Issara Simone Edwards's Blog, page 6
July 29, 2022
A Better Version of Me
Friday 12th of June 2020
This morning I woke up with this consuming , paralysing panic, this terror in the pit of my stomach. It’s still there, fragments of it anyway, lingering tremors of fear and anxiety, spreading outwards through limps, down to the tips of my fingers. If I had to give it a colour, it would be yellow, yellow claws tearing at my body.
I tried to meditate it away, that’s what you’re supposed to do, right? Maybe it helped a little. Near the end of it I saw myself, but it wasn’t me, perhaps a better version of me, a girly version at least. Curly hair, just under shoulder length, make up or just flawless skin. This lookalike wanted me to heal and brought me into this golden yellow light. We talked for a while, about the future, and she told me her name was Medea, and that’s all I’m going to tell you about that.
Yellow seems to be a recurring colour today. I needed an new pencil, so I pulled one out, from my secret stash, the one that came to hand was a mustard yellow with the word ‘appreciate’ on it.
For most people, I’ve learned, yellow is the colour of happiness. For me, yellow is the colour of disgust, sickness, fear. If the sounds ‘ugh’ or ‘eww’ had a colour, it would be yellow. What does that say about me?
July 14, 2022
How to be a Better Vampire.
Wednesday 10th of June 2020
Every meditation is different. I like that.
Today, near the end, I heard a fragment of something:
‘… get advice from more experienced vampires.’
And my first thought was:
Suggesting that I’m a vampire?
And unexpectedly, an answer came back:
‘That’s who you think you are.’
But, it didn’t feel as though it was being suggested in a bad way, it wasn’t negative. It was an explanation, a word to explain or used to figure something else out. So, let’s look it up.
Vampire:
a corpse that leaves its grave at night to drink the blood if the living.a person who preys on othersNeither of those sound particularly, nice.
a trapdoor used for sudden disappearances from a stage.Okay, that one does sound a little like something I do. I will just disappear if I decide to. But still, I’m more confused than ever.
Perhaps it was just a random thought, my mind did wander a lot today. Wander. I love the difference between wander and wonder, and their closeness. It annoys me when people mock others when they confuse the two. Let the two words be interchangeable, there’s a beauty in it, a poetry. Besides mocking people for their mistakes is just… low class. I may or may not be talking about a specific YouTuber who has done this unnecessarily on multiple occasions. I don’t care if it’s an ‘in’ joke, it’s just low.
Anyway, shall we get back to the meditation?
In the Moon Forest there was a broken pen, a fountain pen that had been split into several pieces. There were four books surrounding the shards, but you only need to be aware of two at this present moment in time.
The Snow Spider by Jenny Nimmo
Snowbird Winter by Sue Welford
The Snow Spider was the first book I ever loved.
In primary school, the library would bring a selection of books for us to choose, once every two weeks, if memory serves. We could pick what we wanted then return the book to the wheely cart when it returned. Exciting times.
I loved this book so much even though it made me cry. I didn’t want to give it back.
My mum tried to find me my own copy, pre-internet. Unable to find it, she bought me, Snowbird Winter instead. Not the same by any stretch of the imagination, but not a terrible book. She did her best, that’s what the book now means to me. I still have it, and all the memories that come attached to it.
I wanted to bring the fountain pen back to life. I’ve always had one, until recently. The fountain pen is important to me, it’s craft, it’s care, it’s the symbolic pen of the writer, the modern day quill and ink. I don’t feel like a proper writer without one. I need to bring the pen back to life.
July 13, 2022
Thoughts Skipping from Stone to Stone.
Tuesday 9th of June 2020
Images of places I’ve been, memories of them flashed before me then moved away. Each place, each moment of my history, remembered and then let go of. They’re insignificant now, they don’t matter. I saw myself standing the in kitchen, dressed in clothes similar to mine, but slightly different. I stopped in my tracks, mixing bowl in hand, the me there, staring back at the me here, with a look of what? Disappointment? Disbelief? Did that look say, ‘What a waste?’
Something pulled apart, I felt it, one thing pulling, separating into two, my whole being felt it. The space around me pulsated, blue, black, flickering in and out, distant stars burning.
