If you're frazzled but can't get out to let nature smooth some balm on your frazzle, here's some nature to meditate on right here at your desk.
You can click on the picture to get a larger version if you'd like.
The picture was taken in Tuscany by a very dear friend of mine just the other week. We'd be delighted to hear what it's done for you.
This is the week!
It's the week I'm putting my body in charge. I'd like to hear what it has to say about how I'm living my life and what it would do differently given the chance. Now it has its chance.
I'm imagining it'll have some things to say about the amount of sleeping, eating, resting, exercising and sitting quietly I do and I'm open to hearing from it on any other topics as well.
I'm looking to uncover my natural rhythms and see how close to or far away from my adopted habits they are.
The ways my body will be in charge
I'm going to go to sleep when my body tells me I'm tired, rather than stay up and socialise or finish e-mails
I'm going to allow my body to wake up naturally in the morning when it's had enough sleep rather than set an alarm
I'm going to eat when my body tells me it's hungry rather than when it's lunchtime or others have arrived to join me
Exercise is a bit different for me as I don't believe I've ever received a signal from my body telling me it would like to exercise. With this one I'm going to do what I had planned and watch closely for signs. Signs of ease telling me it's OK to keep going and signs of distress telling me to slow down or stop.
I tend to get frazzled if I don't take enough time quietly on my own, either reading, thinking about a client or meditating. I'll watch for signs of frazzle and whether it's due to lack of quiet.
There's other things I know contribute hugely to the wellbeing of my soul and I'll keep an eye on those too
Order, beauty and good smells in my home (I work here too so doubly important) A balance of stillness and movement
Pleasure and fun, I can tip over into work, work, work, very easily and become dull without noticing
Talking of pleasure, I drink wine (one - three glasses) and coffee (one cup) most days and plan to continue with these pleasures. They are for pure pleasure and not imbibed in order to get my body to do things it wouldn't do without them, like wind down or stay awake so I can drive or finish a piece of work. I know they'll have an impact on my rhythms and I'm going to accept that distortion. So....I've begun, my body is in charge and I'm listening. I'll note down what it asks for and how far that is from what I'd have done. I hope it's not too far! I'll report the findings through the week. Now...time for wine.....
Hello. How’s 2007 going for you so far?
A rich and fertile new year, each moment ripe, luscious, full of promise and lived with zest and relish?
Or is it closer to the other end of the spectrum, a bit grey and tired? Weather a bit grey, skin a bit grey, system a bit groggy and tired?
No problem, eat this superfood and get vibrant in a day!
Wow. When did we develop expectations of year round vibrancy and verve, with no allowances for the natural ebb and flow of things? From people who make products that will help us get that way maybe.
We’re totally accepting of plants and animals having natural rhythms, growth periods and dormant periods. We happily indulge their hibernation.
Trees can drop their leaves and do apparently nothing for months without us being on their case to produce. When new shoots arrive in the Spring we’re delighted to see them. We don’t say ‘About time! How long does it take to produce a few shoots. What have you been doing all winter?’
But ourselves? Alas we seem to be far less accepting of our own natural rhythms.
Or rather we’re very accepting of the flowing, not so of the ebbing, seeing tiredness as a problem to be overcome rather than a signal from our wise bodies advising us to rest.
Do you agree to lots of social things that all sound great and you really want to do but them when the time comes you just don’t have the energy and either crawl your way through and don’t enjoy them or end up canceling and feeling bad? It seems our body just goes right ahead and organises our ‘ebbing times’ regardless of our plans and we go right ahead and fill our diaries regardless of our bodies plans.
Do you keep working late to finish ‘just this piece of work’, telling yourself you’ll get back to normal hours after this, but then another priority arrives, working late becomes normal, time at home drops down the priority list and before you know it ‘ebbing time’ is barely there?
I know very few people who know what their natural rhythms are and fewer still who pay attention to them and work their lives according to this precious wisdom.
I’ve tended to adopt timetables. Working hours that are culturally acceptable, school hours and social habits and flex myself to accommodate them without giving a whole lot of thought to my own rhythms.
