My love, the shadow that touches the flame…

Sometimes I hear you speak to me. Words echoing somewhere, just out of reach. Glimpses of light, fractured memories spin by like a carousel. I get that awkward feeling in the pit of my stomach, as if love sick. That longing, that sense of elevation…like flying and at the same time a melancholic sadness, like the unfulfilled lover. Waiting. Hoping. Praying that one day our roads will meet again.

I remember you as someone who used to fill me with fire. All my artistic dreams came to light. I would wander the streets, pen and poetry book in hand. Page after page would be filled with caffeine covered notes of beauty, mingled with my own inner pain. Everything was a little bit shattered. It was that pain I could never shake, the pain that made me fear my own pursuit. I had the fire. I had the desire. I just lacked the clarity, the knowledge, but I tried. I really went for it. That’s when I realized that beneath the fire was that pain, that insecurity and everything I did was tainted by it. The fire kind of got subdued. I censored myself. Artistic expression became about perfection, about following rules and guidelines. Sure enough some of those guidelines gave me so much – I created things I came to love, things I was truly proud of. I gained the knowledge. Yet I had let go of that sense of complete abandon. Of fully giving of myself. Like when I used to wander those streets.

Sometimes a street light, or the sight of a perfectly yellow lemon will take me right back. I’m once more where I belong, walking those streets, poetry book in hand. Everything I see is filled with beauty – I search for beauty in everything; in smells, tastes, sounds…and life is blissful. I’m immersed in the art of life and my creative juices are overflowing. Everything I see adds another piece to the puzzle. Everything I hear brings me one step closer to completing a script, a poem, an artwork… Around me answers are swirling in the air like leaves in autumn. Everything is there to help me create my art, like a giant jigsaw puzzle I’m gathering one piece after another. One step closer to fulfilling the dream of completing another project.

I’m allowing myself to create again. Stains of red wine next to my laptop. Delirious words flying by. This blog is no longer just about sexy confessions, sexy life lessons with a twinkle in their eye…ever so often I take a break from those and I play. Words enchant me and I let them. The garlic bread and the wine…I’m suddenly eleven years younger and I’m walking the streets of Paris with a dream in my hand.

I still dream. The dancers at the Moulin Rouge are still as colorful as they were when I left Sweden all those years ago. When I dreamt of a bohemian revolution, of beauty, truth, freedom and love…when I took my backpack and left and ended up in Paris. The sunrise by the Seine, the artist studios in Montmartre…every part of the city touched me with her beauty, every part made me ache and wonder.

I can feel you again, your streets so filled with beauty. The streetlights that would fill the night with magic. How you inspired me! How every step I took felt like I was lost in an artwork, or in my own dream. And then as I kept pursuing my dreams everyone congratulated me on one school after another, one city after another. London, Los Angeles, Cape Town…but somewhere along I died. I started believing I’d never come to accomplish anything. That I would be stuck doing something other than what I trained in. The irony in following your dream to become an artist.

A light flickers in the night. A wind caresses my ear. I can hear you speak to me. Soft words. A soft welcome back. Back to the core. To who I always was. Without the pain. Without the destruction.

I remember sitting in our first flat…I was writing on my laptop. The laptop suddenly died, although the battery was full. The lights were flickering. My flatmate was talking about writing erotica as a means of survival as a writer and I laughed. I was so filled with youthful enthusiasm. I told her our flat would be put on the map. A tourist destination. We would become famous. I believed in my dreams, but fame was a false dream, my heart was the true dream. I loved the artistic life. The feeling of living the dream, but as youthful fools do they pursue before they are ready, they start feeling ashamed for having listened to the ego as much as the heart and then they lose the fire as challenges extinguish the flames…just like my laptop died. Just as the lights flickered. A ghost? A story foretold?

I’m sitting by my laptop writing at night. The can can girls still dance. The creperies are all still there. Paris’ streets look the same. With my eyes I seek out the angles for the camera. My heart dreams the same dreams. Nothing’s changed, but everything is different. And from the wilderness in Africa you can hear a different roar…

Free falling…

I’m trying to collect my thoughts enough to write something, but it ain’t going too well. Maybe I should just write anyway.

