Summer in Ireland…. an opportunity for acceptance.

July 25, 2012July 25, 2012 | Mairead

25 7a

(Raindrops…)

We’re back home again and I’m wondering what happened to the sunshine and hight temperatures. Just a few hours east of here the sun is shining and some people are complaining about the heat. They are perspiring from the inside while we are being precipitated on from the outside. At this moment I think it would be great to have sunny weather all the time but I know I’d get fed up with it. I know I’d start complaining. I know I’d start fantasizing about soft rain on my sun-burned face…. Wouldn’t it be so much more useful if I realised that what is here right now isn’t too bad? What is here right now is what someone else (even me on a hot sunny day) wants?

25 7b

(Ducks like rain)

There’s a quote from Eckart Tolle (The Power of Now), “When you are in a state of gratitude for what is … that is really what being wealthy means”. He’s talking about acceptance, when you are content with what’s right in front of you, you are rich. So I’m going to practice being content with this type of summer….. I’ll start with my thinking: I got a little too much sun in Bletchley Park and this cooler weather is very calming for the burning…. There’s no way I can cut the grass in this rain, I’ll have to do something more relaxing, instead…. Isn’t it great we have no flies buzzing in through every open window? It’s so much easier to go walking in this cool air….

25 7c

(Isn’t that pretty?)

Feeling richer already! Byron Katie (Loving What Is and http://www.thework.com) has lots of quotes about this, it’s her main theme, but here’s one…“I am a lover of what is, not because I’m a spiritual person, but because it hurts when I argue with reality.” So for today I’m not going to argue with the reality of the weather. The weather is all around me physically and visually, so making friends with it might be enlightening.

Love the soft rain dripping down your face, Mairead.

Ode to the girls….

July 17, 2012July 17, 2012 | Mairead

17 7a

(Contentment – even with green hair)

I’m back home now and I’m hen-less and egg-less. Will go to the supermarket later for the eggs but we won’t be getting hens. Some people and animals come into your life for just a short time and then they leave. But not before passing on a message or a lesson. What I can remember best from the hens is their one step after the other approach to life…… Sure they were cautious, but once the danger (usually me) passed by or stopped and backed away, then they continued one step after the other.

17 7b

(Take the next step)

Another thing about the hens, they did their own foraging. Each day I presented them with a shovelful of feed and some “treats” but that wasn’t all they ate. They spent a lot of their time scratched around for tasty worms and insects. They could have so easily sat back and eaten the food provided but they took nourishment into their own hands, they maintained their independence and probably their good health.

17 7c

(Celebrate the mistake)

Although I let them out in the mornings (or in the afternoon if I wanted an egg) I didn’t put them back in their pen, they went back in themselves, in their own time. I locked the gate when I found them tucked up together in their house. And the eggs… whenever possible they left their eggs in a place of their choosing, where I never found them.

17 7e

(Find the beauty)

They remind me of Dr. Viktor Frankl who wrote Man’s Search for Meaning having survived life in a concentration camp. Everything can be taken from a man or a woman but one thing: the last of human freedoms to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way. Viktor E. Frankl.

He could easily have included hens, Mairead.

Really, Moira, it was no trouble :)

June 10, 2012June 10, 2012 | Mairead

(View from the dart)

Friday was an odd day. I went to Dublin on the Dart. I didn’t bring an umbrella, probably just as well – gusting winds. I didn’t bring a hat, so hair a bit streely (old Tipperary word meaning… well, not good.) On the return journey something on the train line to Greystones broke and I had to get off at Bray, where there was more rain and windy gusts and also some inspiration…..

(Simple Daisies)

It’s the kind of day you should stay home and sit by a warm fire, but two weeks ago I promised my sister I’d deliver something and I hadn’t done it. Oh, it seemed like such a small thing when she asked and it was, I love going into Dublin. It’s just I never got around to doing it (does this remind anyone of the gardening?) I had even begun to get specific, promising that I would do it on Thursday… but I didn’t. So Friday was the day. The Met. Office had issued weather warnings but I’d have to start lying to my sister if I didn’t go now. I couldn’t do that…. could I? No, of course not.

Heart

(The delivery…. “Head over Heels” Alan Ardiff)

Anyway, I went, and on the way home as an announcement proclaimed the broken thing in Greystones I met a young woman. She had been on her way to Greystones too and heard me talking on the phone to Denis (isn’t he great, he offered to pick me up in Bray?) She asked if I could take her from the train into the station. She was blind and didn’t know this station well enough to navigate it on her own. I was inspired by her trust. Not just her trust in me but the bigger trust… her trust in a benevolent world, her trust that everything would be okay enough to go outside and navigate in the dark. Her trust that she would get to her destination. I was also inspired by her willingness to ask for help.

Trust and ask for help… simple. Mairead.

Horas non numero nisi serenas!

June 8, 2012June 8, 2012 | Mairead

(A bit of the sundial and fountain. Sorry, I chopped off the pretty parts…)

In the end we went to Powerscourt House and Gardens. The house for lunch and coffee, the gardens for flowers and graves. One of the other choices was Wexford and we picked well because they got an awful lot of rain in Wexford on Wednesday. We got the sun… and then some shade because it was too bright and then some breeze because it was a bit hot and then some sun because it got a little chilly. I suppose we got everything we needed except rain (which we didn’t need anyway).

(The Dolphin Pond)

We began our adventure in the gardens and the leaflet told us that this first section, called the Italian Gardens, was designed in the 1840’s by Daniel Robertson and that it took 100 men over twelve years to complete. Well then… seems like all the best gardens take more time than you might think sensible to complete….

