“You’re beautiful just as you are; keep going”

/ sarahlissyjenkins / Leave a comment

If you had a time machine and could send just one message to your past self, what would it say?

I was not a happy child most of the time, although I had glimpses of joy through writing stories, spending time with my mum, being in nature, and my faith in God. I was bullied at home and school and was deeply, painfully lonely much of the time. I had very low self-esteem and severe social anxiety. I spent break times at school hiding in a toilet cubicle due to the shame of having no friends. Although, as it turned out, I had more friends than I realised. To this day I’ve kept in touch with one female friend who isn’t in touch with any other female classmates but me. And some years after I left school I met up with a guy from my year group who had always liked me. I finally realised I hadn’t been as alone and disliked as I thought I was.

But the child and young teen lived through despair and grief and fear, believing she was worthless and alone. I want her to know she is not only okay but beautiful. I need her to keep going and trusting everything will turn out okay. School will end and she will find her tribe. She will thrive. She will meet some wonderful people and build better relationships with her family. Most of all, she will grow into herself. She will become her own person. She will have many tough experiences but they will mould her into who she was meant to be. She won’t be defined by school or her upbringing. She is worth so much more.

I also want her to know that despite the pain of those younger years, in some ways I wish I could return to the 1980s and 1990s and appreciate them for what they were; freedom from smartphones, freedom from climate worries, freedom from adulting.  The young me had so much freedom. She loved nature and spent many hours down a field near her home. There were nowhere near as many cars so I used to skateboard down roads or play with my marbles or kerbsie with a football. They were innocent times where glimpses of joy bubbled up despite the undercurrent of loneliness. Now in my late 40s, I think about them often and wish I could go back. Not to relive my childhood,  but to experience those years again in some different way. I don’t know. Youth is wasted on the young, as they say.

Adulthood can feel heavy, but then so did my childhood. Maybe the answer isn’t in longing for times past but in finding the freedom that exists within me right now.  And that is a freedom that cannot be understood by thought.  It is a soft, gentle, intuitive sense that everything is truly okay, even if it isn’t okay.  I am beautiful.  I am okay. I am free. That’s what the child part of me needed to know back then. And it’s what the adult me needs to know now.

Missing you Zoey

/ sarahlissyjenkins / 5 Comments

Share a photo of your pet and tell us one thing that makes them uniquely them.

My one and only dog Zoey passed away on February 20th this year and my heart still aches for her. She was the most wonderful companion anyone could want. She was easygoing by nature so nothing really bothered her. When I introduced my mum’s cat to our household Zoey couldn’t have cared less. In fact I could have placed various rabbits or mice around our home and I can absolutely promise you Zoey would have just eyed them from the sofa with disinterest. All that mattered to her was me and our daily routine of food and walkies. That was it. She hated being apart from me. When I went out she sat by the window (or, as she got older, on the floor looking up at the window) until she heard me return, when she would rush to the front door and greet me with uninhibited excitement. As she got older this became more muted, as she didn’t have the energy anymore.

I miss you Zoey. You were such a placid, calm, easygoing yet stubborn little thing who knew your own mind and how to make your wishes clear. You took me for a walk, not the other way around. You knew where you wanted to go. I miss our routine. I miss going to the shop with you to get treats. I miss not having you follow me around indoors. I miss your gentleness, your love. I miss everything about you.

