Vienda Maria

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Author: vienda

  • let go of control: body leads, mind follows

    I have intentionally reduced my commitments over the past few months to allow life in, in a way it hadn’t been before. There’s a cost to this though — lost productivity, lost progress, lost income.

    I’m sitting with my back cushioned against the headboard of the bed I call my own for this month. When I left Mallorca I chose a life that would exist in a state of flux for a while. The first 5 weeks in a small village in the north of England, now a month in a market town in the mid-East, then a month in London, and after that, possibly Asia.

    Still in my pyjamas at 4.30 in the afternoon, I am getting to the business of my work: emails, admin, articles… finding my flow amongst the tasks that tether me to the physical world more than anything else. I enjoy the familiarity and comfort of it.

    Yet…

    The truth is I haven’t felt much like working for a long time now.

    Since April I find myself a season of life that is asking me to allow rejuvenation by ‘not doing’. Some seasons are imbued with unparalleled productivity and abundance and some seasons are fallow.

    I have intentionally reduced my commitments over the past few months to allow life in, in a way it hadn’t been before. There’s a cost to this though — lost productivity, lost progress, lost income.

    I have this feeling that maybe this season of not knowing how life is supposed to look like is a fragile invitation to discover how life wants to be lived.

    People talk about thriving inside a busy life. I don’t want a busy life. I want a slow life. I want an empty life. I want a life that I can fill with ordinary passing-by moments that only I can witness. A squirt of lemon juice fired in the wrong direction. A single butterfly seeking shelter in a bougainvillaea. A patch of grass, soft and cool, under my feet. I want a life that is pregnant with stillness.

    So… I have let go of control: body leads, mind follows.

    I act from the advocacy of my body’s wisdom and while systems are necessary and valuable, at times they get in the way of what wants to land.

    Even the structures I used to pin my productivity on have fallen away.

    Binding my tasks to the energy of the days of the week which I infused into my Plannher stationery brand has naturally dissolved, for now. Showing up to specific timelines and time zones is relaxed and limited until I find a new flow. I pay attention to my cycle and endeavour to have fewer commitments around my menses and am more available for social and travel engagements around ovulation. And that is it.

    There is very little planning happening in my life right now.

    I am allowing life to move me.

    It is an enormous privilege to be able to do so.

    It is a privilege to be able to disentangle myself from the hyper-productive capitalist world we live in and to be able to take a step out of that. To surrender and wait and hold out for where life is wanting me to go.

    It takes courage and determination and trust and willingness to let go.

    It is clear to me that the more controlled life is, the less it is actually in control. The more out of control we feel the more appealing the illusion of control becomes. That the way to gain control is to let go of control.

    Allowing ourselves to let go isn’t a revolutionary solution to everything that ails us. Instead, it is a process and a practice.

    To let go is to let life wash over us. To let it redirect us and renegotiate the timelines that we exist on, to teach us things we otherwise could not see. Things, feelings and experiences we cannot access when life is tightly contained and managed.

    Letting go of control — letting your body lead and mind follow — is about opening up space. It’s about allowing another dimension of life to open up for us to slip into.

  • where have all the grown-ups gone?

    Maybe protracted adolescence is the anxious state of millennial life.

     

    “I hate it when people call me on the phone,” I say between bites of a cheeseburger I had pulled the top off, sitting on a wooden bench outside a British pub opposite a good friend. It was a warm early summer’s eve and we had slipped out to have ‘girl time’ while baby and baby-daddy stayed at home. She nodded in agreement, laughing, the bubbles in her champagne uplifting spirits.

    “Sometimes the calls are from people I actually want to hear from and I still avoid them. And then have to call them back.”

    She giggles. “It reminds me of this meme I watched about how different generations open the door. The millennials are the only ones who want to crawl away and hide.”

    “That actually makes me think of this tongue-in-cheek article I read about how the ’90s was the best time to be alive and someone in the comment section added that they felt like there are no grownups left anymore.”

    “Right?! Who is coming to handle things and sort this world out?!!” We laugh.

    But it’s something I can’t stop thinking about and talking to anyone who is willing to. Where have all the grown-ups gone?

    On one side we have shrugged off many of the markers that have traditionally defined adulthood. Owning a home, a car, having children, staying in the same company and progressing through it over a long period of time… This may be due to constrained monetary realities but, more broadly, there’s an attitudinal sea change evident here.

    Even those of us who do eventually have any and all of the above continue to focus on things unseemly in previous generations like prioritising lifestyle and living in the present and determinedly throwing ourselves into our passions and turning them into “dream jobs” at the cost of said markers.

    We are stressed and confused but we are also very interested in the social justice system, a stronger healthcare system, the environment… all those things have pulled us to the traditional political left.

    Politically millennials aren’t moving to the ‘right’ and to a more conservative mindset as is common with age. That’s just not happening for us. Partly because we are not acquiring those markers but also because we are just not thinking with that conservative mindset which could be seen as not thinking in a very ‘adult’ way.

    This disinclination to grow up is reinforced by popular culture and technology. Our millennial lives aren’t stacked with a lot of adulthood or the perception of being adults. We didn’t change our behaviour at all when we moved into a much more adult stage of life marked by something like having a child or buying a house. We keep living the way we did in our 20s but will bring our kids along. We are able to devote our attention and income to self-improvement and self-indulgence almost exclusively.

    In that conversation in the setting summer sun outside over burgers, I brought up the idea of how the loss of ‘the village’ meant that we were never initiated into adulthood because we were not tied into those kinship and tribal systems that previous generations were.

    Our parents became unstuck from the village but they still had remnants of that experience remaining and remembered models of that. Then we failed to grow up because the ones who were supposed to show us how did not. They did not know how to or that they had to or were not there.

    As adolescents, we entered a globalised world and often moved away and travelled for various reasons which meant that the village is now gone and we don’t have any memory of it.

    Perhaps we could argue that if you destroy or abandon the village adulthood becomes untethered as well.

    We imagine a world where no one is in charge and no one necessarily knows what’s going on, where identities are in perpetual flux.

    The world is our playground, without an adult in sight. And we’re largely okay with that.

  • wave after wave after wave…

    how to pull yourself out of depression, grief and other dark places…

    Wave after wave it hits. The feeling of slipping beneath the surface. It can feel like no amount of struggle lessens the power of those waves. Wave after wave after wave after wave. No reprieve, no relief, no peace. you’re just being pummeled by these waves of emotions bigger than a human body can contain. Grief, depression, long anxiety…

    Then with time, the waves are still there, but each wave is accompanied by several minutes of peace before the next wave. A little more time to breathe and be. The desperate sense of slipping under is replaced by a feeling of still being submerged, but no longer having to endure the grapple for a breath between each wave.

    Ultimately, the waves never go away. But the space of time in between each wave gets longer and longer. Eventually you go a whole day before another wave hits. Then a week. Then a month. Eventually it’s a whole year

    And maybe you feel a big wave of those familiar feelings that might haunt you on an anniversary of that loss, or the when you first started feeling this way before being okay for another year until another wave hits.

    Depression, grief and other dark places move through us like waves. When you have a really, really significant loss in your life it’s never over.

    You carry that with you forever. But the waves get farther and farther and farther apart as you grow and heal and grow into your new life. Being really honest about that is really comforting to know.

    And then in that new space that all that depression and grief has carved out of your soul opens up for beautiful things that weren’t available to you before

    Every single journey is different, but there are some life changes and circumstances that feel like a death of the life that you had, an identity, a future, a world view even.

    You don’t have to be okay. Until your ready. It takes as long as it takes to consolidate.

    Still… how to pull yourself out of depression, grief and other dark places?

    “Life is a whole journey of meeting your edge again and again. That’s where, if you’re a person who wants to live, you start to ask yourself questions like, “Now, why am I so scared? What is it that I don’t want to see? Why can’t I go any further than this?” — Pema Chödrön

    I’ve always felt things very deeply. It’s a sensitivity that I cherish yet in the most difficult moments resist. This feeling of going under, head barely above the water, treading lightly, where everything hurts…

    There have been times in my life where I have fallen into a depression in response to the world, my experiences and and perceptions of it. One of those times has been recent. Life isn’t all good at all times. But the depth of feeling gives me a breadth of compassion that extends beyond the superficial and that’s where the beauty and true kindness lies.

