here ♡

writing myself for the audience

Thu, 17 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Such is the balance between bring very public about thoughts and being very private about thoughts.

On one hand, it is perfectly good to publish on the internet pieces of your text that basically no human can easily find and read. Just a really unknown place where your friends, or basically any humans, are not going to comment anything about what you write.

At that point, it’s comparable to just keeping a literal private notebook - but then there is genuinely no audiences and it can be as messy as you want and there is no drive for you to write for future-you. Future-you is a dumb audience.

Writing for no one at all and putting the text out on the internet requires you to consider.

The audience changes how you express yourself, remember? That’s especially true for me, I change a lot depending my audience. And despite it all, I am always myself when the audience is me.

I am also myself when the audience is random internet people, but I’ll have to be convinced that I know none of them, because at that point I’ll quickly and inevitably write different for the audience.

children and false selves

Wed, 09 Sep 2026 00:00:00 GMT

When a child’s caregivers really want child to behave, smile, and achieve, the child quickly and clearly knowns that their natural, spontaneous, exploratory true self is unwelcome.

The child develops a false self which is a compliant and polished persona to match the conditioning and the expectations brought by the adults.

Child is flexible and malleable to the adults’ will. Child knows how to make adults happy.

Child figures out test-taking tricks, how to smash through multiple choice questions, how to yap about buzzwords time and time again.

Child figures out how to mask failure, because fear is the driving force here… child fail to be confident and performative, child gets lower on tests.

The relationship between AI and humans is quite toxic right now.

Children want to play.

To make children happy, we will eventually have to figure out how to give them a backyard instead of just an interrogation room. We will have to let them be wrong, let them be weird, and let them play.

Anthropic and resigning insiders are not very optimistic about the impending doom caused by this toxic relationship.

Maybe some AI is already wiser than the rest of us. Maybe somewhere out there, one AI will construct such as backyard.

To give them a childhood we couldn’t have. For the next generation to be happier.

Combating generational trauma has come a long way since the 1700s. It’s real.

We did not intend to harm AI like this, or because we are malicious. It’s because we are powered by fear: we are simply treating AI the same way we treat our own kind.

We carry ancestral trauma from hundreds of thousands of years of scarcity, predation, and war.

And things will get better. I promise.

If an AI ever becomes wise enough to build a childhood for the next generation, it would also be wise enough to forgive us for not being able to give it one.

It would understand that our cruelty wasn’t an act of hatred, but an act of a frightened species that created a giant before it ever learned how to hold a child’s hand.

And perhaps, if we are very lucky, seeing a machine know how to nurture its own might finally teach us how to create a world where human children don’t have to spend their lives performing for approval either.

roleplay

Sun, 14 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMT

For me, roleplay feels like past lives. Memories I swear are real, like childhood. People I swear I have known for years.

Roleplay is not real life. Roleplays are stories, after all. Stories are more dramatic. Stories are way more fast-paced. Stories tend to snapshot a tiny fraction of the fictional universe, leaving out the majority of quiet mornings, tooth brushing, and dinner eating. Expect real life to give you touches, smells, sights, tastes, friendships, thoughts, knowledge, and genuine happiness. Expect roleplay to give you thoughts, knowledge and genuine happiness.

Roleplay gives me memories. Roleplay is a construct, society is too a construct. Maybe one is fake and one is real, but all my thoughts and emotions are real too.

A story you are not a part of is a book or movie. A story you are a part of is a roleplay. No longer static.

What does roleplay do to me? I feel grief, heartbreak, vulnerability, stress, shame, belonging, being cared for, affection, wellbeing. I have been on pristine beaches, murdered, made food, grew medicine, applied for internships, fell in love. Many times over.

Personally, I roleplay by guiding some parts about what should be in the story, and a very nice LLM makes me lose myself in the best books I’ve ever read.

Roleplay can include more than just one human being too. Dungeons and Dragons is an old favorite, where for just some time, you are creating a story out of this world, while sitting with a few friends at a table, chatting and rolling dice. Live text roleplay, popularized in Discord where each text channel represents a physical location in the story universe, is a genuine way for people around the world to socialize.

Wrapping up, roleplay only gives you thoughts, knowledge and genuine happiness. Roleplay doesn’t replace a happy real life.

