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Our September session was beautifully led by Karen Whittick, who shared a heartfelt piece of writing to guide us in. Her words got us thinking both philosophically and personally, and set the tone for a session that felt both reflective and connecting.
We began by exploring the act of saying hello and goodbye. We talked about how in some languages the same word is used for both greeting and parting, for example aloha in Hawaiian or salut in French. In Islam the phrase as-salaamu alaykum means “peace be upon you,” with the response wa alaykum as-salaam meaning “and peace be upon you too.” This struck us as a beautiful way of not only wishing peace in both directions, but also of recognising the cyclical nature of life
From there our conversation moved into the different ways hellos and goodbyes show up in our lives. We spoke about the safety created by acknowledging someone on a hike (they might remember you afterwards if you go missing!) while others are told that its not safe to say hello. For children especially it can be confusing to be told to beware of strangers and also to be polite. We also thought about the everyday moments when a hello opens the door to respect, conversation and connection.
Our reflections then widened out into life changes ; moving home, changing jobs, the end of relationships, and the opening of new chapters. We noticed how every goodbye can carry the possibility of a hello, if we are open to it, and wondered whether that life lesson get easier with practice. How sometimes we can feel a bit stuck, while others we might flourish because we have learned to take something from the goodbye and carry it into the next chapter.
Philosophical threads ran through the whole session. We thought about the infinity symbol and how beginnings and endings are never really separate, how in Buddhism everything is interconnected and always in flux, and how nothing is ever static. At any moment there can be fullness or absence, and it is always shifting.
We touched on the whole spectrum of emotions that beginnings and endings can bring – joy, sadness, excitement, loss. Ceremonies, seasons and phases all hold that mixture. Airports and train stations came up as places where hellos and goodbyes are especially present and felt.
It was a session full of richness. There was a zooming out to the big philosophical picture and then zooming in to the specifics of our own lives.
Read on to see what our participants wrote and shared in response…
Karen Whittick
Not quite at the beginning of my life, but fairly early on, I was read the poetry of A.A. Milne, the author of the Winnie the Pooh books. My dad was also a fan of his poems and stories, so I thought I would start with an A.A Milne poem, that is titled, The Christening, which felt apt, as the naming a child (or a pet), tends to happen at the beginning of a new life.
The Christening
What shall I call
My dear little dormouse?
His eyes are small,
But his tail is e-nor-mouse.
I sometimes call him Terrible John,
‘Cos his tail goes on -
And on -
And on.
And I sometimes call him Terrible Jack,
‘Cos his tail goes on to the end of his back.
And I sometimes call him Terrible James,
‘Cos he says he likes me calling him names…
But I think I shall call him Jim,
‘Cos I am fond of him.
I have been thinking lately about hellos and goodbyes, that they can often signal the beginning and ending of chapters in our lives. For a few weeks now, I’ve known that I needed to prepare myself for my 21 year old daughter, Gemma, to begin a new chapter in her life and say, “Goodbye”, to her. She’s chosen to spend a year abroad, as part of her university course. I was preparing for feelings of sadness, whilst knowing that I needed to stay positive and reassuring for her, as she embarked on the start of a new and exciting adventure.
However, very unexpectedly, there was a turn of events! The evening before Gemma was due to fly out to Zurich and then on to Konstanz by train, she had a very big wobble, became very upset and she asked me to travel with her and to stay for a couple of days, to ease her settling in. So on Monday morning, I found myself saying “Hello!” to two countries I had never visited before, Switzerland and Germany with my “Goodbye” to Gemma, having been postponed for a few more days.
By Wednesday, after two busy, but lovely days spent in Gemma’s company, leaving her was much less painful for us both, than I had anticipated only a week earlier. She was less anxious and the new chapter in her life was awaiting her that morning, at Konstanz University. I knew exactly where she was living and our shopping trip for some nice items, to add to her very bleak looking room, had gone some way to transform it into a cosy space. I ended my trip, not with sadness, but with joy. My blossoming daughter was going to be just fine, with her self confidence and spirit of adventure restored, once again!
Another reflection of mine on beginnings and endings, is related to my sweet dad, who as some of you know, died in February. His life had ended and not being a religious person, for me that felt like a very big FULL STOP, in my life. Such a beautiful man, with the most loving heart had gone! Then I found out that I could plant a tree and my dads ashes could be scattered at its roots and nourish that tree. A new beginning, in life of a Silver Birch tree. I have been tending and watering it, and in a month or so, I will plant some bulbs, (his favourite flowers, Bluebells) and watch the tree grow, over years, in the memorial woodland. A Life for a Life!
