It's not about what you look at- it's about what you see.

Our Wedding

2012-02-11T08:10:00.001-08:00

People keep asking us why we got married without friends and family.

We wanted it simple. The day we said yes to each other was only about our love. It was not about party nor glamour. By saying yes to each other we gave each other the most important gifts : trust, intimacy, faith, belief in something great, time, emotions. It was the Moment we made it clear to each other that this was what we wanted for the rest of our life's. It was odd because we made it clear even though we have known it already right from the beginning. It felt so natural but yet so intimate, we made the energy between us visible and it was a simple but intense moment that needed nothing else but our focus on it. Focus. It was our moment. OUR love. Nobody else is dissolved in this magic as we are we therefore wanted it for us. no one missed out by not being a part of it . The love is there. Whoever wants to experience it is not bound to a wedding day.

The other side of being lonely

2012-02-11T04:46:00.001-08:00

Loneliness the clearest of crystal insight into your own soul, its the fear of one's own self that haunts the lonely.

If you are alone you belong entirely to yourself....If you are accompanied by even one companion you belong only half to yourself, or even less, in proportion to the thoughtlessness of his conduct; and if you have more than one companion you will fall more deeply into the same plight

There is absolutely no point in sitting around and feeling sorry for youself. The great power you have is to let go ... focus on what you have, no that which has been mean or unkindly removed.

I am not sure about how to start this. Probably "lonely" is the wrong word to describe the state of "being alone". I think the word "lonely" rather describes an emotional suffering so I should better title this entry "the other side of being alone".

I am in Berlin. My sister and her friend are out sight seeing. I decided to spend some time with myself and stay home. Being a mom, a wife and a doctor - all these are different faces of desi. But from time to time it is nice just to NOT plan, to NOT think of tomorrow, to hang around without listening to duties calling for me. The beauty of being alone can only be visible to those who have a choice, to those who can chose between being alone and having company. Without having a choice the state of "being alone" probably turns into the emotion of "being lonely".

What is happiness?

2012-01-23T12:26:00.001-08:00

A million words should enlighten this title but I am too overwhelmed right now to say much more than: happiness is when what you need and what you need harmonize.
I am in a strange emotional state -partly an ecstatic high and partly a soothing/calming contentment. Perfect temperature thanks to our chimney, the crackling sounds of wood that devoted itself to fire, the smell of homemade Indian food that reminds me of another place that I too call home, my peaceful daughter whose sleeping face can melt ice, knowing that my soulmate will come home any time and that we can engage in philosophical conversations that make you wake up a little more sophisticated than the day before.
I wish that we can recreate out lives in a way that enables us to spend more time doing things for ourselves than for others!

Decide what You Want to feel like

2012-01-16T22:59:00.001-08:00

Yesterday- it was Monday- Jogi came home at 8pm instead of 2pm.

The day before we were told that there will be an unplanned activity on monday so he will come home a little later. We were not happy about it ( i had appointments planned that demanded his presence) but we accepted it.

He was in several meetings and I did not hear from him all (mon)day so I was not aware how late it will get which means: I waited at the dining table, heartedly cooked dinner, cold favorite food, burned-out candles, no husband.
I got really angry and even more so when he finally called ( had not even eaten anything) and told me that he had to go to work on Tuesday which was supposed to be his day off. He had been working for ages now, I hardly saw him during the weekends and yes: we would low to spend some family time together!

Back to monday:
When I discovered that I was really getting angrier by the minute I asked myself what the subject of angryness was. It was NOT Jogi. Understanding this was necessary to stop directing negativity into his direction.

First Subject of my bad mood was his work that was consuming our private life and
Second subject was the fact that I felt like a desperate housewife waiting for her meaning in life to come home.

This was a very necessary reflection and when I UNDERSTOOD what was causing the tension within my chest (it is important to distinct things that you can change from things you cannot change at this point) I DECIDED to take the situation as it was and go into our favorite "good-mood"- room and read: by doing so I had shifted my sun/center of world from Jogi to myself and the problem was solved. It was really this easy.
Buddhists say that it is important to stop identifying with a problem, it is important to accept, to live in the presence, THINGS SIMPLY "ARE" and how you emotionally interpret/assess them is up to you: and I believe in this to.

Also, I CHOSE to not make my tired husband -who himself was frustrated about coming home late - a scene and welcome him with a smile and not make him feel guilty for something that was not his fault.
I think marriage (or in general: a good relationship) is about foreseeing and prevention. What would happen if you constantly decide to be a frustrated housewife that criticizes her husband once he enters the house? In the long run he would not really enjoy coming home anymore and seeing his wife and this again will make him work longer and then you have entered a spiral that causes many relationships to fail.
I have seen it.
BUT I am not saying that you always have to choose to be happy about everything. I am talking about occasional turbulence. When occasional storm turns into an unbearable climate then definitely a change has to happen. Here again: it is easier to foresee and prevent than to heal deep scars or to break through a spiral of frustration. It takes reflection as an individual and with the partner to differentiate these two when they haven't reached their worst-case-scenario.
When work keeps consuming you and prevents you from enjoying family life then occasional storm will turn into an unbearable climate and a change has to take place to prevent something so great (family and love) from falling apart. You simply have to decide what is important to you and act upon your priorities.

A letter to my readers...

2011-12-29T11:15:00.000-08:00

Dear you,

I want to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2012!

They say time flies by quicker the older you get and it is true: time flies by because you do not live just for yourself anymore. Your time kind of belongs to others, especially if you are a part of a family with kids. Our pre-christmas time was a huge time challenge for Jogi and myself (we moved into our new home on the 20th of December) and ended up in my physical break- down BUT : The kids were extremely happy and had a jolly good time!
If it had not been for my 41 Degree fever, sobbing in pain and dyspnea while trying to have christmas dinner - they would not have noticed that something was wrong with me. While I was focussing on how miserable I felt - they were really pulling themselves together in order not to strip down our christmas room.
I swear: I reached my physical and mental limits the past days: Sleep deprived, pyelonephritis, fever, weak, stressed to the max, and on top of it: pneumonia with some of its complications. And still I could not stop cleaning up and unpacking boxes. I just thought I was tired and the shivers came from exhaustion. There was so much left to do and I knew: if I rest now - Christmas will be an evening of disaster, little kids hearts will be broken and we will spend in negativity. 2011. After five years, finally Jogi had his boys around him during Christmastime!

I still feel ill and now that the boys are gone I can finally make time to rest. But watching the kids interact with each other (and we did attach great importance to the kids REALLY feeling like siblings) just warms my heart. Jogi and I love it when the three kids climb into our bed in the morning to cuddle and enjoy a good read before going to bed. I am happy that our new home makes it possible for us to be happy together. This time Samu took good care of me and the others. Joni came to my bed when I was sleeping and whispered "good night" and first thing in the morning for Maya after giving us a quick good morning kiss : paying her brothers next door a visit.
When we sent the boys off, Maya refused to kiss them goodbye. I think these farewells are harder on her than on the boys but you can also see that Samu gets sad when Maya is sad and Joni demands a million goodbye kisses and still is not ready to leave her. But overall: These children can only profit from having each other. It is wonderful.

The upsides and downside of Living in The countryside

2011-12-03T01:16:00.000-08:00

A friend wanted me to write about this.

As we have not moved yet I can only suspect that there can be certain things that might get annoying but I honestly don't think that these things will affect us because we are very, very aware of the choice we have made. It was a choice of maturity- at least for us. You might need a little excursion into our past 2-3 years to understand my phrase "choice of maturity":

Our last couple of years were happy ones because we have spent these years being in love. But at some points our lives were clearly dominated by stress and we felt heteronomous, other-directed.
We lived in fear and panic when I was pregnant, Mayas first weeks on earth were terribly strenuous and the fact that the boys were here after she was born made it worse. I was tensed, I had a break down (that sounds a little too dramatic ..) after the adrenaline medication I had to take during pregnancy felt away, I was so weak and tired from lying around for seven months. Maya was tensed from the adrenaline I had to take while she was in my tummy. She was tensed because I was. Four weeks with two very active boys, two dead tired adults and a screaming baby- all this moulded into 80 square meters.... wonderful start as first time mommy... For me this was hell and it took ages for me to recover from this stress and I think I was worsening Mayas stress- we were lost in am awful doom loop.
And honestly: after waiting (high risk pregnancy) and lying down for 200 days in pleasant anticipation of my girl - it was (at first) not what I had expected it all to be like.

It all resolved itself after two months when Maya suddenly started sleeping.
But still Jogi spent 24/hours a day at work, he was tired of a very hard split between us, boys and work- he had no time at all to himself. He felt like a hamster in a boogie wheel. Still. No complaints from his side. Just a tired and worn out look on his face. And still he got up every night to help me take care of Maya.
We had no time to ourselves, every hour we had off work was planned and organized, mostly concerning others (work-related work after work, really great, or boys). We hardly spent time at home. And home was getting umcomfortably small for all of us. Home was not anymore a place to retreat from the stress but home reminded us of all our stress. Bills and to-do-lists were piling up and they kept reminding us that we are not done working yet. Happy times turned into frantically busy and frustrating times: whenever the boys came to visit us (which were the only days off we had during the year) we were all stuck in our living room, day and night (especially during really hot summer days and really cold winter days)..... lets put it this way: even though this patchwork-family thing works really well for us: under the circumstances we were living it , we got really combative after few days of imprisonment and something that has so much potential to be beautiful turned out to be really stressful.

We started looking for bigger apartments. The rent we would have paid for an apartment covers approximately our monthly down-payment for a house. So we started to look for a house. My toddler and I had days where we looked at 10 houses, spent all day long driving... more stress...We did not like any of the houses we had looked at and Ratisbona is really, really expensive. You pay half a million euro for a tiny house with hardly any green around it that you still call garden. We never felt what we were looking for.
When I got Maya, I noticed that the city is not what we needed. I went to town quite often, just to "do" something and to not have to sit at home. But town was not as interesting anymore as it used to be. I did not want to go shopping everyday, after a few weeks you know every centimeter of the city by heart, you do not want to have cafee all the time and when a toddler starts to move: believe me, having a coffee is not as relaxing as it used to be.
It was a coincidence that we got so see our first detached house in the middle of the country side. And even though we never thought of buying a single family home neither of moving to the country side- when we got there , we felt peace. We loved the greeneries. We loved the garden. We loved to see Maya moving around and playing with the leaves of a tree (she says hello to them :-)), we suddenly felt detached from all the stress and the size of the house and its attached land made us feel free. We were flying in space. We were liberated from the confinement of our own four walls. We did not take this house for cost-related reasons but from this moment on we started looking for houses in the country side. People keep objecting because they say that 25 Minutes of commuting everyday is a huge annoying time waste. I am pretty sure that for some it is. But not for us who drive thousands of kilometers every month to see the boys or to get out of the apartment. We now live 5 Minutes away from work and I can tell you one thing for sure: if you had a long day at work, these 5 Minutes are not enough time to help your mind rest. It might be long and nerve wracking sometimes but I can tell you: the qualitiy of life we will have in our own new place is worth it! It is about a change of perspective (http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2011/11/suddenly-i-grew-up-this-is-about-change.html). Lets put it this way: we do not want everything to be quick and effective anymore! And also: people in munich would be over the moon if it would only take them 25 Minutes to get to work.

