Lost

I have decided after a dreamy ten day holiday to take part in the #100DayProject. There are various versions of this across the web and Facebook, but the general premise is a promise to do one thing everyday for one hundred days. I have decided to write. As a "writer" this may seem an odd thing to choose but I am in dire need of a writing habit that is not at the mercy of my creative spirit. I think comitting to this project will FORCE me to write something every day, however rubbish it is. For added help I will be using The Writer's Block by Jason Reuklak for those times when my head is empty.

I will be posting everything that is written here, so prepare to see A LOT more of me... and apologies if sometimes it isn't the most insightful prose.

Today my challenge was "Describe Your First Brush With Danger". This turned into a much deeper piece than I was expecting, but ain't that the way it goes. Anyway here it is. Day 1.

Lost

Being physically lost as a child is perhaps the most frightening thing in the world. Your heart beats quickly, the world seems huge, familiar paths and areas that you walk with your loved ones everyday suddenly transform into sprawling jungles filled with monsters around every corner. You jump, you jump as anyone approaches you as you have been told not to talk to strangers... you don’t know who to trust as your mother usually vets people for you. You tend to think more attractive people might be nicer to you, or kindly old ladies, but still, you are good and heed your mother’s words. Don’t move, don’t talk to strangers.

After walking around the small vicinity of the area in which you first found yourself lost, eyes desperately trying to make out a familiar figure, a red coat, the pitch of voice that calls you home, you sit down and you cry and this seems like the end of the world. This, the first danger you have ever felt, real true danger. Even as you remember the nightmares you have had in your bed, when your mother or father has come running, you scoff and become more tearful. When you had monsters in your head at night, you knew that they were always there to reassure you that these were just dreams and after hours of softly stroking your back and whispering calming words in your ears you believe them, safe in your home. Safe with your people.

But now they are nowhere to be seen. Everyone around you is a strange blank face and they all seem so large. Your mind flits between panic about how badly you will be reprimanded when they finally do find you and even more hysterical panic that they never will. You cry all the tears you have, until you know it is useless and then you sit forlornly on the ground waiting. You wonder what will happen to you now. Will you die soon or will one of those strange people kidnap you and take you away forever. You know not where, but you have heard such things.

Then she appears, an angel on the horizon that you almost don’t believe is walking, no running towards you. And she is crying. And you find yourself being enveloped in the familiar smell of cigarettes and perfume. The fear tension pours out of your body and the relief brings more tears. You are found.

**

Being mentally or emotionally lost as an adult is perhaps the most frightening thing in the world. Your heart in turn beats quickly and irrationally and then slowly and dully. The world seems huge and tiny at the same time, familiar streets and trains of thought seem both terrifying and full of monsters and that mind-numbing type of monotonous that is so alarming that it often makes you feel physically sick. You fear approach in this loss too, physical approach as this feeling of loss has turned you into a shell-less tortoise, a mole in the sunlight, shirking, blinking... diving for solitude. And also mental and emotional approach, because as fearsome as this loss is you are comfortable in it for now and anything or anyone that might try to tug you from it is highly suspicious and intrusive. Don’t move, don’t talk to strangers.

After walking around this small vicinity of your brain that your loss is comfortable with, you recognise all the familiar figures. They are all you or versions of you that you have allowed or other people that you have allowed, who echo back at you this version of yourself that you have approved. But these familiar figures don’t comfort you, they make you angry because they are why you are lost. This is the first danger, you have felt, the first real true danger, but this time you do not scoff at your nightmares, because they are part of your daytime. And your mind has given so much power to them that they have wrapped around your thoughts. And it is much harder to reassure yourself.

Your real people, your good people are everywhere to be seen. They are in photographs and in phone conversations, they are beside you every day, they are reassuring you, they are laughing with you, they are there. Yet, you are still lost. Even in the sea of familiar faces. You do worry about reprimand, because you are now an adult and adults are not meant to be lost, but it is ok because no one will know. You sometimes cry and sit on the ground forlornly. You do not worry about people kidnapping you... you think that might be a welcome break. You do worry that you have already kidnapped yourself. You know not where, but you have heard such things.

Then she appears, no angel at all, flawed in many ways, but she is familiar. Get up, she says, get up... we do know the way. We are not really lost are we? We have taken ourselves here and so we can get back. She is not crying, she is smiling and she is strong. I’m sorry, she says, I went away for a while, but you always knew I was here. Why are you not moving? Why have you not talked to some strangers? You are not a child. There is that familiar bossy yet placating tone and your fear is beginning to ease. It might take a while you realise, but you do know the way. You knew the way all the time really. Didn’t you. She did, she’s you. You are found.

