New Boots

This blog post is dedicated to Toby Carr who died on 10th January. He and I never met but we were online friends. His courageous, adventurous and gentle spirit inspired me, and I’ll miss his presence and all he was so generous to share.

Karen gave me a pair of boots for Christmas. I think they are imbued with magic because I’ve found myself walking in them just about every day since I received them. I’ve fallen in love with walking again. I’ve walked over ninety miles in them already! They’re made by Vivobarefoot who have an innovative and ethical approach to designing and producing a wide range of footwear. I think they are the most comfortable boots I’ve ever worn.

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These boots have come to epitomise my recovery process over recent weeks. Normally at this time of year, I’m feeling blue with grim anticipation for the long pull out of winter. Instead, this year I’m feeling bubbly and buoyant which is absolutely fantastic. 2021 closed well for me and this new year holds plenty of promise. Enjoying an extended, relaxed and happy festive period with Karen certainly helped - though I think there is more at play than this. The therapy I was fortunate to receive in the Autumn and the run up to Christmas was a vital component for which I’m eternally grateful. Linked with this, the continued support I receive from my Community Psychiatric Nurse is important too.

There is within me a settled determination to overcome my depression through positive action. I’m at that point in my recovery journey, when I believe I can literally cure myself through activity and adventure. Indeed, over the last couple of weeks I’ve enjoyed active time in the outdoors just about every day. It’s almost as if my new boots are calling for me to put them on and go exploring. I’ve this sense of coherence with regard to my personal struggle with my depression. My thinking has cleared and is no longer ravaged with thoughts of low self-worth and self-disgust. The clarity I’m experiencing is like the air after it’s been freshly laundered by a heavy rain shower. The haze I’ve been experiencing has been replaced with spotless views, so sharp, they take my breath away.

With my newly acquired coherence comes the awareness, I need to be cautious - not to leap forward like a horse from its stall and rush headlong into a race against myself to be come totally well again. In my experience, this has sometimes led to a crash and a deeper depression. However, it’s difficult not to feel excited about the opportunities before me this year, and be eager to fully engage with the world. Certainly, this eagerness has motivated me well so far this year.

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Recognising a need to be realistic, I set myself only one resolution at New Year. All the rest are exciting aspirations. My resolution is to lose weight. I began this year 12kgs overweight and I’ve managed to lose 2.1kgs since I set my goal. It helps me to align losing weight with my recovery process, to accept it takes time and there’ll be challenges along the way. Again, I find myself thinking of my boots and how much I enjoy walking in them, working up a sweat, puffing my way towards a rewarding summit or a hidden waterfall I’ve wanted to find. The rewards are not simply the views but a sense of achievement and the knowledge my health is being enhanced. I’ve been suffering from pretty high blood pressure too, with it peaking rather alarmingly over Christmas. It’s pleasing to see it returning to a more normal and healthy level, particularly when I return from time out in my kayak or a long walk.

My aspirations for the year ahead are more ethereal; live with purpose, be more present, enjoy more fun, find my laughter again, revel in the wonders of Nature, and many more like those. With the spectre of my depression drifting further away from me, I find myself believing anything is possible this year. I’m feeling strong. I’m feeling creative. I’m feeling adventurous. I’m feeling impish. Who knows what opportunities I’ll encounter.

I’m inspired to live life as fully as possible. Toby Carr reiterated this for me with his sad passing and through the fullness of his well-lived life. So too have the ravages of the pandemic. Life is tenuous and not to be taken for granted. It’s so incredibly powerful for me to understand this, to know this and to embody this too, because only a few months ago, I was fighting not to end my life through my suicide. Thankfully it’s now difficult for me to reconnect with those deep levels of despair, so much so, I find it hard to imagine feeling that way again.

So here’s to 2022 and all it will offer. My warmest wishes to you and as always, thank you for your continued love and support.

Fate

I know exactly what’s happening here and I thought of writing to explain one of the processes I face when coping with my depression.

Right now I have a belief the world is conspiring against me. That fate is some how preventing me from achieving the goals I so desperately want to attain. The notion that my depression is governed by an outside force beyond my control. The result for me, becoming lethargic, repeating again and again, “What’s the point?”

A couple of weeks ago I foolishly lost my GoPro camera with all the footage I had taken to create my first You Tube vlog. This vlog is one of the tasks I have set out to achieve this year. Losing the camera was a huge blow, particularly since I lost the footage. For a couple of days, I experienced a deepening malaise.

