failing, fasting, felting, free food and some critical reflection

 'noticing the cracks'

Before christmas, I wrote here about having a second interview for a job I had applied for, however I noticed myself choosing not to follow that thread up here - basically, because I didn't get the job. That is the blogger's privilege, I guess, but its worth considering how we make these choices when constructing the narrative of our lives, whether the electronic or 'real' versions. We are probably all selective about what we post on Facebook, for example. Its totally ok to brag about our successes, but less so to air our failures.

It is a similar issue to a Radio National discussion on the Law Report I heard this week, about Photoshopping female models to make them look thinner, and how the fashion/magazine industry doesn't follow voluntary guidelines about this. The more others seem to look perfect, the worse we are likely to feel in our normal imperfection...

'never good enough'

Interestingly, I was able to identify some downsides to (hypothetically) getting the job at the time, but not to consider the possibility of 'failure'. Although clearly, going for a job interview always includes a good chance of failure, unless there is only one candidate, in which case, it probably isn't an 'interview' at all. And the last 'interview' I had, for my current job, was like that. In other words, its been a long time since I experienced the excruciating process of putting myself out there and facing the possibility of failure. (Whilst I was writing this paragraph, I got a phone call inviting me to an interview next week, for another job I applied for, how ironic! Another opportunity to self-monitor...and practice acceptance. Oh, and another opportunity to try to get another job...)

Part of my dilemma is that I love my current job (so I don't really want to leave), but its only for two days a week, which is not enough. The other part of the dilemma is that now I have  been granted my Accredited Mental Health Social Worker status, it would be a shame not to immediately use it! And I am exploring some possibilities around that as well. Its great to have options, don't get me wrong...

 

free tomatoes, see below

Fasting (doing the 5:2 fast) is another topic which I sometimes tend to gloss over, basically because I  think I don't do it properly. This means that I eat a little during the day, for example fruit or almonds, and I don't always limit carbs in my evening meal. However I think I did ok yesterday, literally not eating between 7am and 8pm apart from that peach, so I thought I'd explain what I ate, to make it clearer. I can't calculate calories, but its a lot less than I usually eat (on a non-fasting day).

• 7 am Breakfast: 1/2 cup of uncooked muesli, soy milk, 1 fresh fig, frozen mulberries, natural yogurt. I skinny cappuccino.
• no Lunch except miso in boiling water, and cups of tea a couple of times during the day
• 6pm I ate a peach before going to a Body Balance class, so I didn't feel faint.
• 8pm Dinner: (late because of the class) chili made with lean beef chunks, kidney beans, tinned tomatoes, onion, celery, red capsicum, and spices including cocoa (my 'secret' ingredient, makes it very yum), a small spoonful of freekeh, salsa with corn, mango, tomatoes, red onion, lime juice, olive oil, fresh coriander, and low fat natural yoghurt. I also had more fruit (peach and fig) and yoghurt after this. 

I probably ate too much chili, as it was delicious, I was tired and hungry, and my youngest, J, had made it (with some assistance from me), so it was extra special!

I was a kilo lighter this morning than the day before. This is mainly because there is less food in my system, but it does feel good: its encourages me to keep going, the trajectory is still downwards, and I also didn't feel super hungry or have a headache, as I sometimes do after a fast day. I also noticed that a mouth ulcer that had been hanging around for a week had gone. Perhaps this was a coincidence...but one of the interesting ideas behind the 5:2 fast is that fasting allows the body a breathing space from digestion to heal.

This is an Instagram of some felt slippers I made yesterday, in about an hour or so (time becomes available when not eating!). They are made from a washing machine felted Fair Isle (traditional Scottish pattern) moth-eaten woollen jumper using this pattern, and inspiration from this blog. They are a bit big, but the pattern is adjustable, so I should be able to correct this next time. Its not really slipper weather, but I remember a colleague talking about having 'slipper weeks', meaning she was basically at home all the time, like a 'staycation'. I am having lots of 'slipper time' at the moment, and loving it.

Finally, some free food, to continue the 'F' theme for today. I have a whole tomato patch that is self-seeded. It is in an area that used to be part of the chook run, so its full of seeds, including rocket, basil and pumpkin, as well as tomatoes, and is well-fertilised. All I have done is mulch and stake the plants, remove the lateral shoots, provide water, and pick the results, as in the photo above.

