Protective Factors

Most people have an intrinsic desire to live. They have factors in their lives that protect them against taking unnecessary risks and ending up in dangerous situations.

Other people, sadly, are devoid of the protective factors in their lives that guard them against negative acts to themselves or others. This is usually the case when relationships break down, when beliefs about relationships are questioned and the social bonds that hold us together are difficult to hold on to.

This is not just some random anthropological or social theory, this is a reality – to me, and to many others.

When I was decades younger I thought I was always to be denied regular involvement in special peoples’ lives. I believed that routine bonds and relationships were never meant for me. The continuous denial of my reality caused me to seriously think about a negative action in my life.

It wasn’t helped at all by the fact that in my family keeping secrets and denying the truth were regular behaviours. I felt excluded, and I quickly realised that the bond that kept others together, was not part of my makeup.

All the protective factors that I saw easily glide into others’ lives seemed like a rocket ride to the moon far away for me – impossible. Their positives became my living negatives; it really hurt. It was a period of intense anxiety as my personal identity was realised.

As I became more isolated from meaningful family relationships my sense of crisis was deepened. I went undercover in my ownfamily.

While others did not seem at all bothered by the obvious secret, to me it became almost too heavy to bear. I was sorely tempted to throw it off the top of a local hill – without a parachute.

Somehow I found my own social bonds that have become vital protective factors in my life. For these I am eternally grateful. What others may slip into easily, like a birthright, I had to struggle to reach but now it fits like a hand-made glove.

I have relationships that have altered my perspective and given me a deep sense of social meaning and focus. I have my own protective factors in my life and I am bouncing with well-being and happiness.

There’s something wrong ...

Have you ever noticed that sometimes things look or feel great when you’ve just done them but after a while some uncertainty begins to surface?

Well, I have been painting the house for a while and as time has passed I have found out that I’ve missed bits. Now something else has come to light. Literally.

This concerns a door. The inside of this particular door is not frequently seen as it is not often closed but when my eyes lit upon it on one of the rare bright afternoons I instantly developed a hint of a frown.

I decided to ignore what I had seen but as I am not the only one in the house it was soon brought to my attention by my son.

“There’s something wrong with the door,” she said casually.

“I know.” I sighed.

“Why’s it like that?” M asked.

“The paint I used wasn’t right,” I conceded.

“Oh. OK.”

“It doesn’t look nice,” he continued.

“I know. I’ll fix it soon,” I answered.

“Good. Then it’ll look nice like the rest of the painting!”

When I had picked up the can of paint it had brightly announced that it was a one-coat brilliant white paint for all wood and metal surfaces. So I had just used it in good faith ... just as I had many years before. And this is where the problem stemmed from.

The paint was white when I dipped the brush in the paint tin, it was white when it first went on the door but after a few weeks it started to fade and turned a strange shade of sickness, it was a streaky creamy colour and the previous white colour was peeping through this top layer of discolouration.

The paint I chose to use was old. It wasn’t right for this use. So I had to buy new paint for that door, other doors and radiators.

Now they are all white because I eventually used something that was fit for the right purpose and will not just be a temporary facade.

Squirrels are out and about

Cleaning up is part of everyday life. However, when the spring arrives I notice that there is an ongoing tendency to do more cleaning than usual. Maybe we are a bit like squirrels that have slowed down our activity through the winter so we have to do a big clean up.

Consequently as I was going through cupboards the other day I discovered a baking tin that I had avoided using for a long time; I couldn’t decide whether to throw it away or use it. It held many memories and was one of those ‘seasoned’ tins. It had been put away clean, but I decided to do something different to it this time. You see, I had decided to keep it instead of throwing it away, after all it still had lots of use.

I stood at the kitchen sink and decided to use a different scourer than I had normally used on it. Within minutes I could see a different shine on the baking tin; the past ‘seasoning’ was scrubbed away and with it the old memories started to disappear.

When I placed it in the draining rack I looked at it and thought that all it took to make a difference was to do something in a different way and I got a totally different result.

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Albert Einstein

Tinted vision

Months ago I decided to start painting some areas of the house. And, I did just that. I moved furniture, pictures and curtains and I painted. When I had completed the work I put some of the things back and the rest have either gone or are waiting to go to new homes.

