things to remember

Coffee. A daily essential, much like writing.

In my recent article about journalling, I mentioned that I often dedicate several pages - usually the first or last two or three - of my journal to “things to remember”.

By that I mean, I write down phrases, affirmations or reminders that ground me, things I find useful to hear often depending on what is currently going on. If I read something in an article or book, or hear something someone says in a podcast, that particularly speaks to me, that might be helpful for me to bear in mind at the present time, I will write it there. I also sometimes write down insights that occur to me in daily meditation.

I highly recommend this practice of writing down things you find comforting and grounding that you can look at and remind yourself of, especially if you’re a bit like me and find your anxiety running away with you at times. It can be really handy to look at it in your over-thinking moments.

As I’m just coming to the final few pages of my current notebook, I thought I might share some of the things I felt moved to remind myself of or ground myself in the truth of this last little while, in the hope it might be useful for you too. Perhaps I’ll make sharing these a regular thing.

Things to remember

• Karma never loses an address.

• When victory comes at too heavy a price, there’s honour in choosing defeat.

• The seeds we nourish and cultivate within us are the seeds that grow.

• Every storm eventually runs out of rain.

• No matter what you do, someone is bound to end up disappointed…so do what you want.

• There is no ahead or behind, everyone is walking a different path to the same place.

• You can have what you need, even when others need you.

• Confidence is quiet, insecurity is loud.

• How other people treat you is a measure of who they are, not a measure of your worthiness.

• Live with reverence for what truly matters.

• Be radically responsible for yourself.

Daphne (my favourite winter flower) on my desk at work as the sun started setting.

• No one has any power over you, only the power you’ve given them.

• Other people’s opinions are always one of two things: completely irrelevant or feedback you can choose to take or leave.

• Resilience is an asset.

• Live, and write, with audacity.

• The work is your domain, you are not in control of the rest.

• Finish what you start.

• Ripe fruit falls quickly.

• Discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life.

• Being hard on yourself is never the route to more joy.

• You are going to be OK, regardless of the decisions and behaviour of others. You have survived everything so far.

• You are at your most powerful when you trust yourself.

• You are more than your thoughts. You are more than your body. You are more than the place where you live, your job, your bank account, your current health, your trauma, your highlight reel and accomplishments, your lowest moment and your worst day. You are enough. You always have been.

And finally….

“You will never be able to experience everything. So, please, do poetic justice to your soul and simply experience yourself.” - Albert Camus

40 things i've learned about life, now i'm 40

1. If you don’t own it - your life, your past, your story - it will own you.

2. The messiest times in life are often, looking back, the most interesting and nearly always a source of growth. Hold your nerve, stay the course. Trust it will all work out.

3. A life filled with magic, adventure and fun does not just happen. You have to make the choice to cultivate those things in your life, every single day.

4. Playing small doesn’t serve you, only the people around you who want you to stay that way.

5. “See what happens” is not a cop-out, it’s a way of taking the pressure off. Letting things evolve naturally is a lesson in grace and patience.

6. You can't change anyone. People only change because they want to and there’s got to be something in it for them to do it.

7. We all have a choice in how we want to live - the trick is to make conscious choices rather than unconscious ones.

8. Tables always turn.

9. It is possible to be strong and fragile at the same time. Both are courageous.

10. Change is what it is. It’s all about how you negotiate it.

11. Anyone who believes gossip and lies about you before hearing your side of the story was already looking for a reason to be against you. Let them go.

12. Protect your mental health and inner peace by any means necessary. You never have to apologise for protecting yourself.

13. Old ways will rarely open new doors.

14. Perspective is everything (thank you Sandi Sieger).

15. Your passions are not accidents. They are the clues to where you will find meaning in life. Embrace them. Follow them.

16. Three things always come out - the sun, the moon, and the truth.

17. You have to go out on a limb in life, because that’s where the fruit is. Corny but true!

18. There are many universal needs that human beings have - one of them is to feel appreciated. Showing gratitude, for others and for life, as often as you can is an instant mood lifter.

19. Love will never feel like love unless you also love yourself.

20. Comparison is the quickest route to despair.

21. No is a complete sentence. And you can say it - just do it politely and fast.

22. Most people deserve a second chance. But no one deserves a third (see point 12).

23. Likes and follows are empty calories that never satisfy. Find what really feeds you instead.

24. There is no shinier, more successful, more likeable, more accomplished, more together you waiting in the future. You are only you, now. You are only ever here. Accepting that will make life so much easier, and sweeter.

25. Confidence doesn’t come from achievements, it comes when you decide to have it. Confidence is a choice.

26. So is self-pity.

27. You are the only one who can give yourself what you’re seeking from others.

28. When change comes, it’s likely that opportunity will also knock at the door. Keep an ear out.

29. Nothing is forever - pain or joy.

30. Boundaries will protect you, and allow you to love and give more freely. Without them, you will be constantly resentful and disappointed.

31. It’s amazing what can happen when you drop all your expectations and attachment to an outcome.

32. Continuing to choose joy in the face of adversity is an act of courage and resistance (thank you Holly Ringland).

33. Meanings of words change all the time. “Success” is probably the most mercurial. You do not have to hold yourself hostage to past definitions if they no longer serve you.

