It was misty when we stepped out, and the spiders had been busy all night by the look of it. There were webs everywhere, finely woven and sparkling when the sun started to shine.
After our walk, I gave Lydia her breakfast and headed off to meet up with a friend.
We don’t meet often, this friend and I, but we settled into each other’s company quickly and easily, as only good friends can do.
Like me, she has recently suffered from anxiety, so we were able to ‘compare notes’. She’s found hypnotherapy a great help; I’ve found meditation works for me, along with affirmations.
“I choose to be peaceful and calm. Everything is unfolding as it should.”
I did a quick Google search and it seems that hypnotherapy is not usually available on the NHS, which means that it sometimes is.
I’ll stick with meditation for now, but hypnotherapy is something that I had little awareness of before and know a bit more about now.
We talked about a lot of other things too, of course, and I so enjoyed catching up with my friend. Then I had another good friend to go home to: Lydia of course!
Good friends come in all shapes, sizes and species. I don’t know where I’d be without them.
Lydia enjoying a yak’s milk chew yesterday evening
Continuing the story of Lydia and Me
“Oh, what a beautiful day!”
Yesterday I sat outside on a bench, with a friend. We were watching the world go by. Our part of the world, in our village. It was quiet, with just a few passing cars, people and birds.
Then my friend suddenly burst into song: “Oh, what a beautiful morning! Oh, what a beautiful day!”* And I joined in.
It was a moment I will treasure and will always remember every time I now walk past or sit on that bench.
My friend, in her eighties, suffering from dementia and grieving the loss of loved ones from her life, gave me a great gift. She transformed my day into a beautiful one, through her spontaneity and joy; the joy of her loving heart, however sad it may be.
This morning as I woke, I found messages on my phone from members of a WhatsApp group I belong to. It’s a group called ‘Sangha Meditation’. ‘Sangha’ is a Buddhist term for ‘community’ and I really value the support and sense of community that centres around the Buddhist teachings that I go to. The messages were very simple – people just checking in to see who was planning to go the evening meeting – but it was good to be included in that very simple exchange. How wonderful!
This evening’s class will be the last in a series of four, on the theme of ‘Transforming Adversity’.
I’ve had a massive amount of support from friends and therapists over the last few years of my life, when I’ve been doing my best to deal as positively as possible with a very difficult and complex set of circumstances. I’ve also been taking on board the Buddhist teachings, as presented in these weekly classes, and occasionally at weekend and day retreats.
The practice of meditation has been and continues to be a transformative process for me. I still have a long way to go to achieve the calm and peaceful mind that I aim for. However, thanks to friends – in the village and in the wider community – I do now have moments of spontaneously feeling happy.
I think Lydia has moments when she spontaneously feels happy too. We’re getting there.
My book, Train your dog; train your mind – positive reinforcement for humans and canines – is now available in paperback: https://amzn.eu/d/eQ2sWjU.
The Kindle version is currently for sale at £2.99 on a Kindle Countdown deal https://amzn.eu/d/99yW3Qk.
I don’t claim to be a dog trainer or a mind trainer – I’m just a woman with a dog who writes a blog, and has written a book, about life, and about being glad.
Keeping things simple is key for me just now. I can’t cope with complicated nor do I want to.
What better way, then, than to enjoy the company of friends, as I have done this weekend.
Yesterday I visited a friend – a fellow Ceramic Artist – at the Dovecot Gallery, near Doncaster, where she was exhibiting. It was a summer show in a garden setting, full of colour and creativity.
Today a friend and I visited a friend of hers. We sat together for about four hours, talking. Just talking. It was lovely to have a three-way conversation, each of us bringing in thoughts and ideas from our lives and experience.
My Ceramic Artist friend is a year or two older than me, so in her early 70’s. She started out in her career with clay just a few years ago. Rarely have I come across anyone more passionate about what they do.
My friend’s friend is about 10 years younger than us. Unlike me, she doesn’t enjoy good physical health, but she doesn’t let that stop her expressing herself through her art. She is a talented Textile Artist as well as a dog lover and owner of four canine companions.
While I aim in this blog to be positive about pushing through into a position of mental health recovery that I’ve been working towards most of my life, at the moment I’m struggling to get my brain to function.
Despite enjoying the company of friends, despite the wonderful weather, despite the woodland walk I had with Lydia this morning, I’ve hit a wall.
At least though, now, I know it won’t last, that I just need to rest – which I will – and tomorrow will be another day.