I was pleased with my efforts - indeed I still am pleased with them.

So imagine my surprise when it came to my attention that something I thought I had painted was still the original colour. How did I miss that? I thought I had done a thorough job but weeks after the painting paraphernalia had been put away I noticed a yellow piece of wood amongst all the newly painted white bits.

It literally came to light one morning. All that was necessary for me to see this oversight was the correct lighting and the right perception.

When I saw it I immediately realised what I had done; I knew that I had painted when it was getting late in the day, with a yellowish light overhead (I know, it all sounds obvious now!) and I therefore had the perfect set up to obtain a tinted vision that obscured what was directly in front of me. The piece of wood appeared to have been covered in brilliant white paint but it remained yellow all this time.

Now with the right conditions I could plainly see what had always been in front of me. If the sun had not been shining right then, or my eyes had been focused elsewhere then I never would have seen what I had so easily omitted.

Without the right conditions then my painting in the dark would have seemed fine.

It's all in your head

That’s right. It is all in your head. At least that’s where it starts. We think things into existence. We have a thought then we have an action (or is that the other way around?), somewhere thoughts and actions are connected and our thinking becomes more than firing neurons in our brains.

The problem that I sometimes have is that I get over concerned with what other people are thinking about ... me. It bothers me. In reality it bothers me much less now than it used to but there is still a small area of my brain that thinks about what people are thinking about me. Does that make sense?

However small (or large) that area of thought intense brain activity is what I have come to realise is that I can’t control what other people are thinking. I have enough difficulty controlling my own thinking! What I can do is remember everything that I know to be true about myself and my circumstances and make sure that I don’t let the thinking about what they are thinking about me become too big of a distraction in my life.

That was a lot of thinking!

I think I’ll go to bed now.

Right of reply?

When you are offended, as I have been recently, do you want the right of reply? Do you demand it?

In England there is a parliamentary procedure where the person offended passes a note through the chair to ask for an apology.

Blogging can be an ideal forum to defend one’s self publicly and to air one’s grievances as the note is passed through cyberspace but, on the other hand ...

sometimes the best response is silence.

Mountains of Pleasure and Valleys of Loss

Let me start this off by saying I have a good life, I really do. But sometimes, in the middle of the mountains of pleasure that I experience for the majority of the time, I can fall into the deep, deep crevasse that is my personal valley of loss.

It is a long way down. I don’t know when I will stumble into it, but when I do I just stay still and cry.

The tears that flow do not trickle out of me, they pour rapidly and my body shakes with the immense pain of the loss. And it’s not just one loss that I feel when I am temporarily trapped in this valley: it is all the losses of all my time. I feel total devastation.

This is not a trite recollection of some ancient time. This is fresh.

I am in the valley now.

I have been here before. However, I do know that my tears will provide the leverage to float me free of my depths and I will once again walk the mountain paths.

A memory triggered me and I slipped. Losing my footing I went into free fall. I’m not sure whether it was the bruising on the way down that hurts my chest now or the actual pain of ejecting the tears from my body, but I ache as I cry.

As I fell I reached out for something to save me, alas all I caught were more links to losses in my life and they tumbled down the valley with me.

As I sat, dejected on the floor, the images of people and places flickered before me. They will never be replaced, they are gone – forever. And that is why this journey into loss hurts so much each time it catches me unawares.

It is hard to see clearly as my eyes are filled with water, but my heart also replays the images with no loss of definition. So I remember it all.

And then, suddenly, I breathe. I exhale.

I notice the tears have stopped and I have the strength to stand again.

127 Hours dir. Danny Boyle

Falteringly at first I do stand up and then, looking up to the brilliant skies and welcoming faces that are peering down to me from the top of the mountain, I begin to climb back to the top. The people in my life now are calling me back; they are willing me to quickly ascend the valley to be with them. I smile and wipe away the tears as I climb.

It does not take too long before I am again on the mountain enjoying the pleasure with my friends and loved ones.

The loss is always there and I know that sometimes I will fall back into it. I also know that I always rise again.

