Author: lyndyh

Do your characters lie? If not, make them, they will be more authentic. We all lie, don’t we? I know I do. Sweet little lies (there’s a great song there, check it out!), not the big stonking ones I used to tell.

I learnt to lie from my mother. Not that she sat me down and gave me a lesson or anything. My mother kept secrets and lived with shame. If this intrigues you, then you will be able to read more about this, about the lies I told in future posts of this blog. Or you can read my book when it’s published (or do both!). My mother passed me a silent message; I must lie to keep the secret. She didn’t instruct me how I was to do this. I had to make it up (literally) as I went along. It started when I was five and ended eleven years ago when my mother died in 2007. I was then able to begin to move from beneath her shadow. It was a very big shadow as it took me another four years (in 2011) before I told her truth (and mine). Since then I haven’t looked back. Who was the first person I told? My husband and it was the best thing I have ever done. Since then, all (or nearly all) the significant people in my life know my truth. Others know it too, acquaintances, strangers. I am no longer shamed by my mother and it feels good.

Back to writing. Make sure your characters lie. Not just for their own personal gain, but for a deeper reason. You will be amazed where your story goes and how your characters grow.

LIHazleton.

Follow me on Twitter where I connect with other writers and all things writing. Follow me on Instagram if you love animals.

February 6th – my Mother’s birthday. Were she still alive, today would have been my mother’s eightieth birthday. My Mother died when she was sixty-nine. Enough years on the planet one might suppose to ‘get things right.’ What things, you may ask. Well to find that out, you’ll have to wait for the publication of my book. And of course, ‘getting things right’ means different things to different people. Now, you may think I’m talking in riddles but one thing is true, we all have a mother and we all have an attachment style that is indicative of how we were ‘mothered’ as infants by our mother or our significant caregiver.

To learn more about attachment, read the work of John Bowlby, the founder of Attachment Theory.

(The main theme of Attachment Theory is that mothers who are available and responsive to their child’s needs establish a sense of security in them. The child knows the caregiver is dependable, which creates a secure base for them to explore their surroundings.)

I am fortunate my mother died when she did because sadly, I was never properly attached and would have remained in this state (with a poor attachment style) had she not passed away. My mother was never ‘available’ for attachment (for whatever reason) nor was she able to ‘get things right.’ I would still be in a state of ‘Dismissing Avoidant’ or ‘Fearful Avoidant’ (recognised attachment patterns) were it not for her death. Because of the work I have done on my own ‘self development’, today I can happily say I have a ‘Secure Attachment’ pattern; I am positive to others and to myself and most days I can say I am secure in my relationships, feel loved, accepted and competent.

***

Understanding Attachment Theory helps me as a writer. I am able to consider my characters in a way which helps me make them fully formed people with not only a past, present and a future but with a mother (or caregiver) whether they feature in the story or not. Reflecting on a character’s mother is important, as is their attachment style because every character has a mother and an attachment style. Ignore them and you miss a wealth of juicy writing material that will enrich your work.

LIHazleton.

Follow me on Twitter where I connect with other writers and all things writing. Follow me on Instagram if you love animals.

For me my best writing comes from emotion, feeling empathy for my characters, understanding their needs and who they are. Have you ever written about a character who sulks? Think about it, the opportunities to discover the inner workings of their mind. Why are they sulking? What is it they want? What is it they need? What’s happening to them inside? Why are they choosing to sulk?

Have you sulked, as a child, as an adult? Do you know someone who sulks, a child maybe? Sulking like any behaviour is a choice made by a fully formed, functioning and healthy adult mind. Sulking in children is another matter.

As I child I often sulked. This is why:

Sulking = Something is Wrong

Sulking is an expression of the spirit. I knew something wasn’t right at home. Children do, they have an in-built barometer to these things (to abuse), but they aren’t capable of fully comprehending their emotions, expressing themselves or doing anything about it

Sulking = Pain

Not the pain of an aching tooth or a stubbed toe, but a pain deep down inside that cannot be seen or described, certainly not by a child

Sulking = Unexpressed Anger

Anger at not being able to communicate the pain inside. Anger at my mother. Anger at my grandparents for not listening, not believing, not understanding, not noticing what my mother was doing to me

Sulking = I Want to Hurt my Mother

I thought I could hurt my mother by hiding myself away, by sulking. Did it work? No. I was only hurting myself.

Sulking = Come and Find Me

I needed to be cared for. I craved attention. I needed my Mother. I was the only one, no siblings. I had no Father. My Mother lived with her friend. I didn’t like her friend. Her friend didn’t like me.

***

I used to sulk as an adult too but this was a long time ago.

Now I choose to express myself. I choose to communicate. I choose to love myself and find what feels good. I take care of my needs.

Take the challenge in your writing. Write about a character who sulks.

LIHazleton.

Follow me on Twitter where I connect with other writers and all things writing. Follow me on Instagram if you love animals.

When I write, it’s usually in a cafe with a coffee by my side, sometimes it’s at home in the early evening with a glass of wine and a snack. Always it’s with pleasure. Pleasure in my surroundings, pleasure filling the blank page, pleasure sipping my chosen drink and eating my chosen snack.

I write mindfully, in the moment, aware of my feelings and emotions. The words may flow and I flow with them, but I observe myself as I am writing; where my thoughts go, what I am experiencing in my body and what I am feeling. I am aware as I take my sips of coffee or wine and eat my snack,

I am aware of me. I know myself and it fuels my writing.

