Well, I love the BBC series of this name but I’m also wanting to make note of an interesting web site I discovered via Google search. It’s a blog called Raptitude – Getting better at being human, and is written by a bloke called David. His articles relate his own stories of rising above shyness and other human limitations. He writes in a very down to earth style, very easy to relate to. Already since reading a couple of his articles on conversation and connecting with people I have felt inspired and renewed.

Another poem. When I was younger, I liked consider depression as a condition which helped me appreciate the highs and lows of life. Depression takes you to such depths, it was comforting to imagine it has some positive effect, of making joy-filled moments more poignant and meaningful. This poem reminded me of that.

Defeat may serve as well as victory
To shake the soul and let the glory out.
When the great oak is straining in the wind,
The boughs drink in new beauty, and the trunk
Sends down a deeper root on the windward side.
Only the soul that knows the mighty grief
Can know the mighty rapture. Sorrows come
To stretch out spaces in the heart for joy.

Edwin Markham

This poem responds well to my mood of the other day, I think Lord Tennyson is right. I love this.

Whatever crazy sorrow saith,
No life that breathes with human breath
Has ever truly longed for death.

‘Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant,
Oh life, not death, for which we pant;
More life, and fuller, that I want.

Alfred Tennyson.

Having one of those restless nights, mind tormented by depressing thoughts. Worried about work, and all my inabilities and my lack of caring about just about everything and everyone (except H of course). Wanting to quit. Feeling trapped and scared because I’m getting older and my options are disappearing. Sinking into fantasies of escape into oblivion. Trying to remember the therapy I’ve had, trying not to feel down that it is not the quick fix I’d hoped for, that life is still shit, that it requires hard work, and that it is so difficult to summon the energy and will to try and rise above it.

I’m thinking I might quit the HR course I signed up to last year. It is just too hard and my brain can’t cope with trying to work it out, and my heart can’t cope with the inadequacy. Not easy being a quitter; still beat myself up about the whole dog rescue group business last year. Don’t know what the answer is. I seem to sign myself up to things to try and make something of myself, but all that happens is it adds to the things I can’t cope with and I get stressed and end up quitting and beating myself up even more about it. Damn.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxOidIjknls&feature=player_embedded

He whom a dream hath possessed knoweth no more of doubting,
For mist and the blowing of winds and the mouthing of words he scorns;
Not the sinuous speech of schools he hears, but a knightly shouting,
And never comes darkness down, yet he greeteth a million morns.

He whom a dream hath possessed knoweth no more of roaming;
All roads and the flowing of waves and the speediest flight he knows,
But wherever his feet are set, his soul is forever homing,
And going, he comes, and coming he heareth a call and goes.

He whom a dream hath possessed knoweth no more of sorrow,
At death and the dropping of leaves and the fading of suns he smiles,
For a dream remembers no past and scorns the desire of a morrow,
And a dream in a sea of doom sets surely the ultimate isles.

He whom a dream hath possessed treads the impalpable marches,
From the dust of the day’s long road he leaps to a laughing star,
And the ruin of worlds that fall he views from eternal arches,
And rides God’s battlefield in a flashing and golden car.

Sheamus O Sheel.

Being possessed of a certain dream – obsessed in such a way that it rules your life. It could be a dream, or it could be a nightmare, or a perspective that takes prominence above all other ways of looking at the world and affects every action, every word, every thought.

Been promising myself a new sewing machine for ages. Then I heard that Spotlight were having a sale, so I went and got myself a Swiss made Elna 1000 for $169. Very basic model, but a neat little machine. Can get onto all the mending I’ve been putting aside for years now! Would also like to sew myself a couple of skirts and vests, maybe brighten up the house with some new curtains.