First Advantage:
The time we commute will be used to relax and to catch up on friendship. If we talk on the phone while driving , you can really BE and FEEL home once you get home.

First disadvantage:
It will take longer than 25 Minutes sometimes and you need to plan everything ahead (meetings etc.). The only thing I am worried about is snowy winter... but all our neighbors are commuting to Ratisbona on a daily basis and they say it is not a problem because the clearing of the snow happens very early in the morning.

Second Advantage:
Maya has a huge garden, and a lake, she can go pick fruits and eat homemade apple sauce, we do not have to worry about her safety because there are no cars in our dead-end street. I am happier to live on the countryside than on depending on a park that supplies kids with green and ducks. I do not feel like i need to see the city everyday anymore, my visits to Ratisbona will be less frequent but more special than before.

Third Advantage:
Houses in the countryside offer more space and land for less money! I do not want to live in a tall but slender house that forces me to look into someone elses kitchen while I wash my dishes. I do not want everyone to be able to look into our garden. I want to have space between me and my neighbors.

Second Disadvantage:
In terms of investment, it it probably smarter to by an apartment/house in the city center. Especially in Ratisbona the landprices are shooting up and population growth is predicted. This means that especially nowadays if you buy a house you will sell it for much more money.

Fourth Advantage:
We do not see people from work all the time while we have a pizza in town. You have small talk all the time with people you know from the clinic becaus ratisbona is small!

Third disadvantage:
I do not think that many people will come visit us very often because 30km is a long drive for many people. For us it is nothing to be honest.

Fifth advantage:
It was important to us that we have enough space for our kids and for their friends (if they sleep over). It was also VERY important to us that we have space for guests with kids. Because especially for those it is expensive to come buy if they have to stay in a hotel. And we love having guests and cooking for them. We absolutely love it. However, we want them to have their own space. We want our guest to feel that their visit is not only about us but also for them to spend family time together, have a good holiday, have space for themselves. This is what our house can offer. We can have guests without having to see them all the time, they can feel free and walk around naked, we would not mind :-)

Sixth Advantage:
We want to have our own place. We want to WANT to stay home and work on our home. We want it to be our peaceful island that we can always return to. We want to have our happy oasis. We want room for creativy. We have our studio (looks like a winter garden, glass everywhere) which will be used for creativity and spirituallity only. We call it our "good-energy-source". We will draw, meditate, talk, have tee while we watch the sunset.

Semi- disadvantage:
This is only a relative advantage. We very consciously decided that work will not control our lives anymore. It will also not control where we find our home. When Jogi has on-call-duty and the doctor on ward is not very experienced, he will have to sleep in his office at work.

Seventh Advantage:
Mayas soul grows up with nature and animals. That is something that we could have never given to her in the city. I believe that she will grow up with a certain peace by living within nature. She might hate us for it when she reaches puberty, haha, but we still have time until then. AND: We only are willing to move there because it is well attached to Ratisbona by public transport! Very important!!

Eighth Advantage:
The boys have their own room. They might even move to us one day. We want them to have the opportunity to come see us when they feel like it. They have space so they can take a break from each other. From us. They can feel at home now, decorate their room, leave their things with us. They can do what they want and have place to move around. I love it when they come and Maya loves them soooooooooo much. I am so excited about our first christmas together. 3 Kids and us. FANTASTIC!

I have to pick up my poopie from daycare. I could go on forever. But I think this is enough for now!

Blogs on demand

2011-11-26T23:50:00.001-08:00

Dear readers. From now on you can mail or comment if you have anything in specific that u want me to write about!

Suddenly I grew up - this is about a change of perspective

2011-11-16T04:50:00.000-08:00

I turned from a city-chick into a country-side-housewife within two years. What does it take to have a free spirited traveler finally settle down?

In the end it all comes down to one thing:

A change of perspective.

This is a story about development = a change of perspective.

I have constantly changed throughout my life. Every single thing I see or do changed/changes/will change me either on a conscious or unconscious level. That change can be a tiny hint, almost imperceptible to others, or it can be drastic, visible to everyone.

27 vs 13: drastic

25 vs 25

I can pin out a couple of phases that probably mark my most drastic changes:

1. Being born (unconscious-passive)
2. My sisters birthday (unconscious-passive)
3. Puberty (conscious - but passive)
4. Moving to Malaysia (conscious - but passive)
5. Moving to Singapore (conscious - but passive)
6. My first boyfriend (conscious - more active change taking place - starting to adapt and form my personality to make our relationship work- but still only focusing on one thing: my role in a relationship)
7. My boyfriend moving away from Singapore
8. Moving to Germany (conscious - very much pain from culture shock - active change taking place while desperately trying to "fit in" while "staying myself" - this took 5 years)
9. Trying to break up with my first boyfriend (same as above, painful attempt to have closure with the past, took many years)
10. Africa - people signalized me that I am great the way I am - I learn that my ambitions are big and worthy and not crazy and abnormal. I learn to once again (as during school time) stand up for my interests that my German surrounding made me question. This was the first big conscious, aktive phase that I used to create and re-define myself through intense experiences in a short time period. I think this took only 4 to 5 months. I came back to Germany- stronger and much more independet. This journey continued in
11. Australia - where I met one of the most important people of my life who helped me complete the development I had started in Africa.
12. India - the most spiritual and most basic of all my journeys so far - (very conscious and very active three month long phase which detached me from many materialistic needs by making clear how free one can feel without having anything)
13. Work - I love my job!!!
14. Meeting my soulmate and his boys and ex-wife (interesting journey)
15. A high risk pregnancy that proofed to be the longest phase of selflessness I could have ever imagined
16. Maya being born...a magical moment and at first a hard time. Now so much fun!
17. Moving into our new home...

I have been waiting to feel like a grown up.
I never did- so I wondered about what I was expecting to feel like. I think it was: organized, in-control of everything. But I am impulsive, chaotic, emotional and very overwhelmed from time to time.
I thought becoming a mother goes hand in hand with the feeling of being a grown up but When Maya was born, I felt exactly the way I had expected. Being a mother came naturally and dealing with the responsibilities too. I was more tired though. Does growing up come down to being more tired? Probably. Haha.
The past months have been very intense. We have worked, worried, we have been ill, we have looked at many many houses, we have been financially frustrated, we have spent many nights with our senior consultant, we still have to organize five different schedules into our daily lives (the boys, the ex-wife, Maya, Jogi, myself), we have to plan and pre-cook food, we have to work when we are ill, we cannot sleep when we are tired, and there did not seem to be an end to it.
All this stress made us realize that all we want is a peaceful life and time. We want to grow plants and draw and meditate, go for walks, be creative, feel the happiness that we have been given, see the sunset, spent free days at home, have fun times with the boys, we want to stop looking, we want to find. We decided to settle. And just by making this decision we shook hands with inner peace. We are consciously recreating our lives now that we have changed our view on things. I.e. Settling down in a house is not anymore a way of encaging our dreams but it will give us the peace that we need to create dreams that are good for us!

To Summarize it:
To ME, growing up is about harmonizing the things that I really need and the things that I do. The word "I" has a different meaning now that I am married and have a child. This pronoun consists of "Desi, DesiJogi, Jogi and Maya, The Boys" now. I am discovering what is good for me and my family on the long run and therefore I develop interest in things I have avoided so far (financial security, medical or household insurance). In the past I have been a free bird with no home (a good starting point to travel all the time) while in the present I long for more security. I want a home to shelter my family (check) and time to live our family life (we will get there). At the same time I am creating space to stay true to myself and I feel pretty balanced out at the moment.

An intensive change of life changed the perspective I had on things:
The country side used to be a boring enemy, now it is my peaceful friend.
The town center used to be my entertaining friend but I have discovered that I have within me all that I need, I profit more from seeing nature everyday than seeing the walls of Ratisbonas Old Town on a daily basis. I still love our City but I am fine with visiting once a while - let it be a special occasion.
I do not want to see people I know from work all the time and have these constant encounters engage me in rounds of small talk that last forever. I thought about living in Australia and Asia and wherever I go an Idea comes up that surely consists of another period overseas, but now that I have Jogi and my Maya, I have come home. It does not matter where we are. I long for our idyllic home, our place that brings us peace. A place that looks, smells and feels like love. Yes, the things I need in the future have changed due to decisions we have made in the past.

Our home is our choice

2011-11-14T23:03:00.001-08:00

Hello everyone!

This entry is actually based on a draft that needs to be revised and edited first before I post it! It is called "the ability to share joy" and it will find it's way online some time later today. I have been reflecting on it since we started to look for a new house/home and it has really brought me nearer to understand human nature better.

We have a new house.
It is in the countryside.
Some people describe that place as dead-end village, dump or one-horse town. These people keep saying that you need to make compromises when longing for a house that size as affordable one family houses have become a rare good. They keep reminding us of how annoying the daily travels of 30km (each way) will be. Over and Over.
As I am citing good friends I am aware that these phrases were somehow "well-meant". At first I wondered if they were produced on some unconscious level of jealousy or disfavor but I know my friends and I knew that it had to be something else.

But the fact that everyone kept repeating the same things whenever they heard about or actually saw the place we chose to be our new home made me wonder about what it is that made people I love say these really not encouraging things about a place Jogi and I really, really, really feel deeply happy about. We are at peace with our choice. Well Jogi is, it makes me upset that no one seems to be able to emotionally share our joy!!!
Everyone keeps talking about compromises and by using that word they are actually implying that this house is not perfect for us.

The home seller said that when they moved into that house everybody repeatedly said they were crazy to buy an old house so far away from the core of Ratisbona (which by the way has increased in size since then). And now, 13 years later the same people keep saying that they are crazy to abandon their beautiful home to move back into city center.

