James Ballantyne

Tag: shame

  • Will you be brave and give love a chance?

    Will you be brave and give love a chance?

    One of the reasons we men dont want to deal with our shit is because we dont believe we have the capacity to love ourselves.

    In many scenarios, whether from driven, neglectful, absent or collusive, abusive parents, Love was absent, and instead rules and expectations.

    In School, that wasnt the place either.

    And then there was the competitiveness of existing, having to win at football, chess or reading, having to be the best, having to compete and complete…

    Having to grow up, having to stay strong, having to not be weak

    And all the while, that little voice inside, seemed to grow smaller and smaller, the trappings of externals whilst dying inside.

    Not believing in Love.

    Not knowing Love

    Unless conditional, unless dependent, unless loaded, unless

    Unless hidden even behind labels in sacred stories. Believe in God (who is Love btw) or Jesus, or Mohammad, or whoever, and have the strength and power of Love be hidden behind all of these, and even then, some of these institutions require loyalty or adherence (of rules, of routines) and preach love like its a strategy for expansion. Conditional love, and rarely love of the self, love of the body, love of the past, love of feeling, hurts or wounds. Just pray them away and come back for more, morality the enemy of growth, and maybe even the enemy of love.

    Or you chose a different path, another Vocation, Military, Farming, Teaching, Medicine… All where the purity of what you wanted to be, got lost in the system of numbers, discipline and rules.

    And the was presented as real. This is the real world.

    Dreamers and Artists those who love. Sensitive ones weak.

    Macho. Hurting. Insecure. Violence. Real Man.

    Ugh.

    Deny the hurt, hide it away.

    Soothe the pain by satirical comedy, busyness, the rat race that continually exhausts, failure for the weak, vulnerability for the soft.

    Cultural masculinity at its best. Show no pain. Keep going.

    Until the cracks appear. Until desperation. because:

    If theres no such thing as Love, then it doesn’t matter does it. Beat up your wife, beat up yourself, steal, take and destroy, because Love is absent, Love isnt real, Love is just once a year, and your loveless head, can’t cope with not being in charge. Its running a show thats destroying you, but because you dont believe in Love, you can’t believe that you have to capacity to love, then you dont face it, you can’t, its too fucking big and painful and you think that it looks weak, or a failure, or your mates will think you weird, or you dont have time, or you dont have….

    Deep down its fear.

    Fear…that Love might actually be what’s required….

    Deep down it’s too much.

    You’d rather believe in power than believe in yourself.

    Deep down you have a heart, but its hidden under layers

    Deep down you have shared that heart to help others even whilst wounded yourself….

    Help….not heal….

    Its deep, because its underneath so many layers and blockages that youve put in there, pain soothers, pain avoiders, and these have caused further shame, guilt and pain – addiction, violence, manipulation – all outward projections of deeper hurt, masking anxiety, depression, abuse, the weight of expectation, perfection and trying to please, or make someone proud who is never satisfied – name your pain and add it here. ____________-

    All that stuff feels heavy and feels impossible to love. Shame monsters feel big. We know we’ve done wrong to others, to ourselves…to keep what’s hidden underneath at bay.

    Can I tell you a secret.

    You have the capacity to love yourself, if you are alive, you have a heart.

    You have the capacity to be vulnerable, to ask for help, to begin a different path

    To shed the masks, the fake strength, the keeping going, the weight if pain and suppression, the false appearances that are aching at your soul.

    The very first time I felt a surge of self love and realised a feeling of true self worth was the day I decided to go to therapy. A tiny step of bravery and fear, a tiny tiny shard of self love, to begin the very beginning step of facing and bringing hurt and pain to light. It’s not for everyone, and I needed a safe place to start.

    Most of you will have that, somewhere, and trust me on this, you might need new friends, or new people who can be your cheerleaders, or have ‘been there’ – once you begin this path, you’ll be surprised who shows up and where it takes you.

    Because you can.

    Healing isnt weak, it’s the bravest thing you can do.

    Sometimes we’re so addicted to the cycle of pain and denial that we wear it like a cloak, preferring blame and victimhood as a norm.

    Dont believe me when I say you can love yourself?

    You dont have to. Thats your choice.

    But stay in unbelief and stay as you are, and nothing changes.

    Love is such a powerful force in the universe and stronger than you think.

    It’s been there all along. Aching to be listened to….maybe it’s time to let it.

    You have the capacity to love yourself, because Love is you.

    It’s been you all along.

    And…..it will save you in the end.

    You just were told otherwise, and believed in it to conform, to hide.

    Yeah, and this all has in some ways applied to me.

