Scream, Surrender

Some people just need to, you know?

I used to be that type, until very recently, actually. Scream it out, sob and shudder it out, run it out. Everyone once and a while I still drink it out, but not that often, haha. More often than not now I grab a book, do yoga, walk, meditate, go stand in a field and talk to myself very loudly about how fucking annoying whatever it is...is.

But nevertheless, some people need to, or rather, they think they do. But it's the same thing, really. And a lot of people scream silently, so silently that they're not even really aware that they're doing it. And so, my mantra became "you've gotta let them". Because one day they'll be done screaming and fighting and punching the air and asking why, and it's in that space that you try to teach what surrender is. Mostly not by actively teaching, but just by being what it is.

Surrender isn't weakness and letting go isn't giving up. Western culture does us a disservice by teaching that it is.

“Sometimes being a friend means mastering the art of timing. There is a time for silence. A time to let go and allow people to hurl themselves into their own destiny. And a time to prepare to pick up the pieces when it's all over.” - Gloria Naylor

The Cafe

She's reading a text book, stopping now and again to take notes. Law for Journalists or something like that. She's got a teal coat that I want, boots over jeans, and what I assume are engagement and wedding rings on her finger. She sips tea. Her baby, girl I think, sleeps on the other side of the little path at the entrance to the cafe. She's only two feet away, but it's far enough that if I was her mother it would freak me out. She's only three or four months old and I have this instant gut reaction of freaking out because she's not within arm's reach of her mother. I wonder where these things come from.

Everyone who walks in smiles at her and comments on the cute baby. This, of course, eventually wakes the cute baby up. She gathers her books and leaves, barely making a ripple in the air. It reminds me of a dance, this thing that mothers seem to just know how to do. Seamless on the outside, likely chaos in her head.

I like this place, the brownies taste good.

I used to write in cafes all the time. Spent the better part of my last year of university in the Williams across from campus. Peppermint tea and a laptop and essays upon essays for months at a time.

I feel like I should be drinking a latte or something, but I don't like lattes so I won't.

I have this thing about writing about places I've been in anything other than a clinical way. I don't do it a lot. I'm not quite sure why, but I seem to have this overarching feeling that putting words to it cheapens it in some way. Or doesn't do it justice. Or makes it just another one in a long series of cliches.

Maybe I just like secrets.

I guess I tend to prefer to let photos do the explaining. Bit of a lazy way out, really, but it is what it is.

I will write about this trip properly when I organize and post pictures, which will probably be at some point later this week. Right now I'm just sitting in this place with my drink and my brownie and my second carrot cake of the day.

I'm bored of this town now and I want to go somewhere else, but not home. Heading back to Guildford in a few hours and I am not even remotely happy about it. That's the danger of little trips for me, they remind me how much I love to travel. I don't want to go back to Guildford, I want to go anywhere else. Although, I have been there for eight months...I knew this would happen eventually.

*laughs*

Pillows, anyone?

Best line ever: "I don't even remember these. I remember those buttons, but I do not remember those pillows. What does this mean?"

Grace in Small Things: Day Twenty One

1. Lambs and calves.
2. Ridiculously good butter. (Who knew butter had a taste and why was I never told this?!)
3. Awesome weather.
4. Rivers.
5. New skirt!

Be The Change, Is What Someone Smarter Than Me Said

I went out in order to write something. Told the boys I wasn’t coming to the pub for the hello-goodbye lunch because I had something I needed to do. It wasn’t a lie; I do have something I need to do. I still lack the ability to centre 100% reliably when there are obvious outside energies around. Especially ones I’ve tapped into so completely. It’s my own fault really; I’m the one that created the connection in the first place.

Be careful what you wish for?

Quite literally, the second I get away I’m fine, and while I’m gone I work on building up enough reserve that I can get through the rest of the day mostly unaffected. But that doesn’t change the fact that I’m eating a burger right now, which won’t help, and I’m on my second Jack and Coke of the last half hour.

