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Well, first off, I should probably make some kind of mention of the fact that I didn’t post yesterday. The day started off as I had planned with my full 40 minute yoga practice. I was still feeling fairly full of the cold, but the yoga seemed to help and I felt not fabulous, but good enough.
By mid-morning I felt awful. My sinuses ached, my face became swollen, my cough barked and my head ached. I crawled off to bed, waking only for dinner, before crawling back to bed rising only at 9am this morning. In other words, I missed my writing target. However, I’m refusing to beat myself up about it. To be honest, I wouldn’t have the energy to do that anyway – lol! Instead, I’m being gentle with myself. I’m being kind, and I’m accepting that when you’re sick, you’re sick, and there’s no point in soldiering on pretending that you’re not. That’s just a sure-fire recipe to feeling sicker.
So, that was yesterday accounted for – what about today…
Yoga
Today I woke up feeling a bit better than yesterday. I’m not in as much pain from my head and sinuses, but I have developed dizziness. Have determined that my yoga practice is probably not the best activity for someone who is exhibiting difficulty walking from bed to sofa! So instead, I will be practicing savasana today.
For those of you who don’t know what savasana is, Bindu has a beautiful post explaining it, in which she calls it the quintessential restorative pose… a pose of letting go and non-clinging. This sounds like the perfect pose to adopt for a day like today. A pose to bring sweet restoration.
Writing
Well, like I said, yesterday was a non-starter for my writing target of 800 words. Today, however, I’ve propped myself up in bed, and this is what I’ve come up with…
The swans are flying again. Their great wings are beating in time to their own inner rhythm, moving through the blue like white sails tacking their way across open water. Long necks outstretched, creating a line from tail to bill that speaks of an elegant focus, undeniable yet inscrutable. They fly past my window, these three large swans, circling the trio of little lochs that skirt the edge of land and river, before arching their wings back and throwing their wide webbed feet forward. The water sprays up on either side, some droplets falling on long ivory feathers, others falling back to rejoin the collective.
And then there they are: picture postcard perfect. Three swans gliding out across the smooth glass surface of the lochan, one following the other, each serpentine neck the exact copy of the others, each sweep of wing feather, each deep ochre of bill. One rises up slightly, raises both wings, and spreading them fully wide, begins to flap them against the prevailing breeze; the noise admonishes a troupe of squabbling gulls plundering the lochside bins, and then the swan settles once again into graceful poise.
Before long, they take to the skies once again. Their wide wings extend to full width, their powerful pinions moving in synchronous motion pulling their large white forms skywards. It all looks so improbable. How can these white giants pull themselves free from the suck and drag of the water and ascend so assuredly? How can these birds of the water make the transition from loch to sky look so damn effortless, while I am left grounded, both feet solidly connected to the floor beneath?
It was while running these questions through my head, lamenting my flightless state, that I remembered a quote by J.M. Barrie, author of the book that inspired the flight of so many children’s imaginations, Peter Pan. He once stated that, “The reason birds can fly and we can’t is simply that they have perfect faith, for to have faith is to have wings.” Perfect faith – what is it to have perfect faith? And is it so wholly unachievable for humankind to find this state of perfect faith within themselves?
I’ve always been quite resistant to the word ‘faith’. For me it conjured up too much of an organised religion’s insistence on blind obedience. Obedience has never been something I aspired to. But lately I’ve been giving ‘faith’ some more thought, trying to recognise it when it presents itself, allowing it expression when I would formerly repress it, allowing myself to touch it, taste it – hesitantly at first, but now with a growing confidence. It now seems conceivable to me that it is possible to place trust in the intangible, the indefinite, the invisible. After all, it is so often the invisible that makes life worth living in the first place.
And I’m beginning to find that faith isn’t something intrinsically antithetical to my way of being. My need to be autonomous. My need to be one unto myself. That I can, perhaps, have both. That I can accept the unity and the duality of what it means to be alive on this earth, in this skin. In fact, I would go further and say if I cannot first experience one then I cannot ever hope to know the other. To recognize oneness, the interconnectedness of all life, then I must also embrace my separation, that sense of individuation, as Jung puts it.