    We are all in this together.

  • You Can’t force your Jigsaw (But do open the box)

    You Can’t force your Jigsaw (But do open the box)

    Each of us has bits of us that we dont really like. Theres the bits of us that got damaged by our parents or family when we grew up, whether this was abuse, neglect, abandonment, the choices of our parents and the hurts of these. Theres the bits of us in school, the parts where we adapted, the parts of us that we’re wounded, hurt. Theres the parts of us that we’d rather not talk about in polite company, the parts of us that turned to sex or drugs or alcohol or something other to soothe the pain, or the parts of us that hid away, the parts of us that acted in fear, anxiety, acted in vengeance and transferred inner anger from parents or jobs, onto partners, children or pets. Theres the parts of us that made choices when in survival mode, choices to be busy, choices to give to others from neediness, choices to take advantage of others, choices not to view another persons dignity and humanity, only as a service t our own. Then theres choices and actions in denial, to run away from dealing with the pain, to avoid it, to hide it.

    We all have them.

    Your pain might feel huge. But you are definitely not alone.

    All making our heart, our mind, our bodies…feel not quite right, or very quite wrong, or just stuck, or weary…

    All with a root of shame, or guilt or anger.

    And we would rather not go there.

    Then theres that inner voice that accompanies them all.

    Shame, Loathing, Guilt, Perfectionism, Control, Fear… all protecting the parts, all making a good argument for ‘not going there’ .

    And so often the morality we encounter – the shame of what we encountered, or what we did, or what we didnt do, who we hurt… feels too much to accept, feels too much to be able to get real about.

    We’d rather hide than face the truth

    We’d rather mask and hide than go there.

    We’d rather continue on, with that ache inside, than give light and warmth to a state of being thats hurting ourselves and others, yet its doing exactly that, and we’re spinning out of control.

    ‘So often… Morality is the Enemy of Growth’ (John O Donohue)

    The moral obligation to look good

    The moral obligation to be strong

    The moral obligation to ‘battle’ through darkness (or sin)

    The moral obligation to not feel shame, is to not feel anything.

    Yet, as a result that ache and pain haunts like a shadow, becoming more and more entrenched when challenged.

    I know. I didnt want to go there. Trying to keep a status quo whilst dying inside and running away from the pain, and the shame of what I was doing to soothe it. Until I cracked between it all, and lost everything, and yet…. realised that when everything was lost, I found something much more precious… eventually.

    Because those parts of us we’d rather hide are like parts of a jigsaw, and along with our hearts, our minds and bodies, theres fragmentation and fracturing within, caused by all the damage, to us and by us.

    And jigsaws, especially those with brittle edge pieces dont fit or mould together with force. Like trying to get two cuttlefish pieces to interlock.

    Friend. It isnt an inner battle you have to win.

    Battles are for armies.

    It isnt a war on the inside between the parts, even if they are raging, and making a noise. Their voice is often so loud.

    Your wounded parts are part of you, but they aren’t you.

    You hold the blow torch.

    Your heart is the gas.

    Love is the flame.

    And your parts and their raw, pained, rugged edges, mould together not with force, but with love, love that powers, love that emirates, love that emerges from your heart….once you finally, surrender, accept and listen to its call. Love from within resolves fractures and pain. Its warmth that melts the edges and aligns them into your soul and heart, its love that unifies your fractures and fragments, Its love that brings wholeness.

    Being a friend to the parts of you, the shame of your past that you’d rather not admit to, is a path marked with the deepest, most passionate and erotic love you can imagine, making love to your inner parts, melting their pain away with tenderness that is possible, even if thats new.

    Pain leaves with tears, leaves in a warm car, on the road to your own soul, to be met with harmony and kindness.

    The darkness you’re doing a battle with, in that tough man masculine way, won’t leave until you and your armour back down, and instead surrender to heat, light and love, and yes, that means losing control.

    But right now your pieces feel all over the places and control is an illusion anyway, shards of temporary colour disconnected, carried in a box that doesn’t want to be opened.

    Dare you lovingly open the lid…. and may love guide you in the integration of your whole, melting, welding, searing and bringing you to a harmony within, harmony your soul is already grasping for in the moments of pain you’re trying to hide.

  • The (not so) wonderful thing about Tiggers

    Without question this was my favourite Disney song. My beautiful Auntie Heather, only 10 years older than me, had in her record collection circa 1982 a Disney compilation, as well as probably a whole load of other cool music that I had no idea of (or wasn’t allowed to hear).

    But the second track on the Disney album, moving the record player arm to the first groove on the record, was the one. The Original Tigger song.