The size of the gap between our natural rhythms and our adopted timetable determines how much we will need to flex and ignore or alter our bodies in order to continue with our adopted timetable.
My ignoring and altering habits seem like minor enough offences
- I sometimes stay up and socialise longer than my body would like to. It says
tired now, time for sleep’. I ignore it and stay up anyway.
- I sometimes need to be up in the morning before my body would like to be, so I ignore
it wanting more sleep, set an alarm and get it up out of bed anyway.
- When I get downstairs and start getting breakfast ready, I’m a little less than sparky and
ready for the day so I alter that with a cup of earl grey tea.
Minor offences I’m sure you’ll agree, when you think about the sugar, drugs, workaholic and shopaholic tactics I could be adopting to ignore or alter things.
Minor though they may be, I can’t help wondering what it might be like not to ignore or adjust all the time but to try life according to my body, what that would mean in practice and how different that is from what I’m doing now?
I’ve decided it’s time to find out.
I’m putting my body in charge for a week.
Next week!
I’ve chosen next week as it’ll be a little easier, it’s our school Feb half term holiday and my son is away snowboarding (the highlight of his year by far), so I won’t have him and his friends for tea. A friend who regularly stays with us while working up this side of the country has her last day in that job today (Fri 9th Feb) and so won’t be joining me to eat next week either. I’ve also kept the week fairly free of appointments so I’ll have as little as possible to dodge around.
I’ve thought about some of the things my body might like to have a say about like how much and when I work, eat, drink, sleep, sit quietly, exercise, and socialise. I’m open to hearing things I hadn’t anticipated too. I’m really looking forward to seeing what it has been trying to get me to do for years.
Have you a sense of how close or far away you are from your natural rhythms and how your body would adjust things if you let it?
I’m hoping to unearth my natural rhythms, (or at least my natural rhythms for a week in February), then we’ll see…….
Is it bliss? Do I love it? Am I converted? What am I going to do now?
All these answers and more…. find out how it’s going here at the blog.
Happy New Year!
That's the traditional greeting. In my Scottish days we'd not be sending you a
virtual greeting but standing on your actual doorstep along with an actual lump
of coal, some shortbread and a tall dark gent.
This really happened. It was a gesture indicating we wished our nearest and
dearest, warm and comfortable whatsits and never to want for food and protection
in the forthcoming year.
It's called 'First Fittin' (or First Footing in English). The first time you set
foot inside your friends, neighbours and relatives houses in the new year, this
is what you'd do. They in turn would welcome you, your gifts, well wishes, hugs
and kisses and sit down with you for a little whisky imbibing,or whatever your
tipple was.
That was how the first day (or few days) of the new year were spent.
(Full of alcoholic but more importantly, full of soul).
Then consumerism arrived and we'd rush back to work, with shareholders eager to
grab the kind of spending that comes when everyones a bit more relaxed.
So...now on New years Day there's shopping and work. No soul. Ich.
Could we stop this please?
When will we find a soulful moment now? When will our thoughts turn to our wishes
for those close to us in the coming year? I'm going for it this year.
No sales for me, but a New Years day spent in thought about what I wish for each
of my nearest and dearest in the coming year. What does my heart swell with when
I think of them?
There then...I have my wish for them.
Care to join me?
Don't forget yourself. What do you wish for yourself in the coming year?
I wish for you, that which you wish for yourself plus the courage and strength
to clear out or work through everything that stands in your way.
They're not new years resolutions exactly, more like wishes, intentions maybe.
I find my desire to think ahead resolution style is very strong around my birthday,
(not till August), far less so now. Having said that, I find it's slightly
more sociable to have one or two to offer up into regular conversation about now,
rather than the proverbial slap in the face of
"No I don't do resolutions".
I've usually got one or two things on the go that I'm heading for and they work
quite well as stand in resolutions.
Here's a few of my current stand ins.....
Clearing up Flo's skin.
My beautiful cat has a couple of uncomfortable little bits which I'm sure we can
work wonders with by rubbing in Aloe Vera Gel daily.
A flat(ter) stomach.