    When I talk to my therapist about being depressed and not wanting to be anymore he says things like:

    “This is what you do. You try. You do everything in your power to feel better. At first these attempts may be feeble, seemingly pointless. You accept and love yourself for drinking water and eating nourishment that day, for talking to a friend for ten minutes, for taking that shower, for working out, whatever small accomplishment you managed. You stop comparing yourself to what everyone else is doing and love yourself for making an effort. You stop insisting you need to be a certain way and support and encourage yourself for whatever steps you can do, and you try to see beauty in it.”

    He is very pragmatic.

    The thing is, I can do all the ‘right’ things. I make my bed each morning and exercise and wash and eat well and take care of my emotions and my mind. I understand that these small and simple gestures are necessary and meaningful.

    Maybe I’m a high-functioning depressive. Maybe I’ve just learned to love myself enough to treat myself like I would a child taking myself through the motions of what I know is good for me even when I feel completely disconnected and apathetic to it

    Here is what actually helps me pull myself out of depression, grief and other dark places…

    Deeply engaging with nothing but what is present for me in each moment. It means focusing my full attention and being fully conscious of what I am doing each moment, like making my bed. That kind of focus leaves no room for the noise of internal dialogue and in that moment gives me a sense of stillness and peace.

    Allowing depression, grief and other dark emotional journeys to happen to me. When I am willing to see them as a gift, and allow them the space to move through me without resistance… When I feel them all the way through, even if sometimes they last for a year or more… At the other end they open up a space for something significant that wasn’t there before. That couldn’t have existed within me or my life prior to the painful inner journey.

    Noticing what in my life is causing this deep sense of loss and disconnection from life. This been a really interesting… I have been taking some time off work and unpacking, around hustle culture and productivity, toxic productivity and productivity addiction and worthiness being attached to busyness, and how all that is connected to money as well.

    I keep circling back to the fact that we live in a sick society that values superficial things which causes a disconnect.

    “Illness in this society, physical or mental, they are not abnormalities. They are normal responses to an abnormal culture. This culture is abnormal when it comes to real human needs. And.. it is in the nature of the system to be abnormal, because if we had a society geared to meet human needs.. would we be destroying the Earth through climate change? Would we be putting an extra burden on certain minority people? Would we be selling people a lot of goods that they don’t need, and, in fact, are harmful for them? Would there be mass industries based on manufacturing, designing and mass-marketing toxic food to people?

    So we do all that for the sake of profit. That’s insanity. It is not insanity from the point of view of profit, but it is insanity from the point of view of human need. And so, in so many ways this culture denies and even runs against counter to human needs. When you mentioned trauma.. given how important trauma is in human life and what an impact it has.. why have we ignored it for so long? Because that denial of reality is built in into this system. It keeps the system alive. So it is not a mistake, it is a design issue. Not that anybody consciously designed it, but that’s just how the system survives.” — Gabor Maté

    I’ve been on a journey of trying to integrate a way of living that is inclusive to meeting my human emotional, spiritual and physical needs alongside supporting myself financially.

    I’ve had to face my fear of running out of money and replacing it with the reality that I am capable of earning more money whenever I want to, or need to and that I will always be supported in my endeavours. That I don’t have to compromise my needs and values for money.

    At times I may choose not to exercise my capacity to makes money. I may that it’s not my priority for periods of time and that is okay. And that whenever I want to turn on the money faucet, I have that capacity.

    Understanding that has been a huge revelatory attitude shift and so empowering, and something that spills over into other areas of life, not just financial, that realisation that “If I really want to or need to, I can. There’s always a way.”

    Taking uncomfortable and unconventional risks. I just left a beautiful island in the Mediterranean and a cute 1-bedroom flat overlooking the sea for a greyer, colder country. Intellectually it makes no sense I had a good life in Mallorca but my entire body couldn’t settle there. I was always anxious. I couldn’t relax. I kept asking the universe in my personal form of prayer to show me where I needed to be. Then at the start of the year a whole domino effect of events guided me to leave the island and return to the United Kingdom. I could have ignored the signs but I chose to listen and take that risk even though it makes no sense. It’s still to early to tell but I already feel much more at peace, safe and see the dials of momentum and opportunities ticking up for me in a whole new way.

    Let it happen.

    Let the depression, grief and other dark feelings swallow you whole and chew you up and spit you out.

    Because on the other side of this is always a new version of you a life that wants to be lived. New things that yearn for your love.

    You can’t get to them without going through it all.

    This is the art of life.

  • go, do, eat guide: Mallorca

    go, do, eat guide: Mallorca

    Folklore tells us that in Mallorca the majority of the population lived in the country, from the country and mostly in poverty. Agricultural land was the most prized possession which was located mostly inland away from the more barren, rocky sea-side.

    As is common in patriarchal culture, the most productive and fertile land was handed down from father to eldest son(s) and the least desirable land was inherited by the lesser members of the family, the women.

    Until the 1950s came around Mallorca when became a luxury destination with stars such as Liza Minelli and Frank Sinatra who came and stayed at the Grand Hotel in Palma and went to Palma’s finest club, Tito’s.

    Across the next 10 years, the island experienced a transformation of epic proportions with 360,000 tourists visiting the “Isla de la Calma” — the island of tranquillity — and the once undesirable land underwent a building boom to house these visitors.

    The women suddenly became rich, while their older brothers continued their agricultural struggle inland. A great discord began between families. One that continues to rival siblings to this day.

    I was based in the southeast, San Augustine (or Sant Agusti in Catalan) a short 15-minute drive outside of Palma. Just far enough out of the city to feel peaceful and close enough to the sea to be in that turquoise body of water within a 5-minute walk.

    When people ask me for tips on places to go when they come to Mallorca, which is often, I can tell you the places I have most enjoyed. And some I will keep to myself because not everything is for everyone and some things need to remain sacred and secret.

    Let me add… if you want to go anywhere outside of Palma, you will need a car.

     

    GO: My favourite places to visit.

    Sant Elm (also known as San Telmo in Spanish) is a charming coastal village in the far southwest corner of Mallorca. Mostly abandoned by locals, it is inhabited mainly by tourists and vacation homeowners.

    The Sant Elm to La Trapa hike is one of the best coastal trails in Mallorca. Along the way, you’ll enjoy breathtaking views of Sa Dragonera (Isla Dragonera) and the Tramuntana Mountains.

    Valldemossa is a village steeped in old-world charm that lies in an idyllic valley in the midst of the Tramuntana mountains.

    Deià is an idyllic village of green-shuttered, honey-coloured houses that has become a millionaires’ hideaway in the shadow of the Teix mountain, part of the Tramuntana mountain range. Although it could have been just another pretty Mallorcan village in the west of Mallorca had Robert Graves not decided to make it his home…

    Fun fact: The English poet and novelist first moved here in 1932 with his mistress Laura Riding and returned in 1946 with his second wife. Muses followed, friends came to stay and, before long, Deia had established a reputation as a foreign artists’ colony. However, Graves was hardly the first to discover Deià, an 1878 guidebook noted its “collection of strange and eccentric foreigners” and it has stayed that way ever since.

    Pollença in the north of the island is an ancient town of attractive narrow streets and an impressive main square, lined with cafés, restaurants and bars. It also boasts a larger and very busy market on Saturdays.

    Costitx is a sleepy little village located in Mallorca’s rural es Pla region, in the heart of the island. It has its own Natural Science Museum and beautiful sights worth a visit.

    Santanyí is a historic rural town famous for its gold-stone architecture. It’s charming, with quaint cobbled streets, and a majestic church and appeals to most for its slow pace of life. Market days are on Wednesdays and Saturdays and are the best day to come and soak up the atmosphere, as locals (mostly Germans) come out in full force to buy local produce.

    Botanicactus is one of Europe’s largest botanical gardens, with bamboo and palm trees and dozens of varieties of cacti. These gardens were opened in 1989 in Ses Salines because of the scarcity of rain in the area. The centre of the garden is full of cacti, surrounded by Mediterranean species.

     

    & SWIM:

    Cala Deià is a tiny, cove beach just outside of the much-loved mountain village of Deia, in the heart of the Tramuntana mountains in the northwest of Mallorca.

    Bugambilia is a beautiful small beach with a restaurant that serves excellent paella, where the owner and staff treat everyone as family.

    Illetes Beach Club is a beach I walk across to get to the next one on my list but sometimes stop for a smoothie. It is beautiful but feels pretty built up and touristic.

    Cala Comtesa is the beach I go to most as I find it the wildest and most beautiful close to home. It also has a restaurant with decent food.

