Locked in

Prisons are not places that people usually choose to go to. However, some people who have relative freedom can find themselves locked into certain prisons.

I have discovered that there are situations where fear can imprison you and you remain as securely isolated as if you were being prevented from escaping by bars, locked doors and armed guards in surveillance towers.

Poverty is also a way of efficiently preventing people from moving from their current situations. Some circumstances can be altered by sheer will power, others may need more assistance.

If there is a way out of incarceration I’m always going to take it. I will make my own escape plan and  - if the opportunity arises – I will work with others to leave the cells of destruction, but I will not remain locked in - it’s not healthy.

Holding back

Some conversations you want to end quickly, others you don’t want to end because it feels like you are talking to yourself, outside of yourself.

Last week I had the opposite type of contact; I wouldn’t really call it a conversation because it does not warrant that label. At the time I wrote down something like this, “Conversations with friends should not feel like entering a trap.” I felt like I was editing my thoughts before I spoke them.

Now I look back, after better conversations, and I remember that when you are comfortable with someone you never feel like saying anything is dangerous.

So you don’t hold back. You share, and they listen because they care. They share, and you listen for the same reason.

There is no holding back with true friendship. The edit button becomes dusty through lack of use.

Belief precedes experience

When I happened upon that sentence in a book recently it really made me stop and think. And think ... and think!

If you believe this assertion then it logically follows that every single thing we experience is evaluated by what we already believe. This judgement can include ideas about yourself that you may or may not like. If we have been taught to believe something about our intrinsic being then all events that follow and impact on that are viewed through the belief system that we adhere to: belief really does precedes experience.

I look at some people and wonder how they can behave so differently (to me) in their lives and then I realise that the fundamental truth is that they hold a different set of beliefs to me, and their lives and experiences radiate from that central belief at their core – as does mine; we just exist on separate forks of the road which we have decided was best for us individually.

The more I thought about this statement the more I came to the same conclusion.

As an individual each one of us may have single-handedly created our own belief system or we may have plugged into another, wider set of beliefs, either way if our experiences are consistently causing us trauma and distress we need to either change our behaviour or our beliefs. I can’t see any other way.

If we choose to persist in a state of ‘resistance living’ then it is like we are permanently in a gym environment using the long-life high quality durable resistance bands (that are designed to exist perpetually) as we use our bodies to fight against the weights we have chosen to pull against. With resistance training and resistance living the tension is constant – and anyone can take part at any time. It’s all based on belief.

Our impressions of ourselves are informed by our beliefs.

Our experience of our existence is founded on our beliefs.

If the resistance living is causing too much distress we can choose to change the tools we use, we can change the belief systems that we live by. Thus doing will alter the impressions we have of ourselves and each other.

“Judgements are what cause experience to be painful.”

Harry Palmer

Clutter free?

My personal 'how to de-clutter in easy steps' guide:

Decide to redecorate the space you want to clear out.

Move everything out into another area that you use.

Paint the room or area in question.

Look at the new space with fresh eyes.

Look at the piled up items with fresh eyes.

Put the essential items back into the room.

Donate or throw away the other things – because they are in a space that you use and now ruin the energy flow of that room.

When my brother was in the army he would de-clutter his home whenever he was on leave – he still uses the same system every year. His saying was that if you haven’t used it for three months then you don’t need it - I like this philosophy and I may well be using it in the near future (this does not of course apply to ANY of my books).

I keep reading articles about de-cluttering but the thing I remember most is how my brother used to clear out his home of excessive items. One thing that he said made me cringe – although it did prove a point – he said he used to give away items that his wife and children had stored in the loft when they had remained untouched for several months. His reasoning was that if it wasn’t used then it wasn’t needed – at least not by them.

Harsh? Maybe, but it seemed to work. He mentioned that only once did someone want something he had discarded and then he was quite willing to pay for a replacement for them. I’m wondering how my child will react if I take on this method of house clearance. Watch this space ...

That is a future concern but right now what I have found - as I am in the middle of this process - is that I am being confronted by things that in the past I said that I would use, deal with, sort or ... something else (meaning I didn’t want to throw it away at the time). Now I have redecorated and I realise that I have held on to things that I don’t particularly like or want. They were just there, and like a bad habit, I got used to them.

Now I am looking at things with fresh eyes, I can see that they do not fit in with my new point of view. Tonight I have a pile of things that I have to sort out in a fixed time frame or I will throw them away.

I like this de-cluttering. I hope it lasts.

I guess it will if I want it to, if I make it my new habit.

Hands Free

When I left home today I realised that I didn’t have my mobile phone with me. For a few seconds I thought about going back for it but then I just couldn’t be bothered. So I went on my way.

Quite soon after than I was so busy enjoying my day out that I forgot that I didn’t have the phone. When I was first aware that I didn’t have it I remembered that there was a time (way back in the 90’s!) when I used to go everywhere without a mobile phone.

I soon got used to a different way of being. I wasn’t checking my phone every few minutes – ostensibly for the time, but also for messages, and I was truly present in the day I was living. It was refreshing and I felt a strange kind of freedom as well.

This has all come back to me because I’ve only just remembered my phone now, after the whole day has passed away into oblivion. And I must say, it was really great to spend a day totally ‘hands free’.

Weighty issues

My body weight has altered drastically several times in my lifetime.

In my younger days I was extremely physically fit and well toned – I was a sprinter and held the county record for the 100 metres – and since then I have verged from normal weight for my height to very obese, several times.

I decided to at last acknowledge why I ballooned and shrunk with regularity. I decided, yesterday, to tell myself the truth and stop hiding behind the ‘I don’t know’ response or the ‘It’s something medical’ answer that seemed to satisfy most queries.

I know, as I have always known, I guess, that the reason why I changed weight so dramatically was because I needed to be in control of something.

This something was my body.

This something was the amount of food I ate.

This something was how I looked.

This something reflected how I felt on the inside.

I wanted to be unattractive to people because I was unattractive to myself.

I didn’t want to be noticed because of looking good and accomplishing things.

I wanted to disappear.

I wanted my pain to disappear with me.

I could eat in secret.

I was the only one who knew about the extra packets of biscuits and bars of chocolate.

I was the only one who knew about the clandestine visits to the fast food places.

I was the only one who knew how much I disliked myself.

I was trying to destroy myself – because I needed to… or so I thought at the time.

Then … way back then. I didn’t know how to love myself.

Way back then, I didn’t think it was ok to love myself.

Way back then, I was afraid of being myself.

Way back then, I did bad things to myself – through food.

Way back then, I detested all that I was. I lived my life in a daze of food fixes and increasing sadness.

Sometimes I lost weight but then I would slip into the trap of self-loathing and consume too much knowing that I was doing nothing to shift the excess. I was not surprised when my clothes became too tight.

I ignored it and pretended that I didn’t notice.

It was another excuse to slip into depression and withdraw from people.

I was taking back control that I had lost. I was choosing, even though the choices were hurting me most of all.

Before, when I had no love or compassion for myself I allowed myself to do bad things to myself

I didn’t look at myself in the mirror – not really look, for years.

Now when I look in the mirror I see the light and love – for myself – in my own eyes.

Now I try to maintain a healthy weight because it matters, because I matter to myself, because I love myself.

Now I love all that I am, and all that I am becoming.

Now I am free to be me.

Now, right now, I am important to myself … and it feels good.

What weighty issues I have been carrying for too many years.

I have purged myself at last.