We have brought a handful of people to our house and it was only one couple who was as excited as we were. They loved the fact that this house has been build and rebuild and somehow molded itself into history. They loved the old apple trees in our garden and the fact that from time to time a farmer will pass by in his truck to work on his land. They love that we can have home made berry pie while watching the sun set. The man is gardener and he appreciated the hand work and love that was invested into paving the ground this way:

They got excited about how close the next train station is and that there is a playground and a little lake near to our house. I swear: it was so refreshing that at least someone could feel what we feel while walking around the house. Our other friends mostly said nothing in order NOT to hurt our feelings. But that still hurts because you can feel that they do not share your joy.
I am not angry at all!!
Everybody has a right of individual opinion.
Jogi just helped me figure out yesterday what has been bothering me about all the sobering comments. And I have to thank my husband for another understanding of human nature that somehow has relieved me from the disappointed emotions I have been having. And I will use our house experiences as an example for our freshly broadend understanding:

When you walk into our house you will be free to Look around. If you are currently also interested in buying or just bought your own place you will probably look at our home differently than I.e. a child that just comes in to play with Maya. You will probably compare or at least analyze what you see and most of you will assign an emotion ("I like" or "I do not like") to what you see. A couple of people do not look at single things they just feel "right" or "not right".
What happens next? Most people will identify with our house and imagine themselves living here. If you hate the countryside, if you hate wood, if you need a modern decoration to feel good or if you prefer a tiled floor to a parquet flooring then (while you identify with the house) you will not be able to develop excitement of living inside our house.
If you see the house through our eyes though and look for the same things as we do: then you will love it.

We decided that a single family house is where our heart belongs. We have had a look at many of Ratisbonas development areas that a producing tons of clone like row houses that cost an absurd amount of money. I hated it. I felt caged. To me these houses had no spirit, no soul, I was bored by looking at them from the outside as well as the inside because after having seen 2 of them you can walk through the others blind foldedly and you would still know where you stand. I loved our
House because it was exciting to see what comes next. It has a history and someone said that a couple of rooms are not located very intelligently but that's exactly what we love!!! It is different! Anyway. You can now tell: I do not like these clone-row-houses. However: my pregnant friend and her husband just moved into her row-house (very slender) that is just right in the center of Ratisbona. It was not decorated or fully furnished yet but from what was there you could feel their love for their first new home. First thing they wanted was to give us a tour of their 160qm oasis. Their eyes were full of pride and sparkling with excitement. I mean: your first house! How exciting is that!!!! I got so excited about the flooring and i started imagining my now pregnant friend walking into her then baby girls colorfully decorated room and calling her husband to share baby girls first step and so on. By doing so I probably moved from identifying with their house to identifying with their emotions. Jogi was a little irritated about how excited I can get about something I would NEVER chose for myself.
We talked about it and we think it is -as i mentioned above- because I do not identify with the house. I do not see myself living in there. I see my friend happily living in there and that makes me happy beyond words.
I have another friend that has a house I feel really uncomfortable in and still I am able to point out things I like about it. Saying nothing at all feels as painful as saying that you do not like it.

I think that there has hardly been positive feedback for us because People cannot imagine themselves
A. In that house
B. In that place

I think that we need to teach our next generation to share joy even if you cannot identify with the object of joy. It is very enriching to simply be happy because someone else is!

And finally my last statement:
1. Our choice is in no way a compromise. We do not make compromises when things are important to us (home, love, family) . We have consciously searched for a place further away from town because we need peace from smalltalk, turbulence and we want it green. We want to live "us". We want to feel "us". We have understood that the seeing the country side everyday is more of benefit to us than seeing the same ancients street everyday. Mayas spiritual and emotional development will profit. We do not want the speed of life/city to force us to race . Everything has to be quick and effective. Not for us.

This is what we want to see/feel every single night.

2. We love the fact that our house is an old country house with weird rooms in weird places. We love to know that a lady has sold her apples many years ago through her kitchen window, we love that old characteristics of the original house have been maintained. We feel a story. We feel that our house is alive. We love that we can now cook with fresh food that grows in our garden!!!!

3. We do not care at all about the fact that some renovations the current owner made are rather unprofessional. To us the feeling we have while standing in that house counts. And we feel that this house has been deeply loved and they have put all their money and energy into decorating it the way they love it. I know many houses that feel like the owners are not done yet, it is not exactly what they want it to be yet. We do not have that feeling in that house. It gives us what we urgently have been longing for: Peace!
So if you are able to see the joy in our eyes while talking about our house, or while showing you around in our house- maybe you can, - even if you would have never made the same choice- just be Infected with our happiness !

our ancient guest toilet

The view from the studio, history here: windows from the original, old building

our country style kitchen with bricks (left lower corner)

lots of wood. And we love it!

What it takes to be happy for others

2011-11-07T04:55:00.001-08:00

Dear world,
I have another bunch of thoughts that I need to share with you. If someone feels the need to philosophize with me until the sun rises while having a cup of tea: you are very welcome. I miss those days back in times when unexpected dates ended up in hours-long and fruitful conversations that left both parties a little "wiser".

A couple of occurrences during the past days made me wonder about what a personality has to have in order to be truly happy for some one else.

Theory 1
(The first thing that came to my mind was:)
a person has to be happy about his/her own life to be able to be joyful if something good happens to someone else.

However, when I think of some of my very close friends it is pretty astonishing that some of those who are going though an unhappy phase in their lives can still profit from my positive emotions even if it means that I have something they want (at the moment). This contradicts with my first theory.

Theory 2:
A person has to be centered (good self esteem) in order to be happy for another person. This means that that person does not feel inferior because someone else has something he does not have or even wants to have.

Theory 3:
A person has to be emotionally free (not rationally blocked) in Order to e happy for someone else. I.e. : a Person who has Trouble showing or Living his emotions might have learned throughout their entire life to surpress his emotions, maybe even the full and intense emotion of joy.

Theory 4:
A person has to have active mirror neurons. What I mean by mirroring is (simplified) that someone can see their own self in their opposite. I.e. A sad movie affects us because we identify with the protagonist/situation. We put ourselves Into the actors role in THEIR situation. By doing so we feel what the other person is feeling.

Theory 5:
A person has to be able to see things in a joyful/ optimistic way. Something like: the glass is half empty? Or is the glass half full? It all is about his perspective on things. I.e u can look at a couple with a great car. You can either say"wow good car" or you can think " oh no, they have something I want, now I feel jealous and deprived"

I have many more theories but no idea what it is in the end that creates a personality that is happy for others. But I know one thing: we can raise awareness and joy by raising our children the right way. There is not ONE way. Meaning: OUR way to raise MaYa might not work for you. But one thing I am sure about: there is a way for everyone.

We want to teach Maya to live joy. We do so by raising her awareness for beautiful things. Beauty lies in the eye of the observer and therefore we try to make the observer (Maya) conscious enough to see things others don't notice anymore. This is not an easy task because we ourselves don't see the beauty in everything anymore as routine and stress but especially age have dulled our senses. But as we watch Maya and we learn what we need to re-awaken within is, we can help her keep Alive within her that what is already within her .

We teach her to notice beauty in nature by kissing the sky and greeting the leaves. We teach her to say thank you but not just saying but feeling it by feeling it ourselves whenever we can. We try to present her all that is important to us l. Jogi and I are gentle and respectful with each other. We appreciate what the other person does and we take a time out as a couple once in a while. I get so excited when seeing him when he comes home from work- so does she. She might be a stubborn little witch from time to time and yes she goes through tough times like all other kids but she is for sure one thing: happy.
With only 17 months she caresses crying kids and gives them her most favorite toy. She strokes my hair and caresses my cheeks. She takes my face into Her tiny, yet still uncoordinated hands and pulls me towards her to give me a gentle kiss. She laughs cheekily when Daddy and Mami Kiss,She Takes my face and pushes it towards daddies face to make us Kiss. She is such a wonderful Child and While i Know that probably Many Kids her age are doing this at this point in cognitive development- we still feel proud of the miracle we help grow up - our miracle child that helps recreates us everyday.

What a wonderful journey for all of us.
And i am writing All this to once again emphasize that by teaching her to be happy for others, she will multiply the joy and the love in and for her life by a million.

Day Care (KITA)

2011-10-26T08:33:00.001-07:00

We are spoiled. Yes we are.
Mayas first day care was the chocolate icing on an excellent cake. So even though I am not at all the clingy mother that compares and judges: I could not help myself but do so when we started her settling in period at the new day care. We are moving soon and it is more than unrealistic to have Maya stay at her first KITA.

A lot of mothers have asked me what my problem was. First of all: I am not a Professional with daycare institutions. This is my first child and I have seen approximately 5 Institutions. It is impossible to filter out the right place for your/your child's needs (hard to differentiate, isn't it?) if you cannot at least compare a couple of places and their childcare workers. Well, unless you feel 100% comfortable with the one and only place you know. And it was so for Mayas first place.
I thought a lot about what it was that I loved so much about Mayas first daycare. It was not the fact that the place was new, that the decoration was childfriendly and beautiful, it was not the fact that it was close to my place or cheaper than other places.
It was the fact that Maya was loved. Really loved.
I believe that a mother feels most comfortable with people taking care of her child when they are emotionally similar to her emotional structure (besides responsibility etc). In my Case: i like caring, emotionally open and happy people, yes, extroverted and positive. But sensitive and non-judgemental at the same time. Fair.

When we eased Maya into the first KITA (a group of 12 kids under the age of 3 is looked after by three young caretakers) I felt at peace because I knew that everybody had fun with her. It's not difficult I have to admit because Maya loves to make people laugh, she is thankful and has a surprisingly mature sense of humor. Yes. She can be a little witch from time to time but that's okay :-) everybody has the right to be in a bad mood once in a while. She was welcomed with an open heart and I really enjoyed playing with the other kids and seeing her interact with them. Obviously I was more curious about observing the caretaker-child interaction and I was pleased with the results. For my taste it wad the perfect combination of love and education.
Within a couple of days she knew how to drink out of a normal cup, she rode the Bobby car or gave the rocking horse a ride. When We got up in the morning Maya firstly got her shoes and immediately ran to the door- that is how excited she was to go to the KITA. They taught her to sit still in a circle while she was singing her morning song with them, she brushed her teeth every day after lunch, they Cuddled with her to Get her to Sleep, After a Few weeks only Maya and the KITA were a pretty good team. And I believe that we can not only thank all the other kids and toys but especially the exceptional caretakers who are passionate about understanding and appreciating the individuality of a child, encourage a good development as well as finding out what the child loves to do. And I am talking about an active way of finding out and not just sitting around and watching. Whenever there was a way of going out, the caretakers would wrap up the kids in some warm set of clothes and take them out into nature. All of them. Mayas caretaker brought her to her Most favorite toy: the swing and enjoy her happy baby giggling. There was so much active laughter and happiness!
Mayas bye bye was so sad!! For me more than for her! I fehlt bad about taking her out of a Place that brought so much happiness to her.

