New Beginnings

I’m not sure that anyone walks through life without having a curve-ball or three thrown their way. No matter how good a run you’ve had, some form of trauma will catch up with you at some stage and lay you low. I’d consider myself as someone who’s had a pretty good run for a long time and, in the scheme of things, count myself lucky that when trauma did strike, it wasn’t something worse. But strike it did when, at the start of the COVID outbreak last year, a fifteen year relationship broke down, rather spectacularly. With three beautiful boys thrown into the mix, it was the toughest time I’ve had to deal with in my life so far.

Not long after a trauma like this hits, people start throwing around the phrase “new beginnings” or “starting over”. The intention is good but the problem is, can you really just skip over the trauma and jump straight into a new beginning? I mean, why do you think Luke Skywalker never hooked up and settled down after throwing down the Empire? He helped deliver the galaxy a new beginning, so why couldn’t he find one of his own? You might say it was the trauma of finding his father was an evil sith lord who then proceeded to chop off his hand. Or you could say that the weight of fame didn’t sit well with him. Personally, I think that if I had found out the girl I was crushing on hard turned out to be a long lost sister, then I’d probably need thirty years or so of time to move past that trauma too!

The view from Mt Cooroora, seeking my new beginning

Now what about Frodo Baggins? Is it little wonder he got on the boat and sailed away to the Grey Havens rather than starting a new beginning back in the Shire? I mean, he had two jobs; 1. Get to Mount Doom and 2. Throw the Ring into the bloody magma! Well, he failed at the getting to Mount Doom; we all know that Sam did the heavy lifting, literally at many points! Then, he failed at throwing the ring into the lava, needing Gollum to bite off his finger and then fall in with the ring. I mean, it was always going to take him time to get over that! Maybe an eternity of reflection in the Grey Havens will do it, but I hope the elves made no promises!

And, if you need a real-life example, look at the USA. The good people of American made the mistake (possibly with a helping hand from that sly-dog Putin!) of electing Trump as their president. That alone is some serious trauma right there. Then, he hung around through multiple impeachment attempts, a bit like that stubborn wart on your foot you just can’t seem to get rid of. Now finally they have a new beginning with Biden, but it’s going to take a healthy amount of time to grieve, self-reflect and recover from the Trauma of Trump.

For me, starting new beginnings seemed a long way off when it felt as though my heart had just been ripped out and thrown to the wolves! Fighting off the dogs, gathering the pieces and doing my best to stitch them back together seemed the more immediate priority! It was raw, confronting, scary, painful, heart-breaking, confusing and traumatic. Three months along and I was still trying to make sense of it, thinking about “if onlys” and the “yeah buts”. The stitches were in, but they were liable to bust open at any time. Six months on and things had gotten easier, but the hurt would surface regularly, like a lurking crocodile just below the surface, ready to snap into my consciousness at any stage. Twelve months on I was certainly getting closer, but still not quite there.

I believe that’s because a New Beginning only starts when you’ve given yourself the opportunity to grieve. You can’t have a beginning without an ending first. Can we really say something has ended without giving it time to grieve, time for reflection, time to grow and learn? Anyone who is starting a new beginning is, by definition, leaving something behind. Whether a relationship, a friend or family member, a place, a mental frame of mind or something else, every new beginning starts with some sort of loss. Unless we face that loss, to grieve it, to reflect upon it, and eventually to accept it, then any new beginning is likely to turn out to be another lap of the same, tired race.

A new beginning can and will come, when we are ready for it. We men often tend to be stoic and like to think we can deal with our own problems, and that’s okay. To a degree, we are wired that way across hundreds or thousands of generations of evolution. It is possible to deal with our problems by ourselves. But at times that can be hard, and we need to remember that going it alone is a choice, and not the only choice. If you are struggling and have friends and family around you that you can trust when trauma hits, then chances are they would jump at the opportunity to listen and help you process it so you can get to your new beginning. This is certainly what I found, and I feel blessed for every one of them. If you don’t feel like you can talk about it with people you know, then try someone you don’t. I’m not suggesting unloading to a stranger on the train after a night at the pub here, but professional help lines or counselling services. I’ve used these and have found them to be a great help. And if that also feels hard, then try reading up on it at the least. Hit up your local library. Anything to help you get there. Because the sooner you can find a proper ending, the sooner you’ll be able to get to a genuine new beginning.

How did you find a way to end a chapter so you could move onto your new beginning? Or are you still getting there?