Then the bell sounds. Times up. Meditation over. What now?
Today I felt like if I just let go of everything I’m supposed to be and just be, I’d be okay. No more expectations, just be.
“Great Mother, may we stay in our uncomfortableness so we may heal. May we drop our defences so we may heal. May we stay in difficult conversations so we may heal. May we be clearly guided so we may heal. Please guide us, please lead us, please show us the way.” – Rebecca Campbell.
I feel like I’ve been fractured and only a piece of me is left in this world. It’s this feeling of being untethered, like a helium balloon left to float away into something unknown. I don’t even feel scared, I’m too detached to feel scared. I feel disconnected, from myself, from everything.
‘The solution seems simple to me. You feel fractured, like pieces of you are scattered across multiple places. Then locate all the different places, find each piece of you and put yourself back together.’
‘That doesn’t sound difficult at all.’
‘Since when have you ever taken the easy path?’
‘Where do I even start?’
‘Right here. With me and The Moon Emporium.’
What are they called in Harry Potter? Horcruxes? Item in which pieces of the soul are hidden. Can’t horcruxes only be created after committing a murder? I wonder who I killed.
In The Moon Emporium, the domain of Luna, she guides me to four objects. I feel pieces of myself in them, locked away and hidden, objects that represent parts of myself denied, supressed.
A pocket watch I carried around with me when I worked at Primark. I’d purchased it just before I started there. It reminded me of ‘Alice in Wonderland’, the White Rabbit. I’d always wanted a pocket watch, the old timey-ness of it, the grace, the historical weight, the idea that it could have been an heirloom, a piece of history, despite the fact that it was a £5 pocket watch bought from Claire’s.
This pocket watch kept time for me throughout my time at Primark. Then when I went back into the purgatory of unemployment, it hung from a nail above my bed, to tell me the time when I woke up.
The pocket watch was to set me apart, no one else used a pocket watch. It was a symbol, a piece of me that shone through the mandatory uniform. It represented me. Then the battery died and I meant to get a new one, but what was the point, it was just a useless piece, unnecessary decoration hanging above my bed. I could just as easily take it down, put it away, forget about it.
The second object, The Thoth Tarot. Not originally mine. They were gifted to my mother by her friend, a friend she no longer sees or speaks to. There was a time when she would visit every week with something new she’d found, discovered. She’d come around with crystals and say: ‘I saw it and it told me it was for you.’
She told my mum to be careful with these cards, they need to be treated in a certain way, if not, they can lead to darker energies. Of course this intrigued me. I was in secondary school, I was a goth, I was into Wicca, I wanted to touch something dark.
My mum never used the cards, so a few years later I asked if I could have them and she said yes. But I never really felt connected to them, they never really responded to me and nor I to them. It was almost the exact opposite, I felt rejected by them. They didn’t belong to me, they didn’t want me, no matter how much I loved them and I did. I loved the art, I loved the meanings, the symbolism, the secret stories they told. They revealed a new way of seeing the world, religion and the potential of it.
Now, those tarot cards remind my of the Basanos from the Lucifer comics, cards with a soul and will of their own.
I’ve since given up with the Thoth Tarot, I abandoned them, but they were a part of me, of who I wanted to be, like the pocket watch.
The third item she guides me to is a mirror.
In a charity shop in Fishponds was an oval, ornate, gold mirror, worth £30 but being sold for £10, of course I had to get it. It was the mirror from ‘Snow White’, it was the Queen’s mirror, magick and powerful. I was listening to a lot of Cradle of Filth at the time and it was the witch’s mirror, a soul mirror, a portal to another world.
“Mirror, mirror on the wall, shouldst not grave pleasures be thy all. For if I shall see thy will be done, grant me the witchcraft of thy tongue.’ – ‘The Twisted Nails of Faith’, Cradle of Filth.
I loved that mirror, it hung on my bedroom wall for years, an icon. Then some Feng Shui book told me that mirrors in the bedroom were bad luck, black holes for money, and it made sense to me. It was as good an explanation as any for why everything in my life had fallen apart and why I was struggling to make ends meet. It couldn’t hurt to see of things improved if I took it down. But with no where else in the house to put it, it ended up in the back of an overstuffed wardrobe and forgotten about.
