This weekend I had the equivalent of a car wash for my brain. I signed up for the Liz Gilbert creativity retreat in London because it was part of my New Year resolutions to attend more creativity/ literary talks this year, so on Saturday morning I found myself sitting next to complete strangers, talking them through my fears and listening to theirs. Yeah I thought that would be my idea of a really bad time too and yet it was the most invigorating weekend that you can possibly imagine.
For an entire weekend I actually really listened to myself. What my fears want me to know. I celebrated how resilient I have been up until now. I’ve thought about my past self and visualised my future self (she wears GREAT trouser suits). I had random yet magical encounters with strangers and people that I know through the internet but had never met in real life. (shout out
and )Then came the Q&A and a woman asked a question about surrendering control. Oh my word. Liz mentioned the P word POWERLESSNESS and my skin began to itch.
Here’s the thing…
By the time I was 16 years old my parents had been through a really bitter divorce, I had become estranged from my father and then reunited with him. My mother developed a religious mania and had a full violent breakdown leading to her sectioning and then just as we came through that my Dad was diagnosed with cancer and died months later. I was 15 years old and I tell you this not for sympathy but to demonstrate that I could TEACH the class on feeling powerless.
Powerlessness is never knowing how stable your own home is going to be on any given day. This is bad enough for adults but when you’re a child it’s excruciating.
I am incredibly resilient - I know this because I am still here however I absolutely fucking hate feeling powerless in any given situation. It makes my breath jagged and can trigger all the terror of growing up in chaos.
So like most adults who’ve survived this kind of stuff, we tend to fake control. We plan and strategise and become more sophisticated about getting safe outcomes no matter what we are dealing with.
At the Q&A Liz Gilbert asked us all to list the things we feel powerless about and so I do. I’m sure most of us had similar lists - sad, fearful lists of sickness or loss, war and climate change. Things that make us feel small and vulnerable and TERRIFIED.
Some people shared their lists and you could hear the emotion in their voices - the fear of being trapped in that smallness where you have no resilience at hand and it feels crushing.
Then Liz Gilbert shared her list and the first thing she said was ‘I am powerless over the colour blue.’
WAIT….WHAT NOW?
She proceeded to reel off a list of things we have no control over and we don’t care. I can’t control trees but I don’t lie awake at night worrying about it. Just like that my fizzy little brain began to recalibrate powerlessness. It didn’t need to be scary. I have no power over lots of things - the sea, sunshine, starlight but they all manage without me being in control of them and it does me no harm.
Sometimes all your brain needs is enough wriggle room to hold a better thought and ‘I have no power over the colour blue’ did that for me.
I have no power over the colour blue and that’s fine.
I have no power over so many life events and that’s also fine.
Let it be…
There is so much to unpack from this weekend and I don’t have the words for it at the moment but this has genuinely shifted something in the world for me.
By the time we got to closing yesterday the fears that we all began with on that first day seemed so far away and so very petty. Our resilience and creativity were right at the front of the queue now and fear and anxiety made to wait in line along with the colour blue and other stuff I don’t need to focus on today. I feel as if I’ve grown inches this weekend or maybe I am just right-sized now.
I don’t know whether this will make sense to you but like everything I write, I hope someone out there needs it today.
That’s all for now
Jx
You’re welcome. Had to share this x
That's super - though I think it being called 'a retreat' is a tad misleading..!