Lydia and I had a bit of a wet walk in the morning, although she was reluctant to let me give her a ‘rub a dub dub’ with a dry towel when we got home.
My friend treated me to a green smoothie- full of nutrients and very flavoursome – and then I had a decaffeinated coffee.
It was busy in the retail park where we met – hard to believe it’s not yet December as Christmas shopping seemed to be in full flow.
I did a bit of shopping after I’d said goodbye to my friend, using a gift card I’d been given to buy a really nice bottle of wine.9
I’m drinking the wine now and it is good. Trying to keep a craving for chocolate at bay – and winning. I did have some cheese puffs earlier so the craving for something sweet will have to wait.
Lydia is chewing on her horn. She showed a lot of restraint when I was eating the cheese puffs earlier, so I’ll take a page out of her book. She’s a good role model, that’s for sure.
The sawdust firing went well. All the pots now carry various shades of smoky grey. They are not fully vitrified but significantly less porous than when they were in the ‘bisque’ or ‘biscuit’ state. I’m not sure what temperature the sawdust kiln reaches and will have to do some tests in future firings to find out.
None of the results are what I would call ‘spectacular’; they are more subtle, although I will continue to experiment with different materials and I think the copper wire has a lot of potential for creating interest effects around the outside of pots.
All my pieces for the Show[1] are now packed in the car.
It’s an early start in the morning, so an early night for me.
I keep thinking that I can hear Lydia moving about the house but of course she is in kennels this weekend.
My partner is out with a friend so I have the house to myself.
A friend from the Buddhist group I belong to circulated a list of ways that we can help our nervous systems to rest and recuperate. I’ll use this list to help me with the work I’m doing with my own dysregulated nervous system as well as Lydia’s:
Slow down
Allow imperfection
Do one thing at a time
Sense our breath and our body
Create daily rituals and rhythms
Offer ourselves compassion
Lengthen our exhales
Express our emotions
Honour our needs
Nourish our senses
Ask for help
Let ourselves be held
[source: Nicola Jane Hobbs, c/o Jilly]
[1] Aldborough & Boroughbridge Show, Newby Hall, Yorkshire, UK
It amazes me that the Buddhist religion, rooted in the East, is so accessible to me here in the West, in the UK.
“Dharma” is the teaching and “sangha” is the community. I’ve taken refuge in Buddha, dharma and sangha recently and will continue to do so, as it helps me to see things differently, train my mind, start to feel calmer about things that have been profoundly distressing.
Sometimes in life it can feel like we’re faced with an impossible situation. ‘Fight’ or ‘flight’ – the reflex responses – seem like the only options and neither of these provides a way forward. But if we can start to see a problem as an opportunity – something that we can grow with rather than get angry about or run away from, there is potential for a way forward to open up after all.
This isn’t something that I’ve found easy, not now and certainly not when I was younger.
I’ve gone into flight mode at critical times in my life because I just didn’t have the skills or insights, confidence or support to help me do it differently.
I used to struggle to assert myself in any way and used to get it horribly wrong, with disastrous consequences in terms of life choices and relationships.
I was in my late thirties when I discovered Buddhism at around the same time as I found out that I could turn to a counsellor for therapeutic support.
I haven’t always found that Buddhism and personal therapy are comfortably aligned. In some ways they have seemed to me to work from opposite polarities – Buddhism teaches that I give up ‘self-cherishing’ and therapy helps me to learn to love myself (with great difficulty). However, my approach has been to not over-think, take from each what they offer and do my best to move forward in more positive ways. It’s an ongoing journey, still fraught with trials and traumas.
I’ve worked through – cried, ached and screamed through – a lot of emotions over the last 30 or so years. There were some, though, that I put to the back of my mind, locked away because they were too difficult to deal with and I had to find a way of building a life for myself rather than staying stuck. Those locked away emotions do, however, have a way of finding their way out, demanding to be addressed because they be need to be resolved. That happened when I retired.
So I’m now at the point where I’m engaging with both therapy and Buddhism again. Except now they don’t feel so polarised. I just feel very lucky to have access to all the wisdom and wonder of Buddhist teachings from the East here in the West, as well as skilled therapy, that will help me to heal, and to make the most of the life that I have.
Glad About 
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