The fourth item, playing cards. These cards aren’t mine, I’ve never played with them, in fact, I’m pretty sure there’s more than a few cards missing. These cards belonged to my uncle.
When he died and we cleared out his flat, these cards ended up at the bottom of a cardboard box from the corner shop, Quavers, or some other cheap snack brand printed on the side. Things were divided among the family, other things snatched and hidden away. Some things were thrown own, others donated. I got a box of old playing cards, I guess no one else wanted them, looking back in it, it does seem like a free for all mess, scavengers around a corpse, literally. I even remember one of my aunties finding £50 in a pocket of one of his shirts and saying: ‘He meant for me to have this.’ Like he’d planned his death and left that £50 just for her. I was sixteen, maybe seventeen back then and the whole thing was so… surreal. But maybe it gave her comfort to think he knew he was going to die and in knowing it, he left money behind, just for her. It wasn’t just his shopping money or anything.
Anyway, I kept the cards, tattered box and all. They were a part of him, and he was a part of me, still is. The cards are the part of me that he gave me. They tell me it’s okay to be unconventional, to the on the outside, to find my own way. I’d forgotten that.
July 12, 2022
Mirror, Mirror.
Monday 8th of June 2020
I’ve been feeling very lethargic today, kinda relaxed, kinda sleepy, spaced out… just lay down and let the world happen.
Yesterday I was talking to someone about their desire to quit smoking. The conversation ended with her saying:
‘I’ll get there one day.’
It felt so dismissive, as though her health didn’t matter, at least, not in the short term. But it got me thinking, ‘one day’ is just another way of saying never, ‘one day’ is some obscure, abstract future where things are better, easier, different. Do I do the same thing? How many times have I said:
‘I’ll get there one day.’
‘I’ll do this one day.’
‘I’ll be this person one day.’
‘I’ll accomplish that one day.’
But when is ‘one day’? If not now then when?
July 11, 2022
Magick Under a Strawberry Moon.
Sunday 7th of June 2020
I want to run. It’s 12:33 am, and I want to run through the night. I want to feel my lungs burn, the air rush around my body, see the building speed by.
There’s this energy in my shoulders, under the shoulder blades, and I want to run. I feel it, squirming, like eels trying to get out. Pent up energy needing a release.
But there’s nowhere to go here, it’s never been safe to just be aimlessly out at night. But run, run, run. I want to run, to feel that release as the muscles fight against current and gravity and inertia. Run. Why can’t we run? Run, run, run. I want to run.
~
I think I had an out of body experience. Let’s start here, we’ll work backwards later. How much detail do you want? Do we skip the orbs of almost clear energy around me, the spiralling between two planes, then following a woman, well, a fuzzy outline of a woman, a figure in red, to somewhere else? A little blue bird flew out in front of me, and it felt like it was me, a part of me, but so captured by this woman, I let the bird fly away.
We had a conversation, but I don’t remember either of us starting it. I begged her to help me, told her I was living on a planet where the people were actively destroying it. Then, pushed back into my body, I felt something actively drawing in, something poured through my skin and rushed in towards the centre of me, filling me.
‘Get out of your own way’ She said.
I went out into the night and walked. The moon was huge, full and yellow, like a canines fang, and flanked by trees, the moon pressing against them, holding them back. I saw a fox, sniffing at the tall grass growing under a jungle gym. Then I walked home. What do you think’s going to happen next?
July 9, 2022
How to Find the Pot of Gold at the End of a Rainbow.
Friday 29th of May 2020
Our the feet that carry us the true sensors of our reality, sensors that we so often ignore? Is it their purpose to not just walk the path but to feel out each step, absorb any shock, detect any sudden obstacles or hinderances?
That’s a bit if an ableist view, I know. Late night ponderings is all.
This morning I did a little research into Ikigai, the Japanese philosophy about finding purpose.
I’ve had a really bad week, only emotionally though, so to a lot, it doesn’t count.
