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 ....
11 November 2007
09 November 2007
The Wonderful Wizard
my wonderful wizard grew weary
of life, the world and the wife
leaving him flat, always wanting,
looking for more ...
go! fill that god-sized hole
with another willing victim
a sweet enchanting soul
sharing your chocolate kisses
your dream of love beyond belief
ah, and yet
just another face in the crowd
beautiful, but ...
is it real?
just another online dreamer
prepared to be fooled
pick them out
suck them up
drain them out
leave them emptihanded
but leave – always just leave
nothing is real here
nothing is yours
run home to mommy
she'll pay your bill
take you back – tuck you in
she always does
leaving you flat but provided
how much of a gift
can you really afford to give?
of life, the world and the wife
leaving him flat, always wanting,
looking for more ...
go! fill that god-sized hole
with another willing victim
a sweet enchanting soul
sharing your chocolate kisses
your dream of love beyond belief
ah, and yet
just another face in the crowd
beautiful, but ...
is it real?
just another online dreamer
prepared to be fooled
pick them out
suck them up
drain them out
leave them emptihanded
but leave – always just leave
nothing is real here
nothing is yours
run home to mommy
she'll pay your bill
take you back – tuck you in
she always does
leaving you flat but provided
how much of a gift
can you really afford to give?
08 November 2007
Anam Cara – Communion of Soul to Soul
In the Celtic tradition, there is a beautiful understanding of love and friendship. The old Irish term Anam Cara is translated as soul friend. When one has an Anam Cara, they are joined in an ancient and eternal way with the person who is a friend to their soul.
"Relationships with an anam cara are not made but rather seemingly unfold or are discovered. The anam cara relationship is the awakening of a friendship in which the anam cara sees you as your highest, most beautiful self and with whom you may share the intimacies of your spiritual journey through life. An anam cara may or may not be physically present in your life to serve in that role."
"Relationships with an anam cara are not made but rather seemingly unfold or are discovered. The anam cara relationship is the awakening of a friendship in which the anam cara sees you as your highest, most beautiful self and with whom you may share the intimacies of your spiritual journey through life. An anam cara may or may not be physically present in your life to serve in that role."
13 June 2007
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 ...)
07 May 2007
Anam Cara Friendship (John O'Donohue)
John O'Donohue says:
"In everyone's life there is a great need for an Anam Cara, a soul friend. In this love, you are understood as you are without mask or pretension. The superficial and functional lies and half-truths of acquaintance fall away. You can be as you really are. Love allows understanding to dawn, and understanding is precious. Where you are understood, you are at home. Understanding nourishes belonging. When you really feel understood, you feel free to release yourself into the trust and shelter of the other person's soul.
A way of explaining friendship is that between two people friendship awakened. It wasn't manufactured or produced or programmed, but it awakened between them in their meeting. It was almost as if an ancient affinity that was latent in their spirit comes awake and comes alive, and that each is joined in an ancient way with a friend of their soul. People say that friends are made. I don't think friends are made at all, but rather discovered. If you look back along your life, you will see that at the crucial thresholds, different people were sent to you to help you acknowledge what was going on, to recognize your own responsibility, and to bring you over thresholds. The most creative growth points in our inner journey are all due to the assistance, graciousness and surprise that friendship brings.
Friendship has a secret logic and a secret destiny. Something that's startling about one's friends is that the first meeting was so contingent and so seemingly accidental; and yet, if you look back now, your life would be unimaginable without the friends who have helped to shape you and give birth to your soul. To put it more pictorially still, it's utterly fascinating to me that no human person ever sees their own face. We look in mirrors and we have images, but we never see our own faces. And we never see our own bodies fully either. A friend is a true mirror in which we begin to get some little glimpse of who we are and the immensity that we carry - and that sometimes haunts us. Friendship is the shelter; and it's not a complacent shelter but a shelter that settles some primal restlessness down within us. It liberates us to get into the dance of our own life."
"In everyone's life there is a great need for an Anam Cara, a soul friend. In this love, you are understood as you are without mask or pretension. The superficial and functional lies and half-truths of acquaintance fall away. You can be as you really are. Love allows understanding to dawn, and understanding is precious. Where you are understood, you are at home. Understanding nourishes belonging. When you really feel understood, you feel free to release yourself into the trust and shelter of the other person's soul.
A way of explaining friendship is that between two people friendship awakened. It wasn't manufactured or produced or programmed, but it awakened between them in their meeting. It was almost as if an ancient affinity that was latent in their spirit comes awake and comes alive, and that each is joined in an ancient way with a friend of their soul. People say that friends are made. I don't think friends are made at all, but rather discovered. If you look back along your life, you will see that at the crucial thresholds, different people were sent to you to help you acknowledge what was going on, to recognize your own responsibility, and to bring you over thresholds. The most creative growth points in our inner journey are all due to the assistance, graciousness and surprise that friendship brings.
Friendship has a secret logic and a secret destiny. Something that's startling about one's friends is that the first meeting was so contingent and so seemingly accidental; and yet, if you look back now, your life would be unimaginable without the friends who have helped to shape you and give birth to your soul. To put it more pictorially still, it's utterly fascinating to me that no human person ever sees their own face. We look in mirrors and we have images, but we never see our own faces. And we never see our own bodies fully either. A friend is a true mirror in which we begin to get some little glimpse of who we are and the immensity that we carry - and that sometimes haunts us. Friendship is the shelter; and it's not a complacent shelter but a shelter that settles some primal restlessness down within us. It liberates us to get into the dance of our own life."
24 March 2007
Lilli goes to the desert ...
Here I am again – I know I've made myself pretty scarce lately, but there was just so much to plan and organize and a lot of work, leaving little time for anything else.
I'm almost gone, leaving for the desert tomorrow, my bag is packed and whenever I look at it I find it hard to believe that's all I'm gonna take with me, wondering at the same time if I'll really need all that stuff. But since I had been given a packing list I'll just trust in it to be all right. What do I take with me? A sleeping bag, an inflatable mat, alarmingly few clothes, and a whole lot of tiny yet seemingly indispensable stuff, like torches, a swiss army knife, a compass, a variety of cords and straps for whatever reasons ... I guess I'll find out once I'm there. I have sold my car yesterday, I guess I'll miss it whenever I'm back but for now I won't need it and decided not to worry too much, I couldn't really afford it anyway.
Every now and then I wonder what came over me when I decided to make this journey ... going into the desert. Why I suddenly felt such a strong need to experience the vast stillness, the brooding solitude and fierce beauty of the desert, see the indescribably starry sky, feel the stinging heat at daytime and the biting cold at nighttime. My sudden desire to meet the people who live there, spending all their lives under these circumstances, so unreal and inconceivable from my central european point of view. Now I'm going to the Sinai desert, travelling with the Bedouin people, the tribe of the Tarabin. Apart from me there'll be two other european travellers, meditation teachers. I haven't met them before but we have been exchanging e-mails and I'm pretty much looking forward to meeting them in Egypt. It's going to be quite an adventure for me, sleeping out in the open all the time, no tent or shelter except the heaven's tent, the enormous sky above me. We are going to have camels to carry the bigger part of our equipment (and us, whenever we feel like riding a camel). Right now I don't see myself doing that, but you'll never know ... maybe I'll end up enjoying it after all! In the evenings the Bedouin will prepare the camp fire and cook a simple meal and I'm full of anticipation for all those new experiences, the impressions, the possible insights and perceptions.
Talking to people who have been travelling through the desert before, they all agree in one thing: nobody comes back unchanged. The desert is said to have a purifying effect, clarifying the thoughts, putting things back into the right proportions. Not just sorrows and problems but also our own ego. They say it's not the equipment you carry into the desert that is your main luggage. It's the mental luggage we carry and the camels can't help us with that. But normally it's the luggage that will get easier to carry with every day and hopefully it can be left in the desert, so we travel home a lot lighter ... Well, I wonder – but I'll just let things happen and see for myself.
I won't have any chance to write here for some time now but I'll carry my little notebooks and tell you about it later, inshallah ...
Take care, ma'as salaama!
I'm almost gone, leaving for the desert tomorrow, my bag is packed and whenever I look at it I find it hard to believe that's all I'm gonna take with me, wondering at the same time if I'll really need all that stuff. But since I had been given a packing list I'll just trust in it to be all right. What do I take with me? A sleeping bag, an inflatable mat, alarmingly few clothes, and a whole lot of tiny yet seemingly indispensable stuff, like torches, a swiss army knife, a compass, a variety of cords and straps for whatever reasons ... I guess I'll find out once I'm there. I have sold my car yesterday, I guess I'll miss it whenever I'm back but for now I won't need it and decided not to worry too much, I couldn't really afford it anyway.
Every now and then I wonder what came over me when I decided to make this journey ... going into the desert. Why I suddenly felt such a strong need to experience the vast stillness, the brooding solitude and fierce beauty of the desert, see the indescribably starry sky, feel the stinging heat at daytime and the biting cold at nighttime. My sudden desire to meet the people who live there, spending all their lives under these circumstances, so unreal and inconceivable from my central european point of view. Now I'm going to the Sinai desert, travelling with the Bedouin people, the tribe of the Tarabin. Apart from me there'll be two other european travellers, meditation teachers. I haven't met them before but we have been exchanging e-mails and I'm pretty much looking forward to meeting them in Egypt. It's going to be quite an adventure for me, sleeping out in the open all the time, no tent or shelter except the heaven's tent, the enormous sky above me. We are going to have camels to carry the bigger part of our equipment (and us, whenever we feel like riding a camel). Right now I don't see myself doing that, but you'll never know ... maybe I'll end up enjoying it after all! In the evenings the Bedouin will prepare the camp fire and cook a simple meal and I'm full of anticipation for all those new experiences, the impressions, the possible insights and perceptions.
Talking to people who have been travelling through the desert before, they all agree in one thing: nobody comes back unchanged. The desert is said to have a purifying effect, clarifying the thoughts, putting things back into the right proportions. Not just sorrows and problems but also our own ego. They say it's not the equipment you carry into the desert that is your main luggage. It's the mental luggage we carry and the camels can't help us with that. But normally it's the luggage that will get easier to carry with every day and hopefully it can be left in the desert, so we travel home a lot lighter ... Well, I wonder – but I'll just let things happen and see for myself.
I won't have any chance to write here for some time now but I'll carry my little notebooks and tell you about it later, inshallah ...
Take care, ma'as salaama!
27 January 2007
Bad habits ...
I really came here to finish a post I've been starting to write weeks ago. After writing a couple of sentences though, I heard there was a new text message on my cellphone and went to fetch it. Rising from my chair I suddenly felt all giddy, like my head was spinning. It took a while until everything turned back from black to normal and I sat there wondering what had caused this qualm when I realized I had not eaten anything but a few crackers for almost 48 hours. Can you believe it, I had simply forgotten to eat – again! I remember having thought about preparing some kind of lunch for myself yesterday but being all absorbed in what I was doing, I didn't want to stop and postponed the idea. Later the hunger must have ceased for I really do not remember having wasted another thought on eating ever since. When I got up this morning my mind was already so filled with ideas and plans for the day, I never thought of breakfast. There might have been the slightest notion that something was missing, I admit, but I didn't feel hungry at all and so I postponed eating, once more.
This tends to happen a lot to me lately and I'm sure it's a really bad habit, especially as I'm already a very poor 'drinker'. I never feel thirsty and as a result I forget to drink. Often I'll realize at night that I haven't nearly drunk the liter of water or tea that I intended to (I know it's still too little but all I manage most of the time). This goes so far that several people send me text messages, reminding me to drink. Like the one I had just stood up for. It was my mother asking whether I'm drinking sufficiently. What am I to tell her? "Well thanks, mom! Yes, I have tea here, alright. But please remind me of eating, will you ...?". She'll think I have gone nuts.
