Poland - I love it - Racism - I hate it. Blog 177

So I thought I would stop off here to visit my blog after a break for ten days or so.Its late afternoon on a Saturday and I am about to go off with Maciej and Ayka  to a 'party' Wroclaw style - all I know is that we are instructed to bring vodka! 

This has been a very interesting visit. I arrived late on Wednesday and its my fourth visit since my first trip in April (that after a gap of thirty years!). I have seen spring into summer and now into autumn. The wonderful cafes around the city square are no longer bedecked with relaxed people in shorts and teeshirts, now its just the hardcore smokers who sit huddled under the blowy umbrellas. Wroclaw in autumn. You can feel the coolness in the air and there has been a lot of rain. The change of weather is so extraordinary at this time of year, only a couple of weeks ago it was 28 degrees! The mood of people reflects the change too. 

Yesterday I had my meeting with Renata Jasinska, Artistic Director of ARKA Teatr. You may remember if you were following the blog in the summer. The purpose of this visit is to check in with Maciej to talk about Jasmine Street developments and to meet Renata about the piece of work she has invited me to direct for ARKA next year.

It was a busy day for the actors and team at ARKA. They were all suited and booted and ready to go to the European Parliament Offices in Wroclaw to receive a European Citizen's Award presented by Lidia Geringer de Oedenberg who represents the Democratic Left Alliance-Labour Union party.

Our discussions happened just before the presentation. I was delighted that ARKA made their commitment to working with Jasmine Street on their next show. As things have moved on and they have become more familiar with our work at Arc, Renata tells me that she is keen to make some work about race. She's seen extracts of Clifford Oliver's play Boy X on youtube and is struck by how far removed it is from things here in Poland. Indeed Maciej and she agree that awareness and understanding of racism in Poland is minimal. And of course there was the exposee last year in a BBC Panorama documentary - Euro 2012 Stadiums of Hate about Polish and Ukranian football fans. Maciej tells me that its bad. People are generally polite but where and when they feel safe the real racism and prejudice rears its head, often hugely shockingly.

I ask Renata about the make-up of her acting ensemble. I know and appreciate the ground breaking work she has done in inclusive theatre with differently abled people, but race? Well exactly how many BAME actors are there in Wroclaw? She agrees sheepishly that there are none. Hardly her fault. The streets of Wroclaw are uniformally white. But then she talks a little about the husband of one of her actors who is of Ethiopian descent. It doesn't take much of a question to discover the level of antagonism and direct racism he has faced, enough to make he and his wife feel compelled to move to a different part of the city.  

I look at her with a certain level of incredulity that she wants to begin this long journey to engage with issues of racism. Its one we have been on for over thirty years at Arc and whilst the overt and obvious stuff has been to some degree addressed, its an ongoing battle requiring constant vigilance. The recent vans touring Barking and Dagenham telling illegal immigrants to go home can put back any sensible dialogue for years. And this -  Poland. Its a huge issue. I suggest to Renata that the first port of call might be a chat with the actor concerned to get his take on it. Tough call to make a piece for a town that is so homogenous that the issue just simply doesn't occur to people, until it does of course and usually in an ugly way.

My mind is whirring with thoughts as I sit down at the European parliament office. Suddenly and unexpectedly I hear my name and am asked to stand up and speak about the partnership with ARKA. Bit of a challenge as I have three words of Polish to my chagrin! But a helpful translator jumps in and I find myself talking excitedly about the partnership with Jasmine Street and ARKA, and then I say that we plan to make some new theatre work with themes around racism next year. It meets with a stony silence. Then some rather polite clapping. And then I am out of there, wondering quite what I have landed in. Fortunately the MEP Lydia spoke to me afterwards and said how important this issue is for Brussels and its a primary target for renewed political effort. We have her support.

Later that evening I went with Maciej to see a show at Adspectores. The audience were given individual headphones for an extraordinary auditory sound scape. Sadly the primarily textual nature of the experience meant that I had no idea what was being said. I learned later that it was a play about The International Congress of Intellectuals 1948 at which great attempts were made to stop western intellectuals such as Pablo Picasso promoting Einstein's ideas about peace. (ie; the real danger to world peace was the existence of the two super powers, Soviet Union and the USA). 

Later I spoke to the playwright - Krzysztof Kopec about the embryonic ideas for a play on the theme of racism in Poland. He started by suggesting we sit down with some neo-nazis and begin to explore the potential for a piece of "verbatim' theatre. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verbatim_theatre of the documentary style kind created by such directors as Nick Kent at the Tricycle Theatre. I got rather excited. 

