Connections, Awakening & Spirituality
Friday 14 July – Monday 17 July 2023
Week Ending 16th July 2023
Last weekend there was a special Event in Hay-on-Wye. Quoting from the website –
‘Community is about personal awakening and social change. Russell Brand and friends are back in Hay-On-Wye for 3 days of camping, conversation on spirituality, wellness, healthy living and our environment.’
I was inspired to take part – but I couldn’t go because I had a Mindfulness-Silk-Painting Workshop on Sunday 16th (in Twickenham, at ‘The People Hive’) with a group of adults with learning difficulties – and masses to prepare beforehand.
I decided I could go to Hay-On-Wye just there and back, to offer Russell and all involved my love and support. But how to do that? Well, I am a Silk-Paint artist, and it is always good to give something, so I looked at all the different workshops and presentations and chose those which I would really love to have attended. Then I prepared a little present for about 20 of these Presenters. I put into a package, a flier about my workshops and the Mindfulness coaching I offer, along with one (or in some cases more than one) of my silk scarves. I ironed them and folded them and tied them with a ribbon. It took hours but it was pure meditation, a real Love Offering.
I had no idea whether the Presenters would actually receive these gifts, but I felt that energetically it would be received on some level. And for my own happiness it was much better to do this than not doing anything. The journey was just like a pilgrimage. I sang most of the way, although I was driving through heavy rain and storm at times. It was a wild day indeed. The following photo comes from the journey down, in a brief period of sunshine between storms.
Forgiveness
I arrived at the Event around mid-day on Saturday, which was perfect. The organisers kindly let me in to make the delivery and I came to the ‘Inspiration’ arena just in time to hear the close of ‘Masculinity in the Modern Age’ given by a panel which included Russell Brand himself. I followed him afterwards and was able to give his gift to one of the organisers who was escorting him away.
This event was followed by another which I had highlighted – another which I would love to have attended if I had been able to go for the day – and since the Presenter was just getting ready for her Talk – on Forgiving to Heal – I was able to sit down and listen. I was actually THERE! It was a wise and well-structured approach to Forgiveness.
I have a unique Programme called The Seven Steps to Happiness and in Step Four we reflect on our lives in a way which engages with difficult and painful past experiences and in this step we recognise the importance of forgiveness, and that it is something that requires real effort and can take weeks, months or years to achieve. I have heard forgiveness described as a river that flows, sometimes deep and sometimes slow. Forgiveness frees us from the continuing pain – and breaks the connection we have emotionally with whoever or whatever caused that hurt in the first place. We forgive for our own happiness, our own freedom, our own progress.
Because we engage with forgiveness in my Programme this is a key area for me to learn more about on behalf of my students, but.I am aware that there are some things in my own life which I need to work on when it comes to forgiveness. The talk was informative and often inspiring. Afterwards, when I was able to speak to Dr Chetna King, I asked her how we can forgive someone who has hurt our child. I find it difficult enough to engage with those who may have hurt me, but almost impossible when it is a question of harm to my son, my daughter or someone – or something (in the case of animals) that is close to my heart.
In my son’s case he was bullied badly when we moved to London and the school simply did not take it seriously. His school was about two miles from our house I remembered my father taking me to Cambridge market when I was 12, to bid for my first bike, so I took him to a bike-auction in Brick Lane, East London. It was an adventure for us both. He was 9 years old and first chose and then bid for his first bike. It was a green racing bike with curved handlebars and narrow wheels. And it was in very good condition.
As he was locking his bike in the bike-shed, on the first day in his new school, an attractive girl came over and asked if he was new. He said he was. She asked where he was from. He had quite a conversational nature and when she asked where Lowestoft was, he explained how it was a fishing town on the East coast – the most easterly point in Great Britain. ‘Well how come you look like elephant s–t?’ she asked – and flounced away. My husband is Indian. I don’t think he had met overt racism before that.
