Active Hope - Day 26

26th December 2018 (Boxing Day)

26 miles is the approximate distance of a marathon. Originally, from 1896 to 1908,
the distance was 25 miles (the same as that run by the legendary Greek soldier Pheidippides
when he from the Battle of Marathon to Athens to deliver news of a Greek victory, after which
he collapsed and died). The marathon distance only became 26.2 miles during the 1908 London
Olympics. Queen Alexandra requested that the distance was adjusted so the royal household
could see the race from Windsor Castle.

I over indulged yesterday and was over indulged. however, it was wonderful to spend time with the family. Today I am planning to take things quietly and spend time appreciating the gifts I have been given. I have been very spoiled but I am very grateful. 

Siobhan Sheridan is the Civilian HR Director at the UK Ministry of Defence. When I first made her acquaintance she was the Director of People and OD at the UK charity the NSPCC. Siobhan's career started in a customer facing role within financial services; it was clear that she had a flair for understanding and developing rapport with people. On joining the consumer lending business Capital One, her talents were acknowledged and she moved into HR, initially via training and development (she headed up the UK-based Corporate University), before eventually becoming HR Director for the Cards business. Siobhán moved out of London earlier this year and now lives on the coast in a stunning house with the most beautiful views of the sea. She is a popular public speaker (renowned for her pragmatic attitude and passion for doing the right thing). She is also a valued contributor on Social Media - her Twitter handle is @SiobhanHRSheri. 

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There have been two regular features of my Christmas these last few years. One of them is this series of Advent Blogs, the other is the time that I spend with thousands of others volunteering for Crisis at Christmas.

Arriving at Charing Cross Station in the mornings and walking along Whitehall towards the office I pass too many curled up bodies resting on crumpled cardboard, sheltering in doorways from the cold night air.  It breaks my heart to see the Big Issue seller with yet another set of new bruises and to hear the tale of the guy whose sleeping bag was set light the night before. 

As I pull my coat more closely around me I know that the chill I feel is not entirely about the temperature outside, but more from a sense of overwhelming despair about how some of the world's problems can ever be solved.

Joanna Macy says that

 ‘Grace happens when we act with others on behalf of our world.’ 

And I guess that is what I see at Crisis every year. People caring enough to act. Just a one example of that is a woman I will call Karen who volunteered for the first time about three years ago.

The first evening in a Crisis centre is a whirlwind rush of so many things. Guests are welcomed to a centre where they can eat, shower, get their clothes mended, see doctors and dentists, access the internet, make a call to a loved one, find a bed for the night. Each centre is run by a group of volunteers whose day jobs probably ill-prepare them for what they find themselves doing. Spending time talking with the guests is something we encourage all our volunteers to do, because many of our guest spend their days being ignored, avoided, or worse. Talking to them is one of the most important things that we do.

During the rush of that first evening I passed Karen a few times, as she sat quietly knitting and chatting to guests. 

There was something deeply calming about her presence and her focus and I found that I slowed a little every time I passed her. Later that evening I saw her talking to a young couple by the front door who were sleeping on the streets and scared to come in. Over the course of an hour she patiently coaxed them into the centre to eat, and later I spied her persuading the woman towards the showers. She came back half an hour later clearly delighted to be clean for ‘my man.’ And I watched somewhat hopelessly as the woman and her partner went off again into the night, saying they felt safer together on the streets than they would in a shelter they didn’t know.

Returning the following evening Karen asked if I would mind if she went to see if she could find the woman again, she’d been told by another volunteer that the woman had been seen earlier in the centre very angry and upset. Karen wanted to find out why. When she found her the woman explained that she had been sleeping on the streets for so long that her long dark hair had become thickly matted from tying it in elastic bands and chronic lack of care. There was a huge ball of knotted, matted hair at the nape of her neck, so thick and tight that when she tried to lay down to sleep it hurt her head. As a result, even when she could get to sleep she was frequently woken by the pain. It was clear she was in a lot of distress. After her shower of the evening before she had started to feel hopeful that perhaps the hairdresser might be able to help her. She was angry because she had been told that all they could do was to shave her hair off. Having her head shaved she said would make her feel even more ashamed than she already did. She was inconsolable, her hopes completely dashed.

Every single one of us I think has a reason for volunteering. Something that caused us to make the decision to do so. In talking with Karen about what her reason was she shared with me that she had lost her adult son in a car accident a year or so before. A proud, strong, elegant woman, she spoke of her loss gently and with just the faintest glisten of a tear in her eye.  

Her heartache was very present but so too was her warmth, her openness and her compassion.  

