Choices and action

We managed to collect all that plastic from Saints beach Tuesday and Wednesday morning, washed up with the tide. We went down this morning but there was very little in comparison. This stuff - toothbrushes, vegan friendly make-up remover and urgh, horrible air freshener- were lost off a container during rough seas. Apparently no one is currently taking responsibility.

Mind you Elon Musk has a rocket spinning around in space, about to make contact with the moon, and as far as I am aware there is no repercussions on him for that. This is then age where we take zero responsibility for our actions and the effect they have on this planet and others. It’s such a shame that money and power are still more important than the quality of the air we breathe, the sea we swim in and the skies we look up into.

This whole episode has reminded me once again that we have to take individual responsibility regardless of the lack of responsibility shown by the corporations and supposed leaders of our time. if we turn our backs on throw away plastic and find other ways to clean our teeth, move our make-up and freshen the air, for example, then there is no need for all this plastic in the first place and if there is no demand for it, then there will be no corporations making it and selling it.

It’s us and our choices and actions that drives all of this. We can’t just keep living the way we’re living and expecting others to make the changes for us. Individually we need to become increasingly conscious of what we’re buying and how we’re therefore spending our money, and the implications this has for the planet. If we each make positive changes, then those positive changes will be felt by everyone. But as always it has to start with us.

We have to increasingly recognise that not everyone had our best interests at heart. There’s a lot of things being made and sold that are simply not needed in this world. But we buy them anyway, because they’re fashionable or the children love them, or they’re cheap or whatever it may be, but really, we just don’t need it.

I often look around the cottage and sigh at the amount of stuff we have that we just don’t need. Often a Reiki attunenment will bring on a clear out and I’m always grateful for this - as we go through an inner clear out, we often want to have an outer clear out too. One of my intentions is to increasingly simplify so that I own very little by way of material possessions. I’m trying to become increasingly conscious of what I’m buying and where it has come from and the implications this has more widely too.

I’m also trying these days to make what I can and buy in bulk where I can. Does mean the children go a little crazy when faced with kilo bags of dried mango and I have to hide them away so that they last out beyond a few weeks! It also means that I spend more time than I used to in the kitchen, this morning making gluten and dairy free pancakes for Eben while simultaneously making lavender deodorant! But i feel better for it. For at least trying.

But saying all that I’m still getting on a plane on Saturday…so that’s a few more trees that need planting. It’s always a work in progress, butI am conscious of it, did consider it, and at least we have been able to take the toothbrushes from the beach to the Animal Shelter where they will be put to good use. As for the other plastic, well at least it’s not resting on the sea bed and can be collected in our recycling this evening. Silver clouds and all!

At the end of the day we have free will and we have choice, how we action that choice is up to us. The Bhagavad Gita talks about this…what motivates our action? I’ve fond it a very interesting enquiry into my life generally, what motivates my choices and the decisions I am making, are they truly from the heart and for the planet and the bigger picture (thinking 7 generations away!), or are they for some selfish and short-term gain? More on that no doubt, another time!

Love Emma xx

Happy new moon flow

Happy New Moon! And what a moon cycle it is too. I could literally feel the energy contracting and expanding the last few days, getting quicker and quicker, like the stuff that needed to be released had to be squeezed out of us, and here on Guernsey we descended into the gloom of the fog too on the dark night, which I believe might have been a dark night of the soul for some of you.

I was lucky, my dark night of the soul has already come to pass, and so the energy, while tricky to manage with it’s in and out, up and down nature, having us plummet from feeling all might just be OK to everything feeling terrible again, was bearable because I already had a sense that we were literally being pushed out…depending on what’s taken place these last few months and our degree of honesty with ourselves about the way we are living our life, whether these accord with your values and with our heart, or whether the mind continues to run the show convincing us we’re living from the heart when we’re really not.

It’s not easy connecting with the heart, let alone truly living from it. The heart does not offer certainty and it is unlikely to take us on a known and previously lived path, it won’t be linear either. The mind struggles with all of that as the mind wants certainty, it wants guaranteed outcome, it needs to know that it will be OK. The heart cannot guarantee this, it lives in the moment and this is where it’s power is, because it sets us free from the restriction of the mind and offers us a richer moment to moment experience.