I guess I'll put up notes "Intake Of Food!" for myself at significant places. The computer screen might be a good idea. Or the mirror. And maybe I should put post-its on all the books I'm reading. If I get any thinner, I'll fit into kid's apparel, which is not really my intention. This has to stop. Anybody out there with a good idea how to remind oneself of eating? Isn't the body meant to perform this by suggesting a feeling of hunger? What's wrong with me? I have once read that this happened to Albert Einstein a lot – forgetting to eat or drink, that is. Just – I'm afraid the ideas that preoccupy myself aren't half as profound ...
Okay, I'll get myself something to eat. Though the hunger is already gone again, writing. Yeah, still – I'll eat. Promise.
This tends to happen a lot to me lately and I'm sure it's a really bad habit, especially as I'm already a very poor 'drinker'. I never feel thirsty and as a result I forget to drink. Often I'll realize at night that I haven't nearly drunk the liter of water or tea that I intended to (I know it's still too little but all I manage most of the time). This goes so far that several people send me text messages, reminding me to drink. Like the one I had just stood up for. It was my mother asking whether I'm drinking sufficiently. What am I to tell her? "Well thanks, mom! Yes, I have tea here, alright. But please remind me of eating, will you ...?". She'll think I have gone nuts.
I guess I'll put up notes "Intake Of Food!" for myself at significant places. The computer screen might be a good idea. Or the mirror. And maybe I should put post-its on all the books I'm reading. If I get any thinner, I'll fit into kid's apparel, which is not really my intention. This has to stop. Anybody out there with a good idea how to remind oneself of eating? Isn't the body meant to perform this by suggesting a feeling of hunger? What's wrong with me? I have once read that this happened to Albert Einstein a lot – forgetting to eat or drink, that is. Just – I'm afraid the ideas that preoccupy myself aren't half as profound ...
Okay, I'll get myself something to eat. Though the hunger is already gone again, writing. Yeah, still – I'll eat. Promise.
14 January 2007
The Wonder of It All
Do you ever wonder
at the wonder of it all?
Do you ever stand in awe
of the tiniest things
and how perfectly they work together?
Do you ever stop to think
about all the possibilities
and how even though they have no limit
they grow in number with every minute?
Do you ever wonder
when the leaves flutter down in autumn
at the incomprehensible power of life
that brings them back in spring?
Do you watch the waves roll in
and then look out far beyond them
where the water seems to touch the sky
and realize
that the vast expanse before your eyes
is only a small little corner
of all there really is?
And do you comprehend that all there really is,
as unimaginably grand as it may seem,
is only a smaller corner still
of all that there can be?
Do you ever wonder
how love can stay alive
past every pleasure and every pain
and even when there can be no hope
there is more than ever?
Do you ever struggle to lift a heavy rock and wonder
how a massive mountain can rise
thousands of feet above the plain
without even trying?
Do you ever realize that
no matter how much you may know,
no matter how many wonders you may have experienced,
there will always, always be more?
Do you ever wonder
why it is you wonder
and why you know what beauty is
even though you can't define it?
Do you ever wonder
who is doing the wondering,
who is looking out through your eyes
and feeling completely at home
with the wonder of it all?
Whatever you believe,
whatever you profess,
whatever you doubt or fear or hope for,
there are some things
your heart cannot deny
when you let go
and let yourself know
the wonder of it all.
Copyright © 2003 Ralph S. Marston
at the wonder of it all?
Do you ever stand in awe
of the tiniest things
and how perfectly they work together?
Do you ever stop to think
about all the possibilities
and how even though they have no limit
they grow in number with every minute?
Do you ever wonder
when the leaves flutter down in autumn
at the incomprehensible power of life
that brings them back in spring?
Do you watch the waves roll in
and then look out far beyond them
where the water seems to touch the sky
and realize
that the vast expanse before your eyes
is only a small little corner
of all there really is?
And do you comprehend that all there really is,
as unimaginably grand as it may seem,
is only a smaller corner still
of all that there can be?
Do you ever wonder
how love can stay alive
past every pleasure and every pain
and even when there can be no hope
there is more than ever?
Do you ever struggle to lift a heavy rock and wonder
how a massive mountain can rise
thousands of feet above the plain
without even trying?
Do you ever realize that
no matter how much you may know,
no matter how many wonders you may have experienced,
there will always, always be more?
Do you ever wonder
why it is you wonder
and why you know what beauty is
even though you can't define it?
Do you ever wonder
who is doing the wondering,
who is looking out through your eyes
and feeling completely at home
with the wonder of it all?
Whatever you believe,
whatever you profess,
whatever you doubt or fear or hope for,
there are some things
your heart cannot deny
when you let go
and let yourself know
the wonder of it all.
Copyright © 2003 Ralph S. Marston
06 January 2007
Healing
Yes, I'm back and very much alive again. Like an injured animal I secluded myself, withdrawing into the wilderness, licking my wounds ... Last month, when it was coming close on Christmas, I felt I just couldn't cope anymore. I abandoned work, family and friends, Christmas and New Year's Eve and escaped into the mountains, seeking quietness, seeking salvation, seeking clarity.
And I found it there – in the snow, in the silent depth of the forests, in the damp pillowy moss, lying like green carpets in the sun wherever the snow didn't reach. I found it in the beauty of the countless icicles and in the soft sound of the frozen mountain brooks, flowing on and on underneath their bizarre icy covers.
It was a different world from the summer mountains altogether, quiet and almost motionless. The snow deadened every noise with the exception of the gnashing sound of my steps and my breath. Being outside all day and in all weather, experiencing nature and realizing how everything is coherent and interdependent made me understand how this is also true for my own life. I found myself looking at all that snow and ice and water, understanding how they are all connected, how they are all one despite being different from one another, each with it's own beauty and own purpose and yet none better than or superior to each other, and I found myself looking at the bare trees, thinking of how they will start to bud again soon, nurtured by soil that was once leaves ... reflecting on nature's diversity and constant change I became aware of how this is true for everything in this world, how I am also part of this nature, subject to change, bound to it's laws and the universal principle of life: everything is subject to impermanence. And that's that. The universe won't make an exception just because it's me out there.
Trying to internalize this simple truth, raising a deeper and deeper awareness, I suddenly found I felt all peaceful and blithe. At first I didn't dare trust this new found peace of mind but the fears and worries did not return. Instead I felt so energetic again, so soulful, grateful and brimful of life.
I needed to move, I felt like dancing up the mountains but the amount of snow stopped me and finally I went ... snowshoeing! What a revelation! You get everywhere, places you wouldn't reach in the deep snow, not on foot and certainly not on ski. I managed to reach summits I had been to last summer ... and what a different sight now in the snow. I was warned beforehand not to leave certain areas to avoid disturbing the animals in their dormant, but still – everything in front of me seemed like a vast whiteness, completely quiet and devoid of human life. All I found were animal tracks and odd marks left by tiny blobs of snow, skidding down the slopes. The single snow crystals were the biggest I had ever seen, some almost the size of a fingernail, and they twinkled and sparkled like huge diamonds in the sun. Everything was so breathtakingly beautiful and I found myself filled with wonder again and again.
What can I say. I came home full of tranquility and contentment. Confidently looking forward to everything this new year will bring, all the change to the better or the worse ... I'll try to carry it with more wisdom than I managed in the past ... finally living up to my old motto:
"I would love to live like a river flows, carried by the surprise of it's own unfolding." (John O'Donohue)
25 November 2006
Friend in doubt
Some time ago I was thinking – and writing here – about friendship. I realize that I keep coming back to this subject and I have the slightest suspicion this may be caused by a couple of situations earlier this summer, making me feel the need for honesty and loyalty in a friendship stronger than ever. There have been difficult moments with certain friends and while I considered my reactions to be justified then, I wasn’t so sure when I recalled these incidents later. I still haven’t come to a final conclusion, still find myself uncertain, still find new questions whenever I think I have the answers.
Many rash words have been spoken in the past, leaving a bitter taste in my mouth, and while I wouldn’t say they were all wrong, they were certainly spoken too hastily, too impulsively to be in any way considerate. So I knew my reaction was premature but instead of questioning my own motivation I started to question the concerned relationships, looking for justification of my wrong behaviour. I felt no longer confident about these relationships, my evaluation of these friendships. I thought that maybe the difficult moments could only arise because I had read too much into these relationships, calling them friendship on a very high level, expecting too much input from the other one. I questioned these people’s friendship, their loyalty. I figured that I had reacted the way I did because I felt somewhat 'unrewarded', I felt that my input wasn’t acknowledged the way it should be and that I was giving a lot more than I was receiving in return. This thought occupied me for quite a while and finally led me to wonder whether a true friendship could ever be about expectations, about input or some kind of ’quid pro quo’ situation. This was the moment I started thinking about everything I have written under Friendship, wondering what exactly friendship means to me, what my friends mean to me.
After writing it all down, what happened was that I became much clearer about my own intentions and expectations but also about my mistakes and misconceptions regarding friendship. I could see clearly what friendship should be and what it shouldn’t be and where I needed to become more mindful, more appreciative and more selfless.
What didn’t happen was that I got rid of all my doubts. Some remained. Some friends remained 'under question', even after seeing that friendship is not about expectation, about being rewarded for what I give. It seemed to me that these friendships are somewhat unbalanced. Despite not expecting return services for my loyalty or my faith, I found that I feel uneasy if I keep on offering but am offered nothing in return. Not because of reward. It’s a question of trust, I think. If I look at friendship as being some kind of commitment, how can I listen to a friend’s thoughts, ideas, fears but hardly ever reveal any of my own, keeping my distance. Friends do not need to tell each other everything, I’m sure there are things that are not necessarily part of a friendship and sometimes there may be things one can’t talk about immediately and has to come to terms with for oneself before being able to talk about. But if I feel that there is something wrong in a friend’s behaviour, something troubling him or her, making me feel uneasy or awkward in his or her company over a prolonged time, standing between us, effecting our friendship even, and they still don’t talk to me, don’t I have a right to feel hurt?
I honestly don’t know. I just don’t find an answer. Of course I have to accept a friend’s decision not to tell me, but can I really avoid to become doubtful about such a friendship in the long run? Is it not natural that I start to question a friend if I feel that trust is not mutual in this friendship? How can I help beginning to wonder what the reasons for this may be? If I am not given any real reasons, my mind starts to make up others. I know this is wrong and I try to work on it, try to remain objective, try not to become attached to these thoughts, but it’s not easy. I see that the innocence of this friendship might get lost, so I talk to the person of my doubts but am told in return that I have no reason to worry. I want to believe this – but again, doubt arises. I look into the past to find the moment when things started to change and looking from my new perspective of doubt, I find more doubt. I find signs that it started long before I realized, I find potential untruth and I start to question more and more. I don’t trust my own perception anymore, especially as I know everything I feel is influenced by my recent loss of another person. I know that and I know it's not right, but I feel like I'm in some kind of limbo. I do not want to lose this friendship and much less do I want to harm it unjustified, a friend so dear and important in my life. A special friend. A soul friend maybe.
I have to be careful not to give too much space to this problem – 'constructing a story around it' as we call it at the buddhist center – and I’m well aware this might be just what I’m doing. Sometimes my imagination is way too vivid and I find it hard to differ between what is there in reality and what springs from my own fantasy or past experiences. The longer I let it happen, the more the borders will blur, making it more and more difficult to get back to the hard facts. Yes, a danger foreseen is half avoided – it's just so difficult to put into practice what we already know in theory, isn't it? So many obstacels to be broken ... idleness, fear, ego. And the painful experience of finding all these fears, suspicions and doubts being finally confirmed is still so fresh and hurting that it’s hard too remain objective and stop myself from projecting what happened with one friend onto another.
Despite the many words I know there is only one solution. I know I have to talk to this friend again, being open and honest about my doubts, leaving enough space for understanding and possible explanation on his part and a will to understand and believe as well as the readiness to admit to possible wrong conclusions on my part.
