2022 Reflections

Gratitude

2022 started with Covid. Then waves of fatigue followed. I now have such great empathy towards those who have been living with chronic fatigue. Having my health back has been the most significant gift. Thank you. 

Chains of events that started in the previous year led me to have a placement at Schumacher College which nurtured and nourished me. I feel safe with those connections and friendships that are, I trust, solid and long-lasting. I have such deep gratitude. At the end of the day, as Dr Dan Siegel says "Our brain is not only in our head but also between us, and there's no healing unless our relationships are healthy or, at least, in a good place." 

During my time at Schumacher I lived in a community where I taught yoga, offered breathwork sessions besides working in the gardens and the vegetable fields, and helped in the kitchen chopping vegetables and washing dishes, many dishes! (Who'd know clearing dishes could be the best therapy.) I made fires and prepared posies for new arrivals. I was lucky enough to continue my coaching and movement work with private clients online which supported me financially. Volunteering has been part of my life for many years now and I see it as a big opportunity to support different causes while having such different experiences. In my case, it also helped me stay on my path even during those moments of questioning and self-doubt and enabled me to explore various avenues. So I found it quite unbelievable when I received such a comment: “Oh so you were just a volunteer at Schumacher." I was initially perplexed by the tone of the voice and appalled by the implication. No, I wasn’t just a volunteer. I was a volunteer. Big difference. Having worked at many organisations where volunteers sit at the heart of their operations I can go further and say volunteering can be so sacred. I’m deeply grateful for all the volunteering opportunities that served me well while I was serving others. 

"True beauty always contains a delicious dash of chaos. It has a wild or unpredictable quality that takes you by surprise." says Toko-pa Turner which summarizes my 2022 so well. For me, beauty never only involves the rose but the thorns and the bud too, and 2022 has truly been a year of gifts, big challenges, and new seeds. It’s been a year of bloom and unfurling, and a time for deep questioning; sometimes even my faith in humanity! 

In the midst of turbulent, emotional, and ambiguous times I heard people telling me how brave I was, how courageous to have chosen a new path, to walk into the unknown, to follow my heart. How exciting, they said.  Some days  I wasn’t in the place to appreciate this acknowledgment as there were times when I found myself growing weary; doubt was running through my mind and fear was climbing up my chest and throat. I struggled. Time and again I have taken refuge in the depth and richness of the wonders of nature. What kept my sanity was holding onto that strong calling, this knowing deep inside me, appreciating how far I came as well as those others who were on a similar path. Thank you to the voice that kept saying, lift your eyes and take a few more steps. 

Thank you for the dream. My big why. 

On one of the programmes there was one particular man who walked into the room on the first day with such heaviness and a sulky face. At the end of the programme at a triumphant moment, he turned to me with light in his eyes and a big smile on his face “I’m transformed”. Thank you for this moment. 

Thank you for that special occasion when I lost my sense of space and time in my own breath and movement at a ceremony that emerged in the moment. Magic happens.

Thank you for all the challenges and the pain that hurt me deeply even when I was amongst the flowers. Those unbearable moments when words are stuck in your throat and your eyes filled with tears. I know it's part of this human experience and I'm grateful that I survived it with my head held high.

Thank you for the heartache; the ache that reminds me how my heart is so capable of loving and protecting me from betrayal.

Thank you for the longing; the longing that made such things possible, the longing that reminds me how human I am. 

Thank you for a new home.