Patience

26 March 2014 This card evokes a number of different feelings for me. An echo of someone saying 'Patience, patience' - probably my mother or father. I expect I say it too. People have told me that I am 'very patient', though it is not a description I would use of myself though. I know how inwardly impatient I often can be, with myself and others. As time has gone on, I have learned more about mindfulness and being in the moment. Realising that my impatience can lead me to miss many wonderful treasures and experiences. If I am rushing somewhere worrying about the time, do I notice the wild flowers in the hedgerow? When I gulp down my food in a hurry to get on, do I taste the flavours and appreciate the goodness it contains? Sharing a conversation and keen to get my say in - do I truly hear the other person, not only the words they are saying but the unspoken nuances? It is interesting that the word 'patient' has two meanings: being patient, and being a patient, i.e. being treated for an illness or injury. The dictionary says it derives from 'one who suffers'; whereas the state of being patient is: "endurance under difficult circumstances, which can mean persevering in the face of delay or provocation without acting on annoyance/anger in a negative way; or exhibiting forbearance when under strain, especially when faced with longer-term difficulties" (Wikipedia). Reflecting on this, it feels to me that being patient in a positive, productive way, is to be able to simply 'be with' whatever is going on, without judgement. My experience of being a patient receiving treatment for cancer, has been a learning process to be able to do this in what may be difficult circumstances. I don't know if I was a very positive patient, or a very patient one. Over time this experience has had a great positive influence on my life - something that is likely to appear in my thoughts frequently this year, being as it is the twentieth anniversary of my diagnosis. --------------------------------------------- Returning after a break to write some more here, I hear the phrase 'all in good time'. Everything has it's right time. I may be keen, impatient even, for the spring to arrive, for the buds to break, the blossom to shine out. Even if I keep plants in a greenhouse to develop early, there is only a certain amount that can be done to speed this process. In good time, each plant will grow, the leaves will appear and the flowers will open. In terms of my own unfolding, of new ideas unfurling and developing - even though I may like to think I am 'in charge' of my own creative processes, I am beginning to appreciate that there is an ebb and flow here as well. Everything has a time in which it may be sitting dormant, or developing unseen, hidden away in my sub-conscious. Just as the daffodil bulbs swell beneath the soil, sending roots down for sustenance before the green shoots appear above the earth, so this may be happening for me too. This tree fern photo seems a good image to share again here. Taken in my garden last year, a little later in the spring than this, it not only illustrates the gentle and steady unfurling of nature, it also contains soft shades of green. On my screen the background colour of this card is a soft blue-green, in the printed card on my desk a darker forest green - all natural shades that I can feel calm and peaceful sitting with while all proceeds around me 'in good time'. As always, please feel free to comment below with your thoughts and comments.  If you would like to own a set of cards to explore their power for yourself please visit the dedicated page. Thank you dear friends for visiting with me again this week and sharing my musings. Until next time, with love, Mary *if you have any difficulty accessing the 'blogspot' service, you can also read here on the Daring to Blossom website, or find 'Dare to Blossom Life Coaching' on Facebook.

Laughter

19 March 2014 Lovely card to come up this week. A reminder of many wise sayings, "Laughter is the best medicine." It is well-proven that laughing is good for you. And I am reminded of  "Rule Number Six" - ("Don't take yourself so goddamn seriously." scroll down the page for the story) which I was introduced to by reading Ben Zander's book The Art of Possibility. I know when I am getting stressed when I do begin taking myself too seriously; when I have a 'sense of humour failure; when I can't see the funny side to events; and - especially - when I lose the ability to laugh at myself. When I can't laugh, I am unable to see the joy in my life. Have you ever been there when a young baby has just been laughing at something she sees? It is may be their parent playing peek-a-boo, or their brother pulling faces. There are many examples on line, and I only have to listen to start laughing myself. What else can I say about laughter? It is a part of sharing, of loving, of being human. It adds so much to life; it helps workplaces be a place of companionship as well as jobs; it is often cited as one of the ingredients in long and happy marriages. The colour of this card is a deep, yet soft, red. Feeling to me like a good belly laugh, a laugh that goes on and on. One that I can't stop, and even when I do stop and pause, gasping, for breath - one look at my companion will restart the 'falling about laughing' again. As always, please feel free to comment below with your thoughts and comments.  If you would like to own a set of cards to explore their power for yourself please visit the dedicated page. Thank you dear friends for visiting with me again this week and sharing my musings. Until next time, with love, Mary *if you have any difficulty accessing the 'blogspot' service, you can also read here on the Daring to Blossom website, or find 'Dare to Blossom Life Coaching' on Facebook.