    And probably to my Aunties great torment I wanted it to be played it over and over and over again in her bedroom when I stayed at my Grandmas house, I was about 3 or older…

    Fast forward 43 years.

    I currently am one of the lead trainers for safeguarding in the Methodist Church, and this week led a face to face session. In it the participants get the opportunity to use a variety of cuddly toys to explore how people respond in places if they feel unsafe or been abused, so there’s the turtle (retreat into hard shell) the hedghog (prickles), you get the picture, and there’s also the Pooh bear characters. The brilliant thing is that every time there’s always one new piece of insight from each group.

    The group had done all of the characters, except our friendly bouncy one.

    So, I from the front went ‘which table has got the tigger, as we all know the wonderful thing about tiggers….’

    And they sang along…

    Then a lady on the table said.

    ‘The thing about tiggers, its like the song, they are bouncy, they are fun, they are smily, but like anyone who is an abuse situation, they believe they are the only one’

    And the lady looked me in the eye, and I looked back, and a shared tear I think appeared in both. My little heart had a moment, when I just realised.

    I believed I was the only one.

    For so so so long.

    If I could see what was happening as abuse, I believed in the shame and isolation of being the only one.

    No one else was telling me that it might not be the only one who could have an abusive mother. And weak as a boy/man for this being the case.

    I felt I was alone and the only one who might be in an emotionally unhealthy/damaging marriage…as a man.

    I felt I was alone when women in work places bullied me – and that I should just ‘get over it’

    I felt I was the alone, the only one.

    I felt that I just had to survive it, that I had no choice but to cope.

    It was so confusing and bewildering that it was impossible to explain, and no resources to.

    Believing I was the only one.

    So in that moment in safeguarding training, I realised quite how much that Tigger song resonated, and as it did so gave me the opportunity to see, to know and to feel, and also to perform in the moment the self love and acceptance required.

    I wasn’t the only one.

    I wasnt.

    So many people had been damaged by her that I wasn’t unique in this.

    I wasn’t the only person to have narcissistic parents, as the book that saved my life testifies to.

    The day I realised my mother is a narcissist

    I wasn’t the only man to be hiding and surviving in an emotionally unhealthy/damaging marriage

    I wasn’t the only man feeling shame and the weight of responsibility

    I wasn’t the only man to feel on the run, incapable of being myself in relationships, just reverting to the hurt wounded teenage persona – there was a reason for this… it was the wounded me.

    I wasn’t the only man who who felt that going to therapy was weak..

    I wasn’t … but I felt it…

    And if this is you, neither are you, even if you feel it.

    Tigger needed friends to help him out of his uniqueness, the projection of being ok and not needing help or have someone else care, all hiding deep insecurity and potential counter- dependence.

    Friends with experience, friends with experience and books, the spaces online that I found eventually where groups talk about this and have resources are all healthy ways of undoing the alone thinking.

    And this week, the feedback was that it was one of the best training sessions they had had, and that it was led with sensitivity and depth. I wonder why.

    I wasnt triggered, (though maybe tiggered) it was just a gulp of realisation of the light shining on the whole, and the opportunity to hold and love that wounded little boy all over again. Yes the tears flowed on the journey home, but thats to be expected with me at the moment, love feels strong.

  • Love; the healer, today and forever

    It doesn’t matter.

    It doesn’t matter if your heart feels heavy

    wounded, broken, or hard

    It doesn’t matter if you are acceptable or powerful

    It doesn’t matter if you are in prison or free

    It doesn’t matter what you have or what you dont have

    It doesn’t matter if you are at the beginning or the end of life

    It doesn’t matter if you done so much wrong, or tried to keep to all the rules

    It doesn’t matter if you have ran away or whether you stand up and face it

    It doesn’t matter if you have tried and tried and tried

    It doesnt matter if you feel shame, guilt or fear

    It doesn’t matter if you denied the need for love, or had that stolen from you

    It doesn’t matter if you have met all your goals, found all your dreams or just trying to survive one day to the next

    It doesnt matter, only now matters, only today matters, only here matters.

    When it comes to love, none of the other matters

    When it comes to love, and the choice of love, only today matters.

    Today love can change you

    You deserve love.

    As you are.

    You deserve love.

    Let love in.

    Love

    Love beyond the fear, the guilt, the shame

    Love beyond the gear, the dreams, the pain

    It is true, that no matter what, you are a wonderful human and you deserve to be loved, and you are love.

    Love cries in your pain

    Love waits for you, in your shame

    Love holds as you grieve

    Love shows in your confusion

    Love fires in your cold

    Love is, the rain and the sunshine

    Love just is.