    Es Trenc is magical and there is also a super cute beach shack/magic forest right next to it which is amazing after the beach.

    Cala Lombards a stunning cove beach in the southeast of Mallorca, near the small village, Es Llombards.

    Cala s’Almonia is a beautiful inlet with limestone walls and turquoise water. No sandy beaches, but a stunning area for swimming.

     

    DO: The most fun things to do.

    Sa Fonda: in Deia, and across the island, these famous summer parties attract everyone from boho people to celebs.

    Flea Markets: Mercadet de Segona Mà in Plaça de Porta Santa Catalina-Palma every second Saturday of the month, Consell Flea Market on Sundays (the best!) & Mercadillo de Son Bugadelles on Saturdays.

    Vintage Stores in Palma:

    De Tu A Mi

    UNICO Vintage Store

    Rita’s House Of Vintage

    Secondhand First Brand

    Seattle Vintage Store

    My Michelle Vintage

    La Simo

    Festivals: Mallorca Live Music Festival, & all the local festivals in each season.

     

    EAT: The best places to eat in Palma.

    Zaranda

    Ramen Otaku

    Surry Hills Coffee

    Taqueria Manataco

    Tiki Taco Palma

    Mistral Coffee House

    Temple Natura Café Garden

    La Molienda Bisbe

    NU Market & Coffee

    Mama Carmens

    IZAKAYA

    Mestís

    Boski

     

    The truth is, I never fell in love with Mallorca.

    There are places that light you up and make your soul come alive. And there are places like this one, that are beautiful on the surface. But lack substance.

    I found things to love about it. I adored the nature and the sea and felt connected to the land. I was fortunate enough to meet and be a part of an eclectic community. But if it weren’t for the people I befriended, I would have left after my first 6 months.

    Mallorca is a very transitional place that is overflowing with tourists. In the height of summer, the energy becomes frenetic from people landing and leaving.

    People — often starved of sun, relaxation and connection — come to devour as much of everything that is missing in their lives. Which leaves this island feeling depleted and devoid of soul and essence.

     

  • shoulder to shoulder with friends and strangers

    I have one month left on this island and after that, the story is yet unwritten.

    I untie my espadrilles from around my ankles and tie them to a tree. My feet dig into the sand/soil/pine-needle ground and I let myself sway and roll to the rhythm of the beat that the DJ is enchanting us with.

    A man I dated for 5 minutes last summer comes charging at me with determination. He holds my shoulder tenderly and kisses me on both cheeks with an intimate “Que tal?” whispered into my ear before wandering off like a lost soul.

    In that moment I catch a flash of a different life, a different story that could have turned into. There is a stretch of unknown rolling between each music track lingering with potential gyrations and side-stepping. Feet grinding into the ground.

    I find another barefooted being and touch his toes with mine in camaraderie. We smile at each other and high-five before returning to our dance floor stations shoulder to shoulder with friends and strangers.

    I have one month left on this island and after that, the story is yet unwritten. A cacophony of possibilities, undreamt dreams, unseen connections. I can’t think too much of the future because it brings me waves of sadness and uncertainty.

    Instead, I hold a steady gaze on the here and now. The only thing that can save me until the next wave of life comes.

    Too much has happened in too short a time that has brought me to my knees and I am afraid of my own vulnerability. So ready to falter. I have had to let life break me all the way through these past few years. And from the fragments and shattered parts, I will rebuild a life that holds more of me.

    I am still very much in existential crisis mode. I am simply trying to get through each day with as much kindness and care as I can. I really yearn for life to make sense and hold meaning and feel like I belong somewhere or a part of something.

    The only thing holding me together in some way in my writing and hope in my heart that one day soon the future will unfold with promises that are more fulfilling and brighter than the past.

    I keep dreaming of lands, tropical and lush, swollen with heat and humidity, free from glorified ambitions and Western ideas of gentrification. I don’t know. I don’t know.

    There is no perfect one place. I will always be torn by the many parts of me. Am I just trying to escape a world that has become more unfamiliar to me year by year?

    It is strange to me to have existed in such a beautiful setting whilst being grief-stricken and under psychological duress for the majority of my time here. The past 18 months have been amongst the small handful of deeply difficult times in my life.

    I have always felt life too deeply and had depressive phases and seasons, but none like this. I wonder if this sense of caged heart and mind will stay here when I leave or will accompany me on my journey onward.

    I hope the former and fear the latter.

    Either way, I have learned to welcome and accept all that is.

    One day it will make sense.

  • inside my closet…

    It takes more than 200 years for a t-shirt to decompose in a landfill.

    That same t-shirt was grown in a field and then passed through a minimum of 24 people’s hands, over 13 stops spanning 3-5 countries, sometimes on 3 different continents to go from farm to closet.

    We live in a culture that values speed in all things — instant payment, lightning-fast downloading and streaming, same-day free shipping, tap-post-click-swipe, and immediate gratification.

    When something doesn’t happen immediately, we often shrug and decide “it’s not meant to be” and give up. In our feverish pursuits, we forget what it takes to bring all our material possessions into being.

    Many years ago — out of necessity — I decided to embrace the capsule wardrobe philosophy because I was living my life out of a suitcase.

    Stuffing our closets with fast fashion isn’t just harmful to the planet, it’s a lot of work. Hence the emergence of the capsule wardrobe, the philosophy of paring down our clothes to a few key pieces that all work together. Forever.

    It works because most of us spend 90 per cent of our time wearing 10 per cent of our clothes.

    My approach isn’t perfect. I’m no saint nor immaculate in my purchases. But I strive to do better for myself and the world, in the best ways I know how, every day.

    This is how I sustainably curate the wardrobe of my dreams.

    1. I get clear on my style by developing a ‘style guide’ for myself for the season or year ahead. I have one mapped out in my Plannher. This gives me the vision and direction that I filter all my clothing investments through.
    2. I ‘shop my closet’ before I buy anything and only then make purchases based on ‘missing pieces’ that will carry me through many seasons. I don’t go shopping because I’m bored or lonely or feel like I should. I don’t go clothes shopping much at all, and when I do, I do it 90 per cent online.
    3. My favourite place to buy clothes is second-hand on Vinted. The way I find the perfect pieces is by knowing what brands I know and love and searching those brands by size from time to time to find those beautiful, essential investment pieces.
    4. The brands I search for the most include Doén, Christy Dawn, Spell & the Gypsy Collective, Sézane, Rouje, Tigerlily, Faithfull The Brand, Chasing Unicorns, Lack Of Color, Zadig & Voltaire, Reformation, Maurie & Eve, Loewe…
    5. My special, unique pieces and jewellery either come from local designers when I occasionally pass through their shops and pop-ups or from Etsy, where I know my purchase is directly supporting a maker. I don’t have a favourite Etsy shop but rather go in with a specific vision in mind and search until I can find someone who can make it for me. I recently had some beautiful gold handmade pieces made for my birthday by the lovely Ieva from Dzerve Jewellery here in Mallorca. I also had a couple of silk slips made by Tu Anh Nguyen from Lela Silk on Etsy.
    6. I buy active wear from Free People. Yes, I know that they are not the most sustainable brand. But the quality is good, I wear their pieces for years and the cuts suit me so at a pay-per-wear level they make the most sense for me
    7. Most of my underwear comes from French niche brands like Le Petit Trout, Ysé, Noo Paris and Icone. I love delicate, lacy bralettes and panties to give me a ‘put-together’ feel no matter what I’m wearing over the top. My girlfriends are often more excited about my lingerie than the rare man that gets to strip them off me.

     

    Buying and wearing clothes in a sustainable, conscious and intentional way has had a ripple effect across all of my life.

    It has taught me that the things we treasure hold more value, that being resourceful with what you have makes looking and feeling good now more important than waiting to look and feel good in the future when you have that coveted piece that you don’t need, and that not everything needs to be fast.

    Sometimes, the best things move slow.

  • I’ve never had a 1-night stand…

    despite my attempts. 3 times, I tried. Here are those (hilarious) stories… and also why I choose to be intimate with men in a very intentional way.

    When I was 29 I exited a long-term relationship with a very sweet man. Staying would have meant me settling, a sentiment that is unacceptable to me. Throughout the relationship, the sex was awful. He just… I won’t go into details but it was unsatisfying, to say the least.

    I was young, free and sexy and yearned for a sexual revolution to make up for four years of truly subordinate sex. What could be more experimental and liberating than a few innocent one-night stands?

