Monthly Archives: August 2011

Podcast: Finding fundamental security in an insecure world

This week’s conversation ranges over what we can do when we’re afraid and uncomfortable, whether Fatty will jump up onto Kaspa’s lap or not, where we can find a fundamental security, and Kaspa crying in coffee shops.

It also includes the following quotes from Ezra Bayda’s book, ‘Saying Yes To Life’. Deep gratitude to Bayda for his ongoing inspiration (especially from Fiona).

“You’ll never be free from discomfort and fear – yet liberation comes from not needing to be free from them.

Ultimately we need to understand that spiritual life isn’t about being safe, secure or comfortable. It’s not that we won’t sometimes feel secure in the course of our spiritual practice; we surely will. And so too will we sometimes feel insecure. Yet there is a fundamental security that develops from many years of practice – though it is a far cry from the immediate comfort we may now crave.”

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Thank you for listening, and do let us know what you think in the comments.

The terror of kindness

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Fiona writes: This week we bought chocolate biscuits for our neighbour and left them in her porch with a card.

We’d seen her in town a couple of days ago, looking tired and drawn. She told us she’d been having a difficult time. We thought we’d buy her something nice.

When she found them, she phoned us to say thank you. She was very moved by our gesture. It cost us £2.50 and ten mintues of our time.

If it costs us so little to be kind, then why don’t we do it more often?

At the moment I’m reading ‘On Kindness’ by Adam Phillips and Barbara Taylor. Their proposition is that being kind to others makes us happy, but it also opens us up.

“The terror of kindness is that it makes us too immediately aware of our own and other people’s vulnerabilities (vulnerabilities that we are prone to call ‘failings’ when we are at our most frightened.)”

And, of course:

“Bearing other people’s vulnerabily – which means sharing in it imaginatively and practically without needing to get rid of it, to yank people out of it – entails being able to bear one’s own.”

Maybe our neighbour, who we don’t know very well, might start pouring out her troubles to us. Maybe she’d become too dependent on us. Maybe her troubles would echo our own worst fears, a little too closely for comfort.

It cost us £2.50, ten minutes of our time, and a small unveiling of our aching, vulnerable hearts.

Suggestion: do one kind thing today. Can you get in touch with the other’s or your own vulnerability?

“A man’s true delight is to do the things he was made for. He was made to show goodwill to his kind.”
~Marcus Aurelius

“People need other people, not just for companionship or support in hard times, but to fulfil their humanity.”
~Adam Phillips

After sending this newsletter out on Friday (sign up here) Thom Woodruff wrote this poem in response, which I really liked – I thought you might like it too… find out more about Thom (he’s touring the UK soon) at his blog and site.

it is late in this heated season

yet tomatoes are still blooming

as gifts (golden apples of the sun

when driving,we always carry food and water

for overheated Buddhists,homeless in their flesh

excess shakes to those the superflux

we give to that part of us/needing us

to rise above the terror of kindness

An interview with Doug Robertson: Artist

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This week I’ve really pleased to introduce Doug Robertson as our creative interviewee.

Doug Robertson is an artist, and member of the Writing Our Way Home community.

Doug was born and brought up on the east coast of Scotland, says that this has had a major influence on his work. Doug has done many one man shows, he has worked collaboratively with poets (and now runs the ekphrastic poetry from art on WOWH) and in 2004 he was in residence at An Tobar on the Isle of Mull.

To see some of Doug’s work, and read his blog (where he shares some of his collaborations) check out his website: www.douglasrobertson.co.uk.

Thanks for joining us Doug. What drives your creative work?
A difficult first question; it’s something I’ve never really thought of until now. Being creative is part of my psyche. Curiosity and an inbuilt need to communicate what I see and experience of the space I inhabit are a major part of my motivation. I just love making art, and feel very lucky that I have been allowed to develop this love into a career, and that there has been an audience for what I have had to say. The drive or need to create is, and has always been with me.

What would you say to yourself if you could go back in time and meet yourself at the beginning of your creative career?
Eliminate procrastination! Above all other advice, I would say to take advantage of every opportunity placed before you, and make the most of your life. Don’t be the sort of person who says, ‘I wish I’d done that’. Do it!

