I slept through the alarm and didn’t wake until 07.40 – hence no exercises. Sunil arrived for the day and there was a different atmosphere to the one with just me and Karaj which has been there this week. It was less flowing, less effective, more stilted and I just wasn’t with it at all. I was different and obviously affected by the presence of another. I should have predicted this but I didn’t.
Important: prediction and planning help me to prepare myself. More importantly, I need to verbalise how I feel. I did not and Karaj pointed out that it was because I did not want to say anything bad about Sunil. I think that I am a bad person if I say something which I perceive to be negative. The truth is that there is nothing wrong with telling it how I see it. If I am wide of the mark than Karaj will tell me, and if I am accurate then we will all benefit anyway.
My thoughts turned to the way Karaj treats people. If he does not want anything to do with them then he will smile, be nice to them, humour them, reassure them and quietly move away from them. It is only when he is committed to them, supporting them fully, that he is upfront, open and challenging with them.
We finished the toilet today and it looks fantastic. The detail is staggering considering its temporary nature. When working on one of the shelves in the cupboard I said that it didn’t really matter because nobody will see it. Karaj told me that the toilet is all about ME. His attention to detail is not about the toilet or about what others see or think, it is about himself and the same is true for me. I am working on myself, inside and out, on the things people see and the things they don’t. Whatever I do, I do it for myself.
Furthermore, I have felt disinclined to carry on at times – as with all the half-read books I have at home – and have wanted to get it finished. This has been a lesson in pushing through to the end. It has shown me how difficult it is for me to keep on going when in the middle of something. Karaj has been there to push me (time and time again) so that I can see what I need to do. That is, to carry on through the middle and onto the end. Push through the frustration and annoyance and the desire to pack it in because the sense of achievement and the results which await me on the other side are highly worthwhile.
In the evening the three of us, together with Dev, finished up early and went for a meal together.
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