Autism & Holding Hands

Finian and I hold hands a lot.

It's partly a hangover from his bolting days, but mostly we just like the connection.  It seems to anchor and soothe him.  

When Finian was younger, I had to keep a death's grip on him to keep him safe.  There was nothing centred, or loving, about it.  It was all about survival.

We held hands in the car today as we drove to youth club. I noticed that even though we had a warm connection, we held hands lightly.  We didn't need to cling to each other to feel secure.

In keeping with life's synchronicities, this reflects how differently I now relate to the world.

My breakdown a year ago was one of the best things to ever happen me.  It was an excrutiating baptism of fire, which burned away my excess baggage. It was a painful, humbling way to shed a thousand pounds of  weighty armour..... but living as a more exposed, but genuine, soul has a lightness that it wonderful.

My ego, and all it's defences, were incinerated.  A generous amount of therapy helped me learn to relate to the world with love and compassion, instead of from a rigid place of fear.  It's still a work in progress (and always will be) but it's a healthy, wholesome path supported by authentic connections.  

Clinging onto anything (hands, people, objects, self-image etc) is a wax-sealed guarantee for suffering.  Any Buddhist worth their Himalayan salt can tell you that.  

Letting go is a scary process, though, when our culture has conditioned us to value ownership of external objects above all else.  

I'm not such a beardy hippie that I want to live in a bin eating lentils.  We need to pay our bills and have somewhere safe to live.  But that's all we need.  

When I meditate, I visualise holding everything, and everyone, I love lightly.

It's really cool to notice this manifest in how I hold hands with my son.