Staying present

The event is just data until we give it meaning and it is the meaning we give it that creates how we feel, then how we respond, then the results. The pause is the bringing of awareness into that moment when we interpret the data and practicing choice- choose to give the situation the meaning that moves us forward with peace or back to whatever it was we were doing before the triggering event knocked us off our centre.

A conversation with a friend triggered a memory of something I'd always remembered as unpleasant. Strangely, I remembered the event and the pain I had associated with it as if I was remembering two separate things.

I could credit it to the fact that I was becoming more aware of the ability of the mind to tell stories and to give the meaning that elicited the most familiar of emotions and practiced of interpretations. I also knew how anger just needs an uncontrolled sense of injustice or entitlement to feed on and it can live on forever. But maybe it wasn’t awareness alone that made this time different- that kept me rooted in the present. 

A study David Eagleman of the Baylor College of medicine, demonstrated that our consciousness lags one- twelfth of a second behind actual events. Maybe what I experienced was that time lag- that pause between the data (the event in memory) and the interpretation or tag that I had attached to it.

Usually, it would have been an automatic jump from event to reaction or in this case, memory to feeling, without any realisation that the two were separate things like that subliminal split second command from your brain to your legs and the walking itself.

But this time, I could recognise and differentiate the memory of the event from the reminder to be angry about it . And I reminded myself that in the present I was unhurt. It was a nice, sunny afternoon with a scenic view. I wasn't the me in the memory who was hurt by another's actions. I was the me in that park, visited by a memory of an event long gone.

With this clarity, I was able to dismiss both event and memory and stay in the present. 

Practice Pause

Over the weekend, I arrived confidently before 4pm, the Post office closing time, to post a package. The Post man equally confident, told me I was 3 hours late and the post office closed at 1pm on a Saturday. With realisation came fear- that I would now be stuck with the items I had meant to return but hadn't till the last minute, loosing both the use of the ill-fitting items and the money that would now not be put to better use. 

Then blame, that I could have been here on time if only I hadn't taken a nap I now regretted. Then my mind flitted to something entirely unrelated but potent with the familiar taste of blame, before I had any awareness of my spiraling thoughts and remembered my practice of pause. 

American motivational Author, Louisa Hay, gives a good tool for the "oh shit" moments of life like this. She suggests saying something along the lines of "all is well and I am safe, this situation will easily resolve for my highest good", in the face of the mental spiral that follows. 

Just saying this quietly to myself changed the direction of my thoughts and allowed me to access self-compassion. It allowed me space to notice what was happening and notice something else too! 

I realised that the feeling I have always associated with disappointment was not disappointment at all! Yes, the post office closing registered disappointment as the data, but the meaning I gave it felt like the more punishing combination of regret, blame and self-flagellation that had escaped my notice because it felt justified after all  'I should feel disappointed'. 

With awareness and self compassion, seating between me and those feelings though, disappointment now didn't feel so heavy in an end-of-the-world way or a hopeless this-is-who-you are way. 

Now there was lots of space around it, lots of give in places that just a moment ago felt final. Now my racing thoughts shifted quickly in a constructive direction- "who knew what possibilities for redemption Monday would bring, what new directions or learnings an unexpected turn could take, how this would all turn out?". 

As I went my way, more in control of the direction of my own thoughts, I decided this experience had cracked wide open my writer's block and given me something to write about- meaning, see?

Cynthia Erivo's 'Wicked'!

Her moments on screen transcended the syrupy and sticky sweetness between Ariana, as Glinda or Erivo as Elphaba, that sold the movie as the new must-see, along with a list of must-haves. 

I watched the movie 'Wicked' this weekend for more of the respite and uplift, than the reward side of a treat- and it delivered both! 

I'd been waiting to watch the movie but it didn't seem like common sense to either buy a couple of tickets or pay full price to stream it until a familiar feeling, "I need a treat", collided with it becoming available to watch at home on Amazon Prime at the same price to see it in a cinema. All of a sudden, I wanted it and I wanted it now!

There is nothing like experiencing something the first time. The things you notice are by raw instinct. No one else will experience it the same and there will never be another first time after that.  

Similarly, on first watch, the things that grab your attention are the things you are wired to see, that appeal to you, that your senses select just for you. 

Now, I already knew 'Wicked' was a smorgasbord of orgasmic visuals, of auditory stimulants, of dopaminergic story telling and it would not disappoint, but sweet Oz- that Cynthia at first glimpse!

Her moments on screen transcended the syrupy and sticky sweetness between Ariana, as Glinda or Erivo as Elphaba that sold the movie as the new must-see, along with a list of must-haves. 

Her acting effortlessly kept from view, how much effort was behind even the slightest brush of the hair away from the nape of the neck and each micro expression, that delivered volumes of internal conflict and inner-monologue to her character, and in equal measure, embodied a host of feelings only understood by people who live in bodies that aren't seen- people who live in lives already written as a means to another's ends.

Cynthia's magnetism in a scene, was not of the variety where you noticed the actor's looks, the actor acting or their lead role. It just did the job, holding together the tempo and beats necessary to move the story forward and give meaning to the innuendo between the other characters.

Part of her allure is how she melds into the art and becomes metaphor for life, and then manages to transcend in both art and life, the code switch of living in two or many worlds at the same time, while operating in a space free of the mental noise that comes with it. 

With Cynthia, you do not see "I am acting", "I am trying to sound American", "I am trying to switch between being British or being Nigerian", "I am trying to sing" or "I am queer"- just Cynthia, with the inner self-talk equivalent of the Ozempic brain, where people on the weight-suppression medication, claim they suddenly feel free of obsessive thoughts about food and no longer have incessant, internal 'food talk'.

It's a theme of freedom you sense in the spirit of the entire film, but one not more palpable than in those final scenes, where Erivo steps into her moment, and sings the anthem of freedom for all of us, like she is speaking to voices that have said "you are not one of them", faces that have said "and you are not like us"; to looks, gestures, vibes, one form of mental noise or other, even the loud chatter of chocolate and fast food-

"...nobody in all of Oz, no wizard that there is or was, is ever gonna bring me down!"