If we haven’t been honest, and are still buying into the illusion then it could be a tricky two weeks as we wax to the full moon. However, if we have seen more of the light and let go go some of our outdated mental and self imposed limitations not least in how we perceive the world, but in our relationship to self, then new beginnings await. But this is not a time to forge forward, still patience is required, we are in the delivery room and discernment is necessary.

Pay attention to everything in your orbit as the signs are returning again. Notice the birds that come into your view, for example, and what’s happening around you. Remember that whatever happens is FOR you, not TO you, at least on a soulful level - we can very easily allow ourselves to drop into victim mentality otherwise and before we know it the ego has us caught in old patterns around goodness and worth (and lack of both).

I’m feeling really positive about this shift. The Piscean new moon may well be a watery one, bringing up emotions, but it is a moon of flow, if we are aligned to it. This really is a time to delve deeper in, notice where we are feeding drama in our lives and agitating our minds, and let go, let go, and enter more of the inner flow. Try not to control outcome. It’s very much about being in this moment and leaning deeper into faith and trust.

This is where the practice is essential now and I have no idea how anyone is navigating life without it. This is about actually putting the practice into practice too btw, not just talking about it. Too many people do the talk and not the walk, talking about a world of light and love and yet not appreciating the many ways they sabotage this in their own lives, always externalising and dramatising, rather than just looking inwards at their own landscape and choices and action. Plus we have to remember not to deny what we perceive as our dark spots, they’re as much a part of us as the bits we like. Embrace them all, this is the only way to bring greater authenticity into our lives.

Some of you are interested in Ayurveda following my previous blog post. Don’t forget that I am a qualified Ayurvedic Lifestyle and Diet consultant, having studied with my doctor for a year and now almost 14 years into experimenting on and learning from myself. I can consult with you to figure out your fault (dosh), where you are out of balance, and I can prescribe Ayurvedic medicine to help restore balance, as well as offering dietary and lifestyle advice too.

Please note Ayurveda is very different to the Western approach to nutrition. This is all about establishing optimal digestive fire, to calm your mind, stabilise your emotions, balance your energy, nourish your soul and help to expand your consciousness, so that your whole life is positively affected, healing and helping to awaken you to more of your own true nature. Like yoga, Ayurveda is a way of life that is over 5,000 years old and ends to be practiced to really experience the benefits - this involves a degree of personal responsibility. I love Ayurveda as it makes a huge difference the more that you bring it into your life.

Happy New Moon!

Love Emma x

Riding the storm

Most people I talk to are currently going through this mill in some way, facing various challenges that are squeezing them and making life a touch interesting. The ‘up in the air’ theme continues on. I can’t be sure the new moon on Wednesday is going to make any difference. i feel we are just going to have to ride this storm until at least after the Equinox, which should shift things, but even then…well we’re having to learn to live with uncertainty and the unknown. To do otherwise is to wish our lives away waiting for things to settle.

The only moment we have is this one and while it might be difficult, there is still much joy to experience, lessons to learn and hope to be found; we’re simply being encouraged to open up to new levels of being and seeing and relating. Let’s hope there might be greater peace as a result - in Ukraine, as much as in our own lives. Although we have to remember that ultimately the peace has to come from within, regardless of what is happening outside of ourselves.

It was with this in mind that I saw my Ayurvedic doctor on Friday because I am aware that all the events of the last six months have thrown my vata and she can prescribe stronger Ayurvedic medicine than I am able to access personally! Plus it’s always good to speak to her, as she helps me to see more clearly what is happening, and reminds me always that it comes back to energy.

I live with two vata (air and ether) beings, and I have another who is mainly fire, earth and water (pitta kapha) but feeds off the air. I’m fire, earth and water too (pitta kapha) and should really be able to calm them down, but there has been so much air, the recent winds certainly didn’t help, that I haven’t been able to maintain as much of my own earth, let alone theirs too!