    And it is all yours.

    The gifts of love in the universe are all yours

    Today, and every day.

    May you feel love today

    May your broken wounded heart be held by surprising love

    May your soul receive the love sprinkles of the universe

    May there be an awakening of love and fire in your body

    May your mind trust the love you receive

    May love today open and cleanse you

    May love change you and surprise you

    May love show its joyful caring face to you

    May love be yours today.

    Love doesn’t mind, it just loves.

  • I Like Me

    I’ve been pondering on writing this piece for a few days now, wondering if it is suitable, wondering how to express it, especially as it’s kind of simple. Full disclosure, I have been back receiving therapy since October, on that journey of remaking, regrouping and rebuilding. One of the revelations from it, was the simple yet, deep self -love and compassion acceptance of myself, to the point where I can say and believe the three words above.

    Then this morning I saw the image I’ve included below, by my friend Andy, it was the spark to the flame of this piece. Do check his work out, he is an incredible artist.

    3 simple words.

    I

    Like

    Me

    Can you say them?

    Do you believe them?

    Those three simple words.

    I. Like. Me

    Image by Andy Gray, Email Website

    But I feel so empty?

    But I feel so ugly?

    But I dont feel good enough?

    If you knew what I had done I the past, you wouldn’t like me

    But. But.

    I’ve been told i’m full of sin and shame

    I was abused and neglected

    I feel overwhelmed and responsible

    I feel out of control

    I have so many feelings

    I can’t like me, I can’t , there’s just too much about me not to like

    Is that true? really is that true?

    My friend, that voice is lying to you.

    what about the daft things?

    like what?

    like when Ive forgotten to send that email, or I tripped over the cat, or put peanut butter in the fridge, or when I let those plants die and..

    I really beat myself up for letting the plants die…

    It’s ok, you give yourself such a hard time, listen but doubt this voice

    It’s time to realise that you don’t have to believe this voice anymore.

    There is nothing stopping you from being able and willing to like yourself.

    Genuinely, 100% genuinely. 

    Who is listening to the voice telling you that you’re not good enough? Thats you. And you are more, you are bigger and you are the listener of the voice.

    So, you can say the words, however, brave or courageous you need to be, its not weird at all – its just not been your norm, but now, now its time…

    Go on, say it, say it slow, write it down, look in the mirror with love and peace.

    I. like. me.

    There is no frailty, no addiction, no secret, no action, no torment, no worry, no fear, no concept, that is you.

    You are not those things, You are YOU.

    And you can like you.

    It is time to say the words.

    I like Me

    I like me, and I can breathe now

    I like me and when I sit it stillness, there is no torment, no mind fuckery

    I like me, and I dont need to do ..anything

    I like me…and I can rest

    I like me… and knowing this gives me freedom

    I like me… even with peanut butter in the fridge

    I like me…even if it cries

    I like me… even if it tries

    I like me….even if it feels

    I just like me.

    I like me… and I am not broken

    I like me.. and I deserve Happy and love and joy and all the best things

    I like me…

    When ‘I like me’ is more than a meme on Facebook, and self-care just a coping mechanism, but self love and compassion means a genuine sense of self acceptance (beyond self knowledge).

    I like me.

    If used properly, the same mental voice that has been a source of worry, distraction and general neurosis can become the launching ground for true spiritual awakening.

    The Untethered Soul, Michael A Singer, 2007

  • Abuse and the fragility of self-belief.

    ‘You shouldn’t doubt yourself, you’re really good at’

    Aww shucks, thank you

    But when those voices return

    Those ones

    You know the ones I mean

    Every action, every creative, public action is a huge sap of energy

    Self doubt shouts with a megaphone from the recess of the mind

    Ive been fighting my own voices for a few months now

    Maybe for a few longer

    I used to pretend that they weren’t there, but they just lay dormant

    ‘You’re no good at this’

    ‘You never make it work’

    ‘You’re not as good as _________ at it’

    ‘are you sure this is you?’

    ‘Faker’

    ‘Dont have ideas beyond your station’

    The voices

    Self doubt merges into paralytic self criticism

    But then again, its no surprise is it?

    The Trophy child, on display

    All the work, no pay

    A childhood ground on expectation, rules and shame

    With only a few teachers to point me in the right direction

    Relying on my own head to survive, the voices I can tell myself

    Those voices I can do this – despite

    I can be something – without

    I can make it – on my own

    Survival voices, from an unsafe land. Maybe that was it, so much energy taken up in trying to survive, self protection, understanding, trying to please, that there wasn’t space to actually be good at something, to be creative.

