Life Under Canvas.

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Mantra

I’ve heard it argued that you shouldn’t say ‘I love you’ too often. The phrase loses it’s power, they say. The words become meaningless, hollow. They don’t send shivers down your spine like the first time they were whispered in your ear, the impact is lessened, and soon the phrase becomes bland, like saying ‘what would you like for tea?’ or ‘it’s raining again, it’s supposed to be summer.’

I am here today to testify. Me and Owen say ‘I love you’ to each other at least fifty times a day. That’s no exaggeration. If anything, it’s a conservative estimate. On days where he’s at work sometimes I pick up the phone, dial his desk, wait till he answers and say ‘I love you’ then hang up.

He usually rings back:

‘I love you too’

It is something we do, something we have always done.

Yet the words have more power now than they ever did the first time: spoken by nineteen year old Jen, my nervous laying down of the cards before I even knew what those words really meant. I knew that by saying them, I crossed a line that would shape us forever. It was a week into the relationship. I said them once. It took Owen three months to respond. Maybe some people would have taken that as a snub. I didn’t. I knew very quickly that this would go the distance. But Owen is more tentative, more hesitant. He likes to be sure about things. He likes to think before he acts. I knew this from the first day we met. I had to accept him for the way he was. So for three long months I waited for the answer I wanted to hear. When I finally heard the words, I knew they were heartfelt. I was curled up on his lap. I had been crying. I don’t remember why. Owen was stroking my hair. His hands fell gently on my scalp, weaving patterns among my follicles. Nick cave was singing softly in the background. ‘Into my arms, my love… into my arms.’ I still don’t know if that was deliberate. He said ‘Jen, I think I love you too’. I fell to sleep with those words ringing in my ears. I smiled and dreamed about us holding hands, our ringed fingers interlocking.

Now its seven years later, we are married. We have said those words almost a million times. They have acquired a history. They have become a ritual. They are a part of us. There are stories I can tell about those words. Some of the times we spoke them stand out. Like the time Owen sang them to me drunkenly on our wedding night before he fell asleep and I felt happier than I ever have in my life. Or the time I said them to him when he had taken his first pill and he looked back at me in sheer delight and awe, like I had given him the secrets of the universe in one single sentence. But mostly when I think of the phrase it is almost as an invisible thread, weaving in and out of our lives, binding us tighter together, strengthening the bond between us.

It can mean different things. Rather than simply being a statement of devotion, these days there’s a whole art form involved in interpreting the sentence.

‘I love you’ can mean, amongst many other things:

‘Shut up’

‘That joke wasn’t funny but you still make me laugh.’

‘I want to have sex.’

‘I’m going to cum.’

‘That food was nice.’

‘Please?’

‘Thank you.’

‘You’re annoying me.’

‘I can’t imagine life without you.’

‘You rock my world.’

‘Goodnight.’

‘Stop being silly. God, you’re a plonker.’

‘Goodbye.’

‘I’m proud of you’

‘Good luck.’

‘I’m with you.’

‘Happy birthday.’

‘Don’t leave me.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Get on with some work!’

‘That’s so typically you.’

‘Do you promise?’

‘I promise.’

‘I want to be with you forever.’

‘Do you love me?’

‘I love you. I mean really, truly, so much I’m going to explode.’


*******************

So the list goes on. We never define what the sentence means at the time. We just say the words and we both understand. It’s a language within a language. It is comforting and inspiring and reassuring and challenging. It’s sometimes a little stifling but mostly utterly utterly freeing.

Has the phrase lost it’s impact since the first time?

Well, yes and no.

The words are just words. Their power waxes and wanes with the force that moves them.

When they are said out of habit they are meaningful and nourishing but not knee knocking. However, even now after seven years, and I would hedge a bet that even after twenty seven years we will still be able to pull a mind-blowing ‘I love you’ out of the bag. It’s all in the context. The power is in the chemistry between you at the time. ‘I love you’ is the product of a reaction, a winning formula. I savour the words, I roll them round my mouth and taste them on my tongue. I have never found a more potent mantra to help me through this life. It might be a cheesy line to finish a rather cheesy entry, but ‘I love you’ is the most important thing I have ever heard, or will ever say.

No Ripple

I have grown to like being still.

I have taken to sitting in silence, especially in the daytime when Owen is away. Sometimes I play a record on softly in the background, usually an old favourite: Nick Drake or Leonard Cohen. Often even that is overwhelming. I dislike too much noise. I sit, with my thoughts on mute; sitting, breathing, just being.

I can do that for a long time, sometimes hours. I can’t explain why, or how but I find such beauty, such depth in silence. I feel a stripping away of the layers, a crumbling of the barriers until all you’re left with is a pure and calm stillness. Sometimes, my body rebels. It gets bored and restless, it longs for the shiny, for the new. I persevere. Still I sit, still I breathe, in and out, in and out. The boredom, too, eventually melts away.