A slow weaning off of winter hibernating stomach and gently moving towards sight
of toes. It's not that bad, but whilst remaining soft and yielding in a womanly
way I'm going for, shall we say, a little less overlap.
Best of son emergence.
Finding the 'interference versus welcome support' balance in his first gcse year
and thus magically bringing out the very best there is to be had from my
(remaining happy) son.
Soul versus output balance
Actually this is a serious one. I wrestle on with the honesty of writing when
it's real and emerging versus the 'daily is good' for the search engine robots
marketing message. I've sat consistently with writing only when there's something
alive and burning to be said but still have a 'if it's not coming daily it's not enough'
message running on.
We'll see.
I can honestly, really and with no hint of conformity wish you a very
Happy New Year! (and virtual coal, shortbread and tall dark gent to you too).
Best Christmas Ever!
I’ve seen so many magazine articles in recent weeks promising the best ever Christmas….if I buy this or follow this step by step plan or do it the Delia way, I’ll have the best Christmas ever. Debenhams are advertising Christmas as designed by Debenhams…that’s getting close to blasphemous.
I want to charge into the highly commercialised middle of it all and ask ‘Best ever according to whom exactly?’
I remember one year doing it the Delia way. I’d decided I’d do the whole shebang. Full traditional Christmas dinner with knobs on. This was going to mean bringing a total of 10 things to the table at the same time all cooked and hot just for the main course alone, which was double my previous record of 5. I was too scared to add in starters and pudding. Some advice was needed and Delia and Good Housekeeping magazine were surely better qualified than anyone for the job.
I read through her carefully timetabled Christmas day plan some weeks ahead feeling relaxed and confident that Delia wouldn’t steer me wrong and even if it did mean turning up in the kitchen at the crack of dawn with my Christmas outfit and lippy already on (as there’s no time for bathing and preening in this schedule), I was still looking forward to it.
It wasn’t long before I realised I was going to need Gordon Ramsay’s veg peeling and chopping speeds to keep up with the schedule and by the time the 5 minutes allocated for ‘sipping a glass of sherry and opening presents with the family’ arrived I was seriously stressed, more than a couple of hours behind schedule and giving estimates of 8pm for eating lunch.
Safe to say, the Delia year doesn’t go down as my best ever.
It’s taken me many years to shake off the media version, or indeed anyone else’s version, of what a good Christmas looks like.
It’s been the most sagely of gentlemen, Thomas Moore, that has been my saviour. He doesn’t do Christmas catering schedules but he did say this which I’ve been finding most wise council for pretty much anything, Christmas included.
“We have to decide for ourselves what’s nourishing to our souls, and do those things over others”.
Oh now! What do you think? Do we like Thomas? Oh we do, we do! I know he wasn’t talking about Christmas specifically but I think it applies very well don’t you?
With fresh eyes, am I, to Christmas delivered! (in sagely style you pronounce that last word deliver-red).
If you were to cast your eye over your Christmas, or prospective Christmas to be, to what extent do you find are you doing things that are nourishing to your soul?
I have already had my own, best ever Christmas, crafted to perfection from the things that were truly be nourishing to my soul that year.
That particular Christmas I had only myself to think of. My son was with his Dad and both my parents departed. My everyday life was filled in the daytimes with work and lots of people, followed by cooking quickly and clearing up before helping my wee man with any homework and then straight onto bath time and bedtime stories before getting back to housework, paying bills and then preparing for work the next day again.
When I thought about what I’d really like, I realised I’d be happy staying at home by myself, in my PJ’s all day eating mashed potato. I knew that a must was to have no rushing at all, really nice food, but little or no cooking, time to savour everything and quiet and stillness in abundance.
It was pure peace, full of savoured moments, with absolutely no stress whatsoever. It was bliss and it went like this……….
I had one very dear and lovely friend over to stay for a couple of days. No crowds, no constant jabber and endless rounds of cooking, feeding, clearing up just in time to start again.
We got up when we woke naturally, no alarm, no turkey deadlines to meet, just allowing ourselves to sleep till we’d had all the sleep we needed.
