Reflecting on my 40th year! Explorations in ageing 🌺 // transcript to I Feel For You podcast episode 72

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Here’s to blooming!

You’re listening to I Feel For You and this is episode 72.

I’m Dionne a writer, installation artist, yoga, somatic movement + embodiment facilitator, dj, ….amongst other things. In short, i create events and experiences for the community to feel more space, more at home in their bodies and more free, using modalities like art, sound, vr, nature, writing and feelings.

First off, thank you so much for listening to, and supporting this podcast. Special shoutout to my Patreon Fam who help make this possible. Thank you.

And if anything resonates with you in this episode, please feel welcome to pass it on and perhaps even share it with a friend, maybe take a moment to like and review the show. It means so much and i’d really appreciate it!

Now onto today’s episode, which is based on is a piece i wrote 16th February 2021 and was reflecting on my 40th year, pondering why i get energised around my birthday, and wondering whether fear was motivating me. We talk about ageing today. And societal pressures as we grow older, and i share some insights gained from trauma-i mean “learning moments and experiences” i’ve had.. Lol.

I hope you’ll find it uplifting and hopeful episode.

With love and thanks for listening

From this 41 year old by the time you hear this!

Thanks for supporting the show!

I have one week left of being 40. And for some reason, i want to do everything. This is not new. This is my “normal” . Whatever normal is... I start to come alive before my birthday. It happens sometime in the first week of February, part-relief part-wow, did we really make it through winter?! The hints from nature in their blooms are like little kisses of encouragement. They are well received, as I reminisce on winters in Norway, where it could still be snowing in May...the audacity, darling!

I wonder, every year, why it is that I get energised around this time. Is it fear driving me to want to do all the projects, immediately? I meant that's my general excitable state tbh, but there’s an extra chug in my engine, propelling me to make and sign things off and launch (last year was the Bloom programme, for example, shoutout to those of you who joined, and the year before i can't remember but no doubt i went above and beyond and burned out after exhaling it into the ether...)

I have to be careful. The lofty dreams that have been harboured carefully in dozens of notebooks and refined over the years but sit, ready to be given to the world but wait, not just yet, because questions rattle out, like “who really needs this?” or “who’s even interested in it existing?!” or “oh i’ve left it too many years and now it’s too late, someone else has done it now and i wouldn’t ever want them to feel weird or like i’d copied them in any way”…. etc.

Am i scared of ageing?

I really examine this, extra sensitive to my bias as i was raised in a household that feared getting older. Dreaded it. I remember my mum turning 25 and her crying and my 8 year old eyes wide and confused, should i be crying on birthdays too?!

...funny to reflect too, on my own dread of making a “fuss” on a birthday over the years, prefering to slip into anonymity of the event. But it's not dread about age, it’s about not knowing what to do when people show they care, so freezing in disbelief as it must be a joke, surely?!

I’ve been really sad on (many) birthdays, particularly since moving to Norway i think. Editor’s note: i just pulled up this old post and i am, quite simply, a broken record, toot toot! (Smiling politely whilst resisting a howl, where i’m talking about this topic, except 10 years before. The loneliness cut so deep but also, you know, the bullying, racism, discrimination, poverty (Attitude/Gratitude), subsequent trauma + depression (Edging towards the light) and 8 months of winter…

And if you want a little snapshot into my life in Norway, I kept a blog when i was there, i couldn't be completely honest about everything that was going on...it was honest, but i couldn't talk about everything going on cause there was a LOT, darling. But if you’re interested, i’ve linked some posts above, that specifically touch on some of those things mentioned that i was moving through...it’s kind of sad to read them actually, feel a little bit of grief even thinking about it cause...yeah...i was all alone and….there wasn't really support you know?

Anyway.

Norway gave space for everything to come to a head. And since being in the UK, it’s been a long road of recovering from the trauma and learning to live with the wonkyness of an autoimmune disorder due to the subsequent stress of it all…

Cheers!

I don’t think i fear ageing.

I think my engine chug at this time of year is more about the fact i’m amazed i’m actually still alive.

It’s like, i wasn't supposed to make it this far, and so, this new lease of life, is a reminder of the excitement and privilege of ageing- and how we’re ever blossoming (please excuse the analogies). Even though, i realise, i’m constantly reminded by others on the perils of ageing. Mostly those younger, who look at me incredulously that i’m “that old?!” with that sneer which writes off anyone over 30. Bless.

30 is the “danger age”. I think we can all relate to that cant we? Whether we’ve been there or not yet? Particularly if you identify as a woman and are viewed through the heteronormative gaze of expectation.