I’m in Covent Garden at Le Pain Quotidien. My beloved Le Pain Quotidien. I don’t haunt pubs, I haunt coffee shops and wine bars. I love it as I can sit down and type away, surrounded by people.

I went to see a friend this morning for a back treatment, then we ended up sitting talking by the Thames in the windy sunshine. After that I walked here, after here a haircut and then a production meeting at my member’s club. I treasure days like these. So simple and filled with what I love – writing, directing and people.

It reminds me of another time. I was over in London from LA, just after Easter. I was sitting in this very cafe, writing. Probably about a boy. I mean it’s always about a boy isn’t it? Whether he exists, or not. Whether he is a figment of my imagination, or a reality. Whether I truly care in that moment, or not. Whether he is a dream for the future, an unknown face, or a current reality. That particular boy from long ago, whatever he was, or is, he taught me many things…“…the greatest thing you’ll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.” Funny how love works. Funny how we learn what we want to learn, so if the person does nothing. We just learn.

There is a grain of sand. The sand doesn’t do much. It’s just…sand, but if I look at the grain of sand for long enough, if I study how the elements move it, how it is shaped, it’s weight, how it behaves…I’m sure to learn something. And maybe that’s what life is like: we set out to learn things and somehow we teach ourselves by our interactions with life.

It’s funny – looking around on this crowded square you see men that feel cool because their hair is combed in a certain way and their Raybans give them a certain look. Yet, underneath it…they are naked. When life tosses them about, they are naked. Standing in the midst of what is presented. Then, I guess all you have is your heart and the love you have showered on others. The love that then returns to sender. Even in the midst of the eye of the storm when they have nothing but themselves. No Raybans. No credit cards. They still get the love, the return to sender.

Love means so much to me and it’s really strange how I’ve managed to avoid it. Not avoided feeling it, but achieving it. Too scared I wasn’t worth it, couldn’t have it. Too scared by my past to move into my future. Too hidden behind credit cards and Raybans trying to be seen as being someone, rather than just being. To scared when looking around at the people who found the candle, but let the wind extinguish the flame…the ones that didn’t keep love alive, I guess it scared me even more.

I used to blame my love life on the men. Even though I took responsibility for my own choices by the end of the day I still blamed them somehow. On another trip to London I remember thinking: “I came all this way and you didn’t even try it you bastard. You never even lit the flame, so how will we ever know? You closed your door before you ever opened it. And I will have to live with not knowing.” Of course people’s choice are up to them. With an open heart you just move onto find an open heart. Yet in this instance, even if he would have tried, I would have killed it. I didn’t trust it, I never do. And yet, I love so much.

I don’t know how to trust love, as it’s always gone wrong. I guess I will have to start living in it. Living in love. So I feel it and know it. Know when someone loves me too. Not just heart to heart, soul to soul, but the dedication to that connection. I never fell for those men. I fell for cowards like me. I may cross the Atlantic, but to open my eyes and show my love…to trust them with my love…I would never even reach my hand across the table and mean it. I mean, I would mean it. Deep down inside, but that wouldn’t come across. I would be scared. I wouldn’t trust them, probably for good reasons. You are drawn to your beliefs. And so I would ruin it.

“How does it feel to be on your own…like a rolling stone…” The street musician is nailing it. I’ve finished my walnut bread sandwich and hot chocolate. The wind is blowing to the point of moving umbrellas and shaking the tables. My heart is opening. One morsel, or sip rather, of hot cocoa at the time. My ex used to say hot cocoa. I remember that from when we first met at the tender age of 17 in the French countryside. I believe I told him, standing outside a church that I’d love to get married there. Just not to him.

I don’t know how to finish this. Maybe because I don’t know how it will go…maybe one day, maybe one day I will taste love again.

“…and I’m free, free falling….” The street musician finished it for me as he moved onto: “find a girl settle down…there’s a way…” Time to move on. With an open heart.

