Wishing you a restful Christmas and a New Year filled with tenderness, courage and grace.
A note from me to you
A friend sent me a piece of writing yesterday which is doing the rounds on Facebook at the moment. It struck a cord, a deep one. It was both beautiful, poignant and so true. It talks of how we should be tender with ourselves and to remind ourselves how we moved into 2022 carrying the trauma, shock, grief and heaviness from the 2 years previous. Did we really think it was going to be a case of wiping the slate clean and carrying on as before. As if we could simply forget and move on? Of course it couldn’t be this simple. How could it be? Our brains and nervous systems had been through so much that in reality we were only just beginning to catch up with all that had been, and in many ways continues to be.
Even if you hadn’t been personally affected by the pandemic, chances are you knew some one who had been. We saw the entire world reeling from deaths, new ways of being/socialising/working/living. The effects of which ravaged our nervous system and left us in a permanent state of fight/flight/freeze and ultimately exhaustion. We were perhaps naive to think that as we slowly re-entered a post-pandemic world, we could erase the effects from our body and psyche but in the words of the researcher and author, Bessel Van Der Kolk ’The body keeps the score” and oh boy does it…Our poor body has carried the trauma of these past few years and the result is one of exhaustion, overwhelm and despondency. The collective level of dis-ease and disbelief continued to flourish as we entered what many of us hoped would be a brighter, lighter and more hopeful year in 2022 only to watch on helpless, as Russia invaded Ukraine. As the cost of living rises across the globe and as the war in Ukraine rages on, it continues, to be a lot.
So yes….Of course this year has not felt as we hoped. We are weary, we are fragile, we are vulnerable. But…..but, has it all been bad? No! Of course not! It is never black and white. There have been moments of immeasurable joy. The world opened her arms once again, We had the most glorious Summer where the sun shone, the temperatures soared and life tasted sweet. Even the plunging temperature these last few weeks as we enter winter, has felt magical. Things appear more vivid, as if everything is in HD. If nothing else, we have been nudged awake to see the beauty in the simple pleasures of everyday life. And as we resume our old ways of socialising, hopefully we will continue to marinade in the joy of real life contact with our loved ones and absorb the richness of traveling to new landscapes near and far.
2020-2022 has illustrated so perfectly how life is both simultaneously sweet and bitter, beautiful and brutal. How happiness and sadness, joy and grief can co-exist and co-habit side by side. Life is complex. Life is rich. Life is also full of hope.
My wish for this coming year is that we take deep care of one another and tender care of ourselves. Take the time you need to rest. Take the time you need to process. Take the time you need to be curious for how you wish this in-coming year to feel. Travel your inner landscape not only with curiosity but also with the grace and reverence it deserves for carrying you so courageously through those previously unchartered terrains.
And then when you feel ready, go and squeeze the juice out of this rich, complex, brutiful life.
With all my love,
Ray xxxx
As a token of my gratitue for sharing your precious Tuesday evenings and practice with me, I would love to offer you this free 60 minute class from earlier this year.
It is a practice based around the concept of Sukha~ defined as ‘a good space’. A place of ease and grounded presence. I really hope you enjoy it x
If you like to practice with a playlist, you may enjoy using this one
The period between Christmas and the new year provides us with the perfect back drop to reflect and distill all that has taken place over the past 12 months. It is also fertile soil for planting seeds for how we wish the incoming year to feel.
At the beginning of December I led a workshop themed around the female archetype the Enchantress and how it relates to the Autumn season of our life (the Peri-post Menopause transition).
Shared here is an excerpt from the handout from this workshop containing Journal prompts for you to tend to in your own time. Regardless of if you are peri/post menopause, the prompts serve as a gentle nudge towards us living a life in alignment to our hearts an our essence. I hope you enjoy!
Teach me how to trust my heart,
Teach me how to trust my mind,
Teach me how to trust my intuition,
Teach me how to trust my inner knowing,
The senses of my body,
The blessings of my spirit.
Teach me to trust these things
so that I may enter my Sacred Space
and love beyond my fear
and thus Walk in Balance
with the passing of each glorious Sun.