The View from my Reading Chair. With peonies. Please don’t judge us for the DVD addiction.

I’m sitting in my reading chair, deep in Janet Conner’s ‘Writing Down Your Soul’, a book which will knock you socks off if you are ready to read it.

For the last few days I’ve been feeling really ill, down and depressed.  I don’t know which comes first, the depression or the pain, but I know I need to tackle one or the other.  Mixed in with all this is stuff about scarcity and deserving, and learning to self-parent.  I’m learning to give myself what I need unconditionally, and my core values about not being good enough are fighting back big time.

And yet here are the peonies.  Big, blousey, blooms in gorgeous, in-your-face pink.

Peonies are something I have only ever bought for other people.  They were always too expensive, not something I could bring myself to indulge in for my own sake, despite the fact they are absolutely my favourite flower.  But the other day, in an act of deliberate defiance, I bought myself some.  They were expensive.  But I can’t stop staring at them.  They have given me so much pleasure.  Last night, I actually ended up watching them for two hours instead of the telly.  I think they may just be the best value flowers I have ever bought.

And when I sit here and look at them, I am practising telling myself I deserve them. That I deserve this enormous self-indulgence.

Nigel has the knives out for the peonies.  He is definitely of the opinion that I don’t deserve them, any more than I deserve having the bigger portion or to wear my favourite top just for myself, even if I’m not going out today, because all that is self-indulgent and selfish, and I should put other people first. If I made a list of all the toxic things Nigel is saying in my head right now, believe me, you would be horrified.  (Except that you probably wouldn’t because I’ll bet your own Nigel says them to you too sometimes.)  I didn’t realise quite how much of a grip he’d got on me again.  So much so that telling myself I deserve the peonies actually makes my physically squirm.

They are just peonies.  But they are an emblem of so much more.

And right now they are reminding me to kick bloody Nigel in the arse and out the door!  Wish me luck!

Happy Creating,

EF