Then yesterday we ran out of fuel in our car. This is a foolish thing to allow to happen but to be fair, the Tobermory Garage is the only one nearby within 15 miles and they have been without fuel supplies for two weeks! We were on our way to the ferry. Needless to say, there began a comedy of errors interspersed with genuine warmth and help. To cut to the end of the tale, after the roadside rescue had come out and ‘fixed’ the problem, we headed back home. Only, the engine was definitely not well. We couldn’t raise more than 20 miles an hour out of her and going up hill was painful. We arrive back in Tobermory with a poorly overheated car. I can’t bear to think what the problem will be and of course the costs to this.

So, just when I had found a means to pay for a new camera, in time for the next bivouac, this money is now diverted to the car - for good reason of course. Hence, this leads to the sense my life is governed by depressive fate. The conclusion I come to (often prefixed with a deep sigh) - why bother!

2019!

A new year! I sincerely hope it is a wonderful one for us and my warmest wishes to you all.

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Tobermory Sunrise, January 2019

I decided at the turn of the year not to set myself resolutions because I know full well I won’t uphold them. This doesn’t mean I’m without aspirations for the year ahead. In fact I think I have far too many ideas and plans to squeeze into the twelve months of 2019.

First things first though and I want to announce I have put on hold my plan to kayak to the rest of the R.N.L.I. Lifeboat Stations around England, Wales and Ireland. I had announced this with some flourish late last year and went as far as getting the planned adventure endorsed by the R.N.L.I. in preparation for approaching sponsors and donors. Then I wrote a book and have had this accepted for publication. This is the book about my sea kayak journey around Scotland in 2015. I was faced with the dilemma of delaying publication while I undertake the kayak journey or cancel this and focus on the book. I chose the latter. The book has taken three years to come to fruition and to delay it further would be demoralising for me. This is the first book I have written and I want it to be something I’m really proud of. Therefore I need to focus on making sure this is the case.

Additionally, there are family concerns which have recently emerged and I can’t in all honesty take myself away for a seven month adventure.

I’m disappointed not to be undertaking what would have been the largest adventurous challenge I will have ever faced and there are moments when I express a big sigh when reflecting on this. However, this is the nature of adventure. There is never a certain outcome and I’m philosophical about the decision I have made. The 3900 miles of coastline and the lifeboat stations will be there in future years.

In the meantime though, I have plenty of ideas for shorter kayaking trips and other adventures. Realising I have these opportunities before me reminds me how fortunate I am. We have the yacht to sail locally and further afield, I have my kayak and endless miles of incredible coastline on my doorstep, and there are hundreds of square miles of mountains and wild land to climb and explore.

Attending to my mental health is a high priority. Thankfully I am feeling strong at the moment and have been for a couple of months now. Writing the book has helped with this. I’m keen to build on my strengthening sense of self and to share more about my experiences with depression and suicidal desires. I have ideas of achieving this through writing, social media and public speaking. Many of you may know me through Twitter and this is where I am most vocal about my mental health experiences.

I would like 2019 to be a year of connectivity for me, where I reconnect with friends, old and new, and forge new connections. To this end then, I live on the Isle of Mull and if you find yourself in Tobermory, I’d be delighted if you looked me up for a chat and a coffee.

Thank you for reading this and for your continued interest and support in my life.

2018

Nearly ten days into the New Year and I'm only now sharing my plans and aspirations for the twelve months ahead. Better late than never I suppose, so here goes.

I'm not a fan of loud and boisterous Hogmanay celebrations, preferring to see the year out with a small group of friends or family. I haven't reached the stage yet where I take myself off to bed to wake the next day to a new year. Neither do I sit gloomily in an armchair, clutching a dram with a curmudgeonly air, watching the clock for the midnight chimes. I enjoy the few hours leading up to the bells, where chatter and banter cheerfully ease me from one year to the next. There's always booze to enjoy and we make sure we have an array of tasty snacks on the go through the evening. It's a fun time in a 'fifty-plus years old' kind of way. 

