Quaker wisdom for a shaken and stirred society

I've been watching social media today with sadness, as people tear one another apart over conflicting political beliefs.  So I came off Twitter and Facebook and was wandering through some old files and came across a piece I wrote for the Daily Mail many many years ago.  As I read it through, it struck me that it could be worth putting out again.
It's about a book, published back in 1998 called The Quaker Book of Wisdom
 

Here's what I said back then...

Life’s tough.  We battle every day to make sense of a world which seems to be spinning increasingly out of control.  Sometimes, with all the cruelty, injustice and intolerance in society, it seems the only answer is to hide away and try to shut out the world.  But a way of dealing with the madness may come from an unlikely source. Quakerism with its unique silent worship began nearly 400 years ago but its teachings seem tailor-made for today’s world and its troubles.   Quakers base their lives around simplicity.  They value simple honest tenets such as truth, conscience, non-violence and service.  However they don’t turn away from the world but embrace it, finding a way of integrity through the moral maze of business, family and education.  

Robert Lawrence Smith who comes from a long line of Quakers, has encapsulated the Quaker way of life in a small but soulful book, A Quaker Book of Wisdom.  In it he explains the main Quaker philosophies - and how to apply them to daily life.  He doesn’t demand we all become Quakers - or even subscribe to a religious belief:  the book just gently nudges us to think of other, maybe better, ways of living.

“It is my ever-growing conviction that the compassionate Quaker message badly needs to be heard in today’s complex, materialistic, often unjust and discriminatory society,” says Smith, “The circumstances of modern life give far too little nourishment to our common humanity - to goodness, courage, common sense, reflection, wonder, patience, understanding.”
Many people, generally suspicious of orthodox religion, find comfort in the Quaker message. “Quaker precepts offer a lifeplan, a clear map which can provide us with all the advice we need to live contented, honest, serene lives,” explains Smith, “The simplicity of the Quaker message makes perfect sense to children often confused by a violent society.”  Above all, he insists, “Quakerism is a pragmatic faith - based on life and its experiences.  It looks to nature, to society, to family rather than to complex philosophies or esoteric teachings.”

I don't think you need to be religious, to have 'faith', to see that Quaker beliefs have a lot going for them.  I love that they can all, very easily, be incorporated into everyday life.

SILENCE:  For Quakers, wisdom begins in silence.  Quakers believe that only when we have silenced our voices and our souls can we hear the “still small voice” that dwells within each of us.  Only by listening in stillness for that voice and letting it guide our actions can we truly let our lives speak.  Quakerism is a very practical pragmatic religion and silence is valued by Quakers because it is, quite simply, useful.  The practice of silence - and it does take practice - is rewarding because it clarifies our lives, while offering a bit of a time-out for our souls.  If we can locate, at the very centre of silence, our individual “still small voice” we will have found our greatest ally in life.  Because, if we listen to that voice with an open heart, it will guide us through the most challenging crossroads of our lives.
• Take time each day just to be silent.  You don’t have to go for deep meditation.  It need only be five minutes but just sit quietly with your thoughts.
• Don’t race to fill a gap in the conversation - learn to listen and only speak when you really have something to say.
• Enjoy silence when it comes.  Don’t automatically turn on the TV or radio.

TRUTH:  Sadly we live in a world where it is virtually taken for granted that many of the people we listen to are not telling the truth:  we distrust the words of politicians, the press, advertisers, salespeople.  But despite our society, we need truth.  Truth is the best that is in each of us - the part of us that is drawn naturally towards the good, towards God.  If we listen for the truth - for the best that is within us - then our lives will begin to “speak”.  As George Fox, the founder of Quakerism, said, “Truth comes from within.  It is the basis for daily life, like the food we eat.”  The search for truth is a lifelong pact with our inner lives that encompasses seeking the truth, recognising the truth, speaking the truth, and living the truth.
• Start by being honest with yourself:  ask yourself how you really feel; what you really want; learn to listen to your body and your mind.
• Be truthful in all your dealings - with children and adults; friends and colleagues, family and strangers.  Weed out white lies; don’t fob children off with half-truths; be honest with salespeople.
• Remember that lies and even small deceptions can undermine relationships.  But be careful not to be cruel in your truth-telling.  Sometimes silence is the best option!
• If you have any doubts, listen to your conscience, the still small voice.  What does it say - honestly?

