So-called “normal” life makes us sick!

Tags

autoimmune disorders, calm down, do less, Hashimoto's, over-stimulated, over-tired, run on adrenaline, Silence, Slow down, slow yoga, slow yogis, Stress, Yoga

So here I am, second week back from my lovely writing retreat and I’ve come down with the flu.

Bah! Change of season and all of that, but honestly, what I’ve noticed more than anything since my return to the “normal” world is that this world? It really ain’t so normal.

In the middle of the bush, with all of my basic needs met – sleep, food, yoga, meditation, writing and hiking – I can’t express how INCREDIBLY well I felt. Just… brimming with health and vitality.

Everything I did for myself was appropriate to the day and how I felt. If I needed more sleep, I took it. If I wanted a longer/shorter meditation, so be it. Time wasn’t a feature in most of my activities other than remembering to go down the hill for dinner just before it got dark.

And then.

I returned to Melbourne. A biggish city. Well, big enough anyway. The response in my body was immediate. Sluggishness, exhaustion, headaches and generally feeling disinclined to leave the house unless I have to.

That was last week. Now, I’m sick again. Which isn’t so great in some ways but on the other hand, its served to ring the reality bell around how completely unhealthy our western world lifestyle is. And I’m not just talking about people who eat junk food 24/7.

Word is that one of the biggest triggers for autoimmune disorders is our environment. Yep. Exposure toxic chemicals and heavy metals. In our cities and suburbs, we’re saturated in them.

Coming down from the mountain, it’s all the little things I noticed, that seem to add up: traffic and street lights; cars, buses, trucks and planes; too much concrete; pollution; loud noises; unaware people smacking their bag into your arm on the train; working hard and long hours; not resting when we need to; staying up late. Etcetera.

We get stressed, over-tired and over-stimulated. We run on adrenaline (another autoimmune trigger!) and then when we fall over, we wonder why.

Really though, is it such a surprise that so many of us feel sick all the time? That we drag ourselves through our week days and then to make up for having to do a job we don’t love, overdo the fun and exhaust ourselves even further?

That whole routine? It’s nuts.

We need to overhaul our entire way of living. But how?

Well… from my perspective and experience, the answer is the same for everyone.

No matter the current status of your health, we all need to:

SLOW THE HECK DOWN!

Recently, the lovely Rachel wrote about Slow Yoga – something a few of us yoga teacher types have been talking about on Twitter for a while now – which is our way of describing a philosophy towards both yoga and life.

We’ve ripped the term from the “slow food” movement of course, but the principals are the same. Well sorta. From a yoga perspective, we’re saying no to Bikram and don’t believe you get any more benefit from a fast-paced vinyasa “power flow” than you do from working more slowly and calmly.

We “slow yogis” all teach what we like to call “nanna yoga” – each of us in our own style. Of course, in slow yoga you can still work your ass off if you want. But instead of feeling exhausted afterwards, you’ll ideally feel more energized and awake.

And… Sarah Wilson wrote about the need for silence. Holy Shiva, we need more of this. Each and every one of us. Less headphones plugged in to the iPhone with music blaring (and disturbing others around you), more observing the world. Taking time to see (and perhaps photograph) things that move you.

Things that make you feel connected to the world. Without having to blah blah blah all the time, yeah?

Personally I crave silence, and fortunately for me I have my yoga practice which serves as both alone AND silent time. I also try to get as much silence into my day as possible. No radio or TV in the morning while I get ready for work. No TV at all really, unless I’m watching something specific.

So yeah… we can all basically do with slowing down, calming down and doing less. It doesn’t make us weak, lazy or pathetic. Instead, it can be an opportunity to listen to your body. Find out what you really need in order to be well.

And when you’re not well? Pay attention. Not just to getting over your cold, but to what you might be able to change in your life to reduce the levels of stress you face on a daily basis.

~ Svasti

Talkin’ to myself

Tags

Anxiety, Dialouge, Did the cat write this?, Foot in mouth disease, Haha, Humour, Laughing at myself, Make of this what you will, Oh just get on with it, Random conversations, Shut up, Silence, Silliness, Talking to myself, Which voice do I listen to?