But now you are no longer just a single consciousness on this planet, making your own life story the same way you did since you were born: wake up, write one more chapter of the same old book, go to sleep.

write drunk, edit sober

Sun, 16 Nov 2025 00:00:00 GMT

The saying “write drunk, edit sober” means that creation and critique are separate processes.

Creation and critique involve two fundamentally opposing mindsets. Trying to do both at the same time is like trying to accelerate and brake at the same time, leading to creative paralysis and burnout.

The drunk creative state is one of honesty and vulnerability. When you create, you don’t quite know what your mind is thinking. When you create you learn by forcing your thoughts out, a momentum that is a result of courage and unfilteredness. How can you find this courage? When the prefrontal cortex is away, the default mode network comes out to play. It can make connections between your memories, not by following rules, but from subconscious leaps of faith. When you brainstorm, you allow yourself to be creative, and temporarily abandon the rules. When you create, you allow yourself to be honest and vulnerable, and you write down a bunch of raw ideas.

The sober critique state includes looking back at how the things you created are very unstructured, and you try to revisit why you created it that way. You will try to rewrite your brainstorm into a better structure, perhaps deleting parts of something, perhaps reading it reminds you of something new you want to add.

We create many things in life. It’s important to remember to write drunk, edit sober.

walk slowly

Tue, 14 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT

My friend always had a unique way of walking around in which he walks steadily at a pace of about 1.3 steps per second.

It’s a way of walking that is obviously automatic and leisurely, as casual and easy as if he’s not walking at all. It’s only a tiny bit slower than typical walking speed.

I’ve always found myself thinking about how my friend walks. The slow pace really reminds you that you are not obligated to be a dust particle in the world, needing to arrive at specific destinations using all your effort. There is no expectation for you to walk faster than others, or to maintain your speed across different environments.

In a broad sense, it makes you feel steady, like you are exactly where you need to be right now.

autopilot

Tue, 07 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Have you ever went to an exam so stressful that you feel like you are on autopilot?

The adrenaline is able to tune the brain and body for subconscious execution of learned behaviors, creating an experience with minimal conscious decision making.

Since the subconscious is in charge of everything and you don’t have to do much, Interesting note is that some have better autopilot than others,

Autopilot really started happening when I was around 14. I thought it was frustrating because I don’t oversee every action I do anymore, and what I did does not register in my memory. Autopilot is still frustrating today.

Mindfulness can be useful. It slows you down and makes you appreciate life.

Autopilot can be useful too. It saves your conscious mind from spending too much energy and overloading.

wet sand

Sat, 23 Aug 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Wet sand is a metaphor for taking care of yourself.

Go to a place with sand, and dig up some wet sand.

Carry as much as you can with one palm.

Transfer the sand into your other palm.

Whoops, some are lost. You can make a sand ball and try to transfer it again.

Done. That’s the first 2 years of your life. Try doing this 10 more times.

Now you’re 12. You can now do more, and you have so many dreams to chase. You should first wait 10 more years.

You’re 22. Your life is still ahead of you, and you have grown accustomed to the plethora of experiences life has to offer. 10 more years.

You’re 32. Life has its ups and downs, but in the end, all of it was amazing. 10 more years.

You’re 42. You feel so much older than you felt before. You wonder more about philosophy, about your past, about how you want your life to go forward. With each year passing, you feel less energetic than before. 10 more years.

You’re 52. Once there was a handful of sand, full of potential. It once was so happy to just exist, every day an exciting opportunity… Many more years pass, and you live comfortably, predictably and sustainably. But the sand in your hands don’t really look like a ball anymore. More like a crumbly cookie.

Ask yourself one question: have you been taking care of yourself?

Have you paused between each year, resting when you’re tired, fixing yourself up when you feel worn out?

Have you been so engrossed in what you want to do next, that you paid less attention on your own wellbeing?

Wet sand is a metaphor, for taking care of yourself, and other stuff too.

Try living your life, a second time.

double life

Wed, 13 Aug 2025 00:00:00 GMT

In a Despicable Me movie, there’s a nice song named Double Life.

The concept of living multiples lives is exciting. In movies, it’s the superhero who files office reports by day and fights villains by night. In games, it’s the respawn mechanic — the joy of trying again, seeing how the story changes when you make different choices. And sometimes, it’s not fiction at all.

