The Waiting...

Phone calls, facetimes, texts, what's apps, facebook messages, tweets. Bumping (literally) into people on the school run, at the shop...

"not long now..."

"you still here?!" - why yes - because I'm having a baby, not emigrating.

People are kind.  They care.  I am so grateful for it all.  I'm sorry I'm not getting to reply/answer/respond all the time.

The waiting for this baby, in all honesty, has been agony.  I am so very desperate to begin this new chapter of our family life.  I've been pregnant for 526356 weeks.  I feel like I have felt all the normal things already; mourned the changes to our party of three, reconciled the tough newborn days/weeks/months ahead, given thought to the impending 'new normal' and given space in my heart and my head to welcome this baby without fear.  

Levi was born at 37.5 weeks.  8lbs 2oz of beautiful, sworthy, baby boy.  I remember going to bed that night after my waters broke and having a silent little cry in the dark as I curled into Dave's warm back thinking that this was the end of an era in our married life.  This was the last night in our little house, just us.  Things would never be the same again; our two was imminently becoming a three.  And now we sit here on the cusp on this next transition, and although those feelings are familiar, they are more processed - there has been more time to give to them than the first time around.  We are so much more ready.

"Are you overdue?" - I mean, I guess - if you base a baby's readiness to enter the world on mathematics alone.  My heart says "forget the due dates - it will come when it's good and ready".  My body says "that's quite enough now".

Every day I wake up, hyper-aware of my body.  Each movement inside (enough? too much?), each change, each symptom, each "sign".  My fingers, hot to the touch of a screen googling anything and everything.  Relax, they say.  Enjoy these last days.  I cried over my sausages, potatoes and beans tonight.  Just because.

The desire to control and to know can be overwhelming.  It's funny how you can feel so ready, so poised and so prepared yet so vulnerable at the same time.

A few friends directed me to this article in Mothering magazine on the last days of pregnancy - this time of waiting, or 'Zwischen' as the Germans call it - 'an in-between' time.  The article calls for a reverence of this time - that it is hugely spiritual - a now and not yet, thin place.  I feel this so very deeply right now and want to be able to rest here until the zwischen is over and this baby can be brought safely into our home and our lives.

International Women's Day 2016

GAH - I just love International Women's Day. I love that we get to mark a day in the calendar to reflect on where we have been as women, look at what is still necessary for all women in the world to flourish and resolve to do more, be more, expect more in the years to come.

My workplace celebrated 10 years of marking IWD this year - a tradition started by my beautiful colleagues who run the Women's World Programme when the charity was just in it's infancy.  Even though I'm already on maternity leave, I wouldn't have missed it so I waddled down to spend the morning with over 100 women from dozens of nationalities who have somehow made their home here in our area.

That's me in the middle, caught in the act of gabbing away to my midwife friend about birth preferences and refusing unnecessary vaginal examinations...as you do.

But these women I spent the morning with.  These women are fierce.  They work, they contribute, they volunteer, they nurture, they resolve to thrive amidst the obvious and the silent challenges that living as an 'outsider' in an already polarised community brings.  Diversity is still a dirty word here.  We ate, we laughed, and we wept as we heard stories of these incredible women in our community who have overcome the most difficult things this year:  cancer, isolation, depression.  A grandmother now the primary care provider for her 3 grandchildren left behind after her daughter died tragically.  A mother who, only a couple of weeks after moving to Northern Ireland was attending English lessons when her two year old accidentally got caught in a blind cord at home and later passed away.

These women and their families have been extended the hand of welcome and friendship; of opportunity to painfully overcome with the support of our dedicated and compassionate teams at work, of generous local churches and of the kindness of individuals.  Such bravery.  It was a privilege to be there to honour them.

These WOMEN.  Their STORIES.  What COURAGE.

My friend Sharon reminds me that the small things are often the big things.

This years IWD theme is on 'pledging parity' - helping to move more quickly the divides and divisions that see and treat women as less than equal to men in so many facets of society.  When I see the audacity, tenderness and bravery of the women I have just mentioned, I am stirred up by the potential for women to continue to change the world because they already are.  They are standing in the gap, they are showing up and they are making things happen.  Their bravery, the sharing and acknowledgement of their stories is part of that pledge, it is bridging that divide.

For me, this pledge starts at home - in conversations with my four year old boy, as we model and discuss the value and abilities of women and girls. Through toys and stories and colours and conversations we are gently showing him - both Dave and I.

It continues in our marriage - in working things out together, being a team, having equal say in all decisions, modelling that there is no boss in our family but that we all mutually try to put each other first, championing each other's successes and dreams - dancing the dance of making sure everyones needs are met (this, the very heart of #motherhoodalive).

It then bleeds out into work, hobbies, friendships, how the communities around me are being built: everything to make sure that the voices, the stories, the plights and the successes of women are seen and heard in our homes, our communities and around the world.

So tell me, how can you pledge for parity in your family?  What ways are you seeing women championed that stirs you up?  What would you love to see changed for women in your own community and how can we do it together?  I'd love to hear from you!  I'm also linking up with Lulastic's IWD Blog Link Up, so if you want to read more from some awesome kick-ass women writers, do make sure to head over there for a good round up!