May your light still shine as bright as it always did. RIP Zoey 💔💫

A beautiful disused cemetery

/ sarahlissyjenkins / 6 Comments

I went for a wander around a beautiful disused cemetery not far from me. Apart from monthly tours set up by the organisation keen to preserve the area and its history, as well as being a convenient area for dog walkers, the cemetery stands mostly forgotten, with the final burial dated decades ago. None of the graves appear to be attended by anyone, with overgrown blackberry bushes and thorns covering the once carefully laid memorials. As sobering as it was to remember that one day most of us will be forgotten to future generations, to me the real beauty lay in seeing the wildness of nature reclaiming its ground. It was pure, touched, raw; a poignant mix of human love and nature’s handiwork merging as one, providing a home to a multitude of wildlife; squirrels, bees, birds, butterflies, crickets. Who doesn’t love the gentle summer chorus of millions of crickets who can rarely be seen no matter how hard you search for them? It feels a less frequent sound these days, but equally more of a gift. As I pushed away overgrown bushes blocking the little pathways, I couldn’t resist picking a few blackberries to eat, not caring if I accidentally swallowed an insect or two. I didn’t care as a child, and I didn’t care now.

I sat on the old wooden bench that was thoughtfully placed the other side of the cemetery and took in the stretches of sunburned grass, the Sun shining through the nearby trees and plants, the wood pigeons that occasionally flew overhead, the hum of the crickets, and remembered the joy of playing down ‘the field’ as it was known when I was young; the countryside that began at the back of the old dump of a housing estate in which I lived and stretched for miles, over a stream and across a railway line. We did live dangerously and it would horrify many parents now, but we felt free. As long as we were back by dark, no one worried about us. We jumped over the little racing stream, built dens out of fallen tree trunks, picked blackberries… The countryside was in our hearts.

I felt tearful as I sat in the cemetery surrounded by the people buried here, wondering about their lives, their joys and their sorrows, their remains now contributing to the beauty of the place and allowing it to flourish. People who were perhaps more deeply connected to the wildness of their souls than many are in today’s modern world. The cemetery must stay a place that reminds us of what many have disconnected from: the natural world, the cycle of life and death, the eternal Being within everything. Every cricket, every bee, every blackberry, every bird, and every person who walked here; it’s part of the same Soul.

I am grateful that as a child I knew this intuitively, and I am grateful to be reminded so viscerally again in this beautiful place.

On the edge of the River Thames

/ sarahlissyjenkins / 6 Comments

I wonder if anyone can place where this was? I travelled last week for another purpose but it was a lovely bonus to spend some time in this beautiful village on the banks of the Thames. The gorgeous summer sunshine we’re having had taken temporary respite but it was still pleasantly warm. My friend and I enjoyed sitting in a nearby park eating refreshments and watching children playing and people walking their dogs. Naturally I couldn’t take my eyes off the dogs. UK viewers may see the area in an upcoming TV show: there was a film crew by the river when my friend when back later, though unfortunately he didn’t get a photo!

The last photo might be a big clue for anyone who knows the area.

Blessed

/ sarahlissyjenkins / 5 Comments

Who can tell I live in a typical British seaside town?!

Honestly, I love it. And today, as I scooted along the coastline on a pleasantly warm summer’s day, I loved it even more. The beach was quiet and peaceful and the ocean was sparkling. Along the promenade, people walked, cycled, scooted, or sat on benches. Others sat outside a nearby cafe situated slightly above the shoreline, overlooking the pebbles. A number of seagulls were watching from the beach, hopeful for a bit of ice cream cone, or maybe a chip or even some fish, if they were lucky. And miles out to sea were the wind turbines.

It was a typical Monday lunchtime really. The town was bustling nearby (which I am glad about, as town centres are definitely on the decline now sadly, thanks to the rise of online shopping) with people doing their usual business; working, banking, shopping, eating.

I felt so much peace in my heart. I felt content. I felt happy.

It was absolutely perfect. I felt blessed to be there, in that moment, riding along the promenade with the ocean to my right, gazing at the sparkling sunlight on the water and feeling the joy of being alive to experience it.

The meaning of true peace

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At a meditation group last night we explored what we mean by ‘peace’ and whether it’s something we’re trying to find/become, or something that we already are. More interestingly, for me at least, we talked about what we mean when we say we’re not at peace. The question seemed to be: is it possible to be at peace when we are in the midst of a chaotic situation or an intense emotion such as anger or grief?