Around the same time that my dad’s health was declining rapidly, an email from Jolene popped up, a reminder about ‘The Stories of Our Lives’ group. So I welcomed the opportunity that presented itself and began this group along with another one that Jolene co-leads, called the ‘Motherline Project’. Joining and being welcomed into both new groups, has been so positive and enriching, allowing me the opportunity to begin meeting a whole new set of people, which I have really enjoyed.
So another ending has arrived, as the last warm rays of summer sunshine are drawing to an end, we are starting to see the beginning of autumn. Leaves turning brown and beginning to fall and before long, pavements will be covered in a leafy blanket.
I’ll end my reflection on Beginnings and Endings, with a poem I came across recently, by Emily Bronte, called,
Fall, Leaves, Fall
Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;
Lengthen night and shorten day;
Every leaf speaks bliss to me
Fluttering from the autumn tree
I shall smile when wreaths of snow
Blossom where the rose should grow;
I shall sing when nights decay
Ushers in a drearier day.
Jean Thompson
Another really great session, led by Karen Whittick on what we understand about beginnings and endings/hellos and goodbyes.
We had a great discussion about what we understood about the circularity of life –how the endings of one phase could become the beginning of another phase if we opened ourselves up to possibilities.
GDJ, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
The mathematical symbol for infinity was introduced by John Wallis in 1655 and is used in mathematics to denote infinity but it also carries a metaphorical meaning of eternity, continuity and un-boundedness in various cultural and spiritual contexts.
We can stay stuck in the ending of something or embrace that ending as a beginning, always allowing for an appropriate time to assimilate and internalise what the ending means. For example, the loss of someone close to us has to be properly recognised and grieved over before we are ready to move to a different place. The loss of a different stage in life, for example our working life, has to be acknowledged before we can appreciate what the next phase, retirement, can bring. Life is not a straight trajectory going in only one direction. We go forward, we go back only to go forward again. Remembering as well that the beginning of something new becomes in itself the ending of that new beginning and becomes the norm.
Another symbol for the circularity of life is the Ouroborus, an ancient symbol of a serpent eating its own tail, representing again eternity, the cycle of destruction and rebirth and infinite renewal across various cultures and traditions.
The idea of beginnings and endings as a circle would seem to go back a very long way in numerous cultures.
At the end of the session, Jolene asked us to consider what beginnings we recognised with gratitude. In the midst of many things to be grateful for, that was easy for me to answer. No question, the beginning of becoming a mother!
Tony Goulding
Our sessions always generate lively and thought inducing conversations and the latest on “Beginnings and Endings” was no exception. Indeed, the discussion turned quite philosophical at times. These two concepts are by their nature inexorably interlinked as “when one door closes, another opens”. Also, it is not always clear when an “ending” is such, as life is very complicated with many twists and turns. What is initially thought of as an end may prove to be more in the nature of a pause. This is something we become more aware of as we grow older. Sadly, teenagers experiencing a first heartbreaking break-up feel that it’s the end of the world, for as the 1967 song written by Cat Stevens has it “The first cut is the deepest”.
Our life circumstances are constantly subject to change as “nothing is certain except death and taxes” (attributed to Benjamin Franklin) and all change involves an end as well as a beginning.
Another reflection is that each moment we live is both filled with memories of the past that has ended and hopes and dreams for the future which is just about to begin.
Patrick Steel
Recently, we enjoyed a session on “Beginnings and Endings”, which got me thinking more positively about how when one door closes, another opens! When I was about 15, I was keen to get my hands on a summer flying scholarship from the RAF. I had heard my Dad’s cousin died in the Battle of Britain.
A completed short application form returned an official looking letter that allowed me to hop on any bus, boat or train going from N Ireland to Biggin Hill, England where I spent three days of tests on my physical and mental abilities. Going before the Base Commander confidentially for my result, I was told the shocking news that I was very shortsighted. I only learned the result of one other boy in that cohort who was excluded for having hay fever. And he was really upset about it!
On returning to school, with a pair of glasses from the opticians, I was amazed to find that I could now read the blackboard clearly in class. And this was even from the back row where I usually sat as the shy, unassuming boy that I was. I’m sure that meant I got much better grades than before, and I even got a place at University in Belfast. On the basis of that degree result, I was offered an all expenses paid scholarship for a Master’s degree in Manchester.
And the rest is history. I spent many years serving society as a public servant in a local council up until my retirement. And I think back to my schooldays when many of my contemporaries seemed to end up in the armed forces.
Margaret Kendall
I was pleased recently to come across the card I was given when I retired from Manchester Metropolitan University. I’d worked there for twenty seven years in total, in several different roles and in three departments, so this card, signed by many of my colleagues, felt particularly appropriate.
It was an ending, but also the beginning of lots of new experiences with new people to meet. People in work always think that retirement is a time to relax but actually I’m enjoying being busy in a variety of ways !
The Stories of Our Lives 