The Biggest Insight I Missed

Part 2 of 3 part series On Slowing Down.

“Change is hard at the start, messy in the middle and gorgeous at the end”, Robin Sharma.

In giving myself 3 months off back in 2018, the pain not only reduced from the severe end of the scale that It had always been but diminished to an on/off level throughout its 72-hour duration (up from 17 years of lasting only several hours, then to 24 hours and 48 respectively).  Something I had not personally experienced in the 20 years of living with migraine attacks of varying types.

What had changed at the back end of my 3 months off was that I had told myself “Right, that’s it. Enough of this rest, it’s time to go back to work”. Subsequently piling the pressure on myself to work, produce and generate, as well as succumbing to fear. All of which prompting me to go directly against what my body was telling me, overriding it with the opinion of others and societal expectation. Let’s face it, at the root of the pressure we put on ourselves is fear. And the voice we talk to ourselves with in our heads, most often comes from a place of fear or someone else (who is also coming from a place of fear).

To recognise and acknowledge that this pressure I’d put on myself, this fear that was driving me to retrain and generate an income was an insight I’d missed at the time. Not only that, but it was one that directly led to me living with pain at the highest end of the scale for a further 4 years. Noting this (and yet without any depth of insight) some 3 years later was truly devastating to me. 

There was no more on/off pain to be experienced again until I intentionally moved into a static caravan so that I could live mortgage and rent free. Is it just me that sees the insights here or are you connecting the dots too?

Please, for the love of God, let my sharing my story bring about not only the change I see in my life but let it pave the way for others to bring about much needed change in their lives too. Photo by Mika Baumeister on Unsplash

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The difficulty I had in improving my health further once I got myself in this position of living mortgage and rent free was the greatest and most difficult, hardest challenge of all that I’ve had to face in this journey to wellness. To the extent that it was, at one time, easier to be severely ill and bedbound than it was to continue on making the changes that I needed to make to improve further still.

For now, there is more I want to share with you about slowing down, rest, what that has meant to me, some examples of change and practices I’ve had to bring to support my desire to improve my health. Even and especially when it’s been hard and in no way have I found these choices and decisions easy or straight forward to make.

 My journey in becoming aware that I was struggling with slowing down first began a few years into waking up to complete disability by illness, when I took a moment to “forget”. I accepted an invite to

“Forget what you can learn, forget what you can enjoy, forget what you can appreciate”.

In accepting this invitation, it opened just enough space for me to check in with what I’d been doing and bring about a newfound level of awareness I hadn’t connected with before.

That morning, there had been a chunk in my calendar where I’d considered myself not to be working. It wasn’t even 10am and, in addition to my morning meditation, breathwork, hot cacao and journaling session with no work diarised until later that afternoon, I realised I’d been hard at it with

• prepping for a zoom workshop,

• letting others know I was sending a skincare order,

• noting inspired ideas for a creative project,

• daydreaming of future offerings and

• was reminded to place an order for beauty treatments.

Noting too, that up there with one of my greatest challenges in the before times was my inability to “switch off”. To stop working and call it a day. To know when enough is enough. Stop “doing”, slow down and start being. You know, like a human being.

I’ve found this way harder than getting to grips with the research of the world’s most complex neurological disorder, committing to making changes and all the challenging decisions I’ve had to make along the way. Way harder.

An actual photo I took on my way to my own monthly bodywork session back in 2022. On my return home from a big week in the North East that week, I couldn’t get out of bed for 4 days.

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This pocket of space I created in “forgetting” opened just enough space for me to feel deeply into who and what I truly am. The real me and not the version of me that has been created by past wounds or the part of me that has succumbed to the expectations of society, parents and what others think.

In that split second, I realised that who I am is enough. I’d done enough here to get my day off to a good start, keep my health topped up and to generate income to cover outgoings.

Is that the key to switching off? Letting go of who I think I’m meant to be and embracing who I truly am? Throwing in a reminder now and then that I am enough, I am good enough, I’ve done enough?