Since I am aiming for zero food waste, and 'using what I have', this is fantastic!

I'd love to hear your thoughts about any of these topics. To post a comment on this blog, scroll down and click on 'post a comment'. 

more later

Australia day double - and quilts

This year we got two Australia Days, because the real one fell on a Sunday, and today, Monday, is a public holiday: to not have a public holiday would be 'unaustralian' (I'm not complaining...)

Yesterday  we went to a 'Survival Day' gathering organised by Benarrawa Community Development Association by the Benarrawa, or Oxley Creek, which is a tributary of the Brisbane river at Graceville.

This is the second time we have attended this community event: last year it ended in torrential rain and floods. Interestingly, the emphasis has shifted this year from Invasion to Survival, which I guess is a more positive reframing.

There is a bronze canoe on the riverbank, which commemorates co-operation between the local Indigenous population and white people many years ago. Two convicts where given a lift across the river by the local Aboriginal people, to help them escape their fate.

I used to bring my sons here when they were younger, to play on the 'pirate ship' playground, not knowing the historical significance of this venue.

I just read a fascinating, and related, article in the Courier Mail Weekend magazine, about a forthcoming Museum of Brisbane exhibition called Many Lives of Moreton Bay, about the social history of the Bay's islands.

The article makes a link between the prior use of Peel Island as a leper colony in the colonial era, and Nauru and Manus Island in the present to detain refugees. Islands are a convenient place to dump people we don't want to think about, in other words. There are parallels here with the institutional treatment of people with mental health issues, and the segregation was often based on fear. Fascinating and shameful stuff.

I just came across the term 'Depression Quilts' via Google, referring to quilts made in America between 1920 and 1930, which forms a nice segue to the next bit, or piece.

The photographs are of quilting blocks I have been making, out of precut printed fabric strips, which are sewn together into stripes, then cut again across the stripes, reconfigured and resewn (alternating different strips) into a sort of chequerboard design. Hard to describe, that process, but its another form of reframing...

This is another pattern that I can't remember how to do. Again, it involves sewing, cutting, reconfiguring and resewing. I'll eventually figure it out. The moral is, don't abandon projects for too long.

Saw the movie of the Book Thief the other night, having read the book...I appreciated it in a different way to reading it. It was very evocative of war, in a more graphic way than words can convey, which is ironic, as the book is all about the power of words.

more later

if your plans bear fruit - make jam!

Last week the Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW) informed me that I had been approved as a Accredited Mental Health Social Worker. Usually you have to be qualified as a social worker for two years before you can be accredited, but I applied under their 'exceptional circumstances' rule, due to my 30 year long history of working in mental health, albeit as an art therapist.

I can now apply for a Medicare Provider Number, go into private practice, and work in the Better Access to Mental Health Care Initiative. This basically means that Medicare will cover the client's costs for therapy for up to 10 sessions a year. Not enough, but better than nothing.

This was my original reason for doing the Masters of Social Work, and I am somewhat amazed to have achieved my goal! In fact, there are so many decisions I have to make now: where to work; how to start; and how to fit it all in with what I am already doing; its a little overwhelming.

But these are good dilemmas to be grappling with..and it is also quite exciting.

S brought home 4 kilos of strawberries the other day. They were not quite good enough to distribute, so I got to make strawberry jam. I am quite entranced by the transformational process of jam-making. I have also recently made mango and apple chutney, and Brazilian cherry and rosella jelly (which turned out more like a quince paste).

Its great to have so much beautiful fruit around at the moment. Mangoes, pawpaws, strawberries, grapes and figs.

We also have an abundance of eggs, as five of our chooks are laying, and our newly fitted bird netting over the chook run is working, as it prevents crows from swooping down and stealing the eggs. The pigeons can still get in, but they only eat a little of the chook food, and they seems to be able to get out again, after flapping around in a panic for a while. 

Finally, we had a journal making workshop this week at work, for teenage girls. This is one I made earlier.So much fun.

more later.

Lazy Sunday recycle #1*

What better way to start the year than with a list of resolutions - er, sorry but I have actually been trying to keep my resolutions for the past three years. As the admirable blogger Frugal Queen said in her christmas speech (dated 24th December, so she got in before the real one): 'Its been a sticky year', meaning she stuck to her goals and kept her resolutions.

