Growing Pains

Most of the time we live in our own ordered, secure world and don't ever look at it or ourselves very closely. Often it's not until you have an experience or meet someone that you are forced to confront yourself and how you view the world - how you will respond, act, feel, change...

The last few weeks have seen some major changes in my life which have seen different people, events and experience come into my world in a short space of time.

Maybe no-one could easily handle this much change without being affected in some or many ways I know I can't. But I can't keep hiding within myself and I can't run away.

It just leaves me the option of 'growing up'.

I say growing up because I feel so immature at times. Emotionally immature for certain. Ironically I think I can listen to others, be wise and mature, empathetic and even insightful but in the moments I have to deal with myself I am a mess.

How do you learn to handle emotions, when all you have done in life is to avoid, suppress or nullify them? They say being in touch with your emotions is a good thing, maybe like exercise where it is often a case of 'no pain, no gain'. One blessing in all this is some off the people I have spent time with in the midst of the pain and the strange thing is almost all of their first names begins with the letter A!

Well here's hoping that the pain I'm going through produces emotional muscle for the future challenges ahead.

Walking backwards

The other day I was walking into town and felt the urge to walk backwards down the hill - I know I am very much a child at heart. I only went for half a dozen or so steps but I was interested in the feelings it brought out of me.

I enjoyed being able to look back at where I had been where I had come from whilst at the same time being concerned even scared of my future destination. I wasn't fully in control of where I was going.

Turning around I was struck by a couple things.
I was now safe because I could see where I was going. However, I wasn't enjoying the view as much because I was concentrating on where I was going.
Also I couldn't really remember where I had come from, the image of the path behind me immediately faded as it went past my peripheral vision.

This speaks to me of our own personal journeys.
Most of the time we are so focused on the immediatacy of our lives as they play out in front of us that we can't enjoy the journey. On top of that we barely have any time to remember the past never mind enjoy or learn from it.

Yet walking backwards down that hill is actually what our lives are like. The only things we can be certain of are those that are in the past, "we only have what we remember"*, and the future is truly unknown. In this future we need to trust in ourselves, in others and in God that we will be safe step by step and maybe every once in a while stop, turn around and have a look at our past.

* from Wooden Heart, Listener

Speaking a different language

How many of you, like me struggle to learn or speak a different language? This year I am going on holiday to France and I know I will only be able to speak a few token words of French and even if I really tried to learn I would barely get out of the basic phrases. And once you try to learn a bit of another language you then hit the massive hurdle of fluent speakers talking back at you two or three times too fast for you to understand.

The easy part of learning a language is using the words, understanding them when they are spoken to you and being able to respond back is the real skill. I have discovered (over the last ten years or so) that I need to learn the language of human emotions and connection. I am probably still in year 1 primary age class in this topic (with occasional flashes of promise!).

I wish like French someone had engaged me with a real desire to learn this inner language and not be stuck in my well established routines and responses. But the good news is we never stop learning and even someone as old as me can learn a new trick!