(One of the gravestones in the pet’s graveyard)

I looked up Daniel Robertson and I read that he went bankrupt in England and afterwards moved his gardening business to Ireland. The gardens at Killruddery, where we went to the food market, were designed by him also. The latin inscription over the sundial in the Italian Garden, says “Horas non numero nisi serenas“, I do not count the hours unless they are tranquil. Because of his previous difficulties (with the bankruptcy) I thought Daniel’s choice of Latin quote might be significant, maybe an insight into how he coped, but for the life of me I couldn’t make sense of it…. if you were tranquil why would you bother counting the hours at all!

(The Pepperpot Tower – built for the children of the house. It was modelled on a pepper pot from Lord Powerscourt’s dining table.)

Turns out (thanks Google!) that this latin inscription is on a fountain in Venice also and the word count can be replaced with remember…I do not remember the non-peaceful hours. In other words I put my attention on the times that I have been at peace, when all was well, I carry the peace from my past with me. If Daniel hadn’t found a way to carry the peace with him we might have been walking through fields yesterday.

Nice work, Daniel. Mairead.

My garden is in the work phase.

June 6, 2012June 6, 2012 | Mairead

(Not my garden… another view of the Birds and Bees garden at Bloom)

The sun is shining and it was very easy to get out of bed, not least because I’m off on an adventure with Ashleigh and Megan today. I’m not too sure where we’re going (the location has changed three times since Monday:)) but I will bring my camera and if there’s any good shots you’ll see them tomorrow. This reminds me of how excited I was to get out of bed when I was pulling weeds in the garden. Since we got back from holidays I kinda forgot about the gardening. I did have a quick dig on bank holiday Monday but for some reason the excitement has gone out of it and all that remains is the work….

(Not my garden yet… also from Bloom)

I do know that I enjoy digging and pulling and planting and watering. I know that I like the colour that appears within days or weeks of sowing and watering a plant. I know there’s huge satisfaction when an area that was overgrown is cleared. It’s just that in this middle phase there’s no excitement and my garden is in the middle phase. The excitement was in the beginning when the possibilities were huge and the work was small. The excitement was in the impact I was making very quickly and….. could more be possible? The excitement was in the energy I had and the energy I was willing to expand.

(Not my garden either… also from Bloom)

Willing to expand energy is a different thing than expanding energy. One is a promise and the other is work. In the work phase the promise comes to haunt me. A promise I made to myself and to others. A promise I see in the before pictures. A promise that I really want to keep, really. In the work phase it’s only this promise that keeps me going. Not going in a light and happy way but in a heavy guilt and shame-filled way.

(Probably never my garden… that’s a rabbit hutch on the left under the raised bed and it leads to a rabbit hole in the middle of the lawn… very cute… from Bloom)

And then I look at my garden and I see no monster forcing me to keep my promise. I see no signs that I will be punished. The garden will carry on as before whether I do the work or not. The plants already sown will flower. The older ones will even search for water on their own. The weeds will thrive again and all will be well in the garden. It is not the garden that pushes me to fulfil my promise, it is myself. My dream, my hope, my intention to have something I want. Somehow I need to let this sustain me in the work phase, guilt and shame-free.

Working it, Mairead.

Bigger is just bigger

December 1, 2011 | Mairead

(Knitting and sewing together)

This weekend I promise I will go out and bring the camera and take lots of pictures. I started taking pictures about five years ago and as the years pass the camera gets bigger. Bigger is not necessarily better…. A bigger camera is not as easy to bring along on every trip out of the house.

(Colour)

A photo opportunity can appear at any time, so it’s a bit of a dilemma…. handbag or camera? coat or camera? computer or camera? reading material or camera? writing material or camera? Then there’s the flash. The camera has been losing out lately and I’ve been taking pictures with my phone.

(Instructions and pins)

My phone is smaller, it’s lighter, it fits in my handbag, it has a notebook and can connect to the internet, it has a make and do magazine to read and it has a built in flash. It doesn’t keep me warm, so I still have to bring my coat. Maybe smaller is better.

Small is the new big, Mairead.

Another Idea Party

November 29, 2011 | Mairead

(Breakfast)

There’s another Idea Party tonight and I’m cleaning up all around me…. I mean I’m doing housework. It has become clear to me that I work very well to a deadline or in other words I don’t do things I don’t have to do. This revelation was a combination of noticing the amount of assignments I could complete while facilitating two Success Teams and running an eight week course along with noticing the exact same trait in one of the present team members.

(Chairs in a row)

Lets call her Annie. I’ve known Annie for years. She is very smart and gets lots of things done. She’s the person to go to if you have a problem, she’ll help you solve it. Whether it’s legal, personal or engine related, she’s your man! When I first saw the movie Erin Brockovich, I thought of Annie. In the end of the movie Erin has a comfortable lifestyle and very few worries. That’s always been my wish for Annie. That along with a wish that she would write, she has a lot to say and I’d love to read it.

So I persuaded her to join this present team and hoped writing would turn up as something she’s love to do and it did. But other things turned up too, with deadlines, like someone who needs help building their house, and someone who needs help starting their business and someone who needs help getting their dream job and….. By the way although all of these bring some pleasure to Annie none of them bring the makings of a comfortable lifestyle (i.e. money).

(Breakfast…. on a different day… promise)

But tonight at the ideas party she will read something she had to write a long time ago for a creative writing class (with a deadline).

Make a deadline for yourself, Mairead.

Travel stories

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Bigger is just bigger

Another Idea Party