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Tag Archives: believe

Understanding yourself: Me

04 Friday Oct 2019

Posted by in Dream, Reflections, The continuing adventure, Us

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I have shared on this blog that the year before we came out here I stood on the precipice of having a full breakdown, and I did have a mini one. I have written about how I can be driven, which in some ways is a good thing and essential, (more of that in another post) and yes, being that type of person is a blessing. But it can also be a curse, when insecurity creeps in through the crack in the open door.

Without my strong personality my book would not be out there, and my Blog would not have been so successful, but more than that so many people would not have found something to give them hope in their hour of need.

But despite that I also remember my counsellors words well when she told me I was a ‘doer’, and that if I didn’t learn to utilise, but control, that part of my personality it could actually destroy me.

Living here has been hard in that I now have arthritis and work is limited for me; because I cannot do the things I used to do; and you see for someone like me to not be able to have something to focus on means that I feel as if I have lost myself. I have always needed something to define me: in the UK it was my career, which virtually destroyed me, but coming here and trying to find something else proved difficult.

But last year life shook me up and showed me the way: I started the Other blog and it took off. I always knew that sharing our story would help others, and now I know it has. As I have written in previous posts it jolted me back to being me, it gave me impetus, and all the things I have worked on: H’s website for the business, the Facebook page, and the business itself, which is doing better than it ever has, was as a result of me finding my impetus again; or as I have said: being driven. The blog reached 96,000 views in a year and I was in control of what I was doing: which is something I love.

But once the book was published the control was taken away from me to a degree. Yes I could promote it, increase my media presence, but I would never actually know any stats for how well the book was doing until the royalty cheque fell on the mat; and that for me was a problem. It was what was keeping me awake at the beginning of the week; I had to relinquish some of the control, and I had to trust the fact that someone else was now doing the driving. I knew it, I knew it was going to be the case but my brain remained active and kept me awake because I couldn’t control it.

I still keep a journal, as I have written on the other blog my journal was at one point the book that saved my life, but I don’t write in it often now, the two blogs tend to work for me. But as I have said they are still not the same as keeping a journal, which is a place where you don’t worry about your audience, because your audience is you, and so you have to be honest.

After my last post I knew that I had to write my journal, that was the key to sleeping. So I did: I had a frank conversation with myself: that the blog had and still is, doing so well why would the book fail? I reminded myself of all the comments I have received from all over the world:

‘Thanks for your amazing insight it helps me to understand how to stay strong through all of this.’

‘This! I need to read this today!’

‘When I am having a hard day sometimes I go back to Rosie’s blog, and it helps me get my demon under control.’

I told myself that I need to have a little more belief in myself, and I was honest with myself that at times I doubt myself and I questioned why. I wrote about the power of belief, but despite that when things are out of our control our belief begins to falter, and the strength is in pulling ourselves back up, and holding on.

On Wednesday night I slept soundly. I have always wanted to be able to meditate, but have struggled. So when I recently read a post from the Fabulous Biscuit factory blog I realised that writing my journal is a form of meditation for me. I put my pen to paper and I just write, and then I read what I have written and my mind is clear.

So in knowing that life shows us the way yesterday I found my book for sale in Waterstones, and stocked in Gardners. I knew that meant that the book was doing well, and it helped me a great deal, I also knew that life was telling me to hold on to my belief which was confirmed when we met a new client with the business last night: they work in the book world and when I said that the book is stocked in Gardners they advised that before that could have happened Gardners would have done their homework: they only stock books that they think will sell!

So I will do all the hard work I need to and support and promote my book, (of course I will) but I will give myself a timeframe every day, and some days I will step back from it. After all someone else is doing the driving! I know that!

Rosie

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Belief – Just have faith and believe

21 Saturday Sep 2019

Posted by in Change is a coming, Dream, Making our own way, Reflections, The continuing adventure, Us

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I am now reading, we are now reading, ‘The Book of Awakening’ by Mark Nepo. There are many passages that have been highlighted for reference not least ‘The Spoked Wheel’; in fact that made me cry; but that is for another post. Today I want to say about belief, in fact will probably post a few posts about belief in the future.

