Fiona Robyn's long awaited Blogsplash!

 Ruth's diary is the new novel by Fiona Robyn, called Thaw. She has decided to blog the novel in its entirety over the next few months, so you can read it for free.
Ruth's first entry is below, and you can continue reading tomorrow here.
*
These hands are ninety-three years old. They belong to Charlotte Marie Bradley Miller. She was so frail that her grand-daughter had to carry her onto the set to take this photo. It’s a close-up. Her emaciated arms emerge from the top corners of the photo and the background is black, maybe velvet, as if we’re being protected from seeing the strings. One wrist rests on the other, and her fingers hang loose, close together, a pair of folded wings. And you can see her insides.
The bones of her knuckles bulge out of the skin, which sags like plastic that has melted in the sun and is dripping off her, wrinkling and folding. Her veins look as though they’re stuck to the outside of her hands. They’re a colour that’s difficult to describe: blue, but also silver, green; her blood runs through them, close to the surface. The book says she died shortly after they took this picture. Did she even get to see it? Maybe it was the last beautiful thing she left in the world.
I’m trying to decide whether or not I want to carry on living. I’m giving myself three months of this journal to decide. You might think that sounds melodramatic, but I don’t think I’m alone in wondering whether it’s all worth it. I’ve seen the look in people’s eyes. Stiff suits travelling to work, morning after morning, on the cramped and humid tube. Tarted-up girls and gangs of boys reeking of aftershave, reeling on the pavements on a Friday night, trying to mop up the dreariness of their week with one desperate, fake-happy night. I’ve heard the weary grief in my dad’s voice.
So where do I start with all this? What do you want to know about me? I’m Ruth White, thirty-two years old, going on a hundred. I live alone with no boyfriend and no cat in a tiny flat in central London. In fact, I had a non-relationship with a man at work, Dan, for seven years. I’m sitting in my bedroom-cum-living room right now, looking up every so often at the thin rain slanting across a flat grey sky. I work in a city hospital lab as a microbiologist. My dad is an accountant and lives with his sensible second wife Julie, in a sensible second home. Mother finished dying when I was fourteen, three years after her first diagnosis. What else? What else is there?
Charlotte Marie Bradley Miller. I looked at her hands for twelve minutes. It was odd describing what I was seeing in words. Usually the picture just sits inside my head and I swish it around like tasting wine. I have huge books all over my flat; books you have to take in both hands to lift. I’ve had the photo habit for years. Mother bought me my first book, black and white landscapes by Ansel Adams. When she got really ill, I used to take it to bed with me and look at it for hours, concentrating on the huge trees, the still water, the never-ending skies. I suppose it helped me think about something other than what was happening. I learned to focus on one photo at a time rather than flicking from scene to scene in search of something to hold me. If I concentrate, then everything stands still. Although I use them to escape the world, I also think they bring me closer to it. I’ve still got that book. When I take it out, I handle the pages as though they might flake into dust.
Mother used to write a journal. When I was small, I sat by her bed in the early mornings on a hard chair and looked at her face as her pen spat out sentences in short bursts. I imagined what she might have been writing about; princesses dressed in star-patterned silk, talking horses, adventures with pirates. More likely she was writing about what she was going to cook for dinner and how irritating Dad’s snoring was.
I’ve always wanted to write my own journal, and this is my chance. Maybe my last chance. The idea is that every night for three months, I’ll take one of these heavy sheets of pure white paper, rough under my fingertips, and fill it up on both sides. If my suicide note is nearly a hundred pages long, then no-one can accuse me of not thinking it through. No-one can say; ‘It makes no sense; she was a polite, cheerful girl, had everything to live for’, before adding that I did keep myself to myself. It’ll all be here. I’m using a silver fountain pen with purple ink. A bit flamboyant for me, I know. I need these idiosyncratic rituals; they hold things in place. Like the way I make tea, squeezing the tea-bag three times, the exact amount of milk, seven stirs. My writing is small and neat; I’m striping the paper. I’m near the bottom of the page now. Only ninety-one more days to go before I’m allowed to make my decision. That’s it for today. It’s begun.
Continue reading tomorrow here...

the yoga of writing

There is a moment whilst writing when pen and paper or fingers and keyboard become one; when nothing else matters; when the writer is totally absorbed in the present moment and the line between writer and written word disappears completely.