Light

12 March 2014 This week it feels as if the light has returned here in Cornwall. After what seems like such a long winter of dark stormy skies, gales of wind, and torrential rain, the sun has come out. And in such a glorious way, several days of blue skies and cool winds (it is still early spring after all even if it looks like summer). Nature has responded: the sunshine yellow of daffodils brightens gardens and roadsides, the lacy white blackthorn shines in the hedgerows, and the slightest haze of green is now breaking out into leaves appearing on the smaller shrubs. Soon the bigger trees will follow and that heart-gladdening moment when the world is full of fresh green in a hundred different shades will be with us. If you are in the southern hemisphere, maybe you are enjoying those bright autumn days when colours are intense and nature celebrates the harvest of the year? Not having lived in the tropics for any length of time I don't know how variations in natural light occur there and the effects - I'd love to hear from you if you do have these experiences. I've been in quite a dark place myself, with physical pain dominating for a while and doubts surfacing about my work. Sunshine can help me feel more positive. At other times the contrast between the outer world and the inner is heightened. Surely I 'should' be happy on such a lovely day? I 'should' be content in my good fortune to have a job with a salary and a roof over my head..... (I feel like a siren should be going off here "Deedah, deedah - negative self-talk warning - deedah, deedah.") Can I shine a light on this? Can I change the 'should' to 'could'?  I 'could' be happy. There are reasons why I am feeling a different way. Can I put a precise name to this feeling, this particular emotion? Recently I've been reading about integrating my 'shadow' with my conscious self. We all have parts of us we are ashamed of and maybe afraid of too - the angry, jealous, shameful parts of us. The parts that feel we'll be 'found out' as a fraud, that people may see our thoughts and be disgusted or hate us. If I look at these parts differently maybe I can accept and integrate them and their power can be used in a positive way? In Jill Badonsky's book The Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard) she says: "The dark sides of personalities are always present, just as light invariably casts a shadow. When the light is brightest,  the shadow is deepest. When mortals explore their hidden shadow side, there is a power, a liberating freedom, and a creative release." Part of this, for me, has been to learn how to express and release strong emotions such as grief or anger in a safe and constructive way. I can't say I have any easy answers, the way I deal with it is to be aware that I am developing new practices, new ways of being truly myself. (And the word 'practice' allows for the possibility that I am always learning, will never be 'perfect', that the joy is in the journey.) Allowing in the light, and adding in humour (as Jill does in her very particular style), are ways of letting the shadow be seen, and to be itself. To be an integral part of me. Allowing the anger to be used for good, to become a righteous power when needed. Transmuting the grief into an honouring and celebration of that which has gone - whether that is a beloved person, a pet, my youth, health, a past career, or a broken favourite coffee mug. Recognising that grief is as useful and valid an emotion to feel about events in my life as are joy or excitement. Without the dark of night I would not be able to see the stars or the waxing moon outside my window as I write. And when the light becomes too dazzling, I can welcome the shadow, turn towards it and look into it to rest my eyes and to see what gifts lie within that part of me. (that last sentence is an approximate remembering of  words I have read, apologies to the author for not referencing them as I cannot remember where). Thank you to Kathy Kane, who I am working with as my own coach at the moment for introducing me to Jill Badonsky's work. I have lots more to explore in the shadows and sunlight. ...................... A pause feels necessary here for a deep breath or two. ..................... The colour of the card is a sunshine yellow, the colour of the trumpets of some daffodils, and of the gorse that flowers in Cornwall nearly all the year round.  As always, please feel free to comment below with your thoughts and comments.  If you would like to own a set of cards to explore their power for yourself please visit the dedicated page. Thank you dear friends for visiting with me again this week and sharing my musings. Until next time, with love, Mary *if you have any difficulty accessing the 'blogspot' service, you can also read here on the Daring to Blossom website, or find 'Dare to Blossom Life Coaching' on Facebook.