I focus on the breath. I count to ten like I’ve been taught. One to ten and back again. Just me and the breath. Everything else disappears. I count to ten. I breathe in and out. Until the thoughts are still and all is quiet within.

Sometimes, when I am feeling this calm, I take out pad and pen and let myself write. This is a true joy. I write spontaneously. I have never done this before. I don’t know where the words come from, but I don’t think them first like I usually do. I do not edit, I do not delete. They sometimes make sense, they sometimes don’t. I don’t care what happens to them. They are not my words, they do not belong to me. They are pure: free from ego and competition and paralysis. I like writing this way, although it feels more like channeling than writing. When I read the words back though, I can tell they came from somewhere inside me. I am no medium, except of my own subconscious. It is so different when you let the words form on the page without worrying about them. You learn that they usually take care of themselves. It’s like a mother finally having the courage to let go of her child’s hand as they cross the road. It’s all in the act of letting go that things become pleasurable, really pleasurable and that you become free. The stress disappears, the knots unravel. The words on the page do not belong to me, nothing belongs to me, hell, there is no me! It’s just all good. Really good. And it makes me smile.

But that’s the writing. I do that because I can’t not write. I’ve never been able to live a life where I don’t write. But the day is long and mostly I just sit. I sit on my stool or I sit on the sofa. I sit on the park bench, I sit by the river. The water flows like time passing. You never put your foot in the same stream twice.

Home again: I stare at the white wall. I see so much peace and beauty there. I walk into the garden. I smell a flower. For a moment, that flower is the universe. I watch the bees and wasps fly around the garden. I wish them well. I breathe, I breathe, I breathe. I go inside. I brew a cup of tea in my old china cup. It is white with a golden rim, and a chip in the top. I pour the water slowly, watch the leaves diffuse. I blow. I sip. I swallow. The tea becomes part of me. Water becomes blood. Hydrogen and Oxygen along with everything else. I wash the cup, the soapy bubbles pop on my arm. I rinse. I dry. I place the cup back in the cupboard. I am aware of every movement in my hands, the feel of the rough tea towel against my moist knuckles. I walk back to the sofa. I sit. I stare at the white wall. I see such beauty there.

Later: I smile. It is colder now. I pull my blanket round me. I don’t know the time. I don’t want to know the time. He is not here, but will be back. Until then, I sit. I make Nick sing some more. I don’t listen to the words, just the melody, the sound of his instruments; his guitar and his voice. That’s how it’s always been with Nick and I. The sun sets, I watch it on the horizon through my window. I do not ignore the building site opposite. I try to see the beauty in the cranes and the scaffolding. It is not difficult, although it was at seven o’ clock this morning. I yawn and stretch my arms into the space above me. I sit, I light a candle. I stare into the flame, I don’t know how long for. Soon, I don’t hear noises, not even Nick. I stare at the candle, I stare at the flame and its many different colours. My eyes softly, gently close.

There is a smell of smoke. I open my eyes. The candle has blown out. Its plumage spirals towards the overhead light. I lick my fingers and pinch the wick. It fizzles but does not burn.

I stand, fully awake. Nick has long stopped, the disk ejected. Outside there is darkness. I shut the curtains, turn on the light. The stillness remains within me, unshakable. My stomach rumbles. I walk into the kitchen, open the cupboards, ponder quietly what to create for us today. Whilst I am thinking, I hear the front door slam. He is home. I smile: another day over and not a ripple in the pond. What joy I have known today, what more could I want for? The door opens, he is wet with drizzle and his nose is red. He kisses me, throws his arms around me, says; ‘It’s good to see you, it’s great to be home.’ Here, you see, I have everything I need. Here, you see, I want for nothing. After all, this is my home. Not this town, not this house, not this man, not even this body. Home is the stillness, the rich beautiful stillness that lies here: deep down inside me.

More Poems from the Archives

The following poems were all written in the second year of my university course in Lancaster. It was a tumultuous time for both me and O, with my mood being all over the place and although we had some really good times we also went through some of the toughest times in our relationship to date. I do not claim that the following poems are some of my most technically competent or well written, but I am publishing them here because I think they have something to say, and capture something of this part in my life.

Pregnancy Scare

He sits in his cage
day and night.
A small box
full of his own shit.
I'm scared of him:
scared of his teeth,
scared of his tail,
scared of his potential
to run away from me.
More than just an impulse buy
guilt on legs.
If I am too scared to love a rat
then how can I
love a child?
Brittle bones
and tiny hands
she will break into pieces easier
than the cornflakes
on the kitchen floor
underneath my feet.


The Truth of the Matter.