SIMPLICITY:  For many Friends, simplicity is the cornerstone of their lives.   However it is frequently misunderstood.  The simplicity of lifestyle the Friends extol is not based on forsaking worldly goods and pursing some vision of a less complex bygone era. Nor is it about finding a quiet corner where you can contemplate your life and feel good about yourself.  In a nutshell Quaker simplicity is not about how much you own but how much you let your possessions own you.  “What do I need?” is simplicity’s fundamental question - a question which stands in strict contrast to our favourite national pastime of shopping!  We gain a false and fleeting sense of self-esteem from our ability to purchase things for ourselves and our children.  Yet we often finish our shopping trips feeling unsatisfied and depressed.
• If you engage the whole family in fun activities - hiking, camping, picnics, shared activities - children won’t feel the need for so many toys to keep them amused.
• Don’t waste your time or your money.  Keep good track of your accounts but don’t let money rule your life.
• Find time for simple wholesome rituals - sitting down for family dinner; spending time in nature; baking bread or a cake together.

SERVICE.  For Quakers there is a direct link between worship and service.  The search for truth, which begins in silent contemplation, finds its expression in action.  Friends believe that the reason we were put on earth is to help each other, to make this a better world.  They ask themselves: What can we do to make the world healthier, happier, less violent?  The first generations of Quakers in the US took up the challenge by working for the abolition of slavery, fair treatment of Indians, and humane conditions for prisoners and patients in mental hospitals.  True service, they believe, responds to need wherever it exists in the human family - not simply to the problems of our direct kin, close friends and political allies.
• Try not to turn your back on society’s problems.  Start to look at problems like homelessness in the eye, rather than trying to avoid them.
• Look for small ways to be of service to others.  If you see someone struggling with a heavy bag up a flight of stairs, could you offer to help?  Might you guide a blind person across a busy road?  If you have a quiet moment at work, could you help someone who’s overloaded?
• By all means give to charity but could you spare time to be of more direct help?  Think about volunteering your time, not just your money.

TEN LIFE LESSONS
Robert Lawrence Smith also offers ten nuggets of advice - Quaker life lessons to help live the simple life.

1. Seize the present.  Make the most of your time every day of your life.  We usually let time slip away from us by continuously thinking ahead to the next activity, the next day, the next weekend, the future.  We live on constant fast-forward.  Instead try to take advantage of today.  We may be impermanent, but we are surely not insignificant.  Everything we do matters.

2. Love yourself, whatever faults you have, and love the world, however bad it is.  It’s often hard to love ourselves and even harder to love the world around us with all its faults.  But look for your good points, rather than focusing on the bad.  And start to look for good in the world too.

3. Stop talking and listen to what you really know.  You know a lot in your heart and through your common sense.  Learning to trust your own mind, with its wonderful richness and versatility is how you find out who you really are.  Hold high expectations for yourself and for others.  People rise to expectations.  Listen to your gut; trust your instincts and your common sense.

4. Play a team sport.  Playing with a team teaches you to be ready for anything and that there is only so much you can control.  You experience the happiness that comes from doing your best and from performing well.  You learn to keep going despite overwhelming odds and learn how to win and lose - hopefully both gracefully.  Playing team sports is a powerful antidote to self-centredness.

5. Accept the fact that your life is only partly in your own hands.  Often we don’t have the luxury of making choices.  Our lives are lived as if we were riding a canoe down a strongly flowing river, just trying to stay upright and get to the end.  Character is measured by how we deal with the reality.

6. Believe in the perfectibility of yourself and society. It’s easy to be cynical but try to resist it.  Instead dare to be an optimist:  optimism builds and creates.  Develop an attitude of expectancy, an inner bounce that is based on faith in the bounty of the next day.  Believe always in the goodness of people and the fact that things can be made better.

7. Make your love visible in the world through your work. You’re likely to funnel most of your waking time and energy into work.  Make it count.  Take it seriously.  In work you can express your own moral voice.  Find a sense of self-worth in your work by making yourself an instrument for healing, for service.

8. Seek justice in the world, but not in your own life. Life is unfair.  There is no shortage of injustice in the world, but equally no end to the ways you can work to correct it.  However don’t get hung up on the unfairness you may perceive in your own life.  There will always be others with more talents, more resources, and more advantages.  Work with what you have and never look back.

9. Look for the light of spirit/God/good in every person.  It’s easy to see people’s dark side - their petty greeds and prejudices, their selfishness and fear. The challenge is seeing the divine in other people.  In the only sense that really matters, we are all equal:  there is something of God (whatever you conceive that to be) in every person.