How do you keep creating when things get difficult?
Is there a time when it’s not difficult? Feeding your creativity is an important thing to do, and for me that mainly takes the form of reading.
I’m a self-confessed poetry junkie, and there are several writers such as Kenneth White, Seamus Heaney or George Mackay Brown who I can turn to as touchstones if my art hits an impasse. And sitting on the coast of my native Scotland never fails to get the creative thoughts flowing.
On a different thread, it is easy to make the not enough time/space/money excuses for not producing work, but if you really want to create, you’ll find a way.

(Oh! and I forgot to mention, a good cup of black coffee is needed to accompany the reading!)

How does your creative work affect the rest of your life?
It is difficult to separate the two. I don’t think it is something you can switch off, nor would you want to. I’m permanently mulling ideas over in my head, and anyone who knows me will be familiar with the small black Moleskine notebook I have on my person at all times. I think if you are an artist or maker of any sort, you are constantly tuned in to what is happening around you, and are consciously (and subconsciously) collecting and processing ideas. As I said in the opening question, I feel creativity is part of the psyche and therefore is with you at all times.
I’m also fortunate enough to earn my living from teaching art, so creativity plays a big part in most of my day.

What is it like to send your work out into the world?
To me it is a very important part of being an artist. Creating, in whatever form, is a very solitary existence, and once you have made the work to your own satisfaction it has no other purpose if you don’t have an audience (unless of course you are using it as a form of therapy). It’s a real thrill and a privilege for me to walk in and see my work hanging in art galleries. I think we are lucky as makers to be allowed, through our expression of shared experiences, to touch and affect people with the art we create. We all hope to do this, and when it works, it makes all the effort and hours in the studio worthwhile.
There is also another way of looking at it; that as artists, we can be guilty of being a bit egocentric, and the work can be viewed as a kind of an ‘I was here’. I know I’m part of that at times, but hopefully it all balances out. I think that we would all like our work to leave some sort of artistic legacy.

What was the best advice anyone gave to you?
The Scottish poet Norman MacCaig once told me to ‘study brevity’. This also ties in with advice given to me by an Art School painting lecturer, Peter Collins, who taught his students that ‘less is more’. Two similar pieces of advice that I have tried to follow in my work to this day.

What helps you to pay attention to the world?
This can be broken down into several layers.
Firstly, knowing what has gone before you. I have learned a great deal from the makers that have preceded me, with their work helping me to understand and develop my own creativity.
Second, a sense of place; being able to centre myself on the familiar and creating work from what I know and understand. I am always true to myself in the work.
Finally, slow down. We live in a world where everything has to be done yesterday. We need to regain the ability to take our time and understand the finer details of our surroundings. I’d like to think that I am in some way bringing this practice into my work, and hopefully encouraging others to do the same.

Brilliant, thanks for joining us Doug.

Kaspa & Fiona

Moments of rapture, moments of desire

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Fiona writes: I’m sitting in my conservatory, looking at my neighbour’s glorious Joseph’s Coat roses. Fatty is curled and sleeping on a chair beside me, our only cat.

The sun-saturated sky is dappled all over with dabs of white cloud. A sliver of moon, like a thinly sliced piece of apple, is lingering.

As I look, a piece of white fluff floats past on the breeze. Man-made, or seed?

I woke early, and my eyes pinged open and my brain started whirring with all the things-to-be-done today and tomorrow and tomorrow.

The things-to-be-done are good things. We’ve chosen to do them, mostly. Sometimes I forget this, and tip over into being a victim, or into panic, or exhaustion.

Each day filled with moments of rapture, moments of despair, and many more moments of ordinariness. Bread and butter. The quiet satisfaction of feeling Fatty’s fur under my palm, of my husband coming downstairs and putting the kettle on.

It’s a good life.

I want to remember.

This was sent out on Friday as our weekly newsletter – to sign up click here.

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This blog is best accompanied by a nice cup of tea and Jane Hirshfield’s It Was Like This: You Were Happy.

The F-word

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Fiona writes: I won’t scare you with the f-word just yet. I’ll tell you about my work as a therapist.

Every week, clients come to my home and talk to me about their lives.