I plan to come back home and am really looking forward to talking this through with some colleagues. Its a big one.

Good to be back on here. I'd be very interested to hear your thoughts and comments on this. This is a huge time of transition and the more we can talk about these issues across Europe the better. 

Uncovering Your Archetypes: Introductory Workshop with Amari Blaize - September 2013. Blog 176

Hi all

I am checking in with my blog this morning to let you know about the forthcoming workshops at Jasmine Street to be facilitated by Amari Blaize. Those of you who are regular readers of my blog will be aware of the work I do using archetypes to unlock and locate character in the theatre I make. This very fruitful work enables actors to step out of their own natural archetypal modes of being to explore imaginatively those that might sit centrally within a character they are playing. These archetypes form the building blocks of any good story or drama and reveal a whole set of attitudes and behaviours, many of which will be alien to the actor but enable an authentic access point into character.

Before working on exploring the archetypes of character in a play it is useful for actors to explore and become familiar with their own in order to extend their creative and imaginative resources. This workshop is open to anyone who is interested in finding out more about archetypes and offers an opportunity to explore these. 

What is an archetype? 

Awareness of archetypes dates back at least to the time of Plato, who called them Forms. Plato believed that these eternal Forms were reflected in material objects. The Form of Beauty, for example, is abstract and applies to all beautiful things; as different as the individual manifestations of Beauty may be--a beautiful person, horse, or flower--the Form itself never changes. The great Swiss psychologist Carl Jung developed this idea further. For Jung, archetypes comprised psychological patterns derived from historical roles in life, such as the Mother, Child, Trickster, and Servant, as well as universal events or situations, including Initiation or Death and Rebirth. Along with our individual personal unconscious, which is unique to each of us, Jung asserted, "there exists a second psychic system of a collective, universal, and impersonal nature that is identical in all individuals." This collective unconscious, he believed, was inherited rather than developed, and was composed mainly of archetypes.

Caroline Myss http://www.myss.com/

So if this resonates with you why not come along to an introductory workshop with Amari - here are the details.

Uncovering Your Archetypes

An Introductory Workshop facilitated by Amari Blaize 

Objectives: 

• To enable you to begin to identify aspects of your personality hitherto unacknowledged. 

• To begin to recognise some of your habitual (archetypical) patterns of perception, response and behaviour; and how they impact and operate in your personal and professional life. 

Cost: £25 per person maximum group size 8

When:

Wednesday 25^th September 5-7pm

Thursday 26^th September 5-7pm

Saturday 28^thSeptember 3-5 pm

Where:

Jasmine Street Creative Lab, Studio F3,The Granary, 80 Abbey Road, Barking IG11 7GN

Essential Requirements: 

1) Box of (Caroline Myss) Archetypal Cards; available from any good bookseller or at Amazon.co.uk (we will also have sets of cards available for purchase at the workshop - £11.50)

2) A Gallery of Archetypes - available to download from internet at www.myss.com/library/contracts/three_archs.asp

Facilitator:

Amari Blaize has a Masters degree in Transpersonal Psychology and acquired ‘technician’ certification after a 2-year training programme in Chicago with Caroline Myss renowned for her work in the field of Human Consciousness.

For further information and to register – Contact Carole Pluckrose

Jasminestreetlab@gmail.com
0208 123 8560
07412 602141

Look forward to seeing you there.
Have a good day

Header photo by Sylwia Wierzbowska

Blog Break

Hiya everyone

So its that time again for a break from blogging for me. For a long time now, alongside writing my daily post I have been spending more time with my private writing including the book I am working on, and I plan to make space now for a while for more early morning writing of this. Not least as the Jasmine Street projects increase.

Much has happened this weekend including several rather frustrating hours attempting to learn Wordpress to build my website - a lovely Sunday lunch at Cristina's in Barking and spending some serious time with my friend Amari visioning and planning the next year for Jasmine Street. We did some great work together which included further exploration of archetypes, a wonderful process for understanding story and character as well as ourselves. The ideas and writing of materials, concepts for new theatre pieces and programmes for JS, curating for the Icehouse Quarter and simply the amount of exciting stuff in the ether now need to be turned into reality. In order to capture and realise much of this it will require sharper focussing, marshalling and prioritising. Indeed before very long I will need to bring in other people to work with me on it all!

