

~ weekly walk in nature

~ a gig

~ house nights

This month also focuses on quietude; a somewhat appropriate theme for the dying winter and hibernation instincts. Looking inward is a good way to meditate on the changes you’ve undergone. I’ve a routine now, enough time for both rest and work; and I can settle into it with a smile and silent eyes.

daily aims:

+ write – novel, blog, study

+ read – textbook, novel, nonfiction, journal articles

+ exercise – stretches/dance/shivanata/walk

+ wake by 8am

What are you planning this month?

In Light,
Rose

Progression, Remembrance & Love

Tags

catharsis, processing, stormy seas, WorkingOnStuff

There’s nothing special about today.

Except the freedom from a cloud of depression that’s haunted me; the rain cold and empty on my skin.

Except for the shivanata I practised about 5 times throughout the day.

Except for noticing I judge a guy in my class; and asking that judgement to be quiet. And discovering his point to be valid.

Except for meeting a pagan and some spiritual society members; and seeing Eat, Pray, Love in the cinema.

Just an ordinary day.

Of beauty, potential and connection.

Of progress in processing.

 

The Memories

I read the book (Eat,Pray,Love) earlier this year.

And let’s just say that in my past I had my own David; without the physical side of the relationship. (For those who don’t know, he’s kind of her obsessive rebound from her divorce. they fight all the time but are so passionately head-over-heels that neither can give the other up) . I poured myself into the man in question, and though we fought so often and to such a heated level of passion; we couldn’t let go. And thus made plans. Or I did.

He seemed to change his mind constantly.

“What if we just acknowledged that we have a bad relationship, and we stuck it out, anyway? What if we admitted that we make each other nuts, we fight constantly… but we can’t live without each other, so we deal with it? And then we could spend our lives together – in misery, but happy not to be apart.”

In the end, he left. He emailed on Valentine’s Day to say that I had to either be his girlfriend/fiancé again; or he couldn’t face speaking to me. I knew then that I’d never be with him again.

 

Noticing Patterns

“People always fall in love with the most perfect aspects of each other’s personalities. Who wouldn’t? Anybody can love the most wonderful parts of another person. But that’s not the clever trick. The really clever trick is this: Can you accept the flaws? Can you look at your partner’s faults honestly and say, ‘I can work around that. I can make something out of it.’? Because the good stuff is always going to be there, and it’s always going to pretty and sparkly, but the crap underneath can ruin you.”

The words certainly sparked in me the obsessive love I used to be a part of. I now recognise that it was a great love because I fell in love with the image of his good side.

“In desperate love, we always invent the characters of our partners, demanding they be what we need of them, and then feeling devastated when they refuse to perform the role we created in the first place.”

When I read Eat, Pray, Love; I found a crying wreck of my old self – that heartbroken girl; too afraid to trust. I found wounds that hadn’t healed from his abandonment, the broken promises and a small voice of anger that I let him get away with it.

“I was full of a hot, powerful sadness and would have loved to burst into the comfort of tears, but tried hard not to, remembering something my Guru once said — that you should never give yourself a chance to fall apart because, when you do, it becomes a tendency and it happens over and over again. You must practice staying strong, instead.”

 

Remembrance

Tonight, I saw the movie. It’s become cliché, they missed out some amazing spiritual moments [the petition to god, the Italian lessons, the “I have been there” phrase, surrender, the swearing football match, the cream puffs, the boy she sang the gurit- meditation thing too, the list the Texan Richard gives her (and the conversation that follows), the struggle to get the single mother a house] and people found the main character hard to sympathise with (possibly because they’ve ripped about 80% of the emotion from it).

However, I found the “getting through the betrayal and the obsession” parts to be real enough to spark my own cognition. (And they didn’t miss out too much in the India section).

“How could two people who were so in love not end up happily ever after? It had to work. Didn’t it?”

It’s been a couple of years and I’m happy in my current relationship. Yet, I’d never fully closed that door. I miss his friendship; his company. I couldn’t see how a relationship so emotion-filled could really dissipate to dust and memories. Yet he’s spent two years ignoring me. I never saw what I’d gain by actively letting his memory go.