    Compliments and encouragement I find hard to trust, easier to dismiss than believe them, I know you mean well.

    It may be easy for you to tell me that I shouldn’t doubt myself – it really isn’t easy for me, I know you mean well

    The effort to doubt my own self doubt, keeping the darkness at bay

    realising that actually, the darkness might be a friend too, it wants to tell me something.

    The battle in my mind, doesn’t need more weapons.

    It’s not a fight. Its a reminder

    A reminder to remember, who I truly am.

    That I am not the voice. That those voices need not over power me.

    A reminder towards love. A reminder towards awakening.

    A reminder towards heart. A reminder towards soul.

    That I am is more than I can.

  • The two things that robbed me….of myself.

    If yesterday I wrote about my own joinery from self loathing and denial to becoming more self referential, respectful and also giving space to trust my feelings. Today I’ve pondered the question – what happened to me, so that I had no ‘faith’ in myself? What happened to the extent to which there was no ‘I’ in my life, to trust myself, my feelings, emotions, desires or wants.

    It boils down to this

    Psychopathic Parents + Evangelical Faith = No Self Trust

    In these ways:

    Self Trust wasn’t possible when I was told not to be selfish

    Self Trust wasn’t possible when I heard that my core was sinful

    Self Trust wasn’t possible when I was told I wasn’t enough

    Self Trust wasn’t possible when I was told that everything good I did…wasnt me..it was God

    Self trust wasn’t possible because I was made to feel embarrassed or ashamed for having emotions, desires or wants

    Self trust wasn’t possible when my emotions were stolen by others.

    Self Trust wasn’t possible when I wasn’t encouraged for being good (or when I was accused of being the ‘eldest son’ )

    Self Trust wasn’t possible when I was terrified of upsetting my abusers.

    Self Trust wasn’t possible when I was encouraged to pray that God would fix things.

    Self Trust wasn’t possible..if my ‘self’ had to be denied.

    Self trust wasn’t possible if I numbed the pain and disconnected.

    Self trust wasn’t possible, even being clever or good… wasn’t enough.

    Self trust wasn’t possible… All to Jesus I surrender.

    Self Trust wasn’t possible, if Jesus gave me all my good feelings.

    Self Trust was invalidated if I tried to express myself

    Self Trust wasn’t possible – when my body was bad (Spirit is good) – and in my body is my emotions, feelings, desires and energy.

    Self trust wasn’t possible when I was masking abuse for 40 years.

    Self trust wasn’t possible if I was told who I was…and I had to accept it, whilst dying inside.

    Self Trust wasn’t possible when my real self was hidden away, unseen.

    Just Pray – they said. Be good – they said. Be quiet. Dont make a mess. Fulfil our expectations for you – they said. Grow up and dont be silly..they said.

    Be our trophy to be proud of – they said. But do this alone.

    Dont ever be who you are. Dont ever think for yourself.

    Live to soothe and placate and please your abuser.

    Live to please and worship God…and deny yourself in the process.

    How could I respect myself, if I didnt trust myself, how could I know myself if I was hiding myself away? How could I trust myself… if God was always watching…and I had to remember sins and feel only continual guilt and shame.

    I was taken..from myself.

    What am I in all this?

    Where am I in this?

    Who am I in this?

    Today. This day. This month. These last few years.

    Have been unapologetically about me.

    Not just ‘finding myself’ – but…actually finding, connecting, listening, feeling and knowing myself. But its no fucking wonder I had hidden myself away… or that I had no sense of self in ‘my’ life. It was all about other people. Other people and ‘other’ Gods. Losing myself in the process. I can look back and see this. Realising the extent of what I wasn’t able to be.

    Reminding myself, now, of my own deep strength. Acknowledging it and accepting it, and being utterly grateful for the now.

    The spills of life going inwards, deep burning of molten lava piercing into the wounds. Feeling Raw, but feeling true, feeling at all. Being me. Healing from within. One layer at a time. One pebble to climb, then a rock, then more. Step by step.

    Soul, heart, mind and body on a beautiful discovery. Wonder from the heart outwards. Time to live. Spiritual life… from the inside out.

    Oh yes, its time to live. Time to be.

  • 1000 Days (Since I last went to Church)

    In a week when its been revealed that 50% of the UK is no longer christian, no surprise really, tbh… but I have to ‘confess’ something:

    I dont go to church anymore.

    It just stopped.

    I just stopped going.

    About 1000 days ago. That’s over 150 potential Church going Sundays.

    Oh and by the way, its also about 1000 days since the start of the March 2020 lockdown.