So here goes. Today brings a meeting with Rooff about my new contract to realise an artistic programme here, public speaking coaching sessions with new clients and a meeting in the west end with an agent about my freelance directing work and then my writing group with Diane Samuels later. This plus thinking about and preparing for my trip to Poland next week to talk about the ARKA Teatr commission and the Beckett project! 

I'm excited about it all, and will pick up here again with my blog when I can. 
In the meantime - thanks to all of you who read it, and to those who have given me such warm feedback over the past few months. Not sure how long this break will be but I'll be back soon.

Have a great week. 

Bridging Cultures: A Role for the Arts in Community: Blog 175

Good morning

Today I would like to share a short piece written by one of my wonderful volunteers about the ARKA Teatr visit to Barking in August. 

In the middle of August Jasmine Street took on the role of curator in partnership with Arc Theatre
for a visit to Barking and Dagenham of Poland’s ARKA TEATR following their successful visit to the 2013 Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

ARKA’s 4-day performance of The Ball at Stephen Hawkings at the Malthouse Theatre in the Icehouse Quarter in Barking was very well received. It is clear that the Icehouse Quarter, situated alongside the Roding River on (wait for it) Abbey Road (!) is a hidden gem, simply waiting to be discovered.

It’s Terrace Café on the banks of the river was a focal ‘community meeting place’ for ARKA’s ensemble, volunteers and visitors who knew what was going on and simply wished to join in. And all of this happening right in the heart of community, alongside terraced houses, apartment blocks and local businesses.

There was a wonderful snapshot of the Terrace Café’s potential when one of the actors picked up a guitar one lunchtime and proceeded to strum a Tracy Chapman number. This got one or two people on their feet plus a joyous sing-along. One volunteer commented that this area of the Borough will soon rival Shoreditch in avant garde community regeneration and revitalization.

As a volunteer for the ‘ARKA project’ but an ‘outsider’ to Barking and Dagenham, I felt very much ‘part’ of community. For an area of London targeted by the xenophobic British National Party (BNP) the cohesiveness of this very diverse community was apparent at the Happiness and Wellbeing Festival which coincided with the ARKA visit.

The festival, held in the town square, engaged the entire community in activity from all a cross-section of the generations doing a ring dance, and a young Polish schoolgirl doing her Michael Jackson moves, through face painting led by the South Asian community to indigenous Brits sitting on the ground eating Jamaican Jerk Chicken. The Square was populated by local businesses and other service providers showcasing their wares, as well as some enthusiastic participation from the Polish actors. And all this on a rainy blustery Saturday afternoon.

In his blog on “The role of the arts in thriving communities”, Kaid Benfield writes:

I believe one of the indicators of a healthy community – the kind of place that is likely to be loved and endure – is good evidence of creative expression. Whether it’s painting, photography, music, dance, sculpture, performance or something else, people like being around artists who inspire not just our rational selves but also our more intuitive, “right-side-of-the-brain” selves.

The sense I took away of ‘community’ in Barking, and I realise that it was just a snapshot in time and place, was not one of a shared and common past. Its not even necessarily shared common values in the sense that this is bandied about especially by right~wing politicians. It was community more in terms of a human eco~system, based on tolerance, respect, kindness, interrelationships and interdependence, that acts to sustain the wellbeing of the whole. And the Arts have a critical role to play in engaging and integrating community.

Pathologising Sadness? Rethinking Depression: Blog 174

Morning y'all.

Today's blog is pretty much a follow on from the theme of yesterday's about beauty, disability and sexuality.Yesterday I didn't touch much on the stigmas around a mental health diagnosis. Of course I am in the ideas incubation period for my new show for ARKA Teatr and this makes me notice certain things that I might otherwise overlook. In this vein today I am prompted to write about this aspect of mental health prejudice by watching a Ted Talk that a colleague posted on Facebook yesterday in which a woman speaks about her experience of hearing voices or as psychiatry would have it 'schizophrenia'. 

http://www.upworthy.com/what-s-schizophrenia-like-a-woman-who-hears-voices-explains-it-beautifully-2?g=2&c=ufb1

It sadly reminded me of stories about people inadvertently finding themselves locked into the mental health system with a medical diagnosis for their grief or emotional pain when in fact they are struggling and maybe not coping very well with very normal human sadness or life stresses. Of course once core human experiences are pathologised and or medicalised, the pharmaceutical companies are rubbing their hands. The growth in the prescribing of anti-depressants over the past twenty years has been exponential, in fact it has soared by 500% according to a recent study. (New University of Lisbon) 

The toxicity of the accompanying discrimination suffered by many of those with mental health diagnoses is that it often pushes them further into a category of the 'abnormal', and not only are they treated as such by society they often internalise it themselves which in turn damages self-esteem, relationships, physical and mental well-being and can seriously impair career progression. Indeed their very belief system about themselves is compromised. At the same time I also appreciate that there are cases of real mental disturbance that must be treated through medical attention. However when we get to a stage where any behaviour or emotion outside the 'norm' (according to whom?) might be labelled as mental illness then we are on a worrying continuum in my view.