And Even though I am very aware that you cannot compare something new with something established: I just did not like the new place. We only had two days of a three week long settling in phase . I found it much too expensive, the opening hours were better (only closed for a week in 365 days) for us. The institution was modern and new and the boss was amazing. The first time we walked through that place we already thought that people were not too warm hearted but we though that this impression would go away once we've gotten the know the people. Mayas group leaders were okay, friendly but more passive from what I wished for. They were not enthusiastic as I had wished for. They did not Introduce themselves to Maya, they did not really smile or laugh with her. The other Kids in that Group were also Tathergang passive compared to The Kids maya was with before. Then Maya wanted to Drink out of a normal Cup which The New caretaker refused to give her and Forced a babycuo on er to make all Kids have The same. I did not like The Way they were Talking to The Kids and you could tell which kids they likes and which they did not. Absolute no go!!!!! Then we talked about brushing teeth everyday and Maya was not allowed to brush her teeth after lunch (even though she loves it and she does it herself) because all kids are only allowed to brush their teeth on Monday's, to keep up the fun by doing it only once in a while! After a while half of the kids were allowed to go out and play while those under the age of 1,5years had to stay inside because it was too cold (I had the impression the caretaker was too lazy) for them so Maya had to sit in front of the glass front while longing and begging to go out and play with her swing. At the same time the kids from outside were mocking those inside. They also told me that they do not leave the room when kids are new because it might confuse them, but please: maya was not confused at all. She was so upset about not being allowed to go out. Then the caretakers were obsessed about their easing in scheme. They wanted Maya to attend to their fairly routine 30 minutes everyday in my company. I wanted to proceed quicker because Maya is not shy nor scared. She could have gone 3 hours at that new place, especially because I was around. I understand that they follow their rules but a don't like it when people are too inflexible to understand that they have child in front of them them that really does not need to be treated like a fragile child.
Well, I kept questioning myself if I was overreacting and maybe Maya did not care about the things I felt deeply irritated about. Jogi and I kept looking for solutions others that that place but we though that we needed to make compromises and just go ahead and stop questioning everything. But after my second day I still could not let go. I could not get myself to compromise on something that did not seem to be emotionally optimal for Maya. I want to support the great that she had and it takes people who can discover it to do so.
I was so upset that I decided to find another place that day. I did not want to continue her settling in phase because either we find a new place immediately or we leave her there because I did not want to get het used and then take her out again.
I drove through Ratisbona and had a look at 5 other kitas. Some of them were fully booked others were Not. I had a Look at The places and child care workers and now i Found The Perfect One: Young motivated Women, Institution New, only 3children in there yet, expanding to watch around 24 children, maya will grow into a growing institution with a care taker that is motivated, inspired, warm, flexible in thinking and has the same values we have. Maya loved it!!!!! She felt the love and the welcome ;-) I am so so happy for her. It is the best place for her (they will draw outdoors, their focus is creativity) and I feel better about it too. Her face is filled with joy and laughter, I see happy sparks in her eyes. That is what I demand of a daycare institution. Now you know!

Raising Maya- Part 3- - raising awareness, conscious existence

2011-10-19T01:05:00.001-07:00

I have not forgotten you guys! I am simply busy being a working mother now, but one by one :-)
I want to continue the "raising Maya" entries first then I will also write about being back to work, family plans etc. Soon!

Everybody who reads my blog or knows me a little is very well aware of the fact that I constantly reflect on various topics. Reflecting as well as self-reflection to me are basic tools for leading a conscious life, which again is my precondition for happiness. I believe that understanding is an important key to happiness. Living a conscious life is a life that will be rewarded because being conscious about the many faces of love means that you are able to recognize them. (please read : http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2011/09/faces-of-love.html).

A. What does "being conscious" for a toddler mean?
B. How can we support mayas Conscious development?

A. To us it is important that Maya does not take everything for granted. We want her to see the little things and appreciate small gifts of god/mother nature, because from our own experience we know that being thankful and sharing joy tremendously contributes to your own happiness. Being conscious about the wonders that your live contents of gives you happiness out of things that are not materialistic and nobody can take them away. So:
If you are conscious you can create happy moments that will supply you with positive energy forever! But being conscious Also means that you know yourself and you can act according to your understanding of yourself. I.e. Jogi and I really want me to get back into the medical field because in the long run intellectual work is very important to me. I have some friends who have not gone to work because they decided that they are already home they might just as well become pregnant again but I think in the long run some of them will one day have regrets looking back and saying : my mother was always unhappy about having given up work- now I have done the same. And people: there is nothing worse for kids than unhappy parents. As I said: some of them. Not all of them. If you understand yourself and you know that staying home and being a full-time mom is the most fulfilling work for you then you have made the right choice and your kids will have the wonderful gift of having a happy mami.

So what is a "conscious toddler"? I think it is a baby who has learned to express (as in "know"/be connected to it's emotional center ) it's feelings and by doing so having a direct understanding of the relationship between subject and emotion.

B. That sounds a little too theoretical so let me give you some examples:
- since Maya gets solids we say thank you for her before giving her food, because we want her to appreciate her food. Now she says thank-you whenever she gets something and by doing so she creates an appreciative feeling within her that she can benefit from. A seed to happiness.
- when we leave the house in the morning we greet the sky and the trees and she now already starts getting all excited before we leave the house because she can hardly wait to touch the leaves and the flowers and the ground.
- when we greet her we do so with genuine excitement and love
- when Maya did something wrong she gets an explanation for it. That is something that she will profit from once she understands what we are babbling on about
- when we go out we always point out the good things we see in other people ("Look she is laughing , that is Beautiful"). This way we sharpen her senses in noticing beautiful things.
- we let her eat on her own even though That makes a mess but this way she has an important experience and she gets confidence by doing things on her own
- when Maya falls down we let her get up immediately without pitying her too much (this way she does not learn to focus too much on miserability)

So much more to say but I have to study. Sorry!!

Faces of Love

2011-09-15T07:43:00.000-07:00

Love has so many faces.
I remember one day , when i was about nine years old...i walked (barefoot) around in our garden and noticed how dry the soil beneath my feet was. I sat down, pushed the grass aside and saw cracks in the dry soil. I felt pain. Yes I honestly did and I also remember that it was odd to me how much it hurt me to see nature "suffer". I got some water and purred it over the dry crack and pushed the edges together. That way I helped it heal. I think this was the first time I consciously felt love for mother nature. When I analyzed this new overwhelming sensation back then I suddenly understood that I was in love with nature. I then noticed that there are different faces to love.

Love can be seen in the way a mother looks at her baby.

....in the way two people can relax together....

...in the way a six year old endures an uncomfortable 2 hour long car trip while his older brother rests...

..in the way proud parents smile while posing for a picture..

...in the way a dad looks at his daughter ....

...in the way someone laughs...

...in the way two fighting brothers can find a happy solution...

...in the way a baby that cannot talk nor walk kisses her mother...

...in a way father and daughter can fool around or in the way a dad teaches his daughter what clowning is about...

...in the way human fabrics can be appreciated...

...in the way religion can trigger creativity and the power to built something like this...

..... in the way you look at your life...

.... in the way a tired dad gives his daughter a place to find peace...

..... in passion of architecture...

.....in being surrounded by happy and colorful things...

...in being crazy together...

....in a touch...

....in making someone feel like they are doing great things...

....in fooling around with someone who has forgotten how to smile...

...in being compassionate...

...in feeling the child within...

I could go on like this forever... i have so many positive memories and I believe that the love you have within multiplies by touching the hearts of those around you.
I was in massive pain the last days. I was in so much pain that I had no power to entertain my little girl. She was very upset and cried because she took my ignorance personally. So her dad took her out to the playground once he was back and spent some quality time with her to make her feel loved. The first thing she did after kissing me hello (I was in bed) after returning back home: she walked into her room, took her second favourite toy and brought it to my bed and gave me a kiss.
This is how love creates love.
When we go out every morning we say hello to the sky and the leaves and the soil and to the people that pass by us on our way to her prekindergarten. And she loves it. I want to teach her to discover the different faces of love because the more we learn about love and the more conscious we watch were love has left its marks the richer we get. We become richer and life becomes more intensive once you learn to appreciate and love nature, travel, home, toys, animals, the sky, water, cuddling, sleeping, waking up and so on.
It is fascinating. You use one word to say that you love your child. Love your parents. Love your friends. Love to do things. Love your husband or wife. And each time the word "love" carries a different emotion. Love just has so many faces!

Due to popular demand

2011-09-14T06:01:00.001-07:00

I am really honored and I am truly thankful that so many people read this blog. I have not had the chance to update you on the events in our lifes because it really has been a hand a lot... But I hereby promise to supply you with more insight into our world of thoughts from now on!!!
I know that people from the states , India and Russia and all over the world read this so I would really be happy if you guys would sign up as one of my followers. I have only got six so far. I think. To actually know that people read something that started off as a diary for myself is so amazing!
I have a deep desire to communicate and learn and philosophize and I do find it hard to find people who are patient and interested enough to join in. So if you have any questions: I would love to answer them. I really would.
Please sign up and off we go! My next entry will be on One of the following topics:
- being a working mother
- how conscious choices Influence your life
- being an ill mother without support
- moving into our new home
- whatever you ask for !
- raising Maya part 3- going to the pre-kindergarden
- sharing joy- extrovert emotions

A feeling called "home"

2011-07-27T02:12:00.001-07:00

Even though we were granted a little insight into the countries poverty, into health issues, corruption and political chaos, scars of a civil war- our hearts felt a sense of home. And it was a wonderful experience that this place feels more like home than a vacational spot.
I have had this feeling every single time I traveled through a poor country. I have not figured out what it is but I am pretty sure that it has to do with the simplicity of life. Even though I grew up and profited from the luxury (materialistic security, education, etc.) around me I have always felt that wanting and needing "more" has become a burden more than a joy. Since my intense (and very basic) travels to places like Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Angola, India... I have changed. I do not feel the need to own something or buy something like before. I have been trying to get rid of many materialistic things we do not need, the way I eat and the feelings I have while eating have changed, I have freed myself from judgment to an extend I am proud of, I have lived with only the contents of a backpack for Almost two years and I felt free. I have had no cell nor the opportunity to constantly inform someone about my next footstep via Internet and I felt free. I have had just enough money to buy what I need and I felt free. Everytime I am in places like this I am focused on simplicity and not distracted by complexity and it feels wonderful. I think that this is why people travel to countries like these. It helps them focus on what is important in the present and come on contact with their "self" again. And this "sense of self" is what partly causes the feeling of coming home.
But almost all travelers know how difficult it is to maintain this "wisdom" during everyday life after returning back home. And only within a few weeks things will change back to "normal".