Having a mental illness is not about slashing your wrists and rocking backwards and forwards whilst grown men hold you down in four point restraints.
No,
It’s wearing knickers that are fifteen days old.
It’s your jealous friends not being jealous of you, but full of pity.
It’s realising you can’t do something that you could do when you were five, like eat a sausage roll without thinking you were going to choke and die.
It’s being full of self doubt twenty four seven.
It’s not being able to ever participate fully.
It’s not being able to remember a film you watched last night.
It’s cringing with shame for the next week when you get somebody’s name wrong.
It’s cutting your leg with a screwdriver because you haven’t and will never finish that essay.
It’s ruminating for hours about what the last thing you eat will be before you die.
It’s going around in circles and recycling old epiphanies again and again and again.
It’s knowing in your heart of hearts that you are boring.
Its knowing you are a cliché, so clichéd you can’t even write a book about all this one day.
It’s not ever being able to think as clearly as you did the day before.
It’s over idealising yesterday and fearing everything about tomorrow.
It’s never being able to live in the moment.
It’s eating a whole chocolate cake without even feeling guilty.

It's killing time watching “A Place in the Sun” when the sun is actually shining and you sit in your gloomy living room.
It’s not being able to enjoy a kiss because you’re obsessed with the way your chin looks.
It’s not being able to think of anything artistically except illness and death.
It’s watching torture victims on the news and feeling nothing.
It’s wanting to die and being terrified of death.


Born Lucky

Right now
in this, our beautiful world
someone is taking their last breath,
someone is doubled up in agony,
someone is crying, but more than that
millions are crying at this very second.
People are starving.
People are burning.
A man is hung on a rack in a torture chamber,
A woman is spread legged on the gravel
being taken, foreign hand over her mouth.

A boy’s balloon pops.
An old man is having his teeth removed.
Some poor nurse is having to say the terminal words
I’m sorry you’ve got cancer,
I’m sorry there was nothing more we could do for him,
I’m sorry, you’ll never walk again,
Would you like us to turn the machine off?
And I look at my trainers
I think of brown hands stitching
the child at the machine
the beads of sweat along their brow.
A gun is being aimed to kill,
a needle is sliding into a vein.
Vomit is hitting the ground with a splash,
a woman is fondling herself alone in her bathroom.
Brakes fail,
hearts fail,
rain fails,
appendixes rumble.
There is mud and dirt
and endless hunger.
People are thirsty
desperately thirsty
yet on this Tuesday morning
over elevenses
you snap your head up
from your grainy cup of coffee
pick up your cupcake and growl
“What the hell are you
grinning for?”

Teacher

Yesterday I had a weird experience. I sat for half an hour and had a wonderful meditation full of peace and joy. I was totally serene and happy, even after quite a stressful day. Then, (as I often do) I looked at a photograph of the monk who despite the fact I have never met him, I consider to be my teacher, the venerable Ajahn Brahmavamso. I don’t know why I get the urge to do this, I just always have, since I first heard him talk the Dhamma. Anyway, yesterday I got out the photo and I just spontaneously burst into tears. My eyes welled up with water and I felt such happiness and such pure overwhelming love for this man who has touched me so deeply. I just sat there, for a few minutes, just crying and smiling at the same time, feeling blissfully calm and loved and content.

Now this is going to sound like the biggest load of hippy crap that has ever come out of my mouth to date, but I must relate to you my weird experience in full. I stared at his image and clearly felt his love radiate out of that picture, almost like ripples from a stone that has plopped into a pond. It was that real I could almost see it. I stared at the photograph, transfixed. His posture, his smile, his silly double chin all just seemed to me to be the image of absolute love, and kindness. It seemed to me the perfect symbol of all that is right with the world. I felt so devoted to this man that if I had been actually in the room with him I would have wanted to throw myself at his feet. I seemed to be looking at goodness and truth itself. I felt almost like I was in a room with him, and he was speaking to me, not in words but in emotions: he was moving me, comforting me, healing me.

And I was moved. For the rest of the evening I walked on a cloud.

Man, this religion stuff is some powerful shit.

In the cold light of day, my rational side comes into play and I woke up this morning and thought to myself, yeah, nice projection there Jen. You want to be real careful messing with that. That’s fertile Bootham territory, right there. One minute you’re crying at a picture of a benevolent monk, the next you’re hearing spiders talking to you and you’re back on the ward.

So this train of thought naturally got me thinking about religion and madness. Historically, the two have been intertwined, with many religious people having the accusatory finger of madness pointed at them. Jesus and Mohammed were repeatedly accused of madness as well as their many followers from Joan of Arc to, more recently, footballer Glen Campbell. There is certainly a large grey area where the two overlap and in Britain, in our increasingly secular society those with strongly held religious views, especially of an exotic nature (i.e. not your cucumber sandwich eating C of E garden party variety) are often treated with suspicion. Certainly, to talk of visions or voices, of ecstasy and higher plains of experience has people either running for the door, reaching for the phone to the hospital or at least raising their eyebrows with contempt. In hospital I have met many messiahs and prophets. I even met a guy who had given away all his possessions including his house because he had read a secret code in Revelation that told him the world was going to end tomorrow. Myself, I have had an admission to a psyche ward that revolved around delusions I had that God was communicating with me through animals and insects.

So to me this raises some interesting questions:

* How can anyone with a mental health diagnosis be sure that any spiritual experience isn’t just a symptom of their illness?