But, of course, it is within that separateness that faith erodes. We forget that we are a part of a whole and begin to think we are alone. Isolated individuals shipwrecked on an island of rational absolutism. Faith, even of the imperfect kind, the kind that means we cannot take to the skies with our feathered brethren, allows us to sense the connections between our tangible existence and our intangible belief in something ineffable, something infinite, something that resides in the essential selves of all living things on this planet.
And I think this brings me to the crux of my uneasiness with the concept of faith: we have been taught that the divine, the numinous, is outside. In fact, not only outside, but upwards and at a great distance. Something that needs to be mediated and interpreted. Something that is too great for just ordinary living souls to appreciate and connect with. For me, having faith would require that I give up some part of myself to some other who, as an initiate, had attained some form of spiritual superiority. I’m questioning this now. Perhaps faith doesn’t require the trappings with which is has traditionally been bedecked. Perhaps one could have faith, without forsaking their belief in the divine spark that belongs in each and every beating heart.
I stand, both feet firmly on the ground, arms outstretched, open to the breeze, that salt sea tang tingling across my tongue as I inhale deep gulps of fresh air. The swans are flying again. But it is not for me to fly too. James Barrie may have blessed his Peter with the ability to fly, but even he recognised that it is not within us to practice such perfect faith. It remains an aspiration. A sweet target that the swans with their outstretched necks may reach, but for me, I remain upon the earth. My heart, however, my heart knows what it is to defy gravity, what it is to take flight, what it is to soar above lochs and land.
The swans are flying again. And this time, my heart flies too.
What does the word ‘faith’ bring to your mind? Have you managed to reclaim it and make it your own? Or do you prefer to practice your faith in accordance with an established belief system? I would love to hear your thoughts on this, so please to feel free to share them by leaving a comment.
Yoga
Today was a rest day from my yoga practice. We left early this morning to go to a farm open day down in Dumfriesshire, so I didn’t get the chance to do it before we left. However, I do plan on some savasana before going to bed tonight. Don’t quite want to let a day pass with no yoga whatsoever!
Writing
But I think it’s safe to say that my new yoga practice is impacting upon my writing. See what you think…
Inhale.
The light streams through the barn door, bouncing off the rafters and spilling onto the straw strewn floor. The swallows dip and dive in and out of the door, their forked tail feathers splitting the light momentarily as they dash back and forth. A calf only days old calls out for the comfort of its mother, and a laying goose hisses at the piglets racing past her nesting place.
But the hubub of the farm melts away when I catch sight of that door – that door where the light pours through into the dark barn. I stand feeling the light wash over me, filling my mind with nothing but its white radiance. And for a while I continue to stay there, bathed in the light, the world pulling back from the irrepressible progress of time. It is one of those moments where everything just seems to stop, and yet it hasn’t. The swallows continue to weave their way through rafters, the calf continues its plaint, the piglets are still on the move and the goose is still cross at the interruption.
It is me who has stopped. It is me who calms the inner storm of thoughts, who casts off the mask the ego presents to the world, and, just for a moment, allows a state of being to preside. Everything else falls away and I am lost to the light. The internal ticking off the to-do list halts. The self-conscious tugging at my jumper ceases. The background maternal worry that accompanies every second melts. And what I find is everything and nothing…
I’ve been reading a book by Patty Harpenau called The Life Codes which looks at seven codes connected to the teachings of Judaism & Christianity. In my readings into spirituality, I find that I’ve specifically avoided any text which explicitly draws upon traditional religious texts. This book has made me think that maybe I’ve been throwing the baby out with the bath water. I have fundamental difficulties with organized religion primarily because of its cultural applications to subdue, dominate and manipulate society. However, I’m beginning to see how I can look past the (what I find) misogynistic and even misanthropic interpretations of these texts, in order to take from them the spiritual wisdom they convey.
The code that spoke to me specifically in The Life Codes was The Eve Code, in which God encounters Goddess and she tells him, “You are the visible part of me. You are the forms and the objects, the creator of all that can be seen. But I, dear God, I am the creator of that which is invisible. I am the substance between the tissue and the breath between life.” The Goddess of the inbetween, of the interstices, who lives in that space that divides one thought from the next, one breath from the next. She shines through the gap that opens up, as the illusions we construct for ourselves and for others fall away, and we are left standing, our true self showing.
