Sea

Magic happens when …

/ Waves and Pebbles - random thoughts and writing on life, memories and creativity / Leave a comment

Earlier this week the thought came to me that I have been living my life differently for nearly three years. This is not a post about the pandemic but it has come from realising that nearly three years have passed. In some ways it feels that it is time lost, yet when I stop to think, there have been so many moments that have enriched my life.

I have come up with a name for a new book, as I often do. Some exist for fleeting moments, others get as far as being created as a project on Dabble, and then there are those that eventually go the full way. It’s a whole spectrum of book inspiration and development.

A friend asked me today if I was still interested in wood. Wood is something I became intrigued by after I graduated a few years back with an interest in sense of belonging and the sociology of everyday life. I kept coming across people for whom wood was important in their lives, working with it in their gardens, as an artist, as an eco friendly entrepreneur with indoor plants, skilled craftsmen making bespoke musical instruments and unique chain-saw carved garden ornaments, biophillic design in architecture (bringing nature indoors), the list went on and I gained a new collection of books.

I am reminded of a wonderful mystery tour through the Kent countryside with my friend when we came across an amazing wood carver in the middle of the Garden of England countryside because we had got a bit lost and needed to ask the way. Sadly I don’t have any photos, hoping to have returned one day if I could ever have found it again. Now I tend to take regular photos as a record so I know where I have travelled.

Back to my book-to-be. The title – Three Years. It will capture my perspective on my own life over the past three years and also as I look forward towards a new decade-dawning age. There is no doubt that the next three years will be very different to the past ones and I am excited to see what develops. This morning I came across a short handwritten note about an artist, Louis Parsons, and what he calls Soulscaping. (His website is an interesting place to visit.)

In my note, I had written down the question “What is my aliveness” and the answers I had listed were dancing, nature and the sea (walking) and bringing people together for my workshops. These remain a good starting point for my focus going forward. Music is always there in the background since a very young age yet I have let it slip, not given the time to it or made an effort to follow it, whether that be listening to music, playing it or dancing, or going to live music events.

I no longer live by the sea but I live by some of the most beautiful wild countryside and I know there are ways that I can remain connected to the sea, through photos, memories, family and friends, and a long-awaited seaside holiday is calling. I had a dream to travel around the coast of the UK … that still remains yet in chunks and my latest thoughts are to travel to Berwick-upon-Tweed in the North East of England and meander down the Northumbrian and Yorkshire coast.

I am in the middle of reading Raynor Winn’s Landlines (I previously read The Salt Path) and I am in awe of Raynor and her husband’s courageous achievements. Both books are such an inspiring read about their long-distance walking and how it has helped with husband Moth’s serious illness. I’ve just looked online for any latest information and Raynor is giving a talk at the Tring Book Festival which has virtual online tickets for the event on Saturday, 28 January 2023.

Perhaps I should finish where this all started with the title of this blog post, Magic happens when … I came across some writing that I did back in 2020 in response to a question about when I had taken action in uncertainty and what I had learnt from it, which I share with you now.

“Magic happens when you step outside the world you know to venture into the many worlds of opportunity and delight that await.”

That’s my focus for the next three years, which will also be when my book-to-be will be finished!

What plans do you have for the next three years?

What do you really want to experience, be, do or achieve?

I have another book title and prompt for more writing in the future … “Nothing” … a simple word that can mean so much and is in waiting for another blog post.

Waves – sea therapy from afar

/ Waves and Pebbles - random thoughts and writing on life, memories and creativity / Leave a comment

I recently took the opportunity, while on a holiday road trip, to visit Hornsea, a small seaside town on the beautiful Yorkshire coastline in England. The following piece of writing emerged (unedited).

“Waves have the power to entrance and refresh, to bring us close in to nature. They devour our stressful feelings and bring an inner depth of awe into our world. The fresh salty air, the constant yet rhythmic movement that rises and falls and moves in and out of our lives.