* How can we distinguish psychosis from genuine visions/ enlightenment etc?

* For that matter, whether you officially have a diagnosis or not, how can anybody be sure that their religious experiences fall within the realm of sanity?

* With my history, that I have blogged about here, How can I, of all people be messing with this stuff again? What is the appeal of it all for someone whom in the past the spiritual has had such a negative impact on their life?

I know I can’t really answer this for anyone else, as I can’t get inside their head. For sure, I have seen the conviction on the face of a fundamentalist Christian arguing that the world was created in six days, and thought to myself; ‘are they absolutely bonkers?’ It is true, their eyes glaze over with a passion and in the heat of the debate I find them claiming the strangest things: that carbon dating machines are the work of the devil, as are the planted dinosaur bones that might as well be the skeletons of red herrings rather than huge prehistoric reptiles. It's bizarre really, what a religious faith can make you believe, in my lifetime I have heard the strangest arguments come from the mouths of impassioned believers, desperate to defend their faith.

However, I think our understanding of mental health has developed enough to realise that beliefs that we consider to be wrong, even passionately, ignorantly, flying in the face of common sense and science and laws of reason wrong do not in themselves equal insanity. I didn’t agree with the principles of Tony Blair’s government, but calling the man insane? That’s a laughable concept to me. I have spent many years in the company of seriously mentally ill people and many of them struggle to get their groceries together on a weekly basis. If you are mentally ill enough to be termed insane, you can hardly remember your name let alone run a country. Yes I know world leaders have dealt with bouts of depression and mania, (Churchill for example) and I’m not saying that mentally ill people can’t achieve great things in their life, but here I am drawing a distinct difference between being depressed and being psychotic or insane. Insanity doesn’t just mean holding an irrational belief- however wacky, it is a total breakdown of reality within your life.

Wrong or irrational doesn’t equal insane, then. But then that of course brings us onto: what does?

Yes I know: the DSM-IV diagnostic system, yada yada. These days we all know the twelve signs of depression, we all know our schitzos from our elbows. Yet if I write down on paper two brief case studies who I have personally come into contact with over the years I think the point I am trying to make will become obvious:

Linda (Met in hospital)

Believes that Tony Blair is the devil incarnate. Believes that Tony Blair speaks to her on a daily basis and tells her that she is going to hell. He tells her to do things, from what to wear everyday, to what to eat for tea. She has intricate visions of the future and hallucinations of things she believes will pass. Is hospitalised indefinitely on a section because of her relationship with “Tony” and for fears that she might one day, attempt to harm either him, or more likely, herself.

Steven (Met at a Church in Sheffield)

Believes that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Believes that Jesus talks to him, personally on a daily basis and gives him intricate instructions on many details of his life. He has sold his house and possessions to work as a youth worker in the church and lives only on the donations of the congregation. He sees actions of ‘the devil’ everywhere, from the new civil partnerships for gay people, to abortion laws to the promiscuous behaviour of today’s youth. He spends his time pleading with young people to ‘repent’ or else they will go to hell. He speaks in a divine language, has prophecies and visions and believes that the end of the world is imminent.

Of course these are just two hastily constructed case studies. You can believe them or not. But I am sure you will have met or read about people who resemble these two in your own experience. The overlap in psychology is clear, the main difference being to me that whilst Steve’s views and beliefs are equally as unsubstantiated (if not more so!) as Linda’s with the weight of the church behind him he is a prominent figure in the community whilst she languishes her 2nd year away on a locked ward.

So what am I saying here? That the billions of people worldwide who all follow a religion worldwide are in actuality insane?

Well, no: it is clearly more complex than that.

I can only speak for myself but having experienced both intense religious experiences and psychotic episodes, all I can say is that there are similarities, for sure, but there are also vast, vast, differences between the two.

For example the first one that springs to mind is that a psychotic experience at least for me is usually accompanied by a whole host of unpleasant things; a complete breakdown in day to day functioning, a lack of self care, an all consuming sense of paranoia, a total detachment from reality and a serious mood problem as well, at either end of the spectrum. I am quite obviously ill, sick, loopy loo, round the twist, whatever you want to call it.

Spiritual experiences are not like that at all. (I’m not going to get into the authenticity of spiritual experience full stop, I think that is too big to tackle right here and now, lets accept for now that spiritual experiences do exist, whether they be caused by altered states or mass hysteria or the goddess divine channelling through you, lets leave that for another time.) But as for them differentiating from madness, I would say that although they might involve beliefs and behaviours that seem hard to believe or odd to the casual onlooker they are usually contained within a system, a framework. Within religious traditions there are people who have trod the path before you and these spiritual phenomena not only have strict guidelines but are not seen as particularly unusual. Followers of mainstream religions will often be well versed in what to expect from a religious experience before it happens to them, and in this sense they are ready for it when it happens, and can cope with it when it occurs.

