A day in an Oxford College

About a month ago, as part of my research for the book I’m ghostwriting, I had to spend the day in an Oxford College.

Such a drag…

A writer’s life is so boring…

… NOT!!!

I had to pinch myself several times.

Me, a French woman from a tiny little village in France, now here in Oxford, interacting with the biggest brains of Oxford and Cambridge, discussing theology, psychology, psychotherapy and spirituality (both in its religious and non-religious sense)?!

Yes, I was dreaming, surely.

No, I was wide awake!

It was so interesting, it was so fascinating, I just wanted the day to go on and on and on.

I arrived early and my bus stopped just opposite Christchurch College, my favourite college. I couldn’t resist – I had only 10 minutes but I knew it would be worth it: I crossed the road.

I feel at home whenever I go up the few steps that lead to the sandy, gravelly, sun-coloured path in front of the imposing building and take in the fabulous views of the college itself and then of the long alley of trees and, far into the distance, the Isis*. The air was getting warmer already, yet it was only 8.45 a.m. on 21 March – Spring Day + 1. There were only a few people, walking or jogging or standing still, admiring the views or snapping away. If you want to photograph Christchurch, come at about this time of the morning on a sunny spring day: nobody will spoil your picture and the sun illuminates perfectly the whole façade. Also at this time, you can hear the birds chirping and the wind in the tall trees, no students about and not many tourists. You can sit down peacefully on the grass – nobody will want to grab the space right next to you, or even 10 metres away.

My time here was limited, so I made the most of it. I filled my lungs with the Oxford air and my eyes with the stunning landscape surrounding me. Then, far too soon, I had to say goodbye and go to Campion College, just across the road, down in an alleyway that I wouldn’t be comfortable walking through past 7 p.m. on a summer solstice.

The silence inside the thick walls was eerie. I was greeted by the master and shown to the dining room, where the other people who were attending the meeting were having coffee and tea. I felt slightly out of place, but the person I’m writing the book with, whom I shall call X, was there so within minutes of sitting down I knew I would be all right and well looked after.

The morning went very quickly, and although the big brains of psychology and theology were there, it was all (as one may expect in an Anglo-Saxon world) quite informal. There was laughter, there was humour, somebody (who worked in the college) had turned up in his slippers, and I sat between an angel and a psychotherapist-priest-editor (of all people!) who spoke to me most naturally, as if I belonged absolutely. By then, I felt quite at ease, scribbling away, listening intently, not missing a drop of what was being said, entranced by the whole event and all the discussions flying around the room.

At lunch time, I sat down next to X and a psychotherapist, who turned out, later in the afternoon, to be the person who had the most interesting things to say, and with such ease and panache as well that I was spellbound once again. Already at the dining-room table, over a slice of quiche and salad, he managed to captivate me, and the fact that he’s written several books on various subjects means I can go back to his printed words should I ever feel the need to.

I then took a little break away from the Big Brains and went back to Christchurch College. Once again, I couldn’t resist the lure of this famous English college, where many scenes of Harry Potter were filmed… It was significantly busier than earlier, and many people were picnicking on the grass and sunning themselves. Still, it was worth going there, even though it was just for a few minutes.

The afternoon flew by, more questions asked than answered, the ideas and concepts and postulates all as fascinating and illuminating as one another. At 5 p.m., it was all over. I had to hurry up to catch my bus, but I took the time to walk to the college master, expressing my sincerest thanks for a most enlightening day.

I then ran back to St Aldates and just 100 metres up the road was my bus stop. (I still couldn’t get over how convenient this was – my bus stop happened to be just a stone’s throw away from Campion College!) My bus arrived 30 seconds later and I went back home, in some sort of trance, a myriad of words coming back to me, giving birth to thoughts and ideas for the book.

One of the best days of my life. Not so much a day of research as a day of ‘immersing myself in X’s world’.

* The Isis, for those not familiar with this corner of the planet, is the name given to the part of the River Thames that flows above Iffley Lock through the city of Oxford.

Slowly

I got too excited, that’s what happened.

I got too excited about the two little dark-green leaves that were growing on each of the two sunflowers that I planted two weeks ago.

