I believe as I am sure so do you, friendships are helpful to have in life. When you are feeling down, we are fuelled by our relationships with others in whatever form they take. In this blog post, I will home in on friendship. Have you ever felt so overjoyed being in the company of your friends? Is the weight of burden released from your shoulders the moment you embrace them after such a long time of not seeing them? Well, I certainly have in response to both these pondering thoughts. And I so do believe coronavirus lockdown certainly has made me appreciate friendship more than ever. Even though I was so limited to what I could do during coronavirus lockdown, the element of friendship stuck by me like glue, a glue so strong, I can let the lyrics of the song ‘I get by with a little help from my friends’ fall off my tongue liberally. They say quality over quantity, so however many friends you keep in touch with whether it be one or two or five friends, then hold them into the pocket of your heart and be fuelled by their love and attention for you and you can fuel them back with your energy to love and attend to their needs as well. It is in the small acts of kindness, the hey how are yous, and the lets go for a walk or a catch up over a cuppa or the footy ball games, or the sit and watch Netflix or the order a curry takeaway or the zoom calls that have saved us from losing our minds during this pandemic and will continue to keep our hearts afloat to this day, do the majority of society depend on our friendships. I love my friends and I cannot imagine my life without them, for they have contributed much happiness into my day to day living. Knowing their presence is always there, is a comfort to me, they are my healers and my cosy warm heart to heart secret keepers, my eyes, my ears with sense of intuition, they are givers and receivers to the personalised nature of our friendship that will be bound forever and ever.

I leave you with a poem I wrote a few years ago. Enjoy:

To the hip

Friendship

Joined to the hip

To the hip

Side by side

Tying knots 

Of loyalty

Happiness resides

Moments to treasure

Sweet company

Sweet cake

Warm words 

Weave through

Our minds

Secrets made

Kept safe

Friendship

Joined to the hip

To the hip

Arm in arm

Hugs so huggable

Bondage of joy

You are my golden charm.

I want to be more resilient.

I listened to a powerful ted talk given by Lucy Hone on Spotify. It opened my eyes to how much we have to be grateful for. In times of adversity, we know there will be much grieving across the country knowing how many lives have been taken from this pandemic, we think of those families who have lost their loved ones.

In this spotify Luce Hone zones in on her own personal trauma when she lost her own daughter in a car accident and how resilience was key to overcoming grief. This reminds me of times when I feel like I am tested in life, when I don’t know what direction I am heading in times of great uncertainty, in this case Covid-19. What comforted me is knowing that people who are resilient, she bluntly says shit happens- suffering is part of life. Rather than thinking why me? Think why not me?

Secondly, they choose carefully where they choose their attention to things they can change and some how accept things they can’t. This is a tough one for me especially knowing when I am trying to adopt positive energy in times of a crisis. I like the imagery she attaches to negative emotions as acting like velcro and positive emotions tend to bounce off us. Choose life. You have to survive. Try to find things to be grateful for.

Thirdly, resilient people ask themselves is what I’m doing helping or harming me? Be kind to yourself. Put yourself in the drivers seat; you are in control. Its easier to say than do but if you are in control then the world will be easier to deal with in someways. I guess it does depend on the circumstance. But I agree with her. Think if comparing yourself to others for example is helping your mood, your mental health.

Finally resilience isn’t a fixed trait. It requires ordinary processes; a willingness to give them a go.