The trouble continued on that ‘Day One.’ I guess the leader of the most prestigious gang noticed that my son had some strength of character because he approached my son after school and invited him to join his gang. He explained who was in it and who they were ‘against.’ My son gave him a lecture about how we are all part of each other – all one family – and we have to learn to be friends with everyone. That did not go down well. This lad was the leader of the bullies and he soon got all the boys to play ‘ghostbusters’ only using my son’s name in place of Ghost. The game was to slap or kick or hit him whenever possible and whoever managed that would get a cheer. He was excluded from every kind of social activity or playground game. I feel such painful emotions when I think how day after day, he stepped into such a toxic and emotionally cruel environment. And I was complicit. Indeed it was I who chose to move to London, to come to University and advance my own career, taking him away from a town and a school which he loved and where he was much loved and very happy – to one where he was (as he said at the time) like a piece of the wrong jigsaw.
The children from wealthy homes called him ‘scruffy’ and his beloved bike, ‘tatty-bike’ because as a single mum and a student, most of our things were second-hand. The ‘rough’ children called him ‘Posho’ because he spoke nicely and didn’t swear. It was months of sheer torture, and I was too busy with my studies and just enabling us to survive (in a world where we knew nobody and had no family or friends) to deal with it effectively.
I approached the school but their attitude of the school was, ‘well there’s always a reason for bullying’ and the Head Teacher smiled in a rather apologetic way – as if he was helpless – when he said that having called my son and the ringleader of the bullies into his office and forced the bully to say sorry, he noticed the lad kick my son as they were leaving the office.
I encouraged my son to look at it in a philosophical way and I read him Haralan Popov’s book, ‘Tortured for His Faith: An Epic of Christian Courage and Heroism in Our Day’ It is a harrowing account. Not one that I would have thought appropriate to share with a 9-year old, but I reasoned that we learn something important from every experience that we get in life, and perhaps God was teaching him a special lesson of courage and resilience at an early age, because he would need that strength later in life. I said he could secretly say ‘Thankyou’ to God, when anyone was mean to him. He started to say thankyou to the face of his tormentors.
One day it was sports time and they were out in the field. His PE-Kit trousers were some I had found second hand before we moved to London. They were a stretchy material with a strap that goes under your instep – and he had grown since I bought them, so they were quite tight-fitting. One of the boys said he looked like a ballet dancer. ‘Thank you’ he replied. ‘You’re stupid,’ the other lad continued. ‘When anyone says anything to you, you just say, ‘Thank you.’ ‘Thank you’ he replied!
On one occasion, I was called from University to come and collect my son during the afternoon, because at lunchtime he had been attacked in the playground by a whole gang of boys, led by the ringleader whom everyone feared. They pulled him off the climbing frame where he was peacefully playing on his own, threw him to the ground, jumped on him and kicked him. It continued until the teachers came out. He was black and blue. He had made one friend, a boy whose parents were not from England, who had been a target for the bullies before. I asked my son if it was this lad who had run to call the teachers who stopped the attack. ‘No,’ he said. ‘He was in the thick of the attack. He was too afraid that they would turn on him if he didn’t join in.’
My son was too shaken up to ride his bike the two miles home that day. The school didn’t offer us a taxi or arrange for someone to drop us home. It seemed as if we were just a nuisance. I had no budget for such a luxury and no friends or relatives to call.
We walked in silence, with me pushing the bike. I simply did not know what to say. My son kept tripping and falling down. He was so physically and emotionally exhausted he could hardly walk. My heart was breaking. When we sat down to eat our dinner that evening I asked my son if he had tried prayer, did he think of God? Did he think of our spiritual Teacher? He knows there is power there, but we have to call on it. (If you think of Christianity, Jesus worked miracles. All the great spiritual Masters do, but we have to ask. Jesus didn’t just go zapping people in the street who he felt needed healing. People had to believe that he could help and then approach him. They had to ask.) Our spiritual Teacher’s photograph has power and so I guess the attack came so unexpectedly that he didn’t have time to think of prayer or calling on anyone. Our Teacher has spoken about this. When someone asked about whether his photograph would protect us from undivine attacks he replied –
‘Believe me, if they see the transcendental picture and if the transcendental picture is operating at that time, they will be frightened. The trouble is that you will not think of the transcendental picture at that time. When you are attacked, you will be shocked, and the picture will not occur to you. But if the victim is receiving light from the transcendental picture, then they will be terribly frightened and are bound to leave.’ I have personally experienced my spiritual Teacher’s protection, but on this occasion my son did not think of it.
