" A Point of Parallax : Tea Tales whilst home alone - alone"

Post One : the eve of 'step one;' staying alert, control the virus, save lives (10th May 2020) 

4th April 2020 : Reflections of the first 18 days… 
As I began writing this entry it had been 18 days since I was last in central London.  That trip taken on a near empty train to collect books from the office, my bicycle from Victoria Station, and drink ‘au revoir London’ pots of tea with one of my oldest friends.  I also witnessed London as I had never seen it before.

The intervening days have seen the Country on a Government directed, convergent path to ‘staying at home, saving lives, protecting the NHS,’ social distancing, 8pm clapping, furloughing, key workers and care workers, home schooling and P.E Joe.  And then a speech from the Queen shadowed by an announcement that Prime Minister Johnson had been admitted to hospital.  Art galleries now provide virtual tours, ballet and theatre performances are streamed (not live) into our homes, and the self-employed ballet, zumba, pilates, yoga, and fitness teachers and instructors have all gone on-line to look after the Nation’s health and well-being, and keep people connected.  

Inherent in this has been the profuse reporting which bleeds advice as to how we can fill our spare time.  And yet I am one of those workers still going, working remotely, and invisibly, from home.  My job, in Higher Education and teacher training, where the subject studied is dance, may not categorise me as a key worker.  But implicit to being catapulted into an online studio and classroom, is experiencing the daily trauma of students across the globe for whom I have responsibility.  Yes, I have a much needed reprieve from a long daily commute, but other than that, my working life is busier than ever.  As I adapt current lecture delivery, I concurrently plan significant modification to all that I deliver and manage across Europe, China and Australasia.  The aim is as much about causing as little disruption to each students programme of study, as it is to the financial impact of postponement.  

As I manage this work part, the changing world in which we live is happening to me too.  I live alone, I have parents in their 80’s instructed by the government to have a bag packed ready.  As such, these two weeks have felt the strangest of times.  Silent tears have trickled almost unnoticed down my cheeks; symbolic of a simmering of emotions starting to seep out, and they seem triggered by the simplest of things.  A friend observed I was fragile.  I was not sure if this was truly accurate.  The only words I can find which go some way to expressing something of what I was feeling, is the beginnings of a deep physical, emotional, cognitive, social and spiritual unknotting of the self; like a holistic detox.  

With any detox there is pain.  Vexed by my inability to vocalise the gnawing sensation rather than acute pain I was experiencing, I sought help.  Perhaps the acerbic words of someone like Will Self would provide some insight.  His keynote at the WOW festival in 2019 introduced me to the concept of parallax, and a statement:  “know where you are before you can let go of where you are and actualise your sense of liberations.”  In processing the intricacies of Self’s words I needed to breathe, to allow the morning to unfold beyond my window, whilst drinking a second pot of tea.  

Over the last few years, in conversation with close friends we have talked about the concept of the eight day week.  On day eight, the freeze frame button on the movie that is life, is activated; but not for us.  Whilst everyone else is motionless, we can carry on, we are then able  to catch up, and allow ourselves a moment to breathe.  Implicit in this concept has been the aspiration to pause the world and, for three months, step off.  

Mindful of the saying ‘be careful what you wish for,’ with absolute certainty I can say a pandemic did not feature in our musings.   However a truth deep at the heart of these discussions was a palpable need for reflection on life and to realign, recalibrate, and reconsider how we wanted to live.  

25th April 2020 It is now 39 days since I was last in London
In the days between starting to write and writing today (25th April), the Easter break brought 4 days of research leave and 4 days of annual leave.   Whilst these days were spent in isolation, they provided time and space to breathe, and for the level of anger I had been experiencing, to slowly diminish.  I found myself able to approach each day differently.  And unexpected outcome of this has been to see how in all the time I have had ‘work from home days’ I have been doing them all wrong!  But I will write more of that later.  

These weeks also included the dichotomy that is ‘Captain Tom’ and Prime Minister Boris Johnson.  Captain Tom, a decorated war veteran aged 99, pledges to walk 100 times around his garden using a walking frame, with the aim of raising £1,000 for the National Health Service.  Mr Boris Johnson, professional politician and current PM, pledged to sell off this national institution by the back door and cheered when the vote went his way to deny NHS workers a pay increase.  To date the sum raised for this organisation, by a decorated war veteran, has risen to over 24 Million Pounds.  To date, and in the words of the current Prime Minister as he recovers from Covid 19, “the NHS saved my life … where over a 48 hour period, it could have gone either way.“

In 2012, when Danny Boyle placed a spotlight on this ‘Jewel in the Nations Crown’ as part of our 2012 Olympic Opening Ceremony, the National and International Press hailed his vision.  As a citizen of the United Kingdom I walked tall.  Proud to call the UK my home, I felt lucky, and I felt immensely fortunate; this pioneering initiative, born from the rubbles of two World Wars, to “make healthcare no longer exclusive to those who could afford it but to make it accessible to everyone,” was part of my cultural heritage.    
(https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Birth-of-the-NHS/).