These moments to me are the yoga of writing. If yoga means 'yoke' or 'union' and yoga is the union of breath and movement, of body and mind, then this moment is the union of me as the writer and the writing itself. There is nothing else but the sound of my heart, my breath and the words forming in my mind and reforming on the paper or screen. There is no monkey mind. There is just writing.

I wish these moments came more often. But as with meditation and asana practice, the moments come and the moments go. We cannot force these moments, we can just allow ourselves to be.

~~~

Which brings me to a question, dear readers. I have read many, many books on yoga over the years; from the ancient texts to modern travelogues of yoga ashrams; from anatomical text books to the poetry of Shiva.

But is the yoga book market saturated? Or do you think there are so many more stories to be told?

(Naturally I am in the second camp. Otherwise I could be wasting my time!)

an interview

Well I'm back! There will be more on my lovely but exhausting holiday tomorrow but firstly, before I can be distracted any further, as promised an interview with Fiona Robyn.

Fiona is the author of several books, including the novels The Letters and The Blue Handbag. On Monday her third novel Thaw came out which, as the regular reader will know, she is promoting with a Blogsplash.

In honour of this momentous event Fiona very kindly agreed to answer some pressing questions regarding life the universe and octupi (SY = me, FR = Fiona)

SY: My earliest writing memory is making a picture book about a kingdom under the sea. I was about 6 and the octupi all had 16 legs. Do you have a similar writing memory dating back to childhood? If not what was your earliest realisation that you needed to write?

FR: That sounds like a good story! I do remember stapling folded paper together to make books, designing the cover, writing the first couple of pages, and losing interest. Thankfully I’ve learnt the skill of completion since then. I also loved books from an early age, Roald Dahl was a particular favourite. I didn’t start writing until I was 18, but words were already in my blood.

SY: Tell us a little bit about your writing day. Do you have routines and rituals or are you more spontaneous? What are your favourite procrastination tools?

FR: I have a wide range of procrastination tools, from feeling hungry to suddenly needing to dust the living room. I’m very creative. I need to sit myself down first thing in the morning, and make myself stay at my desk until I’ve written 1000 words, although that does vary depending on what stage of the novel I’m at. I do light a candle before I start writing. A good (writer) friend gave me the candle holder.

SY: Your first two novels, The Letters and The Blue Handbag, were published last year. How was "the road to publication" for you? Long and winding or smooth and straight?

FR: Long and winding, I suppose, as it took six years after finishing my first novel to find a publisher, but I know it can take much longer. In retrospect, I’m pleased it took so long, because I had a lot of opportunity to learn how to deal with rejection. That’s a vital skill if you want to be a writer. I was also able to write exactly the kind of books I wanted to write, without having to worry about an audience, agent or publisher, as I didn’t have any of those things.

SY: Your next novel, Thaw, is out now. It tells the story of a woman deciding whether or not to end her life and explores what makes a life worth living. Can you share a little about where this story came from and what it was like to write?

FR: The book came from the same place as all the others; they begin when the main character turns up in my head. As I get to know the character, their story emerges. It was quite difficult to write sometimes, as the book is hard hitting, but I’m very fond of Ruth and I hope my readers will grow fond of her too.

SY: Finally Fiona, you have decided to publicise Thaw with a "Blogsplash" in which as many bloggers as possible will publish the first page of the novel on their blogs. How did you come up with this idea?

FR: It’s a bit of a gamble to blog the whole book, it might mean I don’t get any sales at all, but I wanted to make sure that as many people as possible knew about the project and the Blogplash felt like a way of getting the word out. Bloggers have always been very supportive to me, and I knew they’d be up for it! Let’s see if we can still make 1000 blogs. I’m at 245 so far so it’ll be a big push!

To buy Thaw right now go to Amazon UK or the Book Depository (with free worldwide delivery).

Thank you Fiona and best of luck with the new book!

one last thing before i quit

Off on holiday tomorrow. We're staying this hotel for the first couple of days and apart from a necessary pilgrimage to Howarth I intend to do nothing at all. Then off to Leeds and Derby for ink!

So Radio Silence until Thursday, when I will be back with an interview with Fiona Robyn in celebration of her New Book (go on, buy it, you know you want to!)

Namaste Bloggers :D

the joy of yoga!

Today I am a guest blogger over on The Joy of Yoga. Go take a look!

I love Emma's Joy of Yoga blog. She posts so many interesting and inspirational sequences and is always looking for guest bloggers so if you have something to share drop her a line!

The thing I love most about Emma's blog is the title. The JOY of Yoga. That sums yoga up for me. Yes some days my practice is frustrating. Some days I find myself bogged down by ego and my own limitations. But always, whether I'm teaching, practicing at home or practicing in a class, always somewhere deep inside I feel that innate joy of living. That joy doesn't come from other people or things or places or beauty. It comes from me. Just me. And that's why however terrible I may feel I drag myself onto my mat 6 days a week. :)