It hasn’t always been this way. Emotional intelligence and self awareness developed later in life for me, only when my mother passed away in 2007 and I was able to move away from her shadow.

Lisa stepped inside the pantry and closed the door behind her. It was gloomy and smelt of grannie’s coconut cake. She reached for the tin and cradling it in her arms knelt down on the floor. She prised open the lid, peered inside and with her fingers and thumb picked off a bit of cake and put it in her mouth. It was still warm. The moist, sweet sponge melted on her tongue. Licking her fingers, she pulled another bit off and then another bit, bigger this time and then another bit more and more. Lisa  forgot to swallow, her cheeks bulged with deliciousness. Hmmmmmm … patting the side of the cake, smoothing it over, Lisa closed the lid. She stood up. What next? As she hooked her finger into her mouth, gouging out the stickiness from behind her teeth, she looked around. Sugar puffs. She reached for the box, pushed her hand in and, grabbed a handful, stuffing the honeyed loveliness into her mouth. Hmmmmmm … she breathed a silent sigh and dived into the box again and then again. One more time. One more time.  

This was me sneaking into the pantry and gobbling whatever I could find, sticking my fingers into jars (peanut butter a firm favourite), my hands into cereal boxes and peeling open blocks of jelly.  I had no idea I was eating to fill the void, seeking comfort, looking for the love and security I craved from my mother.

Much later, in my twenties, thirties and forties I ate for punishment as often as I ate for comfort. Rarely did I eat for pleasure. Was I aware of this? No, of course not.

The ancient Greek aphorism ‘Know Thyself’ was later expanded upon by the philosopher  Socrates who taught that the “unexamined life is not worth living”. Today we understand the process of examining our lives as moving towards “Self actualisation”. To self-actualise, we strive to expand our horizons as a human beings. To achieve success (being the best that we can be), we must always seek it. The potential to self-actualise lies within us all.

Take the journey. Become self aware and discover the real you.

What gets you moving, writing, creating, thinking, communicating, reflecting … ? I could go on. As human beings we advance, we flourish, blossom, grow. If not, we die. It’s the truth.

***

I passed a man walking his dog this morning.

‘What a lovely dog,’ I said. It was a Jack Russel type, one with long legs. The dog moved to the far side of the path as I approached, his head down slightly, nose twitching, ears back.

‘Ah, he seems nervous.’

‘No, just curious,’ the man said, not slowing down.

‘Is this your usual morning dog walk, what a lovely place,’ I said stopping, happy to exchange pleasantries. We were in a secret garden, planted with Japanese maples. It was peaceful, there was no-one else around.

‘Yes, it gets me up in the morning,’ he said as he passed and carried on walking.

Encounter over, I continued my walk.

A simple dog walk, helped this man get moving at the beginning of his day.

***

What gets me moving, writing, creating, thinking, communicating, reflecting is the need to tell my story. I began writing in 2014 as a means of continuing my therapy. Very quickly this developed into a desire to write creative fiction as a ‘way in’ to telling my story. I have progressed from writing short stories to embarking upon writing a novel. It is a rewarding journey.

When I was a small child, I spent an enormous amount of time on my own, reading, colouring, playing out of doors. I don’t remember being told a story and certainly not encouraged to create my own. My mother ignored me. As long as I was not being a nuisance to her, kept from under her feet and didn’t command her attention, it was alright.

When I was older and at the ‘big’ school, telling stories / writing essays in my English lesson was an extremely difficult, almost impossible task for me.

When I started writing in 2014, I realised much of what is written as a novice writer comes from felt or known experience and so it is for children. Drawing upon real life experiences helps a child write stories.

But how could I tell a story? How could I write a story where the central theme of my real life experiences were based on shame, lies and hiding?

My mother’s silent message to me was to keep the secret of what was going on at home.

I grew up feeling hot with shame, my mother’s shame. It burned inside me through childhood, adolescence, my 20’s, 30’s, 40’s and on …

I no longer feel the shame … it isn’t and was never mine.

I can now tell my story.

I need to tell my story.

I grew up with a feeling of being in the way; a sense of not being wanted, of being a nuisance to my mother, a bother, an unwanted distraction. My mother was pleasure seeking and I was not her pleasure.

What is pleasure?

Kahil Gibran on pleasure:

Pleasure is a freedom-song, But it is not freedom. It is the blossoming of your desires,
But it is not their fruit.

I feel my mother sought pleasure without understanding pleasure itself. Her pleasures were ultimately her pain. She was not able to distinguish pleasure’s truth from it’s pain.

Kahil Gibran:

And now you ask in your heart, “How shall we distinguish that which is good in pleasure from that which is not good?”
Go to your fields and your gardens, and you shall learn that it is the pleasure of the bee to gather honey of the flower,
But it is also the pleasure of the flower to yield its honey to the bee.
For to the bee a flower is a fountain of life,
And to the flower a bee is a messenger of love,
And to both, bee and flower, the giving and the receiving of pleasure is a need and an ecstasy.

What was it like as a child, not to be pleasing to my mother?

It was a heartbreak, a lonely, confusing place.

A child learns the world from their mother’s face, the eyes especially are a child’s refuge, the mirror where their existence is confirmed. From the doting reflection of a mother’s eyes, a child draws their earliest, wordless lessons about connection, care and love.

For me, being ignored by my mother, craving attention and that craving being unfulfilled left me feeling bereft, unworthy and feeling small.