Hard Things

1. The phone call

Today I had to ring my mother and kind of break her heart. It’s the hardest phone call I’ve ever made to her and she cried and I cried and then she blew my mind, like she always does.

She turned around within minutes something that is the worst case scenario for her (having to leave her own beautiful home and garden) and having to consider options that she has loudly and frequently claimed as ‘over my dead body’. Fair enough. Gotta love a women with dramatic flair.

But once she understood that our worst fears were actually happening, she immediately voiced what could be positive. Even if it started off tentatively she never, not once, was oh whoa is me. She never has been that person and I don’t think I realised till today just what a beautiful trait that is to have. Or rather, that it is to choose.

I got off the phone both devastated for her and uplifted because she is my mum and she is amazing and I am so proud of her and who she is. Yes, she has fed us cat food accidentally FOUR times during childhood and yes, she does say yes to things that cause outrageous problems down the line (of course she would love to have a German schoolboy come and live in our home following the death of her son because that sounds like a SUPER idea). But she’s also that mum that after a hip replacement can’t be found because she’s gone for a drive in her friend’s new low sitting convertible. She diagnoses herself for everything (as a still-working nurse) and does nothing about it. She pretends she’s baked sliced up Ernest Adams and tells me they’re vegan. She recently told me fish pie is vegan. She read my diary throughout my teenage years and didn’t even bother putting it back where she found it. She loves everything we do and is our biggest supporter. Always.

She’s the funniest person I know, hands down, and today was a hard call.

2. Saying no

Always struggle with this one. I used to say yes and then spend an extraordinary amount of time trying to wiggle out of things.

So, no offence but NO.*

*Okay, well maybe. I’ll get back to you.

3. Letting go

Well, this is an ongoing one isn’t it? Surely not just me?

I forgive easily and I don’t feel like I hold a grudge but somewhere in the midst of my insides there resides a heavy load of stuff. And it’s hard, so hard, to put it aside sometimes.

Is there supposed to be a time limit on how long you relive mortifying conversations or go over what you wish you’d said and what you’d been wearing?. (I have a very specific moment in time in which I nail a situation looking like Christy Turlington with a French accent. Totally credible.)

In yoga and meditation we hear about letting go all the time. Sometimes I sit there and think, you let go, in the manner of a petulant, ah, fifty-year-old. I have yet to visualise my thoughts drifting off down the river. Instead I get particular about what the thoughts are drifting off on and how long I’m supposed to watch them go. It’s all in the details. Unfortunately.

Today though was about letting go of control. And this is a shocker, what with me being a Virgo and all (possibly on the cusp of something if I could ever understand my chart properly), but there was a slight relief in the release.

I’m sure this is growing up.

Also, my mum is the best.

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Anything you got going on? Hope you have better luck with the letting go sitch than me…

Photo by me! Taken in my mother’s garden.

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© The Yoga Connection 2017