I decided to share my voice note and transcript with you on this one, just feels a bit more like a conversation between us that way somehow.
Listen:
Read:
Hello, Julie here. I’m out for a walk and it's a really gorgeous, cold beautiful day. Very still. Although the slight breeze does have a very icy chill on it, so I have my Merino buff tucked up right over my chin to try and keep me warm in the fields today. I've been kind of ruminating on the idea of need, and all the forms that it takes and the ways in which society shames us for having needs and for needing things. Oh, it's okay to want things of course: we all should want things – and we should want more and we should have more and we should spend more but as soon as we voice something as a need, suddenly that's a weakness and a shameful thing.
We shouldn't need to need things in a world where we can have anything that we want.
We've just exited a time of the year that's very focused on what people want. Overindulgence and excessive gift giving and worries about ‘is it the right thing’ and ‘what's the best present to get somebody’? And I love it as much as anyone. It's an excuse to really throw yourself into self-indulgence. Which, again… is kind of seen as a shameful thing, and a privileged thing for sure. And I think we can only exist in that window, and in that way, for a short space of time. So for the couple of weeks over the festive break I really throw myself into it. It's the posh biscuit tin from M&S, it's eating cheese boards at nine o'clock at night because I feel like it. It's grilled cheese just for a snack and it's the Gruyere not the cheddar. Just because I want to.
Okay, that's a lot of foody things, but it's also the indulgence of umpteen fairy lights, and candles and everything that sparkles. A house stuffed full of cheer and of light in the darkest time of the year. I think that indulgence can exist in a healthy way. And I think it can be really good for us, if we have the ability to do that. And that's not to say that it's not an incredible struggle and a very difficult time of year for lots of people. I'm very fortunate that my experience can be one where I can choose to indulge, particularly when rest is part of that. Rest is still seen as an indulgent thing, rather than a necessity for human existence.
I thought I'd share with you where this thought came from today. I listened to and met an internal need, or just a need, to feel more grounded and connected with the earth; and also to try and sort out my mild balance and proprioception issues. I got myself a pair of barefoot shoes for the winter which are fleece lined and fully waterproof. And it's a real treat and freedom to wear these shoes, particularly when I'm out in the countryside because it feels heavenly. It's a different kind of indulgence and luxury. It's not four inches of super springy, cushy gel pillows under your feet. It's not hundreds of pounds worth of branding on the side. These are visibly non-branded shoes. And it's completely about ergonomic function. It's not so much about what looks good as well as feels good, but it's dispelling the myth that our feet need to be heavily cushioned and tied up and bound up for our comfort, which actually we now know damages our feet and our overall posture and health, and impacts on our central nervous system functioning. I recommend looking into if you're interested in this kind of thing, but for me… to be able to step outside and not have to think so carefully about where I'm placing my feet, or how my body is aligned, or are my hips swinging and rotating too far.
I have hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome and hypermobility can cause me issues. If I'm not walking and moving properly and I wear the shoes, and my feet can really connect with the ground underneath, they deal with it themselves. It's an automatic response, and my muscles respond accordingly and they don't feel off-kilter at all. For me, that's really, liberating. Traditional shoes actually cause a lot of overcorrection elsewhere in our body to maintain this kind of tilted forward position that normal shoes give us with the raised heel bed. It's amazing that such a tiny thing is having a flat sole; that's tough but thin, cushioned on the inside and malleable and flexible – also there's a very wide footbed so your feet and toes have just all the room to spread, and suddenly I can feel my toes doing their natural thing and they're gripping the ground – this one tiny thing is such a huge deal. I feel so comfortable when I'm out walking.
Disclaimer with bare-foots: you do have to adjust, because our bodies are so deconditioned out of the normal strength in our feet. You've got to take it easy. You don't want to just start wearing them all day every day. I've been building up on a longer walk every few days and it does make me tired when I get home, because I'm working all of these little muscles and accessory muscles that normally are sleeping and the shoes activate those, are which is a really good thing, because that starts to strengthen other most muscle groups in your body and starts to correct your posture.
