Well the theme of August appears to continue. This campervan morning sees an early morning chill and a dull light once again. Heavy cloud overhead and the air dominated by far off motorway traffic, a real heavy drone, that’s not been present for a long while. There is no breeze to speak of, so it must be the sheer volume of it all. It really is overpowering. As if to make a liar of me a small breeze comes from nowhere and briefly ruffles the oak and ash before disappearing again, leaving them stagnant and hanging. The light is grey and heavy, a feeling that rain may not be that far away, even though none is forecast. A couple of pigeons and that’s it, no crows, starlings, blackbirds, magpies or anything else, quiet on that front. A few far off unseen gulls can just be made out in the melee coming from the roads. It’s been an interesting few days, sessions of contrast and balance. Working with the charity getting homeless young ladies and gents off the streets and into work and houses, which was off the charts and left me buzzing, to working with a group of beautiful young children with additional needs and so many challenging behaviours as to exhaust me and my skill set, even after 15 years of doing this. I sense this is what called into question my comparing myself with others, and the posting of such great stuff around me, when in fact in the trenches it can and often is far from that. The trap of social media. So I have been reflecting on the balance of things and I came across Alain De Botton again :
“ There is no such thing as work-life balance. Everything worth fighting for unbalances your life.”
It kind of made sense, when you’re out there, as I say working and fighting for what you believe, especially in my line of work, then it’s going to unbalance you. You’re on the edge, working and engaging with people who are on the periphery, it’s not always going to be easy. So a certain degree of imbalance is almost inevitable. You are working in areas that are the unnecessary victims of cultural, political and societal imbalance and it’s almost always the difficult side. Further fuelling the imbalance, you’re actually sitting in it and with it. It bleeds into you. So a sense this morning that my imbalance is the collateral damage or an occupational hazard of working in these areas and it makes it kind of acceptable. That said a day off today to recharge and even the scales up a bit. Lovely days people.
I do love some of the work of Suzy Kassem.
APPLY WITHIN
You once told me You wanted to find Yourself in the world - And I told you to First apply within, To discover the world within you.
You once told me You wanted to save The world from all its wars - And I told you to First save yourself From the world, And all the wars You put yourself Through.
APPLY WITHIN by Suzy Kassem
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