Over the course of the next few days I watch Karen sit with the woman and her partner for hours. She talked with them about their plans for the New Year, helped them get advice,  laughed with them, ate with them. And throughout all of that she combed. For hours and hours she gently teased, combed, untangled and snipped the woman’s hair. For three afternoons and evenings Karen worked with the patience that perhaps only a parent who has lost their own child could summon. 

On the last evening, they walked hand in hand to the hair salon again, where the woman was treated to her first proper haircut in many years. Beautifully blow dried she turned to the Karen and I watched as first they high-fived, and then giggling like teenagers collapsed into a huge tangle of a hug.

As the woman left that last evening Karen and I both said good bye to her and her partner. We never say ‘see you next year’ because we hope, that we won’t. And I’ve never seen them again. Karen returns every year and continues to channel her amazing compassion and patience into heartbreak, hope and high fives.

So, as I contemplate the start of Crisis again this year I hope, somewhat strangely perhaps, that my heart will be broken every day. Because as the poet David Whyte says:

‘Heartbreak is our indication of sincerity…..it may be the very essence of being human, or being on the journey from here to there, and of coming to care deeply for what we find along the way.’

I am lucky enough to care deeply about the work that I do both in my day job and my volunteering and am blessed to be surrounded by many other colleagues who do too. They make me want to do better every day because they deserve the best that I can possibly be. Crisis acts as a special reminder to me though every year.Whilst it is about finding homes for others I always notice that it helps me to come home to myself too. To remember some of the qualities that I want to strive to bring into my life and work every day.

‘The heart is the inner face of your life. The human journey strives to make this inner face beautiful. It is here that loves gathers within you. Love is absolutely vital for human life. For love alone can awaken what is divine within you. In love, you grow and come home to your self. When you learn to love and let yourself be loved, you come home to the hearth of your own spirit. You are warm and sheltered.’

                                                                                                                              John O’Donohue

Crisis also leaves me constantly amazed by just what we can achieve as human beings when we set our mind to do so. And each year it leaves me with a heart full of hope that we have everything we need to deal with the many challenges that our world faces today. We just need to crack on, and act on that hope, regardless of what others might say.

So I’d like to leave you with some of Joanna Macys words about Active Hope and to wish you all adventures in the New Year.

‘Active Hope is not wishful thinking.

Active hope is not waiting to be rescued by some savior

Active hope is waking up to the beauty of life

On whose behalf we can act.

We belong to this world.

The web of life is calling us forward at this time.

We’ve come a long way and are here to play our part.

With Active Hope we realise there are adventures in store,

Strengths to discover, and comrades to link arms with.

Active Hope is a readiness to discover the strengths

In ourselves and in others;

A readiness to discover the size and strength of our hearts

Our quickness of mind, our steadiness of purpose,

Our own authority, our love for life,

The liveliness of our curiosity

The unsuspected deep well of patience and diligence,

The keenness of our senses, and our capacity to lead.

None of these can be discovered in an armchair or without risk.

                                                     

                                                                                          Joanna Macey, Active Hope

Day 13 - Christmas Comet Fragments

Day 13 (Sunday 13th December 2015)

13 stripes on the flag of the United States of America represent the 13 original British colonies
that declared independence from Great Britain and became the first states of the Union.
The American flag has been modified officially 26 times since 1777, most recently in July 1960
when it gained its 50th star. The stars represent the current states in the Union.
Above illustration shows some of the forms of the flag over the years.

Today's festive and love-filled post is by the ever popular Mat Davies. Mat is a highly respected international HR Director, a proud Welshman and a valued friend/colleague. He is passionate about music, rugby, books, technology and connecting. You can follow him on Twitter (his handle is @RafaDavies). You can get a feel for the subjects that matter to him within the work environment from his Somewhere posts or else catch up with him at a Tweet-up.

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Are you hanging up your stocking on the wall? I’m fairly certain that you know that this is the time when every Santa has a ball. So here it is, Merry Christmas, everybody is having fun, looking to the future now it’s only just begun. Christmas. I love it. The older, but not necessarily wiser, that I have got, I’ve learned to cherish this time; not just the day itself but the anticipation of the day; the reflection that Boxing Day  brings; the days between Christmas and the New Year where days seem to go on for ever. Christmas, though, is all about the love.