How do I tell a person I have – temporarily maybe – lost faith in his or her loyalty and honesty? Maybe that is the moment true friendship reveals itself, in being able to work this out, to come out even stronger of a crisis like this. Of course this is wishful thinking on my part, especially as I have just learned the hard way that it may also happen quite differently, but what else can I do but remain positive and optimistic? If I’m not, how can I see any sense in a difficult situation, a confrontation like the one I have to seek now or in the future?
Many rash words have been spoken in the past, leaving a bitter taste in my mouth, and while I wouldn’t say they were all wrong, they were certainly spoken too hastily, too impulsively to be in any way considerate. So I knew my reaction was premature but instead of questioning my own motivation I started to question the concerned relationships, looking for justification of my wrong behaviour. I felt no longer confident about these relationships, my evaluation of these friendships. I thought that maybe the difficult moments could only arise because I had read too much into these relationships, calling them friendship on a very high level, expecting too much input from the other one. I questioned these people’s friendship, their loyalty. I figured that I had reacted the way I did because I felt somewhat 'unrewarded', I felt that my input wasn’t acknowledged the way it should be and that I was giving a lot more than I was receiving in return. This thought occupied me for quite a while and finally led me to wonder whether a true friendship could ever be about expectations, about input or some kind of ’quid pro quo’ situation. This was the moment I started thinking about everything I have written under Friendship, wondering what exactly friendship means to me, what my friends mean to me.
After writing it all down, what happened was that I became much clearer about my own intentions and expectations but also about my mistakes and misconceptions regarding friendship. I could see clearly what friendship should be and what it shouldn’t be and where I needed to become more mindful, more appreciative and more selfless.
What didn’t happen was that I got rid of all my doubts. Some remained. Some friends remained 'under question', even after seeing that friendship is not about expectation, about being rewarded for what I give. It seemed to me that these friendships are somewhat unbalanced. Despite not expecting return services for my loyalty or my faith, I found that I feel uneasy if I keep on offering but am offered nothing in return. Not because of reward. It’s a question of trust, I think. If I look at friendship as being some kind of commitment, how can I listen to a friend’s thoughts, ideas, fears but hardly ever reveal any of my own, keeping my distance. Friends do not need to tell each other everything, I’m sure there are things that are not necessarily part of a friendship and sometimes there may be things one can’t talk about immediately and has to come to terms with for oneself before being able to talk about. But if I feel that there is something wrong in a friend’s behaviour, something troubling him or her, making me feel uneasy or awkward in his or her company over a prolonged time, standing between us, effecting our friendship even, and they still don’t talk to me, don’t I have a right to feel hurt?
I honestly don’t know. I just don’t find an answer. Of course I have to accept a friend’s decision not to tell me, but can I really avoid to become doubtful about such a friendship in the long run? Is it not natural that I start to question a friend if I feel that trust is not mutual in this friendship? How can I help beginning to wonder what the reasons for this may be? If I am not given any real reasons, my mind starts to make up others. I know this is wrong and I try to work on it, try to remain objective, try not to become attached to these thoughts, but it’s not easy. I see that the innocence of this friendship might get lost, so I talk to the person of my doubts but am told in return that I have no reason to worry. I want to believe this – but again, doubt arises. I look into the past to find the moment when things started to change and looking from my new perspective of doubt, I find more doubt. I find signs that it started long before I realized, I find potential untruth and I start to question more and more. I don’t trust my own perception anymore, especially as I know everything I feel is influenced by my recent loss of another person. I know that and I know it's not right, but I feel like I'm in some kind of limbo. I do not want to lose this friendship and much less do I want to harm it unjustified, a friend so dear and important in my life. A special friend. A soul friend maybe.
I have to be careful not to give too much space to this problem – 'constructing a story around it' as we call it at the buddhist center – and I’m well aware this might be just what I’m doing. Sometimes my imagination is way too vivid and I find it hard to differ between what is there in reality and what springs from my own fantasy or past experiences. The longer I let it happen, the more the borders will blur, making it more and more difficult to get back to the hard facts. Yes, a danger foreseen is half avoided – it's just so difficult to put into practice what we already know in theory, isn't it? So many obstacels to be broken ... idleness, fear, ego. And the painful experience of finding all these fears, suspicions and doubts being finally confirmed is still so fresh and hurting that it’s hard too remain objective and stop myself from projecting what happened with one friend onto another.
Despite the many words I know there is only one solution. I know I have to talk to this friend again, being open and honest about my doubts, leaving enough space for understanding and possible explanation on his part and a will to understand and believe as well as the readiness to admit to possible wrong conclusions on my part.
How do I tell a person I have – temporarily maybe – lost faith in his or her loyalty and honesty? Maybe that is the moment true friendship reveals itself, in being able to work this out, to come out even stronger of a crisis like this. Of course this is wishful thinking on my part, especially as I have just learned the hard way that it may also happen quite differently, but what else can I do but remain positive and optimistic? If I’m not, how can I see any sense in a difficult situation, a confrontation like the one I have to seek now or in the future?
04 November 2006
"My favourite season"
Thinking about autumn and it's many different aspects, it's heady beauty, it's dignity and grandeur, I am tempted to call it 'my favourite season'.
But then I start thinking about spring and instantly recall the dazzling beauty, the lusciousness I associate with it. It's so hard to decide ... and I find myself thinking: Maybe it's rather spring, that is my favourite season?
Until I remember the many things I loved about last summer and suddenly start to wonder: Isn't summer a season I love so much, maybe even my favourite of all the seasons?... It's opulence, it's radiant beauty, I surely wouldn't want to miss that?
Especially as the above are just the aspects necessary to provide an apt contrast to everything I love about winter ... it's austere beauty, it's frosty elegance. Because winter, you know, might just be ... my favourite season.
...
(Smiling, sighing ... I'll just drop the unnecessary comparative here.)
I vaguely recall a poem by some Chinese Zen master on this very subject but must admit that I remember only the first few lines ... hold on, I'll try to find the book ..!
(5 min. later)
I got it, here it is:
Ten thousand flowers in spring,
the moon in autumn,
a cool breeze in summer,
snow in winter.
If your mind isn't clouded
by unnecessary things,
this is the best season of your life.
(Wu Men)
But then I start thinking about spring and instantly recall the dazzling beauty, the lusciousness I associate with it. It's so hard to decide ... and I find myself thinking: Maybe it's rather spring, that is my favourite season?
Until I remember the many things I loved about last summer and suddenly start to wonder: Isn't summer a season I love so much, maybe even my favourite of all the seasons?... It's opulence, it's radiant beauty, I surely wouldn't want to miss that?
Especially as the above are just the aspects necessary to provide an apt contrast to everything I love about winter ... it's austere beauty, it's frosty elegance. Because winter, you know, might just be ... my favourite season.
...
(Smiling, sighing ... I'll just drop the unnecessary comparative here.)
I vaguely recall a poem by some Chinese Zen master on this very subject but must admit that I remember only the first few lines ... hold on, I'll try to find the book ..!
(5 min. later)
I got it, here it is:
Ten thousand flowers in spring,
the moon in autumn,
a cool breeze in summer,
snow in winter.
If your mind isn't clouded
by unnecessary things,
this is the best season of your life.
(Wu Men)
03 November 2006
Friendship
Brooding once again, still contemplating human relations – friendship and it's different aspects, effects, implications and correlations ... occupying my mind for weeks now.
I realized that I never really thought about friendship in the past and that despite certainly appreciating my friends I somehow took them for granted for a very long time. I never really cared a lot about friendship. I don't mean to say that I do not care about the people who are my friends – of course I care about them – what I mean is that I never cared much about finding friends. If it happened, it was fine, but if it didn't – well, it didn't bother me too much. Being much of a loner anyway, I never measured my popularity with people by the number of friends I had. When I was younger I often looked at having a lot of friends as being a bit of a burden, a strain. People bugging me, stealing precious time I'd rather spend by myself. Quite selfish maybe, I know, but what can I say – that's the way it was. It's different now. I'm grateful I have my friends and I wouldn't want to miss any of them, however different from one another they may be. I feel they are all genuine in their very own way.
But what exactly does friendship mean, what does it mean to have a friend, to be a friend? Does it mean the same for everyone of us? I found that Europeans use the terms 'friend' and 'friendship' quite different from Americans for example. While in many European countries 'friend' is a status granted to a rather small number of people only, typically describing a very close long-term relationship, clearly distinguished from the more superficial and non-committal 'acquaintanceship', Americans often use the term 'friend' more freely and general. So, just to avoid misunderstanding: when I use the term friendship here, I understand it in the 'traditional' European sense of the word, a relationship based on esteem, trust, loyalty and mutual understanding. It may contain a certain emotional intimacy but not in a sexual context.
Some of us, especially the younger ones, use the term 'friend' rather easily, while others have quite a struggle with that expression. Special friendships – those that stand out of the big pool of different relationships we build up over the years – are very rare. Most of us have a whole variety of interpersonal relations and I want to draw a clear line between mere acquaintanceship and real friendship here, leaving out relatives as well. Parents and siblings may have a lot of influence on us, especially as we grow up, but they are not what I am thinking about at the moment.
Who are the people we call our friends and why do we call them that? What does the expression 'friend' mean to us and in how far do our various 'friendships' differ from one another? Friends, true friends, close friends, best friends – we distinguish between so many different kinds of friends and while most women seem to be quite particular about these distinctions, many men seem to avoid the term 'friend' altogether, prefering to call their friends 'mates', 'buddies' or 'lads' instead. I think the average modern male friendship has little in common with classic or antique concepts of friendship between men. At least in our western world it is often complicated by social manipulation, conditioning and – as a result – subliminal homophobia. I do not want to imply that there is no real friendship between men, I just think it's rare. And the rarest of all seems to be sincere and lasting friendship between male and female, friendship independent of gender, based not on romantic or sexual aspects but on mutual understanding and a deep confidence in each other.
In native Hawaii they have a concept of friendship known as pili hoaloha – a devoted, platonic union between members of the same or opposite sex, a commitment between two friends, reaching it's climax in a ceremonial act not unlike a wedding. Pili hoaloha goes much deeper than our modern understanding of friendship, it's more like a 'cohabitation of soul friends'. The Hawaiians do also have ceremonies for 'normal' sexual marriages of course, but they clearly differ between these.
If I get more particular and start to focus just on what we call our best friends, isn't it surprising how different from one another they still are? What is it that attracts our interest in a certain person, that makes us feel congenial with him or her, raises enough emotion, enough affection and confidence in us to want to be friends with this person? What is it that creates the foundation for a future friendship? Is it shared experience? A person's appearance? Charisma? Or a certain quality in that person? Are we trying to supply a want, an unsatisfied need in ourselves by making friends with somebody, giving in to a subliminal selfish interest? And if we are, are we honest enough to admit to this, trying to understand what's driving us? Maybe it's a blend of all those aspects in different shares. It might vary from person to person and even within one friendship the focus might shift over the years, as friendship grows, developes and changes with us.
Thinking of friendship in the purest sense of the word, the term altruism comes to my mind. How many of our friends do we love unselfishly, without regard to reward or benefit for ourselves? I dare say that most of us are far from a sublime virtue like that: wholeheartedly loving a person not for his or her qualities, skills or attributes, but simply for being a fellow human being. Sometimes we experience a short glimpse of that altruism, feeling some kind of abstract love, of Metta or loving kindness, a sudden concern for the well-being of a person beyond rational understanding or selfish interest. But normally our motives are not quite so unselfish. When we say we miss someone, normally we mean that we miss that person's company. We miss that friend in our life. If we're honest with ourselves we'll recognize it as the selfish wish to be provided with what we lack in ourselves. The more friends we have with a certain quality, the less we will miss any one of them but if a certain interest is shared with only one friend, we will miss him or her very quickly. When we are bored, we miss the entertainment, the diversion or amusement this person offers. Or we miss the safety, the strength this friend provides whenever we feel weak. Many of the people we call our friends we call so simply because we share some kind of interest. It's more like a syndicate than a real friendship. If one of the involved parties starts to change, developes or redirects his or her interests, we may find that we have nothing else in common and often such a friendship will just fizzle out.