And even if you don’t, messaging makes clear that youth is valued in the mechanisms that support the means of production, as seen in societals ridiculous pressure with 30 under 30 lists, heralding young millio-billionaires aspirational, and the consequential harm to those who are squeezed even further to the edges just a shrug and a “it’s every man for themselves”, and the rags to riches conditioning to shame those not born into money. This linear, capitalist, competitive, ageist, ableist, classist, transphobic, racist, sexist, “i’ll sleep when i’m dead”-disembodied, land-grabbing, land and body owning and extracting, supremacist roars from the colonial hymn sheet, are exhausting to behold and impossible not to bump up against.

Hi, it me and decolonisation is a process i expect to be untangling for the rest of my lifetime.

I think we can agree that much of the vibes here don’t feel excellent, but woy, is there opportunity here for other ways of being?

A

Pause

Imagine

That

...saw things i imagined....

Then, there’s the energetic soup of turning 30, the more subtle but-doesnt-feel-so-subtle saturn returns, which has been lighting your ass on fire the years before. I felt it too, moved countries (but tbh, this was happening around every 2 years anyway…) and starting again anew, again and again (as before). Not unusual in my lifetime.

But although something is “new”, it’s always continuous, right? I mean, if i can dare to squeeze a cheesy nugget of recognition that we are ever-spiraling (hopefully not always downward though!), loops and cycles revisit us sequentially, sometimes with a kiss on the forehead, others with a “you gon learn today” meme. Sometimes it’s simultaneous, others, an oscillation.

Cue meme:

And so it is with each year, if we measure it according to the Gregorian calendar. A year is a year. A day is a day. All valuable. We move. Lol. but really, we’re always in transition. At least, i hope to be in many ways. Growth. That’s what i mean. But hopefully not so much of that agonising growth for now, thanks.

I am amazed i've made it here. So many i’ve met along the road didn’t.

I relish ageing.

I think Ethel, my alter ago, is testimony to the respect and awe i have for growing older. The wisdom it gifts us (if we’re lucky at least, i don’t want to be riddled with shame and regret at all the mistakes that have made us and give opportunity for learning). And Ethel makes me hopeful of the glamour i might finally acquire someday as i age, a dollop of chintz and heel-click of pizzaz, darling. Mostly though, inhabiting this meat suit with as much grace and kindness and humility i can muster. And ever-learning and forgiving myself for my mistakes.

I am excited for 41. It’s not been the year i expected (was it for any of us?!) and i can’t bear to listen to the podcast i made this time last year (oh yeah, forgot i made that on my engine chug-charge too) recalling all the grand plans. But i’ll link it for you in case you want to lol @ me.

→ What do you (really) want? dreams for my 40th year 🍰 i feel for you podcast episode 40.

This was to be my 40th year. Where i, for once, allowed the pomp and fuss, in that i finally got to choose what i wanted to do with this day and year ahead. This was the moment after decades of grafting that i was making a long term dream happen, where i was to return to the Caribbean to live for part of the year. Finally find a place to call home on land stewarded by my ancestors. Treading and tending to the earth, my roots, giving my bottomless chakra a place to land. (sidenote: funny Human Design story from 2002 to insert here, but feels a bit niche so perhaps another day? Let me know if you’re interested?)

Also in my 40th year, our art installation ForRest was due be touring through various countries. As you might know, it opened in January 2020, and we were lucky enough to have it up for about a couple of months in Bryne, Norway, there’s a podcast about it here.

We were due to be touring it during the spring summer and autumn with lots of community workshops and exciting connected projects. A stint in LA for a project. Etc etc. You know, the stories, dreams, hopes and plans eh?

I guess it wasn't meant to be. It is what it is, as they say.

I was hoping to cultivate more intimacy in my relationships - practice the two-way flow. Signed up for an online womxn's circle cause i was too afraid to transfer my own irl ones to the digital realm and put my own out there for too many years (sidenote: i also still believe both things can co-exist simultaneously, that is, being a part of a womxn’s circle as well as run spaces, but i wanted to practice being in a space that i wasn’t holding for others as recognised how imbalanced things had become - again, my conditioning to serve and put others first before self, always, do you feel me?) That February of 2020, so hopeful, so full of promise.

Also in my 40th year, I’d promised myself to indulge in joy! Unbridled! And if you know me, one of my most joyful activities is roller skating. And i did just that to celebrate this 40th milestone (that is, after i realised after waiting 3 months for an invoice to be paid that i couldn’t actually make it to the Caribbean, which, i guess worked out for the best, i mean, i certainly would have been stuck there during all of this -waves into the ether of 2020 - but i try not to dwell too much on that either, cause the grief gallops up my throat in thinking that actually, it wouldn’t have been such a bad thing to have been “stuck” in the Caribbean…….. then i also remind myself, hey now, there really is no point in wondering what if, unless it’s inviting possibility to explore something. Less doting on what’s lost, cause it just is, so we stay present and hopefully not overwhelmed, knowhatimean?)

