February | 2022 | Rosie Goes

Today I left my clothes on the floor, the bed unmade and I drank from the milk carton. I burnt supper too.

I’m learning that ‘starting,’ does not simply involve pressing the ‘green button’ and moving forward. Instead it’s a dance. A dance that I’m still learning; one with some rather complex maneuvers and a dance in which I am wearing a pair of heels for the first time. It’s a dance that I move back and forth, I sidestep, I fall, I nosedive without a hint of grace and I twist my ankle, I kick my big toe and fall to the dusty dance floor in a great heap of self-pity.

But this is the difference. In my mind, there is no choice. I don’t get to stay on the floor like I once did. I must get up and do it again, and dance some more.

It’s easier said than done. This month I have fallen many times. I’ve felt the paralyzing heaviness of frustration, doubt, anxiety and overwhelm weigh me down, my thoughts pinning me to the floor and locking me in a place that I don’t want to be. The music that usually brings life to my soul, that makes me not only want to be upright and dancing to a melody, is barely audible. All I can hear are the loud and disruptive voices I don’t want to hear and that keep me stuck and from progressing with the process of starting.

Starting something new is a process. Before I can dance, I must learn ‘how to’ first. I must accept that learning to dance is most likely going to be an inelegant, imperfect process of ‘stopping and starting’ and of course, because I’m wearing heels while doing it! It’s a constant ‘to and fro’ between falling back on old habits and mindfully embracing new ways. It’s about recognising when the old narrative is at play and getting better at stopping it sooner than later. It also involves sparing some space for the ‘fall,’ being ‘okay’ with a clumsy and imperfect start, being patient with myself, being kind and learning to dance in a new pair of shoes!

It’s been a tough month and I have been a wreck! I’m going through a divorce and with that comes adjusting to a new way of life and stepping into a world I know little about. This month has been particularly challenging, mostly because it’s the end of year tax month and it’s been a very steep learning curve! It’s a strange dance; dancing between grand business plans, feeling passionate and motivated about what will come and then in the midst of being positively pumped up about ‘kick starting’ my future plans, I receive an email that states ‘it’s time to pay SARS the moolah’….and I put my pen down. My question is this? How on earth do I get creative when I am feeling so anxious?

This is something that I want to learn more about. How to manage anxiety? I have been so damn anxious this month and it’s crippling. All I know is that I cannot stay here. I must get better at this. I must continue to ‘start.’

“The chief beauty about time
is that you cannot waste it in advance.
The next year, the next day, the next hour are lying ready for you,
as perfect, as unspoiled,
as if you had never wasted or misapplied
a single moment in all your life.
You can turn over a new leaf every hour
if you choose.”
― **Arnold Bennett**

The journey of Rosie Goes is all about ‘learning and understanding our humanity and how it connects us,’ and right now I am at the very beginning of this journey. It’s ‘real’ and I know in my heart it is going to be one heck of a dance of ‘To and Fro.’ But in the build up to starting Rosie Goes, I have learned many things and I realise that part of my own personal challenge while on this journey, is to apply what I have learned to my life. And this I know will require mindfulness and discipline.

I have good days and bad days. I think it has been important for me to recognize ‘what’ pulls me out of a dark space. To give whatever that is my attention.

Sometimes the best thing for me to do is simply to have an early good night sleep and to put the day behind me, knowing that tomorrow is a blank page. It always seems to be better the next day. A break in the wave of anxiety, a deep breath…perspective again.

“Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance.”
― **Eckhart Tolle,** A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose

Having support has been crucial for me while ‘starting.’ I have a group of people in my in my life who have pulled me up many times, and often unknowingly, simply because they are there. And with this support that I have had and belief in what I want to do, I have learned the most powerful and uplifting lesson I could hope for, to feel gratitude.

I am often filled with a deep sense of gratitude – for what I do have, for the unconditional love and support from friends and family and importantly how I believe with all my heart, ‘that life is on my side’ and that I can trust it. Focusing on all this ‘positivity’ in my life does 2 things; firstly it helps me regain my perspective when I have temporarily lost it and secondly I believe that when I focus on ‘appreciating,’ it gains momentum, attracting more of whatever I am feeling and thinking. The trick, I think, is to surrender to what I am feeling; accept it and name it. Then unpack that fear or deconstruct it and identify how it is holding me back. That way, it loses its power over me and again, helps me regain perspective and pulls me back on track.

Part of my Rosie Goes journey has involved a series of extraordinary synchronicities, hence me believing that life is on my side. I pay careful attention to these synchronicities and treat them as confirmation and also a ‘clue’ as what to do next.