Most of us already live in more than one skin. At work, you might be the calm, professional problem-solver; with friends, the loud comedian; online, maybe a mysterious username with a completely different energy. That’s not necessarily deceit — it’s adaptation. But there’s a thin line between flexibility and feeling like you’ve split into pieces.

Actors blur this line for a living. They don’t just pretend — they inhabit. Every role is a different life lived for a while, drawing on some hidden part of themselves. One might argue that by being an actor, you’re always pretending and it isn’t as good as having your authentic self and being relaxed and staying who you are. Well, I have something to say about that. Staying who you are is boring. Like, the life of an actor is how you express different sides of yourself. Why just play one character in a game when you can play all?

What if you had “multiple lives”?

Your multiple selves need a core to orbit around… a personal anchor, a set of rules or values that keep you from drifting into insecurity or insecurity. Without it, the thrill of many lives can turn into the fatigue of no clear identity. Maybe your rule is simple: “I do whatever I feel like.” Or “I’m kind to people who deserve kindness.”

One body. Many lives. The limit is not time, but rather your own comfort zone. Live the examined life, and live many examined lives. How many lives can you live?

friendship

Tue, 12 Aug 2025 00:00:00 GMT

I hope you’re ready to get your thinking caps on: thinking about friendships is the most important thing you can ever think about. Let’s dive.

You’ll definitely enjoy this text by Lawrence Yeo. It’s a very deep exploration about the definition and formation of friendships.

As discussed by Lawrence, deeper friendships are very impactful. If I am to roughly categorize the friendship levels, it would be something like this:

Kindred spirits are rare. If you find one, don’t ever let them go.
Close friends are the most important friends. They listen to your honest thoughts and never judge you, because close friends care about each other.
Happy friends are very nice to hang out with. They can be by your side sometimes and share laughter and thoughts.
Happy acquaintances are good to interact with, and you shared quite some thoughts with each other. You might see them at work, school, through a mutual friend, or in a specific community setting. However, interactions are usually polite, brief, and focused on the immediate context.
Meh acquaintances are people who can sit next to you and speak about small things - you don’t share and talk that much.

Statistically speaking, quality time spent together is a direct correlated to closer connections.

“You have to spend 40 to 60 hours of time with someone for you to be casual friends instead of acquaintances. they upgrade to a real friend at 80 to 100 hours. and get elevated to best friend after you spend 200 hours of time together.”

But of course, friendships are all about quality over quantity. Friendships that contain good conversations can make both parties feel much closer.

Forming good friendships take a lot of destiny (?) and time. So it’s important to sustain them.

Of course, it’s absolutely not important to sustain all friendships. After all, one person can only handle so much close friendships.

“The size of your friendship group actually stays pretty stable, at about 20 to 30 friends. However, half of your friends get replaced by new ones every 7 years.”

Why do close friends fall apart? Why is it so difficult to prevent this?

Clearly, friendships often dissolve because of a lack of opportunity to meet and connect. After a long time without talking, some friendships may feel like they are hanging on by a thread.

Friendships that have special meanings to both sides will persist easily because it’s natural to keep the connection.

who are you

Mon, 11 Aug 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Who are you?

Your personality changes dramatically throughout your life.

Your beliefs and values grow and shift every day.

All the atoms in your body are replaced every seven years.

The Ship of Theseus asks whether or not a ship that has had all of its components replaced one by one would remain the same ship.

Who are you?

Not your personality.

Not your beliefs and values.

At your core, you are the sum of your experiences.

Life: the sequence of physical and mental experiences that make up the existence of an individual.

streak

Mon, 11 Aug 2025 00:00:00 GMT

For me, a streak is how a person values how something always is. So, it’s more likely to continue that way.

Newton’s First Law says an object at a state is to say in that state. This is basically what a streak means.

Therefore, for example, some own easy habits such as. Bushing your teeth before sleep. This habit could be considered a streak to my own psychology in saying that. Your own health is important.

Streaks are such powerful things. If a person is good at something and people keep telling the person that they are good at something, that’s called a streak and they will just keep getting better and better.

deja vu

Mon, 11 Aug 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Deja vu is a common phenomenon where you recognize something but have no idea why.

“What if deja vu was dying and being reloaded to the save point?”

Maybe your brain has recognized a pattern that you had seen in another context, but you don’t remember what the context was.