It’s how I feel during certain moments in my yoga practice. Those points at which I have breathed in, held a pose, but before exhaling and executing the next movement. Just for that small amount of time, I gain release. I find that I am not thinking thoughts, as I am between thoughts. I find that I am not breathing, as I am between breaths. I find that I am not moving, as I am between movements.
And I find that this brings a quality to my waking everyday, a quality that up til now, I found mainly in meditation, when I sat and found that still place within. Knowing that I have access to this place of the Goddess, this space betwixt spaces, fills me with such a sense of calm. Yesterday I wrote about the mantra that has been recurring for me of Just let go, and it strikes me that it is precisely this point at which we have achieved the letting go, the moment of surrender, in which we experience this same quality.
As I stand in front of the barn door, this is what I feel. That I have relinquished the need to control. That I have relaxed my grip. That I have released my breath. That I can just be. And this amazing feeling floods my senses in the same way that the light floods the space where I stand.
But please don’t get me wrong. This moment does not last. I don’t live in this space. I don’t know anyone who does! I only taste it fleetingly, the way you taste the floral perfume of a woman passing you on the street, or cappucino froth as it dissolves on your tongue or an all too brief goodbye kiss. It’s precious but achingly impermanent.
And soon the flitting swallows, frenetic piglets, defensive goose and lowing calf call me back to where I stand. The moment has passed, but I remain grateful for that glimpse of the invisible, of the inbetween. I let it go, knowing I can find it again.
Exhale.
Yoga
Today’s practice was completed with the intention of grace. Grace is a word that has been coming up a lot for me of late. When I think ‘grace’ I can feel my spine lengthening, my step lightening and my heart expanding. I look on everyone and everything from a place of acceptance, and the whole world begins to connect, begins to form a whole, a unity.
Taking this into my yoga was such a beautiful experience, and I actually found the entire practice much easier than I have so far. Setting my intention for the practice and then taking it forward into my day is colouring my perspective in such a delightful way, and has to be one of my favourite discoveries from my participation in the challenge.
Writing
The writing wasn’t quite so successful. And what do you do when you have a target to reach and a block firmly in place? You write 800 words about not writing. Well, you do if you’re me, anyway!
Oh what to write, what to write….
Sometimes the words just seem to flow through me and I don’t even seem all that involved in the process, but other days (like today) the words feel sticky. Almost coagulated. And the more you push at them, the more they resist flow. Better just to let go…
Letting go has become a bit of a mantra during my yoga practice over the last 5 days. I tell myself as I stretch into downward dog just to let go. I tell myself as I release into pigeon just to let go. I tell myself as I lie in savasana, and my mind is whirring, and my ears pick up any and all distracting noise, and my eyes long to open to check the clock, just to let go.
And I do let go. I breath into my stretches, I focus on my inhale and exhale, and I can feel the difference. Today I could feel a shift in my practice; it felt smoother, steadier… graceful almost.
But my writing…. well, that’s another story today, for whatever reason. You know, when I was writing my phd thesis I used to have moments like this when the words wouldn’t come. An almost blind panic would start to seep into my fingertips which stayed poised over the keyboard, just in case a wave of words would suddenly flood through my synapses, down into the muscles of my arms, across the delicate joints of wrists and hands, to be transformed into black characters against the illuminated screen.
The thought that the words wouldn’t come became crippling. A physical ache would sit in my abdomen, as I would sit and try and try and try to think up more words, more ideas, more theoretical expositions. But somedays, no matter how desperate I felt, the words just never came. And sometimes those days would connect to form a week. And then a month. I know what it is to be haunted by writer’s block. Only all too well.
What I would so often find during these bleak periods of stagnation is that the breakthrough would always occur when I let go. I would throw a bit of a tantrum, exclaim my authorial ineptitude to anyone who would listen (and even those who wouldn’t), and then walk away from the blinking cursor on the blank page. I’d go out dancing. I’d visit my grandparents. I’d go for long walks with my camera for company. Anything but write.
And then, just as I always knew it would on some subconscious level, the breakthrough would wake me up in the middle of the night. The great dreamtime aha. All of sudden a connection would be made and I would sit straight up in bed with a fully formed sentence resting lightly in my mind, just waiting to be committed to the page. I would clamber over my slumbering husband, desperately seeking pen and paper before the elusive sentence escaped me.
