experiencing

Today I wanted to share not just my words but those of a friend who sent a message to me (letters somehow don't seem to be written as much in this new technological world we live in). Many of us are searching for... something. What do we want to do? I'm not just talking about a job, but in life.

We take out time or rush into it. We talk to others about it... endlessly. Or we don't say anything at all and keep it stirring and rattling away inside of us for many years. Some of us decide to go for it.

(photos taken by me of wild pigs Red and Twinkie at home on the farm.)

This is how my friend Remco put it to me today:

" When talking about ME, I mean I really, REALLY need to find out what makes ME happy. Not find out what I think or have been thinking I 'should' do, or what other people would want me to. But simply what makes me happy. Amsterdam e.g. is huge, and provides you with all possible and thinkable possibilities. So I should go there and prosper. Right? Wrong. Rem (saying to myself), you are no semi-Jesus, you stupid a**ewipe. You are just a guy. You need things. You want things to connect with you, not the other way around all the time. Amsterdam makes you numb. Makes you feel little. Realize that and realize that's just fine. Your home place is not there. You don't want the tram and the bike. You don't want the 179 neighborhoods. You don't wanna give it 5 years starting a completely new life and living. You wanna make your lonely mom see you more often than once every 2 months. You wanna cherish your 100 friends and 1000 acquaintances rather than throw 90% away to start all over.So live that life! Not a life you have sketched out. Just the life that you ARE."

The life that we are. I could't have put it better then he did (and his words are residing on this page with his permission). So many things would go so much better... if they were done from the heart. Wouldn't they? 

(Picture below is of my husband Nico holding a very much alive wild piglet called Twinkie short for TwinkleToes.)

More from Rem: "So, what I am doing, is finding ME. I have no idea about ME, when it comes to simple things.  NOT helping when trying to put down my desired career on a sheet. What helps is listening to my gut feeling. Or starting to learn to listen to my gut feelings actively. I might just go do any job to find myself pursuing a life more than pursuing the 'right career' (the one I 'should' find and pursue). 

I have already realized many things. About the friends and other peeps I don't wanna miss. Not because they are the most perfect, but because they're mine. They are MY friends, and I am theirs. Furthermore, I think I really like grey, blue'ish grey, and some shades of brown. I am willing to pick up litter from any street and should NOT feel being laughed at when I do. I DO have the right to be a pain in the ass once a week. It IS possible for someone to not like me.. I wanna live NOT in a big city and that is nothing to be embarrassed about. 

I can dream and have high morals and standards and left-wing utopian dreams... but it is okay to be human and normal in daily life. It is ok that I hate extremes, and love the middle, the reasonable, the social, the average.. And, it is okay to live the life you want to live. Even when others, from their capitalist and materialist views, express they feel sorry for me not getting all out of life. They are NOT talking about the same concept. At all. And that is ... OKAY. It might be me +wine speaking. Speaking, opening-up, not-organized-story-building, and doubtful-sentence-building anyway. But hey, I know you won't mind. Cause we're okay. We don't demand, we experience." 

I like it. How do you feel about your life at the moment?

Photos: taken by me and copyrighted: please do not copy for any reason.

socially yours

Cordially yours? Nah. Socially yours!


According to maestro Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook: it's not about being connected, but "what you are going to do once being connected" This means even MORE apps. Personally I think the market will increase to be flooded with apps that there will be a point where we will be "apped" out. This moment will come sooner rather then later. But that's a story for another day. For now we are all still playing.

Google+ has swept the geek world by storm. As Robert Scoble says: "How popular is Google+? Well, in less than a week I will have more followers here than I have on Facebook despite being on Facebook for more than three years."
Or: as another Google+ user tells it (Oliver Reichenstein): "User Interface Design standards have reached the level of graphic design, industry design and architecture, a level, where only user interface design professionals can discern outstanding work (Google+) from good work (Twitter) and average work (facebook)."


We are social animals. No matter how we live: exchange of thoughts and feelings is always going to be paramount. So what is going to be next? Does it matter? Well: does it matter to you?


And that is exactly it: instead of looking upon other people to provide answers as we generally tend to do: I think we will come to understand more and more that we are our own authority. As Hugh Macleod so aptly says:

I translate that to: you need to decide for yourself. At all times. CHOICE is what always matters. In everything.


You're never are going to have as much fun as the moment you know and decide that your life is. your. own. Whether you do something brilliant, stupid or whackadoodle: it's yours! How cool is that! So if you don't enjoy your life as much as you think you should: it's solely your responsibility to do something about it. Ha! Now you can't blame anyone for anything anymore. Liberating isn't it? 

Cartoons all by Gapingvoid.com