Fran Macilvey's Blog, page 60

Change the Record

 

What do we say to ourselves?  Get up, you lazy bag of bones!  Hurry up and stop wasting everyone’s time!  Stop drawing attention to yourself.  Get a move on.

I’m always alone.  No-one stays with me.  I always have to manage by myself.  I am never good enough.  Nothing I do works out…..You get the picture.

I could simply change these voices by throwing them on their heads, just for a change.  Let’s see.  Slow down, you lovely lady.  Take your time and smell the roses, there for you to enjoy.  Join in with the party and have fun, there is plenty of room for everyone.  Everything you do is much appreciated by everyone, and you are learning the lessons of love as you move forward in life.

I receive lots of help for my dreams and plans.  I am never alone.  People help me every day, with everything I do. (Gosh, that is certainly true!)  Everything I do is fine, just as I do it.  Everything always works out for me, at the best time and in the best way possible.  I’m free.

No prizes for guessing which messages I prefer.  Just because a record is an antique, is no reason to keep it.  Age does not automatically confer respectability, any more than grey hair does; so I guess, in this season of hope and regeneration, a bit of playful reinvention would work wonders, huh?

Since paranoia strikes when I am tired, it makes sense to get enough rest.  If I can’t think clearly because I’m hungry, it makes sense to go and prepare and eat a meal in peace.  If I need colour, I should take a drive to a lovely garden.  I did that today – hooray! – I wish I could remember more often, that these activities are not selfish.  They are delicious.  They are life savers.

The Water Garden, Compton Acres

Bright Light in the Morning

Early one morning recently, I signed off all my worries, knowing, in my heart that God would make a better job of my current batch of tired worries than I was able to.  Just giving everything up for a while was a release.  And so I slipped into a very bright, white light.  Interestingly, the light that had been offered was a little yellower, warmer, less intense; but I blithely stepped past that suggestion into my brilliant white.  I chose full immersion.  I was warned it would be too much for me, just yet, but I ignored the warning, thinking I understood that since light = god, I would come to no harm.

Then I was unable to sleep, instead lying wide awake and unable to drift as I like, in the shades between waking and dozing before rising for a new day.

Finally, I tumbled hard to morning and started weeping, wailing and bemoaning my fate.  Too soon and too quickly, an intense sorrow landed as if from no-where, consuming my reason and making my breath rise in panic.  I needed to escape, I needed to breathe, had too much to do, not enough help, always alone…all the old messages came hammering back, and I was winded, privately shredding my composure as my family looked on, bewildered, and, for the most part, staying out of the way.  The grief was intense.  The weeping would not stop, no matter how I reasoned with it or tried to look on the bright side.  Hubby suggested I get back into bed, and gratefully accepting his advice, I lifted leaden legs under the covers and sank back.  Grief abated, slowly. And the reasons came.  The explanation was waiting for me, just as soon as I was able to listen for it.

Total immersion in bright white light brings fears of personal annihilation to the surface.  The contrast is too great, and the ego panics, flailing about and crying out for our attention.  Though ego fears are unreal – just as the ego’s fear of annihilation is unreal – when we move closer to the light, the ego will fight for its survival by turning up the volume on its preoccupations, to hold on to our attention.  Even though, the ego does not really exist apart from God, the ego sees God as ‘the enemy’.  Thus, fears of annihilation and abandonment feel very close.

Only love is real, therefore every ego fear is unreal.  Only love persists.  But fear grips and shakes us, feeling very real when we are going through it.  To avoid a massive reaction, the best approach to spiritual enlightenment, as to anything, appears to be one small step at a time (in the right direction).

Cartwheel Galaxy

The Journey

I was ensconced in the train between Edinburgh and Glasgow. In my comfy seat, admiring the sharply cut sidings, the wild grasses and ferns clinging on, the leaning trees with their new clothing of light green foliage, I would have been very content for the journey never to end, for the vista to remain open, wide, clear and new. Imagine gazing out at such beauty as this all day, I thought. … Imagine if life could become a never-ending journey…

There is something delightful about time held in suspense, while we are unable to do anything but sit peacefully and wait. After a long day, I was uncharacteristically reluctant to reach my destination and assume once more the role of decision-maker.

Placed against what I feel I was ‘expected’ to do, that particular journey felt fresh and colourful, throwing into sharp contrast the grey predictability of many of my usual vistas. Yet, do we not often see arriving at our destination as more important than the journey between points?  On crowded platforms or in samey airport lounges, do we not dream of arriving ‘on holiday’ – arriving at a place of perfection, a vista of joy? Often played out as this ideal ending, “arriving” becomes the place we reach where everything will be relaxed, happy, easy going, finally. I blame the movies, and books too, for leaving us with this feeling that if we can just manage to endure now for just now, soon we shall find a place of relaxation, throw down our heavy loads like grateful guests in a hotel lobby and rest our weary selves.

