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My iPhone likes to post a photo on the lock screen each morning and this mornings was no different.
It posted these photos with the caption “8 years ago today” .
Left - Adam & Viriam 2013
Right Fresh Passionfruit & Strawberry Mojitos ( + my hand ! )
8 years ago today was our very own Adam Divine’s wedding by the beach in Goa - It was amazing in every way - Happy anniversary Adam & Viriam. I was honoured with the tasks of playing Handpan during their traditional indian wedding ceremony, and creating the cocktails and bartending for the party afterwards ( music has always been a mainstay for me and working as a bartender in NYC is how I paid for my degree in medical massage back in the day - I was quite at home ! )
This wonderfully happy tropical memory of love & togetherness started my day today with some inner reflection; how different this last year has been, and what are the teachings and blessings that I am aware of today.
Travel was such a big part of my life. Travelling to share AYM around the world, travelling to perform music across the globe, and travelling between visits to see my family in the UK and what was my home in Brooklyn NY.
And so … to not be moving in the same way caused me to have quite a “disturbance in the force” .
I left Goa in a hurry after the AYM residential retreat in February 2020, my return flight was cancelled by the airline and the Indian border was about to close .. so I scrambled to book on one of the last flights back to the UK and landed into Heathrow early one freezing morning in March 2020.
Ultimately, I needed to make sure my parents in the UK were OK; information about the pandemic at that time was coming in from every angle and I didn’t know what to believe. Staying in my little house in the jungle with my treasured community in Goa to ride out the pandemic wasn’t up for debate.
Little did I know I would spend the next 5 months living with my parents in Dorset! I was a teenager when I left home and there were times I became a teenager again during the lockdown with them, wings clipped and totally grounded.
But really, and for the most part, this was a golden time to spend with Mum & Dad. A special time I would never have made space for in my “ normal “ life ( and my life is far from normal ). It is a time for which I am now truly grateful.
The opposite of movement is stillness, and reflecting this morning on stillness and how things look and feel one year later has been a sweet thing. My togetherness with friends and family has deepened, being time rich allows for presence, and presence is a commodity money cannot buy !
Another sweetness is, I’ve had more time for creativity. Yoga videography is something that has been calling me for years and now I’ve had some time to hone the craft ( I’m still learning but enjoying the process ) - see one of my recent videos below.
The pace of my life has slowed right down, what’s important has become much clearer, and as of right now I’m aware of a deeper sense of grounded-ness in myself, which I hope I can in turn share with my students and clients when life goes back in the “ normal “ direction.
Thanks Adam & V for the inspiration for this post x
James x
PS Just incase anyone is wondering - heres how to make the special wedding cocktail
FRESH PASSION FRUIT & STRAWBERRY MOJITO RECIPE ( makes 1 cocktail )
1 passionfruit - blended and strained to get rid of the bits ( if you cant find fresh passionfruit just go with the strawberries - its still delicious )
2 to 4 strawberries, hulled and sliced (4 if small berries, 3 if medium or 2 if truly massive)
8 mint leaves
3 tsp - simple syrup (1:1 sugar and water; I prefer turbinado sugar)
5 tsp fresh squeezed lime juice
50 ml white rum
sparkling water
Crushed ice
METHOD
Muddling ( its a medical term … )
Place the strawberries, mint, and simple syrup in the bottom of a glass, and muddle until the strawberries are smushed and juicy.
If you don’t have a muddler, crumple the mint with your hands just a bit before dropping it into the glass,
then smush with the back of a spoon to release the flavour.
Add the Passionfruit pulp on top of the strawberries and mint, then add crushed ice ontop then pour in the lime juice and rum.
Use a bar spoon or teaspoon to stir the drink. Don't stir too vigorously, otherwise you'll bring the mint to the surface!
Fill the remainder of the glass with more crushed ice, then top with sparkling water.
Enjoy
Drink responsibly ;)
Drink water afterwards
Enjoy
Collective Connective Loss - Nathan Synge
Photo - Nathan Synge - Sri Lanka 2020
I realised after the first month of lockdown that this was not going to work out well for me.
It was just a feeling I had. I have spent a lot of time in my own company over the years and I can really thrive when I’m on my own, but this I could feel was going to be different.
