A Surprising Message From Granny Oak

I’ve been enjoying my slow start to January.

I was away for a few days early in the month. Last week I eased back into novel writing and attended to a list of administrative chores which I had ignored for several weeks before Christmas. It felt like a productive week, though I was a little tired on Friday.

Last weekend, I had another two days of my Energetic NLP course. Saturday was immense. We learnt how to do readings and dissolve major blocks in our life. It left me with the feeling that something profoundly good had happened and also that I’d been punched sideways.

The course is conducted over Zoom and the teacher is in Los Angeles. Even though it starts at 9am in the West Coast, we are eight hours ahead in the UK so the course runs from 5pm to 10pm. It’s weird timing because you have to not do much during the day so that you are alert and ready to go in the evening.

I woke up Sunday morning feeling overwhelmed, knowing that there was another five hours later on. I had a Buddhist meeting at my house that morning. I could have done without it but it was the only time, with other events on the calendar, that we could schedule it and it was an important and inspiring subject matter.

By twelve-thirty, the Buddhists had left and I decided to go and see Granny Oak. I could tell that my body was tired so I didn’t intend to have a long walk, just get some fresh air and see my favourite tree.

In the last few months, Granny Oak has given me more cautious messages or confirmed my own feelings that I don’t need to push myself too hard at the moment.

In my exhausted state, I expected something similar, or even a rebuke for taking on too much. So I was surprised when she said: