Running Girl

I did it.  Today I did it.  I ran for 25 minutes, non stop, very slowly, to the tunes of Chaka Demus and Pliers.  I got out there and ran.  And uphill for half of that.  I am already feeling less scared.  I can do it.  I am doing it.  I will run 6 k through mud and water and uphill and down hill.  Though i may do it very slowly!!

back on track, tracking update

I am starting the day every day with a cup of hot water and lemon.  My 2nd cup of tea is PG tips.  My third is a rooibosh caffeine free thing.  So that is 2 less cups of caffeine a day.  Am making an effort to have more rooibosh tea.  I really like it anyway, so its not difficult.  Am still drinking coffee, but hey.  Mostly its one cup a day, but yesterday I had a meeting and had another one.  Am totally fine with that.

Food wise, its going really well.  I am eating porridge and apple, with dried fruits and nuts in it, every morning.  I made a huge swede and celeriac curry  - another Abel & Cole recipe and have been eating that, with quinoa and cavalo nero. 

Hub is back on his diet, and that is going well too.  We have been avoiding doing big shops at the supermarkets.  And have discovered Lidl and Aldi, which are super cheap, and in most things, its seems no worse for quality.  Our last shop as £60.  I mean really.  No way would any other supermarket have been that cheap.  And Bub really wanted the advent calendar there, which had chocolate in it and was only 49p.  Go Lidl.

Hub has got a new work lead.  Setting up the Yoga class in town for January is going well. 

I have NOT yet done any running.  I have to admit I am even MORE scared of it than ever.  Its SO COLD.  And I have discovered that the run I am signed up to do includes RUNNING THROUGH RIVERS!!!! seriously!!! It turns out I need special shoes.  And the best thing to wear is apparently shorts and a vest.  I am so so so very not keen!!  But I have arranged to go running with friends next Friday.  And I need to put in a couple of runs before that.  F*CK.  I AM going to do it.  I have to.  I am sponsored.  I am committed.  I do not like the cold.  But I have a sports bra.  I may go back on my wearing weird foot wear though.  I need trail running shoes.....  bloody hell.

I am up to date with work admin.  Which I was not up with. And I need to be better at doing that straight away.  I am committed to making better notes sooner and entering the data sooner too. 

Oh and I sent off our accounts to the accountant.  Get me.  Hub did as he was told and queried a charge on the credit card bill, and we got £12 back.  Also he has transferred some cash out of a rather forgotten ISA and its now in his current account which helps there. 

Work, despite the admin lag, is actually going really well.  I was pleased with my more improvisational approach this week.  I think it helped my clients. 

Today I am off to a tea dance with Joyce.  Joyce is 92 and I am being a companion to her while her daughter is a way.  A tea dance. This is a new thing.

circling around

I love that autobiography in 5 chapters I posted last (see here).  Because it just shows how we circle around and keep going back over the same things, but each time with more awareness, until finally we are ready to let that thing go.

I am circling back around to tracking.  For various reasons. 

My glamourous exciting trips abroad this year were all totally worth it, but there has been a price.  Not just financially (though of course this is a large part of the issue) but in terms of control.  Taking that time out meant not only was I not earning money during those times, but that I didn't take any time to organise myself, take stock, or keep up with my admin.

I was thrown slightly by my trips.  I came back to rather a lot of chaos.  A workroom I could hardly get into.  Piles of admin waiting to be dealt with.  And finances in rather a lot of chaotic disarray.

Add to that, the sense of discombobulation, the sense that I am behind on myself, and I am running, running and not yet, quite ever catching up, or feeling satisfied that my jobs are well enough done.  It has been a period of flying on a wing an a prayer.  Nothing has gone horribly wrong.  All is fine.  But that sense, that I couldn't quite trust where I was at, has been getting me down.  Yesterday, and perhaps for a few days prior to today, I had started to feel a bit depressed.  On Friday, I had a lovely day out, but on the journey there, and on the journey back was this gnawing dissatisfied feeling, this slightly sneaking suspicion, that perhaps I ought to have spent my time catching up on myself.

I think for that whole last week, instead of catching up on myself, I had been running away instead.  Friday, because I left the house and went to London, seemed to highlight what I was up to.   Hell yes a day trip to London with wine and art and trips to Borough Market.  And at home, though I knew in my soul I wanted to do more yoga, get running, tidy up and eat better....... instead I have lounged around, eaten fried potatoes and take aways and watched a lot of I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here.  (I do kind of know one of the people on it.  But that really is an excuse) and add to that the time spent on facebook, watching Strictly AND all the It Takes 2 subsiduary shows...... Life was feeling sluggish, I was feeling down on myself and yuck.  I felt l distracted and dissipated and plain WRONG.

I knew something had to be done.  And so, while not wanting to be too hard on myself (I have been reading about self compassion lately)  I did change some things this morning.  And I am going to go back to various form of tracking.  It makes me feel like progress is being made.  And YES I am making progress.  Hurrah.   Am all tidied up.  I have various plans moving forward.  I am caught up on admin (OK I do still have the 2013 accounts to send in, but I AM working on it)  And yes I DO definitely feel better.

I have reduced my current projects right down to the bare bones.  These are

Financial control
6K run
Yoga
People Who Do
Art
Christmas
Healthy eating

I am also reducing the amount of time spent on facebook.  To this end I have deleted the app from my phone.  I fess up to having visited 2 times today.  But I did not browse while I drank my morning tea.  And at lunch, I did read and interesting article, but it was essentially a pointless waste of time.  Yup.  Stopping it.  Or at the very least cutting right down.  Sometimes it is a good thing.