Now I’m in questioning,

I’m not claiming to be able to “see clearly now” because I’m blinded; seeing how she was happy but in the end; so much happier. Making excuses that it’ll be different for me; that my situation was different. Every moment we shift; I’m not the person I was last night; when I began writing this. My every experience is a shift in ‘me’. This is progress.

It’s a process;
we’ll see where I end up.

 

In Light,
Rose

P.S. All quotes in green are written by Elizabeth Gilbert in the book, Eat, Pray, Love.

Dancing With Limitation: Two Weeks In

Tags

breaking habits&labels, dancing-with-limitation, potential, soar

“Dancing with that limitation. Finding the edge of your limitation and dancing with it.” – Susan O’Connell

I mentioned last time that Community is my word for October and I’ve certainly been experiencing it.

The feeling at home is certainly one of connection. Emma and I spent 2 hours doing the crossword together, Hannah and I spend hours chatting, watching silly TV show clips and movies and Friday night some friends came over and we watched a movie with some wine. Tonight, two of us are going to see Eat, Pray Love at the cinema, and tomorrow is the monthly pub-moot.

My housemates and I have plans in place for a fortnightly cooking session where we all cook a meal together, or all go out for a drink together; just devote time to being together for one evening.

So how is it going?
I’ve had a low week, avoiding some of my usual clubs; and yet the connections are still strong. I now have a schedule for the week in place that looks a little more like this:

Monday – lectures 9-11 & youth panel meeting 4-6 OR meditation 6-7
Tuesday – lectures 9-11, seminar 2-4, meditation 4-5 & write club 7-10
Wednesday – seminar 11-1, meditation – 2:30-3:30 [& monthly pub moot 8-11]
Thursday – volunteering 10-4, spiritual society meeting 7-9
Friday – lectures 12-2

So far this week, I’ve had 135 minutes of exercise, met the minimum reading and writing quotas and will have done 40 minutes of quiet by the week’s end.  Although yesterday, I had fruit juice and did 15 minutes of shivanata; my “sustenance” item is the hardest to keep up with.

Last night I met another limitation of mine.
I went got off the computer at 10:35pm. Not midnight, not 12:30, but 10:35. I practised Shivanata until 11 and read until 11:45pm. And was likely asleep by 12:15.

And Today?

Last night’s activities allowed me to get up at 7:45, even though I didn’t need to be up until 9:30am.  In a way, dealing with the limit of my “you’re awake, you must stay up at your desk until you tire” monster, meant that my “you-don’t-need-to-get-up-this-early” monster was still fast asleep.

And that meant I could have some grapes and fruit juice with my cereal; instead of rushing out of the door with just toast. Two sustenance items almost ticked off.

What limits are being put on your life? How could you gently change that? What effect would this have?

In Light,
Rose

A Monster Post: Negotiating Bail

Tags

Insights, processing, stormy seas, WorkingOnStuff

You know when you’re surrounded by people who are having low/bad days? Who’re ill or down; whose energy is depleted and you can sense that they just don’t want you there?

Do you know when that’s all going on yet you LIVE with them and thus find it hard to give and get the space you need?

-sigh- My days are good yet I am down. I have no reason to be feeling like this. I’ve been avoiding writing a blog-post since each attempt seems to focus so much on how I’m feeling; and I don’t want to bring you down with me.  I’ve been through depression. This is bordering those kinds of downs. My negative thoughts are taking form; making forts and preparing to fight for rights to my actions and mind again.

And due to many different circumstances, I’m actually more alone than I’ve ever been. Most of the the people and systems that helped me four years ago are long gone.

Darn and drat. Life has a way of picking moments to welcome in the monsters.

Time to Respond

Time to say hello, to welcome that negativity in for a peace talk and offer it cake.

– Gentle fights

Yes I know, Fighting isn’t helpful when it comes to monsters [ to most things, actually…] and nonviolence rocks and all. I agree with that 90% of the time.

