lessons in gentleness

May 01, 2023

At the end of last year, I went on a ‘wild’ retreat. I went to review the experience for work, expecting the awkwardness of faffing about with ‘estatic dance’ and interacting with new-agey types who spoke of heart chakras and psychedelics. It delivered both of those things, but something else, too: what felt like a midpoint of a breakdown and a breakthrough.

It started with a grief ritual, which I thought would be pointless for me. There were people here who were facing serious illness, who had lost people, who had faced immense trauma. This process - sitting around a fire, chanting, going into the centre to cry and scream and unleash - was for them, I thought, not me, whose only experience of grief was for acquaintances and the cat I’d loved in my teens.

Before the collective chanting began, we were split into smaller groups and each went around in a circle to talk about what they were grieving for. I felt protected by the knowledge that I was a journalist, someone here to observe, and that I didn’t ‘have’ to share anything. But when I started talking, I didn’t stop at my initial qualifier of ‘I don’t think I’m really grieving anything’. Instead I poured out things I didn’t know I felt: grief for myself, grief for the time I’d lost, grief of guilt and self-hatred. As drums rumbled and Norse song erupted, I cried and cried, staring into the fire.

I came out of this and went back to my final week at my previous job, got swept up in the busyness of finishing up and the nerves of starting something new. But the experience had lifted something up in me, exposing a swirl of something dark and difficult underneath. I booked on to weekly counselling sessions, hoping to speedily resolve that mess and keep marching on.

We started talking in December. At the same time, I was invited to a New Year intention-setting workshop. My counsellor pointed out how self-critical I am. In the workshop, a worksheet prompted us to circle our ‘words for the year’ from a list. My counsellor asked: ‘why do you believe you don’t deserve to feel good?’. I wrote in my own word, which came without much thought: gentleness.

In our Monday sessions following, the therapist and I have spoken a lot about unhealthy patterns, about triggers for my OCD, the pull towards self-destruction, the guilt, the shame. A lot of times I just want to know why I’m like this, so I can get to the root and cut it out. A lot of times I’m frustrated by the unfairness of it all; of how hard it seems I have to work to just be okay, of why doing things I know I want is so difficult.

I haven’t found answers or solutions. That’s frustrating in itself. But I keep coming back to ‘gentleness’. I think of it as a practice, something I can choose in my responses, in the way I talk to myself.

When I started my new job, I rejoiced at the much more reasonable start time - 9am instead of my previous 6am. I can wake up early and write fiction, I thought. And do pilates! I no longer work weekends. I imagined going for woodland walks, more writing.

Despite reading multiple books about habit-forming, filling in daily ticksheets, and getting into Notion, I’ve woken up early and written six times in the past four months. I’ve done pilates three times. I haven’t been on a single woodland walk.

I’ve slept in, I've scrolled TikTok, I’ve spent Sunday afternoons slumbering on the sofa. Today, I planned to wake up at 6am and spend the day writing. Instead I got out of bed at 10, ventured downstairs, scrolled social media, then fell asleep again until 1pm. My tendency is to beat myself up for this. I’m lazy, I’m a failure. What am I doing? Why am I like this? What’s wrong with me?

But I’m consciously choosing gentleness, which looks like this. I wake up and look at the time. I think: wow, I must have been really tired. I make myself lunch. I bring my laptop to the sofa and sandwich myself between two blankets. I think: it was so nice to spend an hour cuddling with Babka1 this morning.

Gentleness is a choice and it’s one I want to pick more regularly. Between that and self-berating, it’s clear which one is a better option. I can get obsessive over productivity, but I’m starting to realise that being horrible to myself is probably the least productive thing I do. It’s far more damaging than having a lie-in.

I’m learning you really can’t hate yourself into improvement. I’m learning that I want to be little kinder; in my touch, in the words I use about myself, in the words I use when I talk to myself. Gentleness is being softer, more loving, to outweigh the sharp, rough, harshness my brain tips towards. It’s asking: how can I make this easier? rather than viewing myself as a fuck-up because I’m finding things hard. It’s trying, sometimes, and other times accepting that I need rest, that I’m tired, and not asking why or judging that, but just pulling the blankets up around me, listening to Babka snore.

guess i'll die

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