All this (and a lot more) went through my head, trying to define the meaning of the word 'friendship' for myself. While all this thinking opened my eyes for some aspects I hadn't really regarded so far, I realized that there will probably be 'friendships' that might not stand up to it in the long run, that will remain mere acquaintanceships despite calling them friendship and I accepted the fact that it just makes no sense to constantly question whether or not some friendship is a true and stable one in the purest sense of the word.
We need friends to master this life. We need people who share our interests, who listen to us, who understand and care for us. And in return, being friends, we fulfill this need in others. Only now have I come to understand that the people from whom we receive these gifts do not necessarily have to be the people to whom we offer them in return. One man's teacher might be another's scholar, every scholar might be another's teacher. Life changes all the time, people and situations change, nothing can ever be final or constant. Also, every friendship consists of at least two people and even if I am sure about my own motifs, I'll never know about the other's. I have to trust. That's part of the concept of friendship I think – confidence and trust.
I might feel a lot of friendly affection for somebody and still this person might not return my feelings, which will hurt me – because of my still too alive ego – but shouldn't change my feelings for that person. Friendship - as love - should be about giving, not receiving, in the first place. I am well aware that it's pretty hard to practice altruism and that I'll probably never manage to be completely altruistic. It's illusory. I am far from reaching the ideal of complete unselfishness but that doesn't mean I stop trying. I'll try not to lessen those of my friendships that seem somewhat 'minor' to others – less intense maybe, less exciting, less intellectual – and I'll try to stop judging by what benefits I gain myself. As long as these friends have an interest in seeing me, I should keep in mind that they might just judge the very same friendship completely different. Looking back on my life so far, I must admit that sometimes my 'best friends' didn't necessarily prove to be 'true friends'. Sometimes the true friends were people I didn't even count among my closer friends. And I might not be my best friend's 'best friend' (ego beware!). So I guess there's not much of a point in all this labelling and classifying after all. A friend can only be a friend if I let him in, if I do not judge in advance, if I accept his or her friendship and do not shut myself off.
And while my mind starts to go even further here, toward a yet different kind of friendship – spiritual friendship – I think I'll grant us a little break. I'm really, really tired now, writing for hours on end, as usual.
I'll be back some time soon, so ... good night!
I realized that I never really thought about friendship in the past and that despite certainly appreciating my friends I somehow took them for granted for a very long time. I never really cared a lot about friendship. I don't mean to say that I do not care about the people who are my friends – of course I care about them – what I mean is that I never cared much about finding friends. If it happened, it was fine, but if it didn't – well, it didn't bother me too much. Being much of a loner anyway, I never measured my popularity with people by the number of friends I had. When I was younger I often looked at having a lot of friends as being a bit of a burden, a strain. People bugging me, stealing precious time I'd rather spend by myself. Quite selfish maybe, I know, but what can I say – that's the way it was. It's different now. I'm grateful I have my friends and I wouldn't want to miss any of them, however different from one another they may be. I feel they are all genuine in their very own way.
But what exactly does friendship mean, what does it mean to have a friend, to be a friend? Does it mean the same for everyone of us? I found that Europeans use the terms 'friend' and 'friendship' quite different from Americans for example. While in many European countries 'friend' is a status granted to a rather small number of people only, typically describing a very close long-term relationship, clearly distinguished from the more superficial and non-committal 'acquaintanceship', Americans often use the term 'friend' more freely and general. So, just to avoid misunderstanding: when I use the term friendship here, I understand it in the 'traditional' European sense of the word, a relationship based on esteem, trust, loyalty and mutual understanding. It may contain a certain emotional intimacy but not in a sexual context.
Some of us, especially the younger ones, use the term 'friend' rather easily, while others have quite a struggle with that expression. Special friendships – those that stand out of the big pool of different relationships we build up over the years – are very rare. Most of us have a whole variety of interpersonal relations and I want to draw a clear line between mere acquaintanceship and real friendship here, leaving out relatives as well. Parents and siblings may have a lot of influence on us, especially as we grow up, but they are not what I am thinking about at the moment.
Who are the people we call our friends and why do we call them that? What does the expression 'friend' mean to us and in how far do our various 'friendships' differ from one another? Friends, true friends, close friends, best friends – we distinguish between so many different kinds of friends and while most women seem to be quite particular about these distinctions, many men seem to avoid the term 'friend' altogether, prefering to call their friends 'mates', 'buddies' or 'lads' instead. I think the average modern male friendship has little in common with classic or antique concepts of friendship between men. At least in our western world it is often complicated by social manipulation, conditioning and – as a result – subliminal homophobia. I do not want to imply that there is no real friendship between men, I just think it's rare. And the rarest of all seems to be sincere and lasting friendship between male and female, friendship independent of gender, based not on romantic or sexual aspects but on mutual understanding and a deep confidence in each other.
In native Hawaii they have a concept of friendship known as pili hoaloha – a devoted, platonic union between members of the same or opposite sex, a commitment between two friends, reaching it's climax in a ceremonial act not unlike a wedding. Pili hoaloha goes much deeper than our modern understanding of friendship, it's more like a 'cohabitation of soul friends'. The Hawaiians do also have ceremonies for 'normal' sexual marriages of course, but they clearly differ between these.
If I get more particular and start to focus just on what we call our best friends, isn't it surprising how different from one another they still are? What is it that attracts our interest in a certain person, that makes us feel congenial with him or her, raises enough emotion, enough affection and confidence in us to want to be friends with this person? What is it that creates the foundation for a future friendship? Is it shared experience? A person's appearance? Charisma? Or a certain quality in that person? Are we trying to supply a want, an unsatisfied need in ourselves by making friends with somebody, giving in to a subliminal selfish interest? And if we are, are we honest enough to admit to this, trying to understand what's driving us? Maybe it's a blend of all those aspects in different shares. It might vary from person to person and even within one friendship the focus might shift over the years, as friendship grows, developes and changes with us.
Thinking of friendship in the purest sense of the word, the term altruism comes to my mind. How many of our friends do we love unselfishly, without regard to reward or benefit for ourselves? I dare say that most of us are far from a sublime virtue like that: wholeheartedly loving a person not for his or her qualities, skills or attributes, but simply for being a fellow human being. Sometimes we experience a short glimpse of that altruism, feeling some kind of abstract love, of Metta or loving kindness, a sudden concern for the well-being of a person beyond rational understanding or selfish interest. But normally our motives are not quite so unselfish. When we say we miss someone, normally we mean that we miss that person's company. We miss that friend in our life. If we're honest with ourselves we'll recognize it as the selfish wish to be provided with what we lack in ourselves. The more friends we have with a certain quality, the less we will miss any one of them but if a certain interest is shared with only one friend, we will miss him or her very quickly. When we are bored, we miss the entertainment, the diversion or amusement this person offers. Or we miss the safety, the strength this friend provides whenever we feel weak. Many of the people we call our friends we call so simply because we share some kind of interest. It's more like a syndicate than a real friendship. If one of the involved parties starts to change, developes or redirects his or her interests, we may find that we have nothing else in common and often such a friendship will just fizzle out.
All this (and a lot more) went through my head, trying to define the meaning of the word 'friendship' for myself. While all this thinking opened my eyes for some aspects I hadn't really regarded so far, I realized that there will probably be 'friendships' that might not stand up to it in the long run, that will remain mere acquaintanceships despite calling them friendship and I accepted the fact that it just makes no sense to constantly question whether or not some friendship is a true and stable one in the purest sense of the word.
We need friends to master this life. We need people who share our interests, who listen to us, who understand and care for us. And in return, being friends, we fulfill this need in others. Only now have I come to understand that the people from whom we receive these gifts do not necessarily have to be the people to whom we offer them in return. One man's teacher might be another's scholar, every scholar might be another's teacher. Life changes all the time, people and situations change, nothing can ever be final or constant. Also, every friendship consists of at least two people and even if I am sure about my own motifs, I'll never know about the other's. I have to trust. That's part of the concept of friendship I think – confidence and trust.
I might feel a lot of friendly affection for somebody and still this person might not return my feelings, which will hurt me – because of my still too alive ego – but shouldn't change my feelings for that person. Friendship - as love - should be about giving, not receiving, in the first place. I am well aware that it's pretty hard to practice altruism and that I'll probably never manage to be completely altruistic. It's illusory. I am far from reaching the ideal of complete unselfishness but that doesn't mean I stop trying. I'll try not to lessen those of my friendships that seem somewhat 'minor' to others – less intense maybe, less exciting, less intellectual – and I'll try to stop judging by what benefits I gain myself. As long as these friends have an interest in seeing me, I should keep in mind that they might just judge the very same friendship completely different. Looking back on my life so far, I must admit that sometimes my 'best friends' didn't necessarily prove to be 'true friends'. Sometimes the true friends were people I didn't even count among my closer friends. And I might not be my best friend's 'best friend' (ego beware!). So I guess there's not much of a point in all this labelling and classifying after all. A friend can only be a friend if I let him in, if I do not judge in advance, if I accept his or her friendship and do not shut myself off.
And while my mind starts to go even further here, toward a yet different kind of friendship – spiritual friendship – I think I'll grant us a little break. I'm really, really tired now, writing for hours on end, as usual.
I'll be back some time soon, so ... good night!
01 November 2006
A Gardener's Life
"In his or her life, each person can take one of two attitudes: to build or to plant.
Builders may take years over their tasks, but one day they will finish what they are doing. Then they will stop, hemmed in by their own walls. Life becomes meaningless once the building is finished.
Those who plant suffer the storms and the seasons and rarely rest. Unlike the building, a garden never stops growing. And by its constant demands on the gardener's attentions, it makes the gardener's life a great adventure."
(Paulo Coelho, 'Brida')
Builders may take years over their tasks, but one day they will finish what they are doing. Then they will stop, hemmed in by their own walls. Life becomes meaningless once the building is finished.
Those who plant suffer the storms and the seasons and rarely rest. Unlike the building, a garden never stops growing. And by its constant demands on the gardener's attentions, it makes the gardener's life a great adventure."
(Paulo Coelho, 'Brida')
29 October 2006
Autumn
I can hardly believe it, but it's already autumn again. We switched the clocks to winter time, finally admitting to the shorter, darker days. And as much as the autumn is a time of acknowledgement and gratitude, a time of 'Thanksgiving' in so many aspects, feeling grateful for all the different harvests - literal or symbolic – that we may have brought in over the year, it's also a time to gather ourselves and strengthen our spirits in preparation for the passage into Winter ...
Yes, yes and yes - all of you sending me text messages, e-mails, talking on my answering machine or whatever other way you chose in trying to contact me, I know it was in vain. And again yes, you are right ... I am a slightly faithless friend these days. I am sorry. I really am. It's not like I don't think of you all, I do, quite often to be honest. I just never seem to get down to show a sign of life - but I assure you, I am still here! Very much so. Please don't be angry, don't be cross, I feel I just need a little time-out right now. Some of you know this already, I need my times of retreat from everything I normally do and everybody I normally see, it's not personal in any way and I don't mean to offend anybody by not returning your calls or not answering your messages.
If I say I need to retreat from everything, maybe I'm giving a wrong impression. It's not a retreat from everyday life (as much as I'd like that). Not like the meditation retreats I take. It's rather an attempt to take 'one thing at a time', focusing on certain aspects of my life only, trying to get a few things done properly instead of halfheartedly leaving a lot unfinished. I spend a lot of time at the buddhist center, meditating, studying, learning, taking in a whole lot of new knowledge and impetus, absorbing it and reflecting on it when I'm not there. I decided to give it more time, spend more time at the center as well, because I realized that just going there every now and then, practicing only when I find the time, didn't prove to be very successful. So for the moment I put it in the center of my life and arrange everything else around it until I feel more 'grounded', rooted in what I hopefully learn to understand more deeply and finally may become able to make a genuine part of my life.
