September Spring | 6. Queen Elizabeth's favourite motto
I once heard an Oxford professor, who frequently attended formal dinners with the great and good, say he had heard the late Queen Elizabeth II quote two mottoes for life.
The first one was: Live Gratefully. I’ll come to the second later.
Her words struck me at the time because I wasn’t feeling grateful. As a shell-shocked divorcée I had had a bad knock and it had left me in a new place midlife:
Alone. Lacking security. Having to give up doing what I loved in order to work at something else to keep myself afloat financially. Tired. Facing an uncertain future.
Yet these words from someone I admired and saw as steady as a rock warmed me and got me thinking.
'Though much is taken, much remains'
I decided I'd experiment with 'Living Gratefully' and see if it helped. Almost instantly the words of a poem came to mind:
'Though much is taken, much remains.'
The point being that yes, there had been loss, but if you stepped back and looked at your life less emotionally, you could appreciate what you still had.
If I cleared away the mists of self-pity (blue panels) some simple truths I could appreciate (yellow panels) began to emerge:
* See 'Poor but posh' and 'Seven more secrets for living posh when feeling poor' for how I learned to enjoy life on less money.
Plus I had gained new things as a result of my (unwanted) change in circumstances: a new job, new contacts, new neighbours, new determination. A new start. A fresh start.
How often do we get an opportunity for starting afresh given to us? I might not like the original cause, but this was something I could be aware of and grateful for.
Did it work?
It could be a struggle but with practice it worked and bore fruit. Not only did I feel differently in myself but I have witnesses.
After going on a date with a man I was starting to like he emailed me afterwards:
It was lovely spending the evening with you and the conversation flowed from start to finish.
'I know you are very attractive, intelligent, a deep thinker, have a wonderfully positive spirit and I enjoy spending time with you.
I think we should meet again next week and talk more about ourselves and our aspirations for life.
By doing that we will gain an even better insight into each other’s personalities. Hope that doesn’t sound too pompous.’
Who could resist? And afterwards we had our first kiss and it was quite a turn on.
🍃🍃🍃