Now the question is:
how do we live the need to lead a simple life where the things that one needs comply/ harmonize with the things one wants? How can a "centered self" survive in a modern world that demands a certain inner imbalance that -at the end of the day- is a big part of the driving force behind progress?
More soon...

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:National Route 6 (Airport Road),Siem Reap,Cambodia

Falling in love with Cambodia

2011-07-27T01:43:00.001-07:00

So here we are . And we love it! Coming to Cambodia has been a dream of mine for many years now and had Jogi known what to expect in a place that is so different from what he has known so far- he would have felt the same!
And Maya? Well after arriving in the center of Siem Reap on a tuk tuk she must have realized "this is different" because when we got of the tuk tuk and the first locals startet approaching us with real pashima for only one dollar and the honking Motos slalomed around me, she apparently got scared because her grip around me got tighter and her and my body became one.

Falling in love with an atmosphere that is creates by the warmth of a Khmer-smile

But only 2 minutes later she relaxed and started communicating with everyone around us. She was in control and smiling and waving and baby-talking. Yes. Once again. Maya was entertaining her surrounding and making every one laugh.

She must have noticed how unusually friendly the locals are. they smile and touch your arm, They tell you you are pretty and speak out the good things they notice, they invite you to their homes to have dinner, they kiss your baby without asking for permission. In a cultural surrounding like Germany these things cause insecurity and discomfort between strangers.
But we did not mind because we are deeply touched by the way people here express their love for each other. Love has many faces and I believe fascination (in this case between people and between culture) is one of them. It made us happy that our daughter feels love from everyone and we wish that there was more like it in Germany- we have no extended family at home. She does not know the feeling of being welcome everywhere. Here- a crying child earns an easing smile. Back home a crying child is punished with an annoyed stare.
Hence, wherever we go Maya starts babbling and signing with the people that smile at her- this is interesting to watch because she obviously feels the same way we feel about people's warmth and genuineness.

Falling in love with an atmosphere that is created by an intense history in which a fascinating culture finds it's roots

We dangled through town and explored Angkor, Siem Reap's neighborhoods and got to learn about life of Cambodian fisherman. A couple of beautiful pictures will be posted soon. So long a few iPhone shots:

We did not feel like tourists. We felt like we were coming home. If I find time I want to write about why we have this feeling. I want to write a couple of things on Cambodian history and on Angkor. If I find time. We are heading to Bali next week.

Sent from cellphone.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:National Route 6 (Airport Road),Siem Reap,Cambodia

Daycare

2011-07-01T03:07:00.000-07:00

I was a little insecure about giving Maya away for several hours a day to people I do not know. I am sure that all (especially first time) mothers can empathize with me! I am not a clingy type but I am still very new to all of this. I worry about "do they know how to put her to sleep?", "can they tell when she is tired or feels sick?" or "what happens when she misses me and starts crying, can they comfort her, will this leave emotional scars?". But as I have posted before: I am learning to distinguish my own fears from Mayas (click here: distinguish). Hence I knew that my child who is screaming for knowledge can only profit from the different things daycare has to offer.
We just started easing into day care and we love it! Maya loves it! She enjoys to see and hear and smell different things. She enjoys to have a more vibrant surrounding than what I have to offer her at home. I am really happy about our decision to socialize her this early!
How do you "ease in to daycare"?
The transition time from 100% at home to 60% Daycare (I am not starting to work full time) looks like this:

Week 1:
Mami/Daddy and Maya at daycare from 8-11 o clock. We get familiar with all the toys and the location as well as the wonderful "nannys". We follow their daily routine (play free style, nursery rhyme, patty cake games, snack time, playing outside or going for a walk...) and when Maya gets tired we go home.

Week 2:
we gradually reduce the time I am with Maya from day to day, by the end of the week she is alone.

I love to play with all the kids and the things they randomly tell me (You are a woman. I like yellow...). They already told me that I would fit perfectly into their working atmosphere and I must tell you: I would like to help out from time to time. It is a gift to play a part in a child's development. And it is a mission to find out what a child's potential is and support it accordingly. And after spending only a week there I am sure that Maya is in best hands!

Raising Maya - Part 2 - Emotional Development

2011-06-08T12:04:00.000-07:00

My mother describes her grandchild like this:
"Happy As a Lark"

I have been told by many people that they have never seen a child who is happy like Maya all the time. I feel very proud when I hear this because we are very aware of her emotional development while raising her. I am not saying that other children are not as happy and I know that Maya just sometimes seems happier because she is not shy and not scared of strangers and at the same time she is extremely expressive when living her emotions (this girl is HOT tempered which means that she can also behave like the end of the world is near when she does not get a piece of the cake the stranger on the table next to her is having). In spite of knowing that Maya is not happier than other kids but simply more expressive - still it makes me happy to hear this compliment because it shows that Mayas "happy-as-a-lark-aura" strikes people in a positive way. And the fact that her happiness is so obvious to everyone makes it clear to us that we are doing a good job in regard of her emotional development. And this again is important feedback to us.

I believe that these are her pillars of happiness:

1. trust and faith

I have written about how we made Maya sleep (click here)

2. her expressive nature

we are supporting her by not repressing but helping her develop certain character traits

3. mirroring herself

Maya sees the sparkling of our eyes when we look at her
when she is misbehaving we tell her that the things she DOES are not okay and we do not degrade her entire personality by saying "YOU are a bad girl".
we treat her with respect and ask her opinion (this way she learns that she is important)
when she falls and hurts herself we do not over-pamper her (unless it was really painful), this way she learns she is not fragile and learns not to concentrate too much on painful events.
we differentiate between our and her needs and try not to make her dependent on things that actually WE want (i.e. sleeping with her in the same room was MY wish so when she was 4 weeks old we moved her into her own room when it was very clear that Maya did not care about where she slept, by doing so we did not make her depended on company in order to one day break her out of that habit again), we are introducing noise to her sleep so she can sleep in places or fall asleep in places that are noisy)
trial and error: we do not meddle to early. Maya needs to try and fail sometimes. we do not offer help immediately this way we do not suggest that she is incapable by doing things on her own.... etc.
when she crys on peoples arms we do not pull her away immediately because that way we suggest that we need to safe her from someone.

4. Being conscious
while doing things that belong to everyday life, this is VERY important because by appreciating things that are a part of everyday life you produce positive emotions that follow you around everyday.

while eating we show how good the food is and how much we appreciate that we have food by saying thank you
when Maya gets up in the mornings we go outside and say hello to the sky and the flowers and notice how beautiful they are etc.
we call Daddy (or he calls us) when he is not around and make him present, this way she learns that she is loved even though he is not around.

5. creativity

we sing and dance and draw (yes, she does all this even though she is only 11 months old)
swim, bathtub
nature
use her hands while eating (yes..it is a mess)

6. Be a part of our world

we eat together
we brush teeth together
she watches news with us
she follow everywhere and never has the feeling of being a burden
she pokes her finger into my eye then I poke mine into hers. Same rights :-)

7. Time for "the self"

Maya can be very clingy but she can stay in her room for hours and entertain herself too. We do not disturb her when she does that even if it means that we do not see her for hours. There is no need then to play with her because she is good in occupying herself and coming to center.

There are many more important things that are important in developing true happiness later-on (intellectual ability to differentiate false and true happiness, etc). For now these are the ones we are working on. I cannot believe how amazing Maya is and it is a miracle to watch our "personal experiment" turn out so good! It makes me a little proud that we managed to create a positive start for Maya into life even though we felt desperately drained and helpless initially (especially first 2 months).

Thank you god for this amazing gift!!!
I am so happy that Mayas life is filled with so much love. May it be the love her parents give her or her grandparents, her aunty, some of my best friends. Maya even gets excited by watching happy people! When Jogi and I cuddle and kiss : SHE LOVES IT, LAUGHS AND SMILES!
Thank you life! You have always given me wonderful miracles.
I want to give and teach what you haven given and taught me. I want Maya to live a conscious life and We will teach her the important tools that she will need to understand herself and the world around her.

People keep asking me : "when are you going to have the next baby?".
Based on what I said before there is only one solution for us right now: to wait!
I enjoy this journey with my first child so much that I am still not saturated. Right now I want to give her and learn from her as much as I can. I do not want stress and a stressful routine to interfere with my need to be conscious about myself, about my husband and about Maya as often as I can. After having Maya I am taking the challenge of life onto the next level by going back to work in September. Then only- when everything (relationship, work, child, personal interests) has fallen into place - will we be ready to give Mayas sibling what he/she deserves and Maya what she needs. Because we have a chance of creating our own little happy world and this is what we feel our mission is. Spread love, consciousness (as a tool to experience life on a much more intensive level) , self-esteem, intelligence, spirituality, generosity, etc.

And these expressions proof to me that timing so far has been perfect;

Another Baby?

2011-06-05T01:29:00.001-07:00

I am back home! Had wonderful holidays! Suddendly everyone is preggy and I looovvvveee it! No I am not :-) And not planning to any time soon. What I have learned and observed in regards of a healthy emotional development of all members of this family especially its already- born and future born- children is that a bit more time needs to pass to especially give Maya room to fully develop a solid center until a new baby will be brought into our family! But I am looking forward to it! I loovveee pregnancy and birth and babies and children!!!!! But I also love myself and my husband :-). So there people! Finally an answer to ur questions!
Anyway: big travel news !!!!! Still arranging some things and will update soon!

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Raising Maya (Part 1: sleep)

2011-05-25T02:02:00.001-07:00

Sorry this entry is no linguistic miracle but time is rare!
I want to write about how I raise Maya. When you meet other mothers you will notice how their raising-style differ from yours. They are not better- they are not worse. Just different. I do not pride myself on being super-mami with the ultimate advice on rasing a baby but many people have asked me all sort of questions so I just thought that I will describe how things work for us. Maybe there are things that you can identify with or even better: maybe this blog entry will help you find new ideas on approaching a problem you have. I thought about splitting this entry into several parts.