10. Let your life speak.  Have the patience to be silent and listen for truth.  Then have the courage to let the best that is in you direct your actions.  Recognise that your true identity is nothing more or less than the way in which you conduct your public and private affairs - the way in which for good or for ill, you let your life speak.


A Quaker Book of Wisdom by Robert Lawrence Smith (Gollancz).  Click the pic for more details.

Kind, good-looking, intelligent, a hero - just, unfortunately, also a pervert

Warning: adult material which may offend. (This warning is, of course, hugely ironic - but hey ho, protocols must be followed... :) 

If you were to see a photograph of my grandfather you’d probably smile.  He had what people call a ‘kind’ face.  He had, apparently, been a very good-looking man when he was young.  Even in his eighties he was a striking figure: his hair was soft and white, his posture upright and direct. He had a great sense of humour – his mouth easily curling into a smile; his eyes crinkling when he told a joke.  And, so they say, he was a highly intelligent man, and also deep-thinking.  My mother used to tell me how, when she was little, he and his friends would sit around the table discussing religion, psychology, philosophy, music, literature, politics… everything.  Oh, and he was brave as well – a soldier in the First World War. 

It was just a shame really that he was an abuser.  A paedophile.  A perv.

I can’t tell you all of this tale – it’s not mine to tell.  But I can tell you about  how he affected me – that is mine to tell.  When I was very little apparently I refused to sit on his lap – I used to run away and hide behind the sofa.  A child’s instinct?  Of course everyone was horrified.  ‘Your poor grandfather.’  ‘How can you be so cruel?’  ‘He loves you so much and you run away? You horrid little girl!’

His first wife – my grandmother – had developed religion. Not just a case of prayer-fests and arranging flowers in church. She’d gone hardcore - joined the Plymouth Brethren and basically turned her back on her family, including her young children.  She died at 32 when my mother was just two – having refused treatment for pneumonia.  My grandfather had allegedly 'adored her'. He married pretty swiftly: the ‘girl next door’; my ‘Nan’ (‘to look after the children’) - not much more than a child herself when they wed. 

I used to go and stay with them for holidays, down in the Somerset countryside – and here’s the strange thing.  Their cottage had two bedrooms.  My grandparents usually slept in the smaller bedroom, which had twin beds.  Yet, when I stayed, my Nan would move out and sleep in the larger bedroom, with its double bed, while I was put in with my grandfather.  Why?  ‘Because he snores,’ she said.  Huh?

I can remember that room so clearly.  My bed next to the window; my grandfather’s bed next to the inner wall. The two separated by two small bedside tables.  There was wallpaper with a pattern of flowers; a window seat; my grandmother’s dressing table with its three mirrors that fascinated me – the first time I’d ever seen my profile; the back of my head. 

But, come bedtime, I used to panic.  I remember desperately trying to get to sleep before he came to bed.  Do I remember being abused?  No, I don’t.  But when, years upon years later, I heard what he had done to other girls, I questioned.  I wondered.  I figured this was obviously what lay behind my ‘issues’; my incapacity to have relationships; my reticence about sex.  I tried everything to find out, to bully my unconscious into giving up the information – I even had hypnosis to take me back. I wanted to know. I like to know what's what - to look things straight in the eye; to know the worst. But I drew a blank.  At a certain point, the curtain would come down each and every time.

‘Does it really matter?’ asked one psychotherapist.  ‘I mean... Whether he did or whether he didn’t, he very probably wanted to. So the psychic intent was the same… and the psychic damage.’  I couldn’t really argue with that.

So that left me as…what?  A victim.  For a while that felt okay – it was good to have someone to blame.  I was part of a tribe, the huge silent shameful tribe of the abused. 

But it didn’t take long for that to wear thin.  I’d seen how buying into victimhood was pretty pernicious.  If you become a victim, if you wear that label, then you have let the bully, the abuser, the one in power, win.  Fuck that! I thought. ‘Fuck you!’ I’d be damned if I’d let him win.  And that was fine, that lovely righteous pure anger.  I swore that this ended right here and now, in this generation.  That the pattern damn well wouldn't continue, sick and swept under the carpet, down through the bloodline. 

And then I went through that too; and – you may find this hard to believe but I actually felt sorry for him. Because really, what kind of place are you in if you want to touch up little girls?  If you want them to give you blow-jobs? If you want to screw them?  I mean, really, how appallingly sad is that?  What kind of hell was in his head?  

