HelenzArt-life-musings

Category: spirit

  • Taking that step.

    Its odd when there has been such turmoil of emotion that there comes  a time where that flattens out.  The peaks and troughs of storm tossed seas lessen to swells. Not a calm but a bobbing up and down where ones  less likely to be swamped, still the occasional push under by a rogue wave that blindsides the heart. 

    In that calming, one rests,  as high emotions are tiring and perhaps to start wondering what is there to do, or be!  Where are the next steps in this life to head towards?  Because loss does that. It asked me to look at me and what I want.  I wanted Gavin to walk through the door and smile, and in a way he did.  I felt that his leaving was an invitation to walk through a door that his transition had opened within me. Could I take that first step? What was to change?

    The biggest habit in my life is being a smoker.  Never stopped when being pregnant, and yes, I know all the reasons why it’s not good for me, but that doesn’t seem to matter. Rationally, I know I shouldn’t do it, yet I’ve tried many times and not succeeded.  Perhaps it was time to give it a try in a different way.  I felt now was the time for a different approach. One not tried before.  Hypnotherapy.

    It wasn’t going to be easy yet somehow, I sort of felt that I had done the hardest thing ever in my life, and that was to say farewell to Gavin.  Now, given what I could recall of my early life, that’s saying something! I needed help, not pills or patches or replacements but a person who could help, and I happened to find one. Serendipity, Universal coincidence, Fate, Luck, Magic, call it what you like but I found who  I needed to, when I needed too and I’m most grateful.  

    So, in my coming writings, I’m going to share my experiences of what I thought I knew and what came to be rediscovered.  A voyage to the weird and scary, fantastical imagination or deep disturbance, yet simply my truth.

    I choose to share my experiences and my perspectives.  Feel free to judge them or not, comment or not, its always your choice. Share them with others if that feels right.

    My next blog will be what I thought I knew before therapy! 

  • How that first anniversary feels.

    To be honest the firsts of anything are hard.  The first Christmas,  mothers day, fathers day, their birthday etc.  We know it’s coming and there can be a sense of dread attached to that.  We found that to do something they would have liked, or to celebrate having known them rather than think of what we have lost is better for us. Remembrances of good times. Certainly better for me, and that’s not a denial of the pain felt. That is tacitly acknowledged,  a sadness that offers gladness to have been part of their physical lives and to be better for having known them. 

    When the first anniversary of Gavins death came round, we had already made a plan. To do something most extraordinary.  To overlay that sad with very special memories of family.  We went to Finland, the family of hubby and I, our daughter with her husband and our two grandchildren.  Snow, huskies, reindeer, the whole experiences that a wonderland of snow can offer.  Did it help, absolutely yes. 

    When we meet that anniversary now it’s with those memories of family. Gavin was with us as we fell and slipped and wondered at the experiences. He was still part of it in spirit of that, I’m certain. 

    On his birthday, I recall that bond of birthing that happened as I first held him. That soul thread attachment between us, welded and melded.  I am grateful that the thread hold strong to this day.  He is part of who I am, and will remain so through this life and all transitions. 

  • Seeing some light.

    This painting came into being in 2022, whilst waiting for my mother-in-law to transition from this Earthly world to some other state of being. Its part of a series I call the ‘Waiting Room’ and can be found on my art website.

    http://www.helenzart2021.com

    Yes, that’s how I see and feel the passing on of a bodied person is. A transformation of beingness from this bodied person, within which is a spirited soul, and the release of those Earthly ties to set a spirit free.

    I started feeling this when the overwhelming pain that Gavins’ death engulfed me with had begun to settle. Whilst sat in the moments of stillness, which come after the releasing of emotional energy through sobbing those copious tears with body wracking heaves, I felt those tugged threads of continued connection. Those heart strings that sing at the memories of his smile, the quiet laugh at a wry comment. His voice, that deepened from childhood to manhood yet always him. A felt knowing that physical presence was not all that he gave, that what was of essence within that body was still in existence. Still held in my own soul spirit, woven into my own fabric of existence, of beingness. So what was I to do with this awakening of connection.

    Like many humans, I began to look beyond the survival needs to ponder on purpose. When feeling purposeless seems to be a result of losing a loved one. Especially one that has been a central part of ones caring. What even is a purpose? Is it to simply be mother, daughter, wife, colleague, and friend, in many cases that is enough. Yet what if there is more to be found. A potential to see that whilst those are important, there is more to being those parts and roles that to be all, and yet none of those is to be more whole. What was to be done by me to bring my potential wholeness to the fore. To be a better version of this bodied person living fully now.

    That sudden loss was bringing the realisation that there is no future for certain. All could be lost in the blink of an eye. Gavin had achieved much in his 28 years, things that had allowed a fulfilling of some of his dreams, and I felt proud and grateful that my nurturing of him in those early years had been a purpose of mine. Where now to place that nurturing spirit that wells up from within. Where indeed!

  • What a difference a year makes!

    What started with the loss of our son, Gavin, became a whole different direction once that embracing of emotion was allowed to takes its own course.

    There’s no denying it was extremely painful in moments, even long moments, yet they were transitory. The allowing was in flow, coming and welcomed, ebbing to and fro. Those inbetween times were of the ordinary and yet were leading me towards extra-ordinary. The feeling that the loss of his physical presence had some how pulled a thread, a soul thread from with in me to be examined. To look for where this soul of mine was hidden.

    At Gavins committal service there were people there who we knew that knew Gavin and some that we had no idea of. His death meant something to them as did his life and interaction with them. His life had touched theirs in a way that we could have no knowledge of. So his soul thread had touched the fabric of their lives and secured his beingness to theirs. His going had tugged on their threads to move them towards something else. Be that a realising that life is transient, that removal from this physical life can happen no matter what age one is. A facing up to and conversation of death and seeing that there is a purpose to how we do, what we do now, rather than next week or next year. To try to live fully today in this moment. Who knows if that stuck or not, and it is up to them to feel it.

    I simply felt that tug to become more ‘now’, to be the better me in each moment. How wasn’t fully formed yet, it would sift through in the quiet moments, and that is OK. It’s still OK to not really know or understand as the feeling is all that’s needed. Threads, strands of spirit have become a curiosity to me. That life tapestry that is poetically thought of as part of life and so much more. I feel the warp and weft that interweaves through all things.