But why, when we are at home and living and eating and working and breathing and doing, can’t we simply bring more colour and refreshment towards us? Do we have to go to the Balearic Islands, or dream of escaping to the country, before we relax? Go through hell at the airports, waiting around to be told which queue to join to take off our shoes, remove our belts and wander in a daze through security? Pile on to charter flights and into seats that are never wide enough or long enough: Purgatory now, but just wait, it will be worth it for the heaven waiting at the end.

I suspect that one of the main reasons we flee in such numbers seeking rest in foreign parts is because we have forgotten how to be happy at home. Daily living constantly teeters on the brink of being deeply unappetising.

Suddenly aware of how ridiculous I can be, and how easily Life might be lightened and opened out to new colour and freedom, I’m sure I can make some changes around here. All suggestions welcome.

Albarracin

Perfection Is…

 

You can please some of the people some of the time….”

 

Hope springs eternal, which is just as well.

To have something more tangible than a mere hope of getting things done, I must learn when it is time to release the many things I feel I haven’t done well enough and see if they swim. Like child-rearing, baking meringue and pleasing the new in-laws, It is very easy, afterwards, to see how we might have done things differently. Once the dust has settled, retrospective wisdom is always dawdling, like a smug guest on the patio, waiting to pick holes in whatever we have achieved so far. The amazing thing is, I tolerate this idiot, nod obediently, and live with a shawl of grey tinged regret, until the weather warms up, I catch up on some sleep and throw off the blankets of despond with a sigh of relief.

Sometimes – most of the time, come to think of it – it is better to get through three things well enough, than to manage a half of one perfectly. While other people have desires, destinations and plans in mind, it’s still too easy to find myself stuck wiping down kitchen counters and gazing longingly out of the window. I don’t want any more of that wait and see. Despite what our cautious mother hen might say, there are times, ripe for change, when we have no choice but to bash on regardless and hope that, if our efforts come out less than perfect, people will be less judgemental and more forgiving than we are.

Thank God for other people and their kindness. Thank God for ‘devil may care’ and ‘I didn’t notice’ and ‘there’ll be other times’ and ‘there’s plenty more fish in the sea’ and ‘I’ll still love you when you’re old and grey and you don’t have your false teeth in and you shuffle instead of striding.’ Thank God for have-a-go heroes, for brave and easy-going and golden and relaxed and luscious.

Grand star forming region r136, captured by the Hubble space telescope

Making the Most of it

Claire Montreuil, writer, 1945.

Seeing a poster advertising a local writing group, I emailed and I suggested myself as a guest speaker. Last night, I had been wondering if I should pop over to an earlier meeting to suss out the territory, hoping to make sure I know where I’m going and what I might expect. Solely with a view to making sure I don’t end up flat on my face or in the wrong place, you see.

This morning, I suspected that my motives might be misconstrued by the regulars. Might they conclude that I am looking for kudos or searching for compliments? It is possible. The last thing I want to do is to get in their way or cause any embarrassment.

I’m no more of an exhibitionist than the next writer is. But somewhere along the way I have had to take on a bit of reinvention, adapt. Shy wallflower with artistic dreams transmogrifies into marketing, networking and sales novice with a few tips up her sleeve. It may help that I am old – well, oldish – and I’ve had a life. I have reached the age where these silly adverts “are you fifty plus and looking for a way to reassure your loved ones when you die?” will very soon apply to me, and I reflect, “Well, I may be approaching that particular doorway, and I may well have already passed through most of the usual doors one expects to, but, really, I haven’t lived much, yet. Can we put off the appointment with the funeral directors for a couple of decades, please?

I hope I’m one of these souls who are euphemistically referred to as “late starters” and that, when Life does finally start, I have a body which is still fit enough to enjoy finishing what I’ve started. Getting all the ducks in the row at the same time is a bit touch and go. But I am determined to do my best, and the omens are very good. So here we go.

Difficulties (2)

Sending off all my pet hates, sealing up my worries, discarding my concerns takes great discipline.  You would think I could just get on and do it – hop out of the cage and be done with all this negativity stuff, but it doesn’t seem to work like that.

Bad news has a habit of clinging on, a bit like the smell of mouldy old clothes – and there is a prize there for anyone who can spot the pun. Actually, this is one of my favourites, sent to me in a dream many years ago. I need to get rid of my bad habits, my old hang-ups. It would be good if I could just discard them for ever. Or box and send them off to the sorting office in the sky. Slap on a stamp and send them away, so that they cannot contaminate, and maybe so that someone else might fix them.