What Are We So Afraid Of?

You can see it pretty much everywhere you look if you look closely enough.  It's there, glaring out at you behind most things.  It's a tiny little four lettered word that has enough power behind it to cripple even the most resilient of us all. Fear.

Most of my surface fears are easy to describe:

-  Flocks of birds flying towards me (there was an incident with bird seed at trafalgar square when I was a child that brought this on...ask my mother)

-  Large groupings of small circular bumps or holes (I swear, it's a thing - Tryophobia *shudder*)

-  That the stuff that goes on in Homeland is actually true in real life (Sarin gas leaked into Capital cities?  I'll never sleep again)

-  Falling down the stairs while carrying Levi (I have this visual in my head every. time. I go down the stairs with him in my arms)

Some of our fears are less easy to describe, though - and they lurk beneath the surface of our brave exterior, showing up in places and situations we might not expect.  Our actions and reactions reveal a lot about our fears.  Let me give you some examples of what I mean:

When we look in magazines or in celebrity gossip columns - our inner voice tells us we don't look like that, have enough of that or are having as much fun as that - that's the voice of FEAR and it holds the power to make us feel inadequate instead of the TRUTH that it's all just smoke and mirrors.

When we see racially isolating, sensational or inflammatory social media posts or articles - Muslims are out to kill us all, more guns is the answer, it's us against them - those posts are driven by FEAR, the world has gone nuts and we badly want to control the narrative and we demonise a whole entire religion instead of the TRUTH that there is more good in the world than there is evil and that violence begets violence.

It's there in relationships that are difficult, where there is back-biting, jealousy, power-playing - FEAR makes us withdraw, be defensive or attack instead of seeing each other as flawed humans that are all just trying to figure things out.

It's there in our overspending and consumption, when we see what everyone else is wearing or having and we break our necks to keep up appearances - it's our FEAR that runs ahead and cripples our finances to make sure we're not left behind instead of getting out of the rat race and enjoying the simple things.

It's there in Churches when heads are buried about important topics that are changing the face of our culture like LGTB issues, climate change, peacemaking, consumerism, racism and addiction - it's FEAR that refuses to face up and keeps the Church looking like a Sunday club for safe-talking holy joes instead of a place of acceptance and of strong leadership on justice issues.

It's there in parenting when we react poorly to our kids - it's our FEAR that rises up and causes us to resort to threats and punishments to try and enforce good behaviour instead of listening and being patient and modelling gentleness.

It's there in the smaller more subtle things too - so many of our decisions are based on our fears and it would seem that if we dig a little deeper we're all just walking around a bit scared of life, aren't we?

I've been thinking about how different it would be if only we could really hear the fear instead of how we see the fear manifested in these often unhealthy ways.  If we could hear the fear, it would say:

"I'm worried that I'm not enough"

"I'm worried that I'm not safe in my country"

"I'm scared that if we talk about difficult things in our Church we'll be ridiculed or seen as wishy-washy"

"I scared that I'm missing out on all the fun"

"I'm worried that if I give other people a platform, I'll become redundant"

"I'm not sure that my life is exciting enough"

"I'm worried about losing my religious freedom"

"I'm worried that if I give this person too much of myself they'll hurt me"

"I don't want people to think I can't handle being a parent"

"I'm afraid that if I can't do this that I'll lose attention from the people I want to respect me"

That all sounds a lot more human doesn't it?  Who wouldn't hold empathy if someone stood in front of them and confessed these things?  Who could turn someone away that told such naked truths?  And yet, every day we chose to let our fears have power.

You see, it's not that fear is bad - I think it's inevitable.  I think a certain dose of it is healthy and normal but when fear manifests itself in ways that aren't healthy it can lead to destruction, broken relationships and a lot of collateral damage along the way.

It's scary to be human, to be vulnerable and open, isn't it?  I'm challenged by how fear manifests itself in my own life, and how I can find the courage to be more vulnerable with my trusted people.

I think that truth-telling pierces holes in dark places.  When our difficult truths are exposed to the safe people in our own lives, the dark stuff (like our fears) have less control over us.  We can begin to face up to them and find healthier ways to manage.  I know this to be true.

I also know that when we begin to see how fear manifests itself in others we can hold back our judgement a little easier; cut each other some slack; carve out a road for vulnerability and invite those people to join us.

What are your thoughts on fear?  Are there ways that fear has been manifesting itself in your own life that have been unhealthy for you?  How can we live less afraid and give each other more permission to tell the truth? I'd love to hear what you think about this... let's continue the conversation in the comments or on my facebook page.

Social Media & the Empathy Deficit

A couple of Saturday's ago we woke up to the news that Paris, the city of love and lights, had been recklessly attacked.  Death tolls were rising by the hour and there was much speculation about who was responsible.  As I trawled through my usual mid-morning updates on the usual social media suspects (Twitter, Insta, Facebook) I followed the hashtags #prayforparis, #parisattacks etc and saw the outpouring of grief, shock and anger laden by so many.  I also saw (on those hashtags) people beginning to upload pictures of themselves in Paris.  Really? I thought. Is now the best time to carefully select your best Paris selfie and stick it up on facebook? Stupidly, I weighed in.