    The first I met at a friend’s house party. He was the cousin of her housemate, a c list celebrity footballer (soccer) with a kind face and a hot body. The perfect candidate. As I left the party he asked for my number and asked me out on a date a few days later.

    The date started at lunch and extended into dinner then clubbing then my tiny studio apartment. He laid back on my bed as I slowly began to undress for him. By the time I made it down to my lacy panties, I’d straddled him, kissing, peeling his shirt off his back to reveal the body of an athlete.

    Minutes later he was sitting on the edge of the bed with his face in his hands. I don’t really know what happened but… he turned away from me with shame, and then ended up curling up on the bed with his back to me and falling asleep.

    I assume that for whatever reason, maybe he was overwhelmed or shy or felt insecure… he couldn’t get hard. He didn’t have the emotional maturity to handle that situation with much grace and it was an awkward goodbye in the morning. He still watches all my stories like a hawk 12 years later.

    The second was a friend of mine. A very tall handsome Belgian man. We had a very sincere and comedic conversation beforehand explicitly agreeing that we were attracted to one another and both just wanted sexual satisfaction and would remain friends afterwards. It was pragmatic and sweet.

    As he stood naked before me when the time came I gasped and recoiled. The size of his penis was… immeasurably enormous. It was the girth and length of one of my forearms. The thickest part of my forearm. I… I would have been like a pig on a spit skewered onto that thing. I was so terrified we didn’t even try. He was very cute about it and we cuddled while we slept instead.

    Life continued as normal.

    Months later I met and started seeing someone else who initiated my sexual revolution. The sex was so good nothing has quite measured up to it since. Even though I’ve enjoyed some pretty mind-blowing sex since.

    Our sexual connection brought a level of presence, bodily awareness and liberal experimentation into my life that blew open every cell in my body and changed me forever. We once subtly had sex against the hood of a car in a queue to get into a festival with thousands of people around us. He had a way of arousing parts of me that transcended the physical and even went beyond the psychological and emotional realm.

    It was then that I understood that sex is so much more than the surface-level rubbing up against each other that most people seem to be satisfied with. When done right, with full surrender and presence and devotion, it opens a realm untouchable by the day-to-day human experience.

    The romantic entanglement didn’t last, our lifestyles didn’t match each other, but we remain close friends to this day. My desire for trying to have a one-night stand evaporated. I discovered how much more satisfying a real, deep and meaningful connection is. Why would I want anything less?

    A few years later I was working at a festival in Costa Rica. I met this man on the first day, totally my type. Spiritual, blonde, surfer-dude, man-bun and all. We had instant chemistry and flirted throughout the festival sharing a few kisses and cuddles here and there. After the festival ended our paths parted. He returned to California, I continued my quest to southern parts of Central America. We casually stayed in touch.

    3 months later I moved to San Francisco for a change of scenery and because a friend of mine had asked me to dog-sit for him while he was in New York on an important legal case.

    Blonde man-bun got in touch and asked if we could meet up. He was coming to town to drive a friend to the airport in San Francisco. We met up at Mission Park and sat on the grass making out. Fully dressed, no other parts of our bodies touching aside from our lips at some point a bizarre whimper erupts from his throat. He follows it by pulling away with a look of humiliation and saying “You’re just so pretty.” I am confused. We both look down at his crotch and a recognition spreads across my mind. He’d just come. I giggle. Whatever, it’s no big deal. But he gets up awkwardly, walks to his truck, and drives away. I never see him again.

    I began to wonder if there was a reason that my attempts of casual sex were always intercepted. After telling her those three stories a friend recently gave me quantum healing on this topic just to make sure there weren’t any weird subterranean blocks in the way.

    The more intimate my relationship with myself, and in tune with my inner being I am the more I recognise that I am incredibly sensitive and these kismet hijacks of potential sexual interactions were protection.

    Something that I have felt and witnessed within myself, that no one seems to speak openly about, is the imprinting we receive from the men we are intimate with.

    When a man leaves his seed inside a woman he leaves parts of him — his DNA, his trauma, his healing — inside of you. He imprints his entire being and his nervous system into your body and being and you start to experience life through a filter that is yours intermingled with his.

    I know because, after each relationship, I often spend months clearing emotional and nervous system dysregulation that isn’t mine, but belonged to him. Yet it is inside my body requiring attention and emptying.

    The guy who had anxiety? I took on his anxiety and then had to clear it through my own body. The guy who had deep subconscious fears about being abandoned? I felt those fears as if they were my own and had to work through them.

    Our vagina and womb are deep receptacles. Through making love our hearts create bonds of feeling and attachment.

    I have an exceptionally feminine and receptive system so I feel all of this more intensely.

    Some women are more naturally impenetrable and resilient than others but many are feigning this, later on, finding how deeply impacted they have been by their engagements.

    Knowing this, I have become very discerning with whom I welcome inside me. I know that the connections that are made through sexual intimacy impact me physically, emotionally & spiritually.

    I have to feel safe that the person from whom I am receiving transmissions and imprinting is going to leave me with more gifts than losses. I need to walk away from all of my intimate allyships feeling like I have been cared for, loved and respected through to my bones.

    There’s a beauty in this.

    To choose who you want to be woven with.

    To know the power of sex.

  • “I think this could work”… he said, holding my body close, my long legs lazily tucked on either side of him.

    On the new moon in Gemini on Monday the 30th of May, after a long interlude, I resolved I was ready to open myself up to love again. I went on 4 dates across 4 weeks.

    And then…

    I stopped writing about dating.

    There’s a fine line between vulnerably sharing my heart and world with you, and carefully nurturing and protecting the beginnings of a delicate new connection.

    A mistake I have made and learned from is recklessly revealing too much too soon and hurting both the other person and myself in the process.

    After that first night, we meet several times more. At different beaches, at a festival, at cafes in town. Each time carefully peeling away at each other’s layers. There’s no risk greater than that of opening up your heart to another.

    Navigating and negotiating one another’s communication styles and expectations haven’t been entirely smooth and easy. Yet we both bring a willingness to listen and adjust.

    He echoes my fragility and vulnerability and strength. I’ve never experienced that in another before.

    On Saturday he comes to my apartment for the first time. He arrives feeling tense and stressed. He seems to have a habit of taking on too much, trying to be everything for everyone.

    We sit on my living room floor under the fan hiding from the hot Spanish sun. He rests his head on my knee and I stroke his back while he tells me about the things he’s trying to handle and how he’s feeling and I tell him about my recent trip away.

    We both go quiet for a while, a comfortable silence falls between us.

    He sits up and pulls me close for a hug. I feel myself melt into him and my body fully relax. “It’s amazing what a hug can do,” he says and finds my lips with his. I shift my body closer and we kiss for a while until he pulls me up onto his lap, my long legs lazily tucked on either side of him.

    Heart to heart. Face to face. We continue to kiss and gently rock together. He begins to open up, quietly, gently.

    “You said I was shy”…

    “I meant the way you communicate with me“

    “I am a shy man”

    “That’s sweet” I smile. “I thought that maybe you found me very scary”.

    “Not at all” he laughs. “I’m in a place in my life where I need to take things slow”.

    “Ok,” I softly reply. “I appreciate that. I think it’s what I need. It makes me feel safe”.

    “It’s more than just a physical thing. It’s more than just sex.”

    “Ok”

    “I think this could work.”

    I nod. I’ve felt it from the first moment.

    “Should we try”

    “I’d like that”

    “But we’ll go slow”

    “I’d like that even more”

    “I don’t usually do this you know” he gestures at the air between us.

    “Me neither. It happens very rarely” I respond. “But I picked you out that day.”

    “Was it my singing”? he grins.

    “You’re singing was alright” I tease rolling my eyes. He acts offended.

    “It was the way you felt” I continue.

    He nods.

    We kiss some more and say goodbye.

    This connection feels very sweet and tender. A deeper knowing and understanding hangs between us. And while it gently unfolds I will no longer be writing about it. Until it feels like it’s the right time.

  • there’s no rush

    He looks at me. “I don’t like this type of music.”

    “I can tell.” I smile. “Shall we go for a wander?”

    He nods, his long sun-burned surfer hair streaming out from under his wide-brimmed fedora. We walk away through the crowd shoulder to shoulder to another stage.

    The music is no better but we are away from our group of friends. For a moment it’s just the two of us. He holds me close. I pull away so I can see his face to I ask him what’s on my mind. “I feel like you are a little bit shy with me.”