Some of you might be familiar with Elizabeth Wurtzel's now legendary book Prozac Nation in which she writes compellingly about an overdiagnosed generation 'whose ruling icons are Kurt Cobain, Xanax, and pierced tongues. In this famous memoir of her bouts with depression and skirmishes with drugs Prozac Nation is a witty and sharp account of the psychopharmacology of an era.'

When you make every unwanted experience a piece of pathology, it becomes possible to knit together disorders that have the look but not the reality of medical illness.

Let me give you an example. I know from my work that most people have some anxiety about public speaking, I have it myself, albeit mildly, even though I coach people from all walks of life in this very discipline!  Aren't you therefore "normal" if public speaking makes you anxious? And aren't you "abnormal" if you're able to give a speech without breaking into a sweat? Since that's the case, why would we consider feeling anxious before giving a speech a symptom of a mental disorder ("generalised anxiety disorder")? Have we stepped into a strange Wonderland, where common reactions, such as feeling anxious, are considered abnormal, and uncommon reactions, such as not feeling anxious, are considered normal?

Our anxiety in these situations is common, understandable, and normal. If it is common, understandable, and normal, how can it also be used as evidence of a mental disorder? Just by virtue of the anxiety being unwanted. That is the key: Unwanted=abnormal.

As soon as you employ the interesting linguistic tactic of calling every unwanted aspect of life abnormal, you are on the road to pathologising everyday life. When you make every unwanted experience a piece of pathology, it becomes possible to knit together disorders that have the look but not the reality of medical illness. This is what has happened in our "medicalise everything" culture.

Mel Schwartz wrote in his blog for the US Psychology Today:

I would offer that what would otherwise be a normal experience of the ups and downs of being human are now viewed through the prism of dysfunction. Every challenge and travail has a diagnostic label affixed to it and we become a nation of victims-both to the malaise and [to] the pathologising of what it means to be human.

It is a grave mistake to make every unwanted aspect of life the symptom of a mental disorder. A heart attack may come with symptoms such as chest tightness and shortness of breath. These symptoms occur because an artery is blocked, a valve is failing, and so on. In the case of a heart attack, there is a genuine relationship between an organic malfunction and the symptoms of that malfunctioning. Unhappiness too may come with certain "symptoms," such as sleeping a lot and eating a lot. But these symptoms are not evidence of organic malfunctioning. They are what come with unhappiness.

For thousands of years human beings have made the sensible distinction between feeling sad for certain reasons (say, because they were jobless and homeless) and feeling sad for "no reason," a state traditionally called melancholia. Some people got sad occasionally, and some were chronically melancholic. Today both varieties of unhappiness, the occasional and the chronic, have been gobbled up by the mental health industry and turned into disorders.
With the rise of four powerful constituencies - the pharmaceutical industry, the psychotherapy industry, the social work industry, and the pastoral industry-and their handmaidens (advertising, the media, and the political establishment) it has become increasingly difficult for people to consider that unhappiness might be a normal reaction to unpleasant facts and circumstances. Cultural forces have transformed almost all sadness into the mental disorder of depression.

In fact, the word depression has virtually replaced unhappiness in our internal vocabularies. We feel sad but we call ourselves depressed. Having unconsciously made this linguistic switch, when we look for help we naturally turn to a "depression expert." We look to a pill, a therapist, a social worker, or a pastoral counsellor-even if we're sad because we're having trouble paying the bills, because our career is not taking off, or because our relationship is on the skids. That is, even if our sadness is rooted in our circumstances, social forces cause us to name that sadness "depression" and to look for "help with our depression." We are seduced by the medical model, in which psychiatrists dispense pills and psychotherapists dispense talk. It is very hard for the average person, who suffers and feels pain because she is a human being but who has been trained to call her unhappiness depression, to see through this manipulation.