– Questions

What’s the trigger? How can I ease myself out? What helped me in my depression from 2001-2006. This is *now*.

(Dammit, I hate that label. Might need to metaphorisice that.)

– Catharsis

Poetry, writing on my emo xanga from when I was 15 and crying.

– Incense

As I fall asleep. To stop the flashbacks/nightmares/hauntings. I wish I could remember the last time I slept well. Or dreamed a nonviolent/non-scary/comfortable dream.

– Music

Singing, which helps keep my breathing stable, my thoughts distracted and has lyrics of “I can get through this”.

– Permission

Oh. Permission to feel. To be. To talk to myself negatively even if just for a while; to tell the monster I see it’s points. And then permission to calmly tell it to give me space.

– Good Food

Carrots and sweet corn are good – slightly sweet and healthier than biscuits/chocolate. Same goes for fruit.

The Lesson

What can I learn here?

At this point, I’ve no idea. It feels like a bit of a test, actually.

We’ll throw all we can at you, while you’re already stressed about X and Y.

I KNOW I’ll get through it. I know life has ups and downs, ebb and flow. I can see myself at the other end of this down; happy and smiling.

For me personally, that doesn’t help me with the best way to deal with the “now”.

So it’s a reminder – to practise ShivaNata, to sing, to meditate and to dance.

Attention should be paid to my stressors:

–          Choices/applications for next year

–          Ten pieces of coursework

–          A course I barely understand

• [did you know that MK801 is Dizocilpine; which is a non-competitive antagonist for NDMA, so it’s a depressant and anti-convalescent.  Neither did I. Nor did we want to know…]
• [or that benzofuranyl-chloro-hydroxy-methyl-tetrahydro-bezazepine is a Benzodiazepine which acts on the…omega region of a the activated GABA receptor. Me neither.]

–          Supporting my closest friends emotionally as they’re not strong enough to help me through this

–          Sleepless nights / Nightmares

How does that help?

Awareness is the key, as they say.

Thus, what’s it TELLING me?

…

I need rest.

Then I make space to rest – deciding to miss this weeks creative writing society meeting. And I recognise a new voice. A monster.

The Negotiation

In which I meet the laziness-excuse-making monster who fears I’ll not use the time wisely.

Monster: You’re just making excuses. You’re afraid and tired, so you’ll stay home and do nothing with your life and then amount to nothing.

Rose: What if I promise to work during my night in; even if for ten minutes.

Monster: But then you’re not resting, so you must’ve been lying when you cancelled because you need a rest!

Rose: And then rest once the ten minutes are up.

Monster: Hmm. But will you DO that?

Rose: What if I dedicate twenty minutes of reading in bed at the end of my day; an early night and until then, alternate between talking online with friends, reading, art and work? All evening. I’ve already done 30 minutes of exercise, I’ve a healthy dinner planned and we can have a little lie-in come morning.

Monster: Sounds lazy.

Rose: It’s called restoration. I can’t work 24/7 or I’ll crash and then where will we be? I understand you’re afraid for me. This especially, though, pointing out the negatives is only going to make me feel bad; which drains my energy and I get less done.

Monster: …

Rose: Perhaps you can give me a little reminder or we can set a goal?

Monster: Goals are good. Productive.

Rose: And then I get a reward for reaching that goal; of time to read or a snack?

Monster: Not too much time..

Rose: No, just enough to give me back some energy.

Monster: Hmm. Deal.

So that’s tonight. And I did a good couple of hours of work, had a healthy meal and now I’m off to bed.

Lesson of the day?

Negotiate.

Even monsters can compromise.

In Light,

Rose

DWL: Week One

Tags

Autumn, breaking habits&labels, dancing-with-limitation, potential, soar

So, my theme for the month is Connecting. On Community.

Today, I went for a 30 minute walk with my housemate. Then I cooked while she ate in the kitchen; and we chatted as I ate. Community. Discussion. Space from technology; no music or phones.