When the wind is blowing in the opposite direction…

Nothing’s ever perfect. I keep being reminded of the part in The Alchemist where the boy arrives in Africa and loses his money on the first night. He’s on a quest to get to Egypt and he has just lost all his savings, he can’t even return to Spain. He realizes he has a choice – he can either see it as a complete failure, or as the beginning of an even more daring adventure than he could ever have dreamed of. The boy chooses to see it as an adventure. He then proceeds to get a job polishing glass and he helps the shop owner by introducing serving tea to the customers. He spends years polishing glass. I’m sure it wasn’t easy, but we all have a choice: greet the sun with a smile in the morning, or proceed to look at the sun with envy as we ourselves hide in the shadows.

You can shift your mind about almost anything and you can choose to accept that your adventure is now. That doesn’t stop some things from being difficult to the point where you’re almost completely depleted. The point is, if you keep looking to the sun as part of you, sooner, rather than later, it will return.

Last fall was not a happy time for me. I had left what I felt were some of the most joyous, secure parts of my life – my two best friends, the city I loved and the first home I’d ever had that felt like a home – our gorgeous chalet in the Hollywood Hills. I no longer fell asleep watching the stars and the twinkling lights of Los Angeles. I no longer drove to Malibu in the weekends to jump through the waves. The sun that I so adored, seemed far, far away. There was one point when I was struggling at work (and given I work for my business partner, who is also the investor for my dream company, that was not easy), I had a rash from the cold and felt about as sexy as a burnt toast (I’m not made for winter, pointe blanc), I had found out some friends were potentially ill (and I don’t mean with the flu), I had absolutely no desire to date anyone, my social life was a mess as I was still new in town, my back was as my back is – aching and causing headaches, I felt drained, tired…I lost weight (not for lack of eating, but because my body was just drained), I looked like hell. I knew though, I knew that in LA I had been on top of my game, so there was a place inside where everything was well. It was just a matter of transforming that to the outside.

It took all my strength to turn things around, because let’s face it: when shit hits the fan it’s not like your energy levels are on top and you are ready to play the game of your life, but that’s exactly when you have to play the game of your life. That’s part of the adventure; the trials of the hero.

For me the most difficult part was probably worrying about a friend, but what completely drained me was work, because every day I’d make a new mistake, fret about my future and be completely exhausted by the end of it. It’s easy to say let go of your worries, but when nothing seems to be going your way and you feel like each day you get a new bucket of ice water thrown in your face and you’re not sure how to reach any of your goals, it doesn’t come across as all that easy. I was lucky. I had a fucking strong spiritual core that I kept returning to – a place of love – but whereas in LA that would take me five minutes to get to, here it could take me five hours and last for five seconds (great sex right there…).

Today when I look at my life I look at a smiling boss and business partner who has finally agreed the go-ahead of our company (I mean it was already incorporated, but that means very little without the dough) – once they find a replacement for me in his other company it’s go (well, part-time go…my salary from my company isn’t exactly erm, high). I look at my social life and I feel joy and peace. I look at working with a project that supports kids in London and South Africa and I feel like walking on clouds…a twelve year dream finally starting to materialize. I look at potential dates and I smile. I look at someone in the mirror who’s dancing and twirling forwards with dimples in her cheeks.

Today, you see at a woman who is living her dream, feeling sexier, sassier and happier than ever…but she was living her dream a couple of months ago too. It just wasn’t the pretty stuff…but it was the stuff that makes for a good story, a good adventure. And maybe it could have been different, maybe it could have been easier if I had been on a higher level of spirituality, or higher up the mountain, what have you, but we all start from somewhere and then we climb. I got furious at myself at times thinking I was making the same mistakes all over again, but clearly I hadn’t yet learnt how not to make them. You have to be nice to yourself.

What turns things around in life? In stories of great adventure it’s usually a dashing Prince, or Princess (or Jester, I stick by that one, LOL) isn’t it? Or it’s the ticket that flies in through the window and you realize that you are soon to be jetting off to Africa… Or it’s winning the lottery…or getting the dream job as if by magic.