Tens of millions of people are tricked into renaming their unhappiness depression. Charles Barber elaborated in Comfortably Numb:

"In 2002, 16 percent of the citizens of Winterset [Iowa] were taking antidepressants....What is compelling one in six of these generally prosperous and stable citizens to go to their doctor, get a prescription, and go to the...pharmacy? And Winterset is by no means alone...for Ames it is 17.5 percent; for Grinnell, 16 percent; Des Moines, 16 percent; Cedar Rapids, 16 percent; and Anamosa, Red Oak, and Perry, 15 percent."  (and this can be seen all over the UK too)

Isn't that something? Not the fact that so many people feel unhappy-the number of people who are unhappy is huge. What is quite astounding is that folks in the heartland, where stoicism and common sense are legendary, should have swallowed whole hog the idea that unhappiness is a medical condition.

The first linguistic ploy is to substitute the word abnormal for unwanted. Next, since it is almost certain that profound unhappiness will make it harder for you to get your work done and deal with your ordinary responsibilities, one way to ensure that your unhappiness will be labeled "depression" is to name as a

significant diagnostic criterion an "impairment of function." Maybe you're unhappy with your unsatisfying job and you start skipping work. That is certainly not a symptom of a mental disorder unless we make it one-which we can do by calling it "impairment of function."
Let's say that you're a mystery writer. You've written three mysteries and 

managed to sell them. But they haven't sold well enough to justify your publisher's buying a fourth mystery from you. Your literary agent is certain that no other publisher will buy that fourth mystery, either. You get that news right in the middle of writing mystery number four. What happens? You grow seriously unhappy and you stop writing your fourth novel. Why bother? The thought passes through your mind: Why bother to live? Suddenly you have no chance of ever escaping your day job. You somehow manage to go to your day job, but you find yourself working listlessly and carelessly. Nothing amuses you. Nothing interests you. You begin to chain-eat Twinkies. 

In this contemporary culture of ours, you are almost certain to call yourself depressed. The instant you do so, you reduce your chances of effectively handling your painful situation. Having called yourself depressed, you'll probably take yourself to a mental health provider to whom you'll explain your situation. You'll say, reasonably enough, that you're sleeping too much, eating too many Twinkies, not writing your novel, and performing carelessly at your day job. The first two, by virtue of being unwanted, become "symptoms of a mental disorder"; the second two become evidence of "impairment in functioning." You are diagnosed with depression-which, of course, is exactly what you expected to hear. Any other outcome would have been very surprising!

The American Psychiatric Association defines mental disorder as "a clinically significant behavioral or psychological syndrome or pattern that occurs in an individual and that is associated with present distress or disability or with a significantly increased risk of suffering death, pain, disability, or an important loss of freedom." This definition is specious. Critics of the mental health industry have pointed out time and again that virtually anything unpleasant meets these pointedly empty criteria.

In The Myth of Biological Depression, Lawrence Stevens discussed the relationship between cause and effect:

"Even if it was shown that there is some biological change or abnormality "associated" with depression, the question would remain whether this is a cause or an effect of the "depression." At least one brain-scan study (using PET scans) found that simply asking normal people to imagine or recall a situation that would make them feel very sad resulted in significant changes in blood flow in the brain. Other research will probably confirm it is emotions that cause biological changes in the brain rather than biological changes in the brain causing emotions."

Define the disorder broadly. Say that anything might cause it. Provide no tests. Mislead about cause and effect. Now comes the clincher: create a laundry list of symptoms that anyone who can read can use to diagnose the disorder. This is a crucial step because without this laundry list in hand the mental health provider would have no way to turn a new client's self-report of unhappiness into the mental disorder of depression. This checklist, created by industry professionals sitting around a table, is gold.'
In Before Prozac, Edward Shorter wrote:

"Many of the diagnoses of mood disorder today really don't make a lot of sense...Medicine is supposed to make progress, to go forward in scientific terms so that each successive generation knows more and does better than previous generations. This hasn't occurred by and large in psychiatry, at least not in the diagnosis and treatment of depression and anxiety, where knowledge has probably been subtracted rather than added."

Knowledge has been subtracted for the sake of a profit. The game is very easy to play. If we were in a position of power and influence within the mental health industry, we would have absolutely no trouble creating innumerable mental disorders and foisting them on an unsuspecting-and all too willing-public.

So more serious food for thought in the excavation for my new piece of work! I would very much welcome your thoughts and comments on both this subject and that of yesterday's blog. I can see that its going to invade my dreams!

Have a happy or even a melancholic day  - but watch the Prozac! 

