“Changes are good.  Changes are good.  Believe this, Angela.”  Some of the self-talk I’m directing my mind to doing.  Trying to give it a positive job to do instead of the “What have you done now, I knew it was going to be awful” type of negative thinking.

I am generally very positive about all that is happening, I really am.  However, very sneaky grey clouds seem to find their way past the horizon to circle around my head.

Neighbours sparked not just one grey cloud but a whole storm of black ones a week or so ago.  I won’t go into the details, they’re not that important.  However, a grim couple of days ensued.  Days that concerned me as they reminded me of the weeks, months, years I spent in that kind of state and scared me in case I ended up back there.  I didn’t.  A day or two of self-care, distraction with art, and finally one and a half Star Wars films and some Ben and Jerry’s Karamel Sutra really helped to shift the darkening mood, thank the powers that be.  Must remember to add “Watch Star Wars, eat Karamel Sutra” to my self-care tool box!

Good things have come from this episode.

Firstly, a reminder of how I was and how far along I have come in my journey to heal from my past traumas, and how much more resilient I am.  Yes, I had a couple of very grim days, but it was just a couple, not an every decreasing spiral into the pit of darkness and despair.  That’s progress!

Secondly, it highlighted, with the help of my trusted counsellor, the fact that the one place I really should feel safe and secure in – my home – I didn’t feel that way after this episode.  That surprised me as I hadn’t realised that.  And that was part of the reason I took my work-space upstairs to my bedroom.

After a week or so of being up there working, yesterday morning I woke thinking that was a bit of a daft decision.  With my front room now cleared out of clutter, my meditation table and space set up, time spent watching Star Wars with the company of Ben and Jerry in the light of plenty of candles, that the room really needs to be used for relaxing in all kinds of ways, including creating art, even art that is earning me a living.  That may be ‘work’, but it’s always a pleasure, sometimes a little bit of a frustrating pleasure, but still a pleasure.

So, by 8am yesterday morning, the table, chair, art materials and so on had been moved down to a rearranged front room!  I was drinking a big mug of hot tea and getting myself into the mental state to go do some work in the front room, making it my own space.

The table is one that has panels that fold down so it takes up a tiny bit of space when that way – maybe 7″ wide by 32″ long, which can be cwtched away to make more space as required, or to turn the room into a purely relaxing or room for receiving guests.

Sometimes it really does take me a long time to figure out how best to use a space, to make the changes.  However, the best thing is that when it’s your own home, you decide how to use the space, and those decisions can, and do, change.

The only problem I have, is that the table is in front of the window which a particular nosy neigbour has been caught staring through; he does it to everyone, not just me.  So, I feel a bit exposed.  I really don’t want to go down the road of net curtains, but it may be something I have to do so I feel secure. I’ll see about that though, I’ll give it a bit longer or see if I can come up with a different, more creative solution to the nosy neighbour.