Shiva's and Metta's Mother's Sutra

Exhausted, as usual. I had a really weird dream last night. I dream i was in a building in Singapore. The type of buildings with large glass atriums, and I was with friends from my time in JC. We were watching something. I think we were the age we were... it was super weird. But also not. Anyways... back to the non dream world. I was chatting to a teacher and talking about how Steiner education resonated with us when we first heard about it. We understood it instantly. We recognised it. I said, isn't it interesting, it is almost like we are going back to heal that child which was damaged by what we had experienced. Our future selves, or ourselves here, are looking after the selves which were in some way hurt. How is it though that some of us are hurt, while others thrive or don't feel the pain? Questions.  I never really fit into the RSPB. In fact, the truth is that i never fit in anywhere. Always questioning things, always trying to understand things, is not a popular pl...

Over the past twenty years, yes it has been almost twenty years I got involved in conservation, I have had the opportunity to see the shortcomings of the current conservation model up close, inside and out. I don't really have this carefully thought out, but I think I need to put this down on in some form because the buzzing around in my head is driving me nuts. Can I just say, that this observation is not unique nor original. It was almost certainly written about in a book called Earth Follies , a book more than thirty years old. It looked at the misogynist culture of conservation - how it was male driven - and perhaps i can start there first. Conservation works out of the male model of culture. When I say male model, I do not mean that there are no women. In fact, there are now more women than men in conservation. There are more female conservationists in almost every organisation, even though they do not tend to occupy positions of management. Except maybe in the 'softer...

Well, today, after a short nap I got up and did the dishes and the laundry. I am now waiting for the laundry to be washed so I can hang it out to dry - then I will go back to bed. Today we did Charlemagne and as part of the Main Lesson, we did drawing the human face - portraiture. We did the divide the egg shape into half and then that into half again... etc... and for the first time some of my class drew proper faces. One boy was so delighted that he said, that has to be the nicest thing I have ever drawn and he was utterly chuffed with himself. My own portrait wasn't so bad either. In fact, it turned out rather better than expected. It is sorta magical to start off with a sketch and to slowly put in the details. One eye, then the next and soon, before you know it, you have Charlemagne staring at you from the blackboard. The effect was so compelling that when I had put the finishing touches, one of the students went, wow! I guess that's what teaching's about. Tomorro...

I am lying in bed. I am so tired that I want to cry. It is the kind of exhaustion which I have come to recognise now as the end of the term burnout. I get up, I get ready for school, I go to school, I come home and I have just enough juice to get ready for school before I collapse into a heap on the bed. The house by this stage is an utter mess. I told the boys that unless one of them does the laundry they will not have any clean clothes to wear. I can't do it anymore. It usually takes me about three days after the end of the term to finally recover and feel like a human being again. It is two and a half weeks to the end of term. I think I may also be getting my period soon, that might have something to do with it. The good news is that I have been more or less running everyday now and I am doing two extra sit ups every day. I am now up to 48. Tomorrow I am on 50. I have to say that I am find when I wake up first thing in the morning. I am fine then. It is at the end of the ...

Sometimes, just before I fully awaken I get these vivid dreams, these thoughts. Today's thought was about the future. I have been thinking a lot about time, what time is. And I can never understand this idea of time as not linear. In many ways it is not about time - but our RELATIONSHIP with time - and that to me makes most sense as that is the real experience that we have with time - how we interact with it. So, the thought about the future was something like this: the future is coming towards us, literally coming towards us - in fact, there was this word which appeared - our experience of the future is SUPERPRESENT. The future is Superpresent. So, the future is coming towards us and the only way we can become our future selves is to SHOW UP. This is not a new concept - this is something which the AA and the Artist's Way uses. Show up. Show up everyday, even if you are on your hands and knees. Show up every day even if you are bloodied and bruised in SOME WAY. Show up - ...

The things you think about while washing dishes. FFS... i never thought I would be prespiring in the house! It is boiling. Anyway, I was washing the dishes and of course, I began to think about Freedom. The truth is that I have figured out what Freedom is for myself already. This is because many years ago, about eight to be exact, I took the Steiner teaching course. Steiner's thesis was The Philosophy of Freedom. I did not and have not since read it. However, we were asked what Freedom was. When it was my turn to answer, I said, It is an illusion. This was not an exact answer, in fact, it was a non-answer, because of course you need to say what it IS before you say it is an illusion. So, I was asked to think about Freedom. And this, back then, was the Freedom which I believed, and still know to be an illusion. Freedom is commonly thought of as the ability to do whatever the heck you like. This is the most common idea of freedom, but it is also, I think, a partial understa...

Many years ago, about, almost 17 actually, I had Oisin. Oisin was almost certainly the most beautiful child I had ever seen. If anyone knows the story I tell about Ghin's first weeks will know that I am quite good at being objective. When I held Oisin, I cannot describe the strange light headed wonder. For all of the nine months before I worried terribly. In fact, Oisin's childhood will probably, if I am honest, consist of me mostly worrying. Worrying that he was not speaking on time, or worrying that he had no teeth for one year, worrying that maybe he would not be able to read... worrying, all the time worrying. So much so, that when I had Ghin, I realised the massive mistake I made with Oisin. Worrying was futile and ludicrous. Because of the mistakes I made with Oisin I was able to enjoy Ghin a whole lot more. But it doesn't end there. From the very start, Oisin's incredible temperament was always a source of mystery to me. He is almost certainly the most ev...

Sunday. Is it possible it is already June? I went for my early morning run today at Belvoir Park forest. I did the usual route and felt really strong at the end of the run. So this week I am extending my running for another five minutes everyday and another ten minutes at the weekend. This means a 25 minute run daily and a 40 minute run at the weekends. I am promised myself that I would not run more than 50 minutes at any one time. I don't think this is a good idea as you get older. Maybe I will rethink it next year, but slow and short lengths are the way I think my running future is going. I now do 40 sit ups and this will be extended till I reach 50 sit ups at the end of the week. This week. Just by adding two more each day. Again, modest amounts. I was reading this article about how fitness and veganism was the new virtue signalling now that we don't go to church anymore. I don't know about virtue signalling, but I have run since I was 15 years old. I have never ru...