"Slow Down to Live: Finding Clarity in Chaos"

Life has a way of forcing us to pause and reflect, often through unexpected events. Here are three moments that made me reassess my priorities:

1. The Ankle Incident (14 Years Ago):

• I broke cartilage in my ankle, leading to surgery and arthritis.

• This injury was a wake-up call to slow down and appreciate the present.

• It took years, but I eventually managed the arthritis and learned to value my health.

1. Pandemic Pause (March 2020):

• The first lockdown brought an unexpected opportunity to reconnect with family.

• We spent quality time together, learning, growing, and appreciating the simple joys of life.

• I had my first panic attack and learned how to manage them.

1. Fractured Foot (January 2024):

• An overenthusiastic demonstration of a welly remover led to a fractured foot.

• This injury reiterated the need to slow down and focus on one task at a time.

These experiences taught me the importance of mindfulness and intentional living. They also reignited my passion for writing, something a clairvoyant once told me would be my path to fulfillment.

I've decided to start this blog as a way to share my journey, connect with others, and leave a legacy for my family. Writing brings me joy and a sense of purpose. Here's to embracing life's lessons, one word at a time.

Key Takeaway: Slow down, focus on what matters, and pursue what you love.

Welcome to my blog. Let's learn and grow together.

The first time I injured my ankle 14 years ago, rushing around and smacking it into a wooden drawer, I didn't see the opportunity for analysis and reflection I had been given. I spent 6 weeks in a boot in a "woe is me" fashion, healing physically but essentially wasting a lot of time that I could have spent on mental pursuits. The injury brought on arthritis, something which I have subsequently heard can happen to anyone when there has been some trauma to the body. It generally made me slow down a bit and appreciate the health I did have, and to try not to mess that up as well.

The pandemic thereafter gave me some pause for thought. I spent much-needed and longed-for time with family, walking and cycling in nature and trying to grow fruits and vegetables in the garden with various degrees of success. We played games together, read books, watched films, took courses, learned new things, and talked. We pulled together, enjoying the simple things in life, and I loved that part of it.

On the flip side, I unfortunately also experienced my first panic attack then. But once I realized what it was, after doing lots of research, I learned to recognize the signs and deal with them effectively. Something tells me I probably wasn't the only one experiencing them at that time.

All in all, health-wise, that uncertain, unprecedented period had made me feel quite vulnerable, and it was also then that I decided to start some good, health-related habits to make me feel stronger and slightly more in control.

Gradually, I worked up to doing 10-15 minutes of weekday morning yoga and started doing Deepak Chopra meditations on YouTube (now with my Chopra app). Cold showers, following my regular hot one, for 2 minutes 3 times a week, one cup of green tea a day, drinking more water, taking turmeric capsules and well-woman multivitamins, making better food choices (though sugar remains a challenge), and weight maintenance with Noom.

It was also around then that I stumbled across mentors like Tony Robbins, Dean Graziosi, and my current coach, Matt Hall. I became part of the Success School Coaching group, all of which helped me enormously to grow my physical and mental wellbeing and resilience.

Then, by the time my next 'enforced 6-8 week thinking time' arrived by way of a fractured foot, I already had a much-needed, more positive mindset shift, and I could see the gifts in the adversity even more clearly this time. I still (just about) stand by the brilliance of the welly-removing contraption, despite falling off it due to slippery, muddy boots and injuring myself, but my brother-in-law, who I was trying to convince of its brilliance, remains less convinced.

I decided to use some of the time to do more journaling and realized that I had forgotten how much I loved writing. I used to write stories when I was a kid. I even sent one to a magazine (Margriet) in my native Netherlands when I was 9. It wasn't published, but the editor wrote me a very lovely letter (see photo) encouraging me to practice writing and suggested keeping a diary.

And so I got myself a bit of a reputation with the family, either always found with my head in a book or writing. I ended up writing lots of letters back to the family in the lowlands when we'd moved to the UK. I found a letter my grandfather had typed from there, dated 1981 (See photo), where he apologized for the mismatch of response to my mammoth letters and said he would not be able to reciprocate the volume of my writing as, according to him, I was the future writer after all ;-)

This led me to remember that in my infinite wisdom, in my mid-twenties, I sought out a clairvoyant named April or Avril. It was in Manchester in the mid-nineties where I briefly lived after graduating from University College. I guess I was looking for answers to my life's purpose. I don't remember much from the meeting other than that she said that I would make my fortune from writing. I did have a cassette tape recording of it, but I have no idea where it is, and if I still even have it. And even if I do still have it, I no longer have the tech to play it on. And no, I didn't then immediately pursue a career in writing, weirdly. I almost immediately forgot about it. Until now.

Maybe now is as good a time as any to reignite my passion for the written word, whether reading or writing. What if Avril or April, or whatever her name was, was right? I'm not sure if a timeframe was given.

In any case, here it is: my first shiny new blog. My intro back to one of my passions. It is very much an output-over-outcome effort, learning as I go along. Progress, not necessarily perfection. But if I don't put it out now and keep tweaking and faffing like I have done since February, I never will. So here goes. Thank you for reading this far.

And, in the words of another one of my mentors, Ross Grant from Actonthis.tv:

Bye for now ;-)

Much love,

Maya

x