#27: where you end up is where you started
On labyrinths, apartheid and One Day
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Thinking
I’m staying with my pal Laura in Cape Town for the month of February. Nearby is Green Point Park, which contains a labyrinth, a gift for residents to use. I’ve never thought much about the difference between a labyrthin and a maze. A labyrinth has one single path from entrance to centre, and back to entrance (now an exit). The intention is to provide a walking meditation. A maze is a puzzle, with many paths. The intention is to disorient.
From the sign at the park: “At its most basic level the labyrinth is a metaphor for the journey to the centre of your deepest self and back out into the world with a broadened understanding of who you are”.
I walked this labyrinth with a palm full of crushed, aromatic rosemary from the bushes that construct it. To progress, first you must go backwards to go forwards, edging closer to the outside before you’re taken to the centre. To get to the exit, it’s the reverse. You must once again go backwards, towards the centre, to go forwards to the exit. From the entrance point, you cannot see how the path unfolds. Surrender to the sacred geometry. You must trust you will reach the destination, without ever knowing how. Where you end up is where you started. Simple lessons that need to be learned over and over again.
More: The puzzling difference between mazes and labyrinths.
Reading
The Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela. An extremely long autobiography, and deservedly so (what a life!). Incredibly relevant to current events: white supremacist oppression and the mentality of apartheid, liberation strategy and tactics and the difficulties of movement organising.
Israel, Palestine, and the Doppelganger Effect by Naomi Klein (two chapters from her book Doppelganger, generously released online for free), about “the persistence of anti-Semitism as an ancient conspiracy theory, and the dangers of a particular kind of trauma-forged identity politics as they play out in Israel”.
. Beautiful writing, as always: “I am trying to understand how we as a society want to punish people for changing their bodies by wishing for them to be imprisoned in the body they tried to change, because that will show them… It’s essentially using a person’s body as a punishment for not loving their body. It’s so carceral and insane that I can barely wrap my head around it”.Most read from the last edition:
GriefSick’s trauma-informed collaboration guidelines
GriefSick’s November 2023 update.
Watching
One Day. As funny and devastating as the book, the authoritative adaption. Gorgeous period details and Ambika Mod is sensational, aided by David Nicholls’ sparkling dialogue.
We Are Lady Parts. It’s criminal that there’s no series two of this sitcom about a Muslim women punk band (sample lyric: “Voldemort’s alive and he’s under my headscarf”).
Invictus, about Nelson Mandela’s involvement in the Rugby World Cup in South Africa in 1995, a year after apartheid ended. A very Hollywood treatment, but useful for an introduction.
Listening
To South African artists, courtesy of Laura’s epic playlists.
Writing
This interview for
with about chronic illness grief, creativity and living with severe ME: “There’s always a tug in my heart”. You’ll find our conversation fascinating if you’re interested in how different brains work and how creativity is constructed. Madelleine challenged a lot of my preconceptions about this. Could you create if you only had 5 minutes per day to do so?Talking
On a podcast about
, how chronically ill people live in "the territory of erosion" (Francis Weller), the origins of GriefSick (psychedelics), collective grief and surrender.Do you know someone who is growth-oriented and wisdom-seeking? Someone who loves unusual ideas and great reading recommendations? Perhaps they’d like This Might Resonate; please consider sharing this newsletter with them.
If you’re interested in chronic illness and/or grief, you might like my other newsletter, GriefSick (why have one newsletter when you can have two?).