Breakthrough

“I want you to take a slow, deep breath in, counting down from 6,… 5,… 4,… 3,… 2,… 1, then slowly exhaling as deep down as you can go, counting down from 6,… 5,… 4,… 3,… 2,… 1, and again...”

She was trying to follow her instruction but wasn’t getting into it, thinking to herself, “what am I doing?”

“As you breathe, find your Chi. Connect with it and bring back balance to your mind.”

She started to chuckle, “Okay, I’m lookin’ for me Chi…..Chi….where’s the Chi? Chi, Chi….let there be... Chi…”

Realising what she said was out loud, she slowly opened her eyes to see Penny sitting cross legged on the floor in front of her, an unimpressed look on her face. She tried to hold it in, but another chuckle came out.

“You know, you asked me to help you.”

Her chuckling stops, “I know.”

“Help me destress and clear my head, you said.”

“I know, Pen. Sorry, I’m just not used to this kind of stuff”, a little smirk comes over her face. A moment of silence between them, Penny’s stern glare softens a little.

“Would you like me to help you?”

Coyly, “yes Penny, I would like you to help me”, she looks up at her, “please, will you help?” Another moment of silence, Penny nods in acceptance, “Let’s try something else. Close your eyes for me, take a deep breath in, then slowly exhaling out”.

She complies, taking in the darkness before her and the sound of Penny’s breath as she tries to relax.

The space they’re in is quiet, only the distant sound of the trees rustling outside can be heard as Penny begins to speak, “I want you to visualise… It’s winter. It’s been snowing, and you’re sitting outside on a park bench by a frozen pond.”

A little chuckle, “okay.”

“Visualise quietly.”

She clamps her mouth shut as Penny continues, “looking out at the pond, the ice in the centre is illuminating white. By the park bench, there’s a pickaxe. You pick it up and walk out on to the ice, walking toward the glow. Underneath the ice, there they are. All your worries, your anxieties, your negative thoughts. Look at them closely and tell yourself in your mind what they are. Can you see?”

Her eyes still closed, she begins to tense up, gripping her hands on her knees. Taking in another deep breath to calm, she starts to visualise.

Underneath the ice, there is a man dressed in a second-hand business suit. Thinking back, she has a sense of him standing by her, the smell of his breath and his hand on her shoulder, giving it a squeeze. Whispering into her ear, “you know, if you showed up at the stand in a mini skirt, that’ll bring in the crowd.”

Looking back at the ice next to him, there’s a young girl, in her mid-teens, wearing her disheveled school dress, bruises on her knees. She remembers the feeling of the rotten sandwich being smacked into her face, making her fall to her knees, the sound of laughter whilst kneeling in the mud. Next to the girl, a fair-haired guy in his mid-twenties, casually dressed. Memories of him telling her, “Look at you! You are so STUPID. Just look at you. Stupid, ridiculous thing that you are.”

She tenses up again. Penny gently takes her hand, stroking it. She calmly whispers, “you’re okay, you’re almost there. Take a breath and listen to my voice.”

In the distance, she can hear Penny and begins to calm.

“Now, use the pickaxe. Smash into all of those thoughts and memories and keep hitting until the ice breaks in front of you, allowing the water underneath to flow, the sun softening the ice, melting the shards away, releasing them. Watching them dissolve until you can no longer see them, until they’re completely gone.”

Her mind follows Penny’s words, smashing into the ice with the pickaxe, her eyes filling with tears. One by one, the businessman, the girl, and the guy shatter into pieces and melt away into the pond, her tears rolling down her face as a sense of relief comes over her.

Opening her eyes, her face flushed and tear stained, she locks eyes with Penny.

“How do you feel?”

She takes a moment before responding, “what the fuck was that?”, the pair burst out laughing, holding each other.