Meanwhile, life is going on as usual, faster than I want maybe. But that's the way it is, it just happens and I flow with it.
So what's new? ... Well, the roof problem is getting into crunch mode, about to be solved I hope, as I really couldn't avoid it any longer. In the end, it got more expensive than I hoped (but probably still cheaper than it might have become). I don't know about these things, I never owned more than 2.000 Euros and everything above 5.000 Euros certainly seems a fortune to me. The roof will cost twice that amount, leaving me speechless and kind of paralyzed. I think I've told you that the bank refused to give me the money and that I really didn't know how to advance after that. After a lot of talking to my relatives, an uncle agreed to lend me the money if I assign the house for security. I did – but happy as I am to get the roof repaired now, I'm also quite worried about how I will ever pay him back. It's so much money. We didn't talk about the period of time he'll grant me to repay him or about the exact amount of my monthly installments, so I can just hope he is realistic enough to realize that it will probably take years and years. Anyway, fact is that I'll have a new roof on the house before christmas (I hope). That in mind - and ample relief in my heart - I try not to think about that unpleasant money thing too much. After all, it's only money ...
What else can I tell you. I fell in love. And out of love. And in again. I don't quite know what to make of it myself. It's all very complicated and I don't think I'm through with the subject yet, still trying to find clarity. Can I control whether or not I have my heart broken? I'm not sure. I guess what I'm trying to do is reducing the risk, cutting my losses. Letting my intellect rule over my emotion. Waiting what life has to add ... I guess it will have it's say in this after all. And probably the final one ...
I'm still having a busy time thinking about friendships, relationships of all kinds. Working on some of them, feeling fine with some others, testing here, questioning there. How does this go with not getting back to most of my friends, you might ask. Well, I'm not sure. Maybe it's about reducing risks as well. Or about trying to remain focused, trying not to take too much at a time. The way I tend to scrutinize everything right now, maybe it's better that way, keeping those friendships out that I do not regard to be on the 'doubtful side'. If you find that I make myself very scarce these days, you're probably one of those friends I feel confident with. Confident enough to trust that you'll understand or at least tolerate my momentary retreat from everything. I don't want to imply that I take any of your friendship for granted. Very much the opposite is the case. I am grateful that I have a couple of friends who provide a certain 'constant' in my life and who allow me to fall back on.
Please remain patient and grant me a little more time. I'll be back soon, I promise!
Yes, yes and yes - all of you sending me text messages, e-mails, talking on my answering machine or whatever other way you chose in trying to contact me, I know it was in vain. And again yes, you are right ... I am a slightly faithless friend these days. I am sorry. I really am. It's not like I don't think of you all, I do, quite often to be honest. I just never seem to get down to show a sign of life - but I assure you, I am still here! Very much so. Please don't be angry, don't be cross, I feel I just need a little time-out right now. Some of you know this already, I need my times of retreat from everything I normally do and everybody I normally see, it's not personal in any way and I don't mean to offend anybody by not returning your calls or not answering your messages.
If I say I need to retreat from everything, maybe I'm giving a wrong impression. It's not a retreat from everyday life (as much as I'd like that). Not like the meditation retreats I take. It's rather an attempt to take 'one thing at a time', focusing on certain aspects of my life only, trying to get a few things done properly instead of halfheartedly leaving a lot unfinished. I spend a lot of time at the buddhist center, meditating, studying, learning, taking in a whole lot of new knowledge and impetus, absorbing it and reflecting on it when I'm not there. I decided to give it more time, spend more time at the center as well, because I realized that just going there every now and then, practicing only when I find the time, didn't prove to be very successful. So for the moment I put it in the center of my life and arrange everything else around it until I feel more 'grounded', rooted in what I hopefully learn to understand more deeply and finally may become able to make a genuine part of my life.
Meanwhile, life is going on as usual, faster than I want maybe. But that's the way it is, it just happens and I flow with it.
So what's new? ... Well, the roof problem is getting into crunch mode, about to be solved I hope, as I really couldn't avoid it any longer. In the end, it got more expensive than I hoped (but probably still cheaper than it might have become). I don't know about these things, I never owned more than 2.000 Euros and everything above 5.000 Euros certainly seems a fortune to me. The roof will cost twice that amount, leaving me speechless and kind of paralyzed. I think I've told you that the bank refused to give me the money and that I really didn't know how to advance after that. After a lot of talking to my relatives, an uncle agreed to lend me the money if I assign the house for security. I did – but happy as I am to get the roof repaired now, I'm also quite worried about how I will ever pay him back. It's so much money. We didn't talk about the period of time he'll grant me to repay him or about the exact amount of my monthly installments, so I can just hope he is realistic enough to realize that it will probably take years and years. Anyway, fact is that I'll have a new roof on the house before christmas (I hope). That in mind - and ample relief in my heart - I try not to think about that unpleasant money thing too much. After all, it's only money ...
What else can I tell you. I fell in love. And out of love. And in again. I don't quite know what to make of it myself. It's all very complicated and I don't think I'm through with the subject yet, still trying to find clarity. Can I control whether or not I have my heart broken? I'm not sure. I guess what I'm trying to do is reducing the risk, cutting my losses. Letting my intellect rule over my emotion. Waiting what life has to add ... I guess it will have it's say in this after all. And probably the final one ...
I'm still having a busy time thinking about friendships, relationships of all kinds. Working on some of them, feeling fine with some others, testing here, questioning there. How does this go with not getting back to most of my friends, you might ask. Well, I'm not sure. Maybe it's about reducing risks as well. Or about trying to remain focused, trying not to take too much at a time. The way I tend to scrutinize everything right now, maybe it's better that way, keeping those friendships out that I do not regard to be on the 'doubtful side'. If you find that I make myself very scarce these days, you're probably one of those friends I feel confident with. Confident enough to trust that you'll understand or at least tolerate my momentary retreat from everything. I don't want to imply that I take any of your friendship for granted. Very much the opposite is the case. I am grateful that I have a couple of friends who provide a certain 'constant' in my life and who allow me to fall back on.
Please remain patient and grant me a little more time. I'll be back soon, I promise!
27 October 2006
Gossamer Days
Last weekend, early in the morning, I decided to go for a walk up the vineyard, still covered in fog and dew. I regarded the grapes – they are abundant this year – when I realized there were cobwebs literally everywhere. Hundreds and hundreds of them, absolutely intriguing. The sun was just about to break through and the dew formed little shimmering pearls on every one of those fragile spider webs, as if somebody had strung beads all over the vineyard. At that moment I felt really sorry I had no camera, it was so beautiful and I wanted to capture that moment for my friends to share. In the end I took some 'scanty' pictures with my mobile phone …
It's a pity blogger reduces the photos, because you can't really make out the single pearls of dew the way you can in the real photo. But still, it gives you an impression. And you can always click to enlarge the photos I think ...
Isn't this a wonderful time ..? The soft sun, the dew, the colours, the cobwebs, the wind and - sometimes a bit irritating - those fine strands of baby spider's webs, 'gossamer' I think they are called. I remember my grandma in Connecticut calling certain mild autumn days 'Gossamer Days' because of that, but I'm not sure if it's a common expression? These almost invisible baby webs are floating around everywhere now and when the sun is low they'll catch the light, looking like very fine strands of silvery white hair, reminding me of why the Germans call this time Altweibersommer, 'Old Wive's Summer', which – in turn – reminds me of my grandmother ...
Im Herbst
Der schöne Sommer ging von hinnen,
Der Herbst, der reiche, zog ins Land.
Nun weben all die guten Spinnen
So manches feine Festgewand.
Sie weben zu des Tages Feier
Mit kunstgeübtem Hinterbein
Ganz allerliebste Elfenschleier
Als Schmuck für Wiese, Flur und Hain.
Ja, tausend Silberfäden geben
Dem Winde sie zum leichten Spiel,
Die ziehen sanft dahin und schweben
Ans unbewußt bestimmte Ziel.
Sie ziehen in das Wunderländchen,
Wo Liebe scheu im Anbeginn,
Und leis' verknüpft ein zartes Bändchen
Den Schäfer mit der Schäferin.
(Wilhelm Busch)
In Autumn
The lovely summer has been leaving,
and with its wealth arrived the fall.
The spiders are all kindly weaving
fine garments for the festival.
They're weaving for the celebration,
with hindlegs practiced in the trade,
the veils of elves as decoration
for hill and dale and mead and glade.
Yes, thousand silver threads donated
into the wind, to turn and bend,
are softly drifting where they're fated
to an unconscious, settled end.
They're drifting toward a fairy landing
where love commences shy caress
and softly ties, with silken banding,
the shephard to the shephardess.
(Wilhelm Busch)
11 October 2006
Separation
Separation
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle
Everything I do is stitched with its color
(W.S. Merwin)
Your absence has gone through me
Like thread through a needle
Everything I do is stitched with its color
(W.S. Merwin)
06 October 2006
Coping ... happily
Yes, I know, haven't written much lately. There's so much happening right now that I'd hardly know where to start. My time is all filled up with life's unfolding and me trying to keep pace and the days just pass without leaving any space for writing.
Things are changing, things are happening, things are developing, things are ending. It's hard to sort it all out but I think I am coping quite well so far. It is a difficult but also challenging time concerning relationships. Some are ending, some are growing, some are just being developed and others are redeveloped. It's an inspiring and confusing time in terms of spiritual growth. It's an exciting time concerning every little bit of myself, my life, in every respect.
I have come out of retreat only last weekend and while I feel quite peaceful and happy, I also feel very much alert and all my senses seem to be sharpened and I have to be careful not to get myself into a state of sensory and emotional overload. I'm trying to start off slow now, dealing with everything that happens one by one, which is not always easy, things tend to happen just in their own time and more often than not, all at once. They sure do at the moment ... yet I am determined not to let that impress or rush me, I know that no good will come from it if I do.
Ever since I'm back to intensive meditation, on retreat but also in daily life, it's been getting easier to cope with things. Seeing clearer, acting more aware again. I know that I have made an unhappy decision when I let it slide over the summer. I haven't practiced long enough and I am not stable enough to deal with occurring problems all by myself without the help of meditation and spiritual friends and teachers. I fell back into my old patterns and old habits and found it harder and harder to be mindful in everyday life. I started to feel lost and helpless and overwhelmed by life and I guess some of my friends and other people around me had to suffer from my frustration and mindlessness. I missed the vivid exchange, the generous sharing of interests, thoughts and teachings, the spiritual stimulus that I now experience with friends and teachers at the buddhist center. Going there is a real inspiration for my practise and strengthening me in everyday life, also enriching my friendships 'outside' I believe.
Considering what I have just said, thinking it over again, I find that everything I do right now, in one way or another, has to do with relationship. In several different aspects. Relationships, friendships, past and present, have very much influenced me on my path and now I find that it kind of reverberates, that the course my path takes influences my relationships, or rather me and the way I relate to people – which is not the same I think, but probably comes down to the same in the end.
My most personal challenge lately is the community-conscious togetherness that I experience at the buddhist center. I am really the typical loner, happy and content all by myself and more often than not I find being with others quite a strain. There are moments when the close company of people may cause both physical and mental stress in me, resulting in feelings of panic, circulation problems, being unable to breathe, attacks of sweating, heavy headaches, stuff like that. What I used do in order to avoid this was – quite simply – avoiding company. Sure, I had a couple of close friends and a few family members that I still managed to see on a regular basis and normally without any problems, but even with them I never really felt tempted to spend a longer time. My maximum tolerance limit in being with somebody (when there is no possibility to avoid one another) is maybe three days. But depending on my general condition, at times a single evening may be too much. After a certain time my ability to socialise just declines rapidly and I start to feel under pressure, harassed, ill at ease. It's more difficult the more people are associated. Big Parties are almost impossible. Gatherings of any kind are pure horror for me, especially if I am expected to play an active role, be present, take part. It's not like I am shy, at least not more than is normal and healthy. It's different. I feel like my energy is being sucked off me, like the need to converse, to be present, exhausts me beyond my strengths. I really need to be by myself then. Centre myself, collect my thoughts, gain some kind of mental balance again. The day after such events I always feel extremely tired and worn out.
