Treading Gently (even when it goes against everything we've been told)
Extraction - that's the word I've recently heard Bear Hébert use when describing a key value of Capitalism. Underpinning this is a belief in getting the most money from the least output, as quickly as possible and no matter what it takes. We are told that when selling we need to press on people's pain points, highlight their problem so that we can sell them our solution. We need to hint at their brokenness, their incompleteness. And then we need to create a sense of panic and urgency with a suggestion of scarcity - that if they don't act NOW they'll miss out and will have to limp on by themselves. We are taught to persuade them that we have the answers they're looking for - regardless of whether or not we do. We may end up twisting ourselves into all sorts of unnatural shapes to sell our wares. We may offer incentives to buy quickly, discounts to those who pay upfront - and penalties to those who pay in instalments. We might hint at our stuff flying off the shelves, even if it isn't. This all sets up the people we're selling to as our prey…
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Your Stories
The stories we hold about ourselves are so important. They impact our thoughts, feelings and behaviours - and our mental health. The really, really good news is that if we're up for looking our stories right in the eye then we have the opportunity to start re-authoring them.
It has been incredibly moving to read the scores of responses to the question I asked recently on Instagram: "Is there a narrative you have about yourself that you would like to hold a little more loosely in the coming year?" One of my missions with Middle Years Monday is to bring a sense of connection and belonging to women in their middle years. Witnessing each other's truths and seeing that there is so much crossover with our own, is one of the best antidotes to loneliness and that feeling of being an outsider or a bit of a weirdo. So I want to share two things with you today…
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Words of Compassion and Wisdom
I'm not quite sure how to talk to you about today's Letter of Love without sounding cheesy.
The truth is that I am sitting here with Frazey Ford playing (again!) and I am crying as I write this to you. That's how moving I find the words from Véronique that I have the utter privilege of sharing with you today - despite this being the third or fourth time that I've read them.
It seems especially stunning to me that she is able to write so evocatively in a language that is not her mother tongue...
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A note from the road
David and I have decided to renew our commitment to embracing the freedom that life has given us; to make the most of the time we have together; to inject more joy into our lives; and to remember that – much as 2020 has made us all have to dig really, really deep to hold onto this – we are the creators of our own lives. No-one is coming to save us – that’s on us. So, I’m going to be working hard for the remainder of 2020 at getting much, much better at becoming my own knight in shining armour.
And that’s pretty much what has brought us to this campervan, in this field. I grew up close by and the older I get the stronger the gravitational pull to this place becomes. But this is about much more than a desire to be in Dorset for a few days…
Spending a few months each year packing up our working lives and taking them on the road feels very much like it ticks a huge number of boxes for us. So this little 12-night adventure is actually a test to make sure that we enjoy van life before buying our own van. There, I said it: we are going to buy a van.
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Joy in the time of coronavirus
I'm here today to talk mostly about joy. My relationship with it has certainly become even more scratchy than usual lately. Hot on the heels of every moment of lightness is a searing pain for all the people both in my life and outside of it who don't currently have the opportunities for happiness that I am still able to hunt down - at least on some days.
I'm working hard to remind myself that there is not a finite amount of joy in the world. There are no scales. There is no direct inverse relationship between my joy and that of others. Me enjoying my back garden doesn't proportionately increase the difficulty for those with no green space of their own. My guilt serves no good purpose. All it does is paralyse me and deplete me of energy, thereby making it even less likely that I'll be able to offer succour to the people whose paths I cross during this strangest of times. In fact, surely the least I can do is have the good grace to breathe in and appreciate my good fortune. So, that's what I'm trying to do. Life is short dear friends. So let's be present to any and all of the goodness that is available to us…
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To everything there is a season
It's kind of embarrassing that as a 49 year-old woman who has lived through over three and half decades of menstrual cycles (the clue is in the word, Pip), I've paid zero attention to the whole idea of intentionally living in alignment with my rhythms. I have basically pushed on through, ignoring every kind of season that there is and paid no heed whatsoever to the calling of my body - and in fact my whole self. I have completely disregarded circadian rhythms; my natural sleep cycles; the energy peeks and troughs of my menstrual cycle; the waxing and waning of the moon; the annual seasons; and Yin and Yang. If you too have treated yourself like a piece of indestructable machinery rather than an exquisitely sensitive and miraculous living creature, this is my loving invitation to you to consider that there might be an alternative…
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Is there a place for ritual in our middle years?
I woke up a few mornings ago thinking about ritual and ceremony – and with a pull to write to you about these things. I hope that you may find something of use in my thoughts and reflections. In my experience, when ritual is ‘done’ to us it can be awkward and disenfranchising and alienating (I had a Catholic upbringing that included plenty of rituals that fell into these categories for me). But when we are empowered to create personal rituals for ourselves and each other – rituals that feel truly authentic and mark a passage from one place to another – it can be the most wonderfully potent vehicle for expression, healing, celebration and intention…
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In conversation with sculptor Jo Sweeting
When I arrived at Jo Sweeting’s Brighton home wearing the exact same Toast cardigan as her it seemed likely that we would find at least some common ground during our time together! What I wasn’t expecting was that by the time I left (just the right side of the maximum 4 hours visitor parking allowed in Jo’s street), we would have covered such wide-ranging and intimate ground with the ease and comfort that we did. It turns out that leaving my house and my town and stepping outside of my natural hermit tendency can bring really good things. And I hope that in sharing some of the conversation that passed between Jo and I you too might recognise parts of yourself and feel some of the sense of community that I drove back to Hastings with. Because whether or not we are part of a childless family of two (me) or a mum of three (Jo); whether we have two cats and two dogs (Jo) or none - yet! (me); whether we live in a bustling city (Jo) or a much smaller seaside town (me), the common language and experience of our middle years has potency. I hope you can feel it and that it brings you comfort…
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Becoming reacquainted with sleep
I know I'm not alone in missing my former uncomplicated friendship with my old pal Sleep. I have some good news though - some changes I've made have brought properly newsworthy results. Much of what I'm about to share with you here first appeared in my Instagram Stories several months ago and was incredibly enthusiastically received. But I talk about it today with even more zeal because I've since fallen off the wagon with much of this stuff and the connection between losing these good habits and a return to truly crappy sleep has been undeniable. I've also started experiencing some impressive nocturnal hot flushes in recent weeks which have made night times even more 'interesting'. So I've promised myself that on 1st September I will start taking my own advice again with renewed gusto. I hope you might find a nugget or two here that speaks to you...
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