Category: Ramblings

In the words of my old boss, ‘We’re going to eat this elephant one bite at a time.’

It was definitely my Monday mantra today in between the madness and mayhem. Some days all you can do is one thing at a time.

My mental room felt like an F2 tornado did a number on it and on the train ride home I decided it wasn’t worth the headache. If ever there was a good time to start making sanity a priority, it’s now.

Today step 1 was putting a time limit on the mental room. The madness doesn’t need to catch the train home at the end of each day. 7 hours is more than enough time to be spinning around like a Whirling Dervish. Work stayed at work and the train ride home was spent on a good book.

Step 2 was making time for the physical room: time to pack a breakfast and lunch for work; time to walk, even if it was only 10 minutes at a time every other hour; time for self-care.

For step 3 I’m going to use that slice of time I spend tossing and turning trying to fall asleep to be still and reflect; a bit like a mini-meditation. I don’t think my brain would hack a significant period of time meditating just yet. Baby steps here!

Time to switch off the devices, hydrate and hit the sack with a good book. Just once in my life I’d like to master the art of zen.

Rumer Godden once said: ‘There is an Indian proverb that says that everyone is a house with four rooms; a physical, a mental, an emotional and a spiritual. Most of us tend to live in one room most of the time but unless we go into every room every day, even if only to keep it aired, we are not a complete person.’

True story.

This quote made an appearance in my life a few years back then fell out of my memory only to resurface 2 years ago. It fell off my radar again and has recently resurfaced. Some lessons just keep reappearing until you learn them.

Cliches aren’t the only hidden cache of wisdom; proverbs rank up there in terms of overlooked wisdom but we’re all too busy to bother looking.

The past week has been draining mentally and emotionally. My priorities shifted from finding balance to wasting focus on external things that cannot be controlled and drama that wasn’t of my own making; the drain of other people’s expectations.

The past few weeks have seen me holed up in the mental room with enough snacks to feed a village for a month; neglecting the physical room to my detriment; God knows where the key to the spiritual room is and the only time the door to the emotional room was opened was to toss a whole pile of mayhem into it then slam the door shut quick fast and in a hurry.

Which room occupies the majority of your life? Are there some rooms you’ve never visited?

There was a time living in England when my spiritual room was in order. Religion and spirituality are not the same thing in my mind but that’s personal to each person. No judgements.

The physical room has left me depleted and depressed lately. Surgery has left a lingering presence which is not entirely unexpected but I’ve chosen to ignore that until now. Being up and about doesn’t necessarily mean the healing is complete and I’ve not allowed myself to accept that.

It turns out my body will have the last laugh in that conversation because it will do what it needs to do regardless of my opinion on the matter. There was a significant period of inactivity during recovery and that’s left its mark. It’s not irreparable but it’s not going to be a 5 minute job either. Listening to what my body needs hasn’t been a priority and it should have been.

My physical room is that barricaded door at the end of the cobwebbed hallway. It hasn’t seen the light of day in too long. The sheer volume of crap that’s been thrown into it is staggering. Nothing is as it should be. The interior is cluttered and grimy and it’s time for a serious renovation!

It turns out my sister had the spare key to my spiritual room; the door was cracked open a little yesterday. We spent the day together, catching up and reconnecting. I’ve pushed her away lately because I refuse to accept that she’s struggling with my move to Scotland. Instead of appreciating that it’s because my family love me that they will miss me, I’ve taken it as them not being supportive so I’ve distanced myself from them for self-preservation.

This during possibly the worst few work weeks in years. A time when having my family around me is necessary for my sanity, I’ve pushed them away. We had a good day reconnecting and talking about where we’re all coming from. She really is my rock and having a good cry on each other’s shoulders was cathartic. We found our link again and went and stocked up on some good vibes at a crystal shop in Geneva. The mental clarity from spending a few hours surrounded by crystals and good energy made a huge difference.

Yes, I know it sounds a bit new agey to some but crystals each have their own properties. Some things are true whether you believe in them or not. The stones I was drawn to all turned out to be things I need in my life right now. Clarity. Focus. Help with memory and repelling negative energy. Moving forward in life. Removing obstacles. Enhancing creativity.

