This article was written for Annabel & Grace, which is now part of Rest Less.
I was just reading my last post that I wrote for Annabel & Grace. As usual time has flown by and it is now early summer. One forgets the cold, dark and bleak days but am I right in thinking that winter has been mild? I don’t remember many really frosty mornings. Even the geraniums in the window boxes outside have managed to survive!
People often dislike January. It is true that following Christmas it can be a bit of an anti-climax. However I have been watching the light increasing every day since 22nd December. Literally, I have been counting the minutes since then and now finally we have reached early summer and are enjoying long summer days. It is still light at 10pm.
I have no idea how people in some parts of the world live in darkness for months on end. I could not. Cold is easy to cope with; at the end of the day, pile the clothes on, but what can really replace the natural light? I think May, now sadly over, and June are the best months all round. The green leaves are of a particular fresh, green colour. When the sun shines on them the effect is breathtaking. The river Thames, where I live, is bursting with new life. Nature is so full of joy.
Why then am I feeling so sad and stuck at the moment? Is it because I cannot keep up with the re-birth around me? Do you ever feel like that when you say, ‘I am fine’ but deep down you know you are not tellingthe truth? My mind says one thing, my heart another. I watch days go by, sometimes silently wishing I wasn’t here at all.
What happened to all the promises I have made to myself? Would I make the necessary changes in my life if I were, say 30? What am I afraid of? Why was day dreaming so easy when I was younger?
Our minds are constantly chattering. We are our own worst enemy. If anyone was as dreadful to us as we are to ourselves, we would refuse to see this person again. Yet picking on ourselves is a habit that we don’t even realise we are doing. Do you ever pay a compliment to yourself, ‘I have beautiful shiny hair, my arms are toned etc’ when you catch your image in the mirror? Or do you focus on your sagging skin?
Even when a compliment is directed to us we receive it with a pinch of salt, often responding with an undermining comment about ourselves. Nobody needs to know my shirt was bought on sale nor that I have put on 4lbs. Instead, a thank you would be appropriate and enough.
Avoiding what needs to be addressed is what I have been doing. A serious discussion is a must with certain people around me. Despite congratulating myself on my communication skills, I feel paralysis when it comes to talking about unpleasant issues with these individuals. I need courage to tackle my fear because deep down I know it will be such a relief to get things off my chest. After all I cannot expect honesty if I am not honest with myself.
I know being active is the best remedy for me. The feeling after a session at the gym is amazing. Yet, once I get out of my routine, it takes me so long to get back into it. I present myself with unlimited excuses. This is partly because I dislike doing such activities on my own. I religiously go to my yoga classes on Mondays and qi gong on Fridays. On another plus point, I have been doing ballroom dancing since January and I love it. I spend an hour grinning from ear to ear every Monday night. It is not very easy to practice out of classes without a dance partner but ‘on fait comme on peut’ as the French saying goes. We do what we can….
Continuing with positives, after three school terms, I have finished
upholstering my third chair, and started my fourth. I continue enjoying my weekly two hour sessions.
Tormenting myself with past errors, bad choices that I have made will not get me anywhere. All these questions I present myself have only one answer. No one will wave a magic wand and make my life different. I am the only one who can take control to get out of this soul destroying spectator phase. Constantly being aware and thankful of all the positives in my life will put me back on track. I still have so much to offer to myself and it is still only early summer!
I would love to hear if anyone reading this post is suffering as I am and if they have any recommendations.
For more stories from Zeynep click HERE