The actual moment when the countdown begins and the bells chime is a movingly emotional juncture for me. My voice breaks and I feel tears welling in my eyes. This is the moment where I enter into a new contract with myself - to become the person I continually aspire to be. Invariably the year I am leaving will have been a mixed one, with challenges and triumphs in equal measure. There is no doubt that my struggle with depression will have played a big part during the year. The moment when the fireworks burst into the skies and people hug, kiss and wish each other every happiness, is the briefest of moments when the pains of the departing year are expunged and hope floods my senses. Amidst the tumult of bonhomie I look forwards, visualising myself embracing my life with vigour and positivity. After the celebration is over, it's always a pleasant experience drifting off to sleep in the wee hours of January 1st with sleepy dreams of exciting adventures on the horizon.

I do not call them resolutions but I do have a number of things I want to achieve in 2018. Like many folk I suppose, I begin the new year with high levels of motivation to tackle things I procrastinated over the year before. The challenge of course is keeping this motivation at a consistently high level to effect the changes and the learning I aspire to achieve. For many years I was a development trainer/coach and I'm an old hand at observing the process of initial enthusiasm slowly shifting towards lethargy and eventual disappointment. I understand what the usual contributing self-defeating factors towards this might be. I see these all too clearly in myself. In the opening hours of the year I resolve not to allow these factors to get the better of me - as they did the year before, and well, all the years before that.

As I always advised folks to do, I have chosen a manageable number of aspirations to work towards, rather than create a long and unwieldy list. I remember likening setting post-course goals to work towards akin to packing a rucksack for a wilderness expedition. Pack what is essential and not carry too many things to cut back on the weight. Where possible, share the load too. Trying to cram too much into the rucksack will leave it overladen, jumbled and impossible to find what is necessary because this'll be buried under non-essential stuff. Again, akin to many successful expeditions, it's essential to understand personal limitations and abilities, thus realising the likelihood of a realistically achievable outcome. I've found with my expeditions that they require purpose, something tangible, which makes them meaningful and provide me with the determination I require to see them through. The same is true with setting new year goals for myself - they need purpose, so that I'm purposeful in working towards achieving them. Finally, to bring the alliteration of the wilderness expedition to a close, it needs to be enjoyable, even if at times the sense of challenge may seem overwhelming.

The common sabotaging blocks in achieving my goals are my lack of self-belief, procrastination, not attending to immediate matters to address developing situations, becoming distracted, a poorly organised approach, and allowing a sense of failure determine whether I progress or not. Neither am I good at drawing on any learning from my achievements and successes, instead preferring to dwell on where I think I'm failing. It's ironic how aware of this process I am, yet allow it to play out time and again. 

This year's first aspiration is to not allow this to happen for 2018. I will nip any self-defeating behaviour in the bud and draw on inspiration from my recent kayaking and other adventurous successes. If I attend to this aspiration as the overarching goal, then the list which follows ought to be well within my reach. It all seems so very easy!

Here's the short list of what I want to achieve in 2018. In fact I will change this, it is the list of what I will achieve in 2018.

• Kayak the Three Peaks.
• Kayak to Muckle Flugga from Tobermory and back.
• Complete writing "Strong Winds are Forecast", the book about my 2015 journey.
• Establish a You Tube "LifeAfloat" channel and make at least two films a month for this.
• Sail our yacht at least twice every month when the weather allows.
• Become proficient in addressing and resolving electrical issues on the boat.
• Make contact with all the important friends in my life.
• Teach myself twelve Scottish folk tunes on my tin-whistle.
• Watercolour painting at least once a month.

The list is self-explanatory and contains some demanding items to achieve. I can see which of these will require the greater attention to prevent procrastination and as I write this I'm aware of a my determination to not allow this to happen. Already I have pleasantly surprised myself by not succumbing to the temptations of avoidance and distraction when I had recently set myself the task to settle down to write. The feeling of achievement at the end of a successfully busy day is sufficient reward indeed. 

This blog entry outlines the contract I have set with myself and by sharing it here, I'm inviting you to play a role in the success of my new year aspirations, by checking in with me from time to time and holding me to account. For example it might be that you ask me to post a recording of me playing one of the tunes I have learned on my tin-whistle! However you  interact with me, I will accept your interest and support with gratitude.

So then, 2018 is under way and I'm looking forward to seeing how it unfolds. It's not a case of leaving this to chance because of course, I have the means to influence the outcomes I'm aspiring for. I sincerely hope that the same is true for you too and that this year is a wonderful one for you in so many ways.

Dear Reader - my warmest wishes to you for a happy and fulfilling 2018.