Leading Our Own Life

Soooo... I've been a little quiet lately because I've been figuring my shit out, to put it bluntly. You might remember in a post I wrote about reading the signs that life was battering me a bit - or really I was battering myself. The thing is that I was working in a job for some great people, had been there for four years and I just wasn't feeling any joy from it any more, you know. It was becoming something that I had to get through every day and instead of waking up and thinking what can I achieve today I was letting the fear of change and failure crush me, standing still and curled up, feeling lower and lower.

I was preaching all this stuff on Instagram and in my blog posts about how to live your life but I wasn't doing it. I half-heartedly looked at other positions, but I knew it wasn't what I wanted. I didn't want to work for someone else doing the same thing. That wasn't why I was unhappy, it was because I wasn't using my best qualities. I was living a life governed by what I thought I should and it was destroying me.

Dear Women

A few weeks ago, on International Women's Day, I had another mild disagreement with a friend about feminism, where I had to cave and bite my tongue for fear of launching into an angry shouty, tirade which would defeat my purpose entirely. 

I thought you see, as I think every day that we'd moved forward, that at least middle-class, educated women living a cushy life in the UK's capital would understand that they couldn't not be feminist. Or that I couldn't understand how they could live in our world and not be one. 

I understand that the word has still held onto some bad branding, perhaps I should talk about being egalitarian instead... But to me it is not about everybody being equal, it is about having equal social, political and economic rights - all of us. For we are not all equal, as Osho said, nobody is superior, nobody is inferior, we are each unique and incomparable, and wonderful because of it. 

But if you are a woman who identifies as "not a feminist", it surely means you support the view that men as a collective are better and more valuable than you. Deserve more. Can dictate and control our entire sex. How can you think that? How can anyone man or woman, think that? Why is anyone superior?

So I decided to write a letter to every woman to illustrate what I want for them, for us, for men. After you've read it, please tell me that you still don't need feminism. 

Dear Women,

How are you, you marvellous creators you?

I wanted to tell you a few things that I really want for you, maybe you could tell me if you want them too...

I wish that you will not always be judged by your looks as if that is all you have to give. I also hope that you will be able to wear what you would like with no backlash or judgement. Wear make up or don't, whatever makes you feel your best. Men too.

I want you to be able to walk on your cities streets on your own without feeling ashamed, embarrassed or fearful. I don't want you to suffer rape or sexual abuse because you are a woman and others feel they are entitled to your body.

I want governments and economies to support you, to realise that you have as much to give as a man and to show this through wage and economic equality.

I want you to be able to vote if you want to, to decide things about the country you live in. 

I want you to concentrate on being mothers if you want to and raise your sons and daughters just the same.

Or be sports stars if you want to, write books, run countries or sew and bake if that's your thing. 

I pray that you have choice. I hope that you can do one thing or everything you want.

To Valentine's

Too-red roses squashed on the pavement,

Like they've been painted by Alice's cards. 

Sticky chocs, and socks, and the scent of

What someone has called perfume on the breeze.

Shops are shades of pink and red,

The heart and the flower rule the court.

Stars and crosses cast aside

Whilst eggs are patiently waiting.

Those entangled with another,

Feel pressure and pleasure in parts.

Whilst those who stand alone

Shrug or ignore, burn or laugh.

Men and women both

Revert to forgotten stereotypes.

Restaurants pawning regulated romance, packed.

Though the world seems to ring with rejecting the day.

Silly, so silly, so silly they say.

Love is not one day.

So American with vivid white teeth is St Valentine,

A result of Cupid's arranged marriage with Simon Cowell.

We hug ourselves a little tighter,

Those of us alone.

It's like New Year, I hate New Year.

Yet though true, it doesn't numb us to it.

Leave the cards and three-for-one singles cocktails

At a damp west-end bar

And whether a half of two or one whole one. 

Accept it as a day to remind us of all love.

For yourself, for others, for life. 

Just don't start with a paper cut-out heart. 

On Fear Defining Us...

 

I didn't want to have New Years resolutions this year. A list of tick boxes that defines how I feel about myself when I read them the following year, older not wiser, still growing. Yes I'm still too fat and I haven't fucking read War and Peace OK

I thought of only two things that I wanted. Two words that don't have a Yes you have achieved or No you've failed, but are part of how I want to live better, every day. Nourish and Fear. (insert sarcastic comment here)

Nourish is about faking it till I feel it. Nourishing myself, my mind, my body, my self-esteem. I often struggle to love or respect myself, being the constantly self-critical yawnsome type that I am. My heart often beats to not-good enough, not good-enough, not good-enough.

It's hard to fake self-love is the thing because no matter the look you direct to the outside world, the little voices inside still chatter away. Irritants that they are repeating ones own shortcomings to ourselves, drowned out only by hard cardio, hysterical laughter or vodka.