From the book of awakening by Mark Nepo…

‘January 11

Ted Shawn

Underneath all we are taught, there is a voice that calls to us beyond what is reasonable, and in listening to that flicker of spirit, we often find deep healing. This is the voice of embodiment calling us to live our lives like sheet music played…’

For me this whole passage was about belief. If we had not moved to France, and I had not had the time and the solitude to research and interact with others, I would not have written this book. I would have had the n’er do wells surrounding me and I would have struggled to have got off that wheel and hold on to my belief.

I had another post lined up for this week, but life as always has taken over and showed me the way and on Monday I was called and told my book had gone to publication. On Thursday this arrived.

After nearly four years of hard work, writing and re-writing my book, to hold it in my hand is something I cannot describe and it made me cry.

Within an hour people were messaging asking where they could buy it. I was about to reply and say that it was not available on Amazon or Barnes & Noble yet, but just thought I would check; and there it was! I cried again.

I cannot believe it. But why can’t I. At the end of the day I wrote my book in the belief that it would help others, and my blog (93,000 views and counting) and the comments and messages I receive proved that my belief was right.

I have experienced so often the ‘oh you’re writing a book (in the tone that implies that they should follow it up with ‘ of course you are’), or been asked why, or told you won’t earn any money from that, and so on. But I never gave up.

Our’s is a story that helps others in what often is the most traumatic time of their life. So it was never just about earning money, it was about helping others, it was about perseverance, and it was about not following the crowd. Ultimately it was all about ‘Belief’: it’s all about belief and never giving up.

So now it’s out there and I hope some of you will enjoy reading it.

Thanks for reading, this is part of my French adventure after all. I couldn’t have done it without living here.

Rosie

Making This Better is available internationally on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Xlibris in both paperback & ebook.

Making This Better the book is now available including the journal entries for the first 5 years of our recovery & the whole 21 days of ‘The War’. Available internationally in paperback and ebook  at Amazon and Barnes & Noble also available at Xlibris and Apple Books for iPad and Waterstones Bookstores for click & collect

I would love to hear your feedback.

 

Life

01 Sunday Sep 2019

Posted by in Change is a coming, Making our own way, The continuing adventure, The seasons, Us

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As Autumn rolls in, with the first day of September marking her arrival the day has been warmer than promised. We have had a totally lazy day and at five in the evening I have just got out of my jymbies! H looked at me this afternoon as we sat watching old episodes of ‘Four in a Bed’ and uttered the words we always use ‘I should get on really.’ Only this time I looked at him and said ‘Why?’

You see the French try and keep their Sunday’s sacred, that is why it is frowned upon to mow your lawn, or use loud tools after noon on a Sunday (in some areas that applies to all day); but it is not a bad thing because you do not have a constant hum of strimmers, and lawn mowers, and drills and banging whilst people frantically try and fit in all their jobs before they return to the daily grind of more often than not, ten hour or more days, like we used to do in England.

Since living here I have come to understand: it is not the noise it is the fact that not being able to make that noise makes you stop! And then perhaps smell the roses?

But coming from England that is still a hard thing for us to do: just stop. Have a day when you don’t do anything or give yourself a list of jobs to do. Yes I will be cooking a roast dinner today but that is all, no hardship. Yes I am writing this blog, but I love writing; and yes I have done some social media work, but again I don’t find that a hardship and I do try and manage it.

I suppose the coming of the new season and the slow drop in temperature as the day has wore on has made me think; for new people to this blog you will know that I am inspired by Autumn and all she brings   and represents: death, closure, the end of something, another chapter gone, and the reminder to cherish the moment becauses suddenly summer is over and autumn is here. She has taught me that without all these things life cannot move forward and change is the only thing of which we are guaranteed; so today got me thinking about how we should just sometimes stop and savour the day; stop always trying to achieve and just go with the flow. And today that is exactly what we did.