These are the entries to follow:
- sleeping habits
- eating habits
- rules of living together
- daily routine and travel
- emotional development (self-esteem, discipline, universal/basic trust etc)
- intellectual development and the 5 senses
- raising awareness, conscious existence

Sleeping habbits

I think this is a huuuuugggeee topic for all parents. Especially for those mothers who spend day and night trying to get their baby/toddler to sleep. Some women feel that it is their duty to cover the nights because their husband needs to work. Some men feel it is their duty to support their wife because they babywork 24 hours/day. However you handle sleep deprivation, you all have something in common: you are tired. And you envy those whose children fall asleep once their parents click their fingers.

Everybody who has read my blog or former blog entries on my first months as a mother knows that Maya (Katrin gave her the nickname: terror-cookie) never slept. She did not sleep during the day neither during the night. Her sleep lasted maximal 10 Minutes and her falling (and staying) asleep was highly dependent on me/Jogi carrying her close to our body and constantly moving around (very painful after a cesarean and it might sound cute but it gets massively annoying if you do that 24/7 for weeks!). At this stage I had friends whose children already slept through the night or got up once or twice for feeding and others who had to carry their babies in a carrier too but did not have to move around constantly. What was depressing: all babies at least slept during the day. Mine did not.

Another problem we had with her was her massive urge to soothe herself by sucking on her pacifier. She sucked on it so badly that it fell out all the time. We hated it!!! Even after 4-5 weeks when she started to sleep for an hour (only during the night not during the day) we had to build funky constructs in her bed- hoping for those constructs to keep the pacifier in her mouth. Because when it fell out (and the way she sucked on it she actively pushed it out) she woke up within a second and scream. Yes. We hated the pacifier! After 7 weeks I had enough. I gave her a bottle of formula milk (i actually breastfed but I felt the need to try it with a bottle to make sure that she got enough milk to NOT be hungry again after 1 hour. I made sure she was not in pain, i changed her diaper and I put her into her bed and said to her: "sorry girl. I am drained beyond words. Whatever you do now. I need to sleep for 3-4 hours in a row and you can scream all you want."

And that was it. This is when she started sleeping through the night (defined as :6 hours in a row). Even without the pacifier. She slept 12 hours and got up once after abt. 7 hours to be fed. Luxury. This is when I finally was able to refill my energy tank to survive daytime with my never-sleeping-always-screaming-if-not-being-moved-around-in-a-carrier-baby (and no, walking up and down was not enough, too monotone for madame).

I had planned for her to be staying in our room for the first six months. But luckily (in retrospect) she was such a turbulent sleeper that her sounds and movements kept me (who has become a sensitive I-hear-everything-sleeper) awake all night. This means that we had to make her sleep in her own room after only a month. I have one grand rule as a mother: I need to differentiate my needs from those of my child. So I decided to watch Maya and find out if she even minded sleeping in her own room. I did not want to make her dependent on sleeping with us if she did not even care about it (only because I WANTED TO HAVE HER AROUND). Well: she did not care. I do not know how long we will be successful with this because things will probably change once she learns to walk and find her way into our bed during the nights but so far Jogi and I attach much importance to having time for ourselves in our room.
I found out that a baby of 6 months of age was biologically supposed to sleep through the night without having to eat. When we reached 6 months of age and Maya was still getting up once a night to be fed we decided that it was better for all of us (even for Maya!) to fade this habit of hers out. For a couple of days Jogi went into her room when she woke up in the middle of the night and he would sing for her and put her back to bed. After a couple of days she did not get up during the night to be fed anymore. So after 6 months (or maybe earlier, I am not sure anymore) she slept (if not ill or in pain) through the night. She still has the same night-sleeping-pattern, so she goes to bed around 7pm and wakes up at 7 am. She then entertains herself in her room (nobody knows what she does because we do not disturb her until we hear her making sounds like "hellllooooo. Can someone get me now??" for an hour and then she gets breakfast.

Another big problem we had was Mayas lite sleep. Just one sound (of a chirping bird flying by her window or a telephone ringing..) and she woke up and it was impossible to put her back to sleep. I got really focused on her being able to sleep so I avoided all kinds of sounds because I was too tired and needed time for myself so it was in my own interest to keep all sounds away to keep her asleep. Now that everything has settled we are changing this and we want her to get used to a certain noise level around her. I.e. we do not tiptoe or whisper in front of her room anymore. And it is working. This is important because when her brothers are around: it is noisy!!

We had phases where you could just put Maya down and she would voluntarily fall asleep (which takes her a while because she has trouble "logging off her senses") and we also had lots of earsplitting fights when she was refusing to be put to bed.
I had one more important rule during the first six months: I will give her what she needs. I will be her tool to ease into this world. When she needs to be carried around I will do so. I never let her scream and this was unbelievably exhausting. But I felt that she was very sensitive and had a lot of trouble finding her way into this world. Jogi and I are very, very serious about helping her develop a universal trust/basic trust (another entry exclusively on this topic will be written soon) . As she grew up and started to understand more we found that it was time to teach her on a level that was acceptable for a baby her age. We thought it was important for her self-esteem to learn that she can get her way and we think that it is also important for her basic trust that nobody leaves her alone with rules she cannot grasp yet. So from time to time (when we thought it was okay) we let her scream for a couple of minutes (for example when she was obviously over-tired but refusing to sleep). After 2-3 minutes we would go into her room, caress and talk to her and hope that she stops. She did sometimes. Most of the times she did not stop screaming. But after a while she learned that it was for her own good. Now : she never (!!) refuses to be put into bed. Even if she is not tired. Once she sees her bed, she puts her thumb into her mouth and turns her head away. We put her in her bed and leave the room ( I always wish her a good sleep and tell her how happy I am to have her and to see her again when she is awake and fresh). If she starts screaming after 5 minutes she was not tired and if you hear nothing : she is either sleeping or happy to be on her own (she loves it. she can entertain herself for ages. Sometimes we just hear her giggle and squeak and talk but there is no sign of her wanting to be taken out of her room - so we let her. I used to feel guilty about leaving her all alone (even though I was glad because she does have moments where she does not leave your side and wants to be carreid around) but someone told me that I will interfere with her capability to be happy on her own and this is so true!! Once again I must learn to differentiate between MY own and HER needs.

Up til now Maya only falls asleep when you put her into her room and shut her off impulses that might distract her. She understands that her bed means: sleep and she does sleep in the stroller if you cover her sight. I am trying to teach her to fall asleep next to me but she cannot stop playing with the bed or blanket, my hair, my nose, my mouth. She is too curious. Curiosity is great. It shows how highly intelligent she is and she is intellectually very developed for her age but it is a problem when it comes to sleep.

She fell asleep on the floor while we were packing once. She fell asleep on Jogis lap once. And she fell asleep after eating (after babyswimming) ONCE. Yes. And she is almost 11 months now! This was a happppyyy moment:

But once again: I need to differentiate between MY needs and HERS. And it is MY need to make her fall asleep in my arms. What I do wish for is that she learns to handle the information her senses provide her with a little better. She needs to regulate herself and know when she has had enough. That will be the time when she will be able to fall asleep on my lap while I read to her. I guess this will take a few more months until she understands what I tell her.

We started early with a sleeping routine (shower, massage, baby-light, singing, carrying her for 2 minutes in her dark room to help her relax and get ready for sleep etc). She understood pretty soon that brushing teeth and carrying a sleeping bag meant: sleep. So no refusal during night time. But daytime she only slept voluntarily from the age of 6 months onwards. 6 months. A magical number. She became such a happy and content baby when she was able to sit and able to move around. Since then she can entertain herself until she is tired and she loves to sleep. But we do have a routine for daytime as well which is different from the one that prepares for the long sleep.
Her daysleep is pretty random. Sometimes she wants to sleep again after she had her morning milk, sometimes she does not sleep till late afternoon, but most of the times she sleeps 1 -1,5 hours in the forenoon and 1-2,5 hours in the afternoon. But as I said: very random. I try to keep a sleep routine because I believe that this is very important for a child. Especially if this child travels a lot. We are away every second weekend sometimes for a long time, we travel during summer etc. so I like to at least have a daily routine in matters of food and sleep. We even have a morning routine (cuddling and playing in bed for a while after morning milk) . So we stick to these things even if we travel around. And it seems to work. Maya sleeps everywhere. Even in places she has never been to. She sleeps good. She does not cry when she wakes up at night even though she does not know where she is. This proofs to us that we did the right thing for HER (might not work for others) and we believe that she is an easy traveler because we helped her grow a basic sense of trust. We never let her cry. So now she knows that we never leave her alone. Even if she cannot see us. But whatever you chose to do and however you chose to raise your baby: you should adapt your actions and expectation to your babies age and intellectual capabilities.

Extended Family Time

2011-04-21T23:37:00.001-07:00

Hello! Sorry for neglecting you once again :-( . Currently Mayas Brothers are here which means that I am am mom of three which triples my normal chores!
At the same time I am currently taking courses that will qualify me as in nutritional medicine as well as emergency medicine. This is really tiring because we have been going back and forth to Berlin. But it is so worth it and I enjoy the intellectual stimulation!!!! So whenever Maya sleeps I will have time to study for the upcoming exams as well as work on my thesis. Not so much time to blog because husband and wife time is a priority!
Now it is 8:15. I fed Maya around 7:30. All the boys are sleeping. I changed her diapers and played with her for 20 Minutes then left her by herself in her room. She loves being on her own an playing during the early hours which is AWESOME because I am a morning grouch!!! Sorry people: I am not always in a good mood!!! :-) my friend Katrin once said that I use up all my daily bad-mood-contingent in the morning. :-)
Anyway- crawled back into bed and I love letting my hubby sleep in- he is so drained from all his work related duties (even during free time with the boys -who are rarely here- he had to do a presentation...) so that it makes me happy to support him re-energize physically and mentally!! While I am writing this his arms are wrapped around me, I feel his deep sleep breaths stroking my neck, the boys just secretly switched on the Tv and Maya is talking to herself in her room.
This is ME time.
I do not know how other mothers with many children handle the fact that there is hardly any ME time. I desperately need it and I think it is good for a child to know about it and learn the precious gift of being able to be on your own or by yourself. Whenever I feel that Maya is able to play with her toys on her own I will let her and I never interrupt her even though sometimes I feel guilty when she has been by herself in her room for hours . I have learned that my high tempered girl knows how to demand attention when she wants it and I let her Whenever I think it is good for her personal development (self esteem, etc).
Sometimes she is very attached to me and refuses to let me out of sight and this can get very stressful if you need to move around and clean but it is okay. I am starting to understand the necessity of all her phases and by accepting them i relieve myself from 90% of the associated stress.