In life I think the real turning point is love. It’s a place of love in your heart, where you allow for the magic to happen. It’s the desire to change things around, coming from that place and acting from that place. If you live in that space of free flow, of intuition and love…life does change bit, by bit, by bit. Sometimes over night, but often after many small steps of love. That doesn’t fool-proof you from storms, it just teaches you how to fly a bit better and a bit higher than before on a day-to-day basis.

So once again: love peeps. May it flow in abundance and may you have the strength to find it when life is rough and the dream of tomorrow seems far away. Even when you cry, may you love so that gates are opened for more love to enter, to heal you and move you to safe harbours.

You are always a heartbeat from anywhere: open your heart and be ready to fly when the right wind sweeps by…and it always will, you just have to have patience for it to come round and make the wind chimes chime…

The parody of life, the beauty and the…uhm…blowjobs…

I got this email today: “Dear Sir or Madam, Please take me off your emailing list with immediate effect. I am sick of you.” Is it just me or should the person make up their mind whether to be polite, or an asshole? Confusing. Someone else informed me via Facebook that happiness is always an inside job…and I who always thought it was a blowjob. Even more confusing. And that’s the thing with life: it can be confusing. So fucking confusing you’d need to get fucked just to forget your confusion for a while….but then there’s the confusing bit about love and finding the right men…I mean man…and uhm good sex…

I was messaging with a friend of mine today and her newborn baby was just awakening on her chest as she was writing to me. As I later sat on the bus this suddenly sprung to mind. Or to be precise: what sprung to mind was the feeling of how you watch over a new life filled with compassion because you know what it feels like to wake up, to fall asleep, to fall in love, to lose loved ones, to fail at something, to succeed, to laugh till your belly hurts, to cry till you think you have nothing left inside, to dance like the world is your oyster…if so only for the night. You know, so you feel. You feel for them as if they were you. Especially children as they are absolutely unprotected, or guarded from us by fear or thinking patterns. They are just there, looking with big eyes at a very fresh world.

Moments after this came to mind I gave up my seat to an older lady, simply because I know what tired feet feel like (and because my granddad would jump down from heaven to kick my butt if I didn’t behave with decency towards others).

We act with compassion towards each other; with understanding and sympathy simply because we know. We know what it feels like. Even if we are different and some of us feel pain in different places from others, or fall in love with different things, we all know. We all know pain and we all know love. We know laughter and tears….and making love, of course. We hold onto each other and support one another through life because we know what life feels like, so if that’s the only thing we know. Because we may know what life feels like, but life itself is often confusing.

The day I decided I could have kids because I knew enough about life, was the day I realized I know nothing and life is an experience, not an accomplishment. Yes, we are here to grow and learn…but we know so little. So long as we do our best, we love, we enjoy…we are successful. What life throws you at any given moment is impossible to know. To take a deep breath and lovingly and, erm, preferably with a good sense of humor, deal with any given circumstance is truly success. To apply your knowledge from the past yes, but also realize that what you know is always limited…unless for the heart, of course…I always believe that the heart and your soul’s connection with life somehow knows…but it knows without you knowing. You just open the door and you get the answer (sometimes in a rather weird way), but how, or why, or what…who knows?

Sometimes I try to figure it all out. I think about things. I think for so long I don’t act. That’s why my new motto is “maybe”. I will surrender to every moment and try things out. I will follow my heart….so if it goes in ten different directions. Because hell, I don’t understand myself…I have patterns, thoughts, behaviors that are down right ridiculous and if I think…I end up acting out the same story all over again. I’m the flakiest person you’d ever come across when it comes to the men I meet for example. I can hardly commit to a date – if I think about it, there’s always something wrong. That’s how bad I am. Once I love someone though, I’m loyal for life. My best friend told me the other week that if I she was a man, she’d just marry me, because no matter what, I’m there for the men I’ve once fallen for. As tragic as I think this is, hopefully one day one man can appreciate that….once he’s battled my five thousand dragons to get to my heart that is…that I’m of course now willingly giving away to the right man…erm. You see…if I think about this, I will not go near men. I just get confused and back off. Unless they knock me down, I’m gone. So I won’t think. I’ll just do. Surrender. Let go. Fly with whatever’s there.