But, y’know, I don’t even feel like that anymore.  I was talking about this the other night, to my quasi-guru, and I realized that what I actually feel now is... nothing.  Nothing at all.  It’s just history.  I simply don’t care.  Because whatever happened or didn’t happen, is actually immaterial.  The only reality is how I let it make me feel here and now; the emotions and thoughts I choose to let it stir. 

We cling onto our stories, don’t we?  We allow them to dictate how we feel, what we do, how we live.  For years I clutched grimly onto beliefs fostered by my father’s death, my grandfather’s perversion, my family’s relative poverty.  I watched myself become ill and miserable. I psycho-analyzed myself into tighter and tighter knots.  What a bloody waste of time and energy.  And please...I'm only talking about me here...your reality may be very different and I am not judging, not remotely. How could I?  

Anyhow. Why am I telling you this?  I have absolutely no idea.  Just that I was sitting in the garden just now, smelling the roses (literally) and watching the dogs sprawl in the sun and I felt…the urge. Make of it what you will. :-) 

Finding Love in Jerusalem

This is a hard post to write.  I’ve been thinking about it ever since we visited Jerusalem, trying to think of ways of explaining my thoughts, my feelings.  So, if this is slightly incoherent, bear with me – just aim to get past the words and feel what I’m saying, intuit it rather than analyse it. 

I have a real big hefty problem with religion.  I hate to offend (yet know I will and I apologise here and now) but truly I believe that religion has blood smeared all over its body and soul.  It’s been said before, so many times, but a huge proportion of war and murder throughout history has been promulgated in the name of religion.  My god is better than your god.  My religion is right; yours is wrong.

I understand why people believe; I think I do.  It has been said that we have a genetic propulsion towards belief; that belief in a god or gods is effectively a survival mechanism; that without belief, we can easily fall into despond, believing that the universe is ungoverned, our lives purely animalistic, without deeper meaning. I get that.  And I don’t mind belief; I don’t mind faith, I don’t mind different religions, people worshipping in whatever way they wish. I just hate the religious dogma; the one-upmanship; the hard-lining – I’m in, you’re out; I’m right, you’re wrong.

Really.  Think about it.  Imagine, for a moment, there is a god.  A God. Let’s keep it simple and just deal with one for now, okay?  God is up there/in here/wherever – all-knowing, all-seeing, all-powerful.  Do you really, truly honestly think He/She/It is going to fret about the detail?  About which day we take for rest; about which foods we eat or don’t eat; about whether a festival is celebrated this way or that way?  About what kind of covering we wear or don’t wear on our heads?  Really?  Truly?  Honestly?  And, if He/She/It does, then - you know what – I’m not sure I’m terribly impressed by Someone/thing that is quite so petty. 

Individual religions and their rules erupt from social and geographical conditions and that’s fine.  I don’t have a problem with anyone celebrating spirituality in any way they wish.  Just accept that it is a choice and that other people can celebrate it in their own different (not better, not worse) way. It’s when religion starts or fuels conflict that my blood really boils.

I went to former Yugoslavia literally right before the bloodbath began. I remember sitting in a café in Sarajevo talking to a bunch of people over lunch.  They truly didn’t believe there would be war.  ‘We’re too well integrated,’ one of them said. ‘Look at us here, round this table  – I’m Muslim, he’s Catholic, she’s Greek Orthodox, he’s Jewish…and so on.’  Yet, the day I left the tanks rolled into Zagreb. The market I’d shopped in was bombed; the mountain we’d picnicked on became a front-line; to this day I wonder if those people round the table are still alive.

In Israel, nobody even pretends there is integration - because there isn’t.  Yet in Jerusalem, three religions (and many variations within those three) are squashed into one small city centre, eyeing each other up uneasily like children in a playground. 

‘Jerusalem is weird,’ my friend Jane told me before I went. ‘I hated it.’

I didn’t.  I loved the higgledy-piggeldy streets, the architectural play of curve and line – reminiscent of a child’s wooden building blocks.  I loved the brashness of the souks, the vendors cajoling; the clouds of incense; the twists and turns.  As Tel Aviv is all fresh and funky and outgoing; Jerusalem is ancient and deep and introspective. It broods, despite the sun.

We went to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre - as tourists.  A shop was selling crowns of thorns at the entrance.  Inside there were Islamic tiles and stained glass in the ante-rooms.  I wished people would see the similarities, rather than the differences.  There's a lesson in Kabbala - all religions find a place on the Tree of Life.

