February and Forward.

 So we’ve made it into February, which I always see as completing the first great hurdle of the year. My January has been hard. Much harder than I ever thought possible. A lot of personal introspection and hopefully reformation, and some fundamental changes to how I live my life. All on a very personal level, so not something to divulge here, but so many friends have come into their own as I have worked my way through the month

Sometimes it’s easy to forget how long one has known someone, and there is nothing like a crisis to throw a long friendship into perspective. Their love for me, and their words of guidance have been an enormous wall of support for which I am immensely grateful.

I accomplished the transition into February at a health spa. While I’m a big fan of a spa day, I’ve never done a full week’s detox course. So it was that last Sunday afternoon, Richard dropped me off in the wilds of Northamptonshire for just that very thing.

We had lunch at the village pub just before that. Roast beef from a brilliant carvery and sticky toffee pudding and custard. “The condemned man ate a hearty meal”

After being weighed in and shown to a rather luxurious room, it was time to explore. A fabulous spa for treatments, as well as a busy hour by hour timetable for the five days.

Juice was served, and then, we were left to our own devices.

Dinner was a tentative get to know you session over our first bowl of soup. Some people were spa veterans who knew the system inside out. Others, including a member of the nobility, a psychotherapist ,and a CEO, were, like me, spa virgins.

Just as with the British on holiday, lack of sleep and bowel movements became the major subject of conversation. Early morning Nordic walks followed by aerobic Bums and Tums sessions. Brilliant food masterclasses with tempting raw food creations and a tiny sample to follow. Cashew mayonnaise coleslaw will long be my favourite.

During the week, they rubbed me, sprayed me, pummelled, irrigated, and healed me, with varying degrees of success. Some treatments left me feeling heavenly, and others brought my full Yorkshire scepticism to the fore, but I persevered.

I fell asleep in yoga, and couldn’t face the documentary film on protein and meat eating, but I battled bravely on a juice only diet for three days. The last day brought the bonus of a little light food, but as lunch resembled the contents of the colonic irrigation I had just endured, I ate little - though it was delicious with one’s eyes closed.

Today was check out and weigh out and to my immense surprise, I had lost eleven pounds. Many more pounds may have already been lost to enable the week to take place, but I felt good.

The bonus of spending a week in this rural hideaway, rarely leaving a tracksuit or dressing gown, and being very strict about whose phone calls I took, was a very clear head.

The fog of an emotional January has cleared, and while I may not have worked out the way forward, I am certain of a few more things in life. 

Over dinner a week ago, a friend told me she marvelled at all the things I had achieved and yet she could still see the boy inside who felt that he just wasn’t good enough. It was a perceptive judgement coming from forty years of friendship. She was right..

Today I felt good enough. Not better, but good enough and knowing that what I am is enough. There are eleven pounds less of me, and I’m not sure how long that will last. I won’t be turning plant based soon , but just as I have a new awareness of my diet and its needs, so I feel stronger in myself.

I know I love the man who has given me twenty-five years of his life, and whatever is thrown at us, I will work hard to keep that magic. I also know that it’s not wrong to put myself first. That doesn’t mean a lack of generosity, something I have always enjoyed, often to my cost. It just means acknowledging what makes me feel good and looking for it in my everyday life.

It’s what we all have to do in these precarious times, and for those of us in a demanding and often unrewarding profession.

Find the little joys and seize them. Reading a play, watching a favourite film again curled up on a sofa. Giving something to help someone on a project. 

I know how lucky I am to have been able to do these last five days. How lucky I am to afford it, and how lucky I am to be surrounded by a partner and staunch friends who love me.

I also know that luck doesn’t come from sitting around waiting to be struck by it like a bolt of lightning.

Thomas Jefferson said, “The harder I work, the luckier I get.”

This year I’m going to work very hard indeed.