Elijah’s excess vata has manifested in his separation anxiety. He’s also being assessed for autism too, another indication of vata constitution. I never thought I’d end up a label parent but I have realised that labels help us to make sense of what our children might be going through and helps them to understand themselves better too. It’s understandable that, despite the inclusivity, he didn’t fit into school. His sensitivities are a gift, but might be better nurtured in a different, more nature-based setting.

It’s perhaps not surprising that since we have flowed with him, rather than against him, that he has been the happiest we have known him for years.He’s much more grounded now he spends the majority of his days outside, and often up trees. He has become obsessed with tree climbing, we caught him up the Norfolk island pine in our garden the other morning, he had the firs stuck in his hair as evidence, tricky in that hair!

There is always a sacrifice to make and Elijah being at home probably means we won’t be taking quite so many trips to Sark this year, or farther afield, but it is a small price to pay. I really do feel that we have to orientate away from the patriarchal paradigm of it being all about money anyway, but of course money means power and we live in a time of power, you have only to look at Putin and how the Ukraine situation is unfolding.

It’s not an easy mind set to shift though, we’re all conditioned to it, and we do need money to survive in this world currently, but there still remains the mind-set that the richer we are economically, the more secure, successful and happier we are as human beings. I know that this isn’t true, and that one cannot put a price on happiness and contentment, nor on a way of living that allows flow and space. But nonetheless, the conditioning runs deep and I have had to do some digging deep to let that go over the last couple of years, Covid and the lockdowns helping enormously.

Because I have written about Elijah, other mothers have contacted me recently, concerned about their children who are anxious or showing signs of autism. I don’t yet have any regrets about the decision we have made and like I say, it comes at a price, but it is one we are currently happy to pay. But our way is not THE way and no doubt our way will have to shift and shape to accommodate his needs as they change too.

Many, however, are under the misguided notion that having your child at home has to look like home-schooling during lock down. It doesn’t. There is no curriculum to follow, you do what you want to do in a way that best suits you and your children. This too is a huge mind-set shift, because we are always so concerned about children losing out, or not keeping up and all this other rubbish. There was no rule book as best I know when we arrived on Planet Earth about how life should be lived, and certainly not one about how the mind might be trained and therefore educated.

I was taught lots of information that has been of no use or value to me in actually living my life. Much of it was really boring too, and all those endless exams to check that I had retained the information, nonsense too! And this from someone who thrived on academic success. But really now I see how unhelpful it all was. I couldn’t look after myself when I went to university because I hadn’t been taught life skills. So if there is one thing we focus on with Elijah it is that, how he might work with money, how he might make a fire, how he might prepare food, how he might interact with other people, how he might fix things etc.

At the end of the day, concerns about curriculum and whether you have to give up holidays, whether you can get by on a lesser wage and whether you will have as much time for yourself and all the activities that are currently carried out becomes irrelevant when you see your child suffering. Because then, really you have no choice and it should never matter what anyone else thinks. And locally, there is a Home Ed group that can provide support and more structure if needed, and help and guidance and a friendly face too.

So while Elijah is more contented and stable now, enjoying regular massages from me as recommended by my Ayurvedic doctor to help ease the excess vata, the focus moves to my youngest, Eben, our fighter! He’s been like that all the way, the embryo frozen for two years, a constant kicker in my tummy, breech and kicking his way out six weeks early on a super full moon while I was leading a yoga retreat on Herm. He hasn’t stopped since. He’s like me in many respects, I don’t stop much either, my Dad’s the same. We’re pitta doers, always on the go. I know now why my parents always found me so exhausting!

The difference being that I wasn’t a fighter. Well I mean I am, in so much as I might fight for what I believe in, spiritually certainly, and I’m pretty sure I used to fight my brother when we were younger, but Eben is different. His name chose itself and it means ‘grounded warrior’ so we shouldn’t be surprised, and I’m pretty sure that he has a past life or two as a fighter as one of the first words he uttered was gun, and we had not exposed him to them (that we know about) so it was a bit of a surprise. His fighting though, also comes because he likes the reaction and poor Elijah tends to be on the receiving end.