Baggage

When travelling we pack our bags and take our luggage with us. The light and easy items we take with us into the body of the plane. This is our hand luggage. However, if we have large amounts of things they go into the hold, often thrown in - sometimes without the slightest modicum of care - by the baggage handlers (but that is another story I’m sure everyone has a tale to tell on that score). We are always moving with something as we travel through life. Something from the past constantly accompanies us as we move forward to the next destination. Be it in the overhead compartment, within easy reach, or in the hold, for retrieval at a later stage, our stuff goes with us.

Sheryl Crow said earlier this month “hey, at my age, [she’s 48] everyone comes with baggage. It’s the baggage that makes it interesting.”

Marie Claire readers have been told that baggage is emotional turmoil caused by some issue in a person’s past. This baggage can pressurise or damage a relationship from the start, so says the wisdom of the Rich Santos writing about sex and the single guy in this magazine. Rich Santos describes many types of baggage such as the ‘white whale baggage’ (Moby Dick reference), the ‘family baggage’ (obviously related to family issues), and the catch all type ‘mystery baggage’. This final grouping is for when you are not sure how to define the irrational behaviour that you are experiencing in your relationship partner. When this type of baggage is foremost in the relationship the advice is that it is easier to dismiss the person and move on because they “have too much baggage.”

Sheryl Crow says that being a 48 year old single mother of two children is seen by some people as a lot of baggage – I see it as a mother with two children: that’s it, nothing else. But then I would say that as a single mother of a similar age with one child, wouldn’t I? I don’t see the single status as baggage, I don’t see parenthood as baggage, and I definitely don’t see children as baggage. I know some people prefer to have less complicated relationships without children involved, but hey, they are part and parcel of people’s lives. To me there is no option not to have them: they are already there. Just like there is no option that people have their own life experiences and memories (aka baggage), just like there is no option that people have their personal relationship history (also known as baggage). What may simply have been defined as personal history in an earlier part of life suddenly, after the age of thirty becomes described as baggage. How strange.

Baggage, as it is commonly known, is not optional in life or relationships. Baggage is part of the tapestry of life. Baggage is life.

I have a family history, I have an emotional history, I have a child, I have life. These things about me are not optional. What I have is not “too much baggage” it is life. However others may view us, I know that we are not baggage.

"Speaking as a mother ..."

Does that phrase qualify any woman with any special abilities of perception or understanding of ... anything? Why do people believe that by giving birth, having children, nurturing small humans that they are any more qualified than any other person to spout forth on any topic?

Many women have used this phrase to dismiss the opinions of other people – especially childless women. All the hearer gets is an opinion that the speaker is being reactionary and possibly unethical. Using one’s status as a mother cannot usually justify any personal claims to knowledge on any subject: for example, the distribution of AIDS medication in sub-Saharan Africa, or the deployment of troops into Afghanistan, or the veracity of presidential comments regarding the deforestation of the Amazon.

It is true that motherhood does open you up to a whole range of particular experiences, fears, hopes and expectations from yourself and those immediately around you and your brood, however, being an adult carer for the younger generation is not a magical key to worldwide knowledge.

Speaking as a mother is generally regarded as a euphemism for someone who has abandoned all vestiges of rational thought and regards everything outside of their immediate control as the evil “other” that needs to be eliminated without further ado. I wonder what would happen to people’s credibility if they all started sentences with “Speaking as a ...”? Would the bedrock of society crumble and people start wailing in the streets?

“Speaking as a ...cyclist I believe that motivating and encouraging people allows them to develop and grow.”

“Speaking as a ...stonemason I know that it is essential to situate the bath and the shower in close proximity to each other.”

“Speaking as a ...teacher I promise to build bridges even where no rivers exist.”

“Speaking as a ...plumber I believe that with the right bike, training and confidence you can ride on any terrain.”

“Speaking as a ...fisherman I know that learning the formulae for the equations will help you in the examinations.”

“Speaking as a ...politician I am sure that if you strike a stone often it is better than if you strike it once very hard.”

“Speaking as a ...writer I believe that with the right bait you can catch a fish, land it, clean it and eat it in a short period of time.”

You get my drift I’m sure... speaking as a mother, I mean.