34. You can endure a lot more than you think you can.

35. If it makes you happy, it doesn’t have to make sense to anyone else.

36. Slow progress is still progress.

37. It is possible to one day laugh in places where you used to cry. Know that you can always change the story.

38. Failure and defeat are better judges of character than success.

39. Fighting ageing is a battle no one has ever won, and getting older is a privilege denied to so many. Look forwards, not backwards.

40. When in doubt, be bold, generous, loving and unafraid.

adventures in meditation, part one

Every year, I've made a resolution to learn to meditate and start a meditation practice.

I've been making that resolution for about nine years, maybe longer.

The reason I kept trying? Because every interview with or profile of anyone I admire - whether they're a writer, a public figure, an entrepreneur, or just a generally enlightened and content person - usually mentions meditation in some way. That it is key to their creative practice, to balance, to keeping calm, to staying sane. That it opens the door between the person they are, or have to be in the world, and the person they want to be.

At the start of this year, a friend gifted me Danielle LaPorte's The Desire Map, a much-spoken of phenomena in the online world that gets a lot of traction around New Year, and with good reason - it's a pretty effective system for driving down into what you really want for your life.  One of the activities is 'Core Desired Feelings' and after much excavation and brainstorming, two of my four were 'calm' and 'wise'.

Much of the work in programmes like this centres very much around action and sovereignty when it comes to what you want to happen in your life. In other words, what do you have to do to feel the way you want to feel? What is something you can do, that is within your control, right now to get you closer to where you want to be?

The answer for those two particular desires I had identified in myself was.....meditate.

So, around the same time I did the Desire Map work, I began experimenting with meditation with the help of a wonderful (and free!) app I highly recommend called Insight Timer. This is the moment to tell you this is not a sponsored post, in any way, I just love this app! I think Laura might have recommended it to me too.

The app was great. But instantly I was reminded of why I had abandoned all previous attempts - because my mind was so manic, it wouldn't focus. I could barely get through 60 seconds.

"Just focus on your breath" - sounds easy, am I right? Wrong.  

After many months now, the trick that has helped me the most in learning to meditate has been thinking of my mind as a puppy in training. What do you say to a puppy when you're trying to teach it? 

"Stay."

So every time I notice my mind wandering in meditation, as it always does, I call it to heel like I would an adorable puppy. Hearing the word "stay" does jolt my mind back to the task at hand. A few breaths and it will stay, like a good mind. Then it wanders off again, and I gently grab it by the collar and lead it back. 

It's a nice metaphor, when it works! But my mind isn't always a cute puppy that comes back obediently when it's called. Sometimes meditation for me is like finding the puppy has destroyed the couch, chewed your favourite books and done its business everywhere. Moments like those, I set the timer for 2 minutes and that has to be enough. Miraculously, those 2 minutes do the trick. 

The benefits of meditation are seeping into other aspects of my life too. I find I'm calmer in general, able to let things go a lot faster than I used to. I get pissed off, of course but I allow myself to feel it, for five or ten minutes and then, frankly, I get bored and move on! I've also found I'm sleeping better thanks to meditation, even when I'm anxious. Even when I wake up for no reason and can't get back to sleep - the anger and panic at only being 5 hours away from the alarm going off, and then 4, and so on, has dissipated dramatically. I find that I can rest in those moments, even if I don't go back to sleep straight away. 

I meditated for 53 days straight over March and April, usually in the evenings, after work, before bed. It seemed to be working. I had gone from barely being able to do 5 minutes to doing guided meditations for half an hour or more. I was on a roll!

But then I lost my winning streak thanks to just one stressful and busy day at the end of April, where making time to meditate merely slipped my mind. Hardly a major crime. But over the next few days, I had one day on, one day off, and it just didn't work. Perhaps the practice hadn't been so carefully carved out as I thought. I found myself feeling really out of sorts and realised that meditation had come to be an essential part of my routine, like perfume, caffeine and morning pages. I didn't feel myself without it. Much like running. 

It didn't matter that I'd fallen off the wagon. In fact, there was no wagon. It's a practice. I just had to start again. 

Meditation has become part of my daily routine. My rule is "meditation before social media", which means I meditate as soon as I wake up, happily filling the space between being conscious and the coffee being ready.

I didn't expect it to change my life, but it really has. 

"Meditation is not a means to an end. It is both the means and the end." – Jiddu Krishnamurti

More on this subject to come, as I feel it will be quite an adventure, as the post title hints! 

Do you meditate regularly? How do you find it?

if only you'd remember

"If only you'd remember before ever you sit down to write that you've been a reader long before you were ever a writer. You simply fix that fact in your mind, then sit very still and ask yourself, as a reader, what piece of writing in all the world Buddy Glass would most want to read if he had his heart's choice. The next step is terrible, but so simple I can hardly believe it as I write it. You just sit down shamelessly and write the thing yourself. I won't even underline that. It's too important to be underlined. Oh, dare to do it, Buddy! Trust your heart. You're a deserving craftsman. It would never betray you."

-J.D Salinger, Seymour: An Introduction