So yes peeps…life’s confusing, but we are here to experience it and if that’s how you see it I, personally, think it becomes beautiful. Especially if you surrender to the moment, because then you have very little time to miss lovers lost, or erm ahem California, or your most precious gran or grandpa… We’re here to live. To be there for each other. To reach out to one another. To support each other through this most magical thing called life. May love be with you. Always.

Precisely: live the love…although apparently happiness is an inside job, so don’t think you can solve your man’s problem’s this way…LOL!

 

 

Sex…yes, no, wait, maybe?!?!

The place was cozy – big colorful cushions, lanterns reflecting all kinds of colors, the lights not too intruding, but rather husky and comforting and the place itself small enough to host only a dozen tables, with people sitting on sofas rather than chairs. It was a Lebanese restaurant with that typical feel of the Middle East, or Morocco. It’s the kind of place you can find in London if you manage to find the small door leading in there, in an otherwise over crowded neighborhood filled with people, bars and bike cabs. It was in other words a perfectly normal place in a perfectly normal town on a perfectly normal Saturday night. Apart from being 2012 no one was predicting the end of the world that particular night.

Even though no one had predicted the end of the world, I decided to bring it up….potentially influenced by my own blogs and thoughts from last week. I mean, why not? So, sitting sipping tea in SoHo with my friend I decided to ask him what he would do if this was either our only night together, or the last night of our lives? What would be different, if anything? Does circumstance really affect us? Would we run around town, sing along with the clocks of the Big Ben, dance like crazy people in night clubs, or just sit there sipping wine and tea?

Well, you know, the answer is of course, after exhausting our phone books with “I love you” calls, we’d have sex. I mean, wouldn’t you? OK, maybe not with anyone, but you know what I mean?! Attractive single friend, last night of the world…I think that’s when the phrase “I’m easy” is perfectly suitable. I mean are you gonna play difficult if you have 24hrs to live? I kinda reserve that to the rest of my life. And that’s just it. I do play it very difficult at times.

Normally I only say yes to challenges; things that force me to run after them, solving problems along the way and what have you. Things that keep my mind busy and give me enough adrenaline kicks to keep me going. Things that keep me engaged and constantly addicted to victory; to winning a fight. If something is served on a plate I refuse to eat it, because I sit contemplating all the other things I could eat if I wasn’t eating that. Besides, just chewing what’s served on a plate in front of you doesn’t come with any adrenaline kicks, or the sweet smell of victory either.

Of course when it comes to men it’s not all about challenges – there are also the men who make you surrender without you lifting a finger. I have been known to fall for a few of those. The kind whose power over you (plain masculine force that is) is stronger than your power to say no…and suddenly you surrender and it’s the best feeling in the world…as you are as high as anything on some sort of hormonal kick. Only you kind of forgot to check what you were surrendering to, so you end up heartbroken all the same.

So my conclusion after a night in SoHo that didn’t turn out to be the end of the world is that…well I have to start saying maybe to things. Even if the platter is served rather than me chasing it up the Himalayan mountains, I’m gonna have to try. Close my eyes, take a bite and see what happens, instead of fretting about all the other available plates out there. I have to surrender to the moment as if it was the last night of the world. I have to let go of my own inhibitions, fears and what have you and allow myself to enjoy what is. Besides, taking one bite doesn’t mean you have to commit to something for a lifetime. It’s just one bite. And really if you don’t take a bite you will never know what you could be missing out on…whereas I never take a bite thinking I’ll be missing out on everything else. (And this goes for everything in life, men is just one part of it…and as for men: taking a bite does not mean having sex people…explore the possibility and the energy between you and potential dates, yes. And let’s face it: energy is important. Look into David Deida’s work if you want to know what I mean. However, I’m still convinced that if you go for sex first you may fall more in love with your own hormones than the person at hand. My conclusion that the only way of knowing if someone is right for you is if you long to spend your time with them all the time, still stands. If you aren’t best friends, what’s the point?)