Old messages are part of an old record, with deep grooves, so it takes a while to notice how deeply buried are the old, tired repeats: “I can’t manage…I have to do everything alone….” Out-of-date litanies these may be, but still, they spool round, and on bad days, in tense times, can spill out and threaten to soil the new growth.

Maybe that thought of ‘trying to quit’ doesn’t work so well, because the universe prefers positive formulae. How about, “I am consistently fortunate. Good fortune is all around me, all the time.” I find myself warming more easily to positive words. I find them easier to wrap around me like a cosy blanket. It feels more welcome to embrace the good news than shun the bad: when we try to shun the bad, we have to remember what the bad is, which defeats the purpose of trying to shun it. I think I will stick with the positive stuff. Much easier to work with, and eventually, the hope is that the good news will smooth over the old stuff and allow the positive to flow more easily.

‘Living mindfully’ is a phrase I used to hear a lot. I think it means, remembering not to slip, to go back to the old, deep tracks that are so easy to tumble into. Patterns of defeatism, failure and self-hatred are seductive often because they have been our companions for such a long time and their voices are familiar: which is why discipline is so useful. The refusal to go back there, to slip away un-noticed into the strange comforts of familiar brutalities must be a conscious decision. That conscious choice takes determination and a lot of patience. But the first step, as always, is to decide.

Difficulties

Sending off all my pet hates, sealing up my worries, discarding my concerns takes great discipline.  You would think I could just get on and do it – hop out of the cage and be done with all this negativity stuff, but it doesn’t seem to work like that.

Bad news has a habit of clinging on, a bit like the smell of mouldy old clothes – and there is a prize there for anyone who can spot the pun. Actually, this is one of my favourites, sent to me in a dream many years ago. I need to get rid of my bad habits, my old hang-ups. It would be good if I could just discard them for ever. Or box and send them off to the sorting office in the sky. Slap on a stamp and send them away, so that they cannot contaminate, and maybe so that someone else might fix them.

Old messages are part of an old record, with deep grooves, so it takes a while to notice how deeply buried are the old, tired repeats: “I can’t manage…I have to do everything alone….” Out-of-date litanies these may be, but still, they spool round, and on bad days, in tense times, can spill out and threaten to soil the new growth.

Maybe that thought of ‘trying to quit’ doesn’t work so well, because the universe prefers positive formulae. How about, “I am consistently fortunate. Good fortune is all around me, all the time.” I find myself warming more easily to positive words. I find them easier to wrap around me like a cosy blanket. It feels more welcome to embrace the good news than shun the bad: when we try to shun the bad, we have to remember what the bad is, which defeats the purpose of trying to shun it. I think I will stick with the positive stuff. Much easier to work with, and eventually, the hope is that the good news will smooth over the old stuff and allow the positive to flow more easily.

‘Living mindfully’ is a phrase I used to hear a lot. I think it means, remembering not to slip, to go back to the old, deep tracks that are so easy to tumble into. Patterns of defeatism, failure and self-hatred are seductive often because they have been our companions for such a long time and their voices are familiar: which is why discipline is so useful. The refusal to go back there, to slip away un-noticed into the strange comforts of familiar brutalities must be a conscious decision. That conscious choice takes determination and a lot of patience. But the first step, as always, is to decide.

Fire Escape

Recently, there has been a rash of fire drills: one at my place of worship, another at my husband’s work and one at my daughter’s school. I heard that our evacuation was “slow” because one of our elderly members walked down the stairs. And we have a lot of stairs at our Meeting House. It is a complicated business, arranging a fire evacuation, requiring room sweeps, checklists and timings.

Our elevator is mainly there to help those less able. But, in the event of a fire, I have always been taught not to use the lift, only to use the stairs. I can manage them fine, but I take longer, so, l would normally be instructed to collect with other less able users, remain in a place of safety, and wait to be evacuated from the building last, so as not to hold up other able-bodied users on the stairs. If I hold up those behind me, I risk getting crushed.

Set test drills against what might really happen in a genuine emergency, and a whole new range of possibilities raise their heads. Less able users may be authorised to use the lift if the fire was well away from the lift shaft. In a ‘real fire’ scenario, I would be reluctant to await rescue, fearing that I might be overlooked.

My husband, who has arrested hydrocephalus, was, a propos of his disability (which is not something he ever discusses with anyone, not even me) instructed to move to a designated place and await collection, just as if he were a piece of lost luggage.  His disability in no way affects his speed of travel, and, like me, he disliked being singled out for this dubious attention.