Making time to meditate and be in my spiritual room will pull me out of the mental room that is currently the Black Hole in my universe. Hopefully the key to the physical room is in there somewhere.

As any good DIY-er knows, when tackling a major renovation you should focus on one room at a time. Renovating an entire house at once isn’t possible unless you have somewhere else to live during the chaos.

There’s no option to leave my body during this renovation so it will have to be one room at a time for a while.

Pick a room that would benefit you and spend more time in it. Don’t neglect the others but for now, we’re just airing those out. They will have their turn for a major renovation soon enough.

The physical room is the most terrifying at this point so while motivation is high and the urge is there, it will be the starting point. How, I don’t know but finding balance is part of why I started writing this blog. To find my way home. It turns out home isn’t just in Scotland; my body is also home.

The spirit within will show itself when you let it. If anyone has the instruction manual on how to do that, I’m all ears!

 

It’s taken a while to understand the meaning behind this and wrap my head around the implications of it.

Society teaches us that if there’s something you don’t like, you need to fight against it. Fight obesity; fight disease; fight war *oh the irony.*

Conversely, the Law of Attraction states that energy goes where attention flows. In a nutshell, if you’re focusing on fighting something out of existence, you are in fact bringing it into existence and it persists.

Seems fairly straight forward, right?

Over the past few weeks work has been crazy. One issue in particular is a query that needs data going back more than a decade. In an avalanche of numbers, figures, formulas and equations it’s been challenging finding a starting point, never mind a solution.

To attempt to solve this, I did what any logical human does; I went to the boss. He’s been doing this for years and rather than reinvent the wheel on my own it seemed reasonable to get his input on how to get moving on this mountain.

Simple. ‘Follow the money.’

Fast forward to today. In recent weeks I’ve rediscovered how much I enjoy cooking. The flip side is physically I haven’t been feeling great for a few months. Between the bloating and general poofiness it feels like I’ve gained 20 lbs even though the scale doesn’t seem to think so.

It’s difficult to find pleasure in cooking food from scratch when my body feels like I should be stapling my lips shut instead of feeding it anything.

With the new found interest in cooking I’ve been inhaling food shows on Netflix. Today’s choice was a documentary called ‘Fed Up.’

It addresses childhood obesity and the general dietary mayhem that makes up American culture. It’s a fascinating view; I’d recommend taking the time to watch it if you can as it definitely sheds a lot of light on obesity in general; not just from a child’s perspective.

Scarily we are sicker and fatter than ever before and it boils down to one simple fact: follow the money.

2 completely unrelated dots connected in my head; the circuit is complete and the light bulb just went on.

To solve the problem, we need to follow the money.

The tragedy is that there is no profit in health. The real money is in all the industries that feed us; advertise to us; ‘heal’ us; insure us; peddle solutions to us for all the problems that spring up around us. The weight loss industry is worth billions alone, never mind Big Pharma and the rest of it. If we all became healthy entire industries would go bankrupt.

We’re fighting obesity by dieting, exercising and ‘eating healthier’ when in reality we’ve solved nothing. The deck is not stacked in our favour. Advertising sabotages us around every corner. Health foods are laden with ingredients we don’t understand so in reality, we could be eating anything and how would we know?

With enough money scientific studies can be shushed and the studies that do make it into the mainstream are in fact funded by the industries they’re studying. Co-incidence much? Didn’t think so.

Any sensible gambler knows: if the deck is consistently stacked against you, you fold your hand and play a new game.

Remind me again why we aren’t doing that?! Probably because we have no clue that we were never meant to win the war.

One random fact that came out of the documentary made me laugh out loud at the sheer devious genius behind it.

When they ‘discovered’ that fats were responsible for heart diseases and cancers, blah blah, the industry moved to reducing fat in a bunch of stuff. One of those things was milk. Skimmed and fat-free milk became a thing and people were buying it by the tanker load.

Excellent. The fat that was extracted from the milk went where? Into cheese.

Cheese production went up by a ridiculous amount and suddenly, cheese everywhere. Burgers and cheese; pizza with more cheese; cheese-stuffed crusts; double cheese, MORE  CHEESE; the possibilities skyrocketed and America started inhaling cheese on everything while buying tankers of skimmed milk for the health benefits. KACHING!