    He fumbles with the statement, startled, starting several unfinished sentences. “Is it because I don’t throw myself on you?” he says.

    If you prefer, listen to the 6-minute audio recording of this story here.

    It’s not what I mean.

    I mean, in general. Whenever we are together he’s so shy and gentle and sensitive with me. But the music is too loud and I don’t want to explain myself by yelling. I look at him trying to read what he’s thinking/feeling/saying.

    He continues. “There’s no rush is there?” I shake my head.

    Suddenly, we both lean in at once, our lips press together, his tongue fast and eager in my mouth. Our first kiss, followed by another and another. He takes my hand and pulls me towards a tree for a little privacy and holds me close for a minute more.

    Instinctively, the moment has passed. We return to our group.

    I break away from him and collide with some girlfriends, 4 of us hand in hand. Together we squeeze ourselves to the front of the stage where Muse is playing.

    After their set we run to the next stage, losing one to an ex-boyfriend she’s still in love with. Three of us dance to Justice until 4 am swaying our hips, teasing the men around us with long glances under long eyelashes as if to say ‘come here but don’t dare touch me.’

    The festival ends. The taxi queue is a kilometre long and there are precisely 0 taxis. Two girls walk in our direction and we see car keys in one of their hands and quietly beg them for a lift home. They look at us and turn to each other to discuss between them and then nod. They are Italian — one a Ryan Air flight attendant the other a waitress — who have lived on our little island paradise since just two months.

    At my stop, I throw €5 euros over the seat to them and thank them profusely. They laugh and refuse. “We don’t need your fucking money!” “Please take it!” I beg. I cannot be more grateful to be home. After 3 nights, dancing a total of 50 kilometres, there’s nothing I want more than to lie horizontally in my own, familiar bed.

    It’s 5 am as I quickly shower to rinse off the night, dust and sweat and crawl between the comfort of my sheets. Instantly, I disappear into a deep coma made up of dreams and secret wishes.

    ☽

    I wake to an unfamiliar sensation. My cat, Danger Zone, has jumped onto the bed, but this instant feels different. I roll over, away from the wall and come face to face, with a soft, small, sweet little dove. Still warm yet very dead. Shocked out of my slumber I look at my phone. It’s 7 am. 2 hours have passed.

    At some point in those 2 hours, I must have opened the sliding door to the terrace for him to go out, but I don’t remember. For the first time in 3.5 years, he has killed a living creature and then brought it to me as a token of his love and devotion.

    But the timing…

    I get up and find a t-shirt in my dirty laundry basket to pick up that sweet little dead dove and transport it outside. Danger looks at me confused. He doesn’t understand why I’m not overjoyed by his gift. I lay the pigeon deep into a thicket of bushes to let nature takes its course and vacuum the little soft feathers scattered around from my cat’s deadly rampage.

    And then crawl back into bed, and sleep.

    ☽

    When I wake again, the sun is high in the sky, my lips parched and dry. I get up and slice some watermelon to relieve my dehydrated body from the 3-day dancing marathon I put it through and let my mind wander.

    I have never, in my entire life, met a man who wants to take his time. All of my experiences until now have been of men hurrying into physical and emotional intimacy with me as fast as possible. I have never met a man who has made it clear with his words that he likes me and wants to intentionally and purposefully draw out the process of getting to know one another. I start to wonder if perhaps it’s because I’ve never been with a man before.

    Maybe all the ones before were just boys.

  • sweet, sweet release

    My period is 7 days late and it is making me irate. I know it’s fine because I ovulated late and I assume I ovulated late because I had covid in my last cycle. This has thrown my 5-month record of ovulating on the new moon and bleeding on the full moon off which greatly displeases me. I was emotionally attached to this kismet multiplicity.

    The crescendo of hormones has been pulsing through my bloodstream for the past week. I feel like I’m slightly hallucinating from the cocktail of oestrogen and progesterone that are elbowing each other behind some imaginary door in my uterus desperate to get out.

    All I want is release.

    I have an intuitive idea. I google “enema after eating“. The first lines of the search are “Do not eat for at least 30 minutes before using the enema. Make sure you can get to a toilet easily. Find a comfortable place to lie down.”

    Great! I think and watch the final episode of ‘All I Know About Love’ to let the peach I ate earlier digest.

    I boil the kettle and get the at-home-colonic kit from my bathroom and light the candles because I might as well make this experience as romantic as possible and while there am distracted by the two hanging plants that are dying and decide I need to re-pot them into an outside planter and come back with fingers covered in soil. I laugh at myself and wash my hands and then pour some filtered water into the colonic bag followed by the hot water and then realise it’s still too hot so reach to get some ice cubes out of the freezer but see a shoot of water squirt out of the tube that I had forgotten to clamp and accidentally drop the entire icecube tray into the bag while trying to shut it off. I know I must seem ridiculous right now. This is why I like living alone. There’s no one around to judge. I like to be at peace in my maddest moments.

    I unravel my pilates mat and place it on the bathroom floor and two cushions for my head and strip down and then remember I need to lubricate the nozzle and rummage for the coconut oil under the sink.

    I think I’m ready so I lay down on my right side knees up and gently insert and slowly let the water in counting the seconds between release and clamping the flow until I’m ready to stop. I roll on my back knees up and hear the water making noises as it travels through my digestive tract. Good. Things are moving. Until I suddenly realise how uncomfortable I am. It’s really hot in here.

    I am committed to this cause so following the first toilet visit, dash through my apartment naked to get the fan from the living room and set it up by the bathroom door. Better.

    After two more rounds, I feel extraordinarily cured. My emotional emancipation is visceral with my intuition to thank for this eccentrically brilliant move. Minutes later I feel something and go to the bathroom and there she is. Those first few light red drops have landed. Finally. Sweet, sweet release.

  • closing the loops [a ritual]

    closing the loops [a ritual]

    closing the loops

    2021: Trial by fire.

     

    Today, I am closing the loops. An energetic loop is the container of something that began that needs to be closed. A calendar year, a relationship, a trauma cycle, a life. These are all energetic loops.

     

    2021 found me pulled under the current and tumbled in the backwash of a turbulent world that I had actively opted out of a long time ago. I held my breath and froze. I stopped dreaming dreams for myself this year.

     

    I pulled back this year. I sat back on my haunches and allowed the currents of the world to wash past me while I waited. I plucked at the thorns in my heart and planted wildflowers in terracotta pots on a balcony that was not my own. I watched them grow and loved them through the shortest summer and their even shorter lifetime.

     

    I was held afloat by the women in my life this year. Women who saw me and heard me when I felt I had nothing left in me. I hurt for a world that is unfamiliar to me and over and over I keep wondering if it had always been this way but I had not noticed while I was firmly living in a fairytale world of my own creation.

     

    I drove a Fiat across 4 countries this year and learned to parallel park on narrow winding streets that lead to stairs into the sea. I fell into an obtuse coma fuelled by loneliness and self-reflection and revisited childhood trauma after childhood trauma and grieved all the grief I had suppressed. I needed to feel it all, to heal it. I grieved my past hurts hoping to create space for the light to come in. But mostly, I waited, sitting back on my haunches, for the tide to change.

     

    Until today. Until today, when I decided I would not wait for someone or something else to close those loops for me. I have sovereign responsibility to myself and my life experience. This year has walked me through the fire and taught me energetic mastery. I know where the line of my fierce embodied discernment lies, where I am no longer available to participate in old patterns, and where my wholehearted “yes” lives.

     

    Energetics is the feeling of truth in our bones. It’s the energy that runs through each moment and reveals its core, its verity, the integrity of the current moment and those interacting in it. We work with energetics every day to witness, amplify, conceal, move through what is. More tangibly, energetics is the intersection of our patterns, learned beliefs, and choices. Energetic mastery is how we consciously choose to act on them. It’s our intentional vibe.

     

    When energy loops need to be closed, meaning, they are still open, we feel them leaking our energy leaving us feeling frustrated, tired, confused, foggy, avoidant, crazed, anxious, lethargic, ungrounded. I wonder if you want to close the loops with me too.

     

    Today we have an opportunity to consciously close out open energy loops that need to be closed out before we head into 2022. Today is a beautiful opportunity to kick off this upcoming year with intention, presence and self-love in the form of letting go of what’s ready to go.

     

    CLOSING THE LOOPS RITUAL

    — Take inventory of the open energetic loops in your life by writing down a list.