Most religious people, even after undergoing a pretty significant spiritual experience within their chosen framework, whether that’s receiving a prophecy from Allah or reaching a Jana within Buddhist meditation or collapsing through the power of the holy spirit at a Christian rally, will dust themselves down, talk to the minister for a few minutes or go for a walk in the rain to clear their head. Then they will fairly quickly get back to their day to day lives, albeit from a renewed perspective. They go back to their kids and their jobs and talking about football on the bus with their friends. I’m not saying these experiences don’t change you, indeed they can have a profound effect, but if it’s a spiritual experience, it shouldn’t leave you in a corner banging your head against the wall for weeks on end or swinging at the end of a rope. Your life may be transformed absolutely but these changes should not leave you sick and poorly. On the contrary, most people who undergo these experiences often appear to be in great health, approaching life with a new strength and vigour. In my experience some of the most spiritual people I have met, whether I agree with their beliefs or not, seem to be some of the happiest of all of my friends.

So, in a nutshell I think mental illness is when your mind works abnormally causing you great distress. Spiritual experience also involves stepping outside of everyday emotions and perception but in a much more controlled, less random, and consequently much less disturbing way.

Are they two sides of the same coin, well, who can say?

All I know is this: my psychotic experiences make me crippled and broken. They leave me hospitalised and in need of strong medication even to get dressed properly in the morning. My buddhism and spiritual practice on the other hand gives me great strength, energy, clarity and hope. It leaves me feeling healthy, happy and focused. Sometimes I feel challenged, sometimes confused. But never suicidal, never bedridden, never hopeless.

If you don’t think there’s a difference between a religious vision and a psychotic one, then all I can say is go visit a Pentecostal church then a psyche ward. Both places will shake you out of your comfort zone, but any great ideas you have about them being one and the same will be dispelled in an instant.

So maybe that’s the reason I feel able to continue down this spiritual path. I trust that I know my own mind enough to know what is healthy and what is not, to explore my mind’s potential without breaking it. Sometimes, it feels like a gamble. Sometimes, I think ‘girl what the hell are you playing at?’ But mostly this sense of inner peace that grows daily as I go through the daily rituals of chanting, zazen and kinhin, the strength that is blossoming within me calms my doubts and leaves me thinking this can only be a good thing. So to go back to the whole weird experience thing, maybe it does seem a bit odd that I would cry at a photograph of a man who I never met. But before you write me off as a religious nutter, or even worse just a nutter full stop please bear in mind that I have tried every drug under the sun and every therapy on the market to get rid of this black hole in my life. None of them have ever had any lasting effect. Ajahn brahms teachings on the other hand are turning my life around at a rate of knots and giving me a chance of genuine happiness and stability that I thought I’d never have. So is it any wonder then, that staring at his peaceful smile (and silly double chin) can make me shed a few tears? I may not be able to give a definitive answer to the ‘what is madness’ question that has puzzled academics, doctors and patients alike for centuries, but I can tell you certainly what it is not. Madness is not rising from your zazen stool after half an hour’s silent meditation, making a cup of green tea with jasmine and sitting quietly all evening feeling content, like you are glad and so, so happy to be alive.

If You're Happy and You Know It.....

On Friday, my CPN commented that, right now, I seemed happier and healthier than he had ever known me to be. I thought about it and realised he was right. A smile spread across my face and we sat there for a couple of minutes beaming at each other. He asked me why I thought that was, what had changed? I said that I sort of had the feeling that everything was beginning to make sense, when for a lot of my life it hadn’t. He asked me what I meant by that. I said I just knew how to be happy. How to really be happy. Was it, he suggested, (the CPN in him shining through) because I had learnt through all the intense work we had done since I left hospital how to manage my illness better? I said, yes I am managing my illness a lot better these days for sure and that is helping immensely but that’s not it. It's about a lot of different threads of my life coming together and creating a coherent picture.

I’ve had all these sets of beliefs, often conflicting and not very well thought out that were random and disjointed. These days they’re all fusing and I’m starting to have an actual worldview. It’s been very influenced by my Buddhism, of course, but there’s more to it than that. I have done a lot of thinking in the last few years and I now have, or am starting to have a framework to hang my life on like a clothes horse on laundry day. This is creating this feeling of immense balance and stability. It’s giving me a sense of contentment and freedom and for the first time in my life a realistic picture of who I am and what I stand for. Sure, I’ve always had the general gist that I am left wing, and a feminist etc. But there were so many gaps and holes in my thinking. Now I feel like a complete picture, even if it is a rather surrealist one.

As a teenager and an early adult, there was one word that could describe me and that is ‘confused’. I didn’t know who I was or what I thought about this or that. I didn’t know how the universe fitted together or how my mind worked or how to control my emotions. I didn’t know jack shit, basically, but rather than be one of these self assured people who were convinced they had the answers, when they really knew nothing, I could see with a stark clarity how little I knew. It went on like this for a long time, through some very bleak years. But now I have the sense of it all coming together. That I know who I am, where I belong, what my role is, what the meaning of all this is.