We have been royally screwed guys. If we’re collectively going to solve excess weight in our own lives we’re going to need to go renegade and fix it ourselves.

Diets and fads aren’t going to right this ship. Following the money and realising who is profiting at your expense will change your choices at the store. If you care enough to realise you’re being scammed by every teaspoon of sugar that you eat maybe you’ll walk away from the game and make a different choice.

Sugar is more addictive than cocaine. Ever notice how vitamins and macros on nutrition labels all list % of daily allowance? Notice how sugar has no % next to it? Because if it did it would be 200+% of daily allowance on some servings and you might think twice. It’s conveniently excluded so you can go on blissfully unaware that you’re knocking another nail in your health coffin while the health/insurance/food industries are rubbing their hands in glee at some more guaranteed income on the balance sheet.

I have no interest in living a life of deprivation where every edible pleasure is forever stricken from my life. What I AM interested in is not feeling like a sack of poo tied with string because on paper I’m eating ‘health foods’ only to find out the damage is just being packaged differently.

My challenge to you is the next time you go to the store, shop around the edges only. The outer perimeter of the grocery stores are fresh produce, dairy, fresh meat & fresh bread. None of the packaged stuff that lives down the aisles with a shelf life that could rival the lifespan of a bowhead whale. No venturing down the aisles….. except maybe the spice aisle. *No MSG ALLOWED*

Instead of fighting weight gain and obesity maybe try pro-health. Plan A didn’t work so giving Plan B a go couldn’t hurt.

The Shepherd’s pie was delicious. Unfortunately it didn’t occur to me to take a picture of it because I was distracted with spending time with my friend so I promise to make it again soon and give you the recipe and pictures.

Lately I’ve been finding comfort in cooking up recipes from home. It’s kind of ironic given I’ve never really felt at home in the places I’ve lived. I’m either arriving, unpacking, packing or leaving. Maybe that’s what life is. Flavours from all the places you’ve been mashed up into something that makes you feel happy.

Each place I’ve been has contributed something to the tapestry of my life; some bright colours and other things are the snagged stitches that drive me crazy.

Emigrating is no small task by any stretch of the imagination. There’s a seemingly endless list of things to think about and lately it’s been overwhelming me. The fact that this has all happened before on 2 separate occasions is irrelevant. Each time is a new set of circumstances and a new destination so it’s not a one-size-fits-all approach.

The same major variables are present: job, accommodation, visas, tying up loose ends where you are now and figuring out how to navigate the challenges of the new destination. The big things are a given. You know your circle of friends, job, home and surroundings are going to change so when they do it’s hardly a surprise.

It’s the little things that end up sinking your boat. Simple things like not knowing where to go to buy a saucepan or where the nearest pharmacy is in relation to where you are. New road signs and the fact that a brinjal is called an aubergine in one place and an eggplant somewhere else.

There’s a very vivid memory of sitting on a pavement in Islington in London having a wobbly with my bestie because all we wanted was a bloody frying pan and couldn’t find one for love or money because we had NO clue on which stores sold them.

Not knowing how a simple ingredient is packaged. At home it came in an orange box. Is it now in a can, a packet, a box?! What is the brand name? Stupid little things like wanting to buy a loaf of bread only to be confronted with an entire aisle of options when previously your options were white/brown/sliced/unsliced.

Now it’s suddenly white/wheat/rye/multi-grain/gluten-free/wholemeal/round/square/sliced/unsliced/sesame-seed/poppy seed/pita pockets/round buns/long buns/ciabatta buns/croissants/muffins/87 types of bagels and your brain shuts down because all you want is a goddamn loaf of bread.

Things…….

One bite at a time. As my boss in SA frequently told us: we’re going to eat this elephant one bite at a time.

The man made a lot of sense.

This morning’s elephant was reading about the UK holding a referendum on June 23rd about whether or not to stay in the EU. The result of that referendum will have long lasting consequences, the least of which will be immigration.

Should the UK leave the EU, there’s a possibility Scotland will vote again on whether or not to be independent. That’s a whole other set of consequences.