Braving the waters, there is nothing like being swept up and down within the gentleness of a calm yet revolving sea. To allow oneself to drift within its soothing hug before returning refreshed to the damp pillowed sandy and pebbly shore.

To catch first sight of the waves crashing against the shore is heaven embodied. It draws me in. As each rise swells to a crashing crescendo nothing else matters. This is life. This is all that is needed to wipe the worries away.

Waves are forever there despite them being far away. Their energy may lay dormant within us until we allow ourselves to be within their power, within their being, whether through our own visionary imagination or immersing ourselves in seascapes that effervesce with the sense of the sea, providing a source of sea therapy that is open to all who wish to offer themselves to it.

Sea therapy is for all, regardless of whether you are by the sea, if you have had personal experience of it, it stays within waiting to be given the key to open up your dreams of a life blessed by the sea.”

Not so long ago I moved away from the sea and now live next door to the Peak District National Park with its stunning mountainous scenery. I knew that I would miss the sea yet I have learnt that by remaining connected through my interests, friends, photos, projects and writing, I can still feel the benefits of that connection, that sense of belonging. A while ago I discovered reference to some research that backed this up, that if you have personally experienced being by the sea then the benefits can still remain with you. I now know personally that I can tap into this feeling whenever I choose and when I am able to visit the seaside it is the most amazing feeling and something that I will forever look forward to.

I didn’t realise until I was writing this post that the Peak District was the first National Park, created in 1951 (there is much history behind this which makes me realise how lucky we are to have the freedom to explore such a wonderful area). By the end of the decade the Lake District, Snowdonia, Dartmoor, the Pembrokeshire Coast, North York Moors, Yorkshire Dales, Exmoor, Northumberland and Brecon Beacons had also become national parks. https://www.peakdistrict.gov.uk/learning-about/about-the-national-park/our-history.

Patterns in time

/ Waves and Pebbles - random thoughts and writing on life, memories and creativity / Leave a comment

Today it went through my mind that I was gaining some kind of pattern to my daily life. There is much advice that routine is good for us during this surreal time but a belief I have held for some while is that I don’t much like routines … to me it feels like too much predictability whereas I like to bring spontaneity into my life, to allow time for those creative moments. Yet without some kind of planning, at the moment those creative moments haven’t quite been happening. Slowly perhaps we are adapting to the changing nature of life that has been sprung upon us. For now, life as we knew it has seemingly been put on hold and people are affected in such contrasting ways across a whole spectrum of experience. So for now, I am enjoying accepting a different pattern into my life. One that is evolving yet can adapt and change as the rhythms of the day change with the weather and external commitments that spring from a different source that is changing the nature of how we live in this moment and maybe in the future to come.

Today, to go with this post, I wanted some kind of pattern, so I started with a photo that I love and thought I’d see where it went. I used Affinity Photo software on my iMac and just played around with it until I discovered something that I felt was right for this post. It is a photo of a place that I love that I don’t get to see at the moment but is held close to my heart. It’s so beautiful that it deserves a post of its own – Kingsgate Bay.

Featured

Writing back to Happiness

/ Waves and Pebbles - random thoughts and writing on life, memories and creativity / Leave a comment

In 2015 I started this blog when I was dealing with treatment for a life threatening form of leukaemia. I kept the blog up for some while – it helped provide me with a focus – and when I was able to go out, I enjoyed taking photos and sharing them.

As life returned to some form of normality – I had survived! (needing checks every six months) – my blog writing slipped. I had a couple of attempts to rekindle it but somehow life got in the way. Yet when I wrote my first book “Life Happens, Live Happy” (available on Amazon – author Kay Underdown), I fully realised how both writing and blogging had helped me through some very challenging times.

When I eventually graduated from University in 2017 with my degree in Social Sciences, having had a whole year out due to my illness, the idea for Life Story Writing was born. Workshops and courses using my own unique approach combining coaching, creativity and sense of belonging.

Following graduation I had to negotiate some difficult, and unexpected, life paths. the outcome is living in the most wonderful area by the sea, one of my dreams that I had long wanted to achieve but never before had the guts to see it through.