Of course from my spiritual understanding I will always say yes, absolutely, peace is always here and yes, it is possible to feel at peace even while in pain, but the current invitation is for me to really know that in a heart-centred, experiential way, not just believing it.

Peace feels like being at the centre of a spinning wheel, much like the wheel of karma, whereby life goes around and around, bringing with it various thoughts and emotions and situations and chaos, but in essence I am not touched by it. My awareness sees it all but remains still and clear and pure, like the depth of a lake, no matter what is going on on the surface. It is the part of me that is unchanged even though life in all its forms is temporary and always changing.

However, my meditation teacher suggested that only being the witness of our experience may also keep us removed from it. He asked whether there is peace to be found in being with ALL our experience, and if so, what this may mean.

I realised that when I am in the midst of an emotion such as anger or grief, generally I am not at peace because I do not want to be feeling it. Nor do I want the situation that has triggered it to have happened or be happening.

In short, I am resisting life as it is.

On the one hand, this is a bit annoying. It feels natural to resist what is painful or difficult. Why on earth would it be otherwise?

This is where I think Eckhart Tolle’s teachings strike gold, at least for me.

He talks about accepting life, without resistance. He says, in his comic wisdom:

‘You may as well.’

His teachings centre around the notion that life is simply the way it is and being present with what’s happening is what allows us to feel the peace that is always available.

But it isn’t easy.

Years along my spiritual journey and I still find myself resisting what comes up. So much so that I wondered if it’s just part of being human and the whole dance of living in this world and that trying to make it otherwise is futile.

My meditation teacher had a point to make that may be relevant to this, at least in my mind.

A close follower of Adyashanti, he suggests that the ‘I’ is the real barrier to peace. In order to experience true peace, the sense of being ‘I’ needs to be surrendered. Rather than being a person having an experience, there is simply the experience itself, without anyone there to object or cling to it.

This is how it may be possible to feel at peace no matter what is happening.

But I wonder how realistic this is?

When I’m feeling grief, I’m very aware that my mind wants to identify with it and make the emotion into a narrative about my entire life. This fuels the sadness I’m already feeling and worsens my suffering. Conversely, in moments when I let the tears flow without attaching any thoughts to them, the sadness passes and I reach a more stable place. I suppose one could say I’m at peace with the emotion because I’m not resisting it or making something else out of it.

Thus, peace is in letting go of thoughts and being with the experience in the moment.

However, thoughts will often come, including ‘I’ thoughts; I think the key here is not to try to resist or judge anything. Just let it all pass. In my experience, being the witness has immense value, as long as it’s not used as a way of avoiding anything, as that becomes another form of resistance. Witnessing my experience reminds me that I am the centre of my wheel where peace always exists, but at the same time I can be with everything on the outside, feeling or experiencing it fully, all the while knowing the centre of the wheel is my true essence which always at peace, always whole, and connected to all life.

So, whether there is an ‘I’ or not, doesn’t really need to be an issue, plus I think that part of the spiritual journey is to have that sense of ‘I’, at least for a time. The Divine wouldn’t have created things that way if it wasn’t meant to be part of the dance.

Any true spirituality needs to allow for the fact the human experience can be bloody painful and awful and traumatic. And that this is the case no matter what we do or what teachings we follow.

Maybe it’s possible to embrace all of it and still feel the peace within.

But if we can’t or don’t want to, that’s okay too.

A slice of midlife

/ sarahlissyjenkins / 4 Comments

I wanted to write a post to say hi to anyone reading and to say I haven’t forgotten about my blog. I’ve been meaning to update it for ages but I haven’t had the inclination. I’m writing everyday but in private journals and an app purely for my own purposes, as a way to shift through some deeper feelings and experiences. Also, I wanted to write without expecting or needing any kind of external validation. Not that I think external validation is wrong; it often provides a much needed and deserved emotional boost for the writing process. I just needed space to be my own witness. But at the same time I want and need to put myself into the world again and reconnect with other bloggers.

