Do You Dream?

When you slumber, free from reality

With limbs in gentle repose, breathing soft

The images come, unrestrained, welcome

Of days gone by or a longed for future

Complete liberty to construct your view

Of a World that beckons your aching soul

Do you face the fear that binds you: regret

Or are you, in that moment, cleansed, reborn?

What do you dream when night comes to claim you?

When you become, once more, all that you hide

I dream of the day I first saw your face

I dream of the day I’ll hold you again

I dream of you, my love, I dream of you.

Lisa x

Get Out!

It’s grey, not pink, that’s a bit of a shock

But now that it’s out let’s see what we’ve got

Too many, too much, I’ll make a big pile

Sifting through this could take quite a long while

Small heaps perhaps to the left and the right

The good and the bad, the dark and the light

This one is sadness, it must belong there

Along with contrition, pain and despair

This is a memory of happiness lost

Where do I put it? Shouldn’t it be tossed?

Or kept in a pile with hope and a dream

Of a ghost’s soft reproach ‘Carpe Diem’

Arranged before me, they’re not as I thought

A mountain on one side; how hard I fought

To hold an echo and hoard the shadows

A mound on the other, the things I chose

To leave in the light, hoping they would grow

Hope is the first, a sprout, starting to show

Joy is there too but a almost unrecognised

Love their companion albeit disguised

Now to decide, what to keep, what is thrown?

What goes back? Good or bad it’s all I’ve known

For so long, same thoughts again and again

It’s not so easy to clean out my brain.

The last few days have been pretty grim. Maybe it’s because Valentine’s day is just round the corner, maybe it’s because grief just decides to beat the crap out of you sometimes, I honestly don’t know but sadness is just eating away at me. I’ve spent the last 5 years finding coping mechanisms to stay strong and keep positive, to enjoy each day as it comes but, right now, I have negative thoughts chasing around my head like puppies on speed.

This morning I thought how wonderful it would be if I could just take out my brain, give it a good shake and get rid of all the negative shit that seems to be clogging it up – hence this poem. Have you ever felt like that? I’d love to hear from you if you have.

Lisa x

Invisible

I think therefore I am.

The more that I think

The less I am

To you all

Do you

Still see me

As you pass by

Or am I now lost

Inside my broken mind

Having one of those days so I’ll catch you guys later

Lisa x

Poignant…..

Have you ever had a thought that just seems to pop into your head out of nowhere? Obviously there’s a reason for it tucked away in the cerebral tangle but, on the surface, there appears to be no apparent reason, do you know what I mean? Yes? Good, in that case you’ll understand why I am posting this. There’s no real reason other than this scene popped into my head and I wanted to share it with you as it’s so unbelievably poignant……..

“I’ve… seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those… moments will be lost… in time… like… tears… in rain. Time… to die”

I saw this film many, many years ago and this scene has stuck with me during all that time; Rutger Hauer’s acting was absolutely flawless and his speech exquisitely sad.

Do you have any film moments like that? They’ve stayed with you from the moment you first saw them and just randomly pop into you head every now and again? Let me know, I’d love to hear from you..

Lisa

x

I Thought You’d Come Back…

Be patient, they said

Time heals

The indefinite

Never ending

Waiting game

Unceasing, progress

Marching forward

Never patient

Still insistent

I thought you’d come back

You can’t, I know

I can’t stop

Waiting………….

Feeling sad today but trying not to. Have a lovely day wherever you are and whatever you’re doing :O)

Lisa

x

Do You Like You?

It’s a pretty important question, after all you have to spend 24/7 with you so is it a joy or do you sometimes wish that you could tell you to just shut the F up and leave you alone? Do you love to just go out with you, do some shopping and have a coffee with you or do you try to make a dash for the front door and pray that you doesn’t notice that you’ve gone?