I do still have a self-destructive streak, it would appear.
*insert evil grin here*

It’s frustrating to me, on less of a level than it was before, to know that I could fix this. At least to some degree. That I could quite easily make it so that the pain that they insist on feeling wouldn’t need to be so sharp. A quite place to rest is what is required, and that is something that I know how to do very well, but all I can do is lead by example and throw out strength and positivity where I can. Hold a space for them to move through, unseen, as it should be.

So I laugh at lot, and hum along to music, and smile. I find ways to point out that deep in your toes good stuff. I look over and say something random, smirking through a Cheshire Cat grin. I live my life, I have a good time, I get enough sleep, I remember my practise, I breathe in, I breathe out, and I have unwavering faith that they’ll figure it out. That this too shall pass. That they’ll get where they so desperately want to be. And I wait. Fold my hands and patiently count unnecessary seconds, mentally imploring them to get out of their own way.

It doesn’t really frustrate me anymore. The knowing, I mean. Knowing that it doesn’t need to be this way. Knowing that they’re doing this to themselves. But I do still find it quite sad. There’s an incredible world out there, so far beyond their greatest imagining, that they’re holding themselves hostage from. Creating a separation that doesn’t exist and then living it as if it’s a prison they don’t hold the keys to.

They matter to me so I want to show them but I can’t. Well, not through any other way than living it myself. Which feels so woefully inadequate.

Even though it’s not.

Breathe In. Breathe Out.

It didn't rain today. Pretty blue skies. The first hint of winter being over. It's almost the vernal equinox, you know.

I hold this space and remind myself to let go and to trust.

Once again.

Spaces

For those who want to see where I spend most of my time; this is my room, unedited.
I still need to put up some twinkle lights...

(click on the image to see the rest of the photos in this set)

The In Between

Spinach pasta with pesto, a steaming mug of peppermint tea, one rather mediocre glass of red wine. The Longpigs streaming through speakers, keyboard constantly clicking. It's cold enough in the conservatory that I can see my breath mingling with heat rising from lunch and tea; perfect fusion.

It's raining. Hard. It doesn't typically rain hard in this part of England. I've lost count of what day of lashing rain we're on. Must be getting close to ten. It's not usually all day; couple hours early in the morning, couple hours at night--the universe's way of making fun of those working 9-5. Except on the weekends, of course. Today is Sunday and have we seen even the tiniest hint of break in the clouds? Of course not. Those few hours most afternoons, though, they're beautiful. The most clear blue sky you've ever seen.

Took a wander yesterday, down to Stoke Park. It's one of my favourite places in Guildford, but I've only been there twice since October; it can be a mind fuck to go there if I'm even remotely uncentered--surrounded by windows into other times sometimes best left in the past. It was a good place to go this time, though, because it unintentionally reminded me why all this rain is worth it. Purple and yellow flowers poking through the ground already and emerald green grass as far as the eye can see. For a place so often characterized as grey and dreary, England explodes with the most beautiful, vibrant colours in the Spring.

I walked back from town with a friend yesterday at dusk, me contemplating the nature of my adopted country, him whistling to the birds. The catch 22 between progress and constancy is a big part of the reason for why I'm here, in this place, right now.

Grace in Small Things: Day Twenty

1. Tesco Cheese Cake!
2. Long walks.
3. Books.
4. White wine sauce.
5. Tingly fingers.

Echoes of Grace

"Words you read won’t transform your life. Words I write won’t transform my life. Only one thing transforms my life: practice. I mean both my formal practice on a meditation cushion, and my everyday, standing-at-the-sink, emptying-the-hamper practice of giving up my chronic search for something else. The life we are most devoted to is the life we don’t have.

More to the point, I told this friend of mine that if I didn’t have a practice of silencing my inner screams, I would have hurt someone a long time ago. I would have hurt either myself or someone I profess to love. I cringe when people ascribe to me such heavenly virtues as calm, peace, patience and wisdom. They don’t yet realize that I do what I must to keep from destroying my life and everyone in it out of anger, fear, frustration and resentment."

Read more from the talented and wise Karen Maezen Miller, here.