I didn’t run or anything, but the wood of the decking was so slippery, there was no chance to keep my balance, and BLAM! flat on my arse I was, my right clog three meters away and my right knee in agony.

I screamed so loudly that my cry echoed in the quiet, sleepy town (it was 10 o’clock on Sunday morning).

I then shouted Monsieur l’Anglais’s name so loudly it sounded like I was about to die.

No answer. He was in the living room, the radio on, oblivious to any other noise and to what was going on outside.

Later, he told me that he had heard the racket I had made but thought it was the kids next door playing. As they do most Sundays. Couldn’t blame him.

It took another two long, loud shouts – along with seeing me outside the kitchen window clutching my knee – for him to come and see what had happened.

I couldn’t stop crying. It was painful, but mostly, I think, I had been sooooo scared when I had realised that the step I had taken that was going to get my balance back had been even worse than the previous one and when, in that split second where your mind disassociates itself from your body and you kind of see yourself from above, I had seen that I was unable to prevent a fall on my back, right on the edge of the step of the decking. My hands were also hurting quite a lot. I had used them to ‘soften’ the fall. The base of the thumb on my right hand was the most painful bit.

As we say in French, I think there had been ‘plus de peur que de mal’ – more fear than hurt. We put some ice on my knee, then I massaged it with body oil, as prescribed by my dad who’s a rhumatologist, and I tried not to use my legs too much. Fortunately, it rained more or less all day and I had intended to finish sorting out our wedding pictures, so it didn’t affect my plans. Our first anniversary is in less than three weeks (can you believe it?!) and we want to finish the album by then. It’s nearly done, we just need to add a few pictures of the day before, the day after and the French wedding.

Yesterday, my knee was better already, so I walked into town to run some errands. But I had to walk very slowly. It was nice actually. I realised what ‘slowly’ really meant. I took my time, told myself there was nothing I could do, so I had to be patient, and I made the most of it: I looked at the trees, stopped to find the bird that was singing so melodiously in one of the fir trees in the park (I’m hopeless at ornithology and my eyesight is not brilliant, so I don’t know what it was, but it was pretty!) and took in the busyness of the town, while I slowly wandered around its streets.

I might do that again today, especially since, for now, it doesn’t look like it’s going to rain so much...

Serendipity

So at least I look like I could have children.

Well, that’s something!

I’m starting to find the monthly disappointments a bit boring. I’m starting to get impatient... But never mind. At least we’re making the most of our ‘no-children’ life. DIY, gardening, going out for dinner on a whim, reading, writing, watching Desperate Housewives till late without worrying about being woken up at 6 a.m. the next morning. Yay!

I went to the gym last night. I nearly didn’t go because it had been raining like mad and because it was getting late, but in the end I went because I had worked for 7 hours proofreading some French revision cards, trying to finish the project (and failing miserably), and my whole body was starting to ache: neck, back, arms, fingers. It was time for a good walk uphill on the treadmill and a vigorous work-out on the so-called transporter.

If I had decided not to go to the gym
and if I had decided to do 10 minutes on the transporter rather than 15 minutes (I nearly stopped at 10 minutes, but then thought ‘Come on, you can do another 5 minutes!’)
and if I hadn’t realised that it was 7 p.m., when the Legs, bums and tums class finishes and all the girls rush to the changing rooms to put their decent clothes back on and hurry home to their Friday-night TV/film/meal
and so if I hadn’t rushed, myself, to be in the changing rooms before the LB&T girls’ invasion
and if I had taken that little bit longer to tie my shoelaces...
well...
I wouldn’t have met this lovely French woman who was coming out of the LB&T class.

Let’s take this further.
I wouldn’t have heard her speak French and would have been none the wiser when I saw her in front of me just about to go out the door. (I probably wouldn’t even have noticed her!)
I wouldn’t have had time to think ‘Wouldn’t it be cool to have another French woman in my circle of friends? Or at least someone to go to the gym with?’
I wouldn’t have had time to think ‘Shall I? Shan’t I?’

