I love this time of year. Here in North Wales, where I live, the rainy season starts in October and can go on all winter, so a sunny day, or even a sunny few hours, is a jewel in the mud. The sun, at this time of year is crystal clear and low in the sky and at times I’m almost blinded by the light. Out in the garden with my hands in the soil, clearing and weeding and planting bulbs, breathing in the scents of damp earth, savouring the touch of cold air and the caress of warm sunlight on my face, I’m reminded where I end and where nature begins, where I am separate and where we are one.
I’m recalling how this time of year has often been a time of new beginnings for me. I’ve moved into new homes, begun new relationships, started new jobs or projects.
It’s also a time for honouring death and remembering loss
The tenth anniversary of the death of my beloved soul friend Woods is coming up soon; he made his transition on December 22nd 2015. Ten years ago, while he was tidying uphis practical affairs, saying goodbye and coming to an acceptance that his life was ending, I was in a deep dive into the mystery of what happens to consciousness after we die. We were both in an inquiry into what it means to die consciously and there was excitement mixed in with sober acceptance and the delicate loosening of our hands.
It can take a long time to say goodbye, it happens incrementally and we never really say goodbye to those we love. I am still connected with Woods; he lives on in me and I imagine being reunited with him in some way after my own death. But this is not the same as being able to see his face, hear his voice, speak to him and be in his energetic presence, and I miss him.
The pain of absence lives on
I’m doing a lot of tidying up these days and I’ve been sorting through all my audio resources this week. Over the last 17 years I’ve held more than 100 recorded conversations and the other day I found one I’d made with Woods. It’s an amazing thing the human voice – we can recognise a friend anywhere by their voice, even if we haven’t seen them for years. Voice is one of those mysteries – how do we get to have such a unique signature? Woods had an especially distinctive voice – rich, deep and velvety, it was like being wrapped in the loving embrace of a wise old soul. I always felt safe with him, and at home.
But when I clicked on the recording of our conversation the other day I was shocked as if I’d touched an electric source of energy and instinctively, I jumped back. I switched him off. I couldn’t go there. I was surprised by this reaction. He was suddenly in the room with me again – and yet I experienced his absence so strongly and I chose not to revisit the pain of absence.
I have grieved. I’ve paid my grieving dues over these last ten years.
A few weeks after Woods’ death I came to North Wales where I was lucky to be offered a small cabin with nothing to do but write every day, from morning to night. I wrote my way through grief.
Then, six months after Woods departed, my brother David died suddenly and unexpectedly. That was a shocker and the fact that he left me the sole surviving family member was hard to bear. Our family had never been a great comfort to any of us, and I had to grieve what I hadn’t had. I’d also recently returned to my homeland in the UK after living overseas for twenty years and I’d left behind in New Zealand good friends, a vibrant community and my identity. Coming back to the UK meant re-planting my roots, grieving again for my parents and my ancestral line. This was an opportunity to come to an acceptance of having been born English, part of an imperialist, colonial super-power while my people had been used as cogs in the industrial machine, cannon fodder for the military industry and breeders of the workforce. It was time to let go the last vestiges of disappointment, victimhood and shame from our collective history and from my personal past.
This work of grieving, healing, remembering, reclaiming, integrating and harvesting takes time. A lot of time and devotion.
A few years later there was Covid and lockdown and we entered a new phase of global insanity and collective grief
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I’ve used my creative tools to support me through grief – creativity is my best medicine. As well as writing, I created a learning programme called Sitting with Death and Choosing Life and people came to sit together and hold conversations in virtual space. We discovered together what grief is, how to let it be and give it space, how to let the energy move through us.
I chose to live in a beautiful environment and made myself a soul sanctuary, I found a new partner and moved in with him, I made a garden.
I began to come to terms with living in an aging body – two hip replacements, a broken wrist from a fall, a cataract in one eye, diminishing short term memory and fatigue. It’s weird not knowing how many years I have left.
In the face of all this I choose to keep doing the work I’m here to do and can do. I stretch myself, refusing to be constrained by limitations.
Healing and creativity are two threads of our soul work and as we weave them together, we evolve consciousness.
I’m in the phase of integration now.
As well as sorting my online resources, I’m also doing a lot of decluttering in my physical world.
This has included finally getting around to selling my brother’s jazz collection. David was passionate about jazz, an expert – he knew the history of jazz, how it developed, who influenced who, the innovations. He had a big collection of around 300 albums and another 100 or so cds. Earlier in life I loved jazz too and we shared some favourite artists, went to concerts together, or when I visited him we’d sit late into the evening as he played me his latest favourite sounds. Much of his taste was too raucous for me but I recognised that this was where David found his freedom – and jazz has always been a music of freedom with its roots in black oppression, breaking through constraints, spontaneous co-creation and improvisation. This was where my brother’s soul came alive. His vision was to build an eco-home in Wales where he could live out his days grooving to jazz to his heart’s content. He died before he could realise the dream, leaving me with his records, holding onto his soul.
Letting go
300 albums are heavy and bulky. I kept them for a while in an old stone shed on his land.
Then I shipped them up to North Wales and created a space for them here. Four years ago, I sorted them, chose those I wanted to keep, cleaned the rest and got them ready to sell. Only I couldn’t let them go. I needed the ballast of all that weight, something to hold onto in the void of grief. I needed to stay connected with the history of liberation from oppression that jazz expresses. I needed to stay close to my brother’s soul. I wasn’t ready to let him go.
Now it’s time and I’m ready. I’ve sorted and cleaned the albums again and found a company that’s interested in buying and selling them. It’s time to send my brother’s soul on its way, to free the music so that it can be enjoyed by others who will make it their own.
I’ve been reminded how long it can take to move through grief and loss. These ten years of grieving have been a mighty challenge. I know I am not the only one who has been flailing around in grief. When heartbreak visits, I feel alone, and yet we are each part of a collective grief which is opening us to the One Heart, so that we can move on from the suffering and create something beautiful.
Sitting with death is a process of purging, cleansing and connecting. It calls us home to the body and to the earth. Through submitting to it, I am developing patience, endurance, strength, resilience, courage, simplicity and compassion. I’m coming into embodiment, developing the ability to be here now, content with what is.
The gaping hole left when a loved one dies, heals but it doesn’t close. As each beloved departs there are more stars in the sky, more openings to the mystery of the beyond. If we are lucky the wound of loss remains tender.
Offerings
I wasn’t planning to offer any groups over the next few weeks, but I’ve decided that I will. I know this is a difficult time for many people and I also know this is a time of great opportunity for healing. This is what Tribe in Transition is for.
I’ll be offering a Soul Sanctuary Sunday Circle on 22nd December.
And my 22-day Build Your Soul Sanctuary Practice over the holidays.
Look out for another message from me this week with more information