I have to write about some principle topics or concerns while raising a child. Soon. I hope ;-).

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Ducks

2011-03-21T08:22:00.001-07:00

Maya And I Went for our First summer-like Walk. I Love The Sound , sight and smell of Life.
I Love how Sunrays warm up my skin at the same time as a breeze of wind reminds me on natures force. I love it when ducks discuss while birds sing and I love the smell of trees and flowers waking up to the call of spring/summer. Even though Maya is sleeping- I know that this sense of nature balances her spirit and plants something important into her heart. Love for nature. Recent events remind me of how much more people should appreciate what they take for granted. Mother earth. I am impressed how the aboriginies manage to live their philosophy: we are guests on this planet and we reward nature by treating it right.

These are the first two ducks Maya has ever seen in her life:

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Age- Growing Up.

2011-03-16T11:57:00.001-07:00

I went to the gym yesterday. I miss feeling fit and healthy. I lost all my muscles while my 9-month-long rest in bed. After I had Maya I could not start exercising straight away because the c-section wound was still painful.
Now - 8 Months later- I finally feel ready to face what is ahead: starting all over. I have to learn to walk uphill with the stroller. When taking stairs i feel short of breath only 1 Minute later. It was pretty frustrating to be a 29-year old inside a super-elderly body. But I managed to change my point of view and now I am excited to take this challenge. I really do. I decided to focus on little results - not expecting to run a halfmarathon by next month.
Yesterday I went to a step-aerobics course. I have never been to one as I prefer outdoor sports. But this gym is just for woman and it offers childcare. I NEVER thought that I could handle the whole 60 minute long work out (as I had done NOTHING for over 1 1/2 years, muscles wasted) but I did! AND I AM SO PROUD! Actually, while writing this, my whole body aches. :-)
Anyway. Another lady was pretty surprised when I left the studio with Maya.
She said: wow, you are a young mom.
I said: well, actually I am average age to be entering motherhood, how old do you think I am?
She guessed: 22 years?
I laughed: No I am almost 30!
She replied: WHAT? WHY DO YOU HAVE NO WRINKLES?

Hahaha. I could not believe it. And today I spent a couple of hours with my neighbors daughters (17 years old) who thought that I was 22 years old. It is odd to me that people misjudge my age. I do not think that I still look that young. Maybe they confuse my behavior (which really is not very mature to some) with my looks? Maybe the fact that I am semi-Asian makes me look younger to them?
But it makes me think and I noticed that I feel much more attracted to the young girls in our neighborhood than to their parents. I do not feel like a grown up at all - I mean: I do not feel that I am what I thought I would be as a grown up....
Retrospectively I used to think of grown ups as old, conservative, in control, super mature, having solutions to everything, not scared of anything. I think that these are attributes that children give their parents when they are young. On an unconscious level.
And I feel nothing like it. I cry while watching the news. I am chaotic. I am still learning. I am surrounded by grown ups with childish behavior.... no one is in control and in fact: I sometimes feel that grown ups are more immature than children. Because children often do not know better but grown ups do and still do not behave accordingly (so much gossip and prejudice and miscommunication and absurd happenings).
Motherhood has brought me closer to my childhood illusion of "grown up". Simply because I suddenly have so much responsibility. Having to live with your family means: living FOR your family - it changes your life over night. Without a family or a partner you are independent and you are your own center. Once you have a partner and especially children: you are not the leading actor in your own film anymore. Very interesting shift takes place.
The good thing: I have lived my center for a long time. I have lived it very consciously what makes the time I had for myself, the time I was on my own, very intense and profound and makes it seem much "longer" than it actually was. So I was ready for family and the responsibilities of motherhood. Thank god I was! :-)

I cannot be spontaneous anymore.
I cannot go watch a movie whenever I feel like it.
I have to cancel a party I was excited to go to when Maya is ill.
I have to leave dinner early when Maya screams.
I have to carry a bulky stroller around... there are so many limitations but odd enough: they do not feel as such. I enjoy my new life just as it is. I love having Maya around and watching her grow. There is so much love. A new kind of love. Therefore I welcome the change and I do not miss my old life - no matter how tiring and strenuous it sometimes gets - I love it. I feel free because I accept and enjoy my new duties. And probably this is what has grown up. My point of view.

I mean:
Look at them:

Finally: Normality

2011-03-08T06:41:00.000-08:00

After Maya was born I went through the following phases:

1. Phase:
- Weeks 1-7
- Indescribable fatigue with consecutive mental overload
(too many questions and doubts)
- Maya does not sleep at all during day nor night (max. 20 min.) and screams whenever she is not in the baby carrier.
- I am not capable of coordinating mother or housewife skills yet: would be living like a messy if it wasn't for our cleaning lady.

2. Phase:
- Week 8- Month 5/6
- Transition time as things began to settle and get better by the week
(most painful teething process seems to be over, sleep-awake cycles are getting more constant which
makes the day more predictable, Maya is not refusing to sleep at all during the night anymore and
only sometimes fussing about sleeping during the day, endured her first infections, she found her
thumb to soothe herself and no one has to sit next to her anymore to hold her pacifier)

3. Phase:
- Month 5/6 onwards
- Normality with the feeling of being reborn (a sense of invincibility and more self confidence in
motherhood)
- As Maya's motor skills improve she gets more and more independent which enables her to entertain
herself for pretty long time intervals. She sleeps 12/13 hours a night and I feed her at 7.30 in the
morning. I put her back to bed where she plays by herself until 10 a.m. ! She can show when she
wants to be carried and when she wants to play on the ground and as I learned to read her signs she
got unbelievably happy and relaxed. This is our reward and the proof that we did the right things with her.

I always thought that it had hit me hard with Maya. I was not prepared for a screaming baby. Yes I know... I work with children but all the babies I see stationary: they sleep all the time. And nothing can prepare you for the effect your own screaming child has on you while going through maximal sleep deprivation. But I knew how lucky I was to have Jogi by my side who did everything he could to make it all easier. Not one complaint from his side at any time. I never had to ask for help. It just worked.
We went travelling with Maya pretty often because from the time she finally started to sleep for longer intervalls during the night- she did not care where she slept. During the day we carried her in a carrier on our chest all the time. In the end it did not matter if you carry her around in Lappersdorf or in New York. She just wanted to be with us. Actually traveling and carrying her was easier than carrying her around in your own four walls (b-o-r-i-n-g and more tiring because you focus on the weight all the time while sight-seeing is simply distracting). Anyway. After almost three months of traveling (and therefore carrying the baby) Maya had learnt two things: to trust and to relax.

Carrying while doing house work in the middle of the night.

Carrying while doing nothing

Carrying while sight seeing

carrying even though you have a stroller (which she hated during the first five months)

When Maya learned to sit and use her hands and move forward while commando-crawling everything changed almost overnight. We remember it vividly because Jogi had a week off and during this time she became so independent that sometimes you would forget she was there or feel guilty about not entertaining her. I still have to tell myself from time to time that unless she complains there is nothing I need to change about the situation. It is important because this way she learns to be happy with and by herself and also she learns to concentrate on one thing.

Anyway. What I actually started this blog for:
Now that things are so unbelievably relaxed (most of the time :-)) I have time and energy to think about my future or work on duties like my thesis and plan what I want to achieve work-wise. I have applied for two super-duper training courses and I am really psyched about it!!! My mother will be her to watch Maya....this is the first time I have someone helping me out (besides Jogi). I am starting to study a bit during the day as I will be going back to work in September (I have been abstinent for more than 1,5 years!!!). Part Time of course.
We have had a family reunion last week-end with Jogis' boys and their mother which went really well. Yes. I am proud of us. Everything has fallen into place. Once again. It always does.

For me, nothing ever comes easy (i.e. others had an easy pregnancy and a baby that slept all the time). I always have to fight for things which does get tiring and frustrating from time to time. But I love it because it makes me stronger and more self confident and no one can ever make me insecure when I am driven to do something. It is true: if you really know what you want you will get there. And everything has an upside: After staying in hospital and lying at home for almost a year, after Maya's first weeks of life I have become a much better pediatrician because if it had not been for those hard times I would not know anything about the things I have learned the hard way. Parents: I might have advice! And as you know me: I love learning. Whatever enriches my mind: bring it on!

A good Child- Part 2

2011-02-03T00:09:00.001-08:00

I keep meeting people who (meaning to say something nice) phrase the one sentence I learned to dislike during the past months:
"oh what a cute baby, at this age they are still good ("brav")- enjoy it while you can!"

I asked Jogi one day why every one has the urge to verbalize this. He said -so true- that the older a child gets the more independent it becomes. It's personality matures as baby first discovers then experiments with new boundaries. A pain in the ass for parents of course.
When children get older a parent looses control. Sorry people but a child is not a convenient gift for us. Baby might depend on certain things we do as parents but it still has a "self".

I have written about this topic before. I mentioned that I really do not like the attribute "good" while talking about certain traits of a baby.
I.e.: I went to a funeral last week with Jogi and Maya. There was another baby (4 months) that slept through the entire ceremony while our Maya (from time to time) excitedly commented on the priests words by playing with all she had: vocal cords, air, mamamama and some other weird sounds. She was happy. It made me smile how a baby gets all happy and excited at a funeral. But I did notice the "you-annoy-me" stare around us so we left earlier. Mayas relentless joy was simply inappropriate.
After the funeral some people came up to the other mother and said "you have such a good baby, we did not hear a thing!" (baby=convenient=already follows the norms of society and is either sad or quiet at a funeral). Then they came up to Maya: "so you are the one complaining all the time?". I grinned and thought to myself: I am glad I know better!
But still it is really interesting how Even babies are being judged . Because honestly: I sometimes do not even understand her, how can others presume they know her?!
But that probably is the nature of prejudice: ignorance (non-knowledge) combined with Subjectivity and the incapability to apply Socrates wise discovery that we know " nothing".
I have thought and written about this many times but what really surprised me is that this can even be applied to adult-baby-interactions!!
And I am proud to say that I have freed myself from judgement because I have come to understand that I will neither know enough about someone else nor do I have the right to judge. But this is another topic. :-)
What I love about children is that they are honest (to a certain age :-)) in thought and emotion- and they see or feel things very clearly. They might avoid someone they do not feel 100% comfortable with but they manage to do so without claiming to understand the other person by judging them. Why don't people learn more from their children instead of thinking that children need to exclusively learn from them. I think some childlike traits better stay untouched!!! Let them touch you!

