When something breaks we chuck it into the wheelie bin.  It, whatever it is, is of no more use to us, unless we can repair it, but nowadays, repairing things broken is both an art and an opportunity for the introduction of a Health and Safety scare.  A broken ladder might be repairable, but how will I feel each time I climb it?  A mug with a glued on handle is asking for the third degree and as for a chip in the rim, well goodness me no!  The glue always goes brown anyway. A garden chair, tied up with string might collapse under my neighbours backside and I might be sued.  In truth, the dump sites across our land are rising into the clouds with all those broken things nobody cares to mend. It was our forbears who mended things and that was because there was a war on, so they tell us.

On days when I am most aware of my broken-ness, it feels like there are a trillion biting ants on the inside of my skin.  I am restless, distracted, flitting from one small task to another to fill in the time till lunch.  I am without purpose and being without purpose is the scariest (and most illuminating) feeling of all, because my monkey mind (that’s the bad dude within) begins to speak, with volume, authority, assertion.

‘What you should be doing is this.  Why aren’t you?  Because your’e lazy, that’s why. You always were.  You’re putting on weight too, just look at that flubbidy belly, and those old lady shoes you bought make you look like Olive Oyl.  You should be re-writing that novel, not persuading yourself this isn’t the right time.  Why aren’t you?  You always did waste time, your mother said so, all that reading and thinking and staring at clouds did you no good at all.  Look at that person over there or look at him!  They have purpose in life. See how busy they are.  They’re not lazy. You’re hopeless.

And so on.

Often, I have believed in monkey mind, and the listening to what it says takes me way down into a pit.  Trouble is, most of what it says I agree with, a bit.  It is so much harder to counteract that ceaseless babble with ‘Things I Could Say To Myself’, such as ‘you are wonderfully made, unique, perfect for this life you lead, you are more than enough, I love you.’

Sounds like poppycock, even as I’m saying it, to the raggedy torn up inside of me with my fizzing head and my flat  feet (in  Olive Oyl shoes), but I am learning, inch by inch (do we still know inches?) to stop, to stand or sit still, to keep myself right in the present moment, the horribly itchy raggedy-anne moment, and to wait.

For what, you might ask?  For the angels to swoop in like swallows with big smiles on their faces?  For the phone to ring with news of a painting sold, or the offer of  a regular article slot for a magazine with a big readership?  Well, no.  That might have been my hope in the past, but now I know that when something suddenly lifts me away from this discomfort and pain, all that happens is that I am temporarily relieved of looking at it, at myself, of being alone with me.  The itch will always come back because I am still broken and not accepting that I am.

To sit and to stay sat-sitting is not easy, not without a book, a friend, a tv programme, a knitting pattern, a hem to sew up.  In fact, my old mother in law would have something to say about any such pre-lunchtime sitting.

‘Idle hands are the devil’s workshop’ for one, and ‘I’ve got a job for you as you’ve obviously nothing to do!’ another.  From childhood onwards there is noise, activity, stimulation and we are taught drive and motivation, that time is not for wasting, it’s the early bird that catches the worm etcetera etcetera.  Who teaches us how to sit, to reflect, to watch, to say nothing, hands quiet, mouth closed, eyes, ears and heart open?  Glory heavens…. the country would have collapsed by now had such nonsense been allowed!

I cannot meditate because it just makes me laugh. I see myself as ridiculous and can’t erase the image from my mind, even though I know meditating is something rather wonderful.  My mind is never quiet, not even in sleep. There is always noise inside that shorn drum.  It’s like a farmyard at feeding time.  Knowing that this chatter has a lot to do with my broken-ness is a start.  Knowing that it is only in the quiet places, the still moments, that the higher spirit inside of me, inside us all, gets a chance to say a word or two is another step along the road.  But the world, the monkey mind is strong, powerful, believable and cunning, and not just in me. It is tempting to run fast, and to run faster.  It is tempting to fill every minute with jibber jabber and small tasks, to be like others, to fit in, to kid ourselves everything is okay.  It is tempting to run away from looking inside and, besides, it’s messy in there.  However, this running is not away from anything but our own broken-ness, our own hurts, rejections, betrayals.  Running is….. Us avoiding us.  You avoiding you.  Me avoiding me.  And yet, in our stopping, in our acknowledgment of this broken part within, lies the real hope, hope that has nothing to do with our plans, nothing to do with our cashflow or the area we live in, the partner we choose, the school we went to.  In pulling out that brick from the wall around me, I let go, relinquished control. All i could see was wall anyway, but now I have this spectacular view and no idea what to do with it.  It’s new land to me, new sky.  There might be dragons out there, thieves and plunderers, villians and demons, disaster, destruction.