Yesterday I went for a walk through the graveyard, it’s locked up, but there’s a whole in the fence. I went with my sister because we like breaking the rules, we’re rebels like that. Anyway, we shimmied through the gap and were immediately greeted by a very friendly older gentleman with a dog and a chewed up tennis ball. He said:
‘Isn’t that the most glorious hole in any fence?’
We nodded and smiled. What do you even say to that?
‘I’m glad they haven’t covered it up.’ He continued ‘There was one further up but they covered that one. The people who look after the grounds though, they’re really friendly, they want people to come in.’
We wished him a good day and continued on our weekly graveyard walk. This was week three.
These walks have been the best part of my week, and every time we’ve been we’ve discovered a different path, seen different sights.
Week one, I think I found Yggdrasil, week two, a tree shaped like a mushroom, genuinely, a capped mushroom. Week three a grove of salsify and wild daisies and a secret bench hidden under a tree that bends over it like a canopy.
It’s really become like a magical, secret garden, you can never walk the same path twice, never see the same things twice. There’s always a new treasure to be found.
July 8, 2022
An Anti-Stress Potion
Monday 25th of May 2020
Add half a teaspoon of lavender to a bowl, dried if you have it but fresh works too.
Add a generous twist of lime peel, a vanilla pod.
Add hot water and leave to infuse.
What have we made?
Let the bowl warm your hands, inhale the heady scent.
A little something to destress the body, to smooth out the roughness of the day.
Alternatively, blend the essential oils together and add to your nearest diffuser, or a hand lotion would do, make a scented candle perhaps.
I’ve been exploring new things, as previously discussed. Tried my hand at digital art. Didn’t like it. I prefer the tactile mess, the happy accidents, the textures under fingers, the layers, exploring each moment with hand as well as eye.
I’m now taking an online aromatherapy course. So far I’ve spent thirty pounds on oils so this course better be at least 30% satisfying.
Are we feeling less stressed yet?
July 7, 2022
What to do When Feeling Unsteady.
Saturday 23rd of May 2020
I’ve been avoiding you. Can you tell?
Hi.
I’m at a point where I don’t know what’s a genuine feeling of pointlessness or just simple exhaustion. I think I know the answer, I hope I know the answer.
If it’s the latter that’s a problem, how do I break that cycle? Do I just have to know that it’s there, accept it and ride it out, hope that it will end? Maybe there’s an alternative.
I’ve been thinking that reason, purpose and meaning are the same thing. I’ve been feeling that something need to change in my life, but I have no idea what. Maybe I should try asking.
Hold on.
Okay. We have an oracle deck. Let’s ask.
“Reconnect with the earth, spend time in nature.”
“Try something you’ve never done before.”
“Share your true self with the world.”
Okay, sounds, good, reasonable, but vague enough so that I can question everything and end up doing nothing. Vague enough so that any question I ask can be answered the same way. Well, maybe not any.
So, how do I apply these answers, make them more practical?
Reconnecting with the earth: I can go for more walks in nature, grow more plants, eat more fresh veg.
Try something new: I’ve always wanted to try aerial yoga. Or maybe a self-defence class. Those seem more long term plans though, what can I do now? I’ll think about it, then forget and end up doing nothing.
Sharing my true self: I can share these journals, post them to some blog like a crazy person desperate for attention. I can be honest with people. I can speak to people. I can keep writing. I can actually use my Instagram account. But here’s a problem I have with Instagram, social media in general.
The other day I saw a post of a celebrity sat pretty much alone in a field, reading to her four year old son. She, or someone who works for her, wrote something like, ‘a perfect moment’. Here’s my actual problem with this. Did she set the camera up, then go back across the field, sit in the right position, hoping the camera got just the right angle, then start reading to her son? If so, that wasn’t a perfect moment, that was a staged moment, a performance. How many pictures did they have to take before they got the right one? She’s got a four year old, four year olds are nightmares.
Or, did she have someone follow her out there, on this magical alone time with her son, to specifically capture this ‘perfect moment’ If so, that’s also performance, it’s not real. But it’s the un-realness of reality that gets all the likes and hearts isn’t it? It’s the un-realness of reality that makes us feel so unsteady, inadequate and pointless. How do we reconcile that?