This is Golgotha, where Christ was crucified.  There was a queue to pray at the altar, to lay one’s hand on the Rock of Calvary.  And I don’t know why I queued but I did, chatting to Rosie, snapping pictures as we waited.  But then, as I knelt down and laid my hand on the rock, going through the motions, something happened.  It felt like something had stabbed me in the heart, deep, deep, deep. Tears sprang to my eyes and I fought hard to keep control.  What was it? 

Love. Total overwhelming Love. Unconditional love that sweeps away all prejudice, all difference, all wanting, all needing, all sense of I, of ego. 

I staggered to my feet and walked unsteadily away.  Someone touched me on the arm. Michal, who runs the educational programme at Kinetis. ‘Are you okay?’

‘Yes, sure. It was just…’

‘Powerful?  Yes, it is. It hits me too. And I’m Jewish.’ She smiled.  ‘Maybe it’s the years of belief and prayer that imbue the atmosphere of Jerusalem. Faith sticks to the walls.’

Maybe it is.  Maybe it does.

We walked then to the Western Wall. Watched the same kind of pilgrimage, the same intent, the same need. This time prayers written on paper and pressed into crevices.

So many people.  So much humanity.  The same hearts and bodies dressed in different ways; the same anguishes and desires wrapped in different rituals.  It sounds trite, it sounds New Age and hippy dippy, but really – we are all just people. 

What was my prayer, for the wall?  It has to be obvious, surely?

To dissolve the need for enmity, to eliminate fear over that which is different; to replace hate and suspicion with that one true cleansing emotion. Love. 

Does that leave you wide wide open?  Yes.  Does it mean you can be hurt, used, manipulated, crucified even? Yes. Does that matter?  No. 

Jerusalem is "complicated"

‘This is a complicated city,’ says Shai, head of the Biblical Zoo in Jerusalem. He gives a rueful shrug as if he knows full well this were the understatement of the year.  ‘And a zoo in Jerusalem is a very different thing from a zoo in London, Barcelona, Los Angeles.  I reckon I’m the only zoo director who starts off talking about human beings, rather than animals.’ 

A group of small children race past at a hundred miles an hour, giggling out loud.  A family steps aside sedately to let them pass.  Shai nods at them.  ‘I can tell by their dress that the family are Palestinian Muslims, the school children are orthodox Jews.  But, you see, this is the one place where everybody can come. Everyone who walks through the gates is welcome.’ 

It could sound corny anywhere else but he has a serious point.  This is possibly the only place in Jerusalem where religion and politics need not raise their heads (except, of course, we’re talking about it).  ‘It’s one of the very few places that orthodox Jews will come, for example, because their religious strictures count out most other cultural pursuits – museums, theatre and so forth.  Yet, because a zoo purely presents ‘God’s creation’ it is deemed suitable. 

‘Of course they don’t come to learn about conservation, about our breeding programmes, about our ecological pursuits..’  He pauses and grins… ‘Yet, hey, once they’re here…we hope we can raise some awareness.’

Shai loves to tell stories and his stories have messages.  He tells us about the zoo's disastrous attempts to get their flamingos breeding.  After trying every ingenious situation going (from oomphing their diet to placing mirrors around the lake to kid the birds into thinking their flock was larger) they realised, to their acute embarrassment that the reason their flock of 60 wasn’t producing eggs was quite simple: they had 60 male flamingos. 

Moral of the story?  Check your basic assumptions.

He then goes on to explain, ruefully, that even adding females into the mix hadn’t produced a rash of eggs.  Meanwhile another zoo, much less pristine and fabulous, had a superb breeding programme. ‘Maybe, just maybe perfect conditions, perfect facilities aren’t the most important thing,' he says.  'Maybe it’s something else – Love perhaps?’

He smiles and takes us to meet the Griffon vultures and tells the tale of the gay vultures – the pair of males which fell in love and built a nest together.  The zoo tried to split them up but then, realising they weren’t having any success, took pity on the star-crossed lovers and let them build their nest, even giving them first a dummy egg and then a newly hatched chick to raise.  ‘They were the best parents,’ says Shai. ‘Loving, attentive – and hey, guess what?  Their chick grew up totally naturally and went on to have chicks of her own – so gay parenting really doesn’t affect a child’s development!’  He grins rogueishly.

Moral of the story?  Be open-minded. 

Then, oh my, we go to meet the elephants.  As in really meet the elephants – up so close we could nigh-on hug them.  There was a moral here but, to be honest, I missed it as I was talking to Ofer, a journalist with the newspaper Ha'Aretz, who was telling me more about the political minefield that is life in Israel. But really, the lesson of elephants is,surely, quite simple.  Beauty, dignity, love.