It might be possible to stipulate that every building should have two stairs, one for use by the able bodied, and the other reserved for use by the less able. But if there are two stairs, the users of the building will insist that they use both, and in a real emergency, I don’t fancy trying to stop them, do you? I would not want to, even if I could.

Perhaps it makes sense to evacuate the less able users first. Of course, that would take up precious minutes. So, I guess that means we less able users will just have to take our chances. Don’t fancy it, though.

What to Write Next?

‘We want you to write’ suggested Spirit, ‘because we think that will give you some true satisfaction.’

Feeling immediately overwhelmed, I thought, ‘Yes, but about what? I don’t know anything.’

‘Oh, really? I could just feel the arch smile, the lift of the eyebrows… Here you are, almost fifty, with a husband, a daughter, one career behind you and another one well underway, and you don’t know anything? We beg to differ.’

‘You mean, about architecture, the nature of the cosmos, the probabilities of market trends, babies, healthy eating, women’s issues, that sort of thing?’

‘Perhaps you can write about these subjects. But just for the moment, consider the hundreds – thousands – of books that have passed through your hands. Do you honestly think you need to do yet more “research” before you can write about something that reflects your secret passions? Which books do you keep on your shelf? “A Course in Miracles”, the “Conversations with God” series, books about angels, the afterlife, forgiveness, time, the meaning of life…’

‘Yes, but shouldn’t I be a guru, or have a piece of paper from the University of Metaphysical Studies in order to write about these subjects?’

‘No. We all have to start somewhere. Look, instead of making excuses to put things off, just experiment. We understand that existential angst is one of your specialist subjects, but right now, perhaps it’s about time you had some fun. So instead of boring your husband with the “breakfast lecture series” would it not be an idea to share your thoughts with those who might be happy to read about them? Write about what you love, and if you need a bit of help, we will be here. After all, we are very pleased that God is one of your favourite preoccupations.’

I happily confess that I have always been intrigued by angels, the meaning of life, the importance of forgiveness, the purpose of time, the nature of progress, what it means to be successful, how to be happy and many more such topics which come under the heading “spiritual”. I enjoy fitting pieces of the jigsaw together that help answer the bigger questions, “Why am I here?” and “What is the point of existence.”

I could have a stab at writing about these, I suppose – hopefully in a way that is entertaining and practical, as well as useful. Reminding myself of the spiritual buttresses of life does help me immensely to deal with daily practicalities. I could tackle potential subjects alphabetically, thematically, or haphazardly. Knowing me, it will be entirely haphazard….

 

Writing Letters

We love technology, don’t we? It is so nippy, so quick and smart, and we can do so much with it. Well, okay, maybe you can, but there are things this writer finds challenging. Simple things, like adding pictures to my posts – the results seem to look so amateurish – and linking posts so that there is a trendy bit of purple writing which takes you through to a book, an article, a piece of news. I find these things hard to do, but on the whole, I agree, that technology is a fantastic piece of kit. Pieces of kits. Love it.

I picked up a flyer at my local bookshop this weekend, a brazen black and white piece of paper with red headlines and featuring a journalist, Barrett Brown, pictured in a perfectly respectable jacket and tie. It seems he is in detention in the US for “his extensive work exposing the inner workings of the …world of private intelligence and defence contractors who work with the growing surveillance and national security state”. According to the leaflet he has been in jail for over 500 days already and faces 105 years in prison.

For investigating things? For writing articles and chasing leads? For exposing the underbelly of society and attempting to discover truths? 105 years in prison?

Conspiracy theorists, it seems, have a point about surveillance cameras and mobile phone tracking and monitoring of email traffic, but if I was somebody watching, I might conclude that the best tactic was to ignore the critics. The heavy handedness of some “enforcers” reminds me a bit of that rather implausible crime drama in which the villain tracks down the solitary witness because s/he thinks s/he saw him doing something dubious. The chances are, that even if s/he did, they forgot about it straight away and has no more chance of picking the villain out of a line-up than a five-year-old heifer with mastitis.

Still, it is sobering to reflect that the only sure-fire way of not attracting the attention of the “security forces” is to write a good old-fashioned letter. While it may be legal to hack into email traffic and listen in on telephone calls, I doubt that there is a man sitting at postal HQ in a dark room with a letter opener. Rebels! Take out your parker pens!  And we can write to Barrett Brown #45047-177 at Federal Correctional Institution, Seagoville, PO Box 9000, Seagoville, TX 75159-9000. Doubtless, his mail is opened and read.