I’m not saying there are no grey areas anymore. There certainly are. But part of my new acceptance of myself is to love and accept my own ambiguities. That grey is the new black, so to speak: to accept fully that I am never, ever going back to that clear cut time of fundamentalist Christianity and nor would I want to. This ever present questioning is part of me, part of my identity. The fact that I can see things from a multitude of angles should no longer be viewed with absolute negativity but as a very beneficial thing. I see my doubt and scepticism as something that pushes boundaries and helps me examine the world, rather than a negative hindrance to ever fitting in or finding peace.

I say this at the risk of sounding smug but I think I am learning how to be happy. This is something that many people take for granted, but for me it’s something I’ve really had to work at hard. And now I am starting to have a sense of payoff. As one of our exercises this week, my CPN has asked me to write down in concrete terms, for a bit of fun, a sort of practical guide to my new found happiness. So I could know in future, if the sky were ever to cloud over again, where the path to sunnier climes lays.

So here you are, in all its glory is the document I have cobbled together for next weeks meeting: I did it like I was a guru or something because I thought it would be fun. I actually am not suggesting anyone do the same as me. Think of this as a kind of self help manual, literally written for myself. This for my purposes only- though if it helps you, I do individual sessions of life coaching for $300 an hour! Email me for details.

Jen’s Practical Guide to happiness.


1. Body: All the common sense advice they say is true. Sleep well. About 7-8 hours a night, no more, not much less. Keep bedtime regular. Eat healthy meals, not junk food. Exercise, preferably out in nature. Drink a lot of liquid, not so much beer and coffee. Go to the doctors and dentist regularly.

2. Mind: Read a paper every day, but not the same one. Keep connected with the world from a variety of viewpoints. Think about what you’ve read, process the information, form opinions. Read books, watch films, listen to music and interact with culture. Challenge yourself in your choices. Never stop learning. Express yourself creatively through whatever medium suits you. Stretch yourself. Try new things. Meditate daily or whatever helps you wind down. Keep a journal or blog and reflect on your life.

3. Friendship: Be close to the friends that matter to you. Ditch the ones who don’t. A few good close friends are better than many fake ones. With those who you keep, make an effort to maintain contact. Rebuild burnt bridges. Surround yourself with people who love and understand you for who you are and appreciate your talents. Reach out to them when you are struggling. Be honest. Be a good friend in return. Listen to others problems. Be happy for your friends when they are successful, rejoice in their achievements. Phone them even when you’re feeling antisocial. Be generous with time, money and hospitality. Let them know how much you love and value them. Try not to compare yourself with them- everyone has their own suffering. Don’t try and solve other peoples problems for them or encourage other people to become dependent on you, help your friends help themselves.

4. If you have a partner: put their needs above your own in everything you do. Give them the biggest plate of food, the largest glass of wine, fulfill their fantasies in the bedroom, dress in clothes you know they like. Try in everything you do to make them feel like the most special person on the planet. They deserve it for putting up with you! Apologize first, make peace, don't hold grudges. Realise, above all else that (like all your friends and family) they are just another person passing through on this great cosmic journey and whilst you love them with all your heart you really can’t make them the centre of everything. Avoid dependency. That whole thing about letting things go and they come back to you is pretty much the truth. Just love everything about them, farts and all, and remember it is not your job to change them! Only they can do that!

5. Attitude: Learn to let go of the past and the future. Try to live in the present. Be peaceful. Treat everyone equally. Be kind to people, especially if they are suffering or rude to you. Try not to attach to things: to people or possessions or feelings. Develop contentment and learn to love where you are now, not where you want to be. Try to see things as they really are: avoid lying, avoid delusions. Try to contemplate and come to terms with death by looking it straight in the face, but without seeing it as a solution to your problems. Remember the path to enlightenment as a better solution. Be mindful in your actions, try to not ever behave thoughtlessly. Walk the line between doing your best and being a perfectionist. Don’t ever let your fears stand in the way of your dreams.

6. Don’t compare yourself to other people. Don’t judge others. You never know why or how until you’ve been there yourself.

7. Laugh. A lot. It really is the best medicine. Take risks with laughter, never sit on a joke, share it! Even if nobody laughs you’ll most likely get a groan.

8. Time: If possible, strive to get a job that is also your passion. Fill the time you have free with what you really want to do. Never kill time even if you are tired. It only makes you feel bad afterwards. If you have to rest, take quality rest : meditate a while or sleep. Don’t watch Junk TV.

9. Cut yourself some slack: Don’t make the standards too high. Be kind to yourself. Love yourself. Don’t overwork.

10. Find balance and harmony in everything you do. An excess of anything nearly always leads to bad things. Take space. Build in quiet time. Take delight in peace and stillness, even if only for half an hour a day. Don’t dwell on negative thoughts, just let them go. Equally, delusions of grandeur should be abandoned for a more realistic worldview.

