Slowly, Slowly

Bruno's, Marysville (pre-fire)  Pic mine - free to use but please link back

Yesterday, I took the next few steps towards seeing if this creative space idea of mine - Liminal - is viable.

I created a survey (which I would love for you to fill in, if you could be ever so kind, especially if you live in Australia).  I created a Facebook page.  I already have a Twitter account.  And I sent out the first newsletter.

After all of that effort, Speedy Snail is a little exhausted today!

Unable to identify image creator - apologies

This is so how I felt this morning.

My hope was that I would at least try to do some basic yoga stretching,  some breathing, and some meditation, to start off the day right.

It's hard to do that when you can't get yourself out of bed, though, so I did the next best thing - I just stayed in bed and did it all.  Sure bed yoga entails reduced poses but it's not like I would be doing downward dog first thing in the morning anyway, so it's all good.

Starting something new - or at least dipping your toe into the idea of starting something new - is terrifying, isn't it?  It feels daunting because it's big and it's changey and we aren't very good at change.  But still, right next to the terror is excitement.  It reminds me of how often this state felt as a child and a teenager, and how as we get older it's easier to sequester ourselves away from new experiences.

Especially true for me after 15 years of chronic illness.

But the good thing about having a chronic illness is that it has forced me to confront my limitations.  I'm not very good at managing them, even after all this time.  Sometimes, if I'm extra ultra anxious, I can easily feel like pacing myself is simply not allowed, as if something outside says it is not permissible to do things your way, in your time, at your pace.

It's the insides that are making me feel like that, and what is inside is anxiety.  It's been probably the hardest symptom for me to manage in recent years and I only now feel like I'm getting on top of it again.    This racing mind has thoughts rushing through like traffic, in combination with a fatigued body, so I end up feeling sorta somethin' like this:

CC pic by Andrew

But of course, there is also something outside my own body that says that I can't go at my own pace and neither can you.  It's this stupid, childish, ridiculous, amateur culture we're all stuck with while we slowly realise we can change it.  The one that tells us to conform to it, not the other way around.  The one that does not fit us right.  Our culture is like a one-size-fits-none jumper made of scratchy wool that's 11 sizes too small that we have to wear all summer, and which has too many holes to keep us warm in winter.

Stepping outside of what you've been born into is the equivalent of that saucepan frog jumping out.  It's scary and hard to see what one day ends up being so clear.  But it's doable.  Being aware of our culture's stupidity, and that your desires to do things your way are perfectly acceptable - sane, even - makes it just that much easier.

And so the fears I have about starting up something like this with limited stamina are not so surprising in the light of the inside and the outside.  I can't start up something like this.  Why not?  Because I don't have the energy.  Well start it part-time.  But you can't start up a business part-time!  Why not?  Because it doesn't look professional.  Who says?

Good point.    But I can't do it by myself.  Then get other people on board.  I don't know where to start with that.  Well, just start.  Build it and they will come.  Was it really necessary for you to insert a corny film line?  Yes.

There are so many ways we can limit ourselves.  I'm a hardcore mistress at it.  But to be honest with you, I have absolutely NOTHING to lose in pushing to see what happens with this idea, and everything to gain.

At the very least, I will be able to say I tried.  And that's something.  

Public domain

Snails have been featuring prominently for me lately.  I wrote a short story a few weeks ago for a competition.  The winning story goes onto a wine label, which is all kinds of cool.  My story involved a woman at her daughter's wedding who is voyeuristically watching a couple of snails having sex.  Can say I don't write about the important stuff, now, can we?

Liminal Spaces

Liminal means threshold in Latin. 

Pic by A. Davey

In Celtic lore these spaces are "thin spaces," where the veil between the worlds is so gossamer thin that one world seeps into another. 

Liminal spaces are disorientating spaces.  In rituals around the world it is the middling space where you have moved on from what was before ~ orientation and normality and everydayness ~ into a space of disorientation.  Everything's flipped.  Alice is down the rabbithole and nothing is the same size anymore. 

In rituals, the disorientation is for a purpose.  Out the other side of the initiation, the participant comes changed from their experience.  They are back in the topside world once more, but everything has changed.  Or, at least, they have, and therefore the world looks different and they walk in it differently.  They have gone from orientation to disorientation to reorientation.  Order out of chaos.

Some of us find ourselves in these spaces on a physical level and on an ongoing basis ~ through chronic illness or trauma or both.  These are difficult spaces to hold.  You can easily lose track of any kind of meaning attached to your suffering or of any transformation coming from your experience.
 
But now the earth's climate is changing, and along with it monumental seismic cultural seizures happening around the world.  Now, we all find ourselves in this strange space, where it feels like everything is disorientated, everything shaking, everything falling apart.

This liminal space is where we are now.  It is anything but comfortable.

But amazing things come from this space.  It is the space of possibility.  It is the space where creative acts come out of necessity.  Amazing energy flows from out of this space.

And while it feels like everything is up for grabs and we seesaw between abject despair and furious hope, we need to remember that we are in the middle of the process.

The reorientation is still to come and none of us know what it will look like.  It may even, just possibly, be better than we could have hoped for.

This is the logo for the space that I am hoping to birth into being.  It is probably quite appropriate that I am swinging myself between abject despair and furious hope about its formation.

I do not even know if it is a viable space.  What I do know is that it is an idea that will not leave me alone.

I envision a space that involves relaxation and stimulation, where no matter how halt or infirm or on the edges you feel, that you feel welcome.  A space that explores ways of feeling more at home in discomfort, and creative ways to envision the future.  A space that has a swing inside.  For adults.

I am planning a newsletter to send out to anyone who wants to be kept in the loop on what's happening (which may be a little or may be a lot - I am trying to start this up with $1.71 in my bank account and 14 years of chronic fatigue syndrome under my belt :).

If you'd like to receive the newsletter, drop me a line at susieq777@dodo.com.au.