In Tel Aviv, it was possible to ignore, if not forget, the huge conflicts surrounding this baby nation carved out of desert.  In Jerusalem it is impossible. Three major world religions jostle uneasily, their buildings and worshippers nudging right up against one another.  Bullet holes pit the ancient city gates.  And that most physical and redolent of boundaries – a wall – stretches out over the hills surrounding.  

Will there ever be peace; ever any kind of reconciliation, resolution?  Nobody I spoke to seemed very hopeful. 

I found myself thinking, as I walked away from the most famous wall of all, having poked my prayer into a tiny gap, how sad that we can’t learn from the lessons of the zoo. 

Check your assumptions

Be open-minded.

And, above all. Love.

er, I have a new book out - apparently

Was idly wandering around Amazon, as you do, when stumbled upon a book called The Smudging and Blessings Book, just published. Hmm, looks nice, I thought, wonder who wrote that. Umm, turns out I did. Well, that was a weird way to start the day. A little explanation maybe is called for here. Years ago I was asked to put together The Smudge Pack – a book based on Native American cleansing and space clearing. The pack included a book, a smudge stick (a bundle of herbs you light and waft around to cleanse yourself, other people and your home). There was also a candle, a crystal and maybe some essential oil (it was so long ago I forget). At the time my publisher swore it was going to ‘go stellar’ and make me a wodge of money. Sadly she was wrong. This was around the time she told me I was going to become a ‘brand’ and yup, still waiting for that to happen. But now it seems the US publisher has brushed it off and repackaged the book. Nice I suppose but kind of wish someone had told me. I know my life is out of control but this really is ridiculous.

Maybe it’s time to google myself and find out if I’ve written any other books lately.

Actually I really have written a new book – at least I have a fleeting memory of typing furiously for a few months – so pretty sure it’s happening. I don’t usually plug my work on this blog but these are tough times so needs must and this one is quite amusing. It’s called The Mind Body Spirit Miscellany and should be coming out some time in the next few months (earlier in the US than in the UK). It was a hoot to write as I had to dig out unusual, useful and downright bizarre stories, facts and self-help tips from the broad wide fields of natural health, mythology, psychology, symbolism, religion, esoterica and the supernatural.

A few of my favourites include:

· how to conduct a home séance
· how to master lucid dreaming
· how to locate ley lines
· ghosts in the Viking sagas
· essential oils that pests hate
· water spirits of the world
· the ghost hunter’s tool kit
· how to practice CaoDai
· how to make herbal cough drops

As you can see, it’s all vital stuff. Of course, if I’d been smart I’d have written The Miscellany of Getting By and Making Do but hey ho, those kinds of books are going to be ten a penny and at least with mine you can have some fun while the ship is sinking.
Some of it is actually pretty useful – in a sort of left-field way. Take onychomancy. Heard of that? No, thought not. It’s a form of divination – the art of reading symbols formed by the reflection of sunlight on the oiled fingernails of a child? Grab a nearby child and try it. Tongue analysis can be handy too. Bet you didn’t know that if the right-hand side of your partner’s tongue is pink with a flecked texture, this can indicate lying and unfaithfulness?

I haven’t looked at Adrian’s lately and can’t right now as he’s off in Dorset on a brewery visit, having stayed overnight in some smart hotel. Hey ho. Better cop a look when he gets back. So it was left to James to get me up this morning.

‘It’s 7am, mum. Are you getting up?’
Oh shit.
‘Don’t worry. I’ll let the dog out – he’s been howling for the last hour.’
He has?

I am such a lousy mother. In fact, let’s face it, I’m pretty hopeless all round. My child has to get me up. I don’t even know I’ve got a new book out. I don’t even have a clean house or a tidy garden. While other career women are sitting in meetings or holding serious conference calls, I’m hurtling round a rollercoaster at pucking DisneyWorld. The older I get, the more disorganised and out of control I feel. I keep waiting for someone or something to haul me out of my torpor and shake me hard.

OK, off to pull myself together and get a grip. I might be some time. In the meantime, you can see the books I know I’ve written over at my new ‘serious’ blog – Never Knowingly Overwhelmed. It’s kind of a work in progress so let me know what you think. And do tell me if you stumble over any other books I might have written…..

By the way, there's still time to enter into the draw for FREE LEGO DUPLO.....just ask nicely in the comments section of the post before this.......the draw will take place on Sunday.