When I asked if he had thought of prayer, if he had thought of our Teacher, he said, ‘Afterwards, Mum‘, and a tear slid down his face. He said that after the attack, he had been advised to sit outside the Headmaster’s room while he waited for me to come. That was when he remembered our Teacher. He wears a photograph of him around his neck and took it out. He was concentrating and meditating on it when one of the children passed by and noticed. He called out, ‘stupid Pakki Grand-daddy.’
Not long after this, my son said, ‘I’m tired of being good. Can I just bash them, Mum?’ I said absolutely. That has always been an option but it was he himself, from a young age, who had eschewed fighting. He would be out playing and then come in, saying someone was fighting. He thought it was stupid. I said that fighting was absolutely an option but he needed to be very clear about what it meant. He would have to fight the ringleader – the biggest of the bullies. and there were only three outcomes – he would win, he would be dead or unconscious – or the fight would be stopped by a teacher. or other adult. And he needed to know that his opponent would be very good at fighting. He will have studied professional wrestlers and boxers. He will be experienced in fighting and very difficult to beat. But before he took that step, let me send a message to our spiritual Teacher. It was Friday. I sent the message next day and on the Monday the leader of the bullies was not in school. He never returned. My son and the other children never learned what happened or why he didn’t return but it made a massive difference.
Thanks to what I believe to be this ‘inner action’ by our spiritual Teacher, the situation changed from night to day. Part of the ‘solution’ was the disappearance of the ringleader of the bullies, Another was a change of teacher in the next term. The new teacher was a musician and initiated some music and drama activities. My son shone at these and suddenly became popular, but that is another story.
I am strong when it comes to Gratitude – in this case gratitude to my spiritual Teacher for his action. I wish I had thought to let him know before – and gratitude for the new class teacher who was able to ‘change the dynamic’ of the classroom. Also gratitude to my son for his own inner strength and willingness to persevere for so long in using the ‘higher’ approach. Later he won a scholarship to The Arts Educational School and was selected to dance with The English National Ballet for two seasons. He was in the Drama stream, but he could have moved to Mainstream dance. Ironic that he was earlier taunted for looking like a ballet dancer, at a time when he knew nothing of that world.
My son seems to have forgotten the bullying episode and moved on, but there are some things I find it difficult to forgive, especially since I know that research into ACE’s (Adverse Childhood Experiences) shows how they cast a long emotional shadow over our lives – and he had several – issues in our family which led to my separation, our time in Hostel Accommodation for homeless families and the move to London would count for several and bullying is another of those which is included in the list.
Trauma is real and while the results of Trauma can be addressed, as our brain really is plastic, with new cells being created every day, the damage is real and remedial action may needed for healing. That can’t happen on its own and not everyone can achieve this without help. For many people experiencing multiple ACE’s in childhood leads to multiple problems in adult life, including depression, addiction, difficulties in relationships and many other issues including lower income and shorter lifespan.
Fortunately my son has a strong spiritual life. He practises meditation and mindfulness and is one of the kindest and most compassionate people I have ever met. He has a sweet, almost childlike nature and consciously sets out to (as he calls it) ‘hunt and harvest mutually joyful encounters.’ He has never been drawn to alcohol or drugs and he constantly works consciously and prayerfully to direct his life in a positive and cheerful way. The bullying and other difficult experiences seem to have disappeared into the past for him – but I guess the whole incident was traumatic for me as well, especially because I felt it was my fault.
As you see, the bullying episode remains strong in my own memory and I need to work on ‘forgiving.’ Just mentioning the subject to Chetna, after her talk, brought tears to my eyes. So for sure it is still raw and unforgiven and the negative emotions are eating away at my own inner happiness, keeping me tied to those who caused the problems years ago. It’s time I let them go. I think I will arrange to go into the school and share this blog with the current Head Teacher. In the past 30 years their policies will have changed, but it would still be useful – if only to me – to talk this through with the head and find out what kind of anti-bullying strategies they have in place now.