~~~

Kelly McGonigal, who guest posted for me last week, has sent through a copy of her book. I havne't finished reading it yet but it is wonderful so far.

Inside the front cover Kelly wrote a message for me:-

"No-one is more deserving of your own care and compassion than you yourself."

How true. How true. And how easy that is to forget. The last few years of my life have been hectic and rushed beyond measure and my own health has come second place to my career, my yoga teaching and the health of my clients. This year is about me. Surrounding myself with the things and people I love and begin to move in a different direction, slowly and mindfully.

Thanks Kelly for yet another reminder of my need to do this!

blogspash update!

As the regular reader will already know, Fiona Robyn is going to be blogging her next novel Thaw.

Bloggers across the web will be publishing the first page of the novel on the 1st of March. The entire novel will be available to read for free online, and this 'Blogsplash' is a way to let as many readers as possible know about it.

I also have an ulterior motive, as if you, yes you dear reader, sign up, I'm in for a chance of winning a signed book and a special gift.

If you sign up and ask one of your blogging friends to sign up, you'll be in with a chance too!

There's more information here and when you do email Fiona, make sure you mention my name.

Do join in. Fiona is an awesome writer, her blogs are totally worth reading regularly, she has the most gorgeous red hair and seriously, who can possibly resist a surprise gift!

Yoga for Pain Relief

A week or so before Christmas I was approached by Kelly McGonigal, a health psychologist and yoga teacher at Stanford University, and the editor in chief of the International Journal of Yoga Therapy. She is also a former chronic pain sufferer who wanted to get the message out about how yoga can improve your health and happiness on as many blogs as possible in celebration of the publication of her book Yoga for Pain Relief: Simple Practices to Calm Your Mind and Heal Your Chronic Pain. Of course as a fibromyalgic yogini I jumped at the chance for some wise words on a subject so close to my heart.

Kelly is kindly sending me a copy of the book - which I will review when I have read it. Unfortunately it is not available in the UK yet but you can pre-order it here or order from the US here.

So without further ado let's hear from Kelly about Fibromyalgia and Yoga.

~~

Most people think that yoga is about standing on your head, reaching your toes, and getting twisted into pretzel poses. But the healing practices of yoga go far beyond the postures. The breathing, meditation and relaxation practices of yoga may have the most powerto help people with chronic pain, including fibromyalgia. Below, some of the science and promise behind how yoga can help:

1. People with fibromyalgia appear to process pain differently than people with other forms of chronic pain, including musculoskeletalpain and headaches. As anyone with fibromyalgia knows, they are more sensitive to physical stimulation. The pain detectors of the nervous system can become so sensitive that they react to any sign of increased pressure, tension, or inflammation in the body. But research suggests they are also more affected by negative emotions. For people with fibromyalgia, emotional distress increases the nervous system’s sensitivity to pain more than it does for people with other types of chronic pain.

This may sound like bad news, but it also means that learning how to handle negative emotions can have a significant positive effect on your pain. Many meditation techniques teach you how to accept and then move through negative emotions, and how to consciously choose to feel positive emotions like gratitude and joy.

2. Catastrophizing, telling yourself that your pain is unbearable, uncontrollable, and likely to get worse, makes the brain more sensitive to both the physical sensations and emotion suffering components of pain. This has been shown specifically in people with fibromyalgia, as well as other forms of chronic pain. Strengthening your belief that you can handle your symptoms can make your pain more manageable.

This may be one reason that guided imagery and relaxation can reduce pain in people with fibromyalgia. Research supports three types of imagery: imagining yourself in a favorite, safe place; body awareness and conscious muscle relaxation; imagining yourself engaged in an activity that pain/fatigue have made difficult. Imagery and relaxation may help make the brain less reactive to pain, which can make sensations more tolerable and reduce the anxiety, sadness, and anger that can go along with pain. Other yoga practices may have a similar effect, for example, research shows that simply paying attention to the sensations of breathing can reduce stress, increase a sense ofcontrol, and make pain more tolerable.