I do feel that his entrance to Planet Earth has not helped and possibly set this all in motion. He was whisked away from his mummy within minutes of being born, had a cannula inserted into his little hand, had a needle inserted into the bones between his spine, curling him into a ball in the process (they chose not to tell me too much about it as they said I would be too upset by the idea of it), fed formula and antibiotics, popped on his own in a little plastic box, and administered oxygen. It would be hours before I saw him, let alone held him.

It’s possible, that as a consequence of all this, he suffered some trauma. It’s possible that this has caused issues around the way his brain fires connections, especially in terms of dopamine. It’s possible he has lower levels than other children and has to do certain things to get more of it, like hit his brother repeatedly, eat sweet things (dried mango is his go-to), and generally act out, not because he’s naughty, but because he is seeking a reaction to obtain his dopamine hit and experience feelings of satiety.

The easiest way I find to understand the brain and how this all works, is to think of it as a very complex and intricate computer. Instead of electrical circuits, the brain consists of billions of cells called neurons. These neurons are organised into circuits and networks. Each neuron acts as a switch controlling the flow of information and if a neuron receives enough signals from other connected neurons, it fires, sending its own signal on to other neurons in the same circuit.

The brain itself is made up of many parts with interconnected circuits that - in theory - work together as a team. Different ‘circuits’ are responsible for coordinating and carrying out specific and various functions. The networks of neurons send signals back and forth to each other and throughout different parts of the brain, spinal cord and nerves in the rest of the body.

To send a message, a neuron releases a neurotransmitter into the gap (a synapse) between it and the next cell. The neurotransmitter crosses the synapse and attaches to the receptors on the receiving neuron, a little bit like putting a key in the lock, and this causes a change in the receiving cell. There are other molecules (transporters) that recycle neurotransmitters and bring them back into the neuron that released them, which limits or shuts off the signals between neurons.

Dopamine is a type of neurotransmitter that your body makes and your nervous system uses to send messages between nerve cells. It’s often referred to as a chemical messenger and it plays a key role in how we feel pleasure. If people have lower levels of dopamine, they will seek it out in alternative ways, which gives a rush of dopamine in the brain - it motivates drug taking for example, such as cocaine and amphetamines, and as with my son, it can motivate the need for sugar and carbohydrates and just acting up and fighting to get a reaction. There is a label for this but we’re not quite there just yet. But regardless, it is taking us on another journey individually and as a family.

Life tends to gives us what we need, not necessarily what we want, at least from a soulful perspective, and I find my life taking on new direction, led by the children. I’m learning lots about the effect of trauma on babies and children and the manner in which this affects them as they grow and the various ways that this can be healed and managed, and this from experience as much as from written text. I’m becoming increasingly aware that the more I surrender to the needs of my children, the richer my world becomes, not financially necessarily, but certainly from a heart and soul perspective.

And this brings me back to Ayurveda and energy and the notion that we see in you and Reiki, that the more we transform and change and balance ourselves and access greater levels of authenticity, the more positive the effect on those around us - our vibration shifts positively, theirs is more likely to shift positively too. So always, it has to come back to us and how we are relating to the world. If I’d like a calmer life then it’s no good looking at my children and simply trying to make them calmer and more balanced, I have to make myself calmer and more balanced first.

I’m very aware from my conversations with a child psychologist and from my friend who is a family counsellor, that regulation is key, regulation of the parents and caregivers mainly. My friend has been telling me this for years. Sleep deprivation is therefore not idea, because it creates patterns of disregulation simply because one is living on an edge. But really, regulation in my world means being energetically balanced.

And life generally has a way of throwing us off balance, especially when the energy is all up in the air and strong winds come in to further challenge us energetically. So the key is to try to maintain energetic balance as a parent. If we’re out of balance, all over the place and floundering, then the chances are our children will be too. And this is one of the greatest travesties of government reaction to Covid-19 the last few years, is the way it has impacted on adults and their mental health and how this has further impacted on their children.