Or, there might not.

Being broken to whatever degree and for whatever reason is not a state of permanence.  Unlike the ladder or the cup or the garden chair, admitting to our broken-ness and accepting it heralds a new beginning.  Unlike ‘things’, we glorious human beings with our colours and our light and our unique and beautiful inner spirit, can re-build into something even more wonderful with no glue showing at all.

And remember this…….. the most beautiful mosaics are made with broken pieces.

I was talking the other morning, over good coffee, with a friend. We discussed many things and one of them was our broken-ness.  Not specific to either of us, nor to any particular situation, but more the general broken-ness of all humans and the fact that it doesn’t stop there.  We don’t stay broken.  What we learn, as things break down, as they always do, is that this is the only time the huge power of the human spirit finds its feet.

When life bounces along, like a big bright beach ball, full of lift and colour, there is no call for this spirit.  There’s nothing to be fixed or cured, to be assessed or repaired.  We just bounce along.  All is well and we badly want it to remain thus.  It never does.  Now, somewhere, someone at some time will have considered this, spent sleepless hours considering it, defining it. And yet this mystery defies definition, for it makes absolutely no sense at all.

Life is good, we are doing all the right things, such as limiting alcohol, or giving it up completely; cutting out dairy or wheat, exercising our socks off, reading ‘best seller’ books on How To Be Happy, that guide us, page by page into the Elysium fields, if, that is, we, a) believe it works and, b) have the willpower to sustain such a disciplined life.  The trouble is that most of us, if we are honest, cannot keep it up and the rest of us don’t believe it anyway, because at some point life is going to shaft us, no matter what regime we embark upon.

Well, welcome to the human state!  And welcome, also, to the broken-ness in you, because, trust me, it is there.

I am interested, nay, fascinated, not with the beach ball but with what happens when somebody’s terrier bursts it and all the children weep.  I admit, freely, to being a member of the Broken and have found, to my delight, that this is not something I have earned through misbehaviour.  I haven’t racked up any more black marks than most, well, maybe a few more, and I do not believe in that sort of karma.  I think we are born with it and what is more, I believe it’s quite intentional.  Whether we believe in the God of creation, or our evolution from apes, our fundamental wiring is pre-set from birth, for all of us.  Of course, there are subtle differences, such as skin colour, location, facial features, talents handed down from our forbears, but some things are just a part of us all, and one of these is our broken-ness.

I used to think that mine was my fault and that led to self-flagellation, guilt and regret.  At each knock-down I would send my mental mouse scurrying through my mind in search of all the things I had done wrong, dragging each of them out from the shadows and assessing them again in the light.  I built on them until they were growling bears and jaw-snapping wolves and sometimes, they overpowered and consumed me.  ‘If only I was a different person, measured and not impulsive, steady and controlled instead of compulsive;  If I talked less and listened more, if I stopped showing off, if I could just control this constant urge to fly away, be like my grounded mother, my steady sisters; if only I could manage my affairs better, if only I liked joining clubs and groups, if only, if only……..’

Most of us don’t even look at it, our broken-ness, for it is way too scary. And yet, it is exactly where we should look.  Not our aching joints but our aching hearts.  It is a subject most avoid, and I have cleared rooms, and certainly silenced tables whenever I rise the subject.  When someone asks a question, a difficult one, I can see the respondee mining his head for a tactical response, one that deflects attention away from the personal element of the question, from any light shone on his broken-ness.