My girlfriend who was also living alone at the time was not fairing too well either. Facetime was never going to substitute what we both knew we were missing, human contact.
So we soon established a ‘bubble’ between the two of us and I moved into her one bed flat. Not long after an eight week old black Labrador called Yogi joined us and two became three.
The three of us were lucky to share a very blessed space during lockdown, but I know many others suffered in quiet loneliness.
Becoming a massage therapist, hand on heart it is the best decision I ever made. Through my practise I have had the pleasure first hand of feeling and seeing the impact that human touch can have on another. It’s profound ability to calm and centre someone.
Sometimes one is only aware of the importance of something once it has been taken away from you.
The months passed and myself and my partner began to fully appreciate the importance of having contact on a daily basis.
As 2020 dragged on and the population found itself in and and out of confinement I became increasingly aware of how people I knew who lived alone were really struggling with the lack of other human interaction. I am in the business of human contact and hearing so many stories of people with no voice suffering in solitude caused me grave concern.
Touch is vital, and humans are designed to touch. It is in the very fabric of our being. A new born baby’s survival depends on it. A healing and loving touch releases oxytocin and dopamine into the system that can have a huge impact on the levels of cortisol within ones body.
There is no substitute for human contact and we are all feeling deprived of it right now in one way or another.
Of all the things I have truly missed during this strange time it is the grounded-ness only another human in close proximity can bring. To be alone or lonely is difficult enough, to be without touch for extended periods also is inhumane. Touch has a huge impact on our psychological and physical well being, social touch and grooming with loved ones and friends is an intrinsic part of our society.
During this time many of us will be trying to cope with profound stress without the comfort of touch and its ability to reduce anxiety and help calm the nervous system.
The need to be with one another I believe is being felt across the world right now.
Once we come together again, and we will, I hope and trust we will adjust quickly, fall back into our old patterns of coexisting. We will remember and celebrate passionately together again and revel in that undeniable thing that makes us all human. The power of connection.
More caution, less touch
reflections from the bodyworker- Steven Taylor
Photo Steven Taylor - Cotswolds
With close contact therapies widely, and understandably, on hold, I've come to reflect lots on what drove me to study, offer and teach massage. It's certainly true that to appreciate anything; not doing it for a while will bring clarity as to how important it is, or isn't.
Having to scramble to set up shop on a weekly basis, then dismantle days later, to advertise, cancel, book venues, cancel bookings -all makes for a highly precarious business model, and one that should bring into focus whether or not one's heart is in it.
I got into bodywork some ten years ago after an increasingly nagging realisation that a formalised 9-5 career in criminal justice, followed by an exhilarating foray into the start-up world (with deeply inspiring metropolitan life alongside) left a bit of a hole. The theatre of it all was easy, and being adept at making the right noises meant for a form of success too, but something was definitely missing.
I realised after some time on the road that I was using my brain a lot, but not my body, and this was beginning to divide me. I found that whenever I was given an opportunity to utilise my own physicality and body awareness I was a much happier, creative and nourished person. And so I found massage as a way to focus this.
Fast forward 10 years, having built a solid offering feels great. And to see the joy of sharing that with students that are so keen to learn is a wonderful feeling.
To have that cancelled has led to some genuine soul searching, and as usual, it's the clients that remind me best as to how critically important massage remains.
Over the last year, when permitted, I've seen people from all walks of life, with varying needs, reminding me just how important, more than ever, that their 1 hour of genuine down time is. From the NHS staff that have sacrificed their own needs for others, to the care workers, to the lonely runners and cyclists who's only thread of sanity in this cancelled world sits in their ability to tear up the trails and roads, to the mums schooling and raising families under one roof, alone.
Massage has been the reminder for all of these, and me, that the skin you're in keeps the score, and a neglect of the physical is a neglect of the mindful. For me this needs acknowledging more than ever as the pressures of life are amplified, as mental health plummets, as loneliness spikes and any darkness dealt with, and not, sees new opportunity.
So as we move into the lighter months, I look forward to being able to offer treatments to a world that really needs them, and to share massage with new students too. And whats more my desire to learn more about the body and its ability to heal has grown too, so a return to formal education is on the horizon too!