Dressing gowns on, we got the fire going and got all cosy in the living room, and brought in the present opening refreshments…champagne and proper Scottish smoked salmon.
Present opening was luxurious. One at a time, taking turns, we opened, admired, played with, listened to, drew a big deep breath of, sampled and fully appreciated each present.
I had no idea what time it was and no need of knowing.
More luxury Moddom? Oh yes please. Sinking into a divine smelling bath, big deep breaths of Caleche (my favourite perfume by Hermes), slathering on equally divine body lotion and feeling just gorgeous.
We were ready for some fresh air by then and to stretch our legs. Lovely crisp air with some wonderful warm soft powdery Caleche wafts. Meanwhile, the best sausages in the world tended to themselves in the oven.
We brought our glowing cheeks, stretched legs and nicely developing appetites back for sausages and mash followed by mince pies and brandy butter. Just delicious. Not so much food we couldn’t walk and barely any clearing up to do. A bit of a curl up on the sofa with some port and cheese much later. Peace, ease and luxury!
It stands unbeaten as my best Christmas ever for doing just what I needed at the time. Let’s hear it for, at the very least, low stress and better still soulful Christmases.
Sculpt and craft your own best ever, no-one’s version but your own.
Would you like lots of people around, a few, one, none?
Would you like to be quiet, raucous, still, playing games, dancing?
At home, in the Alps, on the beach, at Grandmas?
Will you travel far and wide, some, none, in style, in a plane, train, car, on a sledge?
Are you feasting big-time, your table groaning under the weight of many, many platters, or dream of just a sliver of truffle on your handmade papardelle and the best Chablis you can lay your hands on?
Want to go and sing your little heart out at midnight mass?
Present opening in bed?
Want to wait till everyone’s arrived and then decorate the tree together like you did when you were tiny?
Or does none of it matter a bit, so long as you get to sit in front of a real fire talking for an hour or so with your old Dad?
How close is the actual Christmas you’ve got coming up, to your ideal, soul nourishing one?
Are you doing things because you’re telling yourself you have to, out of duty but grudgingly?
A grudging Christmas? Hmmm, not doing it for me either.
Liberate yourself, and your family and friends too, from grudgingly doing anything this year.
Gather up all those that will be with you this year, let everyone describe their best bits, the bits that make Christmas for them, get creative and see how many can be accommodated if maybe someone was happy to come early to make all the beds, or are more than happy to stay sober to drive Mum to church at midnight on Christmas eve…. everyone getting at least their most favourite bit.
Once you get clear about what it would take to make it low stress for you it’s not usually beyond the wit of man to come up with how to do that.
Want lots of company and all the family together but without being a galley slave for the duration?
I know one family who each arrive on the day with a major contribution, one travelling the length of the county with a hot turkey taking up most of the back seat of the car, another all the veg and trimmings, another the starter and pudding, another all the wine and other drinks. The house hosts make the beds, the fires, the games, the music, the crackers and lay the table. Once there, they stay another day or so and take it in turns to make meals and clear up so it’s all shared out, some like doing it on their own for a bit of quiet and others in pairs for a proper catch up.
Want to have everyone round but to have more harmony than arguments and moaning then how about signing up to this.
Make no complaint without suggestion.
If you need to come up with a suggestion before complaining about something, and have agreed not to complain at all if you can’t come up with a do-able suggestion, it can do wonders for your holiday atmosphere.
So, if everyone’s yacking away, the TV’s on and there are radio noises too, drifting in from another room, the moaning version could come out as
“What a racket, I can’t think in all this noise”
The ‘no complaint without suggestion’ version might translate into;
Would anyone object if we closed this door to keep the radio to the other room?
Or
“Would anyone like to join me for a quiet walk for half an hour?”
Or
“I think I’m going to take half an hour’s quiet, in my room with my book”.
If something you dearly wanted to eat or drink has been forgotten but all the shops are closed and you can’t think of another way of getting some then you’d just
‘Hud yer weesht’ (hold your quiet or keep one’s mouth shut) as they say where I come from.
