Desiderata

by Max Ehrmann
written around 1920

Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.

Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant, they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love, for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is perennial as the grass.

Take kindly to the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world.

Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.


Desiderata is Latin and means 'things that are yearned for', which in the context of the poem more closely means 'essential things'.

Awareness and ignorance

Sometimes life is so much of a mystery ... things happen all the time, they come into being and then they pass and we never know for what reason, neither why they appear nor whey they disappear.
Instead of trying to comprehend why they do, I should just take them for what they are, remaining in the moment, simply seeing, enjoying and being grateful for what is pleasant ... accepting what is not ... but my mind is so restless lately, always wondering, pondering, trying to comprehend.

What happened to my assumed 'peace of mind' ... have I been carelessly taking it for granted, endangering it by that? It may just be that way. I felt so content and happy ever since I returned from the desert, nothing could disturb my balance, I felt rooted in reality, mastering my life with so much awareness and gratitude. It was nothing I did with much activity on my part; I had just given up trying to control what was happening – taking life as it came – and that had left me with a certain peace of mind.
It wasn't an easy time – early this summer I had to go through what might have become a bit of a tragedy in the past but I could just watch it and remain in awareness and avoid to fall into the abyss the way I would probably have a year ago. Now, this sounds quite arrogant in a way, and maybe it was ... expecting this 'new condition' to be there for good ... some kind of spiritual armchair ... just sit down, recline and make myself comfortable. Looks like it doesn't work that way – and I guess I knew it all along.

Why is it that we master some things with so much sensitivity and consciousness and others leave us completely lost and helpless. Why can we see the traps and dangers of going wrong so clearly in looking on others but are so often blind when it comes to ourselves?

All spring and summer I have been there for a friend in need, completely forgetting about myself, simply serving the moment, giving my guidance, my comfort, sharing my gifts freely, somehow independent of my self. I could just divine this friend's needs, fears and doubts – somewhere beyond intellect or reason – and gently guide him out of his darkness, back to a point where he could take over again, able to cope and go on by himself. Now I see something similar happen to myself and all I do is squirm and whine, losing patience with myself, blaming myself, dramatizing things instead of accepting them.

What I was able to detect with so much love and understanding in this friend, I find hard to grant myself, looking at myself with a certain rigour and prejudice of how I should be, how I should act and feel. It's silly and I know it – I can see all that, I can see what I'm doing to myself and I still don't seem to be able to act accordingly.
I carry that quiet resentment, that feeling I have been done wrong, played or fooled ... that the world is unfair, concerning a certain situation iny my life. I can not even claim that I know no better, I have no apology or justification for what I'm doing to myself, I am in fact aware of how I cater to my own suffering ... so why don't I just get up and do something, help myself ..? Am I enjoying my momentary misery? I feel so tired and weary, so reluctant to act if that means I have to question myself or my reasons for suffering. Maybe I don't want to look. Or maybe it just seems so arduous or complicated to get to the bottom of things. I am drifting into some kind of inability to act, some resignation or reluctancy to come to terms with myself. Everything feels so idle right now. I feel it is all too much, too strenuous to think about it. But is it really?

I feel like everything is too much for me when really I do not have much to do at all. What do I do but sit around feeling sorry for myself? I make an attempt to get started on something then lose myself in some moment in time, lose my relationship with time and reality and before I know, hours have passed and I still sit there – none the wiser. Later ... always later.

Outside it's dark all the time, or so it feels. It's grey and wet and cold. I miss the colours. I know it doesn't make sense. They won't come back until spring, so why quarrel with reality? And yet, there is a certain mood in the air and it gets at me. Winter depression. I detect it in almost everybody around me right now and I take up the mood. Again, knowing it's stupid to harm myself by doing it. I know better than that. But ... always but.

I guess I will just have to stop typing and start looking and acting. Come face to face with reality. Stop wasting precious time ... sorry for whining like that ....