I don’t know what they’ll tell me when they arrive. Often, they don’t either. As they speak, something unfolds.

Over the years, I have learnt to trust that the process has its own life, which takes us both where it needs to go. If my client finds themselves talking about their dog, or their great-aunt, or their love of shoes, then that’s where we need to be heading.
Over time, stories unfolds. These stories are scary, raw, secret, angry, joyful… they are whatever they need to be. As time goes on, something wonderful blossoms.

Sometimes, we reach a treachorous part of the path and the client flees, stopping the sessions suddenly. When I was first practising, I felt like a terrible failure. The process had floundered, and it was all my fault.

My supervisor wisely advised me at the time. Leave the door open for these clients, and they may come back to you and they may not. Either way, you have given them an experience of being accepted as they are. Who knows how your time with them might have affected them? Who knows how slowly their blossoms will unfurl?

So here’s the word. Faith.

I developed faith in the process of therapy. I trust that what needs to happen will happen, however confused or conflicted we feel along the way. And it does.

As my own life unfolded, it took me in directions I never imagined I would travel. I’m in the process of developing a more expansive faith, in an ineffable something that holds the process of therapy and everything else.

I often have doubts. I sometimes feel that I’m doomed to get it wrong, and that we’re all doomed. When this happens, it helps to act as if I can have faith in the universe, even if I don’t feel it.

If you’re short on faith right now, then you can borrow some of mine. Keep it for as long as you need it. Here.

We also spoke about faith on yesterday’s podcast – have a listen.

To explore your own beliefs around faith (and praise, perseverence and clear-seeing) you might want to join us in September on my Writing as Spiritual Practice course (only space for 12 people), or learn The Art of Paying Attention on Kaspa’s – we’re now open for registration. It’d be eversolovely to have you along.

Podcast: Sowing good seeds

Instant lemon-curd-karma

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Fiona writes: We have some particularly delicious lemon curd in the fridge at the moment. The proper home-made stuff – buttery, zesty, bursting with lemoniness.

This morning, as I ate my toast, I noticed that something was a little ‘off’. I thought it might be the butter – maybe it’d been out in the heat too long and had turned a little rancid.

As I reached the end of my toast, I remembered making garlic bread yesterday. I remembered stirring the fresh minced garlic into the butter with a knife. I remembered using said knife to slice another knob of butter from the pat.

Garlic lemon curd on toast. Instant karma.

But there are also instances of not-so-instant karma.

We went to a local tea rooms last week and ate beautiful home-made quiche & then decided to go crazy and order cake & coffee afterwards. They do GOOD carrot cake, and you know how I feel about cake.

As we paid, I knew that we were paying too little. I knew it as we walked down the stairs and back up the hill towards the car. We were half-way back to the car before I made myself stop and say to Kaspa, they didn’t charge us for the cake & coffee. We went back. We paid.

What made me go back? I can tell you for certain that a couple of years ago, I wouldn’t have done it. I would have blamed the cafe for making a mistake. I would have rationalised that £5.20 wouldn’t have made a difference to them. I would have continued with my life, guilt-free.

I think I have more faith now that it is good to be good, regardless of whether anyone will ‘find me out’ or not. I was more able to think about the owner of the cafe as a small business owner like myself, relying on people’s honesty and repeat custom. I was able to see my potential act of dishonesty as laying down more karmic seeds in me, that would ripen in turn and lead to further dishonesty. I was able to take my ‘bad seed’ of ‘wanting to get away with it’, and cast it onto the concrete.

This is an example of me doing-the-right-thing, but I could offer you many more of the opposite. Like leaving garlic in the butter, and knowing that SOMEONE was going to get garlic lemon curd…

An interview with Isabel Losada: author and broadcaster

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This week it’s my great pleasure to introduce Isabel Losada. Isabel is a who writes what she calls narrative non-fiction. True stories about interesting things… her books include, The Battersea Park Road to Enlightenment, For Tibet, With Love: A Beginner’s Guide to Changing the World, Men! (Where the **** are they?) and The Battersea Park Road to Paradise. Isabel has also worked as an actress, presenter, researcher, director, stand up comedienne, public speaker, singer, single parent and author. She really does live in Battersea Park Road. She has one daughter and a ginger cat.