Earlier in the year I wrote of how we did not know if we would stay here and I said that life would show us the way. So far it has: Rich’s business has taken off, I have got me back, we have met some lovely people (sadly we have met some more arseholes as well, but those bastards are about wherever you go) and we have learnt our worth. My other blog was a main contributing factor to that: in the way it has just took off, and the responses to it. It made me realise that I should not listen to the n’er do wells in life and trust my own gut instinct because so far it has never let me down; things never worked out when I didn’t listen to my gut, but when I do things come good.

On Thursday I was sent the proof for my book and the front and back cover (which are fabulous). Yes I have to proof read it and should have been doing it today but it is good too take a break when you are looking for any editorial mistakes! Once agreed the book should be available to buy by the end of the month, and I already have people from all over the world waiting to buy it. I will keep you posted.

In addition to that Rich has now been contacted via our website by two clients who have a lot of decorating work and they are now pencilled in for the winter months. That is a first!

But we have also stayed true to our word in that we would know our worth and we will not just take work because we need the money. We always need the money but we agreed that we would not do sub-standard work for people who did not want to  pay for prep; and also that we would not work for people who appeared rude, or when alarm bells were ringing about them. We have done that too often since living here and it got us nowhere.

As most of you know I do believe life shows you the way and sends you lessons and in the past two weeks she has sent us a test to see if we were going to be true to our word: life sent us a client who was at times abrupt and rude and who rang all of our alarm bells:

They told us that their regular decorator had been too busy all summer to accomodate them (alarm bell 1, that normally means that the person is difficult to work for and that the decorator turned down the job) then they told us that they would do the prep work prior to painting (alarm bell two because if the prep was not done right then the paint would not adhere properly) then they changed their minds about what they wanted and asked for another price for the job with the work they had originally said they would do included. (Alarm bell three, as they did not seem to know what they wanted so how could we provide it?) Then they asked me for my phone number four times even when it was already on the messages sent, and they had our business card! They said that they did not use the internet even though they messaged me via Messenger and have a Facebook page! They could not understand why the days required to do the job would increase (even though I had to add the additional work that they had said they would do) and on and on and on. Their messages got ruder and more and more blunt and in the end all of my and H’s alarm bells were ringing loudly.

But me (ever the empath) still gave them the benefit of the doubt even when H said he had serious doubts about working for them.  I suggested that ‘life will show us the way.’ It did the very same morning!  After providing six different estimates accomodating their changes of mind I got home to a message querying something that had already been explained four times. It was both rude, demanding and abrupt, and I thought ‘well life sure showed me!’ I was getting the impression that I was having my time wasted (hence the lack of blogging) and I spoke to H and we both agreed that we would let the job go. So we did; and it felt good. Life will send us what we need, it has proved that to me over and over again.

So on this first day of autumn those are my reflections on life, and what we have learnt so far this year.

I learnt long ago that life is driving the the mini-bus  I’m not, and it is only when I don’t listen to what life tells me that things go wrong. I am now listening.

Here are to exciting journey’s ahead.

Rosie

Image result for tree lined avenues

 

Dreams

22 Wednesday May 2019

Posted by in Change is a coming, Dream, Making our own way, Reflections, The good life

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When we were planning to move to France I had a little dream in my head: I pictured myself sitting in my garden writing. I had some pretty clothes on and a jaunty French scarf around my neck, and the sun was shining. So as I sit here in my garden today, writing this blog, the sun is shining, and I am in paint spattered clothes (hey you can’t have everything!) and I realised that my dream has come true.

I am editing my book, surrounded by tranquility and birdsong, with two sleeping Welshies at my feet and 3 sleeping cats around me.

I realise again that my dream has come true.

My book is half way edited from the printed version (so much you cannot see when it is on the laptop!) and I will be contacting a publisher on Friday. My blogYou can read it here just hit 50,000 views, with over 8,000 visitors.

I always knew our story would help others, and from the interaction and feedback from the people who read it I was right. Someone once told me to ceremoniously burn my journal one day; but I always knew I couldn’t because it is part if me: keeping that journal made me the person that I am today.