I don't see the new year as being a particularly significant time for doing new things, and I don't stay up until midnight unless I have to, but I do like a good recycle, I mean review. And having condensed my original 13 goals into 4, that should now be easier to achieve, right?

# 1: Health

Last year was the year of the knee (as the year before, 2012, was the year of the foot after a long walk in New Zealand resulted in plantar fasciitis - that word is a lot like fascist!) And yes, there was an arthouse film called le genou de Claire, from 1970, which someone may remember...about a fetish I believe.

Meaning the knee was the body part I struggled with the most in 2013. Knees are now slightly better, I am trying Green Lip Mussel capsules, after being on a UQ knee trial for osteoarthritis, where I am certain I got the placebo, so I thought I should try the real thing. But these are not cheap! I am also still taking red clover for menopause symptoms, which are also expensive, but they seem to help control those hot flushes, which are worse in hot weather.

I remembered today that the reason I first started exercising in earnest was to try to control sciatica, by doing pilates. One thing led to another, and I have since played squash,  run on treadmills, done boot camps, and now do the Les Mills trifecta (body pump, combat and balance), as well as cycling and yoga. And the sciatica is heaps better.  Its a fine line though (at my age) between exercising to combat pain, and combating pain to be able to do exercise.

Anyway, I have largely weaned myself off painkillers, and am also using ice after significant exertion, and am managing to still do most of what I want to do, except running. But cycling is a good replacement for running, and I am learning to love spin class. Not to mention the early Sunday morning river circuit with S, which is always good, but particularly so in the summer, when its warm, and I don't have to wear layers of clothing, including arm warmers (no I didn't know they existed either), to still have the use of my arms.

 Apart from that, I have been on the 5:2 Fast for the whole year, and have lost 6-7 kilos, depending on which day I weigh myself. I am not very strict, because it does give me a headache if I stick to the 500 calories, but it still works, if more slowly.

Emotions are harder to quantify (ask an art therapist!) and my focus in 2013 was on mindfulness as a means of managing anxiety and life in general. Which doesn't exactly take it away, but does make it more manageable. Except in certain anxiety-provoking situations, like exams and interviews.  But this is normal, of course, isn't it?

#2 Community

I am feeling a great deal more connected to my community these days, partly through this blog, and also because I am no longer studying, so I have time to be social, but there is always room for improvement here, its a constantly evolving process.  

My community development plan is to investigate an Open Table project for Brisbane. This incorporates ecological and social goals, so its a nicely compact and inclusive scheme, although perhaps not an easy one to start. I'll keep you posted...

We finally succumbed to installing an air conditioning unit this summer, and its been so worth it, given the ultra high temperatures, which are becoming the new normal for our crazy summers. And this article was written before the records were broken again last weekend.

#3: Creativity

Just briefly, as I wrote about this in my last post. I need to keep making and drawing, this week I made a wrap around skirt out of material I had already,  and a hand sewn journal, covered with lovely hand made wrapping paper from the Maldives (thanks Kareen!).

#4: Leisure

Ok, this will have to be a list.

Books I discovered beside my bed, in two piles:

1. Books I have (mainly) read last year/early this year:

•  Art as therapy by Alain de Boton - really interesting concept, did he discover/think of this himself!!??
• the Rosie Project by Graeme Simson - romance on the ASD spectrum
• the Missing Ink by Philip Hensler - about the dying art of handwriting, and italics!
• the Signature of all Things by Elizabeth Gilbert (yes, she did write Eat Pray Love, but don't let that put you off, I loved this book!)
• Why be Happy when you could be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson, an autobiography.
• Chicken Poop for the Soul by Kristeva Dowling - she was friends with a cousin, Clare Rolling, who sadly died in 2010 (I never met, she lived in Canada). The book is about food sovereignty.
• Notebooks by artist and critic Betty Churcher, who wrote this knowing she was losing her sight.
• Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte - an early edition, given to me by dad
• For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
• The End of Alice by A. M. Homes. An author I really enjoy.
• My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George. The ultimate running away from home and living off the land children's book, which I loved as a child (what does this say about my childhood?) and recently rediscovered. Gretchen Rubin of the Happiness Project loves children's fiction too, and why not, if it makes you happy?
• Seven Little Australians by Ethel Turner - doing some cultural studies research, plus see above...
• Kafka and the Shore, by Haruki Murakami, a weird and wonderful fiction, thanks Sam!
• I can jump puddles by Alan Marshall - olde worlde Australia, and a story about a boy with polio...
• how to think more about sex by Alain de Boton - again, where does he get his ideas from? seriously thoughtful, but sometimes 'wrong', has a male perspective only...
• In the Winter Dark by Tim Winton. Love Tim Winton's work.
• Classic Haiku and the Ruba'iyat of Omar Khayyam. Awesome.