    But, my last Sunday Church Sunday was over a month before.

    A month before everyone was doing it.

    I just stopped going.

    And…. I haven’t gone back.

    On one hand that no one contacted me from the church I was going to at the time, revealed to me something, but I know the world was gearing up for a major crisis at that time, and me not going to church was barely that. Im glad in a way though, as it meant I didnt have to deal with any conversation about not going.

    So here I am, 1000 ish days later.

    To say id been drifting away from church for a long time before was pretty accurate. I knew I didnt want to commit to a church, something was stopping me, and had for a while.

    Also, though I wrote this piece in 2016/7, about falling off the evangelical cliff, and the resources I gathered along the way, what I hadn’t quite been able to do was ‘stop’ going to church.

    Falling off the Evangelical Cliff

    ‘Church’ had been part of me for , well, a lifetime, and ‘not’ going at that time was too much, I think. I still needed it, for the things that it gave me, identity, some influence, even a space to be creative, music and the odd preach. But in another world I was dynamic, edgy, liberal, yet I still ‘went’ to church in quite a conforming way.

    So I still kept going. Just.

    So, not going had been on the cards for a while.

    It took a bit of courage to finally stop going. Two Sundays of guilt. But that was it.

    Then I stopped, I thought it might be for a few weeks.

    But then no one went to church for months.

    And neither did I.

    And… it was ok…

    And…I am still alive…

    What I lost by not going was some of the people who went.

    But what I gained was significant time for me.

    I also gained coherence, and the time I didnt waste in trying to justify something to myself, doing something I felt I ‘should’ do, and had always felt I ‘should’ do. But then Sundays became another day at the weekend to walk, another day for me.

    I gained many other things too, and I think they are for future writing.

    And, in the last 1000 days, I have so needed those days.

    As, what I have come to terms with and dealt with in the those 1000 days has been the extent of the abuse I suffered as a child, and the effects of ‘self-loathing’ evangelicalism, and the impact of rigid, moralistic, closed minded evangelical faith on me as a child.

    Also in those 1000 days I began and recently ended a process in challenging that abuse, and in that process constructed significant boundaries from them, yes, finally 28 years after wanting to do it the first time, I have effectively divorced my parents.

    I took time to undergo therapy for those events, and their impact.

    It has been significant, and hard.

    And, from a spiritual perspective, through these discovered something about myself that has been profoundly impactful, about the spirituality that has been revealed that exists on my inside – and that’s for another day in terms of writing about it, but it has been a beautiful life filling awakening spiritual journey. (Do have a look in the menu above to see some of the resources that have guided me during this time on this, especially Lucia Cappacione, Eckhart Tolle, Haemin Sunim, Richard Rohr, Gary Zukav, as well as the Daily Northumbria prayer book, The CCA daily readings, and more recently John O Donohue)

    In 1000 days, or more specifically, since I started a 2nd bout of therapy 2 years ago this week, unbeknown to what I thought I was going to therapy for, I discovered a coherency to my spiritual life that I hadn’t encountered before. And I feel significantly better for it.

    God makes more sense too, because actually God makes less sense, but I feel God and this is a whole new mysterious love that is deeply connectful. God seems everywhere and in everything and also deeply within. Maybe that’s what Colossians was about all the time. Reconciliation of all things.

    ( See.. I haven’t rejected faith)

    I have enjoyed in the last three years experiencing a number of ‘online’ churches, with the most coherent, deep, soulful and peaceful being a Jewish Bar mitzvah and the Buddhist meditations, and these I have gone with with Christelle, who I also introduced her to anglican services too with Gemma Sampson (then in Hartlepool).

    I didnt expect to not keep going to church, in the same way that I didnt expect that going to therapy became the beginning of a spiritual journey, via some of the dark nights of my own soul. And also, discovering that soul too. A soul, a life, a ‘James’ that had been left behind and adapted into a type of existence.

    And this is before some of the other things that have happened to me in the last 1000 days, including marrying my beautiful Christelle a few months ago – changing jobs, flats and cars in that time too.

    As I look back on these 1000 days I now notice that its been a time of shedding of the old, and some of that was very painful, some less so, some shedding, like the proverbial Onion involved tears, and other sheddings gave space for the new to emerge.

    And some of that is for the future.

    But for today, its to recognise that its now about 1000 days, especially in a week when the christian faith in the UK has been brought to the attention, it prompted me to share a little.

    Maybe I’m now in the ‘spiritual’ and still slightly religious category, maybe I’m just realising myself and the spirituality within me, within the universe and the divine love that connects all, maybe….