The desert

I've been back for quite a while now and still find it difficult to write anything coherent. There are bits and pieces, single thoughts and reflections, but it seems impossible to write any kind of fluent itinerary concerning my time in the desert. I feel like a lot has happened and changed ever since I went there – and since I have last posted in this blog – but I couldn't name it, really. There are hardly any visible changes, it's more subtle, almost impossible to figure out, even for myself. It's as if the desert perturbed me, messed me up, but in a positive way. Going there has proved a most valuable experience and even though I've spent a relatively short time in the Sinai desert and mountains, it was so much more intense and impressive than any of my other travels so far. The desert made me see a lot of things in a totally different light. There were plenty of wonderful experiences that left me with a somewhat changed perception of the world in several aspects.

Forgive me if my following writing is going to be all jumbled and confused, I haven't yet found a way to put the desert into orderly words (especially not in English) and probably it's a futile effort ... I guess I shouldn't even try but somehow I want to share my impressions and maybe a tiny little bit will still come across and give you a slight insight into what it was like to be there ...

(My favourite valley in the Sinai desert)

When I decided to go into the desert it wasn't mainly because I was looking for a deeper meaning of life or new insights. I also expected the whole thing to be as much of an adventure trip as a spiritual journey. I wasn't searching, but willing to find and be found, to come across things without purpose ... whatever life would decide to provide me with – or put into my way – I was prepared to deal with. I didn't so much want to 'discover' as to 'uncover' what was already there. The only intention I had was to challenge myself, to defy and allay my subliminal fears and bring back to life those things inside me that had become forgotten over the years, numbed by routine, comfort and safety thinking. I wanted to regain access to my natural energies and intuition and felt that the desert might be just the right place to try to do that.

(An especially beautiful multicoloured uromastyx – spiny-tailed lizard)

Despite being extremely curious and keen to discover this mysterious place, fascinating me beyond explanation, I was still pretty scared of what might expect me there. The thought of sleeping under the open sky, without any shelter made me feel kind of awkward ... sandstorms ... the heat ... cold nights ... the thought of all possible creepy-crawly animals, insects and reptiles ... uaargh! Telling myself that I would certainly survive all that, as others have before me, I avoided to think any more than necessary about snakes or the notorious scorpion. But there were other doubts instead ... I had but a vague notion of the Bedouins ... wild and untamed people I'd have to come to terms with ... what would they cook, how would we communicate ... how would I manage to ride a camel – so many tiny yet slightly disturbing worries! You see, I wasn't all pleasant anticipation as my departure drew near, my courage slightly faltered during those last few days ...


(The immense heat around noon blurred all images, making them seem unreal and fugitive ...)

Once there, the desert quickly lost it's horrors. What scared me so much in advance felt just natural being there. Inavoidable, for there were no choices or alternatives anyway. I'd have to accept whatever would occur and try to make the best of it. Like many other problems, the things that made me so nervous in advance, became simple facts in the deserts, to be considered rather than be afraid of. I felt so much at peace, so centered and genuine from the first moment I got there – calm and quiet inside ... no more worries, no more wishes ... everything seemed to be just right, consistent and wholesome. I've never felt so much at home inside myself. All the sorrows back home lost their meaning and were put back into the right proportions. There was nothing to be solved. I completely lost my usual urge to 'take care' of things, being overactive in trying to control them. In an almost buddhist manner I realized that if I just took certain things for what they were – facts instead of problems – they'd probably lose a lot of their impact. I became aware of how often I created my own problems by fighting the facts – the reality of things – instead of accepting what was beyond my influence. How useless ... and how much healthier to just let go of the resistance!


(Waking up under the open sky ... every morning had it's special magic ...)

