We have updated our Privacy Policy Please take a moment to review it. By continuing to use this site, you agree to the terms of our updated Privacy Policy.

THE THINGS I LEARNED… FROM FALLING


I think about the desert every day. It might just be for a moment, when my hip twinges and shoots a niggling pain to my still-busted ankle. Or on those occasions when I’m feeling low, or inadequate, or racked with self-doubt. Then, a part of my brain takes me back to that place below the boulders, and reminds me how things could have been, and how far away from it I now am. Look at you, you’re still here. This is your bonus life.

It changes you, a thing like that – although the way it changes you is not (in my experience, at least) as straightforward as one might expect. My experience gave me clarity, but that doesn’t mean I can see clearly all the time. It gave me gratitude, but that doesn’t mean I don’t need reminding to appreciate what’s in front of me. It showed me how to push past my fears, though the fears still remain. My default setting is still that of a flawed and fallible human being, only now I understand that it’s actually OK to be one.

In a nutshell: same eyes, new perspective. When I moved back to London it had been less than two years since the accident. I’d soaked up the last year of my unextendible Canadian visa, finally reaching Vancouver where I knew nothing and no one, but where I could see mountains every day; there, I worked part-time in a shop and finished writing this book. It was a period of time I had given to myself, to be surrounded by Big Nature and have the space to process. A bubble of catharsis, preparing me to return to my so-called normal life.

The move back to London wasn’t without trepidation – would this new perspective translate into the world I’d left? But I was also buoyed by gratitude and possibility, knowing it couldn’t be the same because this time I had the tools to build a more balanced existence. In my former London life I had isolated myself, then become isolated in the desert, and then lived in self-imposed isolation in Vancouver. Now – as I declared to those around me – I was ready to leave isolation behind, and live a life more open.

Four weeks after arriving in London, I was in lockdown. (At the time of writing this, we’re still in one.) A pandemic. Didn’t see that one coming. 2020 threw us one hell of a curveball, and everyone was knocked off their feet at once. It was a collective fall in slow motion, everyone crashlanding into isolation, forced to spend the days reflecting on what our lives are about, what had to change, and what matters to us most. I recognized this uncertainty and anxiety, and knew the sudden, desperate need to reach out to others. It was a curious thing to sense recognition in a situation so unfathomable.

The book had come out in a magical blur of joy just before the world shut down . . . and then I couldn’t see it any more. There was no tour, no signings, no events, no meeting readers or readers-tobe; I just knew it was out there. It was a strange phase of knowing I had laid my vulnerabilities bare and opened up about things that even my nearest and dearest hadn’t really known, and sent it into the world not knowing if it would connect with anyone. But then . . . I started getting messages from readers, to whom the book had found its way. (Sure, I’d once reached out to Douglas Adams, but it surprised me that people would take the time to do the same to little ol’ me, at home eating soup in my slippers.) At this juncture, when everyone was so cut off from one another, those little connections, so real in their honesty, amounted to something huge. They helped me through the long days of uncertainty. Readers told me they related and felt seen, and through the book I finally felt seen too.

Connecting with others has, of course, been the fundamental point. Even as an introvert, well used to being alone, I struggled in lockdown along with everyone else. I missed people greatly – and perhaps even more so, the opportunity of other people. Meeting, learning, possibility. In our shared solitude I leaned into my closest relationships, and found that now I had opened myself up, others began to do the same. There was more real talk. Instead of staying in touch via ‘likes’, copious text chat groups burst into life and people checked in with one another, staying connected in a more genuine way. Hey, this is more like it.

That said, connection is about being open with oneself, too, and since my recovery I’ve been working on acknowledging the parts of myself I’d previously neglected or been ashamed of. I’ve become much bloody nicer to myself, overall. (Besides, it makes sense to be good friends with yourself when that’s the person you’re spending the most time with.)


THIS IS AN EXTRACT FROM CLAIRE NELSON’S THINGS I LEARNED FROM FALLING