Stage 2: Detachment

The second Hopkins poem on our journey from despair to delight is also deeply troubling, but it does offer us a glimmer of light along the way. 

A note before you start reading: in the first line, the word ‘fell’ means ‘deadly, ferocious evil’.

            I wake and feel the fell of dark, not day.

          What hours, O what black hoürs we have spent

          This night! what sights you, heart, saw; the ways you went!

          And more must, in yet longer light's delay.

             With witness I speak this! But where I say

          Hours I mean years, mean life. And my lament

          Is cries countless, cried like dead letters sent

          To dearest him that lives alas! away.

          I am gall, I am heartburn.  God's most deep decree

          Bitter would have me taste: my taste was me;

          Bones built in me, flesh filled, blood brimmed the curse.

              Selfyeast of spirit a dull dough sours. I see

          The lost are like this, and their scourge to be

          As I am mine, their sweating selves; but worse.

The main message Hopkins conveys to me in this poem is his dreadful sense of loss; endless separation from the one he loves; sourness and bitterness; visceral, heart-wrenching grief.

And yet. 

He finds an element of detachment.  Despite his obvious distress, Hopkins is able to write perfectly formed classic sonnet lines: ten syllables, with the stress on every second one: ‘I wake and feel the fell of dark not day’.  And then in the final six lines, he decides to vary the rhyming structure from the standard <cde cde> of the previous poem to <ccd ccd> (decree/me/curse; see/be/worse).

There is resonance again with mindfulness meditation - with the point at which we begin to create a space between ourselves and the pain and distress. Instead of being caught outside in the middle of a thunderstorm, we begin to watch the thunderstorm through a window. 

He has some inner company in this time of trouble. Within the first three lines, Hopkins’ switch from the first person ‘I’ to ‘we’ (I plus heart) to ‘you’ (heart). So he is not dealing with all this on his own. His heart is taking some of the burden for him.   

And maybe there is a purpose for him, behind all this suffering.  With ‘I see’ at the end of line 14, Hopkins suggests that this experience is enabling him to understand the torment of lost souls. We do not have to share his views on the afterlife to gain value from this idea. If we have experienced grief and loss ourselves, we are so much better placed to offer empathy and compassion to people we know who going through it all now. 

Love is not an apple pie

When I was a boy I used to worry that there wasn't enough love to go round.  I thought love was like an apple pie – good stuff, but there was only so much of it and then it was gone.

When I was born I sort of assumed (as much as babies can assume things) that I had all my parents’ love. Then my younger brother was born and I had to share their love with him. Only half a pie now.  And worse was to come. The next year another brother was born and my share of the pie went down to a third. Oh dear, what a disaster…..  

No wonder we used to fight so much. The arguments we had on Sundays over who had the most fizzy drink with our roast dinner were nobody’s business!

Luckily for me, I thought, no more brothers or sisters arrived to take even more pie away from me. A third of a pie was better than nothing.

But of course, I realise now that this is all nonsense. 

Love isn’t like that at all.  It’s not finite, it’s infinite. In fact, weirdly, the more love you have the more there is around to share.   

Another way of putting this – for those who like maths or game theory - is that love is not a zero sum.  My gain is not your loss.  My gain is also your gain.   Or, if you like chemistry, we can state that love (like gas) expands to fill the space available.

And we can build up our capacity for love through meditation, and practicing random acts of kindness.

Why am I thinking about this now? 

Well, it’s because I’ve just had a delightful cuddle this morning with Heath, my newest grandchild.

And a couple of weeks ago I was sitting in a (fortunately large) tent in the Peak District in the pouring rain with thirteen family members of various ages.  It was busy, noisy, chaotic, exhausting - and yet totally wonderful to be part of all those loving interconnections.

I’ve got so many grandchildren now it’s easy to lose count, but the brilliant thing for me is that it simple doesn’t matter. They are all equally loveable, and there is no sense at all in my old worry that I somehow have to cut that love into bits and share it around. 

Unlike the apple pie, there is plenty of love and always more to go round!

Breathing Space

I’m doing a lot of meditating these days, with the help of Headspace.  Twenty minutes or so, every morning, sitting in my favourite chair.  Often with a dog curled up near me.

The focus of the exercise is very much on my breathing. Not trying to alter it, or breathe in any particular way. Just observing it. Noticing each time I breathe in and out, how my chest moves out and in, the rise and fall of my belly. How each breath is always just a little bit different from the next one. Some are quicker, some slower; some are deeper, some shallower.  The pauses between the breaths: how the pause after the out-breath is usually longer than the pause after the in-breath. A wisp of air on my upper lip.

Maybe counting each breath, one in, two out, three in, four out…..up to ten, then starting over again. Or maybe not, maybe just letting each breath come and go. Resting my attention on the breath. Observing, watching, noticing, witnessing, all in a relaxed sort of way. Nothing too intense.

Sometimes it feels like I’m sitting on the sea shore, watching the waves coming in to land on the beach. They keep on rolling. They are endlessly different, and endlessly fascinating.  And you don’t have to do anything about waves. They just happen.

You might think it is boring, but it isn’t. It’s gentle, kind and enjoyable. I often find I’m smiling quietly to myself.  

It’s important, in a subtle, understated sort of a way. It creates more space for me. It puts other things, my everyday busyness and concerns, into perspective. And if I do get hassled during the day, I can take a few seconds out, just to breathe. I’m finding all those things I have to do, somehow may not be as important, as urgent, as serious or as worrying as I thought they were going to be.  

So making time for breathing now, creates more breathing space during the rest of the day.  Seems like a good deal to me!  

Trying Easier

Most of the time, we think we really should be trying harder. If only we did a little bit more, things would work out OK. It’s all about achievement, success, doing more and doing it better. If at first you don’t succeed, try, try and try again. It’s drilled into us from an early age.  Study more. Get a promotion. Run faster. Score more goals. Be a better parent. 

But right now, for me, it’s different. After my cycling accident I’ve developed a mild traumatic brain injury. I’m easily tired, my mind often feels foggy. It’s difficult to concentrate for long.  

So the advice I’m getting now is – don’t try harder, try easier.

 

I need to take things easy, give my brain a rest so it has the chance to recover.  

This turns lots of things on their head.

It’s better for me to put things off until tomorrow, even though I could do them today. Procrastination is no longer the thief of time – it’s the essence of healing.

 ‘You snooze, you lose’. Not any more. Quite the opposite. My afternoon siesta is essential to keep me going throughout the day. So for me it’s now ‘You snooze, you win.’

Laziness, slacking, indolence, idleness, sloth: that is supposed to be one of the seven deadly sins, but not any more. Now it’s a cardinal virtue.

I don’t always find it easy to take it easy. Trying harder is so ingrained in me that trying easier doesn’t come naturally.  I have to remind myself, stop myself doing stuff that I really don’t need to do, or not just yet. And it’s surprising – and liberating – how many things that I was convinced were absolutely essential turn out to be a bit less important after all.  The world hasn’t quite ground to a halt because I’m not doing as much as I used to.

It’s about being, not doing.

I’m enjoying my weekly tai chi classes, and I’ve taken up meditation again, with the help of a  website called Headspace. They help me to be aware of how things are, notice my experiences and feelings, without having to worry or do anything about them.    

And I’m building up my physical fitness. I’m back on my bike – off road – and it feels great.

Trying easier is helping me heal. It is refreshing. I can feel the benefits – each week a bit more energy, a bit more headspace.

I gently recommend it!