What a mess we’ve made! Now, I don’t know quite what to say.

Say anything! Say something!

But what if it’s the wrong thing (again)?

You’ve gotta try… and you’re a smart girl…

Easy for you to say! What if my attempt is unwanted?

The way things are going, you’ll never find out!

But… I don’t want to seem needy (yet again)!

It’s not all about you, you know…

That’s true, I know that, and I want to ask, but…

But what?

What I said before, what if the question, any question from me is unwanted?

After all this time, you think it’s that simple?

I don’t know! I hope not! But I’m a little scared to ask in case…

Okay, but perhaps that’s how it is for…

Yeah, yeah, maybe but there’s no clues either way! I don’t know what’s happened, if that’s it, or…

Have a little faith!

But I don’t know! I don’t want to push my luck, or look desperate or manipulative?

Hey, posting this to your blog could be seen as any one of those things, too.

True… but I don’t mean it that way. I can’t read minds you know! And I’m scared…

No, and most other people can’t either, but I get why you’re scared…

What do I do? I just don’t know…

So wait, give it more time.

I’m trying to do just that! But the silence is killing me. It’s deafening.

Yeah, it’s tough… but hey, why not just send out some love, see what happens? Everyone needs support and love, even if they can’t reach out in return…

You’re right! So… here’s some love, just for you. And you. And [looks straight down the camera] for YOU too.

You know the rest, I hope…

~Svasti

Innocence – part 2

Tags

1980's, Betrayed, Crying underwater, Diary, First boyfriend, Half-brother, Innocence, Love, Police, Runaway, Secrets, Self-esteem, Sex, Silence, Virginity

[Read part 1]

Packing

The afternoon of the day I ran away, my sister watched me pack… in the room we’d shared since she was born, throwing notes on scrunched up paper across the room, playing with dolls and toys, fighting, creating an absolute mess, giggling way past our bedtime.

She kept saying she didn’t think I’d really do it. And she never said a word to my parents.

The bag was stashed in our wardrobe, a place we’d spent time hiding to eat illicit chocolate. Where not too long ago, I’d leave out cheese and milk, hopeful faeries would visit.

I wrote a note – don’t bother trying to find me – about all I can recall from the rambling one pager (as if they wouldn’t think of where to look).

How terrifying for my sister to wake and see I was gone. How panicked my parents must have been (no one has talked about that time to me, ever).

Apparently this was the only time my brother showed anything resembling caring for me – taking to the streets on his bike, looking for me. Apparently.

What next?

Tick, tick, tick. I was hiding. Not in control. No idea what my life was going to be like. Police looking for me. All I wanted was to be with my boyfriend (though he was going back to England), just what my parents didn’t want.

I knew I was missing out on school. Would I ever go back? Would I ever see my school friends again? What about my little sis? Swimming training?

The cops took my bag of clothes, also containing my diary… documenting my childish fancies.

Documenting also, the night N indelicately erased my virginity… copying in my childish hand, in the style of some adolescent book I was reading then, the words were stark – As of tonight, I’m no longer a virgin. I don’t feel different, but I know I am… – can’t have been pleasant reading for my parents.

It was later I discovered they’d read it. If I was them, I’d have done the same. But that act still violated my trust and I was furious. Especially when my dad would say – you live in a world of fantasy most of the time, don’t you – based on what he read and held it against me as though I was retarded, for a long time.

But I hated him for a long time for reading my diary.

Before all that… I was hiding out in the next door neighbour’s house. In a bedroom. Under the bed. I didn’t get to see N very much at all. No one would let us be alone together.

I’m sure there were phone calls and discussions I wasn’t privy to. About me, not including me.

Night rolled in…

N’s aunt and uncle eventually convinced me the best thing to do was to go with the police. They knew I was there; they wanted to help make things right with my parents. I didn’t know how to, and I was scared. And angry. And worried I wouldn’t get to see N again.

