Inspiration
I went to see “Little Women” in the cinema today. I knew I was going to like it, but I didn’t know I was going to love it! I have read a version of the book many years ago, but I am like a goldfish with some books and films. As we came out of the cinema, my mum told her friend and I that she played Amy at school. I can see how she would make a good Amy – surprisingly clever, and kind, despite a harder exterior at times. Amy comes across as someone who loves her family, but also someone who loves herself enough to expect to be treated right, and is deserving of good things in life. I liked her character.
I, however, one hundred percent, related to Jo. To me, she came across in the beginning as if she knew what she wanted to do, steely, determined, and her family loyalty and kindness was evident. But when she showed the anger and passion she had, inside I felt emotional, like those were my feelings. It was clear that when she wasn’t writing, she became more angry and I would say despondent. She started to look to others to make her happy and less lonely.
Films come and go in the cinema, and some I wish I had seen, but this one I knew I had to see. I don’t know why. Did my guardian angel send me there, knowing I needed that kick? The inspiration….providing me with a need as well as a want to write……
Of course the film deals with sibling love and loss. When Beth dies, it’s hard to watch, knowing how sibling grief feels. I didn’t have a sister. I know people who have lost sisters and it is different to losing a brother – I can see that. But it’s similar, I expect. Love is love and loss is loss, and how it affects each individual is based purely on the relationship between the two people. I will never understand what it would be like to lose a sister. I’m relieved at that, as losing my brother was horrific and not something I would ever want to go through again.
Transient feelings
I have come to realise I will have to deal with the loss of Phil on a daily basis. It’s not something I will get through, but it will carry on through the rest of my life in my own internal sacred circle, the grief but also the love. I need to balance the love and the grief. Feeling is living; and living is good. Meditation helps. Knowing each feeling is transitional, and being able to sit with a difficult emotion until it shifts and moves on, which is does, gives relief.
Now I’m not saying if I had known that practising meditation over the past 3 years had this effect, that things would have been easier. Far from it. What I am saying is that now that I have experienced around 1150 days of waking up in my head to the news that my brother is dead, is that I can tolerate it better. I would not have coped with sitting with my thoughts through meditation in the beginning. Concentrating on the breath would have just emphasised that Phil no longer had breaths. I still get that when I meditate now, but I can sit through that uncomfortable panicky feeling and return to my own breath, as my own breath is the only thing I can control. It does take time. Anyone in the first stages of grief (which can be years) has to just persevere until they feel a bit better to try these techniques.
Being plunged into sudden, deep, untimely grief is hard to describe, but feels terrifying – the sense of abandonment, fear, distraught, and how the body aches, is only something others who have had this experience can understand. I still get very achy. Today I feel sore. My heart aches, but so do my limbs, and my bones. I don’t get this every day – yesterday I felt great! Knowing the feelings are transient does help.
Introducing Savers
I had a hard time at the tail end of last year. The lead up to Phil’s anniversary, and then Christmas, combined with SAD and other things that were happening, meant I couldn’t cope, and I had to take some time out. I am learning to be more compassionate towards myself. If a friend of mine was overwhelmed, would I tell them they weren’t strong or good enough not to be able to continue? Of course not – I would be supportive and caring towards them, worried for them, and want to help them. I am my own best friend now. Phil would have helped, but more than that he would have told me what to do to help myself. He is gone, but what I do have installed within me is his legacy – the resource he’s left with me of years and years of his guidance, his voice in my head, and I need to draw on that, heed his advice, and be kind to me.
SAVERS was something I heard about in a podcast. It’s a morning routine which is supposed to help set you up for the day. What I remember SAVERS to stand for is Silence, Affirmations, Visualisation, Exercise, Reading, and Scribing. The aim is to do all of these things before starting your responsibilities for the day. I like to try and think of them as commitments to myself, to gauge their level of importance. I made the resolution that at the start of 2020, I would embark on SAVERS.
How’s it going? Not that great on paper. I have done about 6-7 days of the complete SAVERS routine out of the 19 days of January we have had so far. Some of the other days I have managed 1-2 of the SAVERS, but doing all 6 takes me about 3 hours. If I get up at 6am, this isn’t too bad, as it means starting work around 9.30am, but in the winter months this is tricky as I also need to walk my labrador while it’s daylight, and therefore I can end up working well into the evening.
What I have learnt is more compassion and to not beat myself up when I don’t have time for all my SAVERS. Appointments, sleeping in, or simply not wanting to start/finish work that late, are ok, as these things are also important – they lead to better health and well-being too, but in a different way to SAVERS. Therefore, if I can manage at least 1-2 days a week of my morning routine, I have made an improvement on what I was achieving last year, and it is a step in the right direction.
Knowing I am trying has started to release some joy back into my life. I am doing some reading, some writing, and some exercise. These things give me joy, and I am hoping once spring and summer come, so too, will joy come with more abundance. I have gained a little patience, although I am still incredibly impatient but I am not perfect, and there are greater flaws than wanting things to happen more quickly!
Progress
There is a slight improvement within me. Is this the outcome of Christmas passing, gaining hope through new methods of coping, and/or simply acknowledging gut feelings and perhaps listening to the possibility there is an angel out there, guiding me in a better direction?
I’m not going to overthink it, but what I do hope is that all of this is preparing me for the toughest day that is yet to come – the day I become older than Phil ever was….. it’s looming, and is ever so close….. I am praying it passes swiftly and easily, and I can continue this bizarre journey with courage.
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