Community Spirit

Through the next week, I’ve got so many plans – it’s the first week of University after four months off. The rough plan so far is:

Monday – volunteering 12-2 & meditation 6-7

Tuesday – dissertation meeting 3-4 & meditation 4-5 & gig [the birthday massacre] 7-11

Wednesday – tai chi – 7-8

Thursday – volunteering meeting 1-4

Friday – my other half comes down

So I’ve a bit of a busy week when you add lectures and travel.

And then I watched this. It’s long, but so worth it. I’ve read Tim Ferris’s book, I read Leo’s blog and have one of his books. The video talks about meditation, zen practise, waking early, habit formation, motivation, healthy space-taking and work-play balance.

Some phrases and tips I’d heard; others were new to me. It’s good to be reminded and good to learn.

Discipline, as you may know, is something I struggle with.

“Dancing with that limitation. Finding the edge of your limitation and dancing with it.” – Susan O’Connell

Wow.

I dance. That’s my connection. Movement touches my spirit and is a meditation I can connect through. And that reminded me of Balance.

Balancing with Self-development

Exercise. – Shivanata. Dancing. Free weights. Stretches. Yoga. Breathing exercises. Walking.

Aim: 20 minutes a day of any combination of those.

Reading. – Writing books, core texts, journal papers, blogs.

Aim: 30 minutes a day minimum.

Quiet-space. – Meditation. Writing on my patterns. Analysis of my plans/behaviour, Breathing exercises. Walking.

Aim: two 20 minute sessions in the week.

Sustenance. – Junk-food-free day. Five-a-day. Water first thing. Breathing exercises. Yoga/stretches. Fruit juice. Fresh meal.

Aim: two of the above each day.

Writing. – coursework, dissertation notes, blog, novel, diary entry.

Aim: thirty minutes a day.

Now, a lot of those overlap. Today, I did: Walking. Free-weights. Fully fresh meal [tuna and sweetcorn rice with thyme sauce]. Pattern-analysis. Reading journal paper. Reading Blogs. Blog-writing. Dissertation notes.

Which means I’ve done 20 minutes of Exercise, Read for 30 minutes, done one of my twice-weekly Quiet sessions, met the Sustenance goals and Written enough.

The only thing that I had to put effort into was the cooking and the walk. And they were so worth it.

If you felt you could dance with your limitations – what would you incorporate?

In Light,

Rose

October

Tags

plans, seasons

October is Here. Autumn is underway and the cold chills of English mornings settle around me. It’s windy and wet outside; the cloud covering grey.

If we had a fire, this would be the time to stoke the logs and get ready for the dim light of flame.

tradition:

~Samhain/Halloween October 31
~ Full Moon 23^rd October

food:

~apples! [Apple crumble]

~nuts and seeds

~elderberry drinks

~berries!

~broccoli

~grapes!

~parsnips

~sweet potato with rosemary ^_^

home:

~purge items

~full cleaning ritual

~ready the warm clothes

~begin seeking gifts

~craft ^_^

~writing!

~air out house

writing:

~enter October poetry contest

~edit Seven Sisters

~prepare plot of forth novel for possible NaNoWriMo

field trips:

~maybe join community choir/fencing/circus/creative writing/physics groups

~pub moot 21^st and grove ritual 30^th

~yoga, trance dance, talks, general walks in nature

crafts:

~solstice gifts

~watercolours/sketches

~reading! with chai tea!

This month also focuses on community and re-building connections – with University friends I’ve not seen for 4 months and with new people in my voluntary jobs and societies.

day-to-day-activities:

+ mondays – volunteering 4-6pm

+ tuesdays – run meditation 4-5pm
+ tuesdays – creative writing 7-9pm

+ wednesdays – circus society/ pagan pub moot 8-10pm

+ thursdays – volunteering 10-4pm

+  ten hours formal teaching per week

+ associated training days for those voluntary organisations

daily aims:

+ write – novel, blog, study

+ read – textbook, novel, nonfiction, journal articles

+ exercise – stretches/dance/shivanata

What are you planning this month?

In Light,

Rose