It brought a tear to my eye today. Dreams can come true, you just have to believe in them.

Moisy

Motivation during the French winter

08 Tuesday Jan 2019

Posted by in My home, Reflections, Simple things, The adventures of living life in the French countryside, The continuing adventure, The seasons

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I have written many times about winter in rural France. I have said how people dread it, how it can be very grey (although that is one of my favourite colours!), and how work can be scarce to the point of non existence; add that to what can be one of the most expensive times of the year with fuel to find, and it can be hard.

A new year – a time of reflection

So this year we are approaching winter with a different approach, in fact this year we are approaching a lot of things differently, but more of that to come over the year!

Firstly we have wood, in our garden, our own wood. So we spend at least one afternoon a week chopping the wood (don’t get me started on the log splitter!). I enjoy it, I enjoy working with my husband, with the puppies running around us, and I find it rewarding.

Secondly we have decided to focus on what we can do, instead of what we can’t do. I believe if you keep going what you need will come, so since the new year we have done the following:

We went for our New Year day walk around the medieval city of forgeres

I said we are going to enjoy the winter in my previous posts, and I hope by doing this I will inspire others to just embrace each and every day.

Rich has decided to use his time, and has painted our toilet, and hung the radiator on the wall. We have decided that this is the year that we will take control and this is one way to do it. To decorate the house, with the paint we already have, and to do it well and how we want it. This house will be unrecognisable.

He has also re-arranged our living room, so that we take more advantage of the log burner with a ‘snug area by the tv and fire. I love it, it has gone from this……

To this..(dog leg not included!)

He has opened up the seating area at the other side of the room, and we have decided not to have a table. We never use it! So it’s going up for sale and we now have a huge amount of space. From this….

To this

We have a long list of jobs that we want to achieve this winter, pulling all the logs from the overgrown dead grass around them, decorate the hall, paint our living room and kitchen ceiling white (the leaking roof has been fixed, properly this time without any odious little people in sight!) and decorate both rooms. I am sure in-between all this work will come Rich’s way.

And last, but never least I will continue to cherish the scenes around me, because they keep me here. So here are some winter sunrises and sunsets from 2019.

Sunrise Ambrières-les-Vallées January 2019

Let’s be positive, and honest with ourselves this year.

Moisy

Sunset Ambrières-les-Vallées January 8th 2019

Counting My Blessings: Day 10

02 Wednesday Jan 2019

Posted by in My family and other furry creatures, People, Reflections, Simple things, The continuing adventure

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So here I am on my final post of the ten day series Counting My Blessings and I am going to cheat, I am counting three in this post, and will put it under the heading ‘My Family’.

First let’s talk about my son Tom. I chose this picture carefully because he is on top of a peak in the Lake District in England, with the sun behind him, and for me it symbolises how he can do anything he wants, he is young, and his life is in front of him with every opportunity available should he wish to take it.

I am proud of him: how he has coped with mum and dad moving to France, has pursued his dream of working in the gaming industry and has never given that up. I don’t think he realises just how much strength you need to pursue your dream, and exactly how much strength he actually has.

He is full of fun, empathetic and learnt his lesson to walk in others shoes and is loved by so many people. I am proud of him.

Now my second blessing, my sister. She will kill me for putting this photo on, but she has to be in this, not least for the support she has given Tom over the past four years. The second photo is of Tom and I, with Tom getting ready to walk her down the aisle.

We have had our ups and downs, as sisters do! She thinks she’s always right ( and annoyingly more often than not she is!) But she is always there, she cares, and Tom would not have his dream job without her tenacity and love.

Now last but never least:

My husband Richard.

If any of you have read my serialisation of my soon to be published book (it will happen this year whatever) https://makingthisbetter.com you will know how Rich I and sailed The Ocean of Despair for a long time, to get to where we are today.

This man fought tooth and nail to keep me; he evolved because he wanted to, not because I asked him to; because I never did! After what happened he had to keep up with me, I wasn’t going to wait for him!

And every minute of every hour of every day he did.