Once scrawled on the back of an envelope in eyeliner, I could then relax because I knew the rest would follow now. I knew that when I sat down and opened the much fretted over word document, and copied down that night-time scribble, an ocean of words would flow. And oh it felt so good! Just knowing that I had broken free, that my words had not deserted me for good, that I was capable of capturing the free-floating ideas to give them expression was enough to re-establish belief in myself.
But that was over 18 months ago now. The kind of writing I do now is creative and free-style. It’s a dance between meaning and movement. An arabesque of narrative that leaps across medium into spotlight and back into shadow. My writing resists structure and glories in the fluidity of form. It feels like a gift…. when it flows.
I’ve never really found myself in the position of having made a commitment to write, but discovering a block between my mind and the page when it comes to this kind of free writing. It’s almost as if there are just too many options. Too many wonderful stories to be told, tales to quicken the heartbeat, that I feel almost paralysed into writing nothing at all. It’s almost as if my mind craves the structure, the straitjacketed style of academic prose, which gave reassurance, albeit within clearly defined borders.
No. There maybe many things I miss about writing my thesis, but that is not one of them. The feeling that I’ve had over this last week of writing fairy stories, of giving my creativity free reign, has been magical. Even when I am reduced to writing about not writing, it still feels good, still feels like home. And look at that… we’re at 800 words!
Yoga
In all honesty, I wasn’t going to write an update for today. I woke up this morning with a sore throat and a nasty headache. Rather than get up to do my yoga before the kids got up, I pulled the duvet over my head and retreated back into sleep. An hour later I dragged myself from bed and medicated with tea and sympathy.
I had already intended to take things a bit easier today anyway, as the lower parts of my palms have been getting sore while doing my yoga, and I was planning a pared down yoga practice. So, after the kids left to play in their bedrooms and I had the lounge to myself, I did the beginning stretches – the foot and wrist stretches, the cat, cow and child poses – before doing the twists and savasana. And it was oh so just what my body needed!
I stayed in savasana for the longest time I’ve managed so far (20mins), and had the most wonderful image of falling white feathers running through my mind. I had set the intention at that start of the practice of gentleness, and so the feathers seemed a perfect accompaniment.
I finished up the practice with a greatly diminished headache (thank goodness) and a much better perspective towards my physical body. It can be difficult for me not to get cross at myself when I’m not feeling well. I keep telling myself that I don’t have time to be sick, and that I should just be able to get on with things. After yoga today I found a new sense of kindness towards myself, and resolved not to push myself quite so hard as I normally do.
Writing
Well, I’m afraid you’re not going to get to read the writing that I did today. I wrote a post on the theme of Wonder for my Nature Space column over at The Calm Space, but it won’t be published till next week. I didn’t really know how it would turn out, and the form it took quite surprised me. I’ll link to it next week once it’s up.
What I will say though is that I’ve been surprised in general about the turn in my writing practice since I started this challenge. I don’t know whether it’s the yoga (altho I rather suspect it is!) or whether it’s the discipline of just writing every day, but I’ve found the fairy stories of the last couple of days personally enlightening, and have been so humbled by the response of others to them.
I hope I manage to keep it up over the rest of the challenge – I am so enjoying the opportunity to give free reign to whatever wants to come through my pen. So liberating!
Amazing how we put up blocks to our writing – why do we do that when it feels so good to finally break through?
Yoga
Today’s yoga went sooooo much better! Woke up earlier, which meant that not only could I do my yoga in the lounge, so I could avoid kicking the walls as I did yesterday, and I got complete silence rather than an ACDC soundtrack. What a difference!
And not only that, but I actually found that I wasn’t as unbalanced in some of the positions that I struggled with only a couple of days ago. There are still many wobbles throughout, but at least I managed to stay upright. I do still find that I get frustrated with my body, but I’m also finding it easier to forgive it for not being as strong/flexible/supple as I would like.