Cop shop

They took me away in a police car to the local station where my parents waited. I knew by then about my diary. I spewed fury – I hate you – at my parents. Dad cried, one of the only times I’ve seen that, to this day.

At the station I was given two choices – go home with my parents or stay at a girls’ home. A place for juveniles. I don’t know if it was just a threat… but for a while I was seriously gunning for the girls’ home.

Much of the station time is a blur. I remember a police woman being very abrupt, and in return I was rude. Mum slapped my face, afraid I think, the police would make decisions for me.

I scowled. None of this would’ve happened if they hadn’t said I couldn’t go to the airport so as far as I was concerned, it was their fault.

Somehow, during some very tense moments, tears and anger, they all talked me down. Talked me in to returning home on the promise of being able to go to the airport for N’s flight back to the UK.

I shake my head in wonder now, thinking of the wilful young child that I was, the anger and destruction I created…

A night of reckoning

The car ride is blank. Back home, I think my brother and sister were in bed – perhaps awake?

My parents and I sat in the kitchen, looking at a calendar. Trying to work out if there was any chance I could be pregnant.

No mum, I haven’t started my period yet.

Doing the laundry she’d noticed some blood in my knickers, so she wasn’t sure.

I don’t remember much of what was said, the three of us sitting there. Tension, sadness, anger and frustration. At some point I shouted – What would you know? How could you understand what its like?

Things grew silent.

Teary and terrified, mum revealed her darkest secret – her first son, out there somewhere – taken from her for the crime of being pregnant and unmarried (a brother I’ve never met??). My first glimpse of the shame and grief she’d worn like an invisible coat, never removed.

I expect you think I’m a terrible person, she stated.

Oh my god mum, no I don’t! That’s… so sad! So horrible.

Sworn to secrecy, I couldn’t tell my brother or sister or even mention it again.

Went to bed at some point, back in the room I shared with my sister. Gone for one whole life changing day, I think.

Back to school the next, and no one knew. Now I had two secrets I didn’t tell anyone except M. And I only told her little bits. Done and dusted, I was left to live with the aftermath.

And then…

So long, goodbye…

Hazy tear stained scene of N and me at the airport. My parents, his aunt and uncle, hovering on opposite perimeters as we hugged and I cried inconsolably. We promised to write, to call, to stay together.

He went through the gates and he was gone.

I wrote the first of many letters that night. Pages of ‘I love you‘ written over and over. A long wait for something in return. A phone call or two. The promise of ‘a promise ring’.

Sputtered into nothing.

Realisation came slowly, then as with sunrise… dusk vanishes swiftly in the first rays of sunshine. Full daylight. Oh.

It was over. He didn’t really love me. Oh… He didn’t want me. Had he only wanted sex?? Oh!!

There was a silver pendant and chain my parents gave me once. I’d loaned it to N because he asked (though I hadn’t wanted to) and never saw them again. I wrote and asked for them back. Nothing.

Far away in another country… he didn’t want me any more.

Heartless

In recent times I’ve talked of feeling like my heart had been ripped from my chest. My therapist asked me if there was another time I’d felt like that before.

Sure was. When I realised I’d been used and discarded.

Felt like I’d been raped (though I hadn’t – just manipulated). Cheated and misused, certainly. Empty, sad, heartbroken and alone. Lost. Confused. Betrayed. Shredded.

Coulda driven a truck through my chest, the hole there felt that large.

Every notch my self-esteem rose on the back of being loved was gone. Worse, it was all a lie. Extreme pressure filled my head… would it explode?

But none of this was a topic of conversation at home. Just like my mum, I wasn’t allowed to express my pain. No privacy either, in my shared bedroom with a sister too young to understand.

I found solace in swimming training… diving deep and crying underwater where no one could see or tell the difference. For seconds at a time.

Struggling on at school and home, I was low. But you wouldn’t have known, ‘cept for the odd flare up with my mum. Arguments like a flash and gone again, core issues never addressed.

Two generations both limping in pain, but not solidarity… what could’ve brought us together just pushed us further apart as secrets often do…

~Svasti