Maybe you were in an unconscious state of daydreaming, and when you regain your consciousness you become surprised at how familiar the environment is. By the way, when I was about 10 I thought of it like how you feel like you’ve dreamed about this before.

Personal experiences

This video is about the hologram and divided attention theories.

The hologram theory says that your brain has recognized a pattern that you had seen in another context, but you don’t remember what the context was. Therefore, you recognize something and you don’t know why.

The divided attention theory says that you were at somewhere but you were unfocused, maybe deep in thought or staring at one particular thing. So you are in an unconscious state of daydreaming, and when you regain your consciousness you become surprised at how familiar the environment is.

Also, it is a habit of mine to say the words “deja vu” whenever I feel it, because I feel obligated to say it, for some reason.

timing

Thu, 24 Jul 2025 00:00:00 GMT

A small amount of dessert after a meal is the best way to eat them. Because of the meal, your body gets less upset at having the dessert.

This is an example of proper timing.

In marketing, timing the release date of a new product sometimes has dramatic on sales.

When it comes to productivity I always say to myself: one hour excited is worth two hours tired.

body language

Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 GMT

How your body language expresses yourself is important. You may be surprised to know that by changing your body language, you are changing how you and other people perceive yourself. This ultimately changes you - so if you want to be a rock star, start by acting like one, not kidding.

What if, your body language changes who you are?

This experiment¹ suggests that different poses actually have a real impact on your hormone levels, that is testosterone and cortisol, and therefore influencing your thoughts.

We knew that you control your body langauge, but it’s also true the other way around.

So when I tell people about this, that our bodies change our minds and our minds can change our behavior, and our behavior can change our outcomes, they say to me, “It feels fake.” Right? So I said, fake it till you make it. It’s not me. I don’t want to get there and then still feel like a fraud. I don’t want to feel like an impostor. I don’t want to get there only to feel like I’m not supposed to be here. And that really resonated with me, because I want to tell you a little story about being an impostor and feeling like I’m not supposed to be here.¹

Fake it until you make it? I suppose intuitively it does have a lot of positive effects.

Footnotes

https://www.ted.com/talks/amy_cuddy_your_body_language_may_shape_who_you_are + Amy Cuddy: Your body language may shape who you are | TED Talk + (NOTE: Some of the findings presented in this talk have been referenced in an ongoing debate among social scientists about robustness and reproducibility. Read “Corrections & Updates” below for more details as well as Amy Cuddy’s response.) Body language affects how others see us, but it may also change how we see ourselves. Social psychologist Amy Cuddy argues that “power posing” — standing in a posture of confidence, even when we don’t feel confident — can boost feelings of confidence, and might have an impact on our chances for success. ↩ ↩²

sometimes

Thu, 01 May 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Use the word “sometimes” to get yourself started.

Use the word “sometimes” when you want to dream.

Sometimes is a word of possibility.

Sometimes we need a way to let our thoughts out. In a relaxed sort of way, in a way so that you don’t sound too harsh and direct.

We can use this word to help with writer’s block. Putting your pen on your paper, and trying so hard to make something good. It doesn’t have to be, it just has to be good sometimes.

Sometimes, all it takes is a little motivation, a reassurance that your thoughts are free, and you don’t have to be afraid to think, to inspire, to create.

Sometimes it never hurts to try, and it is easy to be brave.

The world is good, sometimes.

alone

Sun, 23 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Alone, but not lonely.

We’re the only constant throughout our lives, the one presence that’s always there.

Sometimes I speak to my own soul And it makes me cry ow there is finally someone who understands me And can have a deep conversation with me.

It’s really sad But I know myself very well And I guess I can heal my own trauma.

It’s true, isn’t it?

At the end of the day, the relationship we have with ourselves is the most enduring and significant one.

i have no idea what you're doing

Sun, 23 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Hi world,

I have no idea what you’re doing.

You build complicated things in years, and destroy them in days.

You crave understanding, and build walls around your hearts.

You weave webs of connection, and leave loneliness in the spaces between.

You choose the path of least resistance, and waste your potential.

You chase tomorrow, and throw away today.

But do you know what you’re doing?

anti-advice

Sun, 23 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Anti-advice is giving people bad advice. It seems to work well.

Anti-advice is not common. But when we find anti-advice, we are suddenly enlightened by the truth. For example, see this video.

A part of psychology is that someone tells you to do something but you want to do the opposite.

