With you on your wondering way...

A Place for Gentleness

This year I decided against giving myself any resolutions or strict goals. Last year had been a big year of change for me. I’d gotten married and finished a training course to become a Counsellor and Psychotherapist that had taken me four years of training and countless hours of volunteering (all while working to fund my studies).

At the end of 2019 I was left with a question that didn’t seem to shift: ‘What now?’

I felt like so many doors had been opened to me that I couldn’t possibly walk through them all. Suddenly, my vision that had been so focused and singular only months before was blurry and undetermined.

Then something shifted. I was on holiday with my husbands family in Northumberland. I felt anxious and worried and guilty that I was here on holiday when I hadn’t ‘gotten anywhere’ for months.

I started spending hours on the beach combing for sea-glass and remnants of smashed and then smoothed pottery. I found I was distracted from my worried mind with these little treasures that honed my attention and quite literally guided each one of my steps. One step, crouch and inspect a pebble, next step, was that blue I just saw? Next step, and so on. Minutes and hours bled into one another and after each outing my soul began to feel lighter. My purpose was simple: to hunt out sea-glass and to marvel at them.

Sometimes my Husband, Mother-in-law or Brother-in-law would join me. We would only lift our heads to share our finds; to discuss if it was worth putting into our already heavily laden pockets. We would point out what we noticed, a boat on the horizon, a crab clinging to the shore.

I swam in the sea. The North Sea was breathtakingly cold. I couldn’t feel my toes, only a feeling of freedom bubbling up in my chest. I felt so small in the vastness of the sea and relished the looks of early morning dog-walkers watching on utterly baffled.

It was like I’d unlocked a door. I was able to look at myself as the girl floating in the water; rather than the girl who didn’t know what the next step was.

The expectation I had mounted on my shoulders that summer had been too much. I was exhausted by the weight of it and felt so trapped by  the cage of what my future ‘should’ look like.

This brings me to my word for the year: Gentle. These few months taught me that gentleness is a vital companion in times of hardship.

Gentleness leaves room for you. Gentle provides a kind safety net. Gentle looks within and out of ourselves. Gentle is strong. Gentle is allowed to be lost or unsure. Gentle doesn’t judge.

Since then, ‘Gentle’ has been my single word mantra that I return to again and again. It has been far more powerful for me than any goal, resolution or target ever could.

I’d love to know if you had a word for the year? How is it holding up for you right here and now?

Some of the treasures I collected in Northumberland