Tag Archives: destruction

Fairy Story

Posted on January 13, 2015 | Leave a comment

Last night, as I flicked through an old copy book in search of an empty page, I stumbled upon a Fairy Story that I’d been asked to write as part of an Inner Child workshop I’d taken part in a while back. Here it is…

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful, perfect little princess called Sharabella. There was something about this girl that shone brilliantly from within. You could see it in the sparkle of her eyes and her fun-loving laugh.

People loved to be around Sharabella. She didn’t even have to do anything. People just felt better after having been in her presence.

This was Princess Sharabella’s magic gift. She simply had to be herself and others were healed. All was well in this magical kingdom.

However, there came a time when Princess Sharabella was needed in a very different kingdom. A kingdom that was full of pain, sadness and suffering. The Powers That Be decided that Princess Sharabella could help transform this kingdom’s pain into love and beauty.

Sharabella landed on this kingdom filled with peace and optimism. What Princess Sharabella hadn’t counted on was how much skepticism and resistance she’d face.

Slowly over time, poor Sharabella began to doubt her magic powers. She started to wonder if she really was as perfect and beautiful as she’d once believed.

It was such a struggle trying to change these people’s way of looking at things so Sharabella began to shut up and shut down.

Her beautiful light dimmed more and more over the years until one day, when The Powers That Be paid this dark, gloomy kingdom a visit, they no longer recognised beautiful Princess Sharabella.

Sharabella was tired, grey and depressed. When The Powers That Be finally realised who she was, they asked her what had happened.

At first, Princess Sharabella didn’t know what they were talking about. “This is who I am now,” she stated gruffly. “I’m ugly and useless and this kingdom would be better off without me.”

“But once upon a time, you were Princess Sharabella – the most beautiful, luminous, perfect creature, with the gift of healing others with your mere presence,” The Powers That Be exclaimed.

Nobody realised that an outsider had overheard their conversation. A crippled old lady had witnessed the whole exchange. She was moved to tears by Sharabella’s despondence. If a Princess despised herself so much, what hope did the rest of them have?

The old lady couldn’t help but speak out. “Excuse me,” she interrupted as she leaned on her walking cane. “I’m confused. I have to ask: What is a Princess doing in this horrible kingdom? This place is filled with hate and destruction. Us citizens know no different. We’re used to this life. But you? I urge you to get out. Save yourself, while you still can!”

The lady trembled with urgency while The Powers That Be stood there, uncertain as to how to proceed.

Slowly, Sharabella looked up, her eyes brimming with tears. She started to sob – loud, uncontrollable gulps of emotion.

As she cried, her cloudy, grey eyes turned to bright blue. Her ashen complexion became rosy pink. A brilliant light flickered, then started to beam out with such magnificence that everybody dropped to their knees in awe.

In this moment, Sharabella realised that she was not the ugly, depressed woman she had grown to believe she was. She remembered that she was the beautiful, perfect Princess that was her birthright. It had simply become unclear and difficult to express in a kingdom that had never accepted such perfection.

If she could heal people in her old kingdom, she knew she could do it here too. But not if she continued believing that she was ugly and worthless.

Suddenly the old lady, inspired by what she had just witnessed, ran away, excited to tell her friends and family what had just happened.

“She forgot her walking cane,” Sharabella said. And Princess Sharabella and The Powers That Be laughed and laughed.

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Whirlwind

Posted on November 26, 2014 | Leave a comment

The last couple of months have been challenging. A whirlwind of emotion has been spinning forcefully within me. The intensity of these feelings has scared me. I’ve fumed with anger, cracked under pressure, retreated in fear, and battled against exhaustion.

Today, a dear friend sent me this passage written by spiritual teacher and author Jeff Foster:

Your feelings, the energies alive in your body right now, were not ’caused’ by anyone else, and nobody else can take them away.

Nobody else is responsible for your feelings. This realisation can end the blame game once and for all, and leave you standing in your true place of power – the present moment.

Making others responsible for how we feel is the beginning of all violence, both internal and external, all conflict between people, and ultimately all wars between nations.

Let others off the hook. Honour what is alive in you right now. Learn to hold your own feelings like beloved children, however intensely they burn and scream for attention. Celebrate the aliveness in your hurt, the vibrancy of your disappointment, the electricity of your sadness. Kneel before the power in your anger, honour its burning creativity.

From this place of deep acceptance, you do not become weak and passive. Quite the opposite. You simply enter the world from a place of nonviolence, and therefore immense creative power, and you are open to the possibility of deep listening, honest dialogue, and unexpected change.

In suffering you become small. In love, anything is possible.

Of course, I knew these words were true. But I also felt strangely annoyed by them. Because I can’t hold anybody else responsible for how I’m feeling. I am not a victim.

Blaming other people or situations may seem like the easy option. It can be comforting to be able to vent to a friend. And it can feel nice to have somebody take your side, bestow you with sympathy, and agree that the other person is wrong. After all, the ego loves to be right.

I had convinced myself that I can’t be at peace until this problem is resolved. That I can’t be happy unless he/she changes. And that I can’t go after what I want in life when I’m trapped by this situation. Hip-high in resistance, I’ve been wading against the flow of life.

However, today’s message has hit home for me. I’ve realised that if I keep raging and complaining, I’ll only be stoking the fires of this energy. I’ll become a casualty of my ego. A slave to circumstance.

Tonight, as I lay my head on the pillow, thoughts of my current predicament come to mind. A swirl of emotion begins to rise up in me. Then, I remember Jeff Foster’s words. Blame nobody.

