Take me beyond forgiveness / Zabierz mnie poza przebaczenie (bilingual English-Polish post)

Take me beyond forgiveness
.

POEM

Take me beyond forgiveness
Where love ends all quarrels
And gratitude replenishes hands
Tired of work
For nothing
So it seems…

Take me beyond forgiveness
Where I understand the concept
of a nutrient
without doubting its worth or value
and I clean
and I eat
wisdom for breakfast
and love for dinner.
With you.

QUESTION TO PONDER

If you were to take yourself beyond forgiveness, where would you take yourself?

Who is ‘you’ for you?

What would be on your wisdom plate?

Acknowledgment: I first saw poetry combined with questions in the book 21 Spotkań. These questions lead to individual insight. Click here to see. It was written by Maciej Bennewicz and Katarzyna Zaremba. Both psychologists create poetic dialogues and work with metaphors that aid individual growth and self-understanding. The more humble I become, the more I grow in the appreciation of this approach.

May is a mental health awareness month and I would like to strengthen us all using my talents today in a similar manner. I learnt yesterday that a friend of mine died being only 48. She loved travelling and this blog too. I wish I had still a chance to eat a dinner with her. Travel. Keep on living. x

By engaging in this exercise you are practising these mental skills:

  • self-compassion
  • self-awareness
  • inner peace.

So if you were to take yourself beyond forgiveness, where would you take yourself?

Enjoy it.

POLISH TRANSLATION

WIERSZ

Zabierz mnie poza przebaczenie
Gdzie miłość kończy wszelkie kłótnie
A wdzięczność wypełnia dłonie
Zmęczone pracą
Za darmo
Na to wyglÄ…da…

Zabierz mnie poza przebaczenie
Gdzie rozumiem pojęcie
składnika odżywczego
nie wątpiąc w jego znaczenie i wartość
I już teraz sprzątam
i jem
Mądrość na śniadanie
i miłość do obiadu.
Z TobÄ….

PYTANIE DO ROZWAŻENIA

Gdybyś miał/miała zabrać siebie poza przebaczenie, dokąd zabrałabyś siebie?

Co by było dla Ciebie mądrością na śniadanie?

Z kim jadłabyś obiad?

PodziÄ™kowanie: Po raz pierwszy zetknęłam siÄ™ z poezjÄ… poÅ‚Ä…czonÄ… z pytaniami w książce “21 spotkaÅ„”. Te pytania prowadzÄ… do wglÄ…du we wÅ‚anÄ… sprawczość. Kliknij tutaj, aby zopoznać siÄ™ z książkÄ…. Autorami tekstu sÄ… Maciej Bennewicz i Katarzyna Zaremba. Obaj psychologowie tworzÄ… poetyckie dialogi i pracujÄ… z metaforami, które pomagajÄ… w indywidualnym rozwoju i zrozumieniu siebie. Bardzo doceniam to podejÅ›cie.

Maj jest miesiÄ…cem zwiÄ™kszania Å›wiadomoÅ›ci na temat zdrowia psychicznego i chciaÅ‚bym nas wszystkich wzmocnić, używajÄ…c moich talentów w podobny sposób. Wczoraj dowiedziaÅ‚em siÄ™, że moja przyjaciółka zmarÅ‚a majÄ…c zaledwie 48 lat. UwielbiaÅ‚a podróże i ten blog. ChciaÅ‚bym mieć jeszcze szansÄ™ zjeść z niÄ… obiad lub kolacjÄ™. ”Podróżujcie. Å»yjcie dalej.” powiedziaÅ‚aby dziÅ›. x

Angażując się w to ćwiczenie, ćwiczysz poniższe umiejętności:

  • współczucie dla siebie
  • samoÅ›wiadomość
  • wewnÄ™trzny spokój.

Warto?

Więc: Gdybyś miał/miała zabrać siebie poza przebaczenie, dokąd zabrałabyś siebie?

Abstract from ice (modified and updated)

Once upon a time we had a rabbit. The rabbit died over a year ago just on New Year’s Eve. We took the rabbit tray outside, it was in our garden collecting rain water and algae. It was a big cage, capacious. When the big freeze came over the last week all that water with algae froze creating interesting patterns and compositions. I chopped the ice with an old bread tin. It was also filled with heavy ice. Our son lifted it off the tray. He placed it next to his knee to show how tall and thick it was, impressive in size. I photographed the blocks of ice while they were still floating among the icy water and when son was holding the ice.