I once had someone say to me that they ‘had never had a man look at them in the way Rich looks at me’ and that was true, I know I am truly blessed to have that in my life.

He is a kind and gentle giant, who enabled me to trust him enough to come on this adventure. He makes me laugh every day, literally every day, with his dry sense of humour, and silliness.

Everyone he meets loves him, because he just sees the funny side of life. Look at him in this picture, he is so naughty he has led them all astray.

I am blessed to have this man in my life, he is sensitive and loving; strong when I need him. I could not be on this adventure without him. We are blessed to be as strong as we are now, and we both count that blessing every day, and NEVER take it for granted.

I know he will cry when he reads this; and that just makes me love him even more.

So my final blessing, my family, but more than that: the pride I have for my son, the hope I have for him too.

The understanding I have of my sister, and the respect too. My book wouldn’t exist if it wasn’t for her!

The respect I have for my husband, the love I have for them all. I am truly blessed.

I hope you have enjoyed this series; And I hope it has made people think about the small things, because, trust me, they are the things that keep you going in life. So in this New Year, please take time to stop, and see the small stuff.

Moisy

Counting my blessings: Day one

24 Monday Dec 2018

Posted by in My family and other furry creatures, Reflections, Simple things, The adventures of living life in the French countryside, The continuing adventure

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As I have got older I have started to find that we seem to have lost what Christmas is about.

Christmas was originally a pagan festival to celebrate the Winter Solstice, it was just taken over by the Christian faith and Christmas was born. It was meant to be a time for reflection on the year past and to celebrate the small things we have. I really believe have lost that along the way.

So this morning as I sit here drinking my tea in bed (yes it is one of my favourite things when we are not working, and I notice, a place of inspiration lately) I looked at my beautiful boy and came up with an idea: each day until New Years Day, I will post about a small thing I am grateful for. Here is todays…..https://moisfrenchadventure.com/2017/12/05/dogs-are-not-our-whole-life-but-they-make-our-life-whole/

My beautiful boy Harley, who we re-homed five years ago, after a relationship breakdown took place. He made us fall in love with the Welsh Terrier, and he is a mummy’s boy. We nearly lost him last year after he ruptured his disc in his back, you can read about it here…

Today this is my blessing: Harley.

I hope that in this time of madness and frenetic rushing about this may inspire some of you to just stop; and reflect; and then join me in sharing your blessings with us by telling us the one small thing that you are counting as a blessing each day over this time of celebrations and gratitude.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Have a good Christmas Eve folks.

Moisy

I’m back! You can’t keep me down for long.’

18 Tuesday Dec 2018

Posted by in My family and other furry creatures, My home, People, The continuing adventure

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Someone said to me on Saturday that she had missed my blogs recently; and guessed after my last blog that I was,perhaps, struggling with life out here; but that she hoped not because I gave her hope.

I wasn’t necessarily struggling with life out here, I was struggling with my belief that life would show me the way, and that despite all the crap good would come.

If you’ve been reading my blog you know I follow the teachings and philosophy of the Tao; I know that where there’s bad there’s good, and where there’s good there’s bad; that you may have a lot of crap come your way but if you hold onto your faith good will come; and things over the past few months were making that hard, I was struggling to believe.

But over the past few weeks so many people have supported me, helped us, and they gave me hope: my sister sent me a medicated mouthwash and mouth gel, my friend Saveena called to say the assessor was coming out for the roof, and both she and my sister contacted me almost daily to check I was okay. It all helped but I still struggled.

So on Thursday I looked up and asked for help to regain my belief; because I knew that good things would not come if I could not believe. An hour later my IPad pinged and what I needed started to come my way. By Friday my faith was back; and I started to see ALL My blessings: good friends, new friends, our son, our family, our animals, the stunning place where we live, and not least our love for each other.

I had worked hard all week creating pretty Christmas stock to sell at a craft fair on Saturday at a beautiful old French Mill half an hour from us.