It’s a very strange time of my life and if I had to describe it in one word I would have to use ’empty’: Both parents have died, my dog has died, my cat is elderly and probably doesn’t have long, my disabled adult son is settled and happy and doesn’t need me very much anymore, ;plus on top of all that my health is not the best, not helped by perimenopause and other issues. The previous 40 plus years of my life were certainly not easy but they were full, demanding, outward focused, always giving a lot to myself to others, especially my son but also my parents and my animals. Looking back, I never really stopped because I couldn’t. At times I was so physically and mentally exhausted I could barely get out of bed or sit on a scooter to take my dog out. I had spent years before that trying desperately to cope with my son and to make myself heard to various people so that his needs were properly met. Eventually they were, although that was more to do with circumstances than my effort in the end, which is fine (just a relief). For the first time in my life I’m not trying to be anything for anyone. I only have my beloved cat to worry about and sadly that’s unlikely to be for long. My health has put paid to much work for the time being although it’s a goal to get back to doing more. I have a few friends but few deep connections. It’s a time to focus on me and who I am when all else is said and done. And so lately I’ve been simply sitting with myself and wondering who, what, how…

Midlife is an invitation to go within. It asks who I really am underneath the roles and identities I cultivated in my youth. It asks what is important to me now. It reminds me of my mortality. It encourages me to look at what really matters. I feel bare, raw, exposed, as well as empty, but this is only because I’m habitually searching for fullness in the things and people I previously found some level of meaning in, but those have now been taken away. Of course, I am very aware that everything is temporary and who I really am could never be found in the world anyway, but it’s one thing knowing that and quite another to viscerally experience it! Despite having a deep sense of my inner being, I was often defining myself even in small ways through interactions with others. My parents, who loved me as much as they could, naturally had expectations of me and I was very aware of slotting into a role while seeing or even messaging them. Becoming an adult orphan, especially in midlife, also seems to ask who I am or need to be without their physical presence or role in my life.

So this is where I’m at. I’m drawing closely on my spiritual awareness and realising that the so-called ’emptiness’ of midlife invites me into a deeper state where there is grief, yes, but also freedom and potential for experiencing a new way of living that goes beyond all prior identities that were formed from conditioning and attachments. I don’t know what that will look like yet. I don’t know what it may call me to do. I don’t know if my health will improve, worsen, or stay the same. Currently I’m sitting with the rubble of the old and trusting that the path will become clear when it’s meant to.

My personal winter

/ sarahlissyjenkins / 7 Comments

I seem to be in a long period of personal winter, and while spring is showing signs of emerging outside my window, the same can’t be said for my internal landscape. By ‘winter’ I don’t mean I’m depressed, although I’m certainly grieving, mainly for my dog Zoey who died on 20th February, but also for parts of myself that have been or are in the process of being stripped away. On a physical level, I’m exhausted and often emotional; sleep is better but can be tricky due to having a very demanding cat who is probably grieving in her own way since the loss of Zoey. It’s a strange and uncertain time for both of us.

No, by ‘winter’ I mean a period of intense silence, of apparent nothingless, of death. 2025 demanded a lot of me and this year looks set to do the same. Two good long term friends dropped off the radar for very different reasons and I still feel the loss. Another very close relationship brought challenges and a lot of sadness to navigate, especially as so much of my sense of self was invested in it. My health worsened a lot from last summer and while I have improved I’m certainly not back to how I was. And now 2026 has brought perhaps the greatest challenge yet: the loss of my long term faithful companion Zoey.