    — Determine which loop is the most exhausting/pressing/ scariest and begin there.

    — Address it. Either make peace with it, or have that hard conversation, or set that boundary (and keep it), or scream it out. Whatever you need to do to move it. Go through your list until you’re done.

    — Watch/feel/sense your inner energetics rearrange themselves. You may feel tired all of sudden and that’s ok. That’s the release. Rest is encouraged after this ritual is complete.

    — Burn your list or shred it up while setting the intention “I give permission for any old, stuck energy that no longer serves me to be released with absolute ease from my body while I rest/nap/sleep. Thank you, body.”

    — Enjoy the reset, rest, celebrate, feel liberated.

     

  • my summer 2021 ‘best of’ reading list

    my summer 2021 ‘best of’ reading list

    my summer 2021 'best of' reading list

     

    In Spring I promised myself: less technology, more books. I love reading, I can inhale words like a hungry caterpillar and delightedly find myself on adventures conjured up by creative minds with glee. So I cancelled my Netflix membership and browsed my rolling list of book recommendations to indulge myself with a Book Depository book-buying spree. Et voila: here’s my summer 2021 ‘best of’ reading list:

     

    Circe

    Give me a daughter of Poseidon, one of the most beautiful nymphs in the sea, turn her into a witch on a deserted island and have her make love with the hottest of Greek Gods and turn men into pigs and you have got my heart. I feel such an affinity with this story, and beyond that, the emphatically magical storytelling of Madeleine Miller. I ended up thinking in her poetic prose for days after the book ended and I just wanted more. One of my intentions of this summer of reading was to find writers who really know how to use words to evoke depth and emotion so I may learn from them and anything Madeleine Miller delivers.

     

    The Song of Achilles

    So much so I also read this one by her which is equally as mesmerising and fascinating because in this retold story Achilles is gay (and not a rapist of women) and in love with a very humble, quiet, lowly man expanding my horizons of all the ways that love can be experienced, felt and seen. All the ancient mythical innuendos captivate my imagination.

     

    The Vanishing Half

    As a very European white woman, I can’t imagine what it might feel like to be judged by the colour of my skin the way that many people are, so when The Vanishing Half was recommended to me I devoured it. A fictional story about two twins, black, who choose different life paths and how the colour of their skin and life choices affect their overall happiness and experiences leaving me with a fascination with how we all sometimes try to be someone or something we are not. And how sometimes we gain something from it, and sometimes we lose ourselves in this effort to reinvent ourselves.

     

    The Chronology of Water

    I can’t stop thinking about this book… It’s an autobiography but challenges and breaks all writing rules and at times touches on topics that are really hard to read: rape, child abuse, drug addiction, but with the fluid finesse on someone who has felt deeply and reflected on the gifts of these hardships with ingenuity. If you want to expand your ability to feel big hard and beautiful feelings and read unconventional hard-hitting stunning writing, you need to read this book. I loved it. I am going to read it again. Soon.

     

    Leave The World Behind

    Something that people are often surprised by is the fact that I love science fiction. Essentially my dream life is a science fiction period drama. Leave The World Behind is another book addressing modern topics: race, emotion, class, belief systems wrapped up in a science fiction plot that is utterly compelling. Nothing actually happens in the book except for a strange loud noise and some human speculation but I was terrified (in a really satisfying way) about 99% of the time.

     

    The Lathe of Heaven

    Ursula Le Guin is the most fascinating author… the way her imagination and brain works completely fascinates me and this story is the best blend of science fiction, romance, psychology and post-apocalyptic possibilities I’ve ever read. Essentially it’s about a man who changes the world when he dreams and his psychologist, who tries to use his clients power for seeming good but in effect evil. I don’t want to divulge too much but rcommend it if you enjoy intricate, mind-bending, dream-based literature.

     

    Awakening Fertility

    While I don’t have ‘getting pregnant’ forecasted, I am wholly committed to overall health which includes hormonal and fertility. I want my body humming at its highest best capacity at all times and having dealt with some hormonal issues in the past I wanted to learn about what would be recommended to someone who was considering making a baby inside their body. Awakening Fertility is a beautifully put together book accessing and compiling ancient wisdom from across cultures to apply to our modern world. It’s easy to read and has just the right amount of depth with a nod towards psychology and spirituality and how our beliefs and emotions shape our health as much as foods and physical practices

     

    Sand Talk

    I’m leaving the best to last… My friends started rolling their eyes every time I referenced Sand Talk as I did so so so often, so much so it even inspired this piece of poetry. It’s one of the most profound books I have ever read and when I say read, I mean read read… going over pages and paragraphs over and over again to melt them into my bones. Written by an Australian aboriginal university professor on how indigenous thinking can save the world he ushers ideas that I feel are keenly familiar but absolutely ambiguous in the modern world as I know it. I don’t want to give you any expectations because I want it to grasp you by the heart the way it did me and show you another way of living: the new way. Also, the writing style is non-linear which make my brain feel like “finally!, you write/speak in the way I think/feel!!!’ — this book should be required reading for every human being. Please, read it. And then let’s talk about it and apply it.

     

    Currently in the middle of:

     

     

    On my bookshelf to read next:

  • moving on

    moving on

    moving on

    ☽
    January

    Most mornings I wake to an aching heart. I place a hand sometimes both, over my heart and remind myself that I am love, that there is limitless love around me, that I am not alone. I’m not even sure anymore what I am mourning but there’s an unbounded deep sadness in me. I just want it to end. I feel fragile, vulnerable and sensitive, there’s a cynicism creeping in and I resent it. I want my innocence back.

     

    I spend the weekends in London with one of my best friends. Her company and way of being are soul-and-heart soothing. I feel so safe and content when I am with her. She has recently gone through her own kind of heartbreak. We are healing side by side. I am so grateful for her.

     

    There are fine lines collecting under my eyes and a frown that is becoming more permanent and I refuse to buy into the idea of ageing. I know I can rewire any belief system and I recommit to my own vibrancy and wellbeing. I ask my intuition what I need and devote myself to it. She says: Vitamin C, Zinc, Vitamin D, exercise every day, vegetables, eating light, passion, creativity, relaxation, harmonious relationships, honouring what I want and need. Most of those things I’m already doing. I start putting Castor oil packs on my liver and reproductive system in the evening and see so much shift and move out of me. A gorgeous Russian woman teaches me face massage and I learn face yoga and begin sucking on little sachets of Vitamin C. Feeling good is my priority.

     

    My relationship with myself changes. Perhaps I have never loved myself in this way before. There is a nuanced subtlety to it. A sensitivity and honesty that is new. The heavy heart, sadness and grief start to melt away and are replaced with anger, disappointment and confusion. I want it all to go away but I hold it close knowing that the only way out is through. Every now and then it overwhelms me and I weep. Big, ugly, noisy sobs shake my entire body until everything inside me feels loose.

     

    One morning I eat a warm croissant and four tiny blue-veined mushrooms and spend the day drifting through a myriad of realities asking each one to bring back to wholeness what has been lost. I scribble endless pages in my journal and draw a card that tells me to restore greater harmony to our Earth. I have nothing to give but my words, I think and hope that this is enough as I write poems and stories and feelings that are meant to soothe and calm and soften the gaze inwards. I walk beside the English Channel over the pebbles until the sun slips behind the clouds transforming the day’s warmth into biting cold. I am restored.

     

    ☽
    February

    There is an unexpected softness to the beginning of this month. My work feels inspired, fulfilling, joyful. I film and present a free 28 Day Journaling Challenge and receive the sweetest notes from women who feel held and carried through this practice. I develop a new program called HER WAY and sense that it is one of the best things I have ever created. I go to the farmers market every Friday and take time to touch, smell and choose local, organic produce for the week ahead. My body craves movement like never before and I blend pilates with yoga or running every day depending on what I am drawn to. I feel balanced, vibrant, satisfied. I make a new friend but crave community in the form of a village. I am excited and scared because I can feel myself embarking on a whole new way of living. It is unfolding before me even though I cannot yet make sense of it.

