Slowing down is a strange experience, at once soothing and terrifying. Many of the stresses of our productivity-focussed lives fall away, but also busyness can be a mask for all the sides of ourselves we don’t want to admit to. You take it off and what’s left? I never met a tree, or a badger, or a river with these worries. It’s all a construct. Slowing down just allows us to see this world for what it is; to see…
Sometimes when I write, I imagine the one person in the world who will hate what I’m about to say, then I multiply that into a thousand voices. Then I stop writing and go have a cry. It’s the same with vanlife. Some people get it, others don’t. I realise I’ve given too much energy in the past to justifying myself to people who have no intention of understanding of me. Not any more. Live your life. You don’t need…
I turned 43 this year. I’d read that mid-forties is a difficult time as it’s when the ageing process becomes more noticeable. Ha. Fuck that. This year I’m learning to surf, spent a week living on my own in the van in a forest in Slovenia, and learned to love & trust myself more than I ever have done in the past. Maybe to some these aren’t massive achievements. We’re not the same – all needing different things from life…
All we need is love 💕. I agonised over these last lines for what felt like an eternity. I worried that finishing a poem on the word ‘love’ might be a bit soppy in this context. Then I figured there’s more that enough love to go round when we’re prepared to share it out. I suppose this is how I‘m trying to embrace that. …
