Sparks will fly #34 #toddling

Recovering from trauma is all part of the human condition.  Most of us begin in trauma as we journey through the birth canal and surprisingly come out a bit squished, bruised, maybe even a bit jaundice.  Over the life course, we have plenty of opportunities to experience trauma. The first falls when we learn to walk, may well be interrupted by tops of tables, kitchen obstacle courses and ambition beyond skill. The toddling is instructive. We cry, dust ourselves off, maybe get a hand up, sometimes have our hands held to steady and shepherd us to the next effort and then over time build our capacity, resilience and eventually (if we are lucky enough to have two feet) are able to stand up straight and tall for all the world to see. We get grounded and from there we learn to walk, dance, jump, leap over, run.

My experience in getting over trauma is an act of toddling. There are the inevitable bumps on the head when I raise up with confidence I am ready to stand, and then find I misjudged where the top of that table was, and end up with a bit of a bloody knock.  There are the all the visible and invisible hands pulling me up to help me get back on my feet. Some of those hands consciously know the practical help they are offering and others have completely no idea. There are even people who don’t realise how they are being deployed by the UniVerse to help me along the way.  These hands turn up every time I get out of my own way and catch the invitations as they come tumbling in to me.  I don’t even have to ask sometimes, but I do need to keep my awareness alert and ready to catch as others pitch.

I have people watching me, to see what I will do next, how I will handle situations. Mostly they are kind, generous and encouraging family and friends who want me to bring my best self to all situations. Some have special talents to warn me of obstacles in my path, that might lead to a fall in my toddling. Some have the capacity to cheer me on and chuckle at my more interesting moves as I fall gracefully and not so gracefully from time to time. I noticed this week I have started laughing more and that is surely a good sign. I have also noticed I am beginning to get more playful again, this feels like relief, I have been missing that piece of myself. Truly something is shifting and lifting. I know that I am still toddling though, and falls are inevitable.

Toddling informed trauma recovery includes understanding the mood swings of toddlers  – one minute confusion, next rage,  closely followed by tenderness.  And like toddlers who fall over in their early efforts to walk, there are still days when I want to lie on the floor, bang my hands into the ground, sob uncontrollably and have someone say “there there”, pat my back, bring me food, change my clothes and tuck me into bed. These days are getting less frequent and my internal tantrums are only for a very small audience and do not appear in public places.  I am beginning to get excited and making plans for change as in a few weeks I will be travelling, to start walking a piece of the Camino. I expect there is more toddling to come and more sparks to fly.

Photo by Jelleke Vanooteghem on Unsplash

 

Sparks will fly #33 #presenttense

The plane was on the tarmac and already almost two hours behind schedule and this last waiting time seemed to be related to inappropriate behaviour of a male passenger towards a female passenger. It was very late in the day and meant another delay was going to keep me well away from where I was planning to be. I was being disrupted by a disruptor, I adapted, sorted out a work around.

Everyday we get disrupted by forces outside of ourselves, we are constantly making adjustments. Having a well oiled set of improv skills and a tool kit of hacks certainly helps in these moments. Nothing works better though than having a reservoir of past experiences and the knowledge that this too will pass. Time is perhaps the biggest disruptor that gets the least cred.

I am unfolding from a week, where I have been disrupted, disturbed, liberated, interrupted, cycled through a series of emotions and memories. I am fascinated in how memories show up as teachable moments. Avoiding nostalgia, I drawn on memories that have been left alone in drawers, in fading blue ballpoint ink, untouched for years. The memories flood back of conversations, touches, shared hopes and dreams, yet these words while true in every way are an alternative truth. The complexity of both and words is beyond my grasp some days and my memories fight with truths disrupting every neuronal pathway.

Some of the teachings of the week include making new memories by grounding self deeply into the present – not the past or the future.  This is living with time as the great disruptor. Time is what a clock reads. although we know time is able to stand still, run ahead of us when we aren’t ready and go so slowly that it is torture … possibly all within the cycle of the sun rising and setting.