Don't get me wrong, it's not like this is happening all the time. Normally I'm just fine when I am with people for a couple of hours, for a single day or even longer, as long as there is enough space for me to withdraw at certain times. The normal living-together in a house or big appartment, like with a family or in a relationship, is not really a problem. It's only in situations of being too close together, when people leave no room for me to draw back, force their company on me, that it becomes a problem. It's been the reason I have been avoiding people for a very long time. Loosing a lot of friends for want of input from my side. Finding it hard to make new friends for fear of possible panic attacks and the need to explain to a stranger what I do not quite understand myself.
Sometime ago, after describing it to a friend and for the first time becoming completely aware of it myself, I decided that it cannot go on like that. That I have to work on this problem, find out why it happens, when it happens and what the reasons may be. I could go on about it here but I will spare you the details. I have come to some conclusions and I have my own theories to part of the problem by now, but most important, I think that I'm slowly progressing.
Situations like now during the retreat (and this was not a solely silent retreat, there were periods of prolonged silence as well as periods of intense emotional exchange), sharing a room with strangers, being together day and night ... that simply wouldn't have been possible a short while ago, while now I actually find myself feeling perfectly comfortable, even missing this 'togetherness' to a certain degree. Well, I must admit that at one point though, during a very early meditation, I had a slight relapse, starting to panic, starting to sweat and feeling dizzy all of a sudden. But I'm not sure if it had anything to do with my old problem or if it's just been a 'normal' circulation problem, due to the early hour, an empty stomach and a slightly too strong scent of 'Nag Champa' in an overheated room (for now, I'll blame it on the latter).
One thing that makes a huge difference is whether or not I can relate to people, if there is a certain point of identification, of mutual understanding. The first time I realized I can cope was in Austria. Even if it wasn't as intense as my recent experience, I still could relate to the people of that hiking-group, just not quite as wholeheartedly maybe. I managed to spend whole days with that group, which for me was already quite an achievement, yet I think I couldn't have shared a room with any of them, I still needed a certain physical distance.
I find that in the end, it all comes down to a question of trust and understanding. If I really trust in somebody and feel that there is a certain understanding between me and that person, I will be fine. Because somebody who really tends to understand me and my motives (and I don't mean on an intellectual level but rather from an intuitive emotional level) will automatically leave me enough space to withdraw mentally if I need it, however restricted the spacial or physical circumstances may be. As soon as I feel there is mutual understanding, I trust and feel free and at ease with this person.
It was a completely new experience for me to discover that I do not necessarily find this quality primarily in people I have known for a long time, but that if I look in the right places, look the right way, I might find it in others as well. People I have just met may carry this quality. So the secret seems to be in looking, in searching and in letting it happen. It doesn't help if I withdraw myself from the world, protecting myself from people. I shouldn't look so much on what I want to avoid but on what I want to find. That's what I'm doing right now, open myself, for potential friends, for companions on my way through this life. They may be old and they may be new. Discovered or rediscovered, I think I'll have to develope a whole new way of looking at people and while some relationships may surprise me in a positive way, others may not stand the test. Sometimes I'll hurt, sometimes I'll be scared, sometimes I'll shine with happiness and every now and then I'll still be hazed by doubt, but all the time ... I have a feeling that it's worthwhile, a feeling of contentment and gratitude, that this may be my path ...
Things are changing, things are happening, things are developing, things are ending. It's hard to sort it all out but I think I am coping quite well so far. It is a difficult but also challenging time concerning relationships. Some are ending, some are growing, some are just being developed and others are redeveloped. It's an inspiring and confusing time in terms of spiritual growth. It's an exciting time concerning every little bit of myself, my life, in every respect.
I have come out of retreat only last weekend and while I feel quite peaceful and happy, I also feel very much alert and all my senses seem to be sharpened and I have to be careful not to get myself into a state of sensory and emotional overload. I'm trying to start off slow now, dealing with everything that happens one by one, which is not always easy, things tend to happen just in their own time and more often than not, all at once. They sure do at the moment ... yet I am determined not to let that impress or rush me, I know that no good will come from it if I do.
Ever since I'm back to intensive meditation, on retreat but also in daily life, it's been getting easier to cope with things. Seeing clearer, acting more aware again. I know that I have made an unhappy decision when I let it slide over the summer. I haven't practiced long enough and I am not stable enough to deal with occurring problems all by myself without the help of meditation and spiritual friends and teachers. I fell back into my old patterns and old habits and found it harder and harder to be mindful in everyday life. I started to feel lost and helpless and overwhelmed by life and I guess some of my friends and other people around me had to suffer from my frustration and mindlessness. I missed the vivid exchange, the generous sharing of interests, thoughts and teachings, the spiritual stimulus that I now experience with friends and teachers at the buddhist center. Going there is a real inspiration for my practise and strengthening me in everyday life, also enriching my friendships 'outside' I believe.
Considering what I have just said, thinking it over again, I find that everything I do right now, in one way or another, has to do with relationship. In several different aspects. Relationships, friendships, past and present, have very much influenced me on my path and now I find that it kind of reverberates, that the course my path takes influences my relationships, or rather me and the way I relate to people – which is not the same I think, but probably comes down to the same in the end.
My most personal challenge lately is the community-conscious togetherness that I experience at the buddhist center. I am really the typical loner, happy and content all by myself and more often than not I find being with others quite a strain. There are moments when the close company of people may cause both physical and mental stress in me, resulting in feelings of panic, circulation problems, being unable to breathe, attacks of sweating, heavy headaches, stuff like that. What I used do in order to avoid this was – quite simply – avoiding company. Sure, I had a couple of close friends and a few family members that I still managed to see on a regular basis and normally without any problems, but even with them I never really felt tempted to spend a longer time. My maximum tolerance limit in being with somebody (when there is no possibility to avoid one another) is maybe three days. But depending on my general condition, at times a single evening may be too much. After a certain time my ability to socialise just declines rapidly and I start to feel under pressure, harassed, ill at ease. It's more difficult the more people are associated. Big Parties are almost impossible. Gatherings of any kind are pure horror for me, especially if I am expected to play an active role, be present, take part. It's not like I am shy, at least not more than is normal and healthy. It's different. I feel like my energy is being sucked off me, like the need to converse, to be present, exhausts me beyond my strengths. I really need to be by myself then. Centre myself, collect my thoughts, gain some kind of mental balance again. The day after such events I always feel extremely tired and worn out.
Don't get me wrong, it's not like this is happening all the time. Normally I'm just fine when I am with people for a couple of hours, for a single day or even longer, as long as there is enough space for me to withdraw at certain times. The normal living-together in a house or big appartment, like with a family or in a relationship, is not really a problem. It's only in situations of being too close together, when people leave no room for me to draw back, force their company on me, that it becomes a problem. It's been the reason I have been avoiding people for a very long time. Loosing a lot of friends for want of input from my side. Finding it hard to make new friends for fear of possible panic attacks and the need to explain to a stranger what I do not quite understand myself.
Sometime ago, after describing it to a friend and for the first time becoming completely aware of it myself, I decided that it cannot go on like that. That I have to work on this problem, find out why it happens, when it happens and what the reasons may be. I could go on about it here but I will spare you the details. I have come to some conclusions and I have my own theories to part of the problem by now, but most important, I think that I'm slowly progressing.
Situations like now during the retreat (and this was not a solely silent retreat, there were periods of prolonged silence as well as periods of intense emotional exchange), sharing a room with strangers, being together day and night ... that simply wouldn't have been possible a short while ago, while now I actually find myself feeling perfectly comfortable, even missing this 'togetherness' to a certain degree. Well, I must admit that at one point though, during a very early meditation, I had a slight relapse, starting to panic, starting to sweat and feeling dizzy all of a sudden. But I'm not sure if it had anything to do with my old problem or if it's just been a 'normal' circulation problem, due to the early hour, an empty stomach and a slightly too strong scent of 'Nag Champa' in an overheated room (for now, I'll blame it on the latter).
One thing that makes a huge difference is whether or not I can relate to people, if there is a certain point of identification, of mutual understanding. The first time I realized I can cope was in Austria. Even if it wasn't as intense as my recent experience, I still could relate to the people of that hiking-group, just not quite as wholeheartedly maybe. I managed to spend whole days with that group, which for me was already quite an achievement, yet I think I couldn't have shared a room with any of them, I still needed a certain physical distance.
I find that in the end, it all comes down to a question of trust and understanding. If I really trust in somebody and feel that there is a certain understanding between me and that person, I will be fine. Because somebody who really tends to understand me and my motives (and I don't mean on an intellectual level but rather from an intuitive emotional level) will automatically leave me enough space to withdraw mentally if I need it, however restricted the spacial or physical circumstances may be. As soon as I feel there is mutual understanding, I trust and feel free and at ease with this person.
It was a completely new experience for me to discover that I do not necessarily find this quality primarily in people I have known for a long time, but that if I look in the right places, look the right way, I might find it in others as well. People I have just met may carry this quality. So the secret seems to be in looking, in searching and in letting it happen. It doesn't help if I withdraw myself from the world, protecting myself from people. I shouldn't look so much on what I want to avoid but on what I want to find. That's what I'm doing right now, open myself, for potential friends, for companions on my way through this life. They may be old and they may be new. Discovered or rediscovered, I think I'll have to develope a whole new way of looking at people and while some relationships may surprise me in a positive way, others may not stand the test. Sometimes I'll hurt, sometimes I'll be scared, sometimes I'll shine with happiness and every now and then I'll still be hazed by doubt, but all the time ... I have a feeling that it's worthwhile, a feeling of contentment and gratitude, that this may be my path ...
26 September 2006
Scarúint
Gabh uaim amach in oíche na haimsire.
Amach sa bháisteach,
I séideán ama.
Gabh uaim amach
Ar na sráideanna bánaithe.
Feadaíl gaoithe i simnéithe cathrach
Suas giota gairid chun cairr
Ach amach óm shaol.
Saol beag árasáin
Solas is teas
Compordúil iad seal
Dúinn araon.
Níor dhearcas thar dhoras m'eispéarais amach
Is leanas tú,
Ach lean tú mé!
Beirt lán d'fhéineachas
Nár oir riamh
Dá chéile.
Cén chaoi ar fhanamar
Seal faoi thost
I lár gréithreán ár n-anama
I gcontráracht nádúire?
D'fhanamar seal beag
Ón mbaisteach;
Ón bhfuacht, bhí fothain
In árasán folamh ár mbeatha.
(Sin é an chaoi)
Is cé bhréagfadh an éifeacht
Ag dearcadh isteach ón oíche.
Gabh ort anois
Suas go barr sráide
Is cas ar chlé.
Ní fhillfidh tú orm níos mó,
Aonaráin
Ag gabaháil ó chéile,
Ach ní gean é an gátar
Sa bhfothain.
(Máire Áine Nic Ghearailt)
Parting
Go out into the stormy night
Out into the rain
Into the blasts of time
Go out
Into the deserted streets
Where the wind blows
In the chimneys of the town
On the short way up to the car
Just out of my life
Little apartment life
Warmth and light
Comfortable for us
For a while.
I did not look beyond
The threshold of my own experience
And followed you,
But you followed me!
Each an integral whole
We did not complement each other.
What held us together
Silent
In the glimmer of our souls
Against our own nature?
Searching for a while
Shelter from the rain;
Shelter from the cold, hiding
In the empty apartment of our life.
(That’s the way it is)
A delusive picture
For anybody looking in to us
From the night.
Come on now
Go up, to the high end of the street
Than turn left.
Do not return to me.
Two loners
Parting.
But love is more
Than accommodation.
