In recognition of Mental Health Awareness Month, the Clinical Lead of our PoS Care Team shared the gift of plants with his Care team Members. Research has shown that men, women and children alike truly appreciate botanical gifts and that people who give plants and flowers as gifts are perceived as successful, caring and more able to express their emotions.
The basic of all basics in support of mental health challenges is to show up. Just show up.
The opposite is to plan to call, or plan to drop by, or to send some food when you cook: in which case both of you stew, the promiser who can’t deliver and the promised who waits in expectation. Nothing beats the actual presence of a supportive human being when help is needed; who arrives without prejudice, without guile, without a mouthful of advice to administer. Just to be there, to show up in a timely fashion is the best of all medicine.
Listen to MJ as a child: You and I must make a pact; We will bring salvation back; Just call my name and I’ll be there.
When we show up we are saying we are the possible, we are the miracle, we make things happen. Showing up is the eternal wonder of this world we have created for thousands of years; when people show up the loaves multiply.
This is the fine art of the possible: even if you don’t know what to say; or don’t know what to do; not sure what to bring; or can’t even remember the protocol: Just show up; that makes one hell of a difference.
This is the basic ingredient of living as a community. Show up. I’ll be there at your side whenever you need me; through thick and thin; when there is a rainstorm or gruelling heat; Just call my name.
If you don’t show up, it will never exist otherwise through any other medium and the moment will be lost. It is not your business to determine how good it is or effective, how valuable or how it compares with other expressions of support; it is your business to keep the channel open.
The showing up was there in the beginning and it will be there in the end: like a rainbow in the sky.
That warm friendly voice you encounter when you contact the EAL offices, the welcoming smile that greets you as you enter our doors, these are the persons who make your EAL experience Unique
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Oh! When the Moon is full: Celebrating International Women’s Day
When the sun, the moon and the earth line up,
And the moon’s face attracts the riveted glare of the sun: Full moon appears.
Woman is like full moon; she shows her brightest self and lights up our world when she is in alignment with her deepest self and her life’s purpose.
War, as in Ukraine makes everyone vulnerable: men, women, children, animals, buildings, even the sacred ground trampled by the tanks. And when peace does come, there is no change for women and girls; they remain vulnerable in any season.
They suffer from a huge bias as odds are stacked against them. They suffer from domestic violence; pressed down by the glass ceiling at work; and during the pandemic work-from-home they became worker, teacher and home marker all in one, not to mention care giver for both children and elderly parents; with a little hand coming occasionally from their partners.
It is like a dark cloud swallowed the moon. She no longer illuminates the night sky and we grow accustom to journey in the dark like half darkness-half light come normal; glass ceiling, normal; only women care for parents, normal; only women see ‘bout children’s education, normal; only women money mind their house, normal. A huge bias dampens her glow: a moon marred by the shadows of her varicose veins.
But do you know what woman and girls are feeling inside?
Don’t put God out of your thoughts and assume that you do
You most likely don’t; and may never know. But, check to make sure you are not that cloud that shrouds her light, swallows her glow and renders her helpless.
But if you can hazard a guess of what they are feeling, then, break the bias, now.
‘Imagine a gender equal world. A world free of bias, stereotypes and discrimination. A world that’s diverse, equitable and inclusive. A world where difference is valued and celebrated. Together we can forge women’s equality. Collectively we can all break the bias.’ And Why?
They are the lining up of the forces of nature
They are the anointed crust of the bread out of the oven of her heart
The energy at sunrise and the green flash you always miss at sunset
She is light, reflected like the rainbow in your dreams
The anchoring of the strewn self gathered into the harbour of home
That hearth through which all real light passes
The convergence of Mama God welcoming back all sisters.
From her office chair in the Twin Towers she saw the smoke rising from the Claxton Bay kitchen window and the huge gulf separating. Stuck in the cloud of unknowing, her talents stunted by the glass ceiling, her creativity hampered. She knows, ‘If you dance and be free and not be hampered you can rule the world’. However, social barricades choke her. Bravely she inhales the aroma of mama’s cooking:
‘Come leh mama unloose those tangles in your hair, girl
Ah dunno why you let people mess with your head
These braids are meant to radiate order and neatness
Now they point any which way like a confused soul.’
Even though the pain is in your body and not ours, we are not separated from it. Just as we are not only not separated from the beautiful things in the world so to the ugly things. We are not separated from those who suffer bias nor are we separated from the perpetrators of this bias. We may not identify with them, but we are not separate from them. We are one with everything. Without them we cannot be here. When I look deeply into myself, there is Woman.