Beauty, Sex and Disability - Blog 173

Good morning.

And so things progress.... well that's how life is, isn't it? Like it or not, everything is in perpetual motion - we live in a constantly shifting dynamic, with ourselves, with each other and with our environment. We might choose to ignore the tiny shifts until one day something big happens that we cannot ignore, a relationship ends, a close friend dies, we have a car crash. And all that we have known changes forever. The illusion of constancy evaporates in a moment. 

Today I find myself wanting to write about beauty, sex and disability. Why you may ask? Well I am off to Poland again in a couple of weeks to meet Renata, ARKA Teatr's  Artistic Director. If you dip into my blog from time to time you may remember that ARKA is unique in Poland in being the only differently abled professional theatre company. Prejudice towards disabled people is rife the world over, and Poland is no exception. The often unconscious assumptions and attitudes towards disability mean that not only do people have to contend with sometimes multiple and challenging physical and mental impairments but they often experience a level of profound oppression that creates significant barriers in their power to realise themselves fully in the world. It can be very tough. 

Renata has commissioned me to make a new piece of theatre with her company, an honour which I do not take lightly. She has given me carte blanche to make a piece of work that I am drawn to create. That's very generous. Having watched her at work with her actors I find myself increasingly drawn to themes of beauty, sex and disability and am looking forward to discussing these ideas with her and her actors when I return to Wroclaw. 

Its funny - I have always liked the phrase 'When the student is ready, the teacher appears' and I have experienced this and continue to do so in many aspects of my professional and personal life. Yesterday was one such case in point. I found myself sitting in a room of differently abled people at the local office of Mencap in Dagenham. I was invited by Neil Crowley, a hugely passionate activist for disability rights and awareness in the borough. We got in touch recently sparked by the ARKA visit. Neil invited me to join the group to discuss the activity plan for the International Day of the Disabled in December this year. The group is made up of people with a range of physical and mental impairments who belong to organisations and support groups in Barking and

Dagenham. This year they have decided to focus the day on the theme of the arts. So I guess that's where I come in, that and some personal and professional experience of disability and prejudice. 

I really wasn't sure whether I had much to contribute to this vibrant and energetic group of people. In spite of their cut in funding, Neil and his group are determined to celebrate IDDP this year and have secured the support of the  Redbridge and Dagenham Football club for the event. In the end I felt that my best contribution might be to help the group to set up an online fundraising campaign to help bring in the necessary money and to raise awareness. My experience with fundraising for the ARKA project was that its tough, but with determination and a certain amount of badgering (in spite of the cull!) its possible. Many people donate to causes they feel a connection to and this is one such cause that I am sure will speak to many people's hearts. In spite of the challenges of communication, Neil is clear and proactive in explaining his vision for the day and his leadership and humour really got the group motivated. 

A few thoughts came to me as I reflected on the meeting, sitting as I was - apparently able bodied. And there's the rub. Many years ago a leading disabled activist colleague - Richard Rieser http://www.worldofinclusion.com/ gave a talk that has remained with me ever since. He was arguing for the social model of disability and in so doing condemning the medical model. In his speech he said something that had a huge impact on me 'Remember, everyone is temporarily able bodied'. This caused an intake of breath in the room and shifted the way I understood disability for good. So its a continuum is it - that old perfection idyll blown out of the water? yep, it truly is. 

At that time at Arc we went on to make a piece of work called Sliced Bread by Clifford Oliver, in which we brought together such a group of differently abled actors to explore the very subject of young disabled people and sexuality. And we took it into schools where it caused quite a stir. Bit of a taboo. Indeed I recently visited a special school in Dagenham and had an excellent discussion with the head teacher Paul McPartland about disabled young people, emerging sexuality and how the school approaches the subject with students and parents. It was impressive.

http://www.trinityschooldagenham.org.uk/

I find myself back in that territory today as I think about the next piece of work I want to make for ARKA. In this vein I picked up a book I haven't looked at for some years and read the opening page.

'Our bodies are where self-esteem, desire and sexuality come together. The more attention we pay to our needs, the better we are able to take care of ourselves.'

From The Ultimate Guide to Sex and Disability, ed. Kaufman, Silverberg and Odette, 2003

Its an enlightening read, especially if this isn't a subject you have thought about before. And it brings me back to beauty and the age old definitions from Plato and Aristotle to the myriad of modern beauty and fashion fascists. And specifically in relation to women's experience and many people's perception of beauty. 