So, what was the desert like ..? Instead of providing me with the adventure and excitement I had expected to find – snakes, scorpions and all kinds of outer extremes – it proved to be a quite different, more miraculous and mediating experience with an enormously healing effect. Challenging in a quite different way than I had thought before. It was full of things impossible to be foreseen ... where I expected monotonous routines there were umpteen unpredictable moments instead. One can not conquer the desert, or force anything, the only satisfying way is to attune one's own rhythm to that of the desert and with a bit of luck, it'll freely share it's energy. It's been such a precious gift, to be allowed to experience the unbelievable power and strength of the Sinai, the vast stillness, the immense peacefulness, the curative force of this place and it's people, the Arab Bedouins ... so strange and alien to me in the beginning, so dear and familiar after all in the end.



(Bedouin household – baking bread on an open fire in the living room ...)

How much heart and humour is in this people, how much courage and curiosity, love and laughter, tolerance and respect. How little do they meet the cliché we have of the Arab people. Traveling and living with the tribe of the Tarabin was quite an enriching experience. The time I spent with my 'desert family' (consisting of me, six Bedouins and two Bavarian friends) left a lasting impression. I don't think my heart and soul have ever been in such close communion before. I wouldn't have thought something like this to be possible, such an overwhelming anam cara feeling, a real 'epiphany'.




(The desert sure was adventurous, breathtakingly beautiful and very impressive – but it was also a lot of fun ... playing innocent children's games with the Bedouins, joining in their singing and dancing ...)




The Sinai is an unbelievably beautiful place, and yet – as any other desert – never to be understimated. One need not fear or dread the desert, but certainly one has to respect it. It's easy to forget about the dangers, taking them too lightly after a couple of good days, but despite being quite impressive and admirable, the desert regularly reminds you to take it seriously, sending a sudden sandstorm, unexpected rain, terrible heat, it definitely has it's ways ... and yet it has so much to offer, to enjoy and be grateful for. It's powerful and peaceful at once. There's so much beauty and variety there, so much life ... I'd never have expected to find in a desert of all possible places. If you walk and ride with your mind open and willing to see, it's a magical place.



I guess people either love or hate the desert, there's nothing much in between. I couldn't help but fall in love with the desert, it captured my heart and my soul and I'll never be able to forget it or leave it quite behind. A part of me seems to have remained in the desert, leaving me restless for it's peace and beauty, forcing me to come back, again and again. Yes, it does take a little of your soul ... but in exchange you carry a bit of the desert inside yourself, taking it's peacefulness with you, wherever you go after leaving it.

(That tiny little figure with the orange headscarf is me, contemplating and enjoying the unbelievable stillness all around)

Planned or not, the desert really relieved me of most of the ballast, the unnecessary luggage that I carried inside myself. Just like I had been told in advance, it was getting lighter with every step I went further into the depth of the Sinai.
"Water may wash your body, but the desert cleans your soul ..." that's what the Bedouins say ... and also "Somewhere in between laughing and playing lies the remedy for an injured soul" and they're right, I guess.




"Traveling broadens the horizon ..." my grandma used to say – and it does, if one travels with an open heart. How different has it been in the past, when I traveled with merely my eyes wide open, taking not much more than flat pictures with me, too scared of the unknown to try to experience what is beyond my own reality. However picturesque those images may have been, they never became alive the way things do ever since I changed my attitude towards life, towards the world and it's people. Where there used to be frozen images are now lively memories:

... vibrant silence, the breath of the earth, the sound of the stars, ringing like a million bells at night ... to imagine that even the vast endlessness of the universe consists of the infinitely small ... just like the mighty desert consists of tiny grains of sand ... hundreds of different shades and colours, changing with every moment ... desert time ... so different from our occidental time ... flowing like liquid, like sweet thick honey ... sticky and yet fugitive ... timelessness ... no need to measure the minutes, hours, or days ... steps, camel rides, tea breaks ... everything is more important than hours, in this kingdom of light and colours ... of indescribable magic ... the Sinai desert.


(Sometimes even the camels joined us in our meditations ...)