Thank for joining us Isabel, What drives your creative work? I think being an only child helped a lot. The main thing behind my writing is a desire to communicate – I kept a diary from an early age and there is a saying that if you keep a diary one day your diary may keep you. This was so on my case. I have also had a difficult life and so have made a study of everything that works. I write narrative non fiction (I have adventures in the real world and then write about them) and I pass on the best of what I have learnt. I also love making people laugh and so letters from readers that say, ‘you made me laugh out loud’ keep me very happy.

What would you say to yourself if you could go back in time and meet yourself at the beginning of your creative career? Keep going – perseverance is everything. But fortunately I already knew that. I had rejection letters from every major agent and publishing house in London – but I believed and do believe passionately in my own work. One book that was rejected 18 times has now sold over 100,000 copies and is in 16 languages. Agents and publishers are just people and don’t know everything.

How do you keep creating when things get difficult? It’s not like this for me as I live my books. I don’t make anything up. Everything in my books is true. So for me the question is the same as ‘how do you keep living when things get difficult?’ Well – one day at a time. One breath at a time. I love writing – if you don’t love writing – don’t do it as there is very little money in it for 90% of those of us who write professionally. So you have to love writing. If you don’t go and get a job that you do love because life is short. J I just said the same thing twice because it’s so important.

How does your creative work affect the rest of your life? Ha ha – there is no division between my work and my life. How does my choice to write effect the rest of my life? Well it means that I’m more isolated than I would like to be and have a considerably lower income.

What is it like to send your work out into the world? Joyful. I write to my readers like long love letters. I am never fearful of how the work will be received. I hope that my readers will love and understand what I’m writing about because I write about happiness and living life to the full and these are important subject. But if someone doesn’t like my books they are not obliged to read them are they? The professional critics will always be critical – that is their job. They rarely read the books anyway and most professional reviews are based on a cursory glance at the first chapter and some random bit in the middle. I write for the readers who enjoy my work – and – thanks to facebook and my website – they now write back and tell me they love my work.

What was the best advice anyone gave to you? I once send a TV proposal I’d written to a man more experienced in that area of writing than I am. I asked if he could give me any help with it. He took a red pen and wrote ‘Make it better’ across the top and made me do it myself. This was the best advice I ever had as we have to be our own editors.

What helps you to pay attention to the world? What a strange question. How can you be a writer and not pay attention to the world? But I suppose since you ask a constant low level of co-dependency (not on any one person) makes me want to make everyone around me happy. So I watch for ways to change things for the better. I’m sure this is highly dysfunctional and based on a spiritual inability to accept things as they are. The Buddhists say that acceptance of things as they are in an important first spiritual step. After 20 years as a ‘spiritual writer’ (or that is where my books are often found in the bookshops) I have yet to progress beyond the first step.

Maybe that first step is to accept that that we are not accepting

Thanks again, Isabel

Kaspa & Fiona

A love letter to you all

Chocolate biscuit gratitude

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Fiona writes: We have been overwhelmed by the messages and emails we’ve received from people after our post about Silver. There are many of you out there who understand. It’s good to that know we’re not alone, and that you felt a little sadness when you said goodbye to Silver too. Thank you.

Kaspa has written a beautiful post about Silver from a Buddhist perspective over on our Buddhist blog, here. (Here we are on Facebook if you’d like to catch his podcasts). Here’s one of the quotes he uses:

“Pain, grief, loss, and ceaseless frustration of every kind are there for a very real and dramatic purpose: to wake us up, to enable, almost to force us to break out of the cycle of samsara and so release our imprisoned splendor.” ~Sogyal Rinpoche

We also received a lovely quote from Cynthia which I wanted to share with you all.

“We who choose to surround ourselves with lives even more temporary than our own live within a fragile circle, easily and often breached. Unable to accept its awful gaps, we still would live no other way. We cherish memory as the only certain immortality, never fully understanding the necessary plan.” ~Irving Townsend

And I’ve been interviewed here if you want to look-see.

I’ve just had two rather yummy chocolate biscuits, so I’ll send you all a virtual one and then I’m going to get back to my writing, which (appropriately, this week) is about kindness.

Be kind to each other out there. None of us know how long we have.