And here some typical concerns and questions to illustrate this from some women.

'I'm never going to look like the women in advertisements and posters, and this makes me feel really bad about the way my body is.'

Join the club. The ads you see and hear are designed to sell products, and they've worked out that the best way to do this is by lowering women's self esteem. By equating certain types of bodies and looks with pictures of happiness or love, women feel like they must look like those pictures in order to be satisfied or loved. As a woman with a disability, this can become even further complicated. Not only do you get the message that all women are receiving ('your body isn't beautiful') but an added one as well - 'your disability means that you can never be beautiful, so we're not even including you in our target audience.'

The people setting the standards for beauty are not interested in making us feel good about ourselves, and while it's far more easily said than done to reject these ideas, it's important that we try. Becoming familiar with or sharing experiences about other women's bodies is perhaps the best way to realise that the images of the female body we see around us have very little to do with real women's bodies, which are more textured and beautiful than the most intricately photoshopped model can ever be.

My body looks and functions differently. Can anyone ever be attracted to me?

Alison Lapper - http://whateber.tumblr.com/

Yes, of course they can, and rest assured (or be appropriately disconcerted) that we aren't alone in our self-doubt. The unattainable standards of physical appearance set by the images and messages around us makes it hard for all women - disabled and non-disabled - to see that there really is no connection between desire and 'beauty' as it is defined by popular culture. All around us are images of sexually aroused women with seemingly 'perfect' bodies - and it makes many of us believe that in order to achieve this ecstasy or love, we have to look like them.

But in reality, desire and sexual attraction are far more complicated than popular culture or visual media would have us believe. Put aside for a moment those images and ideas, and think about what desire  - as a physical sensation: a tugging of the heart - means for you. Is it a glossy magazine page of a semi naked person? Perhaps instead it's the slight smell of sweat on someone you are sitting next to on the train. The sound of a thunder storm. The jumping sensation in your stomach each time your best friend holds your arm. Attraction is a multifaceted arena where different senses collide with memory, thought and sexual fantasy - and these imposed beauty standards may have absolutely nothing to do with it.

Isn't beauty supposed to be an important part of life? If all these ideas of beauty are so false and misleading, what, or who, can ever be beautiful?

Okay, so start by thinking about an older woman you love and respect - it could be your mother, an aunt, a caregiver, or a school teacher. Imagine the lines on her face, the touch of her wrinkled skin, or her slightly rasping voice. Is she beautiful? What about some of the most energetic, passionate or kind women with disabilities that you know? Can you sense beauty there despite falling hair, aged skin or prosthetic limbs? I'm sure you can. The saying that 'beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder' is overused - but that's because it's true.

Societies set false standards of beauty, against which women with disabilities are often harshly judged. But the real beauty secret is not Fair & Lovely cream, rounder breasts or a perfectly straight back - it's that beauty itself has no definition, no standards and no rules. This can be hard to understand given that our eyes and senses are trained to see certain kinds of bodies or faces as beautiful. Many women with disabilities are using online spaces, art, and writing to put forward their own ideas of beauty. Have a look at Penny Pepper's blog http://www.disabilityartsonline.org.uk/Penny_Pepper_Blog for more edgy stuff on this subject.

For my own part - earlier this summer when I was in Cortijo Romero - I had the privilege of spending time with a number of inspirational people in their seventies and one in their eighties. Their natural nakedness around the swimming pool was a bit of a shock to me at first, but then after a few days of dealing with my own prejudice and the overall lack of prurience I began to see these older bodies with curiosity and soon began to appreciate their beauty. Indeed this led to me taking a series of portraits of three older women, a bit of a Calendar Girl experience. It was great fun, hilarious, beautiful and has produced a series of images that my new friends are very happy with! 

So onto the next piece of work - and charting its territory whilst at the same time coming to understand my own influences and prejudices. As Anais Nin says - everyone is a world - I agree wholeheartedly! 

Have a great day.

Zip Cars and writing in Archway: Blog 172

Morning!

So it was a full on week end with a long drive into the wilds of Norfolk for my cousin's wedding party. Mark and Emily did the tying of the knot literally in an ancient handfasting ceremony and a stylish fifties bash in the late summer warmth. It was hugely creative.The long journey back with my daughter and her boyfriend was a great chance to catch up and I fell exhausted into bed early and slept for England or at least for Norfolk! 