This is a long way of me saying that it was an indulgence. They’re a bit expensive, but it was meeting and directly saying you need to meet a need. I don't care how they look, I don't care that I'm being told that I should want something else. I care about what my body needs. And I'm serving that need and it feels great, even in this tiny, small way.
I was walking through the field, at the start of my walk, quite joyously have to say – I was gunning straight through the mud, didn't care a bit, and I saw one of my fellow walkers coming towards me with his dog, and there’s something I've noticed in all these years of walking (although I don't have a dog myself, I get to know other dog walkers and people that are walking the same routes as me). There's usually a very peaceful expression on people's faces when they're out walking their dogs. All the troubles are cleared away. This is the time of day where they have an excuse, because they have got to take that animal out and give it what it needs, and it allows them to get what they need; but in a way that societally acceptable, and in this case of them meeting their pets needs, unavoidable and essential.
If humans were just to go out for themselves, like I do, without a dog for a couple of hours, just to enjoy walking and free up some mental space, I think they would be quite judged for that. And it would be seen as an indulgence, rather than meeting a need. I think can people that manage their own time and who don't work full time often share with each other the fact that they get stick when they're in control of their own patterns in life, and their work life balance. And, ‘Oh, I wish I could just go out for a walk in the middle of the day or take a nap in the middle of the day’. And granted, a lot of the people in my community, the creative community, is pretty neurodivergent and there's a lot of disability and therefore we are people who do need to build our own patterns and factor in rest as an essential part of our existence. But it's so interesting that in wider society, this is still seen as an indulgence, rather than what it is which is very, very much an essential thing of meeting a need. I think that we all can benefit from being a bit more honest and open about our needs and where they're not being met and where we don't have space or room in our lives to try to do that.
Meeting our own needs is an act of self-care. It's an essential thing to do. And yet it's something that we keep hidden, that we feel so shamed for.
It's been one of the most fortifying things in my existence in these last few years, where I've come to find a community of like-minded people with a similar life experience to me, that the mentality is very much it is essential, it is survival to meet your needs, and it's absolutely acceptable and okay.
It's not something we should feel shameful for. I'm very fortunate now that many of the people that I know do the same things as me to get through the day: they take naps, they make little acts of self-care, whether it's cream-topped hot chocolate, or that butter-fried grilled cheese, or a two-hour walk just because they feel like it, or curling up to the sounds of a favourite podcast and having a nap. They're all the small ways in which we take back space for ourselves, that we are so ready to give away to other people. More often than not, that’s to capitalists, and the amount of time and energy and money we put into consuming products, into other people, most predominantly the people that we work for, our employers and colleagues. There is no denying the fact that we live in a world where work comes first.
In a roundabout way I think what I'm saying is, wouldn't it be nice if we could do for ourselves what I can do for my feet? Invite a little bit of grounding. Wouldn't that be a really wonderful thing?
If this resonates with you, I'd love to know how you're grounding, creating space around you and how you're meeting your needs? Or perhaps where you're feeling they're not being met? And maybe you're not sure what to do about that.
There's not always easy answers. But I think the most important thing is having the conversation. If you've made it to the end of this article, thank you so much for listening and for reading. And just for being here, it means the world to me that you're still here. And you're still listening. And I'm hoping to be sharing more ideas and thoughts with you over the coming weeks and months.
Sending you love and light wherever you are x
I’d love to know how you’re grounding and meeting your needs? Please share in the comments below, and with anyone you think should read it xx
"This is the time of day where they have an excuse, because they have got to take that animal out and give it what it needs, and it allows them to get what they need; but in a way that societally acceptable, and in this case of them meeting their pets needs, unavoidable and essential."
So true! I knew walking was good for me but, until we got Woody, it was optional. Why should meeting people's needs be less important?