I’m going to be honest, totally honest………..Ok that’s not as easy as I thought it would be. Oh shit what do I write here? If I say I don’t really like myself (which is the truth) I’ve just written down something utterly negative which will do nothing to improve my self-esteem (or lack thereof). On the other hand, if I say I do like myself………well, to be blunt I’d be lying. There I’ve said it. The thousands of pounds that I’ve spent on self-improvement books and motivational videos and CD’s was just a complete waste of money which could obviously have been put to much better use in a shoe shop.

Right, I’ve had a cup of coffee and a think and what it boils down to is that I don’t trust other people and I don’t have enough faith in myself to believe them when they say nice things about me. Do you remember the quote in Pretty Woman “if people put you down enough you start to believe them?” well, that sums it up. I didn’t ‘fit in’ as a kid, for many reasons that I won’t bore you with, and I was bullied as a result so I tried to change myself in order be accepted. As you might imagine that was a dismal failure but I kept it up for years and then got hit by depression and a feeling of not really knowing who I was – well no shit Sherlock!

I suppose that’s driven by a feeling of inadequacy. I wasn’t joking about the money I’ve spent on self-improvement (Christian Louboutin would be crushed if he knew how much he’d lost out!) and I’ve followed all the advice religiously but I never seem to quite get a version of me that I’m satisfied with. I know what to do on an intellectual level but I never seem to absorb whatever it is that they’re trying to tell me…….

I’ll give you an example and this is intensely personal so don’t tell anyone else please. The first time (and possibly only time for reasons that will become apparent) that my husband told me I was beautiful I went up the wall! I was furious. He wasn’t best chuffed by my reaction as you can imagine and the worst part, the awful, frustrating part was that I couldn’t explain why I was so annoyed. I’m thinking about it now and I believe it stems back to being teased about my appearance when I was a kid; my nose was too big, my legs were chunky etc etc. It was probably just kids being kids but I believed what they said ergo when I was told I was beautiful it could only have been because I was being mocked, laughed at and I guess I was waiting for the punchline…….perhaps, when it comes to compliments, I’m still always waiting for the punchline…….

Writing this I am beginning to realise how cathartic blogging can be; I don’t really like me because I compare myself to others and find myself wanting (punches the air in a moment of epiphany). Other people are more interesting, more confident, calmer, funnier; less prone to being stroppy, introspective, stand-offish and miserable. Other people are spiritual, they have found an inner peace that I crave with all my being and try so hard to find. How many hours have I spent sitting on the floor with my legs crossed chanting Om? How much time do I dedicate to exercise, to being outdoors? I’ve listened to Tony Robbins, Osho, Sadguru and Dale Carnegie until my ears are raw and my brain is filled with great advice for being happy and contented but it just doesn’t stick….

That’s not true, some of it sticks, like the ‘if you are happy, you will attract people to you’, ‘no-one likes being around a misery guts’…….hang on a minute, that doesn’t sound like a world famous life coach, that sounds like my mum!???? There you go – another realisation – I believe that I need to be happy all the time if people are going to love me. It’s great when I am happy but it’ not easy to fake it when I’m not and, the trouble is, when people think that you’re a happy go lucky, fly by the seat of your pants kind of girl and then they realise that you’re really not they tend to go off you. So, that leaves me with being happy (sometimes faked) = being loved and being sad = being lonely; the obvious answer then is to be happy all the time…………

Perhaps I try too hard…..yep there’s no perhaps about it but what else can I do??? Maybe just accept that I am who I am, warts and all (not literally…..WHY am I so shallow, I didn’t need to point that out; if I was a better person I wouldn’t care if I had warts!). Maybe I should take myself off to a desert island and spend a few weeks alone to truly find myself…..aaarrrrrrgggggghhhhhhh!!!!! PANIC!!! Ok, no, that’s not going to happen any time soon

I don’t know what the answer is so I think I’m going to stop thinking about it and go shoe shopping…..

That was another lie, I will keep thinking about it because it bugs me and, until I get to the bottom of it all, I won’t stop trying to become someone that I can live with rather than someone I find slightly embarrassing and, frankly, a bit irritating.

If you love yourself, please tell me, help me to understand…….HOW?

Lisa

x