But I have to start today's blog also with a plug for Zipcars - I'm not usually in the habit of advertising anything much other than good books I have read, shows I rate, maybe the odd restaurant or holiday resort, but I have to shout loud about the revolution that is Zipcars. http://www.zipcar.co.uk/ well its not much of a revolution - the company and the concept have been around since 2000 and I only found out about it a year or so ago. 

Having totalled my car a few weeks ago and waiting for the insurance payout - not likely to be very much, I pondered on the prospect of the next big wheels purchase. Mmmm..... I live in London, why do I need a car? well there's the supermarket shop.... but I've just bought a granny trolley (purple with black paw marks ... yes I know), then there's the visit to see my Mum and Dad in Kent... get the train, my hairdresser in Dunmow?... forget it, there are hairdressers in Barking - I think? So conclusion: Do not buy a new car (it would never be actually new), and then there is the environment....change your lifestyle Pluckrose. And this is where the Zipcar comes in. 

I cannot tell you how excited I was to do my research and get a bit more of an idea of how this car-sharing thing works. Its like the Boris bike indeed. And this is big business - as of July 2013, the company had more than than 810,000 members and offers nearly 10,000 vehicles throughout the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Spain and Austria, making Zipcar the world's leading car sharing network. And to boot one of these little lovelies is parked on my road! Can you imagine the excitement I felt when I went to visit my new little black VW? Well it felt like mine.... without the servicing, the taxing, the MOT and the insurance. It feels like a liberation. I can use it when I want to by booking online for as little as an hour for £5, so if I do decide that the granny trolley image isn't good for me.. well I can hop in the car and then abandon it when I have got my shopping. So just a little plug there for a great example of a creative and practical solution to a perceived need! 

Back to the main course. Having had an amazing time on my creative writing course earlier in the summer at Cortijo Romero, I decided to join playwright Diane Samuel's creative writing course in London. Last night was my first forray to Archway (well not first ever) for the first session. Much to my delight there is a direct overground line so no Zipcar needed. 

As I walked up from the station, it felt like the  first day back at school, and certainly the coolness of the early evening air enhanced that feeling as it brought back many September memories. Another adventure. Diane had asked us to bring our notebook, pen and an object representing time. I have a drawer full of beautiful unused notebooks, people often give them to me as gifts. I had chosen one with a brown cover, a medium sized one that would fit into my bag easily, and one which from now on would be dedicated to Monday writing group. And for my object of time  - no hesitation, I dug out one of my many diaries, this the one from 1975. I didn't even open the cover but tossed it into my handbag just before leaving the flat. I haven't even opened its pages for years so had no idea what I might be revealing should the pages fall open on my teenage self! But there couldn't be too much dark material.. or could there?

I always find it  a little nerve wracking walking into a room full of strangers and yesterday was no different. Of course everyone was very welcoming, and I was relieved that I wasn't the only newbie.Eight of us sitting round in a cosy room, we began. It was easy and familiar in spite of being in the company of strangers. Its that thing I know so well, a group of people come together with a shared purpose, and within minutes all awkwardness is gone. No need to define or reveal myself, simply to get on with the process.

Words are like little gifts, phrases emerge from everyone that strike authentic chords and allow engagement in the imagination and subconscious with such ease. You simply write whatever comes into your mind, starting with a word or phrase given to us by Diane, whatever pops into the mind is where its at. The group is made up of people who write, or want to write, some are published, some not, some have no desire to be. 

The 'time pieces' were eclectic and fascinating, from a school timetable to an amonite fossil. And we write. For a moment when my precious diary leaves me to become a focus object for someone else I feel a slight nervousness. Maybe this was a bit too much for a first session. The 'Jesus loves you' sticker on the front and the little love notes nestled inside the pages might give too much away after all. But I soon relax and trust. I must have brought it for a reason. We each write in response to other people's objects, and its as if each object is imbued with its own silent story. Its amazing how they speak to us, often connecting in surprising and exquisite moments of synchronicity. The two hours passed in a flash and ended with each of us writing one of our phrases on a postit and giving it as a gift to the owner of the object. Mine was - 'Ah, the sea's a rough master' - I liked that and slipped it inside the covers of my old diary friend. 

And so the first session over I made my way back on the overground to Barking excited and reflective. This writing bug has always been with me, and there is much yet to write, including my quietly emerging novel - Waking Eleanor. But no rush or pressure here, no need to force the birth. Simply to be on the journey of discovery. Feels good.

And so off today to more meetings and some excitement about the potential of a new agent for my freelance directing. All good really.

Have a great day.