Day 531: Crisis Crisis

Me

I was a grumpy-faced old cow this morning. Grumpy-bellied. I felt bad. I felt insecure. I've noticed this, over my time doing the Crisis at Christmas shifts. I often feel insecure and defensive and I think it comes out. I have conversations with other volunteers sometimes which I feel must be hideous. Then I remember that most of the hideousness happens inside my head. Some of it leaks out, but the level of it is almost always minimal. I could feel at the point of breaking and what would come out would be a slight tightness in the voice or a shuffle or a misplaced word or two. Nothing to make that other person's experience awful. Sometimes mine. 

So today, I really wanted to make a difference. I went in with the intention to make my being there worthwhile, to use any skills I have to make the experience of the people I come into contact with more positive than if I hadn't been there. Yoga, I thought. Creative writing. Some singing, maybe. Big Jenga, of course, and finally a guided meditation. I've tried a few times but haven't promoted it well enough. Today. Today was the day. 

Or not. 

The yoga space had been appropriated by someone doing a gong bath. They were quite far away (it's a massive building), but when asked, they were only willing to share the space with a yoga class if I didn't talk too loud. Fair enough - their thing is based on sound. So no yoga. Guided meditation was out - theirs was absolutely meditation, so it made sense to guide people there for an experience they can only have today. I suggested creative writing. There was a poet there today. He was going to do a reading, and if there was creative writing to be done, he'd be the one to do it. That's not true. What he actually said was that we should do it together and I heard something else. I said 'okay' and thought 'oh for fuck's sake, how will that even work? I just want to do one thing!'. At which point the art teacher, who earlier had said 'If you do yoga, I'll come and help you teach - I'm a yoga teacher', said 'Collaboration is good.'. Ha! Hsa! I thought 'I fucking well know collaboration is "good", it's my business to know that... AND I DON'T WANT TO! That tickled me and pained me at the same time. 

Omar makes me feel better, even with a gun

I spent the next few hours feeling lame, being instructed to make posters for everyone else's workshops (and I'm really unskillful at that) and feeling deeply frustrated and sorry for myself. Then I went to play Big Jenga with someone - it's a good thing to do to get talking to people and to make a connection. Complaints from the gong people came through. When it fell, it wasn't nice for their relaxing clients. Another thwarting - nothing that I'm good at is valued a all, I thought. My ego was raging. It was kicking back at being worthless and unskilful and was feeling the need to assert itself as valuable because of this. In that state, it missed many little gifts that were still being given and believed all kinds of awful things about what others must be thinking of me. Aaah, the irony... so wrapped up in my own navel, surrounded by people in a situation so hideous, and not hugely far removed from any of us, especially me. Being homeless is horrible. Having nowhere to go and nowhere to belong. The situation in itself is enough to change the mental state of even the strongest person. Many people are very strong indeed, because they have to be. Some aren't. Both ways, it's hard. 

shiiiiiiiit

I spent some time talking gently to myself as I observed. It didn't change anything, but it did make the experience, so obviously self-constructed, simpler and easier to be in. So if I wasn't trying to PROVE my worth, what am I good at? What would be my 'gift' - the thing I can do with ease that makes things better for others. Through my grumpy sing-making, I talked to a lot of people. Some of those conversations were very worth it. In the end, that's what I did for most of the day. Talk to people. And we did the creative writing. One person came (then another, then another). It was really interesting and enjoyable. I forgot to feel unworthy and the whole thing flowed and felt easy, even the bits that didn't. By the end of the day, then, I was flying, and ready to add an extra day to my shifts (though it might be the prospect of my tax return that's helping with that idea. 

So - a successful day, despite myself. And tomorrow, I've promised to sing with people. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!