Actions and connections
The route to the King's Blockhouse from the top of Chelmsford Road is frequented by runners, walkers and cyclists, passing through some lovely fynbos, with big views of Devil’s Peak, city, sea, island, sky. The road is gravel with dongas. To walk or ride or run it 31 times in a row in solidarity with GBV survivors takes special commitment. Not all of us have the time or physical capacity to do this. To join even as a once-off activity might be all we do. So what might walking these steps with Lala, walking with each other, open up for us ? And what might it open up for us collectively?
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| Descending from Blockhouse - what does walking open up for us collectively? |
We might discover that we like downs more than ups or that we love the blooming
fynbos. We might spend the hour thinking about arriving at the Blockhouse, not
the walk we are doing in the present moment. We might enjoy the wide
spaciousness, the freshness of air, the unexpected conversations with people we
did not know until that day. We might notice a sense of safety in
groups.
Walking can be rich with possibilities
As a little girl of seven walking with my father from Rhodes
Memorial to Kirstenbosch I felt tender connection, as we sing-songed his marching rhyme “I had a good
job that I left, left, left, it served me jolly well right, right, right”, half
skipping and dancing red faced and sometimes close to tears. I have felt
quiet awe on a trail through multitudes of trees in the forests near Knysna,
where enormous Outeniqua trees reach upward, ancient wet forests full of ferns
chilly with cold beauty, brown rivers, Turacos and stealthy baboons. The
possibility of solitude, certain that
someone is ahead, and another just behind, but no need to
speak, on spongy earth and leaf fall.
This kind of walking opens a powerful reverence for me, a
connection to what is bigger and wider and wilder than my small self, and it
happens when walking, breathing, sensing, immersed in the space.
But something else becomes possible when we walk with
others, when we synchronise our steps with theirs, when we attune to each
other’s steps, breath, pace, tread. It can happen without speaking, and it
results in a new sense of connection, of relationship, of empathy, of safety,
that isn't about language, that is non-verbal.
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| Making connections - on way down from Blockhouse |
The body as a portal for healing from trauma
Bessel van der Kolk writes extensively about his experiences
working with survivors of trauma in his seminal book The Body Keeps
the Score, describing forms of therapy that work with the body as a portal
for healing from trauma, as it is in the body that trauma is held. Various
forms of trauma processing, neurofeedback, theater, meditation, play, and
yoga aim to make it safe for trauma victims to inhabit their bodies,
and to tolerate feeling what they feel, and knowing what they know, leading to
lasting healing. Some of these practices involve mirroring and movement of
therapist and patient, or movement in groups, and healing that happens within
relationship.
Small even once-off acts of walking are not unimportant. In
the same way that multiple small acts of waste may result in rafts of
pollution, I invite you to see walking as a small act of connection that
results in webs of positive connections, for yourself and for others. You don't
have to do all 31 days, or even donate loads of money. But small acts can be
extremely powerful if there are many of us.
Small actions big connections
If we could change the world by only thinking about
what we wanted to happen, we’d see a whole lot more positive change. As an
integral coach, I try to help people in practical ways to bring desired or
necessary changes into their lives. What makes my work integral is
the process of bringing our whole selves, our habits in our heads /thinking,
hearts/feelings and body/actions into alignment over time to experience real or
lasting change. The catch is that we must act with
consistency, empathy and insight to bring about change.
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