Tomorrow Is Another Day
I have always loved that line from Gone with the Wind, when Scarlett O’Hara says:
“After all, tomorrow is another day!” These days, I hear it differently. I hear a nervous system reset. Scarlett, for all her many faults, has this extraordinary capacity to get to the end of what she can manage and decide that - she doesn't have to solve everything today.
Tomorrow is another day. How wonderful!
Not pretending that something didn't happen. Not bypassing disappointment, grief or hurt. Simply recognising that whatever happened has happened, and there will be another opportunity to meet life again.
Like when riding a dressage test.
Dressage judges look for accuracy and relaxation. You ride one movement and then another, around the arena, until eventually those individual movements make up a complete test.
And each movement is scored individually. That matters.
Because perhaps your halt wasn't square, you trotted late, your horse spooked in the corner or even forgot for a moment where you were going (love a caller as back up for this)
You cannot go backwards and ride that movement again.
But you can:- let it go!
If I am still mentally riding the mistake behind me, I am no longer available for what my horse is doing underneath me now. (Often in the form of shame/being stuck in the past feeling the emotions of when I did it wrong all the other times - which is how trauma can interfere with the present.
So I breathe.
I reconnect.
And we ride the next movement as well as we can. (Because I have a PLAN)
Then the next.
And the next.
Until eventually we ride down the centre line, halt and salute.
Then I can look at the whole test.
I can read the judge's comments. I can notice patterns. I can see what went well and where we lost marks. I can decide what needs more training before we ride another test.
But I don't need to conduct the entire post-mortem while I'm still riding.
Often I put it away and take it to my coach! - Then we look at it together, because she is kinder than me; she has way more compassion and can support me to process the emotions that I was feeling in the test...she can help me let them go.
I have been thinking about this with my clients too, particularly those who find interoception difficult — recognising and making sense of what is happening inside their own bodies.
When someone's nervous system moves into overwhelm or freeze, asking them to decide in that moment what they need can sometimes be asking too much.
They need a movement they already know.
A plan.
Feet on the floor.
Breathe.
Wash your hands.
Push against something solid.
Walk.
Shake.
Feel the earth.
Make sound. (Yes, you all know I love releasing through the VOOOOO)
Whatever we have discovered beforehand helps their body find its way back to themselves.
They reach for the next movement.
And perhaps that movement doesn't immediately make everything calm.
Because regulation isn't always calmness.
There may still be fear.
Anger.
Energy.
A desire to run, push, cry, shake or move.
The body may have protective energy that needs somewhere safe to go.
We don't have to get rid of that either.
The goal isn't to become a body without charge.
Perhaps it is to become a body that can experience charge, move with it, and find its way home again.
And then we look at the test
This is also how I sometimes think about the therapy room.
In everyday life, we don't always have the capacity to process everything while it is happening.
Sometimes we simply have to ride the movement.
Get the children to school.
Go to work.
Have the difficult conversation.
Walk away.
Get through the meeting.
Put our feet on the floor and breathe.
Do the next thing.
But what happened in us still matters.
So sometimes my role is a little like the coach meeting the rider after the test.
We look at what happened.
Not to criticise the ride.
Not to shame the rider for the moment that went wrong.
And certainly not to take the reins and ride the next test for them.
We get curious.
What happened there?
What did you notice in your body?
Where did you lose yourself?
What did you need but couldn't access in that moment?
And sometimes, with another person present, there is enough safety to finally feel what couldn't be felt while life was happening.
The tears come.
The anger has somewhere to move.
The body shakes.
The breath changes.
Words arrive for something that, at the time, had no words.
The charge that had to be held can begin to move.
But therapy can't remain the only place where this happens.
Just as a coach eventually wants the rider to recognise what is happening underneath them while they are riding, I want my clients to increasingly recognise themselves.
There I am.
There's the feeling.
There's the freeze.
There's the urge.
There's my body telling me something.
And eventually:
I know what my next movement is!
That's what we do in the therapy room...
Not to make sure somebody never has another difficult ride.
But to help them become increasingly able to ride their own test.
To know when to breathe.
When to move.
When to ask for support.
When to let something go.
And when, once the immediate moment has passed, something needs to be returned to and felt.
I think of this after our Full moon party in the weekend, coming together to shake our bodies and let go.
There are so many more thresholds where we can say let go...
Tomorrow.
Monday.
Birthdays.
New Year.
Sunrise.
The new moon.
The full moon.
I love looking up and the sky and feel the stars align and twinkle back:
Yes. Let's do that.
Let's begin again.
Of course, the moon doesn't magically erase what happened before. Neither does tomorrow or riding the next corner of a dressage arena.
But perhaps we don't need erasure.
We need movement.
We need a moment in which we can say:
That happened.
And then:
What am I riding now?
There is something generous in that.
To stop demanding that this moment repair the last one.
To stop asking today to fix yesterday.
To allow ourselves another movement, another breath, another sunrise, another moon.
And when the test is finished, we can look back.
We can learn.
We can feel what there wasn't space to feel at the time.
We can train.
We can make changes.
We can take responsibility for the things that are ours.
And then, when we enter the arena again, we don't ride the old test.
We ride the one underneath us now.
Perhaps Scarlett O'Hara understood something after all.
We don't have to get it right/perfect!
But feeling our aliveness! And realising that:-
Tomorrow is another day.
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