A few days ago I was explaining to my neighbour over a cup of morning coffee over the fence how I am writing about ‘starting again,’ and that I wanted to use ‘a dance’ as a metaphor for ‘starting something new’ in the way of photography. And it turned out that her client, a dancer and teacher of a dance school, was coming for a pedicure at 9am! When Chelsea agreed to do the dance photography shoot, I knew that the timing couldn’t be more perfect, and I took it as a synchronicity, as something that I should pay attention to and follow up on.

I believe that ‘life’ is listening. That day I needed to play loud jazz music on the third storey of an old maize mill and immerse myself in a creative shoot that embraced energy, passion for what we love to do, creativity and of course a metaphor for starting again. It was also the day Chelsea came for a pedicure!

This is Chelsea, teacher and owner of ‘Chelsea’s school of dance.’

For me it is exactly what I needed to do to help me regain my perspective.

‘Starting’ is a dance of To and Fro. We’re probably going to fall at some point and it won’t be pretty! But the question is, how long do you stay on the floor boards before you get up again and dance some more?

*“the end came first, the beginning came next”*
― **Tori G Doyle,** *She Loves Me Not: self love poetry with & without words*

Photography shoot location: Kings Grant Country Retreat, Ixopo, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

Dancer: Chelsea Hayter, Owner of Chelsea’s school of Dance

Rosie Goes Photography©2022

It was quiet. Occasionally I’d hear the slow rhythmic footsteps of the night nurse and the swing of a ward door, the hushed voices between patient and nurse, a trolley being wheeled down the corridor, the ping of a microwave, a toilet being flushed. I felt relief for a short while, hoping it would stay like this.

But it never did. I lay still in the hospital bed, nodding off to the sound of hospital white noise when she’d wake again and cry out his name. It was in the darkness of the night when she felt most alone that she’d recede into the depths of her mind and her memories came to life. For a few minutes she was back on the ship on their way to Sydney, safely in his arms, wrapped up in young love and full of hope.

For three nights, I listened to her life story over and over again. I learned how love comforted her and I learned what she feared most. Every night, she lived through each chapter of her life, clinging to the fading memories as if it was all she had left. It was a story on repeat and it always ended with the agonising pain of remembering that he is dead.

At that moment, she’d be swallowed by grief and another narrative would move in like black ink spilled on a page, fear.

“Oh God, my husband is dead. He died 9 years ago.”

“I have nobody, they have all gone. I am all alone.”

“God please help me. God please help me. God please help me.”

“Why are they doing this to me? I have a plane to catch. Why are they being so unkind?”

“I can’t get out of bed, I can’t stand, I can’t walk. I can’t get out.”

“That was a stupid thing to do. Never again will I do this. Never again.”

As she delved deeper into this narrative, the more distressed and anxious she would get. It isolated her and held her hostage in a self-fulfilling prophecy. She was stuck in a story; a narrative that would taunt her and that would whisper in her ear in the hours of darkness. The more attention she gave it, the stronger it got until it screamed, “I am alone, I am alone, I am alone.” And she was alone.

For 3 days, I was with Mrs Harris (not her real name) in the same hospital ward. She suffered from Dementia and was in hospital because she had fallen and broken her hip. I listened to her story many times; tragic and beautiful all in one, ever tussling between love and fear. I learned a lot about Dementia during this time, but more so, this experience prompted me to question my own narrative.

What are my stories that play over and over again in my head? Is it a narrative ground in love or is it a narrative ground in fear? How and why did they begin? What do I not want to feel again because of something that had happened? What do I want to feel again? How do they influence how I live my life and the decisions I make? Do they hold me back? Do they keep me in a negative cycle? Do I keep hitting the same brick wall? Or are they positive narratives, ground in love and truth and that allow me to move forward and to grow?

The morning nurse marched through the ward doors, bright and breezy and ready to take on another day. Good morning Mrs Harris ‘How are you today?’

Mrs Harris groaned and pulled herself up and said, “I have a plane to catch. My husband is waiting for me in France. I must go now. Please help me out of bed, or else I will be late. You must listen to me. I must get to him. Please, help me.”

The nurse replied that she must have breakfast first and before turning to walk out of the room, she switched the television on for Mrs Harris to watch. It was the South African football news bulletin, reporting on the latest regional scores. She stared up at the screen, eyes glazing over as the ball was kicked here and there. And she remembered again, “No, he is gone. He died 9 years ago. I am all alone.”

I knew what I needed to do now.

I sat with her and I asked her about her husband and how they met and what their life was like. For the next half an hour, I heard the beautiful love story of Mr and Mrs Harris and how they met on a ship while travelling from England to Australia. I watched her clenched jaw relax and the muscles in her body soften as she spoke of their time together and of him.

I had heard this story many times by now, but every time she told her love story, I watched Mrs Harris come home.

Rosie Goes

In pursuit of humanKIND

Month: February 2022

The Dance

Rosie Goes Photography©2022

Stuck in a story