Trennung
Geh hinaus in die stürmische Nacht
hinaus in den Regen
in die Böen der Zeit.
Geh hinaus
in die verlassenen Straßen.
Wo der Wind pfeift
in den Schornsteinen der Stadt
auf dem kurzen Stück hinauf zum Wagen.
Nur raus aus meinem Leben.
Kleines Wohnungsleben
Wärme und Licht
eine Zeitlang bequem
für uns beide.
Ich schaute nicht hinaus
über die Schwelle meiner Erfahrung
und folgte dir,
aber du folgtest mir!
Jeder ein Ganzes
ergänzten wir uns nicht.
Was hielt uns zusammen
schweigend
im Schein unserer Seelen
entgegen unserer Natur?
Suchten eine Weile
Schutz vor dem Regen;
Schutz vor der Kälte, Sicherheit
in der leeren Wohnung unseres Lebens.
(So ist es)
Ein trügerisches Bild
für jeden, der aus der Nacht
zu uns hereinschaute.
Nun mach schon
geh hinauf, ans Ende der Straße
und dann links.
Kehr' nicht zu mir zurück.
Einzelgänger
die auseinander gehen.
Doch Liebe ist mehr
als ein Dach über dem Kopf.
Amach sa bháisteach,
I séideán ama.
Gabh uaim amach
Ar na sráideanna bánaithe.
Feadaíl gaoithe i simnéithe cathrach
Suas giota gairid chun cairr
Ach amach óm shaol.
Saol beag árasáin
Solas is teas
Compordúil iad seal
Dúinn araon.
Níor dhearcas thar dhoras m'eispéarais amach
Is leanas tú,
Ach lean tú mé!
Beirt lán d'fhéineachas
Nár oir riamh
Dá chéile.
Cén chaoi ar fhanamar
Seal faoi thost
I lár gréithreán ár n-anama
I gcontráracht nádúire?
D'fhanamar seal beag
Ón mbaisteach;
Ón bhfuacht, bhí fothain
In árasán folamh ár mbeatha.
(Sin é an chaoi)
Is cé bhréagfadh an éifeacht
Ag dearcadh isteach ón oíche.
Gabh ort anois
Suas go barr sráide
Is cas ar chlé.
Ní fhillfidh tú orm níos mó,
Aonaráin
Ag gabaháil ó chéile,
Ach ní gean é an gátar
Sa bhfothain.
(Máire Áine Nic Ghearailt)
Parting
Go out into the stormy night
Out into the rain
Into the blasts of time
Go out
Into the deserted streets
Where the wind blows
In the chimneys of the town
On the short way up to the car
Just out of my life
Little apartment life
Warmth and light
Comfortable for us
For a while.
I did not look beyond
The threshold of my own experience
And followed you,
But you followed me!
Each an integral whole
We did not complement each other.
What held us together
Silent
In the glimmer of our souls
Against our own nature?
Searching for a while
Shelter from the rain;
Shelter from the cold, hiding
In the empty apartment of our life.
(That’s the way it is)
A delusive picture
For anybody looking in to us
From the night.
Come on now
Go up, to the high end of the street
Than turn left.
Do not return to me.
Two loners
Parting.
But love is more
Than accommodation.
Trennung
Geh hinaus in die stürmische Nacht
hinaus in den Regen
in die Böen der Zeit.
Geh hinaus
in die verlassenen Straßen.
Wo der Wind pfeift
in den Schornsteinen der Stadt
auf dem kurzen Stück hinauf zum Wagen.
Nur raus aus meinem Leben.
Kleines Wohnungsleben
Wärme und Licht
eine Zeitlang bequem
für uns beide.
Ich schaute nicht hinaus
über die Schwelle meiner Erfahrung
und folgte dir,
aber du folgtest mir!
Jeder ein Ganzes
ergänzten wir uns nicht.
Was hielt uns zusammen
schweigend
im Schein unserer Seelen
entgegen unserer Natur?
Suchten eine Weile
Schutz vor dem Regen;
Schutz vor der Kälte, Sicherheit
in der leeren Wohnung unseres Lebens.
(So ist es)
Ein trügerisches Bild
für jeden, der aus der Nacht
zu uns hereinschaute.
Nun mach schon
geh hinauf, ans Ende der Straße
und dann links.
Kehr' nicht zu mir zurück.
Einzelgänger
die auseinander gehen.
Doch Liebe ist mehr
als ein Dach über dem Kopf.
17 September 2006
Austerity Weekend
Having run out of money early this month (well, mainly due to going to Austria, which was sure worth it) I had to take some instant austerity measures, staying at home for a couple of days, avoiding everything that might end in spending what I don't have.
More or less forced to fast, dining on what is left in my fridge and still edible, I've been spending a lazy weekend, not doing much to be honest. At least I managed to wait until now to turn on the computer ..! I have been occupying myself with boring household tasks over the last days, doing the washing, ironing, cleaning windows and the like, things that have been waiting to be done for ages. Somehow I never get down to do all these things, commuting between here and the Eifel on a weekly basis, taking care of my derelict little house there.
That whole roof thing is still bothering me quite a bit. It seems almost certain now that the bank will not grant the credit I need to get the roof repaired. Lack of security they say. The house just isn't worth anything from their point of view. And I know they are right, but sure that won't help me a bit.
So I'm back at the setout, still trying to find a solution. With all the buckets up in the attic remaining empty in this unusual hot and dry September the problem didn't seem too urgent since I am back from Austria but of course I know that time is running and only too soon will I be back to overflowing buckets that can only be kept under control when I go there every weekend. Just that I can't, financially speaking. Gas is becoming so expensive, it's unbelievable. They charge fuel per litre here in Germany but converting the recent price it's about $6 per gallon. Germany and the Netherlands are the most expensive countries in the world now when it comes to gas prices, closely followed only by Great Britain. It seemed absolutely unreal to me when I paid less than 20 Euros to completely fill the car on the island of La Palma this spring. Spain seems to be a much cheaper place to be. Anyway, if I decide to spend the weekend in my house it will cost me more than 50 Euros ($60) just to get there, which makes 200 Euros a month. But since 200 Euros are all the money I can spend over the month, I'm in for a problem. I mean, it certainly can't be that I spend that much money on emptying buckets just because I can't afford to have the roof repaired. It seems somewhat preposterous to me. There MUST be a way but I'm afraid I don't see it so far.
And again ... call me Scarlett, but ... I can't think about that right now. If I do, I'll go crazy. I'll think about that tomorrow ...
More or less forced to fast, dining on what is left in my fridge and still edible, I've been spending a lazy weekend, not doing much to be honest. At least I managed to wait until now to turn on the computer ..! I have been occupying myself with boring household tasks over the last days, doing the washing, ironing, cleaning windows and the like, things that have been waiting to be done for ages. Somehow I never get down to do all these things, commuting between here and the Eifel on a weekly basis, taking care of my derelict little house there.
That whole roof thing is still bothering me quite a bit. It seems almost certain now that the bank will not grant the credit I need to get the roof repaired. Lack of security they say. The house just isn't worth anything from their point of view. And I know they are right, but sure that won't help me a bit.
So I'm back at the setout, still trying to find a solution. With all the buckets up in the attic remaining empty in this unusual hot and dry September the problem didn't seem too urgent since I am back from Austria but of course I know that time is running and only too soon will I be back to overflowing buckets that can only be kept under control when I go there every weekend. Just that I can't, financially speaking. Gas is becoming so expensive, it's unbelievable. They charge fuel per litre here in Germany but converting the recent price it's about $6 per gallon. Germany and the Netherlands are the most expensive countries in the world now when it comes to gas prices, closely followed only by Great Britain. It seemed absolutely unreal to me when I paid less than 20 Euros to completely fill the car on the island of La Palma this spring. Spain seems to be a much cheaper place to be. Anyway, if I decide to spend the weekend in my house it will cost me more than 50 Euros ($60) just to get there, which makes 200 Euros a month. But since 200 Euros are all the money I can spend over the month, I'm in for a problem. I mean, it certainly can't be that I spend that much money on emptying buckets just because I can't afford to have the roof repaired. It seems somewhat preposterous to me. There MUST be a way but I'm afraid I don't see it so far.
And again ... call me Scarlett, but ... I can't think about that right now. If I do, I'll go crazy. I'll think about that tomorrow ...
07 September 2006
Silver
Slowly, silently, now the moon
Walks the night in her silver shoon;
This way, and that, she peers, and sees
Silver fruit upon silver trees;
One by one the casements catch
Her beams beneath the silvery thatch;
Couched in his kennel, like a log,
With paws of silver sleeps the dog;
From their shadowy coat the white breasts peep
Of doves in a silver-feathered sleep;
A harvest mouse goes scampering by,
With silver claws, and silver eye;
And moveless fish in the water gleam,
By silver reeds in a silver stream.
(Walter de la Mare)
It's such a huge and bright full moon tonight ... I love the idea of how we all look at the same moon, no matter where we are ... and though the time difference won't let us all look at the same time, it's so sweet to imagine that while I look at the moon, being soothed by it's silvery light, somebody else might be looking up there at the very moment, kept awake like me, our glances unknowingly meeting, 240000 miles away from here. Sharing the same emotion, despite culture, despite distance ...
Walks the night in her silver shoon;
This way, and that, she peers, and sees
Silver fruit upon silver trees;
One by one the casements catch
Her beams beneath the silvery thatch;
Couched in his kennel, like a log,
With paws of silver sleeps the dog;
From their shadowy coat the white breasts peep
Of doves in a silver-feathered sleep;
A harvest mouse goes scampering by,
With silver claws, and silver eye;
And moveless fish in the water gleam,
By silver reeds in a silver stream.
(Walter de la Mare)
It's such a huge and bright full moon tonight ... I love the idea of how we all look at the same moon, no matter where we are ... and though the time difference won't let us all look at the same time, it's so sweet to imagine that while I look at the moon, being soothed by it's silvery light, somebody else might be looking up there at the very moment, kept awake like me, our glances unknowingly meeting, 240000 miles away from here. Sharing the same emotion, despite culture, despite distance ...
01 September 2006
The Manifesto Of The Cloud Appreciation Society
We believe that clouds are unjustly maligned and that life would be immeasurably poorer without them.
We think that they are Nature’s poetry, and the most egalitarian of her displays, since everyone can have a fantastic view of them.
We pledge to fight ‘blue-sky thinking’ wherever we find it. Life would be dull if we had to look up at cloudless monotony day after day.
We seek to remind people that clouds are expressions of the atmosphere’s moods, and can be read like those of a person’s countenance.
Clouds are so commonplace that their beauty is often overlooked. They are for dreamers and their contemplation benefits the soul. Indeed, all who consider the shapes they see in them will save on psychoanalysis bills.
And so we say to all who'll listen: Look up, marvel at the ephemeral beauty, and live life with your head in the clouds!
-----------------------------------------------------
If you like watching clouds as much as I do, check out the Cloud Appreciation Society's website:http://www.cloudappreciationsociety.org
We think that they are Nature’s poetry, and the most egalitarian of her displays, since everyone can have a fantastic view of them.
We pledge to fight ‘blue-sky thinking’ wherever we find it. Life would be dull if we had to look up at cloudless monotony day after day.
We seek to remind people that clouds are expressions of the atmosphere’s moods, and can be read like those of a person’s countenance.
Clouds are so commonplace that their beauty is often overlooked. They are for dreamers and their contemplation benefits the soul. Indeed, all who consider the shapes they see in them will save on psychoanalysis bills.
And so we say to all who'll listen: Look up, marvel at the ephemeral beauty, and live life with your head in the clouds!