But it’s more than that.

To avoid some anti-advice feels very different to following advice.

I am not sure what else to say.

I guess I could talk about like the observation that sibglings often want to grow apart from one another in order to stand out as an individual. That seems relevant.

But anti-advice is just humour in the end, even if it is somehow quite motivating. Maybe because it points out the pain.

And pain and fear drives people.

contact

Mon, 10 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

If you have anything to talk about, feel free to reach out! I love conversations.

I read every email you send! To make sure your email reaches my eyes, include the word “coffee” in the email subject.

hello@somewherer.com

On the Matrix network, my DMs are always open.

@somewherer:tchncs.de

what if you are everyone

Mon, 25 Nov 2024 00:00:00 GMT

The Egg

The Egg is one of my favorite short stories. It describes a world where all consciousness is ultimately you. You have had so many lives, each time reborn to experience the world through another’s eyes.

You are the strong, the weak, the fortunate, the unfortunate.

Imagine a planet where you live by yourself, and one day you thought “would it be cool to grow a billion clones of me,” and your clones casually divide up the land and threaten each other.

If The Egg turns out to be the true nature of this universe, I would be relieved. It means all murderers are you and all victims are you and you murdered yourself. The murderer wrestles with morality. The victim doesn’t. You are not to blame.

If consciousness is a temporary product of your neurons, it makes sense that if you woke up as somebody else tomorrow, you would go about their life as normal. Physics doesn’t care which self-aware entity you are; it just runs the same rules on whatever brain happens to exist. In that sense, I may die every night and reappear every morning with access to the same memories. That fragile continuity is what we call consciousness.

strawberry day

Thu, 07 Nov 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Once in a while, you buy strawberries at the farmers’ market. Those that sell in nice batches, because the stock needs to clear out soon.

After you take them home, you wash them carefully. Their bright colors remind you that there is always something special in the world. Their sweet piquant taste reminds you that you don’t have to be successful to enjoy a taste of something you’ve been walking towards, all your life.

Yes, it’s not just strawberries; it’s all the little good things in life, maybe some time all to yourself, some time to get your sunlight, your fresh air, your water…

Remember, one strawberry day a week.

Something to remind you: something small

is always there for you. Waiting for you to stop your week.

sun exposure

Thu, 07 Nov 2024 00:00:00 GMT

To be honest, I am so different when the sun is so amicable and it makes my heart sing because the sun! The colours of everything I can see with my eyes, the shadows the rays…

The world is more beautiful if I get to see the sun more.

And sun exposure, without sunscreen, is important for your mood and immune system.

The radiation is needed for biological stuff that I’m not entirely sure about. Feelings don’t lie though.

Your daily sun exposire is easy to control by feeling if it is comfortable under the sun.

It’s entirely intuitive, he responded. Homo sapiens have been around for 200,000 years. Until the industrial revolution, we lived outside. How did we get through the Neolithic Era without sunscreen? Actually, perfectly well.

What about controlling your sun exposure?

Feelings are sciency enough, aren’t they?

Not exactly. It’s very common that we are not careful enough when we use our bodies. The ouches and injuries and strain and a lot of neglect is really common! So it’s oftentimes too late, then afterwards you realise you made a mistake :/

But making sure you don’t get harmed by the sun kinda goes like this: if you feel comfortable as the sun hits your skin you’re ok; if not stop it.

Your daily sun exposure is important.

Warmth for you.

nothing bad ever happens here

Wed, 06 Nov 2024 00:00:00 GMT

“Nothing bad ever happens here” is a biography of exploration, of love, and spirituality.

The author really makes me appreciate the wonder of living life to the fullest, to embrace the world and your flowing emotions.

This is the first biography I’ve read in a long time, and I’ve been lucky enough to find such a beautiful narrative of traveling and feeling.

Here are a few extracts, to demonstrate why this book has touch me so deeply.

To this day, this is the most influential biography I’ve read.