I’m aware this is a transition and it feels like a death because in many ways it is. Not a literal death of the physical body, but the death of the identities I was attached to without even realising it. I’m being called to find out who I am without them and this means peeling away those sticky identities and opening to a new way of being. It’s letting go and surrendering into the flow of life rather than looking back at the past. Grieving is natural and I will never forget Zoey, just as I will never forget my dear departed parents or even the friends I’ve lost for various reasons, and I don’t have to. I know that grief becomes the rite of passage that cannot be bypassed because it invites us to remember who we really are when all’s been and gone. It cuts to the quick and leaves us raw, vulnerable, and naked.

Not surprisingly, this process has involved a lot of resisting and suffering. Some people call this a dark night of the soul for good reason. I haven’t always wanted to let go or let myself grieve for the parts of me or the persons that I have lost. I have clung to old patterns and ways of being even when they’re hurting me. That’s being human in a nutshell. No wonder it often takes a dramatic loss or tragic event to pull the blinkers from our eyes and show us there’s another way. And even then we often won’t go there. We refuse to listen or think we know better. That’s okay! Being gentle with ourselves is the key because we are all on the same path and here to learn.

In this period of my life I’m surrendering to the grief, but it is a process. It takes time. Paradoxically, it takes no time at all. Everything I am is right here. And yet, time is needed to strip away what I’m not and grieve for that. There’s a kind of push-pull and I have little motivation for anything. This is what I mean by ‘winter’ and what I know is being prepared within and for me, even though I can’t see or feel it. It has taken me a lot to write this blog post and yet it felt like something I needed to do because it’s from a deeper motivation that is trying to come forth. Plus I’m still human and connection is very important during these times.

I trust that life will take me where I need to be. I am part of the flow. Nothing real ever dies.

A dark night of grief

/ sarahlissyjenkins / 16 Comments

It’s been a long time since I updated my blog and I apologise to anyone who may have wondered where I was. I’ve been through another extended version of the ‘dark night of the soul’ and I needed to withdraw to focus on exploring deeply who ‘I am’ when all’s said and done. A long period of worsening health ensued, followed by the deterioration of my dog’s health and subsequent death ten days ago. It has been a very painful time and although I’ve had moments of wanting to write again, I felt I had very little to give. I still feel that way but I’ve realised that perhaps I need to write for myself, not from a place of needing responses (although I will obviously appreciate any which come) but to explore where I’m at in the hope of gaining some clarity and feeling less alone. If my journey helps anyone else that’s wonderful and I’m glad, but I have no expectations. I feel stripped bare of any ideas of what my life means or indeed what any of it means. I know that I’m beyond thoughts and emotions, I’ve experienced that deep inner knowing in my heart, but somehow integrating it into my daily life and living from a place of liberation and freedom feels impossible. There’s too much pain, too much grief…

My dog meant so much. If anyone has ever deeply loved and bonded with a dog, they will know how awful the loss is. It’s the worst pain and cuts to the core. I didn’t realise until I lost her how much I had depended on her. Despite all my spiritual understanding about non attachment and impermanence, I made my life about her. She was like the child who never grew up and I became the parent whose sole role was to give her everything she needed. Zoey was 16, I knew she wouldn’t last forever and indeed I had began to grieve a year ago when it was clear she was no longer as healthy as she was, but my heart couldn’t accept that one day she really would be gone and I’d have to turn inward and find out who I am without her..

It feels an impossible journey but at the same time I have no choice but to walk it. Someone once said that grief is grace; it’s so often what initiates the journey back to the self so to grieve is an act of grace. Without deep loss and the grief that ensues there is no real need to find our way back to ourselves. Loving someone, whether a human, dog or another being, is the energy projected out into the world and it’s a truly beautiful thing. But take the object away and it collapses back on itself. It IS the self. Ram Dass once said something along the lines of a loved being is the key that unlocks the love that exists within you. The love that I feel for Zoey has not disappeared or died; it is part of me because that capacity for love is the essence of who I am. It’s the fabric of life itself.

But I am grieving and it’s painful because I loved Zoey; I even named her such because the name means ‘life.’ She was my constant faithful companion. It is painful to think about life without her when she represented the vast majority of what mattered. I hope that the essence of her still continues in some way and that she gained as much if not more from our love than I did.