She was walking quite fast ahead of me. I only had three seconds before it was too late to approach her. I thought ‘What the hell? Why not?’ and then the words spilled out of my mouth:

‘Bonjour, je vous ai entendu parler français, vous êtes française?’

And this maybe was the start of a great friendship. Only time will tell.

Yes, she replied, she is French. In the couple of hundred metres that separated the gym from the car park where, presumably, she had parked her car (I can just walk to the gym, I don’t need a car), we learnt where we both lived, that we were both married, that our husbands were English. She told me that she had just moved from a town 20 minutes away, I told her that I have been in this country for nearly 12 years.

‘My children go to the international school in C.... [10 miles away]. That’s why we moved.’

Indeed, they’re now a lot closer to the school than they were before.

And it so happens that that school is in the same town where Monsieur l’Anglais is going to start his new job next month.

You see? You see the link? SERENDIPITY.

If I had been lazy, I wouldn’t have met this woman! I love serendipity. I love understanding the reasons behind this or that. I love creating my own life, too, and this is a perfect example of life creation, because it was all under my control: If I had stayed at home, if I hadn’t pushed myself a little on the transporter, if I hadn’t looked at the wall clock at the gym... and then of course, if I hadn’t had the guts to talk to the woman who had just spoken in French to another French lady...

When we were about to part ways, French Woman said:

‘Do you have children?’

It always stuns me when people I don’t know ask me that, because I still think of myself as 20 years old and therefore as looking very young, innocent and sooooo unlikely to have children already! Yet I am 30 years old, I’ve been married for nearly a year (can you believe it!?) and we’ve been trying for a baby for a few months, so it’s completely plausible that I could have children. I shouldn’t be so shocked.

‘No, not yet!’ my answer came.

Maybe French Woman and I will be great friends.
Maybe our children will go to school together.
Maybe her husband works where my husband is going to work.

The possibilities that serendipity opens up!

Doing too much

(This was actually written on 7th April 2006. I was going to edit it before posting it, but then never found the time or energy – until today.)

Are there not enough things to do in life? Is it not enough to have to get up, go to work (or stay at home but work nonetheless, as the case may be), come back, cook, do the washing-up, clean the house, tend to the garden and the cat, pay the mortgage, update the monthly budget, email one’s friends, speak to the said friends over the phone every now and again too? Why do I, on top of all this, also put pressure on myself to go to the gym, write this article, write that short story, finish my distance writing course, edit my photographs, write my blog, of course – and not only that, write two blogs (there is one in French somewhere in the ether as well!) – write a novel in French, make nice photo albums with my pictures, and now, also, finally, walk my 10,000 steps a day?! (13,000 today!)

Some of these things are laudable – actually, all of them are, it’s just that combined together, they tend to make me become crazy and feel like a zombie, unable to function properly, walking like a disarticulated skeleton. This is what happened to me two weeks ago, after running for 20mn on the treadmill (as well as doing my whole exercise routine) three days in a row (well, two days in a row and then another day after a 24-hour ‘rest’!), when I hadn’t run since I was 18, for the baccalauréat! I was proud of myself on Day 3, but not so much on Days 4 to 7! So I gave myself a two-week break and tonight I went back to the gym for the first time. I still ran on the treadmill, but just for 8mn, and altogether I was in the torture chamber for 50mn – much more reasonable. I listened to my body very attentively and slowed down as soon as there were signs of a slight weakening. I’m feeling quite good as a result, as opposed to a thousand-year-old mummy.

This is one of the reasons why I haven’t written much in here. After the huge and quick descent to hell (exhaustion) 10 days ago, I decided I really, really, really had to slow down and stop doing so much. It was a big wake-up call. I had had it before, but after a while I had forgotten about it. This time, I am going to make sure I don’t forget.

The other reason for not writing much here lately is because I took part in a travel writing competition and 1) I was busy writing three articles that I wanted to enter, and 2) I was horrified to see my name in big letters across my screen when I checked the competition website (they posted all the articles that were entered, and the results will be announced by 30 April). It was quite a harrowing experience. Most people would be impressed and quite chuffed – I was mortified and very scared, especially when I told my boss and her colleague, along with a few colleagues and friends, about it and they looked at the website. I suddenly thought: ‘What if they think it’s crap? What if they think I probably won’t win? What if they think it’s not interesting? What if they think “Why does she even bother?”’. I just wanted to hide and never show my face ever again.

