There is Only Now
Day four of my new life and I have got worse at Spanish…
I am writing this with a laughing tone, but it is still what it feels like….!
With more time to learn the language, I find the box I have opened has no bottom…
It is therefore fortunate to have discovered over the years that bottomless boxes suit me well.
In truth there is no bottom, or a top, or a finish line to anything we do, because there isn’t a future point. Only now….
The illusion of a finish line can of course serve to help us grow. A destination in mind can access inner strengths and help us to know ourselves more deeply and discover what we didn’t know before….
It can serve us even more powerfully, when we recognise it is an illusion we have created
And so feeling myself tense up at the amount of tenses in Spanish verbs – that I don’t know! – is in truth a joy…. Because the destination of being able to converse in Spanish, reminds me once more that I am on a never ending journey….
It took me a while to first understand and recognise this, and I was particularly challenged to accept this through my running journey. A place I tried to find a finish line!
I love trying to get faster and stronger and reach higher than before, and this is still the case after over fifty years of journeying on the running road…. And I learnt the difficult way, through pushing too hard, that there is no pinnacle… But this knowledge, that there is no where to get to, ultimately brought me peace…
And I learnt that I really enjoy making my way to destinations ahead, without attaching undue importance to them…
Maricarmen, my Spanish teacher watched the video of me winning the Dublin marathon, 32 years ago… She asked me today about the young woman then, ‘so full of energy’…
I said to her that in many ways, I hardly recognise her, that young woman, who was to grow into me…
‘She had lots to work out’ I told her… ‘But she knew she loved to run…. ‘
I am finding (on day 4 of new life!) that living each day without a plan is fun…
I am enjoying going swimming and going further each day in these beautiful turquoise blue waters…
They are warming up slightly… or at least, I am staying in for longer, Anadi mentioned that perhaps we are acclimatising rather than the waters getting warmer, We do notice that we are the only people swimming… A whole ocean to ourselves…
There are very few holiday makers here, and most of the Greeks don’t swim until August….!
I have been going in twice a day and recognise that in the same way I enjoy having more time to swim each day and run each day, and write each day, I will simply have more time than before to practise Spanish each day… And see what happens…
By writing every day since November with my left hand (my usual hand, the right) my writing has improved, but there is still a way to go for it to be truly fluido….
And so this left handed writing practise has demonstrated to me again the joy of having no finish line, other than to practise and keep practising whatever art it is we wish to perfect.
Destinations along the way in the form of exams, or races, or performances or tests of any kind, really and truly are better embraced without tension or stress, and with a recognition that we create our lives.
Always, we are the creators, from the inside out…
And so if we embrace the system of exams or races or making a success in business… Whatever the test we put in front of us, then it is worth reflecting on what we are creating as we go.
We are the system, whatever is around us or in front of us is our creation.
We are all responsible for the reflection.
And so it is with that in mind that we can start to create the future – which does not exist – in the present moment ….
I have been running all of my life – it feels I was born to run. In the running step I experienced freedom and my true expression. I came to see that I needed to ‘get out of the way of myself’ and let my energy flow through the running step; allow it to express itself in the dance and the motion of running. I ran for England and GB for some years. My first international was in 1979, a three mile cross country race; and I continued to run at international level until 1993. Two of my best results were first place in the Dublin City Marathon in 1985 and 7th place woman, 3rd British woman in the 1986 London Marathon in a time of 2.36.31, which gained me selection for the Commonwealth Games.
As a little girl I ran barefoot for many years, and then I put on shoes to race around the world. Fifty years later I am travelling the world as a nomad with my husband Anadi and I have taken off my shoes and I am running barefoot again….
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