When did we learn to be so dishonest?  Who can really say, I failed you, I am sorry?  Who doesn’t seek to levy blame on the weather, the traffic, the clock change, the children, the plumber, the husband?

When we learn to admit to our weaknessess, our broken-ness, our humanity, we allow the spirit in us to begin work.  The human brain is a million times bigger than we think, capable of almost everything (although I still can’t fly) and we barely use it.  Admitting to failure, admitting to fault is like pulling out one brick in the wall of our defences.  Of course, this could mean, will probably mean, that the whole wall will crumble.  We are left with no wall, open to the soft winds of change, and the view, my friends, is breath-taking.

In Barcelona church bells ring throughout the day.  I counted five or six churches near my flat, two more some distance away, each one marking each quarter until only three were left to sing out the hour.  I didn’t need a watch at all.  To find out whether it was quarter past or quarter to, on the hour or the half hour was simply a matter of waiting a few minutes.

The big church went first.  One echoing bong for quarter past the hour, two for the half hour, three for the quarter to.  Draw one breath in, and out, and here goes the next bell, followed by the next, and so on until all six were done.   On the hour, four chimes precede the announcing of the hour. Only the big church gets that gig.  It then chimes the hour and two other distant churches follow suit.  The hour chimes are different, another bell, sonorous, ponderous, full of gravitas like a much respected mayor making a big announcement to the city.

The point that made me smile was that each bell was given enough time to bong, echo and fade before another took up the chant and yet, surely this means that some folk are just a bit late for an appointment, because by the time church number 6 had finished, it had to be at least 3 minutes off.  I wondered if that mattered.  I decided it did not, for in Spain, time is not as it is here, something to frantically rush for, something that gets lost, something that decides our chances of success.  Time is just time.

I considered the space each church bell gave the others, thus honouring all the different bongs, the different notes and spacing, giving each the chance to shine, and that led me neatly to another source of music in our lives – that of conversation.  Each voice with its own timbre, spacing, timing, phrasing and language.  Voices are melodies, conversations create harmonies, if we pause long enough to listen.  Sometimes, no, be honest, often, when I am the other half of an animated conversation, I will leap around like a mountain goat, interrupting, jumping to the wrong conclusion, leading us both way off track.  When my counterpart stops me, with an assertive ‘Let me finish’, I feel miffed and not a little irritated, and yet was it not I who bounced in without really listening to the bong, echo and fade?  Was I, in truth, listening at all, or was I beside myself with whatever I planned to say next, thus losing the whole thread and hearing nothing?

It isn’t easy to wait.  Time is short, after all, and I have this bus to catch, this shopping to buy, this presentation to make, so hurry up and say what you have to say whilst I mentally sift through my to-do list, a polite and distance smile on my face.  I’d love to stay and chat but……………..

How many times have we hurried away, checking our watch, swallowing gaviscon tablets, only to find we later think on that encounter, and wish it had been different?  We learned absolutely nothing about the other person and, what’s more, we still have indigestion and the same old thing is going to happen tomorrow.

Is life more mellow in Spain because of the sun?  I don’t think so, although sun does make all the difference to the song in someone’s heart.  Over here, in this green and pleasant wetland, we seem to need a wake-up call.  Time is just time.  Everyone has the same amount each day.  No job decides behaviour, no boss owns his or her employees unless they want it that way.  Not one of us is a victim and we can all choose.  Nothing changes if nothing changes, so…. change.  If we can begin to listen to the melody line of another person all the way to the echo, picking up the song, but not before the end of the bar………. adding harmony, rhythm, discord, counterpoint, joining in the shared music of laughter as the phrasing brings us, as one, to a mellifluous finale…….well, we might find life is rather fun and our own little world expanding.

Oh, and the bells are not annoying at all.  Quite the opposite.  Not only do they upstartle loads of multi-coloured pidgeons to entertain the sky, but they soften the air somehow, the roar of traffic steps back a note and the tourists down in the street pause, look up, and smile.