Needless to say my brain started melting contemplating how this will affect my plan to relocate. After having a complete wobbly about it, it boiled down to one bite at a time.

What can I do today to make progress on my goal? Pick up the phone and call our UK office and simply ask if there’s an option to take a job from one office and work it remotely from where I want to be.

I should hear back in a few days. However small your step, just take it. Pick one small thing you can do and do it. Yes, it’s going to be uncomfortable and yes, it may give you an answer you don’t want but until you do it, the not knowing will steal your peace. To make an informed decision, you need information. Get it. Seriously. Find the information you need even if it’s not what you want to hear because until you know, there’s exactly nothing you can do to make progress.

Pick a direction and take a step that way. Promise me. One small step. That’s all we need to do today. Tomorrow we’ll take another one and eventually we’ll find the way.

 

Written ramblings have been my thing for years. Whenever life gets overwhelming or there’s just something in my head that needs sorting it inevitably comes out on paper and gets filed away with all the previous ramblings.

I stumbled across one written on 16 April 2012. Around that time I was struggling with depression and had finally grown the balls to walk away from someone who had drained a decade and some change of my life. The relationship had ended 6 years before that but we’d ‘stayed friends’, which was the dumbest thing to do because the closure never came.

The hope was moving stateside would close that chapter for the last time by being geographically inaccessible. Yeah, that didn’t work either. After finally deciding to cut all ties the depression kicked in in Technicolor and the ramblings began. This is an short extract from then:

There have been places on earth where the peace has been all encompassing and instant.  It’s like my soul has returned to where it came from, like I’d reached a destination I’d been searching for since the beginning of time. Home.  My soul found its home; that home is no longer where I am.  A piece of myself has been ripped away and I don’t know how to get it back.  It’s just gone.  Having found my home, it was as if, after a million life times, I could finally just exist in a state of rest; like there was no longer any need to struggle; no need to continue searching; I was found.  For a reason I cannot fathom, I’m no longer in that place.  The struggle and search has begun again, the rest is over.  The inner peace has passed; I’m back on the road to somewhere I can’t find.  You must be wondering why I can’t just go back, I wish it were that simple. 

My soul felt complete in Scotland.  There’s something about that land, the desolation of the Highlands, the snow on the mountains, the open spaces, the dark waters of the Lochs, the music, the energy, it speaks to my soul like nothing ever has before or since.  My soul feels as old as that land, like I was born with it a million years ago; that we came into existence at the same time; our energy is the same.  In the cold beauty of the Highlands, it feels like I could walk into the mountains and never be lost.  I could be nowhere and home at the same time.  My soul lives in those lakes and mountains.  I don’t know how, I don’t know why, I just know that I have been drawn to that place since birth.  I’ve never understood, but it was like an inevitable journey that I couldn’t escape. 

Against all odds and obstacles that I put in my own way, I found my way there.  Home.  To arrive at a place you’ve never seen, never experienced, and to feel in your core that you know every inch of it, that you’ve never been away, is something I cannot describe.  Peace that cannot be put into words.  For that moment, all is right with the world, nothing else makes sense.

Everyone should experience that profound belonging at least once in their lives.  It’s not a grey area.  Once you have felt it, you will know.  It will hit you with the force of a bolt of lightning and shake your core in a way you’ve never known. That moment becomes the dividing line of what came before and what comes after. 

Sometimes life requires nothing less than an empty-handed leap of faith into the void.  Deep breath, close your eyes, say a prayer and step over the edge.  Someone will be there to catch you.

Reading that with the benefit of 4 years worth of hindsight I realise I’ve known all along. Earlier today there was a cloud of doubt about whether moving across the Atlantic again is the right thing to do.

Yes. It is.

This is what has been missing. Order. Thinking back to a period when things flowed properly, the magic ingredients were simplicity, order and gratitude.

None of those are making a prominent appearance around here at the moment so it was time to make one of them a priority today.

Order.

Last weekend the kitchen was on the chopping block for a good clean out. Today the bathroom got thrown under the bus. How I’ve managed to cram that much non-essential junk into such a small space beggars belief.

Medications that expired 6 years ago. Perfumes… I have no explanation for some of those fragrances. How many bottles of shower gel does one human need? Hairspray? When in heaven’s name did I need hairspray?!

I shudder to think how long I’ve had some of my cosmetics, given I barely wear any. Into the garbage. Here I thought I was running out of toothpaste; nope, I’ve stocked up for the apocalypse. There’s 10,000 miles of floss too if anyone’s running low & 4 unopened toothbrushes.

2 entire baskets of travel sized hand creams, shampoos, conditioners & soaps. Bath sponges that have never been used. WHY?!

My personal favourite; a supply of contraceptives I’ll never need again and a few other shark week accessories. LATERS!

There was a sketchy jar of exfoliant so I pinged all the expired drugs from their packages and mixed it in with that. Into the garbage. *Don’t worry, I checked online and if there’s no place to dispose of medication in your area, it suggests mingling the stuff with something disgusting so it cannot be consumed. It was pretty disgusting.*

Don’t dispose of medication down the toilet or drain; it’s not recommended.

There’s space for days in my cupboards now and I’ve tracked down 3 missing pairs of tweezers. All the stuff I’ve been stockpiling because it’s pretty and shouldn’t be used it is now on the list of things to be used.

The urge to save pretty soaps and stuff is real, I know. 2 entire CRATES of them were given away when I left SA. Pretty soaps in boxes and ribboned, given away. I didn’t get to use any of them. What a waste.

Use the pretty things. They were probably given to you in the hope you would enjoy them, so enjoy them. Gathering dust is not what they were made to do. Every damn day is a special occasion so for the love of God woman, USE THE GOOD STUFF!

An added bonus is you’ll actually create space for new things when you move the old things out of the way. You cannot add anything to a glass that’s already full.

My grandmother hoarded every pretty thing for a special occasion. She died with most of it still in its original packaging, never once opened or enjoyed. I wish I could kick her arse for it. Those who inherited her things didn’t care for them the way she did so they were wasted. The next best thing is to learn from her and not make the same mistake.

Take out the good towels; use the fancy perfume and expensive hand cream. Stop using the scraps for yourself when there’s probably a treasure trove of stuff you’re saving for someone else.

YOU are the longest relationship you’ll ever have so make yourself happy.

There really is order after the chaos if you take it one chunk at a time.

Oh, I almost forgot Wednesday’s installment of the Edinburgh Rose Street story:

 

Ah Monday… There’s nothing quite like getting to the train station only to hear that a freight train has derailed at the next stop and ‘expect significant delays.’ It was also just a wee bit windy and more than a little bit cold.

At that point you’re pretty much ready to run up the white flag and call to tell the boss you have anal glaucoma; you just don’t see your arse going in today.

Instead I got on the train, dug out my book, sent up a silent prayer of gratitude that I remembered to pee before leaving the house (because train  loos are, for all intents and purposes, bio-hazard zones) and settled in for the long commute to work. Mind you, it was ever so thoughtful of the conductors on the train to suggest using an alternate form of transport.

Cheers mate. The time for that suggestion would have been AT the station but no worries, we’ll wing it, aye?

A few minutes later we were at the next station, slightly slower than normal and next thing you know, the train is going like the clappers and the significant delay turned out to be less than 5 minutes. Didn’t see that coming…

What started out as a train wreck of a Monday turned out to be the smoothest day I’ve had in weeks. To-do list sorted, tax refund credited to my account a week after filing my taxes (WOOT) and everything that went tits up in spectacular fashion on Friday somehow magically resolved itself today.

It was also time to stop putting off treating my body better ‘for just one more day’. Tomorrow finally arrived. Out with the excessive sugar, switched to tea instead of the usual cafe con leche with half a pound of sugar in and made time to pack a lunch. Pleasure is necessary in life and the mission isn’t deprivation here. It’s balance and that is something that has been sorely lacking for too long. Pleasure, yes; overindulgence, no.

Food is not an emergency. Make time for a soak in the tub. Stretch out the achy bits. Sit down at the table and eat a cooked meal. Hydrate. It might take my body a few days to get the memo but one meal, one workout and one day at a time.

It looks like the light at the end of my tunnel really was a train…. albeit a derailed one.