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Stuff

2nd November 2020

WHAT’S GOT BIG?

‘STUFF’

You’ve made it to the top of Blog No.2. Welcome!

If you made it to the bottom of Blog No.1, Welcome back, if this is your first visit to ‘WHAT’S GOT BIG?’; Hello, I’m Matt, it’s good to have you here!
 

So, from ‘things’ to ‘stuff’.

(If my blog 2 is your blog 1, I blogged about ‘things’ last time)
I use the word ‘stuff’ regularly when I am talking with clients in counselling sessions. I am sure that if you searched text books and dictionaries for other terms used to describe the content that clients bring to talk about, you’d probably bump into one. Although aware of them, I prefer ‘stuff’.
The ‘stuff’ that I refer to is not reserved only for things chosen to be disclosed in counselling rooms to counsellors.
When I mention ‘stuff’, I’m not talking about your loft that is possibly full it or  your garage that is probably bursting at the seams with it, neither is it the cupboard or drawer brimming with it. I am referring to the ‘stuff’ that life can throw at us.
STUFF’, the silent alarm clock that greets us when we wake or the engulfing final thought at night, that thought that prevents a peaceful night sleep. ‘Stuff’ can arrive in an instant with a BANG or it can creep up on us, unaddressed over time.
(However, I know of times where my ‘stuff’ has been my stuff in the garage. Causing the loss of sleep knowing that another car boot sale is not too far away!!)
 
For you.
  • Are you aware of a presence of ‘stuff’?
  • What is your ‘stuff’?
  • Where does your ‘stuff’ come from?
  • What does your ‘stuff’ feel like?
  • What does your ‘stuff’ look like?
  • What does you ‘stuff’ sound like?

What does my ‘stuff’ feel, look and sound like???? What sorts of questions are these?

Only when we are able to recognise having ‘stuff’ and what it feels like are we able to find a way through it. The answers to these questions may enable sense to be made of what is being carried.
Has ‘stuff’ appeared in a flash, suddenly, overnight perhaps, immediately.
Is it cutting and sharp, spikey or explosive. Prickly, flashing, blinding, loud and crashing, beating and banging.
OR
Has ‘stuff’ inflated slowly, building gradually. An awareness of something there, but unaddressed over time, daren’t to be touched, avoided.

A dull ache, a throb, an implosion. Grey, a void a nothingness an abyss. Mono-tone, droning, endless.
The term ‘stuff’ ‘chimed’ with me during my counselling courses. I was asked to identify my counselling philosophy and approaches during three years of study.
Although life can be complicated, it is often simplicity that untangles the tight knots.
The term ‘Stuff’ has the simple ability to identify the ‘things’ that we are simply unable to identify. All we might know is that ‘it’ has got ‘big’, it has absorbed us and it is making our everyday heavy.
I am a keen observer of the promotion of Mental Health initiatives, communities, charities and celebrity shares and retweets. The encouragement of ‘getting it out there’ is a welcome message that cannot receive enough publicity.
The Mental Health aware world in which we now live constantly promotes  “talk about it”, “share it”, “don’t keep it to yourself” etc, etc. However, those comments also come with the unhelpful ticking clock of pressure of having to, immediately, right now, what are you waiting for?
For sure sharing, offloading or disclosing in a safe space can encourage our ‘stuff’ to lose its incredible strength to affect how we function. Despite being aware that we have ‘stuff’, we might be in a place where we don’t exactly know what it is or where it is coming from. In time and through personal choice, sharing may be the path to travel down.
The time to share ‘stuff’ will come and when it does it will come with it all of the benefits of what sharing ‘stuff’ does. The time to share does not have to be now, it has to be when sharing feels right.
As a graduate of my own profession I can thoroughly recommend the sharing of ‘stuff’, and with the sharing the limitless benefits of doing so. However, I can also recall the courage it takes to take the first steps towards untangling it. The timing of the when and the where to share is possibly bigger that the act of sharing itself.

Be brave
If you have ‘stuff’, I wish you well.

Take care,
matt_signature

Matt

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