I was sitting with my mood today and a story came...
I moved from Cornwall to Wiltshire in June in order to do more of my beloved work. It was a huge move - emotional, a deep sense of grieving for a place I loved, and a real determination towards feeling good about my new home, which was to be renovated....
The moved done, time passed....
With my request for some action, builders finally began at the end of October.
October??! Right through the winter then when it was planned to be finished by Christmas?
And then, awkward to say, my friend, the person who offered to project-manage the whole thing (her occupation), didn’t. Nothing was happening unless I made it happen. And yet I was meant to be in London networking like mad, building my service, teaching, learning, deepening my experience, and earning.... But confused builders and I finally found ourselves in agreement - if this job was to be done at all, I was the one to do this thing called project-managing. Having never done it before!
And today I saw my mood as an image...
Annie, standing on a tuffet of grass in the middle of a bog. I’m standing, because the tuffet is only about 15 inches (38 cms!) across, so I haven’t even space to sit. It’s green, mossy and springy - not a solid, grounded feel to it at all. It’s pretty I grant you, but it’s about a foot above a sucky, yucky, smelly bog, which would suck me under within minutes. And it’s where I have to be until the work done ‘solidifies’ the mud.... On my little island - looking over to the land where things are happening, conceptively without me.
I made no plans for tuffet-living. I’m bored, frustrated, and feel compressed, but I’m here until... The work done will be the bog hardening, but until the work is done, this is where I am. Wobbling, sometimes resigned, often frustrated, mostly accepting, but stuck. Trapped by another’s whim and idea about my life.
On my tuffet I realise A Big Lesson. Not only have I learned a while ago that if I don’t like myself much and think I ought to change, I will attract people who think I am not good enough and try to change me. And it will be Very Uncomfortable. But now I learn that if I think I can’t do something I will attract people who get a kick out of helping-others-do-what-they-think-the-other-ought-to-do. And the other is currently me. And it’s equally as uncomfortable as lesson #1. And with the growth of self-belief from the first lesson, it feels a time of even greater frustration! But maybe worth it; I choose to learn from every experience I can.
But back to my tuffet. Ah... Oh... Well, that’s it, isn’t it! I’m on my tuffet, and that’s it. Tuffets in the middle of a bog is a place, not a story. It just is. So I shall ‘is’ too. Until I’ve project-managed my way off it. I can fight it and fight me. Or I can resign to it negatively and sit in victim. But what I will do is find that space in the middle - choose to not compress myself physically (doesn't help any) stay soft and open (feels much nicer) and sense self-kindness through awareness of what is without self-judgement, and through choosing to acknowledge that I am alive, capable, discovering things, more powerful than I thought, innovative, and feel immensely grateful for having the choice as to how I respond to all this. This changes how I am towards me on a tuffet. Once I would have knocked myself off it into the bog through drowning in self-blame for ‘being so stupid’. (Ouch!) Now way more open-hearted and minded, I’m here and that’s it. Job to do and job will be done. Its easy to say it’s then I shall attend to my goal, but each part is included in all this goal, if I choose it, and I do. For now, drying my bog (finishing the renovation) is just the first ‘goalette’ of the whole goal. It’s all one.
So, I’ll send you a cheery wave from my wee green and grassy patch - for which I am grateful really; bogs are not nice to sink in and I’m ok up here - and say I am so looking forward to getting off it and seeing you all on land as soon as possible! I’m sorry I can’t welcome you onto my wee tuffet for a cuppa; it’s a bit small, but you just wait - my Big Kettle will be on soon!
Are you on a tuffet in some way? Do you need a bit of support and encouragement? Let me know and we can ‘tuffet share’ for a bit and find courage in companionship.
(PS Did you know a ‘tuffett’ is actually a pad made of untreated sheep’s wool - roughly woven into a square of about 2 inches thick. They’re incredibly warm, and waterproof courtesy of the lanolin in the wool, and now made by a lady in Cornwall. (The Travelling Tuffetteer.) I have two and they are amazing for sitting on cold rocks and beaches! But, as you know, we also use the term ‘tuffet’ for a grassy clump.)
With thanks to: Photo by Simon Migaj from Pexels https://www.pexels.com/photo/silhouette-photography-of-person-standing-on-green-grass-in-front-of-mountains-during-golden-hour-746386/
thanks for sharing
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