We are continuously told that children are resilient, that they can better weather the storm than adults, but this is simply not true. Ask any child psychologist who works with traumatised children. They are no more resilient than adults, and the trauma they experience can have a far reaching effect on their ability to be in this world, and in their relationship not only to themselves but to others too. One of the things I really struggle with is this misconception and the way it has been played on during Covid. Only now are we really seeing the effects.

I was talking to a friend in the UK who works with dyslexic children and she was saying how there are more children than ever being tested, not because they are dyslexic, but simply because they’re far behind where they’d normally be because of all the disruption to education the last few years, let alone the anxiety, which makes it more difficult for children to learn anyway.

This is the crazy thing, children who are not regulated stand very little chance of learning anything because they are stuck in fight/flight, the lower part of the brain and they can’t access other parts so the information doesn’t go in. This is what was happening to Elijah. He just couldn’t understand what was being taught to him in class because he was too anxious, let alone because of dyslexia.

For me Ayurveda is always extremely helpful because it helps me to see the energetic changes that need to be made. The process itself can be informative, transformative and potentially enlightening too and I always relish the opportunity to go deeper as I never know quite what I might find and how this might shape my outer world. This is a time of great potential, we have to find our way to tap into this individually too, for the collective.

Not to say that I’m not also encouraging energetic changes within the boys too. Eben, is slightly easier to get Ayurvedic medicine into, and especially now we’ve set him up with a crystal reward system which I never thought I’d do, but needs must, and he LOVES it, such is the nature of an achiever! He’s difficult to massage though became he is ticklish and laughs instead. He’s very strong willed too, so I have to negotiate, but the reward system certainly helps with this. We’re also working on sleep, he’s a kicker and I get kicked half the night he joins me, but we have a plan…just got to put it into place!

There are many ways generally that we might reduce excess vata and ease the groundless and airy feeling, which can feed restless and anxiety and just make us feel depleted. So if you too are feeling like this, then I can highly recommend massage, eating warm, nourishing and easily digestible foods, like vegetable curry and rice, swimming and walking, guided relaxations, early nights and lots of rest, lying on the earth to literally ground, and being very gentle with the self. Preparing food mindfully helps, so too getting our hands in the earth and I am all set to start planting medical seeds next week, after the new moon.

I do find it so interesting how the changes that are coming in, however uncomfortable, are opening up new ways of being for us, that we might never have previously considered, or thought possible. I have always loved being with children, but I had no idea that my own children would change my life to this extent. I can see how these changes feed my soul, if I can only get myself and my conditioning out of the way and keep allowing myself to go with the flow even if I don’t know where the river is headed. As Ralph Blum writes, “relinquishing control is the ultimate challenge for the spiritual warrior”.

The message really, is to continuously settle into the unknown, to wait for the right time and then take an empty-handed leap into the void, and allow the self-change. This is where we’re at. A time of self-change, if we are up for it. Now is not the time to take action but to sit tight, like a new seed settling into the earth, waiting, waiting, waiting, for the time to sprout. I’m going to let the children lead the way and see where it takes us and all the while focus on the energetic balance and riding any storm and getting more sleep (hopefully!).

Enjoy this wane to the dark night.

Love Emma x

Up in the air

Well that was intense full moon my end, phew. I was pleased when that passed and thought it might bring gentler times but alas life still feels very much all up in the air and this reflected beautifully by this intense wind that we have been experiencing at least here on Guernsey.

Wowsers, I’ve not known anything like it and it my vata (air and ether) is definitely all over the place. My youngest has been wild. He’s wild anyway, has an enormous amount of energy that needs some harnessing in a more constructive manner, and the wind has simply whipped him into an energetic frenzy. Ewan has been away so it’s been full on these last few days!

Not helped because I had a book deadline to meet and so I have been desperately trying to find some quiet space within the chaos. I had it in mind that it had to be finished by the 21st. Other than being a friend’s birthday I’m not aware of it being a particularly significant day, but it just felt it somehow, a month before the Equinox. Maybe it’s because it was the day before 22.02.22, not that I’ve read anything about what that means, but all the ‘2’s would indicate something shifting.