I’ve simply decided to take control over my own heart and surrender to goodness. The time has come to give myself my own adrenaline kicks rather than waiting for surroundings, or men, to provide them for me. Because when you surrender to the moment is when you start to truly live. It’s hard. It’s fucking hard to surrender to anything because of fears, what ifs and opportunity cost (especially opportunity cost)…but it’s the only way to reach bliss. Hopefully there will still be some force though. Masculine energy is so kind of like indulgent if you know what I mean…

The divine sexlife…

A bit of a pretentious headline mayhaps? But then again I guess I always saw the divine and everything else as one, or at least the possibility to experience the divine as part of life on Earth. Follow the divine in your heart and miracles will follow. That’s how I feel about it.

I also believe that the carnal enables the divine, rather than the opposite way around, if and only if, you are driven by love. We have been blessed by five very physical senses and those enable us to feel the pleasure of life on a carnal plane. I believe that’s divine.

If, on the other hand, carnal desires rule you, they will destroy your pleasure because it will be filled with guilt. If I eat chocolate because I love it, I will eat just enough to feel satisfied. If I eat it to suppress something else, I won’t enjoy it as something else is bugging me and the likelihood is that I will overeat and feel guilt as it isn’t serving my body, my temple on Earth. If I want sex and just sex it’s like having sex with only five of a hundred emotions possible, whereas if you look for the divine in sex and the person you are with, if there is love, so for a stranger, that’s very, very different. If you see the divine within it I mean.

Most of us are quite numb to love and the divine as we are busy surviving, our focus entirely on the plane of the carnal. Society teaches us a path that is often very harsh, very numbing. Life seems hard, unfair and very frightening. Moving forward together in love and light…well that sounds like a hippie phrase, not based in reality. Co-operation across the globe for a better tomorrow seems far fledged when people debate the size of cucumbers allowed across borders and shoot others because 2000 years ago there was a division of the land. People are brought up with a mentality that doesn’t necessarily focus on worshipping the divine in life and each other.

I came across this article today, which inspired this post. I didn’t really come across it. It was more like shoved in my face by my best friend. It’s about worshipping the divine in women, the feminine. Although you probably all know by now that I can’t stand the talk that the feminine is superior to the masculine, as we all have superior qualities and balance between the two is my personal theory of superiority (yin and yang), I do love this article. It’s a bit long and winding, but it has a few points, the main being that within a woman there is the sacred feminine. in her core. For a man to reach there, there are a few gates he has to pass through. He has to have the patience and the willingness to get there. In the same way I believe there is a way to the masculine divinity within a man.

I also believe the article touches upon another great point, namely that in each thing, each being, there is a teacher, or a source of wisdom, if you are only willing to learn. A tree will speak to me if I study it, as will a man. And I don’t mean speak in words, but by observing we will learn. We will learn what makes a tree strong. We will learn what makes a man strong. In the same way we will learn what will break a tree and what will break a man. Sometimes it’s good to be like the tree, sometimes it’s good to be like the man. And maybe, just maybe, if you listen to your own heart it will tell you the same tales through your sixth sense if you are open and loving. I believe love protects you and guides you.

To have the patience to enter the divine in each being, in each thing, is a blessing. It’s a blessing because you will discover a world of beauty and magic. It takes a lot of patience though. A lot of silent belief in each and everything. Personally, whether I am trying to get to know a dog, a child, or a man I just sit down and wait. I put myself in a state of calm and openness and I wait. Sooner or later most animals and humans sense the calm and they open up in a positive way. Sometimes this leads to telepathy as well as you become open to their feelings and thoughts, for better or worse you become a channel through which their energy passes.

Who a person is in their heart, unless they are very attuned with themselves and open, is not who they will act out at all times. This is why it takes time to get to the divine of a person – ideally it would be seen easily by all, because everyone would be living it.

And divine sex….uhm…welll, I think it is heart to heart, soul to soul, feeling love and compassion in your heart whilst making love. All gates open whilst making love and appreciating the sex and the feelings it brings to your body and to your partner. To feel thankful for the divine in the carnal.