This taught me a great lesson and made me realise one huge thing. It had entered my mind before, but I had dismissed it, having not looked at it properly, I think. This time, I have, and it all became very obvious and very right: the only reason why I want to be published is because I want some recognition, I want to be acknowledged, I want to be valued. Those murky waters I have mentioned before, that is what they are – a lack of recognition from my parents and family, and therefore a huge lack of confidence, self-esteem and self-worth deep within me. Two weeks ago, I realised: and would being published achieve what I badly need? No, of course not! But most importantly, I became aware that I was chasing a dream, and maybe not that I would never reach it for real, but that the whole pursuit was preventing me from enjoying the present, the very thing I am also trying to get pleasure from and live fully... It suddenly became very clear to me that this carrot (publication) was dangling in front of me, a stone’s throw away, and was likely to be out of reach for a very long time, and that I wasn’t prepared to sacrifice all my life to catch and eat that elusive carrot. 1) It might never happen, 2) even if it does, the price to pay to get there is far too high to even contemplate any more.

And so I decided to stop writing – the ‘for the sake of trying to get published’ kind of writing. From then on, I was only going to write for my own pleasure, with absolutely no pressure. Writing is a business, and as such it needs to be taken seriously if one ever wants to get published. Well, I’m not one of these people any more. The others can take it as seriously as they like, they can spend hours slaving over words and sentences and pages and rewrites, they can worry about the advance they’re going to get (or not), the kind of contract they will be able to obtain from their agent or publisher, about writer’s block, about fame – but I’m not going to take part in this dangerous game, I don’t want to any more.

Since I made this big decision, I have been feeling such relief, it’s amazing! I can read my writing magazine and think ‘Ah ah, I don’t need to do that!’ or ‘Ah ah, it doesn’t concern me!’ and rejoice in the knowledge that never again will I put pressure on myself to finish a piece of writing and to send it to a competition in time. I don’t care any more. That is not what life is about for me any more. That life is too stressful, and I give myself enough stress every day about little things. From now on, I am going to write only when I feel like writing, and write only what I feel like writing, not following the rules, not caring about characterisation, plot and dialects – I am just going to write what I know how to write, for my own pure pleasure, and sod the rest of them!

So you might read me here a bit more often again...!

Put that basket down

Last night, I went to a talk on ‘Living lightly’ at the meditation centre that’s now become my second home (a haven of peace, tranquillity and beauty). Sister Shashi, a famous meditation teacher, was there to enlighten us about this great way of living. She got us mesmerised for an hour, and in stitches at times too. She is a brilliant speaker. You wouldn’t expect this sort of speaker in a meditation centre.

One of the most vivid images that keeps playing in my mind is the one of a man who boards a train carrying a heavy basket on his head, and sits down but keeps the basket on his head.

Why doesn’t he put it down, stupid man?

Well, this is what we all do with our ‘baggage’ in life – we’re so attached to it that we keep it with us, at all times. We’ve taken the announcements that we hear in train stations and airports too literally.

Of course, what does this extra luggage do? It weighs us down, slows us down, wears us down. It prevents us from moving forward. Most of all, this baggage being about our past and our worries about the future, it prevents us from enjoying the present.

Last night, it was suddenly quite clear that carrying these superfluous suitcases (gone over my 20kg allowance, have I?), thinking about the extra weight all the time, was a complete waste of time. What is past is past. I should learn the lessons that those events have taught me, yes, but then I should move on and stop thinking about them. As for the future, I will never be able to control it, so it’s best left to its own devices.

I then asked myself why I was so determined to solve all my past problems: it’s because I want my life to be perfect. Perfectionist that I am, I want my life perfect not only in the present, but also in the past, and of course in the future, too. But this doesn’t make sense! I will never be able to prevent my future from being imperfect, and I will never be able to put my past right! It’s too late, it’s all buried in the ashes of time and will never be resurrected to be changed, so how can I make it perfect now? I can’t! I guess I’m hoping that by trying to make my past perfect, I can make my present perfect.

