New Year: Moving forward

Sometimes it is so hard to think about how to move on from a situation that you may find yourself in. Not everyone has a faith to cling to when the road you're on is shaking to its foundations. Not everyone has the ear of good friends to talk to who will truly listen: A skill that few seem to possess because they want so much to help you solve your problems or to stop you from hurting. Not everyone can afford to go to counselling.  I don't know if we really realise just how deep our feelings about some things can run. Sometimes it can be so deep that we are not even aware of it.

I don't know about you but I've buried my feelings so deep that I  thought, because

Ostricch by Pawny@rgbstock.com

I couldn't find words to express how I felt, that it was obvious that I felt nothing. Wrong!  I felt deeply. I might not have had the words but I sure bloody had the feelings. I also thought that because my feelings weren't at the forefront of my mind they weren't anywhere in me. Wrong. I thought because I didn't share these feelings with others that they were not a problem for me. Wrong! When you are experiencing the impact of your world changing, the shaking that takes place within and around you, these buried emotions come back to haunt you like ghosts reappearing in your life. If you actually make space to be with yourself you soon realise that all those feelings, emotions and thoughts actually sit pretty close and at the oddest times they will resurface and impact on your here and now. So what to do?  Well I did something that my logic was telling me wouldn't really work. I am  surprised that it did help me and for some reason unknown to me I want to share it. 

Yep... you are looking at a bucket on the right. Let me explain.

Bucket of let go

i call it my bucket of letting go. At one point, last year, I was feeling stuck and afraid. I felt like I couldn’t move back, forward or sideways. I felt stuck. Now on the surface everything appeared like I was coping but when you strip away all the activity of my day; kids, family, friends, meetings, work, pub, clubs, telephone calls, text messages, Facebook, watching TV until it watches you or trying to read a book.  All to stop feelings rising. These feelings I thought couldn't be dumped on others and eventually surrounded me.  I knew that I needed to get them out of my head because they were running around causing some real damage and it wasn't pretty. The reality is they were blocking me from me.

I was reading some book and came across something that it suggested I try. 

Girl on a beach by julos@rgbstock.com 

I wasn't expecting much but felt I should give it a go.  it instructed me to get a plain piece of paper and pen. Find a quiet place and a time where I could write down all the things /emotions that were bothering me. it said i should write down all the fears, worries and complaints (I think you get my drift).   Write them down.  Once I had finished doing this I was to place the paper in a bucket and fill the bucket with water. I was like yeah right! All that airy fairy stuff isn't my style, it doesn't work, what good does it do? What you need to do Bev is take some action rather than this. I said to myself. I remembering thinking what if someone finds it you will be exposed! But despite that initial reaction, and after a quick bit of reflecting, I thought what did I really have to lose from trying it?

So I took one piece of paper and started to write. Then I took another piece of paper. Then

Zela@www.rgbstock.com

another and so on until I felt I couldn't write anymore.  I can't tell you how long I wrote for. I can't even tell you the things that I wrote down. Not because I don't want to (I know thank God right) but because I genuinely can't remember.  All I can tell you is that I thought it would end up being two lines. How wrong was I? What I can remember is a sense of relief and a weight off my shoulder. I remember watching  as the water overflowed the rim of the bucket. As it did this my papers sunk to the bottom. When I turned the tap off I thought the paper would float to the top revealing everything. It sunk. They were drowned! I walked away for a bit to test if they would actually stay at the bottom of the bucket or if the paper would float up. I was surprised that they actually did stay at the bottom of the bucket! I left the bucket there for a while and when I returned later. I could see that some of the words had smudged almost like they were melting away and with it my feelings. I then took a soak in a hot bath filled with sea salt and just rested. 

Did it help me?  Yes it did. Was I surprised Yes I was. 

As this New Year has started I was again reminded to let go. I find myself here again doing this exercise not because it didn't work. I am doing it again as I preparation for the year to come.   There is definitely something in it. I'm not trying to convince you. I am just sharing with you what I have found. There is something about putting stuff like your fears down on paper and drowning them. It somehow releases you. It somehow releases me.  I realise that New Year resolutions are unlikely to work unless I learn to let go. I’m sure that the bucket of let go will feature throughout my year ahead but if I release the negative, to let in the positive, and actual begin to heal myself then I’m glad for the bucket. Wouldn't you? So here’s to letting go.