2. So far, unread, or still reading:

• The Luminaries, by Eleanor Catton - I know it won the Man Booker Prize, but I'm finding it hard-going. Its 'quite interesting' as its set in the small West Coast town of Hokitika, South Island of New Zealand, where I went just after getting plantar fasciitis. And near where my maternal grandmother was born...
• David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell - looking forward to this, he usually manages to be surprising.
• Shady Characters by Keith Houston - about the ampersand and other quirky things.
• Flight Behaviour by Barbara Kingsolver - about global warming and the effect on butterflies, but I couldn't read this. It was an airport buy, the explanation for which is in the title, which is so apt....
• The Tree of Man by Patrick White. Could be a struggle, even the title puts me off. Of its time...
• The Blackbirder by Dorothy Hughes - christmas present from S: 'spy thriller with a hard-boiled heroine' !! What is he trying to tell me?

The reason for the large piles being, not because I am showing off my huge reading capacity, but because I 'found' the books, in the process of cleaning and reorganising the bedroom, as I hadn't put them away earlier (and we are running out of bookshelves).

Yes there is more to leisure than books, but this must already be my longest post ever, and I need to go to the hardware store to buy pva glue, and chicken mesh to stop crows stealing our chook eggs... action as well as reflection! Perhaps a movie recycle next Sunday - who knows?

What will you be focusing on this year? Leave a comment, and join the conversation!

more later

*I had this idea for a post a week ago, which makes the title even more apt.

a heartfelt, happy new year

 Connected NYE drawing, pastels, watercolour pencils.

This image was originally created on New Years Eve 2012, so I thought it would be interesting to work back into it on NYE 2013. I have mainly filled out the background in black, and added coloured contrast to the spiral shapes. To me, it expresses connection with others. The people remind me of jelly babies. The addition of the black background and contrast intensifies the bright colours.

I also noticed a couple of symbols that keep recurring in my work. Spirals, as also seen in this Buddha head, and heart shapes, as in the pastel drawing below:

Rainbow Buddha head and avocado leaves, watercolour pencils. Hearts connect, oil pastels

 desert rose, frangipanis, both in watercolour pencils and ink

Over the past year, I have also noticed a shift towards drawing from still life, such as the desert rose and frangipanis above, and away from collage and oil pastels, which I associate more with art therapy, and emotionally expressive work.

Andy Gilroy has written about how the effect on art therapists (AT students, in fact) of being involved in art therapy groups can make them less emotionally open, and more guarded, over time.

Not sure if this is what is happening here. I think its more a case of shifting interests. I am becoming more interested in looking mindfully at things around me, and in social relationships rather than in self-examination.This is what my art is also becoming more concerned with.

 origami heart, paper  pebble art, on the ground at Woodford

Back to the heart symbol. I photographed the origami heart on NYE, before going to Woodford Folk Festival for New Years Day. It turned out the heart was a big theme for the evening fire event, see below.

 bamboo transitional structure, Woodford

This beautiful structure created a transitional space between the main festival and the fire event in the amphitheatre. A transitional space signifies a shift from 'reality' to a 'play space', according to Winnicott.

 this is the heart structure before, and during, the fire event

There was also a story about the monsters we hold fearfully in our hearts, with the suggestion that we need to get to know and accept our own monster/s. This is a message compatible with mindfulness, and it used a community arts event to dramatically convey it.

I would like to focus more on art and community in this years blog, so this is a good place to start.  To add to this, I would like to have more dialogue with readers in 2014, so please feel free to comment on this blog, and to follow it if it interests you.What do you hope for in 2014?

Also, on NYE I reached 10,002 page views, as I'd hoped, yay!

Woodford logo

more later