I had the privilege to work on the 2012 Olympic and Paralympics.  I was invited to attend the first technical rehearsal of that Opening Ceremony.  I took pictures and as requested kept  Danny’s ‘secret.’  Being in the arena that night ignited within me a fierce resolve; the depths of which I am only being to fully understand within in this ‘Covid 19 present,’  to cherish, protect, value and fight for the very principles that underpin the NHS – which in turn (should) underpin the foundations of a 21st Century United Kingdom (in Europe.) Any yet, in the present that is Covid 19, I come to the stark realisation that I feel completely disconnected from the country in which I had such pride.  I trust nothing of this government, and the press, and there is also a sense of deep distrust of many of the UK’s citizens.

On that first Thursday I felt conflicted.  Whilst the Press and the PM hailed the nation coming together to applaud the frontline NHS workers, for me, hypocrisy underpinned that 8pm handclap.  These NHS workers represented 21st century soldiers working in 21st century trenches; hospitals where prior to this pandemic, staffing levels were inadequate, funding had been cut, resources sold off, and pay increases denied.  As such, inherent in the millions who stood on their doorsteps clapping their collective thanks, were the millions who in December 2019, had voted for the continuation of Conservative Policy.  As such I saw the strap line request to ‘Protect the NHS’ as a manipulation of the Nation’s thinking.   The NHS had been on its knees long before this pandemic hit. And now it has been sent into battle deficiently equipped.  But I did clap.  Drawn out by the sound,  standing unseen and alone on my doorstep, my clapping an extension of my vote; I took part on my own terms.  

2nd May 2020  - It is now 46 days since I was last in London.
As mentioned previously, my days of leave over the Easter break had provided well needed space in which to step back from, and reflect on, the intensity of those initial 18 days.  Slowly I began to find words to express, and the ability to put into some sort of order,  what I had been processing.  In the immediacy of lock down and social distancing (temporary isolation and physical distancing), the anger I experienced was connected to fear; but not fear of Covid 19.  As I arrived home on 18th March my head was in over drive, but guided by the strength of intuition my thinking was clear and indeed seemed rationale. 

In essence what I saw was a war that all countries of the world would fight.  They would not fight each other, they would fight together, but in isolation.   Borders would close, information channels would remain open, and each response would be nuanced by a nations culture and politics.  What was unfolding placed us on the edge of the profound; a point of parallax.  Humanity had the chance to look at where it was, to then let go of that and actualise a sense of liberation (Self 2019).[1]  And my fear, then, was that I was alone in seeing this, and that any opportunity would pass by unnoticed.

In the intervening weeks much has been written and broadcast.  The language used in the daily briefings does not dispel my fears    
Johnson, and his government, lack vision, have zero ability to lead and seem fixated on what will play well politically.
It may have taken 46 days* to express, in writing, what was going on in my head, but that time has enabled me to unravel and understand my own processes, to see and appreciate, not reprimand, who I am.  I am right to fear and I should this fear wisely.


Post Two: on the eve of a bank holiday weekend...

7th May 2020 : It is now 51 days since I was last in London
From within lock down two opportunities to develop my coaching practice have emerged.  The first an email from the Shaw Trust to ask how I would feel, as a volunteer, to offer some Health and Well-being coaching sessions online.  The second a suggestion by myself to offer Life Coaching to a company of professional ballet dancers who were not only completely unable to work, but where their future involves a change in artistic management; thus many were feeling directionless or thinking about life after dance/career transition.

I had known that I needed to get back in the coaching saddle.  I have spent the last 12 months so focused on my PhD (understandably) that I worried I had forgotten the practice.  So, I deliberately looked to shake it up a bit, put myself in a vulnerable place and face some head demons.  Week one of coaching had scheduled into it two one-hour Life Coaching sessions every morning.  I was nervous starting up again; worried I would not ask powerful questions, I would forget how to facilitate a GROW model or not be able to implement an ABCDE discussion.  To help me prepare I implemented a daily routine; I rose, ate breakfast, did a floor barre, showered, lit a calming candle and had silence for the 30 mins prior to the first session.  I sat at my desk, opened the virtual meeting platform and waited for the coachee to call.  