There followed a period when I half-heartedly worked towards working for myself as a coach and running workshops but somehow the time wasn’t right. Life was good. I still felt as if I was on holiday whenever I had the time to wander but I lacked something and I just didn’t know what that something was. So I returned to University to start a Masters degree in Methods of Social Research and during this time I had a period of exploration and fine-tuned my direction. It was the Life Story Writing workshops I wanted to focus on. I had an inner conviction that they could really make a difference to people’s wellbeing, and could help increase happiness and sense of belonging.

After a few initial workshops on happiness and empowerment and life story writing, I started running a longer course for a local charity aimed at people aged 50+. That course has led to something very special to me – a small life story writing group. One of the outcomes from this will be my next book – “Writing back to Happiness” Life Story Writing the Waves and Pebbles Way. I started handwriting this book just after Christmas with a lovely new fountain pen, part of a set gifted to me by my group.

It is during these meetings that I have realised how much I really enjoyed blogging, and not really understood why I stopped doing something I loved so much. Anyway, here I am, back again!

I am excited for 2020. It somehow feels that it is a year of the unexpected but that it will be good, providing new adventures with opportunities to explore all that life has to offer and doing it in my own way.

I truly wish anyone reading this the very best for 2020 and the coming new decade. May you give yourself the gift of time to explore what it is you really want to do with your life – whether that’s carrying on doing the things that you love or allowing yourself to explore new avenues based on your own life values and future dreams.

Watch this space as I continue “Writing back to Happiness”. My focus for my Waves and Pebbles blog continues to be random stories about life, creativity and memories – with the addition of nature – which are all reflected in my Life Story Writing workshops and groups.

I live in Broadstairs, on the Isle of Thanet in Kent, England. We are blessed with beautiful bays, sandy beaches and amazing skies. In 2020 I will be running short courses at various venues, usually hotels and cafes where you can relax and enjoy a social occasion and do some life story writing back to happiness along the way. I am also exploring the possibility of offering online groups so if you might be interested in this, please let me know.

I hope you have all enjoyed the festive season and are looking forward to what the New Year 2020 and the next decade will bring. I’d love to hear your life stories and what your hopes and dreams are for the future.

Kay xx

Please feel free to comment here or visit my website http://www.kayunderdown.com. You will also find my page on Facebook @empoweringyoubeyondyourdreams (Kay Underdown, Happiness & Empowerment Coach). Like my blog, this has not been kept up to date and I am looking at developing my social media presence specifically aimed at Life Story Writing. I’d love to hear your own experiences of writing … or perhaps the reasons why you don’t write … I also encourage people to draw their stories if they don’t want to write or to do storyboards, a bit of both!

Timelapse – return to blogging – Brighton West Pier

/ Waves and Pebbles - random thoughts and writing on life, memories and creativity / 2 Comments

Copyright 2015 Kay Underdown/wavesandpebbles

Copyright 2015 Kay Underdown/wavesandpebbles

This photo was taken from my hotel room in Brighton when I escaped with my daughter for a couple of days before returning home for my last cycle of chemo treatment which I am having today.  I have very mixed emotions and hoping that I don’t end up back in hospital.

My post today was prompted by the realisation that people were still reading my blog and if I left it much longer I might never return.  I realise how much I have missed the blogging world but I have taken time out to get out and about as much as possible before I am restricted again.  I have also been experimenting with other social media, Twitter in particular, but there is no comparison.  I find Twitter fascinating but there is not the same sense of community that I feel might be gained from being part of the blogging world.  I would be interested to hear other people’s thoughts on this.  There’s a lot of social media options out there and for me they each serve different purposes and it’s finding a way to use them without social media taking over your life.

I’m just going to leave it there today.  I’ve still been taking photos which I will catch up on and blog about.  My Apple desktop is a scattered mess of photos which will no doubt give me inspiration.  I’m keeping calm and relaxed and there is just something about the photo I have chosen for this blog that takes me to a different place.