There may be a whirlwind howling right outside my door. But I am not the whirlwind. And I am not in the whirlwind. I can see it and hear it and it scares me senseless on occasion. But it’s not to blame. It’s a whirlwind. And whirlwinds do as whirlwinds do.

And when the whirlwind spins a destructive path across my world, I’ll join the dance. When it rips things apart and flings them aside, I’ll bow down in gratitude. Because those things to which I’ve formed deep attachments actually need to be destroyed.

So I close my eyes and listen to it howl.

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Slow Down

Posted on September 14, 2013 | Leave a comment

I am currently on a weeklong holiday in the west of Ireland. Each morning after breakfast, I do some work. Then, I take myself out for a walk. I rush the walk to get it out of the way so I can pop into a pub or café to use the WiFi.

Not too long ago, I felt peace. I appreciated nature. I could lie in a bubble bath and listen to music or read a novel over a frothy cappuccino.

How easily I’ve forgotten. How quickly I’ve transformed into a busy, perfection-driven woman who finds it hard to sit still.

Lately, I’ve been trying to fit as much as possible into every single day. No wonder I wasn’t glad when morning arrived.

Even the things I’d once enjoyed had become just another chore to tick off the self-renewing to-do list. Cycle – check. Meditate –check. Prepare Positive Living class – check.

Even nature, my most favourite thing in the entire world, had become an afterthought to work and exercise. When I did get out in it, I sped through it, favouring body tone over nourishment of the soul.

Today, the sun comes out and I decide to go for a walk. Alone. I leave the phone in the car. I don’t listen to music or take photographs. Today, I walk slowly. I roll up my sleeves and feel the heat on the back of my neck. I breathe. I inhale delightful fragrances that bring me back to simple childhood holidays.

I pause to take in the aqua milkiness of the ocean. I watch a man swimming. A fluffy green caterpillar inches its way along the path. Seagulls congregate on a large, flat rock. Cows graze in a field below.

A woman sits on the cliff edge, eyes closed, face tilted towards the sky. I wonder if she’s being truly present, mindfully aware of all of her senses. Or is she simply completing her daily chore of meditation?

Even though it pains me, I challenge myself to sit for a few moments. To just sit. I exhale a sigh of frustration.

Then, I gaze out at the waves as they crash upon the rocks. The waters roar mightily like the exciting take-off of an aeroplane.

The ocean speaks to me of opportunity and adventure, beauty and impermanence, creation and destruction. Tears spring to my eyes.

But even now, in this blessed moment, I am eager to get back. Because I have been mentally making note of everything I’ve experienced. This is the curse and wonder of being a writer.

I take a deep breath. I breathe in and out. I accept myself as I am in this moment. A writer who is forever composing. A human being who is doing her best. A person who is learning and growing and steeping herself in the awareness that will ultimately set her free.

This evening, I go for a second slow-paced walk along beach, cliff and country road. I peer out at boats bobbing in the bay. I stroll past jellyfish, seaweed and salt-polished pebbles.

I sit several times along the way. I marvel at the sheer magnificence of a cliff face. Gulls soar overhead. I walk beneath a cacophony of starlings perched upon wire.

The sight of fuchsias makes me well up. The scent of cow dung and the perfume of a passing stranger make me smile.

I saunter past stone walls, a tractor and a good-looking horse. I feel my body as it moves. My hips roll and my arms sway. This evening, I do not rush or yearn for the finish line.

I stop to taste roadside blackberries. I pick a handful to take home. For the remainder of the journey, I walk palm up, my hand ink-red with an offering of sweetness.

I realise that when I’m an old lady, reflecting on the beauty of my life, I won’t be thinking about the times I power-walked up hills. I’ll remember the magical moments when I sat and witnessed the silent majesty of a gliding gull and the mesmerising movements of the ocean.

Images: Author’s Own

Life as Miracle

Posted on April 5, 2012 | 4 comments

Life is miraculous. From pregnancy to childbirth; fingernails and eyelashes, involuntary muscle action and the healing process; sleep and dreams, tears and laughter, memory and pain, pleasure and love…

Miracles abound in plant life and in the world beneath the ocean; from sleeping flowers to deep-sea bioluminescence. In the moon’s effects on the tides. In the stars and the planets that glow. In the ever-changing, ever-moving clouds and the simple strangeness of a rainbow. In rivers and mountains and volcanoes. In the mere 62 miles from here to outer space.

Miracles can be sensed in the steady growth of a seed, in the sweet scent of yellow furze, in a silent snowfall. A miracle can be witnessed in every lamb, lion, peacock and panther. In every earthworm, elephant, foal and firefly. In the astonishing metamorphosis of frogspawn, caterpillars and eggs to frogs, butterflies and soaring eagles. In the transformation of chunks of wood to keening violins, the deep tones of a cello, the heartbreaking ambience of a piano and the flamenco dancers invigorated by the passionate plucking of guitar strings.

Miracles can be felt in the beauty that arises from sweeping paintbrushes, from words that tumble from vision to feeling to pen to paper, from a voice that channels raw emotions. Miracles can be found in mathematical genius, geometry and quantum physics. In spirituality, creation, destruction and creator.

A miracle is born with every breath and birdsong; when the leaves dance in the wind, the weeping willow sways and the cherry blossoms fall. Miracles rejoice in the delightful chuckle of an infant, in a lover’s touch, in the awe-struck appreciation of a sunset…

The miracle of life is found in the searching, in the connection, in the bliss and in the discovery of self. In the present moment, in the here and now, in the being beyond language and analysis and definition, in the space between everything else; this is where magic happens. This is life as miracle.