Week’s two and three involved Health and Well-Being Coaching.  Today, in week three, I have facilitated two sessions as well as taken part in a group meeting, a platform for volunteers to come together and feedback on the volunteer experience.  This concentration of events has clearly contributed to my current state. Whilst I write I hear distant clapping.  I join in, and find myself teary.  A coaching session this evening has prompted a need to sit with a pot of tea, look out through the open glass door onto the land outside the house, and reflect on and capture on ‘paper,’ the thoughts stimulated by 7 Life Coaching and 10 Well-Being coaching sessions that I have facilitated over the last month, around my full time work schedule. 

Today’s session was with a Shaw Trust client; someone I had spoken with for the first time a week ago.  Shaw Trust clients are classified as those who may be vulnerable, have long-term health needs, or are suffering anxiety over Covid 19.  Currently sessions are carried out by phone.  I see no faces, and this has proved to be challenging in a way I had not anticipated.  Most clients have a different cultural heritage to my own and they have English as a second language.  As such, whilst navigating a Geordie, Scottish, Irish or Liverpudlian accent might be fairly straight forward for me, the same cannot be said with an Iranian, Israeli, Somalian or Hindi accent, especially when the coaching environment provides no visual cues to help me hear correctly.  In not being able to see the clients face, I cannot register how they form words, or experience their body language which accompanies what they speak of.  This way of coaching brings listening, and hearing, to a whole other level.  And with that comes a fresh appreciation for the art of conversation.  As I type my heart races a little and I feel hot.  I am anxious that what I write will not reflect or communicate the profound sense of clarity that has been revealed to me in the immediacy of today’s coaching session, a session in which a ‘light bulb moment’ belonged me.   I will try and explain.

Following my first week of Shaw Trust coaching, I started to wonder whether I should refer to myself as a coach, and the sessions as coaching sessions.  I can see how the journey through which the clients arrive at a coaching session, and how each session subsequently starts, influences my thinking around this.  Each client is referred to me by a case worker with the suggestion that the client would benefit from a session.  I then contact the client to arrange a mutually good time for a session to take place.  On starting sessions, it was evident that clients were expecting to be told what to do, and how to go about doing what they need to do.  Clients were receptive to questions; having a lot of say and tell, but I was mindful that despite their preparedness to talk, they were not yet ready to work through questions to find their own solutions.  As such when asked what they were taking away from each session clients used expression such as I feel calmer, brighter, listened to and able to do what had been suggested.  And it is that last expression that sat uneasily with me, causing me to question whether I was coaching.   

Some two weeks later and having facilitated more coaching sessions, I am able to recognise my unease as anxiety and reflect on how, and why, I am experiencing this. An aspect of it is connected to studying a completely new subject where part of the aim of this studying was to gain an accredited qualification in order to develop my work and employment options.  The process of learning has not been a problem.  The issue is all about imposter syndrome and thus a need to do everything by the book.  

Disclosing this to myself, through the immediacy of writing, is having significant impact.  This isn’t a dispassionate moment, the act of writing these words is raw.  The physical manifestation is of being hit with the evanescence of a shock wave, it is fluttery, it washes through my body, it dissipates.  I want to reach out, catch it and hold onto it as a memento of my understanding. The physical is ephemeral.  My writing the evidence, the recall, the reminder, what is left in the wake of flow of consciousness; a place where, in the moment, I understand everything, I see clearly how the processes have worked to deliver me to this place.  Here in the early hours of a Sunday morning, I take time.  I try, I always think I am not a writer, but in coming here to write, I understand; even if I am unable to express that understanding in eloquent words which offer insight to others.  In being here I have been with myself, opened up myself to me, it begins to pull together fragments of the self.  And this is healing.  

Suddenly I am exhausted, drunk in the need to lay my head on the pillow and leave the reality of time.  And then I see.  I see the coaching I have facilitated, how as each session unfolded, the diversity of the inner worlds into which I was invited impressed upon me something I inherently understood; this was improvisation.  However, whereas with dance where I had years of embodied experience on which to call on, here on the coaching stage I was building a bank of tools and experience from which to draw.  As such my improvisation was less practiced, and yet intrinsic to whether I was dancing or coaching, is the uniqueness of each human being, and the necessity to respond in the moment.
 
Post 3
 
188 days later - reflections on being back in the studio
 
 


[1] I have no idea if I have used the word and concept or parallax correctly, but I understand what I mean.  
 *  Of course over those 46 days I have not been furloughed - indeed my work load increased so writing was a slow process (my excuse anyway :) )

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