I then understood that this quest for perfection actually makes my life in the present even less perfect than it could be. Any time I try to make my present perfect, it becomes the past already. While I endeavour to make my entire life perfect, the present is absent, as it were. Trying to perfect the present is not being in the present, it’s not staying present, and it’s certainly not enjoying the present. It’s only about control and perfectionism. I would say that these two aspects make up about 50% of the load that is making me bow like an old lady and slowing me down on my journey through life.

If you rummage around the basket, you will also find things that I’ve grown attached to, such as resentment towards my parents for having done this or not done that, negativity (make that 30% of the rest of the load!), some kind of mild anger directed at life (for not being as easy as it could be), and just complexity in general – I seem to love complexity! For example, I want to be happy but at the same time kind of refuse all the happiness that life throws at me (‘Being happy all the time? What is the fun in that?’ seems to ask my unconscious).

When I left the centre last night, I did feel lighter, literally uplifted, and I kept that feeling with me all through the night: whenever I woke up (I’ve got a bad cold at the moment!), I remembered Shisha’s words and I went back to sleep feeling like a wispy cloud moving effortlessly towards the rays of the sun. This morning, I did my first guided meditation (I bought a CD last night), which was all about Light – imagining blue, pink and golden light surrounding my body. But I also took the word to mean ‘weightless’. So my entire being was bright, colourful and light. It was amazing. I floated outside of my body and couldn’t feel anything – my skin was numb. For the first time in meditation, the imperfections of my body didn’t prevent me from forgetting it completely. Bliss!

What is your basket made of? And are you going to put it down, or at least take a few things out and throw them out of the window, leaving them behind you for ever?

Motherhood

Will I ever be ready? Sometimes it feels like I’m still a child myself. Sometimes it feels like I left France and my childhood only a few months ago. (Yet it’s been nearly 11 years, and I’m going to turn thirty soon...) So how can I even contemplate having a baby? At times I’m scared that I’ll have too many tribulations of my own to be able to cope with my child’s – I fear that it will be up to my child to help and support me, not vice versa...

I occasionally think ‘I can’t wait to be a mother!’ and I imagine what the baby, then toddler, then child would be like and how fun it would all be! ... But at other times, all I can think about is the lack of freedom, the lack of time (to write, to read, to see my friends, to go out, to rest, to sleep), the lack of peace, the worry...

I simply can’t imagine a different life – for I know our lives would be completely changed. I have finally reached a point where I’m content with my lot (most of the time), so I really don’t want things to change (or indeed, to change them, active verb, for it would be our decision to change them...). That murky, muddy, troubled water at the bottom of the lake of my life is now far, far down, my roots getting longer and driving me away from it every day, but it’s taken some getting used to – life without the murk, life on the surface, surrounded by clean air, life with joy, on my big green ‘leaf of stability’... Will having a child disturb those dark waters and send some sandy mud up to the surface?

Until recently, it felt like my life was upside down all the time. Now, it’s finally the right way up (though still a bit wonky sometimes) – why would I want to turn my life upside down again (and this time voluntarily)?

On a different note, I am terrified that the day I’m finally ready and really want a child, I’ll be told that I (we) can’t conceive. This morning, I realised I would have had all this worry for nothing.

So back to meditation again – only the present counts. In bed this morning, I shed a few angry tears at the realisation that my life was still and always wonky; that the smallest worry, the tiniest analysing thought sends me right back to instability, that imbalance that I hate so much. But suddenly, I remembered – Only The Present Counts. And as I thought about the present – my warm cosy bed, the roof over my head, the singing birds outside, my fiancé next to me – I realised that in the present, I do feel stable. It was such a relief! ‘I can be stable!’ I wanted to shout! As long as I don’t think about the past and don’t worry about the future, as long as I live in the moment, I feel pretty happy, quite content with my life. It’s as soon as I start reflecting on what was, what could have been, what could be, what should be and what I think will be that I become unhappy.