Soul nourishing best ever Christmases……sculpt away. Do let me know what makes up a soul nourishing Christmas for you and just how creative you’ve been to bring it about. e-mail me
Go Well
Pauline
Nobody sees a flower, really, we haven't time and to see takes time, like having a friend takes time.
Georgia O' Keefe, Artist
Another reminder, again from The National Trust series of cards, of the things that keep us connected to our souls, or at least let us drop the exterior for a bit to give it a chance to breath.
The photo this time is from my garden this summer. Just when I thought it was all over for my clematis for the year it sprang a surprise second blooming, quite quite perfect and all the more appreciated for the surprise.
If you click on the photo it should reward you with a larger version for you to 'really see' it if you would like a moment with nature in your day.
Rest is not idleness, and to lie under the trees, watching the clouds floating by, is not a waste of time.
Sir John Lubbock, Naturalist
This quote has found its way to me twice in one week, once in the great 'Higher Awareness' daily e-mails I'm subscribed to and then on a very lovely 'National Trust' card I was buying for my cousins birthday on Friday.
So I'm paying attention and checking myself out....am I doing enough lying and watching the clouds floating by?
My son is great at this and he used to spend a fair bit of time encouraging me to do the same. I think his energy for encouraging me is waning now though.....more often than not met by a long list of what I need to do before I can lie down and watch the clouds or that programme. He's come to know that I'm busy most of the time.
Are you busy most of the time? How long could you imagine stopping and staring at the clouds for?
I wonder how to break the 'just keep going' habit?
After much thought I've come to the conclusion that maybe this time it's a case of 'Just do it'
Particularly now, as we nudge over into December and for many face a time of near frenzy ....... shopping, spending, organising, cooking ahead, cooking now, card writing, house decorating, bed making for guests, and all that as well as the day job.
To save our souls during this time.....what better than a period each day of watching the clouds go by.
Can't see it? Just do it.
Stop. Let your shoulders sink down to somewhere lower than your earlobes, and find yourself something to stare at that you can lose yourself in (without getting arrested).
If the pebbles do it for you, stare at the screen or print them off. If you double click on the image (fingers crossed) you'll get a larger version. Or maybe one of the photos on another post.
If you can lose yourself here at the screen go right ahead, if not, why not take a printed version somewhere away from your desk, maybe outside (not to stand with all the smokers out the front though), maybe to a tree, maybe to your car or if these phenomena still exist, an empty meeting room.
How much peace would you like? 5 minutes where you've given yourself permission to be at peace? Longer? 20 minutes?
Are you telling yourself you can't spare 20 minutes? Are you telling yourself you can't spare 5?
I can think of very few scenarios (ticking bomb diffusing aside) where 5 minutes out would be a real problem. You're a conference speaker in minute two of a five minute slot...yes, you're running a training programme with a 5 minute exercise brief to give ...yes
But sitting at your desk, working away, getting down your list, thinking things through in a run of the mill day and still telling yourself you haven't the time?
If you're in the flow of something, great, don't stop the flow, but right now as you're reading this, where are your shoulders and how much would you love 5 minutes peace!?
Go, go now, print and run....have a ball!
I've been thinking. Does it have to be hard work to be valued?
If, in your mind, it does need to be hard work , it's a sure sign that in this matter you have not put your soul in charge of operations and it may have given up on you and slipped out the back for a night out and left you to slog away living with your 'must be hard work' decision.
I've been considering myself a nicely aligned soul in this matter till I caught myself fretting about not having written a new practical soul blog post for ages. Telling myself that I really 'should' be posting every day or other day at the least.
WHAT was I thinking!? Any clients using the word should find out that it takes only milliseconds for the 'should' alarm to sound.
Who are you listening to? Who says you should? What about your own choice? What about your natural rhythms? Just who is it that's in charge of what you 'should' do?
But there I was 'shoulding' myself with the best of them. When I looked to find out who says, it was an old old corporate image of hours served in a day, of quantity of hours present being the measure of commitment and willingness.
Of measurement through results, not hours spent, being bandied about as the way it was but that wasn't actually enough when it came down to it. Anyone leaving before 7 heckled as a part timer (and part timer wasn't a compliment).