Incidentally, “I’ve done enough” became a soothing mantra from this point forward that I would affirm to myself on the onset of attack. Alongside various other huge themes around this time that included learning to regulate my emotions and paying attention to the messages being communicated to me through my dreams, it went on to help support the reduction of severity, duration and symptoms in each attack.

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Learning to slow the fuck down as arduous as this was, enabled me to align with the seasons of the cycle, work more freely in flow state and move into deeper alignment with my vision, values, goals, signs, messages and synchronicities. Paving way for a life of ease and freedom. A dream way of being.

Up until this time, often times when I asked my body what it needed, rest was the most frequent response. This year, when I ask my body what it needs, even in the midst of what I now call a migraine episode (now the pain is consistently mild, occasionally moderate and symptoms are few) is connection. Connection with family, friends, readers. Deep and meaningful.

My own agenda in showing up and sharing my story was to show up and write. Not to build massive platforms and loads of engagement. In doing so, the engagement I have come to know and experience is deep and meaningful. Fulfilling one of my needs. So when I say you make a difference by being here, I really mean it. Photo by Bence Halmosi on Unsplash

To give you an example of what I mean by this, I was in the midst of a migraine episode a few months ago. We had a birthday dinner arranged and I really wanted to go. I’d been resting and connection was what I needed. Yet I didn’t have it in me to comb my hair or get changed. I arrived in muddy boots and had to leave the table twice to puke. I wasn’t judged by my partner, his mum or his teenage son. I was welcomed as I was. Free to show up as me. I didn’t have to pretend to be well when I wasn’t.  

Over recent years I have been immensely grateful for the life I have created. The space that I have carved out for myself to be ill. This year, I’m so grateful for the connections I have made. The spaces I find myself in where I am welcomed – where all of me is welcome, all parts of me. All the parts that make me whole.

I am clear on my intention to align my days and life with a way of being, seeing and believing that contributes to improved health. I fully expect health improvements to continue. At the time of writing this, I have 6 consecutive years that demonstrate this is possible. What, for the first 4 years felt like a 24/7 job, has since become a way of life for me. It is a new way of being, a new way of seeing and a new way of believing.

There are times I’ve felt like I’m on a dessert island, left to fend for myself. There are longer periods where I’ve felt tossed out to sea. Caught up in the turbulence of the gigantic waves and storm after storm. Trying in earnest to keep my head above water. I remember sharing with a friend a few years back about how I couldn’t see any land in front of me, or none behind me. To which she replied “well there’s no going back now” and we both sat about laughing. The only choice I had was to continue. It would be the year after that I felt like land was in sight and the end of the year where I felt like I could clamber on to it, find my footing, re-establish a new life for myself, in a new world, all of my own creation. One that supported where it is I’d wanted to go in the 4 years it took me to get there.

I used to think that everyone would benefit from bodywork. I couldn’t fathom why no one understood why I was making the pain staking choices that I was. Why no one got what I was doing. Why we weren’t all doing this. But now I see what it has taken. Now I’ve been able to process the horror of what I’ve lived through. Now I appreciate the connection to spirit that is essential. This path, this journey, it is not for the faint-hearted. It is not the easier option.

It is my hope now, my wish, that we can build boats to cross the shores. From where I am now back to where I once was. With bigger bags of hope, with stacks of insight, boxes of signs and more support when it comes to navigating such turbulent waters. Boats that ferry many across at one time. Holding people so that they don’t have to suffer and struggle quite so much as those of us who have gone the distance before, or are indeed, making their way across now as I appreciate many of us are.

Perhaps its those of us who have been tossed out to sea, without so much as a whistle or a flare never mind a rescue boat, that will congregate together on land and build these boats together.

That is my wish. I’d love to know yours?

We could set up tipis and safe havens. Create space to go with our new way of seeing, our new way of being and our new way of believing. What say you? Photo by Frames For Your Heart on Unsplash

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Part 1 and 3 of this popular 3 part series.