Looking across at Lydia, as I write, she is looking back at me. I’ll give her some more “rub-a-dub-dub” massages later, to help soothe her vagus nerve and I’ll keep doing what I need to do to help soothe mine too.
Train your dog; train your mind – positive reinforcement for humans and canines – now available in paperback: https://amzn.eu/d/eQ2sWjU.
The Kindle version is currently for sale at £0.99 on a Kindle Countdown deal https://amzn.eu/d/99yW3Qk.
Despite, or more likely because of the mind, body and breath work I’ve been doing over the last few days, I’m feeling quite stressed today.
If this sounds contradictory, it isn’t. When I do work on myself at a deep level, I find it releases stresses and toxins, and then it can take a while for them to work out of my system. So, I’m taking the time to be easy with myself for a few days. I’ve just been reading outside while it is warm and sunny, but with some welcome shade.
Lydia is loving it too. I gave her a few “rub-a-dub-dub” massages on our walk this morning, as well as a really extended one before we left the house.
“I choose to be peaceful and calm. Everything is unfolding as it should.”
I have a trip to the cinema with friends lined up for this afternoon and will then go on to the Buddhist meeting this evening. For now, I meditate and then go outside to enjoy a bit more of this amazing weather. One more cup of coffee for the road? Yes.
The Buddhist teaching last night was about ‘patient acceptance’, this being the opposite of anger.
I have been working on patient acceptance for some time, and also been struggling with anger.
In his book, ‘How to Transform Your Life’, the Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche says that “We need to think about our own faults because if we are not aware of them we will not be motivated to overcome them.”
I have been motivated to overcome my fault of anger and continue to be motivated to do so; never more so in my life than I am now. Meditating helps.
The benefits of meditating in a group, for me, are significant. That doesn’t mean that I can’t and don’t benefit from meditating on my own, but there is something about a group meditation that I find has a calming effect, at a very deep level.
Today, I don’t feel angry.
It’s now early evening.
I had a lovely walk with Lydia this morning, then met up with a friend and sat outside in the sunshine, then met up with another friend and had a walk with her and her dog. I think that all adds up to a very good day. I am very lucky, to have had such a good day, today.
Lydia is lying quietly outside. It’s very peaceful here.
One of my bowls, featured on a friend’s windowsill
Yesterday’s combination of walking, yoga and Qigong worked well as I had a restful evening and a good night’s sleep.
I did wake up at around 3am when dawn was already breaking and the birds were already singing. Listening to the birds, the sound of the wind and what was at one point quite heavy rain, I fell back to sleep and woke feeling refreshed, ready to make the most of today.
It’s been a good start so far.
Lydia and I have had a wild and wonderful walk, with the weather warm and slightly breezy. The sun came out too.
It’s a Tuesday, so I’ll go and visit my friend in the village this afternoon. I go every Tuesday, for a couple of hours in the afternoon. We usually go out for a stroll, if the weather’s OK. More fresh air! More exercise!
Lydia is outside enjoying some sunshine now.
I’m going to start making arrangements for my latest pots to be fired.
I don’t have a kiln at home – yet – but I do know someone who runs a firing service. We arrange a time and a place around mid-way between her home and mine, for drop-off and pick-up. She provides a very good service; takes the greatest care.
I have plenty of time before the next planned event for selling my wares – the Aldborough & Boroughbridge Show:
Consolidation is going to be a theme for me, going forward, for the foreseeable. I’m not quite sure as yet what form the process of consolidation will take, or what forms my pots may take, but process and pots will take form, one way or another.
I had a lovely visit with friends yesterday. They lifted me.
I was late arriving at their house. There had been a road accident and I struggled to find an alternative route. When I phoned them to let them know about my delay, they made sure that I realised it didn’t matter – they just wanted to see me. This meant such a lot to me.
I rested into most of the rest of the evening on my return home, after giving Lydia her tea.
I’m continuing to feed her all her food by hand, as training rewards, either when we’re out on a walk, or at home for her evening meal.
The big treat for Lydia, as part of her evening meal, is a raw bone. Today it’s a chicken drumstick. She waits for 90 seconds on “stay” and then bounds towards me when I say “here”. Lydia loves her raw bone[1]. It’s a high value treat that provides a really good opportunity to reinforce the training and learning we’re doing together.
Trev went out to buy our tea – fish and chips. We have some great chippies round here. I like mine with curry sauce. He has mushy peas. This is a high value treat for us.
A phone call from another good friend also meant the world to me and I slept with a much easier mind that I’d had the other day.
