Time is flying by

Sometimes time moves too fast and sometimes it moves too slowly

I cannot believe that time is flying by so fast. It feels like so long ago that I was zooming down the slopes in the French Alps, eating delicious food and having so many laughs with friends and my family. I only got home four days ago but it feels like months ago!

I do try and be fully present and remind myself to be in the here and now which I definitely did do when I was away. It was glorious in the sunshine and so exciting to be able to ski one of the last weeks of the ski season. It just bothers me that time feels like it goes so fast. How did I get to be 50 years old so suddenly when it only feels like yesterday that I was 18 years old at university in Glasgow working, studying and partying. I have a daughter at 18 years now at university. How did I get to be here where I am today? What is going on? (Do not get me wrong, I am not having an existential crisis. Just observing where I am at.) Why I need to put this disclaimer in - I do not know. Fear of judgement perhaps.. Argh. The internal dialoge is at work again.

As I hit my 50th year I tried to make a plan and decide what the next decade is going to be for me. For once I am not setting unrealistic targets that I will never achieve. I hate targets and goals. There is too much pressure. I want to be my best self. I need to stick to my core conditions of genuineness, acceptance and empathy. (Thank you Carl Rogers) Be fully congruent and honest.

My teenage years were all about getting through school and trying to pass exams. Some of this time felt like it was passing too slowly that is for sure. Everyone seemed to get high grades so easily whilst myself and my friend Kathryn were always around the bottom of the class. We bumbled along having fun and just scraping passes. Apart from English. I loved English. My English teacher was one of those teachers who got me and inspired me. I adored reading The Great Gatsby and Norman McCaig’s poems. Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet. I even named my daughter Daisy from Gatsby. There was also Mrs Murray our French teacher. She was brilliant and so much fun. I loved French. I guess those years were spent quoting Gatsby and Shakespeare while speaking random sentences in French while trying to figure out where I fitted in and who my tribe were. Those were tough years. I loved hockey and being part of the hockey team. Even now when I get together with my old school friends we are still connected by the hockey team and the trips on the hockey bus. There was also the month in India at 16 then the 3 months working in Beijing when I was 19 which then leads me into my 20’s with a love of travelling and meeting people.

(Even from a young age I was obviously obsessed with ponies! This is me in my school uniform in the garden of our house in Glasgow in 1981)

My 20’s were also a lot of fun. I left home as soon as I was done with university and headed out to a village in Corfu called Agios Stefanos. Back in those days you could just turn up and ask for work and do a season. I worked in a bar then did 2 more seasons in a lovely family run taverna. In between the seasons in Greece I worked a ski season as a chalet girl. This was interspersed with working in the Devonshire Hotel in Glasgow where I had worked since I was 17. I guess my 20’s were full of hard work but a lot of fun. I also got married and moved to Dunkeld which was a massive change of life for me.

My 30’s were all about bringing Daisy into the world and bringing her up as best as I could. I was one of the first of my friends to get married then one of the first to have a child so there was a lot of bumbling along and figuring it out as I went. I am beginning to see a theme here! I was working hard for a ski company that had chalets in the French and Swiss Alps which was brilliant as I got to go out a few times each season then I set up my own ski company which I successfully sold when I turned 40.

My 40’s were then all about retraining as a therapist. I started with the certificate in counselling at Glasgow University. This was what I needed to get not only Glasgow back into my life as I missed it so much but to meet people of a similar mindset who wanted to go deeper and were ready to accept each other as who we truly are. This was what I needed to answer the questions about myself and find my deeper side that was always there but needed cracked open to let it out. The next couple of years of training were like peeling your skin off, taking your body apart bit by bit then leaving it up to you to get yourself back together before the crows came down and picked you apart. The friendships that I made throughout this course will last a lifetime as it was all a bit traumatic - especially the psychodynamic training. However, it is the psychodynamic training that is my core and my foundation and my heart. When I was 42 I decided to take up horse riding again as Daisy had her own pony and I was craving the feeling of riding a horse again. From Daisy’s first lesson when she was 5 years old, I knew ponies were back in my heart and would be around for a long time to come. I didn’t expect to be living on a farm and having our own as that was beyond the wildest dreams but here we are.

(This photo is me and Freddie in September last summer)

So we come to my 50th decade and what it will bring. I guess that I have learned from a wonderful woman called Tania Kindersley is to ask myself:

What do I want?

What do I need?

What do I love?

These questions are a fantastic way to slow down, take a breath and be present. Truly present. Have a think about what you truly want, need and love. Have a cup of tea, give it a go and see what happens.

Thank you for reading to the end x

I mentioned Tania Kindersley. Do have a look at her Substack as it really is worth a look if you do not already subscribe. A breath of fresh air in a frantic world.