I made a comment on social media about how we should probably be lamenting the tragedy instead of uploading pictures of ourselves in Paris and (quite rightly) got a mixed response.  Some people agreed, some were paranoid that I was having a go at them, and some really disagreed - annoyed that I was policing people's heartfelt reactions.  I tried to clarify, the thread went on, people went back and forth, I had various sideline conversations via private messages etc and eventually just made a decision to delete the entire conversation because I realised this:  social media does not have the capability to hold emotion well.

In this case, the whole thing became unhelpful, and it was my fault for hosting it.  I am not the kind of girl to shy away from hot topics online but more and more lately I have been learning to pick my online battles carefully.  When emotions are charged, they do not translate well on social media.  

When emotions do not translate well, we misunderstand, we calculate what we want to calculate, we react and nobody wins.  Nobody proves their point well, nobody changes their mind about anything and nobody leaves feeling heard or respected.

This incident and related thoughts were compounded by a profound podcast I listened to a week later on Good Life Project - an interview that Jonathan Fields hosts with researcher Sherry Turkle (what a fun name!) on what technology, phones and social media are doing to empathy and the human condition.

It floored me, if I'm being honest.  It made me cry, it made me cringe and it hit me deep in the knower that what she was saying was true. When we live and communicate more and more in a digital world, and place increasingly less value on the art of real-life conversation it has massive detrimental impacts on our well-being.

Some of Sherry's research and insight that stood out to me in particular were:

+  that if we go out for coffee/meals with loved ones and have our phones on in eyeshot, we are less likely to have any depth of conversation with those loved ones than if our phones were out of sight.  The temptation to scratch the itch of phone-checking draws us and distracts us away from deeper connection with the people around us.  OUCH.

+  that texting, PM'ing etc instead of talking and hearing each other's voices is reducing our ability to be empathic because we cannot properly interpret each other's real emotion and our brains disconnect from the REAL person behind the screen.

+  that communication online is reducing our ability to be vulnerable (which further research has shown to be an essential element of being able to live wholeheartedly) because we can so easily control and manipulate what is discovered, known and shown about ourselves.  This vulnerability reduction also connects to empathy reduction because when we control what we put out there, we begin to expect perfection from each other instead of being able to accept and acknowledge each other's natural flaws.

+  that because of constant and instant communication, we are living in and raising a generation that will find it difficult to be secure with solitude, and will therefore have a limited understanding of self.  SCARY.

+  that when we are consumed with online communication rather than in-person communication, we lose the sharpness of collaboration and the spontaneity of creativity and ideas.

+  Turkle says "Technology doesn’t just change what we do, it changes who we are." and claims to not be anti-technology, but PRO-conversation.  I kind of like that.

This information, these studies and this research has massive implications on our wellbeing and our ability to really know, understand and empathise with ourselves and each other.  I was massively challenged by what I heard and what I've since been reading up on about how our further disconnect might actually make us less tolerant and more skeptical of each other.

Some things I am working on putting in place to counteract and try to claim back my own wellbeing around online activity:

+  No phones at the table.  This has been a rule in our house for a while now, but has been taken much more seriously since Dave and I both listened to that podcast and had some honest conversations with each other.  Phones, iPads and laptops have to be out of the room when we sit down to eat as a family.

+  As much as possible, arrange meetings for work to be in person or on skype.  I was really taken aback by the idea that we lose our ability to feed off each other's creativity and insight so drastically when we move away from flesh and blood conversations.  Sure, there are many times when an email convo will suffice for organising and communicating, and SURE, it frees us up time-wise, and SURE sometimes meetings are a drag but for the collaborative work that we do at Freedom Acts that involves heart and soul issues - person to person communication is essential.

+  Similarly - free up more time to talk/skype/facetime with the people we love.  I don't want conversation to feel like a drag.  I don't want to be the person that avoids answering their phone and would rather text because it takes too much of my energy.  I want to re-cultivate the deeper connection that comes with talking to the important people as much as possible.  Even if it is just a stolen few minutes during the day, hearing each other's voices - the nuances, the tones, the emotion, is so much more healthy for our relationships than one dimensional words on a screen.

+  Create distance when necessary.  Unfollow.  Pick battles with wisdom.  Refrain from engaging in conversations that are going nowhere fast (have the hop-topic conversations in person with people you trust - you don't have to agree, but at least you can trust your opinions will land safely).  Do not bite to passive-aggressive online behaviour.  Protect your heart.  I've learned this the hard and painful way but can honestly say it is more than healthy to know when to step back.  Creating distance from toxic online behaviour does not make you cold or frosty, it makes you sensible.

+  Maximise the good.  Utilise the best bits; the community building stuff, the campaigning, the information sharing, the positivity, the thoughtful, the generous.

So I wonder what you think?  Are you, like me, worried about what online communication is doing to the human condition?  Have you thought much about it in this way?  Have a listen to Sherry Turkle's interview and then maybe let's chat some more about it.  In person, preferably of course...