Choices

5 March 2014 Today I stopped to eat my lunchtime sandwich in my car at a favourite spot. Whilst I enjoyed my food I thought about this card - "Choices". So many angles I could write about... where to focus? (A choice!). The first choice I make every day when I wake is - how will I approach this new day? I often feel, rather sadly, that my 'default setting' is grumpy. I wake up still feeling tired, not particularly looking forward to the tasks ahead. I have been choosing to practice changing this. To start before I even get out of bed, to choose gratitude. The inspirational Richard Wilkins says (in his very particular style) that when he wakes he pushes his elbows out to each side, and if he doesn't touch wood he knows he is not in his coffin. He laughs as he says this and it is a black humour way of saying be grateful for the gift of each day. When I was young it took me a while to learn that I really do have a choice over how I respond to events. I can choose to be upset at a comment perhaps, or I can choose to let it pass over 'like water off a duck's back'. (I love that expression). All these thoughts went through my mind as I sat in my car. For once the weather was dry and quite sunny so I decided to take a short walk along the forestry track close by. I had an idea of taking a photo of a fork in the road to illustrate the idea of choices, of arriving at a crossroads in life. (One of the first workshops I ran, for Adult Education, was on just this 'Tools for the Crossroads in Life' I think I called it.) As you see, the path I was following was pretty straight with no turnings, just dropping away gradually into the valley below. This provided me with a one of those moments of clear vision, of insight: that now, at this time in 2014, I am clear on the direction I wish to take in my life, the work I wish to do. My path is to find my own way home to myself and to offer you tools, and a companion if you wish, to help you on your journey of rediscovery. My choices right now are about the speed at which I travel along my road. Do I race ahead at full speed? Do I dawdle along gently and admire the tiny plants by the way, look up at the sky and clouds through the trees?. Do I stop altogether at times and listen to the birdsong and the wind in the branches? I am finding it hard to describe the feeling - this was for me a moment of reconnection with my own heart, my coming home a little more to my truest self. As I stood absorbing these insights I noticed a little muddy, grassy path off to the right - pictured below. The thought then occurred to me that I could choose to explore any turnings such as this, take time to pull on my wellington boots and splash off through the mud and puddles and see what I could see - and then return when ready to my main wide and clear track forward with new inspiration; refreshed and revived from a change of scenery. And at any time I can hang a hammock between the trees and rest in the dappled sun and shade until I am ready to move on again. Even if clouds cover the sun and rain comes; even if  darkness falls, my now clearly chosen path will be under foot to guide me through. I can choose to shelter close to one of the tall sturdy tree trunks until the light returns. I end there, feeling there is no more within me to say in words at this moment. There is a special feeling of connection, reconnection that is supported by the music I have playing, 'Sacred Alchemy' by Devaa Haley. An event to share with you as it is happening before my next monthly newsletter: on 25th March Olivier Maxted is holding a 'Sound Bath Healing' evening at Anhydrous Memorial Hall. I experienced a taster of Olivier's work last weekend at a festival in Perranporth. The combination of didjeridoo, drum, rattles, crystal bowls, and a selection of other instruments is extraordinary. As always, please feel free to comment below with your thoughts and comments.  If you would like to own a set of cards to explore their power for yourself please visit the dedicated page. Thank you dear friends for visiting with me again this week and sharing my musings. Until next time, with love, Mary *if you have any difficulty accessing the 'blogspot' service, you can also read here on the Daring to Blossom website, or find 'Dare to Blossom Life Coaching' on Facebook.