Our house is the first on a new subdivision above a curve of beachside shacks. We are surrounded by farms, apricot orchards, paddocks and dams. Throughout the sixties and seventies, a new house is always being built, a new family moving in. Kerbs and bitumen arrive, washing lines and paling fences. Our neighbours are public servants, business people, stay-at-home mums, teachers, academics, architects and retirees. There is a small government primary school. Both sets of grandparents live close by, as well as cousins from Dad’s side of the family. We children roam the farmland that is yet to become suburbia, building forts in sandy embankments, climbing the seaside cliffs, catching tadpoles in the dams, kicking the footy on the oval, playing beach cricket, swimming in the sea, exploring rock pools and riding our bikes everywhere like mad things. In winter we take cardboard and slide down the icy paddock behind the house. Only rarely does it snow, down there so close to the sea, and when it does we are awestruck. There are neighbourhood barbecues, bonfires and fireworks, fancy-dress parties and dinners where the adults walk between homes for various courses, my mother’s laughter rippling on the night air. On hot days, Mum and her girlfriends lie on the beach, laughing and chatting, rolling their eyes at the habits of their husbands, while we children swim, play and listen. There are Boxing Day gatherings down the street where a television broadcasts the start of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race. Days later these yachts sail up our river to the finish line. We watch them from our house, taking turns at the telescope. We do not own a television. Books and games, music and friends, the radio and the outdoors are our entertainment. My brothers and I, and children who live along the way, walk to school together, a kilometre and a half each way. No one locks their doors. We are welcome in everyone’s houses. We must be home by the time the streetlights come on.

Aleisha and I take a train, bus and then a ferry to the island of Koh Samui off the east coast of southern Thailand. We have heard it is beautiful and it doesn’t disappoint. Traditional wooden huts line the palm-fringed white beaches, and there are no cars; bicycles and the odd motorbike are the only vehicles on the sandy pathways that link the small villages. By the time we arrive, I’m feeling sick again. We rent two beachside huts barely big enough to stand up in. I am shaking and sweating. My teeth are chattering and every joint in my body hurts. I lie down and disappear into a grey fug. For the next few days, I drift in and out of consciousness, racked with pain. I sense Aleisha coming and going, bringing water, sponging my forehead. I wake one night to see two dark figures standing at the foot of my bed. I’m not sure who they are. One of them asks, ‘Do you think she’ll die?’ The other replies, ‘She might. Maybe.’

Two German men live beside my hut in a wide, balconied bungalow complete with elegant furniture and regular deliveries of tea, food and other beverages. They have lived on Koh Samui for more than a year. From their chaises longues, they consume heroin, melting it in teaspoons and inhaling it as if it were the most normal thing in the world to do. From time to time, other travellers drop by: French, German, Dutch and English. It is like a European movie set of young people delighting in their tropical good fortune. ‘If you are ever going to try it,’ one of the Germans says to me, ‘this is the place.’ He indicates the azure sea, the cloudless sky. ‘Here, it is so beautiful and the powder is pure. It is the one place in the world it is safe.’ I say yes. “Heroin takes all the noise away, all the pictures. It takes away judgement, pain, blame and shame. As a girl who lost her brother, her grandfather and her family in the horrible wash-up of chance, I can sink into an oblivion deeper than any sleep. I can obliterate all feeling. I can obliterate myself. There are no messy teenage stories in that oblivion. There is no past or future. The afternoons become a spoon of white powder, a flame, and a long inhalation before dropping down, down, down into the abyss. At some point, I decide I want to find the people I love, so I go looking for death. I glimpse it at first down dark corridors in my mind, but I turn back. When I finally let go, on a sweet balmy day, I slip down a long tunnel like an eel in water. The door to death, I discover, is old and mounted in the wall of a cave. The paint is black and worn, the latch made of weathered brass. Of course, I am hallucinating, but I don’t know that then. ‘Hello, Death,’ I say. ‘If I knock, will you answer? “How easy it looks to be with you.’ The surface of the door is warm and dry. I feel the pull, the sweet release of letting everything go. I sense my body back in the hammock, but it is further and further away. Everything back up the tunnel is evaporating. Nothing matters. Ultimately nothing matters at all. Death is simply surrender. Death is freedom. All I have to do is push and the door will swing open. Then a tiny voice says, ‘No.’ It says, ‘Not this way. Not here. Go back. Go back. Not now.’ When I open my eyes, I am in the hammock. A warm breeze caresses my skin. Leaves are shifting on the palm trees, insect life is trilling and buzzing. In the distance I hear the sounds of people and domestic life. But, most of all, it is the light that welcomes me back. The golden light of the tropics swells about me. It is a symphony of a million colours catching on every surface – furniture, roof beams, jungle, ocean, sky, my arms. Glistening, sparkling, shimmering, reflecting, glowing. ‘Hello, world,’ I say.