I will outline Chetna’s approach to forgiveness in a later Blog. The first step is to revisit the incident which caused the hurt and examine it honestly, as we tend to bury or suppress these events and the unhealthy energy they hold can often affect our physical body and cause both mental and physical illness if it is not released. In this stage, we need to be mindful and careful not to ‘ruminate’ and just ‘go over what happened’ in a way which renews the anger and other unhealthy emotions – which would only add to the pain and damage. This stage is more about ‘sitting with the pain’ and acknowledging what happened. Journalling can help here, as it is a way to recognise what happened but ‘at arms length’ allowing that part of us to feel that it has been seen and heard. It’s like unloading a heavy weight we have been carrying.
Personal Reflections on Childhood Trauma and Forgiveness
I remember the frustration I felt as a child when I felt angry about something my sister had said or done which upset me – and my parents scolding me for ‘over-reacting.’ My elder sister could be very mean, but she was disabled, so my parents naturally always took her side. Now my sister and I are good friends, but I had to do some conscious work on the relationship and work on the ‘awareness and forgiveness-corner.’ I think what helped was to realise that my sister would target me when she was angry or upset because she knew I would react. Something in my angry reaction must have given her a sense of power and satisfaction at that time. Meditation is what has helped me most. I am emotionally detached. Now she calls me ‘the calm one.’ It also helped to consciously appreciate that our parents were genuinely good people, doing their best – and at the end of the day, none of us is perfect and we all make mistakes. Would I have done any better? I doubt it.
‘Be inspired by the natural beauty of the area
Back to Saturday and Hay-On-Wye. I was able to leave my ‘bag of presents’ with the Event Organiser on duty at the Box Office. She said she would take it to the place where all the Presenters go when they arrive, to register and be given directions. Now I am slowly going through the names and looking for contact details so I can ask them, one by one, through email, whether they actually got the present. It is slow but at least it gives me a genuine reason for contacting some lovely people.
In the introduction to the ‘Community’ Event, Russell writes –
‘Be inspired by the natural beauty of the area with a canoeing experience on the River Wye.’
I was not familiar with this part of England / Wales border country and it was indeed beautiful. I found the rivers and hills, the pretty towns and villages, even the storms and dramatic cloud-scapes and especially the rainbows I encountered on the return journey also beautiful. The drive was long and I needed to stop from time to time, so it was late when I reached home.
With the workshop next day I headed for bed (after feeding my cats) but I got up early next day and was able to finish the preparation just in time. The Workshop went well and two young Media Students (who I met through playing my music at Embankment) came to make a video record. What a weekend!
It is the Community Event in Hay-on-Wye that stays most strongly in my memory. It was indeed a significant adventure and continues to fill my mind with sparkling memories and interesting reflections.
Last week I shared two poems with you and I will do the same today. The first is one which touches the very heart of Mindfulness. In mindfulness we develop the capacity to be self-aware and notice where we are, what we are doing, thinking and feeling, with an attitude of kindly curiosity, self-compassion and affection. There is no judgement or criticism in mindfulness. My Teacher Sri Chinmoy writes –
Self-criticism is not the way
That leads to self-perfection;
Neither is self-flattery.
Through conscious self-awareness alone,
The seeker reaches his goal.
Sri Chinmoy,
Twenty-Seven Thousand Aspiration-Plants, no 9823, part 99,
and
Miracles worth seeing
Only two miracles are worth seeing:
The miracle of loving
And
The miracle of forgiving.
Sri Chinmoy,
Ten Thousand Flower-Flames, no 6595, part 66,
I recommend that you reflect on the poems I choose in a way that is heart-deep, rather than something you think too much about. Don’t try to analyse them in an intellectual way, but just let the ideas that arise from them ‘play with your own experience’ allowing them to reduce your stress, bringing you Inner Peace and allowing your own heart’s Happiness-Sun to shine more brightly.