We really are in that space between worlds, neither here nor there, everything still, like I said, up in the air, endings and new beginnings and still not 100% clear which direction the wind will take us next. It’s a very uncomfortable time. I keep hoping it might shift, but at the same time I’m very aware that this is how it is meant to be, the confusion and disorientation, because the process of birth is not easy, it can be long and arduous as any of those who have carried child know only too well.

There’s a tendency to do what we have always done and reach for something concrete to make it safe and known. My tendency has always been to reach towards work and try and make my diary known, add in a course here or a course there, push for things to happen, give my future life some orientation, distract myself in some way. But this time feels different. This time there needs to be space. This time I need to wait.

I finished my manuscript finally. The birth of a book is not an easy one either. I’ve been working on that, on and off for over 3.5 years. There comes a time though, when we just have to let go and let it go, whatever it is we have created. One thing I have learned along the way is the need to do it for the love of the creative process, not for the end result. There can be no attachment to outcome. So I have set it free now, returned it to my editor and it will now enter the final stages of proof reading.

I’m done. Not least with the manuscript, but with that time of my life that I detail within it, the one of depression. Each time I have edited it, it has taken me on a deeper inner journey to really feel into the threads of the story and to seek out any unresolved aspects of self lurking in the shadows. It’s been intense at times. I’ll be going through something in my life and then I’ll go back to the manuscript and lo and behold I find myself next reading about what I have just gone through, but from a different perspective now.

I’m finished with the processing, it is time to move on. I have no doubt that blips of depression will continue to show up in my life, because that is the pattern of my deepening into heart. Depression shows up when my heart feels suppressed, repressed, restricted in some way. There has to be a break down to break through the other side, to allow it more expression in the world. It has always been a path of heart for me, and this is just a way of accessing deeper love, however tricky that may feel as the casing breaks away that has kept the heart limited.

The casing is generally of my own making, a layer I popped there to protect the heart, because to feel is sometimes very intense, especially for those sensitive souls amongst us. Being gentle is key and being outside too. I’m doing a lot of that, to those ethereal areas of this beautiful island, of which there are many. We are lucky, we have ancient valleys and wells, areas where we can be calmed by gentle sound of water and its soothing energy. I’m a water being really so this works well for me and especially in countering the pitta (fire) and vata (air).

It always comes back to love. The universe is love. The universe loves nothing more than showering us in love, if we’ll let it, get out of our mind and into our bodies, overcome our vulnerability and be open to it. But first we have to let go of our defences, break down, be intimate. As above, so below. As we are gifted so we gift back. Our every act can become one of love, if we can shift our perspective to it. The sacred infuses all of life.

It’s perhaps no surprise that an hour after submitting my manuscript, of letting go, my body did its own letting go, not when it was due, but a creative letting go fro the womb space, confirming that we’re done, we’re ready to move on. That holding can drop away - I certainly slept better last night than I have done all week.

The winds are due to ease at some point this week…we’re picking up sped towards the Spring Equinox, life will be clearer after then, but still there is every reason to delight in each moment, it’s a perspective shift, a recognition of the sacred in everything. Not easy but possible. That’s where the work is.

So with love, enjoy this day, whatever it brings.

x

The new paradigm of being

I’ve been grappling to explain what it is that we do with Elijah now he is no longer at school. It’s all been part of this processing that I, like you, have been going through, the pushed through the mill, or the eye of the needle. It has been desperately uncomfortable, a real dark night of the soul.

I battled through it yesterday and felt the fury and anger that comes with the break down of some ego construct that I had been battling, as the ego does not want to be annihilated, but it has to happen, on the path to greater self-awareness and consciousness. Once I had surrendered, seen through more of the illusion within myself, the way I had kidded myself, the relief was incredible.