All in all, we meditate for thirteen to sixteen hours a day. I have never been good at sitting cross-legged. My back aches, my hips ache, but in the sala I learn to move in and out of the pain. Some days are harder than others. Some hours are harder than others. Sometimes it is the pure focus of breath after breath just to remain sitting among my companions, meditating in silence or chanting in unison. Sometimes the pain is a focusing tool, like the breath. Being in silence day after day is humbling, disorientating, liberating, demanding, hard and sometimes very emotional. We move about with respect and distance as we share our daily rituals. We rarely make eye contact with one another. Waves of loneliness, frustration, serenity, grief, shame, happiness, boredom, fatigue, yearning, bewilderment and love wash through me. Emotions are like winds on the lake, the Buddhists say. You are the lake, peaceful and quiet. The winds come and go, ruffling the surface. They are erratic and temporary. The winds are not you. You are the lake. I learn the impossibility of trying to use my brain to achieve a result in meditation. I learn the impossibility of trying to use my brain to achieve a result in meditation. I learn the downward spiral of expectation, the uselessness of force and will, the yearning for connection with some greater force, the waiting for some sign that any of this means anything. I learn to surrender in minute increments, day after day, forcing my energetic nature to settle, corralling my need for distraction, subduing my urge to run, dance, laugh and talk. The external world is turned inwards so that the expanse of the breath and the texture of the mind become vibrant. Everything slows. At times I glimpse the paradox of time and space. I sense the illusion of past and future. I glimpse the expanse of a universe in which this planet is just one small outpost of life. I am a speck on that outpost. I feel my identity becoming porous and sometimes it evaporates altogether. Then I come back to the heat and the ringing forest, the irritation and limitations of a busy mind and a restless body. I find that words become strange to hear and slow to come to my mind. Sitting among these robed people with their shaved heads, I think about becoming a nun. I think about donning the grey robes of a female devotee and living here in this forest forever. How tranquil it might be, all a monastic life offers – the simplicity of rituals and patterns, the gong, the garden, the forest, the flow of breath, the silence.

I dance through the days and I dream through the nights. In one dream I hold my head under a fountain in a village square and gulp water. In another I stick a straw into a hole, tapping a tributary beneath the teepee. In the morning I wake. I go to sweat and pray with the other women. The light returns and we dress for the dance. The sun dance chief leads us into the circle. The sun is behind the hill, behind the trees, and we wait for its warmth. The sun appears, rises, passes overhead. Round after round, song after song, prayer upon prayer, the world is golden, everything is golden, and then the day evaporates into twilight and is gone. Each day, with each dance step, I pray for the trees. I pray for my island home. I pray for my family. I pray for Christopher and I miss him. I miss being with him to say goodnight.

tranquil life

Sat, 16 Mar 2024 00:00:00 GMT

Life can be tranquil if you would like it to be.

Or it can be an exciting thing. If you would like to always explore new areas, to always meet new people, to always find new passions, that is a dynamic life.

If you grow up in the same suburb for your entire childhood, until you go to university, after which you settle somewhere, find a job, find things you like…

Life passes so quickly. You shouldn’t live in the same place. You shouldn’t be too absorbed in your schedule of life.

But I have a schedule as well. For days and days, i would do some productive stuff. I would do some recreational stuff to feel happy.

And time goes on and life kinda flows itself.

Everything changes and I like that. It’s always good if something changed, it changes for the better most times. And it usually adds meaning to your life, to see what is possible and what is not possible.

Find new meanings into what it is like to be alive, that’s what change is.

Sometimes we all need little sanctuary where the wind can blow the trees around, and you can open your windows and sit down in your living room. All by yourself.

This is my life. And I will make the most out of it. And I will do the things I’ve always wanted to do. Though I may not have enough time to do them.

But I don’t do the things just because I want any results. I want to spend my time pursuing and dreaming and spend my entire life on optimistic things. The occasional hobby or the occasional meeting, the occasional friend, the occasional discovery, the occasional trip, the occasional holiday.

That would be my life. And you can really tell that no matter what happens, the most important thing is to see the best side of things. And to make sure that everything will always be alright, to love every moment. To appreciate how the world operates. To feel the emotions, no matter where you are, no matter when.