     

    It is as if I have to be broken in order to become new again. I am creating a new perspective on what my reality looks like. It all takes longer in the physical world — like wading through molasses — than it does as the lighting-fast synapses activate these transformations that occur in my mind. The old ideas and paradigms around what formulates a happy, successful life are falling away and something new is revealing itself. I am left with a sense of curiosity and wonder and an imbued knowing that I can only give all of myself from a place of fullness and wholeness. I want to speak to this more but it requires a page of its own. I am awakening from tight bud to blossom, from maiden to mother, from immature girl to emboldened woman. At almost 40, I realise I have always been a little behind my time…

     

    One of my lessons this month is that I am equally as eager to be loved as everyone else. The human in me sometimes neglects my integrity by way of my yearning for deep intimate love and connection. I wonder if I am a love addict. Then I wonder if it’s helpful to label it this way. I make a pact not to throw myself into love as easily next time.

     

    The test comes soon after. My new friend begins to demands an unrequited intimacy from me that I do not feel. His approach is gentle and hopeful but skillless and artless and leaves me reeling. I want to find a way to maintain the friendship and connection without the promise for more but fail and hurt him with my refusal and lack of reciprocation but fail. Formerly, I would have let myself be swept away into the romance of it all but this time I stand steadfast and centred in my knowing that the love I truly want is spectacular, and not mediocre.

     

    ☽
    March

    90 women join me for an emblazoned month-long journey in HER WAY. 90 women that formed the most powerful alliance, supporting, uplifting, cheering one another on and created a fertile yet safe space for growth, vulnerability and expansion. Very quickly it was apparent that, when given a chance, women will rise most profoundly through alliance and collaboration. Each olive call left me more exhilarated than the last and I thought this, this is it. I can create the community I am yearning for. As we nudge towards the end of our month together I started receiving emails and messages from them. “I’ve never been in a group before where I’ve felt this kind of energy from the group. I’ve been in other group programs and they have been nothing in comparison to this energy that I felt from HER WAY.”  “I’ve never felt so uplifted and supported before in my life! More, please!“. “I miss meeting with everyone every week already! Can we do it again?” “Can we keep this going?” I  start wondering if we could find a way to create an even more intimate space for women to grow, develop and rise within their businesses. HER WAY.  I listen to what is asked for: smaller groups, more 1:1 time, more support and guidance, more intimacy. And so the HER WAY — 7-Month Women’s Business Cocoon is born.

     

    My days a full and fluid and lighter than those of the months before. I find pockets of joy in everyday things and reasons to smile and celebrate. Then suddenly things take a turn and the gods initiate a whirlpool in my little corner of the universe. Within 48 hours, I receive an actual letter (via email attachment) from my mama after not hearing from her for 6 years, a lover from the past asks me to come to Mexico, the love of my life ex (whom I thought was dead) finds me on Facebook and informs me that he has been released from prison and really needs to talk and I am left questioning the meaning of my existence. A calm seeps over me when I realise it’s all part of the closing of cycles, making space for the new way that is unfolding in my life, and I relax into the chaos of human life again.

     

    ☽
    April

    My body always wakes before my mind does… I notice it start to slowly extend an ankle, a toe, palm out. I stretch and remind myself to take my temperature before I move much more and then sit to pull the blinds up. The morning light is hazy outside even past 8 o’clock. I lean my pillows up against the wall and read about Circe the Greek goddess, sorceress and witch. It’s Sunday. I don’t have to do anything. Hours later with several trips to the kitchen for water, coffee, tea my limbs feel restless. I feel restless in my life and in my body. A year of confinement to a small corner of the world is unfamiliar to me. I keep remembering that I chose this. That it’s good for me. That it has already taught me so much. And this too will pass. It’s the last day of lockdown in the U.K. and I will myself to go outside. I pull on leggings and layers, Spring has not warmed this part of the world enough yet, and tie the laces on my trainers. No headphones, I want to hear the world today. I walk to the sea and turn left. Past crowds of people in their Sunday best and worst, past a cute skater girl in baggy jeans and a tie-dye t-shirt, past a dozen fish and chip stands, past new outdoor seating and eating spaces prepared for the new world that begins tomorrow. The seafront feels like the day before a festival, the carousel being tested and repaired, the restaurants offering tents set up with carpets to provide outdoor dining options. I walk until my legs start to ache and the walkway runs out at a hidden car park filled with mobile homes and caravans and gypsy girls in long skirts eating from metal plates sitting on the black asphalt. They remind me of a decade past when I used to live like them and give me heady nostalgia for a life filled with freedom a few cares beyond the next meal and the next place to sleep. Here, I smile at them and wave, I spin around to return to the new life I call my own right now. I wonder what will happen next, I think to myself.

     

  • 9 books I read (+ loved) during lockdown 1.0

    9 books I read (+ loved) during lockdown 1.0
     
    When I was a little girl I used to voraciously devour books as fast as I could, losing myself in their fantasy worlds to escape the seeming mundanity of my own. I couldn’t wait to become a grown-up so I could read all the books in the world. Over the years my reading changed from fantastical to educational and I rarely let myself loose myself in the inspired world of an imaginary land. And then 2020 happened, the country I lived in went into lockdown for 3 months, and I suddenly had long stretches of time to immerse myself in any genre of reading that warmed my heart. These are the 9 books that allowed me to traverse universes and inquiry beyond the 4 walls of my little seaside flat.
     
     
    NORMAL PEOPLE
    Normal People has been lavished with praise from critics, longlisted for the Man Booker prize and turned into a television series that I inhaled weeks after reading the book. Sally Rooney writes with such precision that leaves you feeling raw, touched, vulnerable, seen and slightly uncomfortable all at the same time. A tale of a modern-day romance with all the awkwardness and confusion and sensitivity of two people willing to share their hearts with one another. I love the way that the entire novel runs in a fluid way with no quotation marks when characters speak so you have to use your own judgement between their thoughts and the words that are spoken out loud. I personally loved and could fully relate.
     
     
    THE MOON SISTER
    There’s this dreamy, ethereal quality to The Moon Sister that completely captivated me. In some ways, I felt like Lucinda Riley was writing my own story and history. Adopted by one man – Pa Salt – and raised together as sisters, each book focuses on one of the girls as they discover their ancestry and what part of the world they came from. The Moon Sister is Tiggy’s story. You’ll go from Geneva to Scotland to Spain with Tiggy as she discovers her heritage. It’s a very light and playful read that offers true escapism.
     
     
    WHERE THE CRAWDADS SING
    I think this is the best fiction book I’ve picked up due to raving recommendations and read in years, so much so I sent a copy of it to my best friend who doesn’t read much but devoured Where The Crawdads Sing. It was the first few pages, where my heart falls in love with that little 4-year-old, abandoned by her mother as she walks down that dusty road, that captured me. I had to know what happens to that little girl. She of course turns into a beautiful woman, entirely led by and in tune with the natural world around her, astounding in her astuteness who falls in love with the boy who taught her to read. And then… unexpectedly ends up on trial for murder. I wish I could unread it and read it again. It’s that good.
     
     
    MAN’S SEARCH FOR MEANING
    I had been meaning to read Man’s Search For Meaning to learn and understand trauma and how we navigate severe trials in life from a psychological perspective for a while and then decided it was the perfect audiobook to accompany me on my lengthy pandemic-inspired walks during the lockdown. It was better than I expected. The personal story of Victor Frankl is completely captivating as is the observational and almost detached perspective he tells it from narrating descriptions of life in Nazi death camps and giving lessons for spiritual survival. It turns out that the desire we all have to give things meaning is precisely what allows us to survive and even thrive our way out of tragic experiences. If you enjoy really good storytelling, combined with psychology, spirituality and human behaviour it’s such a valuable insight into actively choosing your own perspective and meaning in life.
     
     
    THE MAGDALENE MANUSCRIPT
    I’ve mentioned The Magdalene Manuscript previously in this voice note I recorded on sacred sex etc… and with all this extra time on my hands decided to revisit it. Reading the story of Magdalene from the perspective of her being a high priestess who offered men an opportunity to activate and connect with their own spiritual depth through sexual intimacy while I myself was exploring those aspects of myself felt profound. It’s one of those books that must call to you and draw you in but if you feel it’s for you, it has treasures, wisdom and insights beyond any I’ve found in more conventional books on sex, intimacy and the spiritual depths we can reach in union with another.
     
     
    THE BODY KEEPS THE SCORE
    I love The Body Keeps The Score because it affirms so many of my own experiences, observations with clients and hunches yet I’ve never completed reading it so I started again this year. I must confess, I still haven’t finished it (still) but some books, like this one, you are meant to taste, savour and integrate slowly. The subject of embodied trauma and how we can heal it carries tremendous amounts of depth and can be triggering for all of us, so it takes time to move through the molasses of emotions and responses to rise up in response to this smart, inclusive and well-researched body of work.
     