3. Physical pain and social pain, such as loneliness or rejection, are detected by the same pain systems of the brain. The experience of either one can make you more sensitive to the other. This may be why a pain episode makes you feel more socially isolated or why you crave social support when you are in pain. It also may explain why loneliness makes physical pain worse, but having a loved one present can reduce pain. Research shows that social support decreases pain sensitivity in people with fibromyalgia specifically. It’s not possible to have round-the-clock closeness with others, but a yoga meditation on social connection can have a similar effect. For example, one study showed that daily loving kindness meditation practice significantly reduced chronic pain.

4. In one unusual study, researchers in Japan tested a master yogi who claimed to be able to block all pain during meditation. The researchers used a laser to create a pain response in the yogi, both before and during meditation. Brain imaging revealed normal pain processing when the yogi was not meditating. During meditation, however, there was dramatically reduced activity in all the areas associated with a pain response, including the areas that produce pain sensations, thoughts and emotions about pain, and the stress response. Although most of us will never become master yogis, this study demonstrates the full potential of meditation for changing your experience of pain.

5. The yoga tradition has long recognized that your breathing reflects the state of your mind and body. When the body and mind are disturbed by fear, anger, sadness, illness, or pain, the breath becomes disturbed. But the road goes both ways: how you breathe can also influence how you feel. This was elegantly demonstrated in a study that observed how the breath naturally changes during joy, anger,sadness, and fear. The researchers induced these emotions in participants and measured changes in breathing rate, depth, movement,and tension. Joy, for example, was associated with steady, smooth, slow, deep, and relaxed breathing. Sadness, in contrast, was associated with irregular, shallow, and tense breathing interrupted with sighs and tremors.

In a second study, the researchers turned the observations for each emotion into breathing instructions. They had participants change their breathing according to those instructions, with no hint that the breathing patterns were connected to specific emotions. The breathing patterns reliably created the emotions they were associated with,without any other emotion cue or trigger.

Yoga can teach you to breathe in a way that supports feelings of comfort, safety, and joy.

~~

Thank you so much Kelly, there is a lot there I can empathise with. I could wax lyrical on how much yoga has helped me in all these ways, but I think we all know that by now right?!!

Namaste x

On Books and Dogs

I have been reading endless lists over the last few weeks trying to find "The Book of the Decade". All of the lists I've read have had some great books on them but every single one of them is kind of generic. Same-y. These are the books you must read for all other books are crap. Apparently. (Image via cuteoverload.com)

The problem with these sort of lists is it's all about personal preference. I loathed and despised many of the books that have been seen as "must reads". I'm not sure if that says something about my reading habits or the general bad taste of the press. I'll leave that decision up to you, dear reader, because you see I have come up with my definitive Book of the Decade and to my knowledge it has made no lists whatsoever apart from this one right here (although I would be delighted to be corrected if I'm wrong!).

(Disclaimer: all opinions expressed below are mine and mine alone. Please feel free to disagree!)
There have been some fabulous books over the last ten years and I've probably forgotten more than two thirds of them. Some of those that spring to mind are Michael Cox's Meaning of Night, Margaret Drabble's Peppered Moth, Lionel Schriver's Something About Kevin (I am the only person I know who didn't guess the ending before the end and it blew me away) and Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake (I read the whole book for the first time in Abu Dabi airport waiting for a delayed flight to Delhi. I know I wasn't supposed to but I fell in love with Crake).

There have also been some utterly over-rated books (The Thirteenth Tale, His Dark Materials Trilogy (oh such promise and oh so cringe-worthy at the end) and My Sister's Keeper for example) and some absolute duffers (the Twilight books, The Lovely Bones, The Historian and possibly the worst written book in the history of publishing, The Da Vinci Code to name a few). But bad books, like bad experiences can be pushed to the back of our minds as we focus on what we truly love.

And so here it is. The Suburban Yogini's book of the decade. Corazon by Joolz Denby.

I cannot stress how utterly wonderful this book is. When I gave it to Himself to read he finished it on a train to Leeds. He phoned me from the train to utter one syllable. "Wow".

