Day 7 – Be mindful. Write about what helps you stay centered in the present. In only seven days, I feel like blogging has taken me through the gamut of my experiences: through joy, silliness, sorrow, despair and hope. I’ve travelled through the past, explored the present and trawled the
Day 3 – An unscheduled post – a rest I knew that daily blogging would be a challenge, but alas, not for the reasons I thought it would be. I thought finding words to write would be the challenge. That it wasn’t, surprises me, although it shouldn’t as I’ve
Introduction During November, I’m writing a series of posts for National Health Blog Post Month. The event is organized by WEGO Health, a great organization that brings together health activists from around the world. What’s a health activist you might ask? A health activist is, not surprising, typically a person
World Mental Health Day is just passed, and with it, the calls for heightened awareness of the issues concerned with, ironically, mental illness. While it is gratifying to me as a long-term sufferer to see awareness raising all the time, and advocates stepping out (particularly in groups often reluctant to
Our parents can’t save us, no matter how much we wish they had, or could. When I was 27, I descended into madness. It didn’t begin then. That process began so many years before, perhaps when I was born: the same and yet so different. There were stages to this
No art or photo today, which feels quite strange. I’ve been getting used to creating something, but alas work has taken what energy I have at the moment. Meditation was beautiful this morning. I have been cultivating the feeling of ‘no-thing’ quite successfully lately, but today I experienced quite a
I don’t know if it’s a coincidence after yesterday’s ‘Conflagration’, but today I feel an often experienced need to contract within myself, to draw in closer for protection. Writing and creating and putting myself out there every day is likely a factor in this increased sensitivity, but for the moment
I was fortunate to be able to spend some time meditating in a small group this morning. Surrounded by loved ones and safe friends, I felt it grounded me and brought my mind to stillness – freeing me of the “monkey mind” that seemed to accompany yesterday’s pain. I became
I find myself wandering in a strange space – like Walter Tevis’ Man Who Fell to Earth, an alien inside the confines of a human body. What began today as a thought experiment, inspired by reading Tara Brach’s chapter on “Coming Home to Our Body”, I feel like I have
So much of our daily lives revolve around cycles: rising eating working studying sleeping. No matter how many years pass, we like to think some intrinsic features of those cycles change. When our oldest daughter started at university, I felt so proud of her. However, I also felt afraid. Our