By being ourselves, I suppose. By being as honest as possible, and sharing that, not the fake.
July 6, 2022
Jump
Sunday 17th of May 2020
Jump over the hurdles and run away, run to the end of the world and fall off the edge. No one will ever find you and soon existence will forget you ever were. Are you ready?
I had a thought today. What if I started thinking of myself as an adult? Is that a slippery slope? Would that lead to me thinking of myself as better than?
In 1926 Yuri Kondratyuk self-published a book on how to essentially travel to space and back. This book helped scientists figure out how to safely land on the moon and travel back. He dedicated the book to:
“Whoever will read this paper in order to build and interplanetary rocket”
It was a book not intended for his time but for a future he wouldn’t be a part of. He knew he had to write the book, he knew why, he did what he needed to do to make it happen. What if he hadn’t? What if he didn’t listen to that compulsion?
July 5, 2022
Tell me something…
Friday 15th of May 2020
‘Can you tell me something you like about yourself?’
‘I like that I can create things, that every so often I can combine words into something intelligent or unique or beautiful, if I’m lucky, all three.’
‘And what do you use to create these beautiful word combinations?’
‘My mind.’
‘And?’
‘My hands to type, to pick up a pen…’
‘So, you like your mind and hands. What else do you like about yourself?’
‘I like the way I see the world.’
‘So, you like your eyes. Anything else?’
‘… I know I’m being trapped now, so, no.’
‘If you were someone else, looking at you, what would you like about what you saw?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘I’ll rephrase. If you were someone who loved you, what would you like about what you saw? Through the eyes of someone in love, what would you like?’
‘…. The freckles on my skin, like a constellation, like a map… like, if you joined all the dots they would reveal some secret message, some divine deeper meaning contained in the universe.’
‘Look in the mirror. What do you like about what you see?’
‘I like my lips, they’re a kiss waiting to happen, a secret poised on the lower lip waiting to be spoken. I like my jaw line. If I suck in my stomach a little, I can see the potential of it, that little mole on the right, like a 1920’s beauty spot, just in the right place.’
‘Now, list all the things you like about yourself.’
‘I like my mind, my hands, my eyes, my freckles, my lips, my jaw line, the mole on my stomach.’
~
What are we supposed to do with emotions that sit in the body? Does anybody know? Do they teach this anywhere? Do we dance them out of us? Scream them out? Is there some talking method?
You know in yoga practices, sometimes the instructor will tell you to get out a notebook and pen and keep it near by, in case anything comes up. Nothing ever comes up, well, besides the occasional,
‘No, no, I’m not doing that. Nope, that’s not possible. No one’s supposed to bend that way. Why god, why?’
Then the other day something actually did come up. I was on my back, doing what I can’t remember, focusing on the spine or something. Anyway, then moving into a spinal twist, I felt the muscles sort of release an relax, then a sort of pop like a balloon bursting and out from that spot came all these emotions and memories. It was a very strange experience. Pouring out from around my spine a sense of loss, a loss of stability and strength, memories of a person I relied on to supply me with those things failing to provide. But what do I do now? Where do I put it? Do I put it back into that space, tuck it back into that knot that’s always there? What do I do now?
A few moments ago the sun was shining through the window at just the right angle, pouring light through the crystal pendulum hanging from a string. It sent rainbow shards of light dancing across the room, fairy lights, mermaid shimmers. It was very girly and very beautiful.
Now the suns setting behind the houses, the last of its amber light reflecting up to the fringes of the clouds and I’m feeling weird about using the word ‘girly’. Why are rainbows and mermaids and fairies ‘girly’? Why are dragons and monsters and race cars… ‘boyish’? Is that even the right word?
Pink used to be a masculine colour. Everything is about perspective.
My favourite things as a child were my toy cars and ‘The Little Mermaid’. Does that make me a ‘tomboy’ or ‘girly’? Or some undefinable creature sitting uncomfortably between the two gender stereotypes, established centuries ago?
