Courage/Fear

I woke up on the first day of 2013 knowing it was the year I was leaving my marriage. And even though I didn't know what that meant, what form it would take, how I'd get from where I was to where I needed to be, I knew I had to find a way. And I knew I'd have to draw on my courage to get me there.

The word 'courage' was one I clung to. Whether or not I actually had any of the stuff, and whatever the hell I was going to do with it if I could find some, seemed almost irrelevant. I just kept invoking the actual word. When I needed to make difficult phone calls, or have difficult conversations, or even think difficult thoughts, if I started to get muddied down in fear or denial or resistance, I'd remember that word 'courage' and I'd be able to go through with whatever it was that needed doing. What is it they say about courage not being the absence of fear, but rather action in the face of fear? I'm not sure. I do know I was bloody terrified. 

Last week I came across a Brene Brown quote that caught my eye. In it she defines courage as: 

1) Asking for what you need 

2) Speaking your truth

3) Owning your story

4) Setting boundaries

5) Reaching out for support.

Is that courage? I'm not sure. But I know that all of those things are incredibly important for an authentic life, and they're all things I'd like to master. I'm useless at number 1, but these days much, much better at number 4. Numbers 2 and 3 fill me with equal parts terror and exhilaration and I wonder if they might just be the meaning of and solution to everything. 

Speaking your truth. Owning your story. 

A few weeks ago, Jodi interviewed me for the Heart to Heart series over at Wholehearted. The chat (via Facebook) was delightful and easy and entirely enjoyable. But then the fear about it being out in the world set in. It's one thing to want to speak your truth, another to do it in earshot of other human beings.

On Friday, when the interview appeared on the site, I was overwhelmed with the response. Such beautiful, loving, generous, supportive comments and emails and messages, from people who've known me my whole life, people who only know me via my blog and also complete strangers (who know a bit more about me now).

Number 5 - reaching out for support. I can honestly say, during this tumultuous past year, I've not needed to reach out. In my beautiful family, in this little village community, amongst my dear friends across the country, and here in this incredible online world, it feels as though the support has come to me. How lucky am I. And thank you so, so much from the bottom of my heart.

Afresh

I fell off my blog.

I've been trying to climb back on it. There are so many reasons, some simple, some  really quite profound. But mostly it's just time. In the several-times-a-day scuffle with priorities, it seems to have fallen in a great heap at the bottom of the enormous pile. Even lower than the washing, which is saying something (and which is also an enormous pile).

So while I try to work out the ropes and rigging (for the climbing back on, you know), I'll enjoy fresh sunflowers on a table in desperate need of oil. The table, which once sat pristine and unused in my grandparents' formal dining room, now graces the kitchen in my new home. MY NEW HOME! It's a tiny house that needs a lot of love, but has already been transformed, in the space of less than a month, by paint and scrubbing brushes, the  incredible generosity of good friends, and the laughter, shouting and singing of my three gorgeous girls.

I'm about 50 days late, but happy new year! Here's to fresh beginnings.

Solo Trip

My marriage hasn't ever been a huge part of this blog. When all of this online world has seemed full to overflowing with loving relationships and supportive partnerships, couples who have each other's  backs, two-person teams shovelling the gritty stuff together at the coal face, I've found myself tongue-tied and with little to contribute.

I've presented to you a joyful world in which beautiful, happy children frolic in the fresh country air, eating fresh-baked delights and wearing mumma-made clothes.  I've leapt out in pursuit of creative fulfilment, trying to turn business dreams into reality. I've taken lots and lots of pretty pictures. I've thrown humour at it, used big words and neatly constructed sentences. I've tried to give you something of myself without ever giving you the truth of it.

That truth being that my marriage has failed and I've walked away. I just can't do it anymore. I don't want to do it anymore.

Tonight is the third night in my new home, and the first without my girls. I'm a single parent now, but I'm also a part-time parent. And I'm not sure they've invented the words yet for how that reality makes me feel.

And yet, and yet...

My marriage hasn't ever been a huge part of this blog and I'm pretty sure the end of it won't be either.  It'll continue to be me and my girls, just painted with different brushstrokes. They're far from the ones I ever imagined back on that shiny white-dress day. But it's our story now. It's my story now.

And I'm going to make sure it's a bloody good one.

Thank you for your beautiful comments of concern after my last post, and to those of you who contacted me via email to check up on me. I am OK. I am surrounded by incredible friends and the unwavering support of my family. I have deep faith in my own resilience and a relentless optimism that rarely lets me down. I promised my babies that everything is going to be just fine, and it will be.

Light

There is much going on beyond the knitting and blogging and enormous morning-tea making. Real life stuff. Altogether unpleasant stuff. Stuff I can't go into here, at least not yet. If things are quiet for a while, that is why. 

In the meantime, I'll remind myself that even in the dim light of early winter, there are sparkly things to be found...if you remember to look.