11. Finally: Sing in the shower, every day, at the top of your voice. It lifts the spirits, whatever the weather.

Serve the Servants

The 11th to 17th of June is national carer’s week here in the UK. I’m not usually a fan of weeks for this and days for that as I think they can often provide a pinnacle of focus for that week’s highlighted charity or issue which then gets forgotten about until roughly the same time next year. They are horribly media centric – perfect for journalists and bloggers who need a prompt for something to write about that day (self obviously guilty here). The activities that surround them are usually very cheesy or horribly decadent, designed primarily to pull on heartstrings and generate direct debits from as many people as possible. However, then I start getting into my feelings about charities in general which I surely will another time but not now. For the time being I am going to take the sound bites I’ve heard on the news and Woman’s hour as bait and talk a little bit about carers and caregivers rights in this country.

I feel qualified to talk about this as it is a subject that is deeply, deeply close to my heart, even though I wish it wasn’t. In an ideal world it wouldn’t be me who was writing this blog at all, but Owen- he’s the expert on this subject and I would love for him to guest blog on this page. I’m sure he, circumstances permitting, would have gladly obliged. Like a lot of people in his position, he’d love to have time just to write articles about things for fun, too. However, for his sins Owen is my long term carer. As well as being an ambitious full time PhD student (sans funding) with a two hour commute to his University, he additionally has to look after me and work two jobs spread over thirty five hours a week to support us both enough just to scrape by. Today, Owen got out of bed at six am, started work at seven, and isn’t planning on stopping until midnight or so. It has been this way for a long time now; he barely even takes a day off. He usually falls asleep at the keyboard sometimes around one o’ clock and staggers to bed after I have spent ten minutes giving him a list of reasons why he will make himself sick if he doesn’t at least get some rest.

We don’t get any help from the government, nor have we ever done, for many complicated reasons, not least the fact that he is a student and financial help for those in higher education is pitifully hard to come by, even if your wife is so sick she can’t get out of bed and doesn’t know what day of the week it is. We don’t get any support, despite the fact that, as part of the army of unpaid carers, Owen and those like him are saving the government billions of pounds in labour costs – for the government to actually pay these carers the same as paid professionals the work they do would involve spending the same again as the annual NHS budget (57 billion). In terms of carers, Owen is one of the relatively lucky ones. Most of the time I am fairly high functioning, and can do things for myself, even if they are within a limited sphere. However, for the last five years I have been unable to work for more than a few weeks at a time and several times a year we will have a bad spell where Owen has to really take over.

During these times, which can last from a few days to a few months, Owen suddenly finds me incapacitated to the point that he has to do all my domestic jobs; the cooking, the shopping, the cleaning etc which are time consuming and annoying, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg. For twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, for long stretches of time I might go into ‘I want to die’ mode, which (as I guess the name gives away), means I am actively suicidal. So, not only does Owen have to do his studies, his teaching, papers and conferences, as well as everything around the house and his mundane paid employment in museums and cafes but he has to spend countless hours watching and caring for me. On the days he doesn’t call in sick at work because he’s too scared to leave me (I think most of his employers think Owen’s immune system is pathetic when in fact it is steely) he will phone me from his desk and we will talk in code every fifteen minutes to make sure I am still alive. It is embarrassing for me to admit, but during these times he becomes responsible for everything about me; from making sure I eat, sleep, wash, dress, brush my hair, and clean my teeth and all the other things that most couples don’t think about. It is not unusual for him to take hours in the morning just getting me out of bed and looking like a human being. At night time, he has stayed up all night, for days on end, just watching me, making sure I don’t do anything daft. He takes me to appointments, liaises with doctors, psychiatrists, nurses, he learns names of drugs and therapies, negotiates what medication I should be taking when and makes sure I take it, even though this can lead to some blinding rows. He sits with me whilst I cry, listens to me for hours moaning about what an ugly bitchy shithead I am. He eats microwave food with blunt cutlery because all the knives are locked away. He accompanies me on bus and train journeys because I can’t face them alone, he walks with me in town because all the people can trigger psychosis on a grand scale.

These are just a small selection of the daily sacrifices Owen will make to give me the best life he can. Our relationship turns, (sometimes overnight) from one of absolute equality to total dependency. My personality is transformed and my functioning is grossly impaired. Yet Owen just gives and gives and gives. He does all the above and more, and has never, ever complained. Sometimes he gets tired and down with it all, sometimes he can get very upset, but has he ever snapped at me or lost his patience? Never. Not only does he do all this but he tries to give me a good quality of life; despite being so tired that he needs twenty five cups of coffee just to get up in the morning, he tries to do this all with a laugh and a smile, a hug and a kiss, a joke, a giggle and lots and lots of sympathy. He tries, whenever possible, to keep me out of hospital. He cares for me with dignity and respect and makes sure my wishes as regards my treatment are upheld as much as is humanly possible. He slaves away to make an awful situation bearable, and every night before I go to sleep he says to me ‘I believe in you, this will get better and even if it didn’t I regret not one moment: I would do it every day for the rest of my life.’ And then he is asleep before his head hits the pillow.