    Maybe its just about becoming me, and that required a deep emotional and spiritual cleanse.

    So, tomorrow, its Sunday… where shall I go for a walk?

  • The Powerful Blog I Didnt Write.

    The Powerful Blog I Didnt Write.

    Last night I was planning to write something. I also thought I might do some reading too, the latter being one of my favourite evening activities, put the music on, light the wax candles, pick up a book and sit and read

    But I was just weirdly unsettled.

    Oh, and the other thing, is that since early October I have been without my laptop to do this kind of writing. I have written quite a bit in my personal journals, free writing, sometimes crayon scrawling and inner James work, but not this kind, the blog writing stuff. What this has done in a month is store up in my mind a number of themes, ideas, pictures that I may want to write about, they are stored, I thought one would download fairly successfully into one yesterday.

    But it didnt.

    I tried picking up all the books I’ve read in the last 6 weeks and before, where the corners are folded, the pages and phrases that have inspired. I even checked my drafts folder. Ive read some wonderful books in the last 6 weeks too, Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth and Oneness with all of life, Matt Haigs How to stop Time, The Pilgrimage by Paulo Coelho and Brene Brown’s Daring Greatly. All wonderful books. Loved them all.

    But Nothing. Nothing Downloaded.

    Nothing felt like it was flowing from the mind, to the fingers.

    And I got frustrated.

    I felt like I wasted an evening

    I was annoyed at myself.

    I wasn’t productive.

    I shouldn’t have felt that way, I was trying to do something, but felt unsettled. There wasn’t clarity or flow.

    How did I react to my self imposed circumstance. Annoyed. Frustrated.

    I had self expectations.

    I ended up with self learning.

    I stopped.

    I was critical of myself and gave myself a beating up, over something that was of my own choice.

    I tend to do this often.

    Beat myself up.

    Think of myself as not good enough.

    Think of myself as not as creative, imaginative, talented as others.

    The critical shell on my outside can turn inwards.

    The over thinking mind that over dwells.

    Then I felt something else….. Shame.

    I felt ashamed that I felt annoyed at myself. Shame.

    Embarrassed that I felt this way.

    Shame made me feel small and useless temporarily for not being attentive to myself. Shame took me to the hiding place.

    Even in the smallest of moments, shame attaches itself to those feelings. Not careful and I’m in a swirl.

    I shouldn’t feel this way, I should be better than this, I should….

    ‘Should’ Shame.

    So.

    I Stopped.

    This was my evening for 90 minutes yesterday.

    Ive noticed this recently. The Shame Cycle. Actually maybe its not a cycle, more like shame is like a leech to feelings, attaching itself to them.

    At this point, I could easily drown or get drawn into over thinking, self criticism, self blaming and feeling pretty low.

    So what did I do?

    I remembered – who I am

    I noticed – my feelings of frustration, and stepped to one side of them

    I breathed.

    I remembered something else too.

    The True Anti-dote to Shame is Self-compassion

    Sneezy/Ziskind (eds) 2013 IFS – New Dimensions

    It was at this moment that my wife Christelle joined me on a zoom call. I told her about my feelings of frustration, and feeling ‘not very productive’ . She also reminded me that I had been very productive, and that it was ok for me to rest, to do nothing. To sit. To just be.

    Sometimes it takes someone else to help us remember.

    As someone so self-critical, from my history of self blame, over responsibility and any kind of support – Self compassion is significantly difficult. Especially as I also hear the self voices that disbelieve in it, that write it off, the voices that are scared of it, its as if shame can have an internal voice that’s screaming because it knows that its about to be listened to, cared for and have warmth applied to it.

    It hates that by the way.

    Self love wins.

    On our Honeymoon in Santa Barbara, Christelle and I went to an amazing bookstore (twice) – Paradise Found In it I could easily have spent far too much on books, and I was probably only restricted by my luggage allowance… The one book I bought was this one:

    I am going to write about the different types of responses I have had the self help books.

    Safe to say this one has been like a warm snuggly blanket from the beginning. I have felt safe reading it, and its softened my heart to discover a path of self compassion, for myself. I began a few weeks ago to write down privately a journal of self compassion, and where this path was going to take me, what I need to have self compassion and warmth for.

    It is as if every day I get the opportunity to practice. Even when it comes to ‘just writing a blog’ .

    Let me close with some words adapted from the book, that were appropriate to me yesterday.

    May I have compassion on myself, for being self critical

    May I have compassion on the feelings that I have

    May I have compassion on myself, breathing in love, like oxygen from the air, and feel that breath flow through my body

    May I have compassion on my wounded heart

    May I have compassion on my overactive mind

    May I give myself grace

    May I be a best friend to myself and to this present moment.