So – motherhood? Well, I’m sure it’s like marriage. You’re not ready for it for ages, and suddenly that’s all you can think about. Let’s wait for that day – for that moment, that present.

Meditation

I had my first meditation class last Wednesday. As you would expect, we all had to introduce ourselves – name, why we were there and what we were hoping to get out of this four-week course.

The woman sitting next to me told us that she was attending this class because her husband had died a few months ago and she wanted to feel at peace and be strong enough to carry on with her life, without him. She was only about 45. She had tried meditation before, and the only week she had been able to do meditation every morning and every evening, she had managed to experience some kind of happiness. After that, she gradually gave up meditating and she lost the blissful joy she had felt. She wanted to get it back, she said, barely managing to contain her tears.

Then it was my turn. What could I say after such moving words? I explained that my New Year resolution was to try meditation, that I had done a one-day retreat at the beginning of January, and that I now wanted to learn meditation properly. I was so stunned by my neighbour’s words that I forgot to tell everyone what I was hoping to get out of it.

Well, here is the answer: a sense of peace in my everyday life; being able to stay present, no matter what happens; being able to stop the flow of thoughts that stalk my brain every minute of the day and to retreat to the blissfulness of the present, where everything is peaceful and quiet. When I do get to that place, I feel relaxed and content. Contentment is hard to sustain, though... But it seems that an excellent way to stay happy, or joyful, is to meditate regularly.

Last week, I discovered that meditation is nothing extraordinary. It reassured me – I didn’t want to become one of those weird people who see things, or who can suddenly sense things that nobody else can. Now I know I can meditate and remain just as I am. I learned that meditation is only about clearing your head of the whirlwind of thoughts that attack it every second. This can only be achieved by focusing on just one thing. This ‘thing’ varies from person to person. For the first time, I managed to find a 'thing' that works for me. I wish I could say I had come up with it myself, but it was actually the teacher who helped me find it. At one point during his first guided meditation, he said, 'Imagine yourself on top of your head, on top of yourself.' Immediately, I could picture a miniature version of myself sitting in the lotus position in my skull, just behind my eyes. I know it sounds a bit strange, but the fact that I could finally focus on something without it eluding me within three seconds was a miracle. Yes, I had tried some form of meditation on my own, picturing a black screen, or a white screen, or just 'nothing', but I could never sustain this focus. Now, imagining 'myself within myself' provided me with the deepest sense of connection I had ever had.

I've since discovered that this powerful image of me within me, in the lotus position – a posture of total relaxation – is also useful when I'm not meditating. If I ever feel a little tense, or worried, I can just conjure it up and feel calm – or calmer, at least.

This is how I came to choose the blog name 'Lotus Flower' for myself. It has nothing to do with my looks, in case you're wondering. Yes, lotus flowers are a stunning species and their beauty does not cease to amaze me, but calling myself 'Lotus Flower' certainly doesn't mean that my physical traits reflect theirs. The reason why I chose it is because I could hardly call myself 'Lotus Position', and 'Lotus Flower' was the closest rational name to select. Then when I thought about the deep, long roots that connect this beautiful flower to the sandy mud that lies at the bottom of the pond or lake they live in, I realised that this name really was appropriate. That is me, if you think of the flower in terms of character rather than looks. On the surface, I am full of joy, I have a colourful, bubbly personality, but underneath, somewhere deep down, the water is somewhat dark and troubled. However, little by little, my roots are getting longer and longer. They are pushing me away from the murky bottom of the lake of my life and my green leaf is growing wider and wider, providing me with more and more stability.

Dave McNeill, on http://www.sgi-usa.org/publications/world_tribune/b2b/thelotusflower.htm,
said it best:
'The lotus [...] grows in mud, the deeper and muckier the better. Yet it stays pristine. Though mud clings to the leaves of most plants, not so with the lotus. Nothing sticks. [...] Out of the muddy swamp blossoms the pure lotus. Out of our swamp of suffering springs our Buddhahood. Thanks to the mud, the lotus can survive. Thanks to all the problems we have to face, we can reveal the power within us.'

I firmly believe that. It's in the darkest skies that you can see the brightest stars. May meditation help me grow even further away from the shadows.