But when Saturday came it was minus six degrees and thick ice, with icicles were hanging off our garden table, and when Rich wound down his window there was another window of ice in its place! The roads were treacherous. But we trundled on, with the van skidding everywhere in the sleet, and set up our stall.

Sadly in the end, and understandably given the weather, only about ten people visited the fair. But we still had a wonderful day. We met two lovely, kind people. They too were doing what they could to keep their dream alive, and we laughed all day. They had spent all summer making these wonderful reindeer and you can find them on Facebook as la petit Cretouffiere.

At the end of the day we all gave each other something: cakes, key rings, angels, chocolates,

And my dear, kind friend gave me this stunning lamp, which now takes pride of place on our stairs (walls to be decorated next year!) projecting stars all over the stairwell

Stars are a big thing in my house, a star is for life not just for Christmas! So I decided to keep my newest design for me – twinkle, twinkle! It now takes pride of place in my bedroom, twinkling in the twinkly lights…

It can be replicated if required by anyone…

At the end of the day we all helped each other load up and tidy before the night drew in. We got home to a freezing house (gotta love that stone!) that took three hours to warm up! But we changed into layers of fleecy pyjamas, Snuggly socks (two pairs!) opened the wine and watched the Strictly Come Dancing final; with a roaring fire, four sleepy cats, and two snuggled Welshies.

I know that we are blessed, we have each other, and we fought tooth and nail to keep that; no money in the world can buy what we have. We have no presents (but the dogs have one) and we don’t need them. Our Christmas present will be snuggling in bed with a cup of tea on Christmas morning, and eating our dinner on our laps, not caught up in all the hype! My happiness is complete with our Christmas decorations, that I have collected over the years.

We have now been invited to various shin digs and I am busy. This morning I woke up to this stunning sunrise and I thought to myself ‘all I had to do was believe.’

And I do, my belief is strong, nothing can take that away, it may wane but it will never leave me.

I’m back!

Moisy

You may want to read my other blog

https://makingthisbetter.com

I had a little cry…..

12 Monday Nov 2018

Posted by in The continuing adventure

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Image result for images for self belief

I started to write my second blog  makingthisbetter.com (See link below) on the 2nd of October. I know that some people do not read it, the subject is one that they find difficult, it is a story of Rich and I in times gone past. A story of heartache and pain but ultimately a story of hope; because we are here today, happy and content with what we have.

After polling my readers on this blog I decided to serialise some of the book that I had written, about what happened to us. I truly believe that it is a tale that will help other people when they are in the place of utter devastation and desolation that we found ourselves once.

Well it went mad!!

On Saturday night, thirty nine days after my initial post, my blog hit ten thousand views. and I have had such wonderful comments:

‘@moiraswindell I’ve already binge read your blogs’

‘You’re story gives me hope, it is incredibly inspiring’

‘This completely resonates with me, word for word’

Not least the number of people who have said that they are going out to get a journal!

So on Saturday night as that figure crept up and over the ten thousand mark  I cried! Why? Because I always knew that we had a story to tell; I knew that others would want to read it, I knew and I never gave up. The emotion that I felt, after so much hard work just overwhelmed me.

When someone told me once to ceremoniously burn the journal that I kept then, the journal that kept me sane and kept us together, I said I would never do that; because at the time I wrote that journal I wanted to read someone else’s that would be like mine – that would show me my pain was normal but also show me I would get through it.

Over the past three years I have had people do that thing – you know – ‘hmmmmm’ when you tell them you are writing a book; had people smile at me as if to say ‘of course you are!’ And people who have said  ‘but that won’t get you money now! You need money now, you need to leave that and go and do other work.’

But I didn’t listen to them, and I never, ever, gave up! I cannot tell you the confidence that the response has given me with regard to my writing, and I cannot tell you how grateful I am to all of you who have read this blog and given me such encouraging words- not least

‘You should write a book, I would buy it.’

A big thank you to you all.

I have sent my book off to an agent now, and will send it to another one this week, because those ten thousand viewers told me that they want to read my story. If nobody takes it up then I will self publish it, because I have a story to tell and now I know that others want to read it!