So, what have i learned in my 40th year?

I had to do a turn around the cramped flat to ponder this one. For i (still) don’t see “age” as linear. I mean, it’s nice to honour dates and things if that’s your bag. But i think you know i don’t see it as one day to recognise an age, it’s a whole (other) turn around the sun.

But for the sake of this exercise, i think i’ve learned to trust in my own pace of things. Even with things i’ve put off doing, through fear or worry it won’t be received. I think it’s easy to feel regret. Part of that capitalist drive to be immediate and effective and produce now now NOW!

I can see that what is meant for you is always for you. And i’m not talking about competitiveness here. That’s a good example though. I can see that i’ve always trusted and felt there is space for each of us, and believed that it’s possible to be in community with people where we lift each other up and all flourish. I am not claiming this is what i always experience, cause i’m often met by many as being provoking, a confrontational catalyst for them, and many times this has left me confused as, well, i’m just here minding my business and also rilly shy, but... it’s not even that... you know the stories i hear on how my presence seems to even offend people. “Presence” / “face” / whatever... I don’t even know what to do or say about that... I understand i want to have impact on this planet, but that also means that sometimes, i feel a brute force of weird competitive vibes which i’ve never understood. Cause i’m not in competition with anybody. But at my big age, i understand the insecurity of where their competitiveness might stem from. And my own insecurity in worrying i’ve done something to invite this. (and on that, i’ve learned i can’t control how people receive me).

And others insecurities that might play out as them, needing to show me their enoughness/ or meanness/ or assumptions that are self-serving and mean spirited or, simply plagiarism.

But i’ve also learned to not take these burns tooooo much to heart….

To manage my own energy and continue to strive to build and create spaces where i hope people can be more free, but also celebrate our connection with each other, respectful of our own journeys on this rock in space, together.

Because systems of oppression seek to divide and create competition, lack, unhappiness with our own lot. Dissatisfaction with ourselves. Worry about age. Ranking of people. Superiority of some, lack in others. Othering.

What a sadness!

But i’ve always been about that liberation energy baybee! Not saying that in a way that makes me “done” at all - rather, chatting to my 5 year old self who always knew and felt what it was. I know and believe unification is a stronger force and taking care of each other (whilst celebrating our diversity) is very healing.

And sometimes, you need to remove yourself. From situations, places, people, relationships...in order to preserve your own energy. But i am also learning we can’t do everything, alone.

I am still stumbling and falling here.

And still hiding, but trying to do that less. Recognising the full-circle moments in understanding this behaviour and where it came from. Holding space for the seeds of survival and coping mechanisms baby Dionne adopted. She did what she had to do.

I’m surrendering.

To it all.

After decades of living hand to mouth as someone close to me once scorned, this was finally a year i could plan and be where i wanted to physically - back in the Caribbean. This, i realise, was not my path - hah! And so, to be as present as possible with what’s here, now. To be grateful for the internets and connection and community i can feel through this ether. To be grateful for the roof overhead, rather than wishing constantly i was somewhere else (i try to do it less, but also allow myself the odd grumble whine and “i hate it here!” because loves, this island……………. ANYWAY!)

Hah.

HELP!

I am ever working on it. This human experience.

And i’m grateful for you. Reading, listening, seeing. And not expecting a neat bow to tie all this up with, lol.

Ok ok i will.

What have i learned?

I’m still learning, and hope to long continue!

Oh and i started a new blog because it’s just who i am and my Gemini moon told me so, so if you like to rummage, feel welcome to meet me there.

I’ve also got links to some old blog posts mentioned earlier, and all references i made earlier in the shownotes.

And again, a reminder that on my birthday, i’m going to be launching the BLOOM spring workshops, so if you’ve always wanted to come and join me in Norway for these (i’ve been running them for a number of years now) but not been able to cause of flights / distance etc, i’m moving them online! I know, i didn’t expect that to happen but, here we are, we move!

So if you want to join, do check out the shownotes where i will link you to all the deets and i really hope you can make it.

It’s going to be a vibe, a kind of mini-retreat and happening over the spring equinox weekend - 19th, 20th and 21st March 2021. So, i really hope you can join. If the timezone doesn’t work out, there’s replays available. I’ve also tried to plan so that there’s hopefully something for everybody there.

And i’m really excited so i look forward to us continuing to bloom together, always - oh that was so cheesy and i didn’t mean that to come out but - you know! Here’s to blooming!

What’s that quote about a flower? A flower doesn’t compete with the flower growing next to it, it just blooms regardless or some sh*t like that but you know - lolz- MAY WE ALL BLOOM, FOR GOODNESS SAKES! I’m sending so much love and appreciation