I'm not going to tell you what happens in Corazon, I urge you to find out for yourself. All I will say is that I have never empathised with a novel's narrator in quite the same way as I did with this book.

Discover Joolz, you won't regret it!

(I'm also excited and honoured to be having her artwork indelibly etched into my body by the great lady herself two weeks on Friday. More on that later!)

~~~~~

Apart from Crake, Himself and Dave Grohl I am in love with a brown dog called Wrigley who lives in Chicago. Nicole is a yoga teacher and general all round awesome lady who raises money for and awareness about abandoned and abused pitbulls as well as having four adopted pitbulls of her own. They are all cute as buttons but Wrigley is my favourite! Sadly pitbulls are illegal in this country so Mr Wrigs will never be able to come visit, but you can see him opening my Christmas card here!

Reasons to be Thankful

"So who wants to live forever when these moments will only come the once?" -- Justin Sullivan




This week I saw the best band in the world. Every time I hear Vagabonds live my heart bursts. Dancing to NMA for 2 hours is worth feeling as though my sacro-iliac joint is on fire the next day. Never, ever stop touring. Never. One Family. One Tribe.

Also this week I am grateful for:-

* Poetry
* Foo Fighters on VH1 Storytellers (even if they did bleep out all the "fucks" - meanwhile Jay-Z is allowed to call women "bitches" without being bleeped!)
* Desperately needed days off work
* Donating blood (another one off my list). Having needed blood myself in the past I always swore when I was well enough I would give it back.
* Yin Yoga
* Cooking for my family (which included British wine. Yes that's right, British wine! And it was nice!)
* Sunday morning power walks followed by curling up on the sofa
* Reading a whole book in a weekend (I used to do this a lot, I just haven't found the time in the last couple of years)
* Things to look forward to

Thaw

Green Ink drew my attention to this and I thought I'd join in :)

Fiona Robyn is going to blog her next novel, Thaw, starting on the 1^st of March next year. The novel follows 32 year old Ruth’s diary over three months as she decides whether or not to carry on living.

To help spread the word she’s organising a Blogsplash, where blogs will publish the first page of Ruth’s diary simultaneously (and a link to the blog).

She’s aiming to get 1000 blogs involved – if you’d be interested in joining in, email her at fiona@fionarobyn.com or find out more information here.

Join up too - it looks like a great book and a brilliant idea!

A book review

Yoga for Transformation - Gary Kraftsow

I sometimes think to myself that books like this should carry a warning for those yoga enthusiasts who think no further than the sweat and getting their leg behind the head. Warning – this book is not about asana!

To me however this is one of those books that really touches me with regard to the true meaning of yoga. After an overview about yoga during the three stages of life (sunrise, midday and sunset) Kraftsow focuses on the koshas. The five layers of the human being, physical (ana...more I sometimes think to myself that books like this should carry a warning for those yoga enthusiasts who think no further than the sweat and getting their leg behind the head. Warning – this book is not about asana!

To me however this is one of those books that really touches me with regard to the true meaning of yoga. After an overview about yoga during the three stages of life (sunrise, midday and sunset) Kraftsow focuses on the koshas. The five layers of the human being, physical (anamaya), energy (pranamaya), mental (manamaya), wisdom (vijnanamaya) and bliss (anandamaya), are looked at deeply in the five main chapters of this beautifully written book. Each chapter takes us through a new layer of human consciousness, showing us all the blocks and baggage we carefully arrange around ourselves throughout our lives to prevent us from looking much deeper than the physical. But peel away the layers and you can find so much more.

Each chapter ends with a practice. The practice revolves around a few basic yoga postures, the same set of postures for each chapter, but a different focus, a different way of practising that helps us to find the next layer by using breath, mantra, chants and meditations. This book is not about what we practice but how we practice, and how that practice can help us in our dealings with the world around us.

Interestingly Kraftsow teaches the koshas in an unusual way. Traditionally they are taught as being similar to the layers of an onion, which always made me wonder what we were meant to do with the layers we had peeled off. But here they are presented more as layers within a spiral. We can go as deeply as we want and then come back out to the surface again. We can concentrate on one area for a while before moving back to the physical. We can mix and match the practices in any way we feel is right. It is after all ourselves who seek transformation, not anybody else, and the five koshas are five parts of our whole.

What else can I say except beautiful, beautiful. A lot of inspiration for both my own practice and my teaching.