Fine Lines & Wild Times

Notes from the wild... on the cost of following your dreams...

A song I'm listening to: Daydream by Lily Meola

It’s 2:08am on a Monday morning and I couldn’t rest until I’d put some pen to paper today. There’s a burning desire within me to write but fear and distraction seem to always get in my way. I’ve been told, many times, not to be afraid. I’ve been told, many times, not to worry. Here’s my story of the last 6 months, it speaks of the toil, perseverance and endurance required to birth something new. This is also me writing in real time. Something I wanted to do from the get go with my writing - maybe as a way to help me process what’s happening in me but also as an encouragement to anyone else in a similar boat. It just helps not to feel so alone doesn’t it?

I’m not sure what you’re birthing at the moment, it could be a business, an actual baby, a family, a new way of doing relationships? Here is my encouragement to you today.

Do not give up.

In June earlier this year I thought I was going to move back to Scotland from Northern Ireland. I had secured two part time jobs and was doing a trial run one but here’s the thing. I had absolutely no sense of peace about my decision to move and in fact, at some deeper level, I knew that to accept these jobs, would be denying myself the opportunity to really make a go of my own vision and business - Wild Therapy.

Normally I would convince myself that it would be ok once I’d moved and to push on through. But this time I was different. I was listening to my interior world. I listened to a podcast that week by Emily P Freeman and there was this one line that spoke to me. It was advice for high school leavers going off to college and the advice was this: ‘It’s ok to change your mind.” What a sense of relief! See my musings on Instagram for more on that decision and the consequences of changing my mind. In short, my current, amazing tenants moved out leaving me with two houses to pay rent and bills for. I lost a contract with the one stable source of income I had. I let more than a few folk down, not to mention the people who had employed me. There was so much loss in making the right choice for me in this particular circumstance. So here I am at 2:09am, having not had a regular sleeping pattern for well over 3 months. My dog lying next to me wondering what the hell I’m doing awake at such an ungodly hour.

On any given day there’s a voice within telling me to jack my dreams in and go and get a regular job, employed by someone other than myself with a regular, stable income. But there’s another voice - I’d say it’s my soul, that just will not give up on my dreams.

I want to write for a living. To create for a living. To help people for a living. To have fun for a living. To laugh for a living. To thrive for a living and to help others to thrive too. Here’s what I’m learning through the process.

There’s a fine line between pursuing your dreams and ending up in debt unable to pay bills or for a hair cut. I keep asking myself is this worth the struggle? And should it be this hard? I think birthing something is hard. I’m not a Mum so I can’t speak about labour pains in child birth but I can speak about the pain of bringing something new into this world.

I created an outdoor therapeutic organisation 3 years called Wild Therapy. It has been so fulfilling in so many ways and such a headache & confronting for me in so many other ways. There’s so much I’ve had to learn that I’m neither one bit interested in, nor could be bothered learning. Websites for one. Tax returns another. Being self-employed at the beginning of a start up you are on your own. No team. Nobody to bounce anything off or to delegate something to. Just me myself and I. I’ve also been grappling with deep flowing insecurity and fear of stepping out and wading into deep waters. Can I do this? Will I fall flat on my face? Do I have enough belief in myself never-mind my vision? I had an appointment this afternoon at the local Jobs & Benefits office because the manna that was falling previously has ceased and it feels like I’m at a cross-roads. Either I give Wild Therapy everything I’ve got and go “all in” making this vision a reality. Or I settle. But you see, it’s almost like I don’t have a choice to settle. Deep within there’s this voice that keeps saying keep on Ellie. Don’t give up. You’ve got this. And maybe I’m beginning to believe it. There have been times that I’ve literally felt spent - in every sense of the word. Literally spent. No money. No motivation. No drive. Nothing monetary to show for my labour. But I do still believe. I believe in the transforming power of nature and therapy. I believe that all of us could do with getting outside a little more and spending less time on screens. I believe there are people out there I have yet to meet that perhaps I could work with and and walk with! I do believe. So to all of you who are stepping out and feeling all the feels and yet staying with the uncomfortable instead of giving up…keep going! I’m cheering you on! Scott Erikson, an artist that I love, paints the tension between living from a place of fear and living from a place of love so well…

He says this:

“Fear wrote a book about you. It’s very short. It reads,⁣
“One day our beloved came up against a wall. Our beloved thought, “Well, it must be there for a reason!” and then our beloved went back from whence they came. The End.”⁣
Whether it’s a true story or not, Fear wants you to convince you that obstacles are evidence that you’re going the wrong way. That the walls are there for a reason and you should listen to their reasoning:⁣
it’s too dangerous⁣
you don’t have what it takes⁣
it won’t turn out the way you think you’ll fail⁣
you’ll embarrass yourself and others⁣
..and so on and so forth. ⁣
⁣
Fear has one hundred reasons why you should stop.⁣
⁣
But what if obstacles are there for a reason, but not the one Fear wants you to believe?⁣
What if obstacles are evidence that you’re on the right path?⁣
⁣
To be confronted by a wall means you’re attempting to grasp a wisdom that is not easily attainable, like a new skill, talent, insight, perspective, revelation, and it’s in the overcoming (or going through) that we are transformed into something new. The walls are our teacher. ⁣
⁣
Love sees hope in these walls because Love sees past the wall to the transformed you on the other side of it.⁣
⁣
Love also wrote a book about you.⁣
It’s very short. It reads,⁣
⁣
“One day our beloved came up against a wall. Our beloved thought, “Well, it must be there for a reason!” and our beloved understood the wall was evidence that they were on the right path to becoming the person they always hoped they could be. The End.⁣”⁣
⁣

So for anyone stepping out into an unknown future, whether that be in a new relationship, a new business venture, a new creative project, adopting or fostering a child, you can guarantee that fear will show up. It will show up in ways that you didn’t foresee. It’s what we do with that voice that makes the difference.

Thanks for taking the time to be here and to read my work.

May it speak gently to you on your way…

Luke Sital-Singh says it well in this song…”How to Lose Your Life”

“Be the voice that shakes me up, be the words when I don’t know much. I give myself to be by your side. I will lose my life to the love I find…”

This must be what passion is!