RIP Zoey 14/02/10 – 20/02/26

Tapestry of love and grief (autism)

/ sarahlissyjenkins / 6 Comments

Yesterday I met my son at a Costa’s local to me – two carers from his placement drove him down. Apparently he spent the entire journey saying ‘Mummy’ which was probably not only due to excitement but trying to process the uniqueness of the event, as the only other time he had been told he was going in a car to visit me was when they picked me up from the station! This time it was a longish journey of around an hour, so plenty of time for him to process and look forward to seeing me, which he clearly had. I spotted one of the carers while paying for my coffee, as he had just found somewhere to park and was waving to let me know they had arrived. I took my coffee and sat by the window, then on seeing them bring my son over the road to the shop door, I got up and greeted him.

He was grinning widely and looked incredibly happy and chilled out. This was a massive relief. The prospect of meeting in a public place had made me slightly anxious due to plenty of memories of taking him out when he was a young boy and having to try and stop him suddenly grabbing things (or people) as he had no concept of ownership or any sense of right and wrong due to his autism and severe learning disabilities. He had absolutely no impulse control. At nearly 24, he is a lot calmer, although I wouldn’t say he has any more awareness of what he should or shouldn’t do, rather that he has learnt through the consistent support and discipline of trained carers. I was and still am limited in terms of my physical build (short and petite) and ongoing health issues. My son needs two strong men to support him in public places and luckily this is what he now has.

So he arrived and said ‘Mummy’ once again, clearly very pleased to see me. He sat at a table with me and was perfectly happy listening to me talking and showing him videos on my phone (mainly of trains, which we both like!). I showed him an ‘upside down’ train from Japan, which interested him a lot actually. I don’t normally grab his attention for long, but the concept seemed to throw him. He had a Thomas the Tank engine toy with him, and had bought with me two others – one of the bus character ‘Bulgy’ and the other of the train ‘Arthur.’ He had a lot of the character trains from childhood and gradually I’ve been giving them to him to take back. The only toy I won’t be giving him isn’t a train at all – it’s a ragged wreck of what was once a toy rabbit called Flopsy – I keep it under my bed as a momento, as he took it everywhere from babyhood until about 12 or 13. He had such a deep emotional attachment to it that it was proof, if it were needed, that he feels deep love, even though he shows it in his own unique ways.

The only slight incident was when he suddenly got up, went to the fridge next to the counter, pulled out a bottle of fizzy Tango and took it back to the table. I panicked inside, got up and asked him to give it to me, telling him I needed to pay for it first. He started to make moaning sounds and my heart sank, for this could easily trigger a meltdown. I was very aware of a small child of about 4 sitting with his father a short distance away and I was scared that my son would suddenly kick off. However, he did give it to me, but one of the carers who had been sitting a short distance away overheard and told me it was fine, to give my son the drink and he would pay at the counter. I was relieved that he took control and that I didn’t have to anymore.

There’s always a subtle ongoing grief when I see my son and I felt it perhaps more strongly yesterday due to being out in public. I love him and I’m proud of him, but it’s the grief of wishing things were different; that life is like this for us both. I stay very present with him so I know that I have healed much of the trauma that shaped my life as a parent, so that is a real blessing, as I can enjoy the moments for what they are now and connect with him in a way that he can feel and respond to. But there is an ongoing thread of grief that weaves through my life, and perhaps I wouldn’t be without it now, because the relationship with my son is a tapestry of rich emotions and beautiful moments despite the pain and the longing and the complexity of it all.

He left with his carers, clutching his bottle of Tango and his trains, and I waved goodbye as they went to the car. I saw him for just under an hour, but less is more with my son so that he doesn’t become overstimulated. Once again, I am so thankful that he is taken care of so well, so that I can enjoy these precious times with him.