Shifting Sands

I woke up today and decided my attitude needed a shift.

I had a rough few weeks a couple of weeks ago, and I’ve been feeling a little sorry for myself on and off ever since. Self-pity just isn’t my bag. Like flourescent yellow, it just doesn’t suit me. Some things I wanted didn’t turn out how I hoped and because I really DID want them, I grumped about it. ‘I want’ piled on top of ‘I want’ and the wants got drowned in the ‘you can’t always have what you wants’. Life became an emotional laundry hamper, and I was all set for a turn through the wringer… until I woke up.

The wake up call was a couple of friends who were going through respective tough times, and it made me realise that whatever was going on in my life, I only had to look back a couple of years to see how far things had come for me. Financially, emotionally, spiritually. It had all changed, and for the better. Myself of three years ago was a shadow of who I am now, and an even fainter imprint of the me I will be in a couple more years.

I’ve regained much of the strength I had and lost. The strength that is perhaps still missing has been patched with courage, and perhaps holds stronger as a result. I once again have faith, and hope. I have belief, in MYSELF where once I had none and my patience and tolerance grow incrementally every day. Slowly I am finding my voice. Sometimes it’s more raucous and louder than I mean it to be, and sometimes when inside my head is screaming for a witty riposte, my voice is less than the quietest whisper, but somewhere in the Universe I’m finding my place.

There was a time in my life, where I was the eccentric one. I wandered about with flowers in my hair and cameras in my hands and little else seemed to matter. I turned up to parties in bare feet. I wandered streets at night because they were different then and I needed to SEE. But my inner and outer selves didn’t mesh. I was a walking example of Cartier Bresson when he called artists liars by omission. My life was a lie of omission because what I was on the inside wasn’t what sat on the outside. My exterior was creative, interesting and eccentric but it didn’t begin to express the complexities that sat under the surface, waiting for a voice.

For a period, at my lowest ebb, I denied those complexities not only their voice but their existence. I was told that I couldn’t be that person and for a while I tried to forget that person I’d been and those things I’d felt and known so deeply that they were a part of me. But I couldn’t always deny them and sooner or later they would surface again and needle at me until one day early on last year, I made a conscious choice to express the elements of me that had lain so far under the surface, and to have faith in myself and my direction in life. I’m now a qualified Reiki Practitioner and I practice all the time. I’ve never had so much fun and being able to express myself in a new way is a constant surprise and delight to me. I speak about experiences and emotions I would never have touched on before. I’m not afraid to try things that are a little unusual.

My current profession, with all it’s irritations and frustrations has also been an eye opening experience for me. It has opened me to people who believe all sorts of things with varying degrees of vehemence and cynicism. It has given me time and space to realise that my own perceptions are not so far removed from reality as I feared and I have learnt to speak of them in a way that is approachable and balanced. Slowly as a child building a vocabulary for the first time, I am building my own vocabulary and learning to speak without fear of mockery but with confidence, assurance and faith in myself.

Last week, I was looking at my life and wondering why things never seemed to go my way, but when I look back and see how far I’ve come, I have to admit that my life is pretty damned amazing right now. No, it’s not perfect. I don’t have much money and I’d rather be working for myself doing something jaw-dropping but all in all it’s good. It’s somewhere I can be happy and something I can build from to make my dreams, gigantic as they are, a reality. There is magic in the air and beginnings sit like a fizzing taste on my tongue. I wonder what this year will really bring?

Tags: Emotion Is A Rollercoaster That's Jumped off The Tracks, What Am I Going To Do With My Life