Reshaping our realities
Part 2 - Maggie
Hey!
A quick note for anyone with arachnophobia, as this story concerns our multi-legged buddies. There are absolutely no spider pictures in this article, nor do I go into any graphic detail about them. In fact, I’d encourage you to read on, because this story isn’t really about spiders at all.
I’ve got your back!
Last time, I wrote about smoking, addiction, and one particular question that started to change everything:
What if my life doesn’t have to be this way?
It was a question that helped me stop smoking nearly twenty-five years ago. As it turns out, it would later help me face something else entirely.
If you haven’t read Part 1 yet, I’d encourage you to start there. It provides the backdrop for what comes next. Which is another fear. This time of spiders.
Though, ‘terror’ would have probably been a more accurate word.
Facing spiders
My earliest memory involves being lowered into a bath as a child and spotting a spider. My dad didn’t even get chance to fully lower me into the bath. He had to whip me out with urgency, because I was screaming (and I do mean screaming) the house down!
What’s really odd though, is that I can’t point to any event that created this fear. There was no obvious cause. I wasn’t raised to be scared of them. My family didn’t demonise them. I just had this almost primal fear. Possibly from birth.
So great was the panicked impact that would rip through my body, that I spent decades trying to avoid them. I’d avoid horror movies (my now second-favourite genre!) and obvious no-go events like Halloween parties.
But everyday, regular life brought its problems. Even newspapers were a gamble because every now and then I’d turn a page and find a giant photograph of a spider staring back at me. The problem, of course, is that you can’t completely avoid spiders. No matter how hard you try. So the times I would encounter one felt hellish.
Until one day, inspired by what I’d learnt from smoking, I stopped putting my energy into avoiding and running away - into being afraid - and I asked myself:
What if my life doesn’t have to be this way?
For the first time, I became curious rather than afraid, and with the fear now taking a back seat, I was suddenly open to going on a search to find out ‘how’ I could change things.
That search led me to London Zoo, and their incredible “Friendly Bug Programme”. After just three hours of attending the programme, I was stood proudly (if slightly cautiously) holding a Mexican Red Knee tarantula called Maggie!
Holding and... caring for her! Because oh my god, she weighed absolutely NOTHING.
The moment they placed her into my hand I felt something shift. The terror vanished and was replaced by something completely unexpected: protectiveness.
My overwhelming thought wasn’t about me. It was about her. If I dropped her, that would be it. I needed to keep her safe!
Everything changed in those two or three seconds. As if my whole nervous system rewired itself. I felt it course through my body for a fraction of a second. Then, calm.
To this day, it remains one of the most extraordinary experiences of my life.
What if?
Both the smoking experience and my incredible encounter with Maggie taught me that change begins when we become open to the possibility that the very reality in which we are living, can itself be changed.
What if my life doesn’t have to be this way?
Whilst I’ve been talking about smoking and spiders, the chances are you’re already thinking about something in your life. A habit, a fear, a belief about yourself, or a pattern you’ve lived with for so long that you’ve maybe stopped questioning altogether whether it even needs to be there.
Because that’s what we do. We adapt remarkably well to the realities we create around us. Over time, we stop seeing them as one possible reality and start seeing them as reality itself.
And then, every now and again, something shifts. A conversation, a book, a moment, or simply a question causes us to look at our lives differently.
What if my life doesn’t have to be this way?
I wonder where that question might lead you.
If there’s something in your life that feels like it’s shaping your reality, keeping you stuck in a pattern, or convincing you that “this is just how things are”, drop me a note. I’d love to hear your story.
PS: A heartfelt thank you to the team at London Zoo and the Friendly Bug Programme. What you’re doing genuinely changes lives.
Thank you!! I looked online recently, and they still run the programme, after all these years! It has a slightly different name, but it's still there. I wonder if Maggie is still there. I wonder if she'd remember me... 🥹
I love this! It's amazing that places, like London Zoo, have these programmes to help too. GO YOU!