Tense is an indicator of time and present tense living can be tense, in-tense even. Living in present tense concentrates time with the essence of the moment completely focussing the mind, body and spirit. Just a drop of the fragrance “the essence of time” can perfume a whole day.   I am often in a fog wandering in the present tense fragrance that is always with me, longing for a time, when, as Rumi says, the fragrance of flowers crushed, forgiveness, arrives.  Disrupted by forces outside of myself, my heart crushed, spirit broken, grief makes way for new  beginnings.

Trust is rooted in love and fear rooted in control, trusting the future to hold me, as I separate from what has control over me. Inevitably, these sparks disrupt and offer work-arounds to reveal future in present actions. Present tense still shines a light into the future from the darkness of the past.

Installation somewhere in New York – I didn’t note the artist #apologies

 

 

Sparks will fly #32 #shrapnel

The fragments of shrapnel, fly loose after the bomb has exploded and continue on a trajectory to hit their target. The pieces of metal arrive through the cylinder that has contained them and with the force of the explosion breaking the casing, separating what was bound together, each piece finding its target and lodging to cause pain and destruction. Often lethal, always hard to dislodge, sometimes almost impossible to detect, sometimes becoming visible though in an infection caused by the puncture, shrapnel is designed to destroy.  There are a few ways to get out of the way of shrapnel, run, hide, protect, not being around where the bombs are likely to go off – all very good and effective strategies. In acts of terrorism, part of the power of that process, you don’t know when those bombs are going to go off, you are completely caught unawares and that is the whole point of it being a terrorist act and not an experience of being at war where the usual rules of engagement apply.

Grief is a terrorist with shrapnel at its disposal.  Just when you think you in safe territory, and have fled to a place where you won’t be under attack or even subject to friendly fire, you are mistaken as the terrorist arrives uninvited, and you have left your amour at home.  I find myself caught out more than once and despite well executed plans, I may well end up in a place or a time or have a thought that will paralyse me leaving me in the path of shrapnel that finds it way to me.

Protective clothing is not enough, not travelling to the places where I might be at risk, following directions to lead me out of unsafe locations, still leave me exposed. It seems so unfair but this is not about fairness, it is about revolution. I am freedom fighter and this is a revolutionary struggle. I need to have my own shrapnel to blast Grief and bring my  own acts of terrorism and show up when Grief least expects me too. To lodge myself into Grief’s body.

I am channeling Banksy.

I am bringing my revolution to life and sparks will fly.

Banksy’s Flower Thrower

 

Sparks will fly #31 #deconstructed

The move is on and there is movement while I hold on tight and let go. The bed is the last piece of furniture to part with and I haven’t done it yet. It was made by my grandfather for my parents and was part of a entire bedroom suite and various pieces have been shed over the years. One of the wardrobes he famously jumped on top of to make sure it would last. I am actually not sure where that piece ended up. I have just the base now, where the two drawers housed Christmas presents when I was a child. Over the years I treated one of the drawers as a treasure trove for gifts and cards I would purchase with people in mind as their birthday or a special occasion arose I would find a perfect match for that friend or family member. The other drawer was full of papers like passports and insurance documents, wills and love letters. Both drawers at any one time would reveal plenty about the contracted relationships with the inner and outer worlds of my life. The drawers were never available to my husband, he never accessed them as far as I can remember in nearly 40 years. This is quite a revelation as I come to new understandings about the bed.

The meta-narrative of the bed legitimizing a marriage is now over in my generation. It is now deconstructed and I continue the deconstruction and reconstruction of myself.

Being one of the last pieces of furniture to leave me, I am learning about attachment and  finding the possibilities  liberation and release offer. I am still learning what it means to live unencumbered of such a primary relationship. Learning to live with less and trying to tread a little more lightly on the earth is a daily puzzle and brings interesting challenges. One of my biggest challenges is the realisation that decisions I make can actually only be for me. This continues to be novel and without the anchor of putting others at the centre I still find myself dithering and doubting.

I am learning about the interconnections of our big story as a planet and peoples, and our little stories of our personal lives. Audre Lorde’s view that self-care is an act of political warfare is finally making more and more sense to me, as Act 3 pivots around post modernism and deconstruction of this bed that I have been laying in for two-thirds of my life. I am learning, synaptic sparks can and will fly away and be replaced with new ones in this phase of reconstruction.

Photo by Sebastian Kanczok on Unsplash