I know. I know. If there ever was such a thing, I am one lucky manic depressive.

But, as special as he is, Owen is not the only one.

Up and down the country there are friends, relatives, neighbours all caring for people they love not for monetary value or job satisfaction but because they feel it is the right thing to do. Many have given up well paid jobs to do so, and have to eke a living out of the pittance that the government provides for the ‘lucky’ few carers it deems eligible for financial help. At the moment, the maximum weekly carer’s budget is around £48.68, (for a minimum of 35 hours a week- equivalent to £1.39 an hour) which is significantly less than many of the other benefits going and many carers find themselves in financial dire straits. These are real people with real lives every day losing their houses, jobs, cars, and possessions in order to give their sick loved ones a life away from institutions and the slow decay they bring. The support they generally get from the system is laughable. Their hard work is often unrecognised or treated as a nuisance, their relationship with the patient undervalued. When they ask for vital support, for respite care, for some kind of state provided home help in addition to their unpaid labour, for some much needed money or equipment, it is usually an uphill struggle all the way. Forms are piled upon forms for even the most basic means of assistance and the lists of excuses soon mount up as to why you are not eligible for this or that. Many carers feel like the authorities are entities they have to constantly fight, rather than vehicles they can turn to for support. The strain is enormous, the pressure huge. Yet many of these carers are themselves are vulnerable people. A huge percentage of them are elderly, often hardly able to move properly or fully function themselves. On the other end of the spectrum, some are mere children who find themselves looking after their parents and siblings instead of concentrating on their schoolwork or social life; terrified that if they, as a ten year old child, don’t keep the family functioning then social services will get involved and split the family up. These are truly the unsung heroes of our society, for those people who have never had to care for someone day in day out then all I can say is you have no idea what it is like. I have no idea what it is like and I’m a lot closer to the action than most.

I sometimes ask Owen; ‘what do you get out of this?’ After all when we met he was just turned eighteen. He was barely an adult with patchy facial hair and a passion for computer games. He is not a super stud but he is not a bad looking bloke and he has a great personality. I think at university even if he couldn’t have pulled the Julianne Moore look-alike that he dreamt of, he could have at least chosen someone whose idea of an evening in wasn’t drinking a bottle of whiskey and locking herself in the toilet with a razor blade for three hours. To this day it mystifies me why he didn’t go running for the hills. I would have done. I have asked him this question a number of times. Sometimes I am genuinely curious, sometimes I do it when I beat myself up. He has only ever responded with these four words: ‘Jen, I love you.’ and refuses to be drawn any more on the matter.

It is, clearly, not all one way. I support Owen in many of the things he does and bring happiness into his life in many capacities other than the ones I have mentioned. Most people who care for someone deeply love the person involved and find caring for them rewarding and fulfilling, even if it is sometimes a soul-destroyingly exhausting and strenuous process. But it seems to me that it is precisely this love and devotion that the government are exploiting. They know that Owen and the six million others like him are not going to just turn their backs on their loved ones. It basically boils down to this, why pay someone for something when they are willing to do it for free? They know that Owen means it when he says ‘Jen I will do anything for you’. Even if that means year upon year of little sleep, no money, overwork and battle after battle with the authorities. When the alternative is to see their loved ones go into hospital or residential care, out of their lives and control, often putting them at risk of abuse and exploitation many carers simply say ‘over my dead body’, and battle on. That is what Owen and the rest of my family have done for me and I owe them my life several times over.

Carers, in my experience, are not asking for much.

They are asking for:

a) Enough money to provide them and the person they are caring for with a basic standard of living where crippling financial worries do not make an already fraught situation 1000 times worse.

b) Recognition of their efforts and respect of their own wishes and needs as well as the patients.

c) Respite care and more short term intensive inpatient services for when times get really tough. When they judge the situation to be unmanageable, that is, not some government crisis team’s checklist.

d) Specialist help for the things they cannot afford to provide themselves, or are not trained to do.

There are other things, but these are the main complaints I find most carers have. Of course, as a patient myself, I do realise there is a debate around giving carers too much power, in that I believe as a patient it is me who should always have the final word, if I am able to do so. Some carers may have ulterior motives and it is the authority’s job to ensure abuses do not happen. However, the truth of the matter is ‘what’s the alternative?’ If, as a patient you are not supported by those around you then there might be some limited care in the community stuff, but if you have a time of crisis or get too ill to cope, you will end up in an institution. Enter a hospital or a residential environment and you relinquish all control anyway, to people who are much more likely to abuse and neglect you than your own friends and families. Ask most patients who’d they’d rather have the power over them and I’d hedge a bet it wasn’t the syringe wielding electro-shocking multidisciplinary team at the hospital, but their loving husband, or their mum or dad or their grandparents. In most cases, patient’s rights are the one and the same as carer’s rights. These devoted caregivers are sacrificing so much and getting so little in return. That’s why we, (especially those of us who are on the receiving end of their love and attention) should be fighting together to get these unsung heroes the rights and privileges they deserve.