One thing that has been striking me lots at the moment is how so many of us look to everyone else as the norm and see ourselves as the stranger in the midst. As the one who doesn't fit in, the one who is weird. The freak. The one who's life journey has taken them places they 'shouldn't have gone' so no one will understand them.

After 9 years of working as a homeopath and with people in this role, I can say that there's one thing I commonly hear which is along the lines of 'you must think I'm really odd saying this, but...' or 'I've never told anyone this because I think it's so strange...' and the funny thing is that it's either not strange, or I've heard it before or it's just one of those things that makes us all unique.

On the surface there's a drive to be different for so many, but with that feeling inside we don't fit, we seem to like that less.

And the really funny thing? It seems that most of us have it. My feeling now is that we put on our 'mask of normal' before we leave, whether that be our clothes, make up, uniform or merely a psychological mask, and head out into the world. Looking out from behind it, all we see is everyone else's masks, not their own brand of unique, which may, after all be parallel or similar to ours. 

I think it's only when we sit, non judgementally with others that we can perceive this and be with it more comfortably. I feel very blessed in my line of work to reach this point but also realise many others won't have sat with people in a sacred space for hours every week for years. And so we continue to think it's just us.

Women, sisterhood and people you can really share with are helpful, are a great part of uncovering the inner discomfort - as are, in my opinion, homeopathy, mindfulness and working with the shadow parts of ourselves in other ways. Accepting ourselves means as a whole, as a real person, not just the shiny bit on the outside that we want everyone to see.

I think now this perhaps is the real journey of discovery, not the islands, highlands and places in between - although I love to go there too!

With love, and an invitation to step away from seeing the norm as where it, where we need to be,

Em xx
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But what would I swap it for? I work with clients going through cancer, extreme anxiety, OCD, depression and lots more. To say you want to swap is all fine but who's to say it's with a person sitting in a hammock, sipping from fresh coconuts and reading their way steadily through their wanted list of books?! 

I realised what I was doing was slipping into my ego, my 'poor me' part, my victim. The dog woke me at 6am, fair enough, but I used the time to work on a workshop I am presenting. We also have a great dog who makes us smile. Today she has managed to get a cough sweet stuck behind her ear, the dopey thing. Mostly it's just me who sorts the washing, the cleaning, the cooking etc but I am blessed with a lovely girl to make me smile and help out here and there. Ditto shopping, mucking out the cats blah blah. 

Once I picked up on my victim state, (and may have discharged a little emotion in a couple of ways before I did so...) I decided to try turning it all around. We have a choice, we really do. The jobs may mount up around us but we can look at life from different angles and this, I feel, makes all the difference. There isn't huge amounts of spare time when you're doing life, and I'm sure mine is no different from many people's. And on the days when the house *is* tidy, jobs are all done then there's a funny, empty feeling about it all anyway.  So back to today, this morning, I started saying thank you... Thank you for the alarm clock dog, thank you for my girl, thank you for the washing machine, the clothes, the clean bedding that needed getting out of it. Thank you for the gifts in my life. Because they are many, varied, and I am grateful. Thank you. How different that felt.

And if you ever fancy popping round to do the hoovering or washing up that's cool too ;)

With love,

Em x