 

 

He was naked and I was young…

“And there he was this young boy, stranger to my eyes, strumming my pain with his fingers, singing my life with his words…” Ever had that aerie feeling as if someone knows exactly how you are feeling? You meet them at a street corner, in a pub, you hear their music, you look in their eyes…and there, somewhere in the music, or in their voice, or in their eyes….you see yourself? It’s a single tiny glimmer of recognition, or a startling resemblance, so obvious it can be seen from miles away? It’s as if someone had captured a part of you, only it isn’t you. It’s you in them, or them in you. And you stand there, mesmerized, shocked, scared, excited and confused all at once…

We read each other’s stories…

Sometimes we are shocked because it’s a part of us we are hiding from unwilling to display in the public eye as we fear shame, or humiliation. Sometimes we are shocked because it’s a part of us we desire to develop further, or display, but haven’t yet had the courage to, don’t feel ready for…yet…but as we see it in them we gravitate towards them as if they were a magnet… At other times they display our most comfortable parts – we feel secure and connect with them immediately….as if they are our other halves, our mirrors and true friends.

…we paint each other’s words…

Our soul is everywhere, in everything. Stardust. Only in some we find a little more of ourselves and it is as if the world suddenly makes a bit more sense, because someone else seems to understand the way we see it, live it…our pain, our joy, our sorrow, our trials, our triumphs and our love…our unique point of view that no other camera lens can completely capture…no other story teller make absolute sense of…

…we are raw, naked…soul to soul…within one another now…

Yet, even if we meet those people, we see ourselves in them, we connect with them, we feel happier being around them than anyone else, the only thing that will make us stay close to them, to the other bits of our soul, is love. Love is the invisible glue that holds it all together. It’s selfless acts of kindness that will make, or break the relationships we form with those around us. We have to look after our friends, colleagues, employees, partners…or they will be gone. No matter how strong the connection, no matter how much you felt like their harbor, as such you need to learn to protect them from the storm, or they will be blown away by other winds… There is magic in a meeting, a lot of magic, but from then on you have to create magic in your own life and in their life, if you want a magical journey on…

If I can’t have you, I’ll have a banana…

A little while back I heard someone explain to me why someone was a bastard, pretty much, at the same time as making it clear they wanted to be with this bastard. For me this was a wake-up call as I thought it really sad and I know I’ve done it myself in the past. Basically you are saying you want the perfect friend, relationship, work situation, etc. but you are blaming someone else for not giving it to you, whether you find them flawless, or not apart from that. Because you say you are willing to do it, you blame them from stopping you. Like you are ready to set up your business, but your business partner isn’t. You are ready for a serious relationship, but the person you are dating isn’t. You are willing to have the best ever relationship, but your friend isn’t. And you are the one ending up frustrated because you are willing to give it all, but if you think about it, why do you choose to do it with them? If you truly wanted it, wouldn’t you have chosen someone who truly wanted it also? Or maybe you are just so used to being frustrated, that you always choose situations which frustrates you? Or hang around people who frustrate you?

This also reminds me of one of this year’s focuses for me which has been whenever someone for some reason frustrates, or annoys me, I look to see if this resonate with something in me. If I get annoyed because someone avoids conflict, doesn’t trust my love, or tells white lies, or whatever I look to see if I have it in me. I.e.: If someone doesn’t trust my love, do I not trust other people’s, or my own love? If someone avoids conflict, do I avoid conflict with myself, or others? If someone tells white lies, do I tell white lies to myself, or others? A lot of our own patterns we are so used to we can’t see them. You can’t see the forest for all the trees, right?! But when you look at someone else it’s like looking at the forest from afar.