    May I tend to my shame feelings with warmth and gentleness

    May I have compassion on myself

    My words, adapted from HeartWork – The Path of Self Compassion (Radhule Weininger)

    In that moment of slow. Not Self beating, but self healing and compassion. Restoring my heart and soul to its core truth, feeling and loving myself, one breath at a time. I can make a choice to love, and love myself. Shame loosens its grip, peace and love flow.

    Sometimes life gives the opportunity to practice, immediately. The opportunity to note the feelings that naturally arise, and respond with self loving care.

    Last night I got frustrated with myself, and it was ok.

    It gave me an opportunity to show myself love and compassion.

    I learned something far more powerful instead.

  • Self Love is a Risk

    Self Love is a Risk

    You’ve just got to love yourself, they say

    Give yourself time

    You are important

    You are enough

    Its about being vulnerable, and embracing discomfort

    Thats what some of the books say.

    Thats what’s required for life, for creativity and innovation (Brene Brown, Daring Greatly)

    I get it. I want to get it.

    But.

    Even the first of these seems risky.

    Loving myself. Loving and listening to myself.

    Becoming aware of my feelings.

    It was brought home to me over the last few weeks.

    Its a risk.

    Complex trauma, both emotional neglect and abuse, coupled with strong childhood adherence to an evangelical faith make this risky.

    Too many self sacrificing defaults have been set.

    Too many ‘put others first’ learned behaviours have been performed.

    Too many times was it safer for me to revolve around others, my abusive mothers, needs than attend to my own – too many times soothing my abuser meant safety for me.

    Too many times I heard – ‘love your neighbour’ very few times I heard ‘as yourself’ – though with the all too often shame that was associated with too much pride. Shame.

    Ahh yes, that ‘S’ word.

    The word you’d feel if you uttered the other S word in church.

    And fear of being accused of being Selfish was the other S word. Especially at Home.

    It took a risk to start to think of myself as anything, let alone something – though I sort of knew I was ok.

    Self love is risky.

    Knowing I can love myself – without justification

    Knowing I can choose what I do with my time – can feel utterly alien and pushing through sand to feel like this is even allowed or possible

    That voice. That inner critic voice. Be useful. Don’t be lazy. Stay Busy. You don’t deserve this. Surely there’s something else to do.

    Its as if its waiting for that moment.

    Self love can feel a risk.

    A risk because it challenges so much of…well everything.. everything I once knew and had become default.

    My childhood emotional needs, my identity and adaption into an evangelical christian faith (though it needn’t have been as evangelical to still have all those ‘S’ words)

    Loving myself is a challenge and a risk. A risk that means looking inwards. A Risk because I dont often want to look at or be close to the painful bits, or shame bits, and feeling like I’m not able to love myself because I might be in trouble for doing so, or be told off for being selfish, or its something else.

    Self love is risky because i grew up with an understanding of responsibility and fault. I believed I was to blame, and I took on responsibility, because I was projected on as being spoilt, selfish, too clever, messy, not there enough for that person, not fulfilling her needs, not able to ‘fix’ the family.

    The over think everything, get lost in my thoughts, think them through, think all the options, think about what I should have done, what I didnt do, what I need to do what I am , what kind of person I was or am, think James, think, and it keeps on going, wake up with the same thinking thoughts.

    I was the fixer of, and helper of others. Responsible. Over thinking.

    Self love is a risk – for that voice tells me not to be selfish.

    I love the writing of Dr Glenn Patrick Doyle, recently he shared this on his blog

    Self love is a risk. Self love, deep self love is courageous.

    It changes the pattern.

    It undo’s the default.

    It communicates to myself that I am important.

    Its a risk. Its a risk every time.

    Its a challenge every day.

    Brene Brown is right. We are living in an age of scarcity. An age where love is scarce- but where products are traded as love. Loving ourselves is the risk to start turning to whats inside of ourselves as a source of love, a source of peace and joy, and give this the opportunity to shine. Self love may well be the source of the river, where it all starts.

    Maybe Jesus was saying, you can only love your neighbour as you love yourself. That was the challenge set down to the lawyer who asked in the question. Can you love yourself? and in that love – will your neighbour be loved too? It wasn’t just loving a neighbour for show. Where might there be balance in the love for self and neighbour/others in the Bible – just thinking out loud…

    Self love is about being brave and courageous – taking the risk and being vulnerable to myself- not just being strong and getting through it.

    Self love.

    Do you dare take the risk? Do you dare not too?

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