-----------------------------------------------------
If you like watching clouds as much as I do, check out the Cloud Appreciation Society's website:
30 August 2006
Stiff climbs and spooky trails
This was my most difficult day up here in the mountains. We left the broader hiking-trails completely, finally turning to the really steep climbs. The trail we intended to take had been described to us yesterday as being a little precarious (I heard somebody else calling it 'spooky' ... and he was right!) due to continuously deteriorating conditions and plenty of loose rock and gravel. We had also been told that part of the route would involve a rather strenuous hand-over-hand climb, requiring the use of a rope, but I must say that I had only a vague idea of what to expect until the route was pointed out to us from an elevated point of view on the way to our starting point this morning. I looked and thought it wasn't possible ... surely we weren't meant to take that way! It looked far to steep.
I suddenly began to doubt being able to make it, knowing it would be extremely demanding and difficult and I got a very strange feeling in my stomach, somewhere between excitement and anxiety. Then again, I knew that our guide wouldn't take us there if he thought we wouldn't be able to make it, so I decided to stop worrying and just hang in there.
We had to descent for quite a while at first, going down a deep gorge, only to make the stiffest climb up again after we reached the bottom. Ascending on the other side we came across several memorial stones and crosses, reminiscent of those mountaineers who weren't quite so lucky - something I didn't find exactly reassuring to say the least.
When we left the marked trail, the path became so narrow that I thought I might lose my balance if I ever stopped putting one foot in front of the other, so I just kept moving in a slow but constant rhythm instead. The higher we got the less keen I actually felt to stop anyway – a brief glance to my right had clearly presented the deepest ravine and sharpest hillside I had walked along so far, going straight down a few hundred metres right beside my feet and I sure didn't want to explore that any further, feeling not so sure about having overcome my acrophobia, my fear of heights. I knew I would start to feel giddy the moment I looked down so I chose to stare ahead instead, trying to divert my thoughts, taking them off any unwanted speculation about possible unpleasant occurrences, which wasn't an easy task at all, blessed as I am with a rather vivid imagination. I'm fascinated by depths just about as much as I am afraid of them, which might just prove that attraction and aversion are never far apart.
Anyway, if you want to have a fair impression of me climbing that mountain, just imagine a somewhat wispy being in short trousers and heavy mountain boots with a rather tense (but pretty obstinate) facial expression, clinging to a rope so tightly that her knuckles start to turn white while her head turns pink in a vigorous effort to make it to the summit and down again ...
That trail was really wild, disappearing into nothingness every now and then, forcing us to cross rather profound chasms with giant strides (those with shorter legs were clearly at a disadvantage ...). Those crevices seemed to be bottomless and I definitely knew why that guy at the lodge had called this route 'spooky'! For once, none of us had much of an eye for the beautiful landscapes all around us, being far too concentrated, focusing on nothing but the way in front of our feet. Also we were far too exhausted by then, only wanting to 'get there'.
When we reached our arrival point in the late afternoon I felt I had gone to my very limits, physically as well as mentally. I will not say that it didn't feel good, it did, very much so, but it was so very hard to go through with it.
We all needed time for contemplation, coming to terms with our own achievement. Every single one of us may have had his or her own doubts or worries in the beginning and yet we all made it, going straight forward instead of backing out, facing and fighting our very own demons, literally going to 'the places that scare us'.
Slowly recovering from the physical effort we started to joke and laugh again, talking about how everyone of us had his own way of coping with the givens of such a tour. Of course there were jokes again about me and my presumed fear of heights, the others telling me that I surely always remain ahead of my fear if I keep on hiking at my speed. I asked the guide whether they were right, if I was too lightheaded, bringing myself into danger by walking too fast but he reassured me that I seemed cautious and sure-footed enough to him, not like bringing myself into unnecessary danger and also never loosing touch with the group which was important from his point of view. He also said that of course we would have to walk or climb differently if ever we got into bad weather, that it couldn't be compared to how it was today and that certainly we all needed more experience until we were able to evaluate our own abilities in a realistic way regarding certain situations. I think it also makes a big difference if you make such a tour on your own or with a guide. In our group of eight I think there is only one experienced enough to make it on his own or even lead others. Well, - I will not give up, I will come back to the mountains, learning and making my experiences, one by one, in my own time, not hurrying it or putting myself under pressure.
But that will have to wait, because now - unfortunately - it's more or less time to go home, back to Germany. Tomorrow we will need a rest after this challenging climb today, planning a little 'relaxation walk' to a nearby village only. Coming back here it will be time to pack and prepare for the journey home the following morning. I will go by car instead of flying back, which means a drive of 10 hours. Somehow it will be more natural to see the landscape changing slowly, it always seems a bit abrupt to me, arriving somewhere by plane. Of course it's pretty comfortable and also there are distances one can't make in a car in time, but still ... it's strange and somewhat unnatural I think.
I'll say goodbye from Austria here. Of course I am sad to leave but I see it more relaxed now than a few days ago. I have had such a wonderful time here and I don't want to spoil it by becoming sad or depressed in any way. I want to keep all my lovely experiences in my memory without any bad thoughts diluting them. I have grown so fond of the mountains and of the people here. Most of them I have not known when I arrived and now we depart as friends. We got along just great and have had such a lot of fun and wonderful experiences together, from the very beginning it felt as if we had known each other for years. It's extremely unusual for me to open up to a group of strangers like that, to trust them and feel so much at ease, so comfortable with them. But I did here. Another new but lovely experience I am grateful for.
So, this is it. I hope I didn't bore you too much. But then again: you had a choice, didn't you?
Anyway, thanks to anyone who took the time to read and follow my 'adventures' up here in the mountains!
Servus and Grüaß Euch
(Austrian greeting)
22 August 2006
Bliss …
I know this might just start to sound boring … but it's been another beautiful day today, going for another wonderful hike up a mountain called Gerzkopf. The Gerzkopf area is a Nature Reserve, a really unique landscape of high-elevation spruce forests, bog forests and mires. The raised bog areas up on top of the mountain are especially impressive: all covered with low shrubs like mountain pine, blueberries and heather, the summit offers a 360° panoramic view of the surrounding mountain ranges, their highest peaks being reflected in the waters of the so-called Schwarze Lacke (black lakes) on the very top of it, lying there like huge oval mirrors in the middle of the marshland. The scent of the mountain pine is so intense in the sun, it smells like somebody ran a giant bath filled with pine needle bubble bath, absolutely overwhelming. Somehow all scents seem to be intensified in this clear clean mountain air. Or maybe it's just that all sensorial perceptions are intensified up here, I don't know. The view again was breathtaking beyond description. Again, taking it all in, I felt so aware of the presence of something, something divine, beyond all this beauty … whatever one wants to call it … creation, God, some kind of universal energy. Grace. Peace. All-embracing love. I have no words for it. But it's pure, strong presence fills me with energy and a deep gratitude for this life.
On our way down we stopped at a sheperd's hut, contemplating the sounds of nature and the somewhat 'boisterous quietness' of the mountains with Bernhard, the shepherd, sitting in between sheep instead of cows for a change. The trail leading downwards was a narrow footpath leading through most bizzare woods and moorland, looking strangely unreal, like some kind of enchanted wonderland. I could have gone on and on, forever walking under these tangly trees, breathing this aromatic air, picking blueberries and cranberries, raspberries and mushrooms, forgetting time and space like a lost child in one of the Grimm's fairy tales.
Coming back to the lodge after this most impressive walking-tour I needed to be by myself. I went down to the brook, trying to collect my thoughts, considering the wonder and beauty of all I have seen and experienced over these past few days. It is all so overwhelming if you're really attentive to what's there around you. One has to walk with the eyes wide open, mindful to the beauty of the world, trying to see everything that is there. We tend to become blind to what is around us too easily, getting used to things, taking them for granted instead of being aware of the small wonders of the world. Seeing the young in the old, the rich in the poor, the beauty in the plain. Sitting there by the water I felt like I was about to burst with happiness, unable to speak about it, unable to share with the others for fear of not finding the right words, as if trying to talk about it might break the charm, spoil the bliss. I felt so close to the group, so much at ease in their company and at the same time totally detached and separate. It was a positive feeling though. Very strange.
Later we went to spend the evening at a friend's place in a tiny village nearby, dining outside, against the terrific backdrop of the sun setting over the Dachstein mountain range. What a view – and yet it was only the 'prelude' to the real sensation to come: the cloudless starry sky! As everything else up here it was just immense. We had a new moon only a couple of days ago so the night was quite dark, making even the most nondescript stars shine brightly. Such a huge amount of stars, I felt all giddy looking up, like my head was spinning, like everything was in motion, like the sky was about to explode. The Milky Way was so clearly visible, it really looked like a broad road paved with diamonds.
I couldn't stop looking at this sky. I still can't. Sitting here on my little balcony in the immense darkness of the mountains, writing by the light of a single candle, I can hear the bats flying by. They are almost noiseless except for the high pitched sound they make every now and then, catching moths or midges, mere silhouettes against the vast blackness of the sky. I think of my friends and loved ones … and as if to acknowledge these thoughts, two shooting stars come down right in front of me, like some celestial sign or greeting … what a night! Those countless, silent stars, orchestrated by the neverending brawl of the brook flowing beneath, reflecting the starlight in it's water.
I try to store all this somewhere deep inside myself, to take it with me when I leave, filling me with peace and quiet energy when I'm back to the bleak prospects of the city. I wish I could forever fill my heart with this beauty, make it immune to the dark thoughts, the grief, the panic eventually arising back home.
Fear my coming sadness … fill my heart with gladness …
On our way down we stopped at a sheperd's hut, contemplating the sounds of nature and the somewhat 'boisterous quietness' of the mountains with Bernhard, the shepherd, sitting in between sheep instead of cows for a change. The trail leading downwards was a narrow footpath leading through most bizzare woods and moorland, looking strangely unreal, like some kind of enchanted wonderland. I could have gone on and on, forever walking under these tangly trees, breathing this aromatic air, picking blueberries and cranberries, raspberries and mushrooms, forgetting time and space like a lost child in one of the Grimm's fairy tales.
Coming back to the lodge after this most impressive walking-tour I needed to be by myself. I went down to the brook, trying to collect my thoughts, considering the wonder and beauty of all I have seen and experienced over these past few days. It is all so overwhelming if you're really attentive to what's there around you. One has to walk with the eyes wide open, mindful to the beauty of the world, trying to see everything that is there. We tend to become blind to what is around us too easily, getting used to things, taking them for granted instead of being aware of the small wonders of the world. Seeing the young in the old, the rich in the poor, the beauty in the plain. Sitting there by the water I felt like I was about to burst with happiness, unable to speak about it, unable to share with the others for fear of not finding the right words, as if trying to talk about it might break the charm, spoil the bliss. I felt so close to the group, so much at ease in their company and at the same time totally detached and separate. It was a positive feeling though. Very strange.
Later we went to spend the evening at a friend's place in a tiny village nearby, dining outside, against the terrific backdrop of the sun setting over the Dachstein mountain range. What a view – and yet it was only the 'prelude' to the real sensation to come: the cloudless starry sky! As everything else up here it was just immense. We had a new moon only a couple of days ago so the night was quite dark, making even the most nondescript stars shine brightly. Such a huge amount of stars, I felt all giddy looking up, like my head was spinning, like everything was in motion, like the sky was about to explode. The Milky Way was so clearly visible, it really looked like a broad road paved with diamonds.
I couldn't stop looking at this sky. I still can't. Sitting here on my little balcony in the immense darkness of the mountains, writing by the light of a single candle, I can hear the bats flying by. They are almost noiseless except for the high pitched sound they make every now and then, catching moths or midges, mere silhouettes against the vast blackness of the sky. I think of my friends and loved ones … and as if to acknowledge these thoughts, two shooting stars come down right in front of me, like some celestial sign or greeting … what a night! Those countless, silent stars, orchestrated by the neverending brawl of the brook flowing beneath, reflecting the starlight in it's water.
I try to store all this somewhere deep inside myself, to take it with me when I leave, filling me with peace and quiet energy when I'm back to the bleak prospects of the city. I wish I could forever fill my heart with this beauty, make it immune to the dark thoughts, the grief, the panic eventually arising back home.
Fear my coming sadness … fill my heart with gladness …
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