The algae surrounded them. I then post-processed the photos in Lightroom. My favourite abstract composition is below.

I wonder what you think of it all?

Let me know.

x

And yesterday while walking, I met this little being. I think its eye is in the abstract.

Writing and photography: Alicja Pyszka-Franceschini, 2025, Home Studio, Derby, UK. Outdoor photo taken in Willington, South Derbyshire.

Updated 16.01.2025.

Thankful

I’ve got an impression that last winter my mother was making this soup every three days for our children. Her grandson was competing with himself to see how many bowls he could comfortably consume. We all looked at him in disbelief, wondering where that quantity was disappearing. Surely, he was not spoon-feeding the dogs under the table. He loved it. Everyone else did too. They gladly returned from the cold and sat in front of a steaming bowl and each bowl came with a piece of popular Polish bread showered with flax seeds. Yummy.

Do you cook? What do you like making?


The knitted cloth that the soup is placed on is actually a scarf made by my aunt. It is so warm, you won’t believe. Shoulders wear it gracefully indebted to my aunt for many hours of her work. I was comforted by the softness of the scarf. The warmth of the soup also brought reassurance. I am grateful that my mum and aunt keep their skills fresh and that they continuously make an effort. It is mesmerizing to see how things emerge in other people’s hands. As if from nowhere…

Creativity blossomed in our house over the weekend. Icy weather gave us many opportunities to refresh and revive our spirit and gave us hope for a good and creative year. I hope you are feeling equally energized.

The photos of the soup were taken last year in Poland. The photo of my children was taken in Melbourne (UK) at Woodhouse Farm. Many thanks to Brian Woodhouse for allowing me to take photos on his farm and fields.

Below is a photo from my parents’ place in Poland.

*Corrected draft.

Front yard fairy-tales. Manifesting joy.

Hi beautiful souls,

How was your day? What you’ve been up to lately? I so rarely hear from you but you often hear from me. It would nice to hear from you. Who you are? Where you living now? What has awakened your heart recently? I am sending you a few photographs of our fairytale wonderland yard. They are still performing well against the darkness of the world. Making neighbours smile or wonder why they are still there. Wouldn’t it be lovely to get all our front yards’ decorations and place them all in our local park to make a magical fairytale land out of this world? Can you imagine children’s faces and all the wows exhaled with joys of laughter and fingers pointed: ‘Look at this!’ ‘Look at that?’ Maybe neighbours and local community centres would be up for it?

Sash Milne from Inked in Colour believed in the power of human connection and community. She planted a strong seed. Thank you for making the difference through your voice and writing, Sash. We can be resilient independently and we can be even more resilient together. Yes, we can.

And I was also thinking…

🙂

Sometimes magic is not readily available to everyone. Sometimes children cannot walk through the city or even ride through the city for various reasons. Sometimes it is because they have to stay at the hospital. And I think that they need magic too, so on the 24 December, trying to observe Polish tradition of having one more place at the table for a stranger I thought that no stranger would come really (they hardly ever come), but I thought to myself that I can be a stranger who makes someone feel better. And I think you can too. If you would like to.. so I wonder if you would like to manifest some hope and joy.. I have something in confidence to share or rather a recipe for joy to share. Good deeds are embarrassing to share but then The Gita for Children taught me this year that goodness leads to intelligence and it leads to knowledge. So perhaps you would like to do it too?

I bought these lovely aurora LED lights (click here to see) and I grabbed my second-hand copy of the book 100 Reasons to Hope. True stories of everyday heros (here) and I took them to our local hospital for the children on the inpatient ward to enjoy together with the nurses, doctors and other members of staff that were working during Christmas. The children’s team play coordinator was so moved. I felt I did the right thing and I’m feeling I am doing the right thing now too to share it with you. Maybe you would like to do the same for the children at your local hospital? Or others. Talk to your family and friends about it. Maybe they would like to do it together.

We have these lights at home too and we use them with my children of they are overly anxious or struggle to come down before going to sleep.

A bit of magic is so necessary when reality is too much to handle. Isn’t it?

Have a lovely week. X