Writing
Well, it turned out to be another fairy tale today. Again, a slightly different style, but you can see what you think…
There is a tree in the centre of a secret Scottish glade in the central lowlands, which has branches so wide and a trunk so tall that it fills the space fully and completely. The trees in the surrounding woodland all began life as a seed which was, no doubt, first carried to its resting place by wind, insect, water, animal, then soaked by the persistent spring rains, until it sent the first of its many roots down into the dark peaty earth before casting a shoot out to greet the sun. But this tree, this tree that grew so strong and full in the centre of the glade did not share this beginning. This tree has a story to tell. And if we listen very carefully, if we lay our heads against its wide, rough trunk, and place our hands upon the earth where this great arborescent being has drawn its strength to grow and thrive, if we do this then maybe, just maybe, we’ll hear a voice whispering its memories of a time before it stood in the centre of a secret Scottish glade in the central lowlands.
If we were to hear this voice, it would surely start its story with the words that begin all great stories…
Once upon a time there was a young woman who lived with her mother and father in two small rooms above the family’s bakery. Her father had taken over the business of baking bread, preparing pastries and crafting cakes when her grandfather, also a master baker, had fallen ill the year she was born. Life was not unpleasant, but it was hard. Every day, the little family rose many hours before dawn to start on that day’s batch of bread, mixing and kneading, baking and slicing. By the time the sun finally made it above the horizon, the young woman and her parents were frequently exhausted, and yet, the day was only just beginning and the customers started to arrive.
And what a number of customers there were! The shop would have a queue out of the door consistently from the time the shop opened to the time when it closed. This bakery was certainly not the only bakery in town, but it was fast gaining a reputation for being the very best. It was the place to find the softest loaves, the flakiest pastries, and the lightest sponges. Perhaps it was only really a matter of time before news of their delicious fare would reach the ears of the King. While his procession passed by the family’s bakery he remarked upon the length of the queue streaming out of the bakery door, and the many jolly-faced customers milling around outside biting into still-warm bread rolls.
His chief advisor informed him that they were passing what was generally considered the very best bakery in town. That the fame of this baker’s was spreading far and wide and that it was now believed to be the only place where one could purchase croissants that melted in the mouth, sponge cakes that virtually floated and bread that after one bite would make one convinced that they had died and gone to heaven. Needless to say the King was intrigued and commanded that the baker should be brought to the castle with a selection of his wares. The message was conveyed to the family by official castle memo, and caused a great uproar as the baker and his small family rejoiced and panicked in equal measure. What would they take with them? What type of loaves should they offer the regent? Would he enjoy some pain au chocolate or perhaps some pain au raisin?
The whole shop became a hive of excitement as their regulars gave their opinion on what should be served to the King, and soon the whole street and then the whole town was chattering about the fortunate baker and his family. The daughter was caught up in the hubub to begin with, but after a long morning of kneading the dough for the day’s bread, and then a whole day on her feet serving that same bread to a queue of customers seemingly without end, she quickly grew tired of the excitement, and when the day ended she crept out the door, and hurried to her most favourite place on earth: a forest glade that shimmered in the evening light, a place that always felt somewhere just between worlds. A magical, liminal space where dreams could be dreamed and wishes wished.
She slumped down in the centre of the glade, the soles of her feet burning from standing all day and the muscles across her shoulders aching from pressing and pulling at the bread mixture. In this quiet space of complete tranquility, she allowed herself to relax, to let go of the tension that tugged and pulled at her limbs, to let her mind drift. This state of bliss was interrupted by a cough just off to the left of the clearing. Startled she sat up and peered into the darkening forest. “Hello?” she called out, but received no reply. She jumped to her tired feet and was just about to start running back for town, when a voice shouted, “Stop – I mean you no harm.”
From behind a tall pine stepped a young man, slightly taller than the young woman, fine featured, lithe limbed and slim hipped. His dark eyes seemed larger than most men’s and his cheekbones higher. His coal-black curls parted to reveal two pointed ears, and his voice, while it was very much within a male register, appeared to resonate with the sound of silver bells. The young woman recognized him instantly for what he was, and while she had been warned time and time again that if she played in the forest the wee folk would one day carry her off, she had never encountered one of their race. Her fear swiftly turned to curiosity, and the two walked towards each other, meeting just as the moon rose above the tops of the trees and flooded the glade with silver light.
Without speaking another word, the baker’s daughter and the prince of the fairy-folk fell deeply and irrevocably in love.
