How do I do it, this thing?

How? Start with the end in mind. This advice has served me well. It worked with students working towards exams, and these days on workshops where participants will achieve speaking without notes for example, and always I'm re-learning it for myself. 

Work in progress © Maggie Sawkins 2017
My word art on Etsy

I know the exercise is a good one for life. Way back, when I started on this path, it was because I felt so odd and unhappy in my own skin. I was introduced to the idea of creating the obituary you'd like others to write about you. So it pushed the questions; what is my life for? Or what truly matters to me? And more recently after lots of procrastination, I finally made a will and thought about the bequests I might want to make and funeral plans that would reflect my preferences. 

Sometimes when I sit still for long enough with no agenda and off the wheel of a ‘busy’ life, it all makes perfect sense to start with the end in mind. 

As readers of this blog will know there's been much reflection as I look through the papers of thirty years of work. I have not always felt in charge of the direction taken. Sometimes I found myself in situations that seemed like a ‘good idea’ but later felt very stifling. I have felt heartbroken from all the effort. There'd be a burnout or a break-down of sorts. Then there are relationships that set out with promise (even love and marriage) but turn out to be far from functional. Some choices I've made have not been so clever. I’ve often put huge amounts of effort in the not-quite-right direction.

I am on the bridge of a ship where I can't see ahead at all well - there is a lot of fog - but I know that degree at a time, the ship is being turned around to point more and more accurately on a course that fits. This has taken willingness to resign from 'figuring it out'. A life is not a problem to be solved. My brain hasn’t got the answers anyway (lord knows I’ve spent huge amounts of time and money trying to find them…) And it definitely won’t have the answers under pressure. This is the time to walk in the park, sit or smell the roses. Creativity is about having the time to have the ideas. 

So whilst this ship is turning, I continue to put my thoughts down here, plan a possible book and focus on the bigger message. I would like to end my life having more money than I need, so that I could give lots to meaningful projects that make a difference to lots of lives.

In my ideal world litter would be no more, art would be everywhere and planning committees would have artistic sensibilities. The Ministry of Kindness would have convinced politicians to re-build the NHS in its original image where there is care enough for all. Care would involve people of all ages supporting each other.

We would once again see food waste as a crime and ensure food gets eaten not thrown away. Young men trapped in gang life, would have received the esteem they seek in new ways of changing their locale by entrepreneurship. Someone would have invented chewing gum that no longer sticks to the street but by now, people wouldn't be spitting any longer. This weekend past I'm grateful for inspiring and wonderful ideas from diverse speakers TEDxEastEnd to help me keep the faith. 

Meanwhile my course is set on helping others get heard: to find courage to speak when they thought it was impossible. To resolve matters where they are in dispute, to listen like it matters. And all of us to realise that we are all ‘good enough’ and don't need to change in order to be ‘better’. I really don't know how to achieve many things that I would like to. But I know that thrashing my fragile ego over the coals definitely does not work. I will continue to start with the end in mind, work my way back and see what today, is the right next small step. x

The courage required

Do nothing for 15 minutes: nothing. Not listening, not reading, not thinking. Just sit. 

© Maggie Sawkins, 2016
All rights reserved

This is step one of The Joy Diet by Martha Beck. I loved her North Star book but this one gave me the gem of sitting and doing nothing; notice what you notice. Feel the feelings. Have the thoughts and look around and just be. 

How much does our culture suggest this? Not much. It's growing now, this awareness that mindful anything is better that automatic pilot. How many of us are still running on adrenaline, habit or expectation? 

Thank goodness, the crisis in the neglect of mental health services here in the UK, may help nudge our growing awareness: how do we neglect our own mental health? 

In my case, I took on the pressures until they squeezed the life out of me. I did so much from duty; I learnt to de-press. And to repress and restrain any instinct and desire towards self expression. I learnt to do the right thing, do what was expected, keep up with the programme. Yes, I did lovely stuff along the way - but the altered self was still mostly running the show. The paradox of doing too much.

Turning this ship around is a delicate, one-degree-at-a-time process, not a sudden overnight success. Even the notion of having preferences, discernment or goals for my life has been SO uncomfortable. Don't ask me what I want, I don't know! 

I know what I think I should want, or what makes me feel safe. Having big dreams and goals is distinctly uncomfortable. But somehow, the process is bringing me towards and into my true self. I am beginning to have a simpler life, a business that brings me more income doing things I love. I'm making a difference doing what I'm good at. 

The paradox is that any of this will not be changed by frantic or urgent activity. That is how I used to do it and look where that got me. Now I follow courage to do less, and sometimes, nothing. To know that today is all there is; that waiting is also an action. 

When I hear of a vibrant 30-something, dying suddenly of a brain haemorrhage at her desk, it wakes me up again. My job is to enjoy my life: TODAY. I do know that I feel better when I slow down. Or under-schedule. Or plan a lovely treat that is close to my heart.

I’m heading out to join the other freelance laptops in the cafe on the green, when "Hah! I haven't meditated today." (I’m a very imperfect meditator.) So I allow myself 5 minutes of meditation. Then another stretch; I can follow my own advice, and find the courage to just look at the trees for another wee while before starting work.

As they say, 'don't just do something, sit there!'. This moment is all we have - the birds just twittered to remind me. x

When I believe it...

Work in progress July 2016
© Maggie Sawkins All rights reserved

For reasons too many to describe, along the way and from a very young age, I picked up a belief that I was broken, abnormal and most likely, 'unstable'. Today whilst painting this, I had a moment, a lovely, fleeting 'hope is like the thing with feathers' type moment: a thought, 'maybe I could live a positive life'. 

What if it were also possible to be relationship material, a successful sole trader, to live without the decades-long-in-my-bones-belief, that I am strange or weird or wrong. What if I could spend the rest of my life however long it is, led by the fact it is my one and only life and really love it.

I revert daily to a sense that there is a debt or dues that need paying, before I am allowed to have 'my' life. I grew up with the sense that my time is not mine to spend how I choose (that might well of course be contributing to others) but there are things I 'should be doing'. Sometimes I slip into this agenda, feel 'off the hook' for a bit and ‘free’ until the next time.

I want to build on this possibility that I could be happy - Facebook tells me 'happy is the new rich' and spend my time wisely. Like the precious-never-to-be-repeated commodity that it is. Really? What if that were possible.  Of course it could be and it is a lot more that way than it used to be. With lots of obstacles and diversions along the way, of course. How well do we encourage our kids to do this? Or are they too, on a fast track of exam taking and deciding what they want to 'be'.

Jo Cox, inspiring in her life-affirming modelling of passion and belief, knew why she was here: we are in her debt. Her life has been witness, as John Sentanu said in the days following her murder. It is heartbreaking. And yet you Jo, have helped to give me some increased hope. Your life looked like it was well lived.

I am doing the work to sweep my side of the street: to clear the psychological blocks that are interfering with me having a wonderful life. I'm paying attention and doing more of the things that give me joy. Of course, I get sidetracked into trying to figure it out, following other peoples suggestions… and wondering yet again what I 'should be doing' next. I recently heard Deepak Chopra: "Rather than, 'I’ll believe it when I see it', try, 'I'll see it when I believe it'..." And so I feel now, that the faith needs to come first. 

If I do what I believe in, and listen to my heart, I will write and paint and visualise the beautiful website I want. I will continue to do my thing. I will contribute my skills at encouraging others to live through fear and learn to speak in front of people, tell their story or develop the art of truly listening. I will keep encouraging people to be themselves, me included. I will take my time, appreciate each new day, smell the roses. This life is mine, and I'm beginning to believe it.