I don’t think all of this applies to everything – I’m not sure every person we meet is a mirror of ourselves in every way…I just think there is something to be said for stopping to think about why we are in the situations we are in when they annoy, or frustrate us. I also think there is a lot to be said for rethinking those situations. Like whenever you get annoyed with what is, think about what you would love for it to be. Sometimes you’ve already left the situation behind, or you don’t want to fix it in that scenario, but then imagine what you would like it to be in the future. If you just left the fivehundredeth bad party, then start imagining what a good party would be like and keep your eyes open to that. There’s a lot to be said for getting out of our own thinking habits, so that what we look for in life starts changing. On that note I’m going to focus on hearts instead of six packs, romance instead of sex and love instead of dangerous attraction…but it would be nice if it all came together…

If you can’t have him, maybe you should go for a banana instead and then stick with guys who offer…banana services…

 

 

Beneath the boxers and the panties…

I was talking to someone about many things last night and one of them was about being present and who we are beneath our attitude(s). We were also talking about love and why we choose the partners we choose. Personally I always say it’s love and soul connection I’m looking for and I would say that’s the same for friendships. It took me years though not to put on airs to impress, but just enjoy being with someone. Being present without attitude. I wanted to see their soul, but I wasn’t prepared to show mine and I thought they wanted…my stillettos. My perfect life. That I obviously didn’t have. 

I guess most of us grew up to believe that what people want from us is a performance, a spiel, rather than us. Purely us. Most people bought into the idea that confidence is something we put on top, rather than us being 100% transparent and being OK with that. That doesn’t mean you have to tell all your thoughts, it just means you show up as you are, in the moment without pretence. Nor does it mean we can’t entertain, or have a grand career, or whatever people often refer to as “the outside,” it just means that when it comes from the heart it’s very different from a need to do it to impress, or whatever it is that’s not simply an expression of you. Your heart.

As I was on the tube home there was a homeless man asking for money, or food. He did it in a very pleasant way, as he simply explained kindly that it was raining and he would love some money for shelter, or just some food. He was very friendly and humble and the very short, to the point speech was polite. He seemed apologetic to disturb rather than demanding cash and he was still apologetic rather than angry if it wasn’t given to him. Still, I didn’t give him any. I wasn’t sure of him. It was a speech, it was a performance, so I didn’t know how badly he needed the money. Some people just want an extra fag and have plenty for the shelter already.

As I got off the tube later and was walking along the platform, I saw the same man sitting down, counting a few coins and looking completely miserable and borderline desperate as he was counting the money. I saw it just as I was exiting and walked back to give him some money. The reason I did it was because I SAW him. Him. I saw him when he thought no one was watching. I saw his pain and I felt it. I saw a human being bleeding.

We connect with people we feel. For you to truly connect with people, you have to allow them to feel you.

Never think you are ugly. Never think that who you are is not who people want to see. Who they will connect with and understand, who they will make friends with and love is the the cake, not the icing.

Allow yourself to show what’s underneath the surface…those are the yummy bits anyway!

Hello sexy, I just wanted to tell you that you are, uhm…yummy…

If you think about it human connection doesn’t start with a smile, or checking out someone’s ass, or laughing at someone’s joke. It starts with hello. It starts the day you decide to cross the barrier of being next to someone, to being with someone.

We think so many things. How we love someone’s smile, ass, jokes…but unless we say it, unless we cross that invisible border from being a spectator to being part of the scene, we will never know. We will never know if we could have worked with them, had dinner with them, or smacked their bottom in bed. Ahem.

If you want answers, you have to ask questions. Not just in your mind, but out loud. You have to dare to launch your own venture to see if it will work. You have to dare to tell someone you are in love with them. You have to dare to ask for a raise, a new job, a better contract for your flat… Always ask. The worst that can happen is that people say no. They often do, but the winners never quit and the quitters never do. The winners become winners because with every defeat they learn something new and they LISTEN to what they learn. They don’t just charge on. They stop. They ponder what went wrong, but sooner, rather than later they start asking questions again.

Start with small questions. Hello leads to how are you leads to wanna grab a coffee leads to dinner leads to… Start small and work your way up the ladder…or down the ehrm, the…you know what I mean…

Status quos are comfortable until you realize what you lose by keeping them… What’s there to lose? Really? Get off the bloody train going nowhere, stop and say hello…because you never know…behind that smile might be the love of your life or the biz venture of your dreams…

Hello…

Why hello, I was just dropping by…your desk…to leave a memory…