It was well after midnight by the time the young woman re-entered the bakery, and as soon as she fell into her little bed by the hearth, she sank into a sleep so profound that it took a considerable effort from both the baker and his wife to wake her the following morning. And it was an important day ahead, as they were due to present a selection of their baked goods at the castle by midday. The young woman struggled to stay awake as she helped her parents in the hot kitchen, but as the hours passed she gained comfort in the familiarity of her movements kneading the dough, stirring pastry mixtures, lifting loaves.
When the last loaf was finally laid into the basket, and the basket was placed into the carriage ready to be taken to the castle, the baker and his wife were in a state of high frenzy, and could not understand their daughter’s strange calmness. What they couldn’t know is that while she stood beside them preparing the precious cargo, her heart was in the fairy glade. She passed the journey in a daze and before she knew it they had arrived at the castle gate. The gate was opened and the carriage rolled in clattering across cobbles. They were brought around to the side where kitchens the size of market squares awaited them. The baker and his family were invited in and were provided with kitchen boys to help serve their loaves and pastries. The family then accompanied the fare up to the King’s court, where they were welcomed and much praised for the delicious treats they had brought with them.
It was decided then and there that the baker and his family would move into apartments in the castle and that they would work with the castle baker to produce the royal bread for the King’s personal consumption. It was also decided that the baker’s daughter would marry the head cook’s son: a decision which both the baker and his wife saw as a blessing, but upon hearing the King’s decree, the daughter could only feel a dark dismay fill the depths of her soul, and her heart continued to pine for her Elvin prince. Her sorrow was only magnified when she met the man to whom she was now betrothed. He was a large man with rough hands and a bullish nature, who made it abundantly clear that he did not like her talking to anyone other than himself, and that he would not stand to be humiliated by her spending a moment with any man but him.
He would watch her all day long as she helped out in the kitchen, and everyone withdrew from her for fear of her jealous fiancee. The baker’s daughter began to feel terribly lonely and she became pale and wan from rarely leaving the castle kitchens. Her parents, who were kindly people, looked on sorrowfully as their daughter withdrew further and further into herself and away from her future husband’s attentions. Then, one evening, a week prior to the date fixed upon for the unfortunate betrothal, the baker came to his daughter and told her he would help her to escape. He could see that life in the castle did not agree with her, and that as the wife of a jealous man, she would not last long in this world.
The following morning, the baker and his wife kissed their daughter goodbye, and she snuck outside into the early sunshine and slipped out through the castle gate. Here, she broke into a run, back towards the town she had left only months before with her heart set upon returning to the enchanted glade in search for her lover. She was so focused on the reunion that she did not notice that the cook’s son had spotted her leaving the castle and was now following her back into town, dogging her steps and darkening her shadow.
It was late afternoon when she finally arrived in the glade, the journey by foot taking much longer that it had by carriage. When she finally entered into the clearing, she found that her prince was already there waiting for her. Their gaze connected, and they drew together in a passionate embrace. The cook’s son, near breathless with rage at the sight of the reunited lovers, pulled a paring knife from out his back pocket and flung it towards the entwined couple. The blade entered through the daughter’s back and pierced her heart and she sank further into the prince’s arms, her breath growing ragged and shallow.
The prince, with tears in his large dark eyes, whispered a few words into the air which were carried off into the ether, high above the treetops, transported by the light. As the last word left his lips a transformation began to take place, and the two lovers, still entwined in one another’s arms, began to grow roots down into the soft brown earth. Their joint form of two bodies held close took on the appearance of a slender tree, and strong lithe branches spread out from its trunk, reaching up into the clear blue of the sky. In only a matter of moments, the change was complete and the lovers had become a young oak tree.
The cook’s son, who had run off at the sight of the young woman’s blood, never saw what became of the two, and he himself was never heard from again as he lived out the rest of his life in guilt and loathing. But the lovers, now in the form of a single oak, continued to grow and thrive and flourish; their love gaining sustenance from the soil beneath and the sunbeams from above.
As you can see, it continues to grow today. Its trunk is solid, its branches wide, and its roots run deep deep deep into the earth below. And if you stay very still, and listen very attentively, you can hear the voice from the heartwood of the tree. It sings, “We are one. We are one. We are one.”
It’s not perfect by a long shot, and I don’t know where all the bakery stuff came from – lol! Anyway, I enjoyed writing it, so I hope you enjoyed reading it 
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