Hello folks,
This is the final in this slow series of INKLINGS voice notes on care-based creative practice, from this neurodivergent’s perspective. It’s great that I can say this now! The neurodivergent bit. It’s rather freeing to claim it and know that if-you-know-you-know and that there is juice here for all brains, but I don’t have to try to be like all brains! I mean, that’s an impossible job, but still one my brain will try to achieve. In classic neuroD style I have looked at these themes from multiple angles and the “oh but if say that, it connects to this, and then that… where does it end?!” thoughts have been big.
But there is something calming about letting this verbal offering be part of a wider, ongoing, never-ending conversation and practice.
This voice note from your (and my) creative comrade and cheerleader explores what rest looks and feels like, depending on the space we’re in, and how rest is a vital part of not just being a functioning human being (which my word can we/I forget) but also supports us to digest and integrate the events, information and activity of our life so that our next turn outwards can be informed by the mulched, processed and important stuff of our lives. i.e., it helps us not simply to stay in reaction mode.
This comes with a huge note (DING DONG!) that we live in systems and cultures that survive and thrive on our reactivity and outsourcing of our ok-ness to things that can be consumed from outside of ourselves. It’s the fundamental tenant of the systems of imperial and capitalist violence that are born out of the commodification of bodies and land, where resources are hoarded, and fears of the scarcity of ‘enough’ are perpetuated.
It’s no wonder bodies and land and hearts and minds are exhausted.
A neurodivergent approach to things strongly overlaps with the lived experience and practice of queering for me, and from what I can gather many other folks too. To be in fluid, nuanced emerging. Bringing awareness to this is a core part of my practice, particularly on challenging days, and today is a challenging day in the body and mind: to take a breath and find the connection and reassurance that there is safety and goodness around me.
It is often in states of stress that leaning into action mode feels most needed, however I am coming to sense where it is actually some form of rest that is needed. Yet, rest might not look like lying down. It might look like a walk, or a conversation with a trusted human where worries can be shared and halved, as the saying goes. Or it is distraction and a mental holiday, or it is saying no to things, or yes to things. It might look like people or solitude.
Bringing an active and curious practice of rest into my life through many years and hours of unravelling all of the things that were preventing, and still resist it, is not simply about self-care in the now heavily commercialised understanding of it. It feeds into my networks, community, friendships, relationships, work and connection with and from the other-than-human world. It is a key element in dialogues of care. Life is long, and simultaneously short (get that on an inspirational quote sticker) and as my old man used to say (because he was unwittingly dealing with a neuroD child) “it’s a marathon, not a sprint”. Pacing is important.
I also talk a bit in this voice note about stopping distances and what I witness in my experience of the in-between space between being active and resting… The often clunky place of trying to stop, not quite knowing what is needed and slowing down. It is clumsy and awkward, often ungraceful, but all part of the gear change.
*Please mentally insert a GIF of some ducks landing haphazardly on a frozen pond here, because I can’t find one.*
In warm, wintery solidarity,
KJ
Thank you for all those who have downloaded this offering already. I would love to hear how you’re getting on with it.
The 45-page ‘Seasons + Cycles’ workbook I recently brought together as a friend and guide to exploring our relationship to our inner and outer landscapes, to the more intuitive, wild and inherently natural parts of ourselves, is now available for download on my webshop.
A gathering of words and insights from far and wide. Writing and journal prompts for throughout the ancient Celtic wheel of the year, as we lead up to Winter Solstice.
Sliding scale: £5-£15
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