Reading

Each person ‘reads’ a situation differently. A certain action may appear neutral to one person yet to another person this same action is incendiary. This is because of our different experiences and histories.

How do you ‘read’ me?

How do you ‘read’ yourself?

Advertising is all about how people read certain symbols and signs. You can advertise yourself (or others) in a positive, negative or neutral way.

Consider these two pictures (and associated text) used by the BBC relating to the potential election of MPs to the shadow cabinet.

28^th September 2010. Diane Abbott.

4^th October 2010. Harriet Harman, Ed Balls and Yvette Cooper

How did you read these pictures? Did you managed to concentrate on the attached text or were you swayed by the image?

‘Reading’ each other is something we do all the time. It is also a way that others can persuade us to view someone in a different light.

I think it’s important to be conscious of what you read and accept or reject views that do not fit well with you.

Be careful how you read today.

Looking and seeing

Sometimes you don’t notice something until it’s gone.

Coming from a funeral this afternoon, I was driving home in a reflective mood as is normal on these occasions and as I rounded a familiar corner I noticed something was different. I saw a huge gap, with daylight shining at me from the other side of the road. I continue to move in the traffic and simultaneously I take a second glance, a quick look at the difference that had arrested my attention so rapidly moments before. As I scan the area I realise that since I passed there a few hours earlier there has been some serious physical effort put in in the area because a lot of pruning and a whole area of greenery have been removed.

I never mindfully registered the trees or bushes before, but now I know that they used to be there. I sense their absence.

In the few seconds that I was on this piece of road I was conscious of a totally new view. I saw a building that I had not previously noticed; I saw signs that earlier were invisible to me. It was as if I was in a new location.

This revelation made me promise myself to be more aware of everyday things in life and recognise and appreciate them before I realise that they have gone. It also made me smile as I realised that sometimes some things need to be removed so that we have space to see.

Space to see often reveals something that was previously hidden or obscured.

Sometimes you notice something different when something old and familiar is eradicated from its usual place.

Therefore each day I will … Keep looking. Keep seeing.

Hostage

Two people are in a room. They are aware of each other but do not openly communicate. One because they cannot, the other because they choose not to.

These people look similar but this is not a trick of any mirror. They are totally different on the inside. On either side of the room they exist, separately. They have habitually been kept apart. The first person is blindfolded, gagged and bound to a chair. The other is lying, unfettered, on a bed next to a wall above which is a window. The sun is shining through this window. But the person lays there with their eyes closed. Tears are flowing. Silent tears.

Today the door to this room has been left open. Sensing silence from beyond the room, the person in chains inclines their head to one side then hearing no outside noise they immediately begins to shuffle towards the beckoning cool breeze of the unexpected opening. Being so constrained it is a hard journey but they keep trying; falling over and righting themselves repeatedly. Eventually, disturbed from their private sorrow, the one on the bed turns away from facing the wall and looks at their room companion then speaks, in a low rusty voice, “Why waste your energy? You’ll never get away from this?”

“I don’t know that,” comes the muffled response from behind the gag, “but I’ve got to give it a go.”

The person on the bed sighs with resignation and swings their legs onto the floor before walking with a stiff gait towards the door. They open it wider for the chair bound person to depart from the room. Then, before returning to the bed, they deftly untie the bonds that restrict their fellow hostage to the chair.

The released man stands in the doorway and glancing out he throws a look at the retreating back of his liberator, “Come with me,” he pleads, “we can make it away from here.”

“I can’t,” comes the sad reply, “I’m more scared out there than in here…. I know this fear now.” The freed man shades his eyes from the temporarily blinding light then saying a quiet goodbye he slips out of the room and creeps along the wall beyond his prison. The shadow of reality that is left in the room gazes at the open door then returns to hug the wall and sob in desperation.

Perspective

Perspective. What is it?

A different viewpoint. Looking at the same subject matter with at an alternative mental relationship. Giving something its correct amount of importance.

Sometimes is as simple as trying to put yourself in someone else’s shoes … not possible in reality, but as a temporary exercise it may just work, to imagine what this same situation MAY just look like from their eyes, with their history and way of thinking.

Get some perspective today. I’m doing so.