I have been reflecting on, and contemplating, “our narrow world view” - how this impacts our way of being, and how automatic and unconscious it is. How narrow our world view can be, how narrow the stories we tell ourselves, how narrow our thoughts and our feelings.

Earlier last week I felt the familiar tapping of grief at my door. Somehow I feel it in my body before my mind can logically make sense of what it is. I was walking in my garden and my body felt crunchy, that’s the only word I can find to describe it. As if I’d put on tight-fitting clothes that were too small for me. It had a crunchy quality to it, I could feel it running down my back.

We have become so isolated, we put “self” at the centre and forget about how entangled we could be with those we live, with those we love, with mother nature and the world around us. In fact entanglement, co-dependency have become the enemy, but I wonder what we have lost in that.

I couldn't find the words today, I wanted to speak but words evaded me. The grief and rage I felt in my body and my being too big for small words. Sometimes there aren't the words, sometimes it's difficult to say or portray what you're feeling or what you're witnessing.

I am sitting deeply with the grief of the world right now.

Recently I’ve been exploring the landscape of not enough. The not enoughness I feel in my bones, a feeling that gnaws and is persistent in its aggressions. Something that is with me almost every moment of every day, some days louder than others, but nevertheless a constant companion.

As I’ve been exploring this it’s brought about an unexpected grief, and this grief feels deep, it’s taken me. It's a grief I haven’t explored in this way before - the grief of unbelonging.

It’s so very easy to do the things we’ve always done. I constantly catch myself in the familiar - feeling a familiar way, doing something familiar, reacting in a familiar way. The habit of me, when it’s so automatic, sometimes visceral, it feels like it just happens, that I have no say.

We talk about unconditional love but I wonder how many of us have experienced it, know it. I believe that we’re not able to love our children unconditionally, because we simply don’t know what it feels like to be in relationship in an unconditional way. What does it mean to free yourself from the constraints of the conditions you’ve wrapped yourself in?

There’s been a catharsis happening over the past month or so. A deep release of the past. The day before Summer Solstice I suddenly realised that I’d been holding on to 16 years worth of journals. I started journalling in 2007, the year my Mum died and my marriage fell apart.

On Friday I went to see my therapist for bodywork, as she greeted me she took hold of my hand with both her hands and cupped them tightly, welcoming me into her beautiful space. But what happened in my body was so interesting to observe.

Mother’s Day took me by surprise last Sunday. Not the day, but the depth of grief I felt. I was enjoying the beautiful spring days that had come along, I was feeling grounded in myself, and felt alive in who I am.

Yesterday I met myself. After a busy week, a wonderful busy week, I met myself. When we slow down, when we stop even for a moment, we can meet ourselves where we are.

So often we look outside ourselves. Outside ourselves for love, for beauty. On days like today, that tell us how love should look, or how our life should be, this can become fierce.

How are you? How's your body? How's your breath? Take a moment before reading on to really see how you're feeling in this moment. To take a pause before everything else.

I always talk to you about themes. I don’t think they’re really themes. When something keeps showing up in our lives, over and over again, it’s time to listen. To hear what wants to be heard.

You may have noticed I’ve changed my name, from Nicky to Nicola. There are a few changes coming in my world and I can’t wait to share them with you. But for now I want to tell you a story.

I’ve been wanting to get these words on paper all week. They’ve been very present for me and as the week has gone on, this thread of being human, has kept showing itself.