What has that to do with living in France? Moving here and having this adventure gave me the freedom to do this; this blog gave me the confidence, you all supported me, leaping off that cliff got us here now. That’s what it has to do with an adventure, it gives you freedom, if  you let it.

Believe – that’s what I say – believe.

Moisy

Image result for quotes about using the past to make a better future

Change is coming, the things we’ve learnt – The Roof

25 Tuesday Sep 2018

Posted by in Change is a coming, Reflections, The adventures of living life in the French countryside, The continuing adventure

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“An integral being knows without going, see withoug looking, and accomplishes without doing.” 

Lao Tzu

In my previous post I told you how our roof is now being replaced, but for those who like to think differently there is more of a story here – it is how Rich and I have learnt to accept things as they are, and now things are coming together.

This has been our kitchen roof for the last two and a half years.

I wrote in a previous blog about Allianz the insurance company with whom we had our house insured, and how when storm Katy blew through in the March 2016, she ripped some holes in our roof and the insurance company refused to pay out because ‘we had not maintained it!’ Considering we had only lived here seven months that was difficult!

We had run out of money at that time and had no means to repair it. We listened to others and bought some tiles when we had some money left from our intermittent income believing that we would eventually accumulate enought to repair the roof, but we never did; we tried to drive circumstance and made our lives even more difficult because we were spending money we could not afford on something that was going to do nothing. As if to prove the point in the September a tornado ripped through the garden, literally! It took half the silver birch with it, and our gazebo, it carried Harley’s paddling pool off into the chemin

…but more than anything it took half the roof!

So for two years we lived with a tarpaulin. Two tarpaulins over each other in fact, after the cat ripped one!

At first Rich and I could not see how we could carry on living here, or carry on with this adventure. Other’s asked whether life was indeed trying to ‘show us the way’ and if we should give up. But at this point I had started to read the Tao, and I did not want to go home. People asked how we could live like it, but, as someone said to me “It wouldn’t be an adventure if there weren’t bumps in the road!”

So we did the only thing we could do, we carried on and believed that good things would come our way one day.

At first Rich got really stressed. worried about the timber rotting – as someone helpfully told him it would – questioned how we were living like this, but I never stopped believing; and I would read the Tao to him and eventually he ‘got it’. So whilst over the years we’ve had bowls all over the kitchen at times, and learnt how to stop water splashing everywhere, we also learnt to accept that it had not killed us, had not killed our dream and we were still here. The worry about how we would survive left us because we knew that to worry about something that you cannot change is just a waste of energy that will just bring negative shit your way; and most important of all we learned to laugh about it.

As time went by I started to read Deepak chopra and as he says:

‘You accept things as they are, not as you wish they were in this moment. This is important to understand. You can wish for things in the future to be different but in ‘this’ moment you have to accept things as they are.” 

(The Seven psiritual Laws of Success – The Law of Least Effort)

This situation has reminded me of my old life when I lived in England; then we would have stressed to the max about getting the roof fixed, got into debt, panicked, listened to others who would have said we had to get it done. We would have believed that we could not survive without it, and we would have worried about what other’s thought. Here in rural France everyone lives simply, and I find that people understand and accept when people cannot afford things and they do not judge – not our neighbours anyway. But most importantly Rich and I have learnt not to care what other’s think, to let go of our egos and just be us. I say it often, as my darling late mum used to say “All the time they are judging you they are leaving someone else alone.” A brilliant way to look at things.

So here we are over two years later and our roof is being replaced. I know that this is at the right moment of time that his has happened and I know that we had to be without that roof to show us that we did not need what we thought we did; that nothing other than ill health and death is insurmountable and that something would come along in the end and enable us to replace our roof – and come along it did. But most importantly this lesson showed Rich and I that you do not need everything that you think you do – No, not even a roof!!

Let go,  don’t force things and see what happens.

Trust – Always

Moisy

“Relinquish your attachment to the known, step into the unknown, and you will step into the filed of all possibilities. ”

Deepak Chopra (The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success.)

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