Today things are a little clearer. I realised that even using the term ‘unschooling’ isn’t right. It plays into the old paradigm and if there is one thing this moon energy is bringing, is the realisation that the new world has to be different. You will know if you read this blog regularly that we took Elijah out of school as he was extremely anxious and deeply unhappy. He was a star shaped being that we were trying to fit into a square box and he was using his light and his sparkle.

He would spend hours given the chance lost in Minecraft as a way of entering a different reality, one which brought gave him relief from the torturous one he was living at the time. Since then we’ve essentially let him be and spent as much time as we can outdoors. He has thrived. I have seen his star-like quality come back to life, he sparkles and glows with renewed confidence and self assurance. He climbs trees, he jumps rocks, he puts leaves downs streams and he imaginatively plays with other children who are not schooled.

He hasn’t needed to see a counsellor or a psychiatrist, he hasn’t needed medication or a special diet. We’ve just left him be himself as a child. he has seen a lady for private one-to-one dyslexia and dyscalculia lessons once a week and there is no doubt this has also helped his confidence. But that’s actually the most formal education he has, aside from the maths that my parents do with him. I don’t do anything formal. He learns about life as he lives it.

And this is my thing. He learns through life experience. So I am not even unschooling him. I’m just letting him be and providing opportunities to experience life differently. We meet a mum and her three children every Monday for outdoor play, this week we spent 3.5 hours walking from Portlet carpark to the fairy ring and back, with various stops for snacks and imaginative play, not least at the fort and the swings, but also at the fairy ring where Steph’s beautiful dog, Sunny, entertained us all!

Tuesdays and we meet up at WildGuernsey for fun around the fire with my beautiful friend Tara and two other amazing mums and their children. I have loved seeing Elijah learn to light a fire with a striker and whittle wood, as well as play with other children who are as sensitive as he is, and shy too. I have thoroughly enjoyed the connections made and the opportunity for all of to just be and switch off from the stresses of the world.

Wednesdays he’s with my folks at their small holding, last week it building a wall and making cement, another week it might be helping out in the greenhouse, or going off to see the boats. There is some maths in there usually, but even that he become less stressful than if he was at school, he gets flusters under pressure, but he knows how to count money and pay for things and he’s brilliant at understanding weight and speed, such is his obsession with vehicles and boats and all things that move.

Thursdays he’s with Ewan and sometimes Grandma too, swimming, park, boats, they don’t stop. Friday he’s with my parents while I teach and then we meet a friend and one her boys for more outdoor activity, rock pooling this week. In between all this, there is play with older school friends, we even managed a fire on the beach last Saturday.

So I concluded that I don’t really do any schooling, not really. I’m a huge fan of knowing and understanding through life experience for the joy this brings. Knowledge for the sake of knowledge seems rather pointless in the grand scheme of things. I learn best when I am interested in what I’m learning and then it is totally self motivated and a relatively joyful experience!

The wonderful thing throughout all this and as Elijah pointed out to me this morning, is that he no longer plays Minecraft. He’s done with it, finds it boring now he’s experiencing all these amazing imaginative play opportunities instead. Now in the morning the boys play together, this morning they were creating a truck on Elijah’s bed filled with all their cuddly toys, yesterday it was guns and protecting each other from the baddies. I feel to hold a ritualised bonfire of all the Minecraft clothing he’s collected over the last few years, were that not such a waste of material and money!.

Here too in my own life, on this fragile morning as the dust is settling, I know that it now has to move away from attachment to outcome and structure to one of greater experience, of just being - this the new paradigm, never lived previously, at least not for me. It has to be less defined and less certain, less known and less based on everything that has happened before - totally new therefore. This demands trust and faith, but it also demands a deeper connection to heart and soul and the Leo courage, bravery and fire to make the leap when the time is right - to let go of how we want it to be and allow it to be what it needs to be instead.

But for now, the energies out there are still buffeting us and I don’t expect there to be any calming until the winds ease on Monday and the light comes back in again. So enjoy the ride, for it is a ride, and pay attention to all that needs to be forgiven and drop away and all that is taking seed, and be gentle with those seed as they are truly in their fragile infancy.

Happy full moon!