     
    THE POWER OF NOW
    I first picked up this book when I was 24, over 10 years ago, when I was going through an inner transformation and awakening that I thought no one could understand. Until I read The Power Of Now and everything finally made sense. Reading it again during lockdown felt like slipping into a warm, comfortable bath and offered me a contrasting insight into the woman I was when I first read the book and how I have grown and gained self-confidence in my inner wisdom since. A practical handbook to living a spiritual life deeply seated in the present moment, with truly simple guidelines I think this should be required reading for anyone wanting to access and anchor themselves in the now.
     
     
    CITY OF GIRLS
    Another audiobook designated for long walks along the sea or up into the hills of Brighton’s hinterland I literally couldn’t get enough. “Life is both fleeting and dangerous, and there is no point in denying yourself pleasure, or being anything other than what you are.” City Of Girls is told via 95-year-old Vivian’s life story. She says she is good at two things in life and that’s sex and sewing. The rest is a colourful life in New York filled with all the adventures a young woman can muster amid showgirls and theatre personalities. The audiobook narrator Blair Brown is incredible in her ability to do all the voices and personalities. I would listen to it again on a long road trip as it is light enough to leave you feeling carefree with enough detail to captivate.
     
     
    OPEN BOOK
    While I have never been a fan of Jessica Simpson I was certainly curious what she could possibly write about her life in a way that would have my good friend and incredible journalist Rosie, recommend it to me. Open Book turns out to be an endearingly vulnerable memoir about the challenges of life, family, fame, beauty and body image, and everything else you can imagine a woman in her position experiencing. I expected to endure it but actually loved it and laughed out loud many times as I listened to her narrate her story on Audible.
     
     
    Plus 3 books I read or tried to read but couldn’t: Dune which is coming out as a film (thank the gods) later this year because even though I love science fiction, this was really, really hard to get through even the first 100 pages so I gave up, The Signature Of All Things that I feel like should have been good because Elizabeth Gilbert is a genius but was painful and I just couldn’t relate to an old, ugly virgin and Untamed that I bought upon a recommendation from a friend but feel repelled by every time I pick it up so haven’t even read the first page of it.
     
     
    Photo: Nadia Meli

  • It’s been 6 years since I spoke to my mama.

    It's been 6 years since I spoke to my mama.
     
    “Happy Birthday” read the subject line. I clicked on the email. The same two words were repeated in the body. “Happy Birthday”. Nothing else. It stung more than if there had been no email.
     
    It’s been 6 years since I spoke to my mama. Every September I remember.
     
    I love my mama. Every time I think of her which continues to be often, I send her love and wish her peace. I truly hope she finds peace. I also believe that she loves me. And that she has always done her very best. My mama has an undiagnosed and untreated range of mental illnesses. Her actions are steeped in trauma and wounding. And she has been unwilling to ask for or to receive help.
     
    She was young, 21, when she had me. Crazily in love with a short, cocky Italian fuckboy (hi, papa, love you :) she wanted to have his baby. So she did. He didn’t care. He told her so. She did it anyway.
     
    One of my earliest memories is toddling in line while a soft, round Spanish woman ladled milky porridge into bowls and asking for mas azucar (more sugar). She laughed at me with sweetness and warmth and gave me more. I must have been around 18 months. We were living in Tenerife on the Canary Islands and I spent the evening hours in night-care while my mama sold roses to the tourists and my papa sold weed.
     
    My next earliest memory is in a small apartment in Salzburg, Austria, my birthplace. I want my mama to play with my big, blue 80’s style rotary dial telephone with me. But she’s crying. She’s always crying. She doesn’t have time for me because she’s too sad.
     
    Looking back I realise that she most likely had anxiety and depression for as long as I remember. She was always stressed, anxious, worried, crying. I imagine she didn’t have enough support or help and she was scared.
     
    When I was 6 she married a man 25 years her senior. I think she married him for safety and security. He verbally and emotionally abused me for the entirety of their 8-year marriage. In all the classic ways: constant insults and attempts to humiliate me, frequently being yelled and screamed at, blamed and made for feel guilty for everything, acting ‘nice’ in front of others but then saying the most hateful things to me as soon as their backs were turned.
     
    She did nothing to stop it. “I did it to protect you!” she said. Silence is compliance, I say. During that time she bore two more children and suffered a mental breakdown I’m not sure she ever truly recovered from.
     
    I forgave her. She was doing the best she could. Plus, she’s my mama.
     
    But then, I recognised something else.
     
    The abuse didn’t stop. It just changed hands. There were erratic mood swings and strange, inconsistent behaviour. There were days where she was so loving and kind. She really wanted to be a good mother. There were days where hate and anger poured out of her she would palpably vibrate with it. It was like something evil possessed her.
     
    My world when I was with her was so confusing. She didn’t make any sense. I never knew what mood I would find her in or how she would react to the simplest things. Any question might set off a day of hostility or violent words for no clear reason. I had to tiptoe around her and her ever-changing moods, never safe, always with a constant sense of threat.
     
    I accepted it all. It was all I knew. I thought it was normal. It took me years to unlearn the persistent tension in my body from the sounds of voices yelling, car doors closing with a bang, hard angry footsteps, or any footsteps, walking towards my room.
     
    I stayed with friends and family often and then left home as soon as possible. The first time I was 16. But I kept coming back.
     
    Like an addict seeking that next hit. I returned over and over again thinking that if only I was good enough, if only I loved her enough, if only I could do what she wanted, maybe I could help her. If I was better, things would be better. Maybe we could have the kind of relationship I had always wanted.
     
    Across the next 17 years, I came back and tried to heal our relationship many times. The last time was 6 years ago.
     
    It was 2014, I was in the first year of my business and struggling financially as I invested all of myself in making this infantile dream real. I had grown so much, I thought. If I stayed centred in my heart and open and loved her through all her ups and downs maybe things would change. I also needed a place to stay for a few months.
     
    They didn’t.
     
    We had a few ignorantly blissful days, to begin with. The magic 3 days, I called them. It was always good for up to 3 days. And then it was not.
     
    I tried to stay open. I wanted to be good. I had forgiven her so many times already. I just wanted to love her. But as the days and weeks passed and violent, aggressive words sprayed out of her mouth I shut down. My heart hardened. I stopped speaking openly. I never reacted. I just became silent, as I always did. It was not safe. Silence is my sanctuary.
     
    A long time ago I learned a very effective coping mechanism: forgetfulness. I can’t remember everything that happened. I wrote all the stories in my journal. So I would remember. But I burned that journal as I always have with my others. What I do remember are tiny snippets.
     
    I remember standing in the kitchen leaning on one leg with my left hand on my left hip. She suddenly turned and screamed at me that my stance was an attack on her. I remember being bewildered and sad and turning away.
     
    I remember her creeping past my door listening to my telephone conversations and then bitterly accusing me of calling her a bitch to my friends on my phone calls. I never spoke of her to my friends. I was too embarrassed to tell them about her. She must have misheard me.
     
    I remember her neighbours looking at me with pity when they learned that I was her daughter. I wondered what they said or knew about her.
     
    I remember sometimes watching her scream at me for unexplained reasons and seeing something that looked like the ugly skull of a demon extend out of her face as she poured her rage out at me. I don’t know if it was real or if it was a way that my subconscious tried to make sense of something that didn’t.
     
    And then one day, I gave up.
     
    After 3 days of helping her landscape her garden she screamed at me when I didn’t help her cut down branches from some trees that belonged to the local council land appending her lawn.
     
    “No matter what you say or do, I will always love you,” I said. “But you can’t treat me like this.” She muttered something violently with hostility on her face. I turned, packed my bag, and left. That was September 6 years ago. We haven’t spoken since.
     
    I promised myself that that was the last time. I couldn’t keep repeating the pattern. It was insanity to keep trying. I had to stop. I had to let go.
     
    It took me 2 years to grieve the end of my relationship with my mama and countless hours across a wide range of modalities to heal. I had to learn how to reparent myself. I had to learn how to have healthy boundaries. I had to learn to feel safe.
     
    When I first started going to therapy in my early 20’s while studying for my psychology degree the therapist told me that sometimes people have children to try and meet their own needs for love, and make that child responsible for their sense of meaning and purpose. I never forgot that statement.
     
    Every year she sends me an email for my birthday. “Happy birthday” it reads. Nothing else.