This morning, I wake around 8am.
At some point during the night Lydia went downstairs to continue her sleep in her favourite armchair. She has a bed in the bedroom which she loves but also loves that chair.
When I go down in the morning to make a cup of tea, she turns from her sleeping position onto her back, with floppy paws.
This is my invitation to tickle her tummy, although these days it’s more of a massage.
I concentrate on her neck, upper arms and chest, rather than her tummy. I’m not a trained masseuse, either human or canine, but I focus on muscles and areas where she might be holding a bit of tension. She makes some soft gurgling noises so I think I must be doing OK. To finish, I take hold of each of her paws in turn and give them a bit of a rub. This will, in turn, help her to feel more comfortable when her paws are being held for claw clipping.
Lydia and I have our woodland walk today.
I do some heel reinforcement work on our walk across the field towards the wood, and the walk itself is easy. I only have to do an occasional turnabout if Lydia starts to tug, but she’s not doing much tugging at all. After a full circuit, I decide to go back and do the walk again, from the other direction.
My right knee, that I’ve had a few problems with recently, is much better.
I’m lucky. At 69 I have no serious physical ailments or infirmities to contend with.
To improve the condition and flexibility of my knees, I’ve been doing some physio exercises that I was taught. I also rub in ‘wear and tear’ lubricating gel, morning and evening, take a good quality multi-vitamin and mineral supplement for joint care, and repeat an affirmation:
“My knee is healing, and getting stronger, each passing day.”
It’s easy to forget, when things are going well, what it’s taken to get to that point.
So, I’ll continue with my maintenance regime, and hopefully continue to enjoy the benefits of healthy knees.
[1] Dogs should never be given cooked bones. Raw bones may not be suitable for all dogs. Consultation should always be made with a qualified canine nutritionist and/or vet.
I received some bad news as a bolt out of the blue, and it hit hard.
It could be argued that I could have foreseen it coming, but I didn’t.
The calm, peaceful mind I’ve been cultivating was suddenly no more. I was angry.
I know anger is a negative emotion, and the teachings of Buddha tell me that it arises from self-cherishing delusions; having more regard for myself and my own needs than for those of others.
I do accept this, in principle. In practice, yesterday my anger arose and was a long time abating.
As I continue to learn how to train my mind – and my heart – anger is something that I need to and will address. I’m going for growth.
Today, on my walk with Lydia, I am still aware of anger. It feels like it is pervading my whole body.
I have concerns that Lydia will pick up on this, but she doesn’t seem to have done.
We are in a quiet spot with no immediate triggers. Lydia is calmer today than she has been on this same walk for some time.
She walks to heel with a loose lead most of the way, and I reinforce this with food rewards and praise.
It rains a little bit but neither of us minds. Then the sun comes out.
I’m going to visit friends this afternoon. It will be another good day. And this time I believe the good feeling will stay, at least for longer than it did yesterday.
When I first started writing this blog I had just retired and it was something that I wanted to do.
I thought it would help me to complete a cycle of mental health recovery that I’d started many years previously, and that in writing about my experiences it might help others too.
I had no idea then just how far away I was from the summit of my recovery mountain, or just how many sheer cliff faces I was going to have to climb to be able to finally enjoy the view.
That was over five years ago.
I found no easy answers but knew that I had to keep going, and I did.
At 69 I have no wish or need now to climb any more mountains, either in my head or with my feet. However, my journey does continue, day by day, step by step, and I will continue to write about it and share it with anyone who is interested.
My new e-book, publishing on Amazon for Kindle 5th June, gives insights into how Lydia, Me & our Family of Three have recently made our final ascent:
‘Train your dog; train your mind – positive reinforcement for humans and canines’
I’ve spent hours – days even – cross-stitching over the last few months.
A lot of other people must have been cross-stitching too, as all the company websites I’ve bought kits from have had special messages up to say how they are coping with unprecedented demand due to the Covid crisis.
Even so, orders have arrived promptly, and been a joy to work with …
… helping me to gain a sense of being at peace with myself and the world:
There’s something so soothing about the technique of counted cross-stitch, that puts my mind at ease.
I’ve mostly made cards – and some Christmas decorations – to send to people – friends – and it’s lovely to think about these friends as I stitch away.
I’m not great on phone calls or Facebook, but stitching has become my thing. I’m going to try knitting again though, for a while. Knitting’s good too. And macramé: knotting!
Glad About 
You must be logged in to post a comment.