So this time, when I lovingly attended to my natural rhythms and to other non blog matters that were uppermost and important, out came that very old fear of being seen to be .. to be.....whatever...productive, prolific, hard working.......EEEK! Get it off me! I thought I'd let go of that one a LONG while back.
I've been doing some personal development work that requires much inner work, meditation, connecting with your soul and more (she said, hoping she's not sounding like she's beggining to attempt to justify the lack of blog posts).
It's alright, there is a point to my telling you this story, it's not a justification.
So, this inner work has really taken it out of me (no, no violins) and so afterwards it would have been ideal to rest. Did I! Instead I'd struggle on and get back to my list...that neverending list of things that need doing.
Until one night I was so pooped I just lay down on the sofa. I don't think I could have lifted my legs had the house been burning down around me. My son wanted me to come to the computer and see some art he was getting all excited about, something which I'd normally be over there like a shot to see. He had to unplug the laptop and bring it over to me.
Well...the point being (finally, thanks for your patience), on reflection, I really liked it that the decision about whether to rest had been taken out of my hands and pinned me like a great weight to the sofa. I was resting, like it or not.
On further reflection I get more than a bit scared that that's what it took before I sat down and stayed that way. So I've been teaching my body that if it needs rest it has to disable me. It can't trust me to rest when I need to because that old 'have to be hardworking' message has still got a hold.
Oh no. That's not good. New message planting required and fast.
I'm very grateful to have caught myself at it....and to be taking myself in hand.
Stop trying so hard, stop forcing myself, if it's not a pleasure why am I doing it?
If I'm having to force myself, I know my soul's not in charge, who is dictating terms here? The dictator won't like it at all but let's get a second opinion on that.
I hope you're loving what you're doing, doing it with ease and are positively sprightly having looked after yourself and your up time, down time balance well.
If not, have you asked lately who it is that's dictating terms? And giving no longer than a nanosecond's thought to ousting the dictator.
Go well!
PS. This one's for Lydia who helped oust my dictator.
*NEW* * NEW* * NEW* *NEW*
Practical Soul Coaching could be for you if you are not 100% in love with your life.
A blank signpost ready for you to write it how you'd like it.
How much of your life is of your choosing? To what extent is your soul in charge?
Nothing will flatten you faster than the soul draining habits of living from fear and trepidation, doing what your ego suggests or even what your mother in law suggests when it doesn't match with what your soul suggests.
How much of the way you live your life are from your soul's suggestions and how much from other's suggestions?
Is it high time your soul was back in charge, the author of your life and the signposts showing you the way to go?
If it is, and you know just what to do about it, excellent. Great stuff.
Do share what you're doing here at the blog. Be an inspiration with your 'Putting my Soul Back in Charge' stories.
If it is time to put your soul back in charge, but you don't quite know how or just don't want to go it alone and know you'll need encouragement when you flagging, then I might have just the thing.
Practical Soul Coaching provides encouragement and understanding when you're flagging, structure and direction when you're lost and holding to account when you're wriggling off the hook.
It's proven to be good for:
Stressed out Souls. Overwhelmed, frazzled and needing more calm in daily life.
Weary Souls. Bored, fed up, flat. Wanting to feel passionate about something again.
Lost Souls. Still with years and years of working life to come, knowing for sure it has to be more purposeful and fulfilling than it is now. But having little or no idea at all what it will be.
Structured or unstructured ways to work
Save Our Souls This is a three month focused look at your soul and your life. Good for those wanting to give things a concentrated kick start.
Each month there's one 60 minute session, homework and a follow up 30 minute session working on the priority issues for you.
Pay up front £250. Book one months dates in advance.
Free Soul This is an unstructured way of working that will suit you if you like the freedom to have as many or as few sessions as you wish in a tailor made programme.
Pay as you go. £ 60 per one hour session, generally booking a few session dates in advance.
Also available, gift vouchers for birthdays or Christmas or just because you know there's no gift they'd love more than a life with their soul back in charge.
For more information call me on 01462 484936 or e-mail paulineesson@thepracticalsoul.com