I started the day with hot water and lemon.  I am not cutting out caffeine totally.  But again, reducing consumption.  I had one cup of tea this morning, not 5.

Cooked some delicious food.  And we are back on the household budget.  We will definitely be making our own Christmas gifts (lots of baking) where possible.  And  we will be staying home and not travelling for a while.  Hub has a large bit of work on in January which should help ease things a little.  All is good.  And I feel better.  So bear with me while I bore on with my tracking.  It helps me.  And this is my personal blog.  Namaste!

Found at Last

Chapter I

I walk down the street. 

There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. 

I fall in. 

I am lost... I am hopeless. 

It isn't my fault. 

It takes forever to find a way out. 

 

Chapter 2

I walk down the same street. 

There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. 

I pretend I don't see it. 

I fall in again. 

I can't believe I'm in the same place. 

But it isn't my fault. 

It still takes a long time to get out. 

 

Chapter 3

I walk down the same street. 

There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. 

I see it is there. 

I still fall in... it's a habit. 

My eyes are open. 

I know where I am. 

It is my fault. 

I get out immediately. 

 

Chapter 4

I walk down the same street. 

There is a deep hole in the sidewalk. 

I walk around it. 

 

Chapter 5

I walk down another street. 

 

~

Sogual Rinpoche - Tibetan Book of Living and Dying

 

I was in a yoga class taught by Nadia Narain at triyoga  - probably circa 2005 - when I heard this.  Nadia read it out, either at the beginning or the end of the class.  It really made an impact.  So much so that for about the last year I have been trying to find it.  Googling half remembered lines and coming up nowhere.  And today I found it.  Funnily enough, I read an article in a magazine about Nadia, and googled her instead.  In the magazine article there were a few books she was recommending and, she really was, is, probably even more so now, a brilliant yoga teacher.  Heartfelt without being heavy or preachy.  And there's the quote.  Perhaps I should have googled Nadia before.  I am so glad to have found it.  Thank you Nadia.  I have read other things in my classes, inspired by your reading of this.  I am teaching on Saturday.  I will be reading this.  Namaste. 

New Stew

I tried a new recipe tonight.  "Brassica, Bangers, Beer & Bay" (that would be cabbage, sausages, beer and bay leaves btw).  An Abel & Cole suggestion that came in the veg box with yet another cabbage.

I really love to try out new recipes and despite feeling a bit shit and smarting from the realisation that I cannot please everyone at Christmas, nor indeed have my own way.... I  got stuck into creating something in the kitchen.

I have to admit it is one of my happy places.  Especially with a glass of good red.  Hub was a little un enthusiastic about the prospect of anything braised, but I am glad I persisted.  Not just because the result was truly delicious and enjoyed by all, but because, the act of cooking it, of conducting a culinary experiement, a small journey into the unknown, which also involved chopping vegetables, was exciting as well as calming.

hear hear to trying new recipes and hear hear to brassica with bangers beer and bay  http://www.abelandcole.co.uk/recipes/braised-brassica-with-bangers-beer-and-bay

Where Art is.

I have been thinking a lot about art.  and I need to keep writing about it, because its becoming increasingly important to me.  i mean I travelled half way across the globe to make some.  I think I needed to go that far to realise.  I don't have to go anywhere.

Its going to be an internal journey.  And an exploration that I can carry out anywhere.  I loved seeing Madelyn again - I love her whole being and the way she can transform anything into a sacred, poetic act.  Just being in conversation with her is a delight.

I also LOVED Tracy Verdugo's class. 

 

I have such a deep admiration for her, I am not sure where or when I met her online, but I know I knew that she hosted Flora Bowley in Australia.  And I feel that I have followed her from way back.  I love how she has taken the leap onto the international stage.  And she is a very good teacher.  She deserves her succes.  It was a great class.  And for me, having done Flora's class, this was definitely a continuation on the same path.  Not the same, but of the same....... mindset.  No, heart.  Heart is a better word.  It built on what I know and acts from a place that I enjoy.

Alena's class had me a bit frustrated.  I wasn't that happy with what I produced.  It felt soft and wafty.  I did manage  to bring it into some focus by the end, but it still felt....  a bit.... I dunno.  Not quite me.  It was good to experiment.  I guess I don't quite connect with soft focus.  I did, however like my quick sketch book page I did.  I guess this is part of the journey, making work you don't like so much.  Perhaps it was the most instructive class of all.

And yet.  All of it.  However wonderful the travel, the new experiences, the great people, the great teachers, the extraordinary landscape and the slipping back into the trusting and serendipity that travelling brings.

I know my work is here, where I am.  My journey begins now.  Here.

faraway and back again

its been a while.  I've been away.  All the way to California and back.  Oh and Spain too.  Get me, galavanting about like a jetsetter. 

Back now. 

I will post some of my favourite pictures from being away. 

And then I will tell you what I learnt

1. I can go further than I think I can
2. Everything I need is right here, right now. 
3.My art practice comes from within me. And I don't need to go to the other side of the world to practice.
4. San Francisco burritos are better
5. Serendipity rocks
6. I know what persimmons are and what they taste like
7. I like mixing colours
8. I like Diptique L'Eau Duelle
9. I like making altars
10. I am more edgy than whimsical (visual expression wise)
11. I am very lucky