I love the smell of my mother’s kitchen on Christmas Eve, the roasting turkey, the perfumed scent of peeled satsumas and earthy joy of cracked Brazil nuts; I love how TIDY her home is and how everything is dusted to within an inch of its life because you never know who’s going to come round now, do you? I love the whispered opening of a bottle of something red and mellifluous; the Christmas eve gathering with our best friends in the cricket club to sing carols really badly but not really care; to re-tell jokes and play schoolyard pranks like we’re sixteen again; the embarrassed recognition that you’ve drifted into talking about house prices and kids in schools rather than your records and films of the year which you quickly deal with because your aren’t that old or that boring; the faint recognition that sat across the room is your old English teacher isn’t it? And then you recognise that, no, that’s your actual class mate, someone you once snogged at the school disco- Lisa? Claire? Sarah, it was Sarah. An embarrassed smile and an acknowledgement of each other’s presence and then a quick retreat to the discussion of how hard it has been to buy stuff this year, much harder than last year and collective agreement of how spoiled kids are these days compared to when you were a child. You were delighted to get a Terry’s chocolate orange - if you were lucky - 

and you were happier playing with the cardboard box that the toy came in as opposed to the toy itself and did you see the price of that Star Wars game? I know, but I got a great deal at the Big Tesco’s- always go to the BIG Tesco’s. I love the cheeky round of a spirit that you never ever drink - but, well, it’s Christmas isn’t it?- and marvelling at the shape of the bottle and the label and wondering what it’s doing to your insides but it’s Christmas isn’t it? You’ll be fine in the morning, honest.

I love the walk home from the club and the fond late night farewells and have-a-great-day-tomorrows, fuelled by drink and nostalgia and bonhomie. I love the late night whisky back at home and the repeat of Carols from Kings and Jimmy Stewart reminding us of why it’s still a wonderful life and listening to the silence descend in the street; reflecting on which kids are going to get a bike from Santa because a bike is just the best present, isn’t it? Yes, yes it is. I love getting into bed and feeling that warm glow of love and togetherness. And Mam, you better have put my stocking up, just in case Santa comes, because although I know he probably doesn’t exist a little bit of me would like to think that he did.

I love waking early in the morning, when the rest of the house is asleep and the acute stillness makes it feel like the rest of the world is asleep; I love those quiet few pregnant moments of reflection of how we’ve come to another Christmas Day and just about survived ; I love hot tea and toast and putting on the radio and agreeing wholeheartedly with Roy Wood’s Wizzard about the wish for it to be Christmas every day and then, as always, wondering just how underrated Slade were, as Noddy Holder and co bellow in my ear.

I love the tearing of wrapping paper; the imaginary dusting off of the dust jacket on a brand new book as if it were a relic from Raiders of the Lost Ark; the arrival of my brother as if some returning boxing legend to the ring - I have arrived you may now commence the festivities; the unspoken acknowledgement that we probably won’t buy sprouts next year, knowing full well that we will, even though no one likes them; the debate about whether or not it’s white or red with the festive bird, but not really caring too much after the first glass or two; 

the remembrance of friends and families who can’t join the festive throng; of grandparents and cousins and uncles and crazy, white-wine-fuelled aunts with too much make-up and too much gossip about Diane and the affair with postman or was it the police officer; no, the postman, that’s him; the strict adherence to watching the Queen’s message to the Commonwealth, even though it gets trailed days in advance and you still cannot recall a single word of it an hour later but still, it’s HER MAJESTY.

I love the swapping of the presents and the sheer joy of finding the one that they really wanted and watching the gritted teeth of these ones that, you shouldn’t have (no, really, you shouldn’t have); I love the walk after lunch - and you’re hoping for a cold winter’s day but it’s drizzle raining again and you’ve got on the jumper that you will never wear again and you’re back home for a cuppa saying Merry Christmas to the neighbour you haven’t really spoken to for a year but wondering how the kids were doing in school and, they can’t already be doing their GCSEs already can they?

I love the Christmas TV specials, the Christmas ghost stories, the repeats of Dickens but, like every year, there’s simply NOTHING on TV, although you never switch it off and is this the 1984 Top of the Pops ? - how young does Paul Young look?; wondering whether the BBC’s Huw Edwards has drawn the short straw and gets to do the news broadcast and wondering whether he can get home to Llanelli to see his mam; which of the holiday companies will be the first to get their advert in, imploring you to book a villa in the sun whilst you’re gorging on After Eight mints and Cadbury’s Heroes; laying casual side bets about how long it will take for the arguments to start in EastEnders and falling asleep before it even starts.

I love that we have cold turkey sandwiches with pickles and cheese; to pretend to be Victorian families by decanting the port, even though we don’t have a port decanter but, it’s Christmas isn’t it? I love that for a small moment there very genuinely is peace and goodwill to all on the day that seems to last forever but doesn’t ever last long enough. 

Merry Christmas.