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Pregnancy/Birth Movie

2011-01-18T06:03:00.000-08:00

Enjoy watching this insight into Maya's Pregnancy and Delivery Story. This is the public version of a much better original, so excuse :-) quality.

These are the links to entries associated with the Pregnancy Story (chronological order)

http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2010/08/part-1-pregnancy-new-experience.html
http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2010/09/part-two-pregnancy-new-experience-first.html
http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2010/09/part-2-pregnancy-second-trimester-fear.html
http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2010/09/pregnancy-third-trimester-fear-of.html
http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2010/09/giving-birth-37-472010.html

http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2010/09/searching-for-name.html

Distinguish

2011-01-18T05:01:00.000-08:00

In motherhood- it is very difficult to distinguish a mothers needs from the babies needs because these two are complexly interwoven. It can be a journey of growth to discover, understand and act upon the new knowledge to the answers to: what do I need and what does my baby need?

The creation of this entry was triggered by two things:
1. a discussion I had with the chief of medicine while discussing my part time come-back as a doctor this year. We were trying to find a family-complient solution for a working mother and based on this we started philosophizing about motherhood and how moms tend to dissolve in their new role. What becomes obvious on ward for example: some mothers miss out on how children also need time apart from their parents (depends on age of course). I.e: a lot of mothers think that their children cannot live without them and that these children cannot survive a day without MOM when hospitalized. They project their own neediness (and I am NOT excluding myself) on their children and therefore making it harder for their kids to learn to be on their own. A mothers love is a paradox mixture of "letting go" and "staying close". But on ward for example, once super-ma is gone , this is what happens; We have hardly ever seen a child that did not enjoy a stay with a new room mate, joking around with the nurses. The child learns a sense of self, outside the consuming mother-child relationship (this sounds a bit provocative but I am just trying to make a point).

2. Now that I am a mom I watch other mothers more carefully. And I try to understand the intense bond between mother and child. By doing so I will maybe avoid making certain mistakes however I know that I need to accept that a mother can never do a "flawless" job. It is impossible to do it all right but it is worth a try to come close.

Let me give you a little example on a lack of distinguishment of needs: Nursing!
Nursing- a mission for all moms. Some become obsessive about it and pride themselves on being the only "source" of food during the first couple of months. On an unconscious (or genetic) level they feel it is their purpose to raise a healthy baby by "themselves". They are proud if their baby never got formula/a bottle. A mother who cannot nurse at all or needs to stop for any reason - more often than not she feels like a failure who was not even able to do the one thing she was born for. This might sound ridiculous for those who have not given birth yet but trust me: you will understand what I mean when you get there. From what I have observed, there are not many woman who do not want to nurse. There are hardly mothers (especially primiparas) who are not upset if nursing does not work out.
But to make one thing clear: I do not think there is anything wrong with formula or giving the bottle- I grew up with formula. The most important thing for mother and child is : harmony.
I think I was lucky because Jogi very quickly helped me to find my right path between responsibility and obsession. Jogi already experienced the stress a sleep-deprived mother can go through who refuses to sleep (while daddy gives the bottle) because she wanted to nurse. It was very important that he insisted on giving the bottle during some nights. Those who read my old blog entries on our first 7 weeks with Maya know why: she never slept and was screaming all the time. During many nights Jogi carried her around - he sometimes brought her so I could nurse her (then continue sleeping) and other times he would give her formula so I could rest.

My learning-process to distinguish between Mayas needs and mine
We began introducing solids two months ago. The aim is to -one day- replace all breast-feeding meals with solids. I know that a lot of mothers talk about problems when putting their babies to sleep without breastfeeding. Most moms nurse very long because they (and of course their child) enjoy the bonding. I have replaced lunch and dinner so there are only two more possibilities to nurse (mornings, later afternoon). For a while I let Maya latch on after having solids because I thought she needed time for transition. I was worried about Maya not going to bed if I refused to nurse her after dinner. But suddenly it became very clear that the thought of not nursing her at night upset ME. I needed the bonding before going to bed!
So I tried to stick to our nightly 'going-to-bed' routine but without nursing and behold: she did not mind. She did not cry, she did not have any trouble falling asleep or sleeping through the night. I decided that by continuing to put her to sleep after nursing I would MAKE HER dependent on this and I wanted to avoid problems later breaking this habit. And suddenly I understood, that on an unconscious level, mothers make their children dependent, because what we need, is for the children to need us.

A husband's support

2011-01-16T22:16:00.001-08:00

I honestly have enough of men who create big dreams (or illusions) about having a family and when baby arrives- suddenly they understand that a baby demands patience and time and yes- from time to time it can be tiring and annoying. There is nothing that gets to you, eats you, worries you, annoys you, hurts and stresses you, like a screaming, not-to-calm-down baby after/before/during a night of insomnia. And this is what love is about: you still care even though (especially the first week with your first baby) you are emotionally constantly ping-ponged between boundless joy and your psychological and physical limits. Yes. Why the hell did we do this and also : oh my god this is the best thing ever!!!

Seriously. Some are lucky but most are not. It is tiring at first. You will get to know yourself and your man all over again. And while your husband has a time out by going back to work (and it is a time out!) you will convince yourself that you cannot demand his support because he is earning the money now and he has to sleep and the poor guy is hard working bla bla.
You might be successful with brain washing yourself but most of the mothers I got to know were one thing: upset. They felt left alone. Tired. Some said that they felt punked.
Jogi got up every single night, even though he had worked for several night and days in a row because I could not handle all the stress anymore (talking about the first seven weeks). I felt really guilty about him doing so because I thought I should support his night rest ("he has to work"). My midwife said the best thing to me, she said: "what you are going through now is more stress and more work than what your husband does. For him, work might be tiring too but it is still a time out from this physical and emotional stress while you are exposed to it day and night. He is the father, he made the descision to have a baby with you- why should you be the only one to carry all the burden?".
Jogi was and always is supporting. But her saying this was really helpful and it took away the guilt I felt when he got up at night.

Men:
A baby is no status symbol. It can be tough and your love shows by supporting your wife. It is All about attitude. Some man come home and are too tired to change the disgusting diapers of their own flesh and blood while Others are tired but spending time (and even changing diapers is nothing less!) with their children eases them because they connect with their baby and support their wifes.

women:
you are not making too great demands to ask for support!!!!! It should come naturally!!!!! Fathers: Why make/wish for a baby of you cannot be bothered to take care of it!!!
I am writing this to make one thing clear: most husband are very, very supportive. So if yours is not: stop telling yourself that all man are the same in regards of I.e. Changing diapers because it is not true. Most man love to support their wifes and most man love to connect with their children and bathe or clean them. If yours does not: he is more the exception than the rule, which means that you can and should demand more of his support.
New and modern days. Men take parental leave and take care of their kids and some even cook and clean and know where their socks are!
Stop selling yourself and demand what you deserve. Really. I feel sorry for those who are left alone and think that these are normal and healthy compromises of motherhood. Nope. You are wrong. If you feel left alone : it is time to talk and find a solution you both are happy with!

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Einsamkeit

2011-01-14T15:35:00.001-08:00

In letzter Zeit habe ich mit vielen Menschen gesprochen, die unter Einsamkeit oder Alleinsein leiden. Dieses Gedicht stammt aus einer Zeit, in der ich mich einsam zu zweit fühlte, ein -so kam es mir damals vor- schlimmerer Zustand als alleine einsam zu sein. Das Gedicht stelle ich online für all die, die die Liebe suchen, verlassen wurden, verlassen haben, in einer Beziehung sind aber sich leer darin fühlen, die geschiedenen, getrennten, die die eine Farce leben und sich noch outen müssen...

Einsamkeit

Wie ein schleier umhüllst du mich,
Wie eine Briese Wind erinnerst du mich,
Wie die Müdigkeit ermattest du mich,
Wie die Melancholie singst du eine Melodie, die sich dem Rythmus meines Atems anpasst und damit zu einem Teil von mir wird.

Ich versuche mich von Dir zu befreien und weine,
Ich versuche dich zu ersetzen und träume,
Ich versuche dich zu verdrängen und rede,
Ich versuche dich abzurütteln, aber in dem Wissen, dass du nicht die Ursache, sondern die Folge bist und mich damit noch eine Weile auf dem Weg, der Illusion, die ich selbst kreiert habe, begleitest.

Du bist
meine endlosen Nächte,
Die stumpfe Leere,
Unersättlicher Hunger,
Aussichtslose Zukunft,
Nicht zu teilen,
Allein zu ertragen,
Meine Gesellschaft wenn ich traurig bin.

Einsamkeit-
Wir müssen uns arrangieren, denn wir werden erstmal zusammen sein.

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Happy New Year!!!

2011-01-02T12:43:00.000-08:00

Hello my friends!

I hope you had a wonderful start into 2011 and I promise to update this blog more frequently!!!

Starting tomorrow! Maya is turning 6 months on the 4th of January and for this special day I made a little movie on her speech/sound development so far. Our screaming-specialist has turned into a babbling-little-miss-sunshine and we are very proud of her. It is a beautiful gift to be a part of such a miracle- (that is what i see in every baby: potential) growing up and giving them as much as they need to become the best they can.

Thank you Jogi for 2010!!!

Hamburg

2010-12-04T09:56:00.001-08:00

A couple if pics I want to share, i l love these two. Facebook refusing to upload:

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On our Way...

2010-11-24T03:57:00.001-08:00

.... To baby Meeting! We have established (a few girls from birth class) a weekly meeting in town or at someones place. Today we will have veggie pasta and catch up on things that happened during the last eight weeks as I had been absent (traveling). So excited to see the two Felix and the changes they have gone through! It never ends: my fascination about babies first year!
I need to stop writing. Sitting backwards in the bus and feel like vomiting. Maya is so cute : watching people smile at her. Her charm is unbelievable - she attracts too many people:

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A well-behaved Baby

2010-11-23T12:57:00.000-08:00

Is Maya "brav"? - This means "good" as in "well behaved".

What do People mean by asking this question?
I thought about it and I think that it means: does she eat and sleep and demand only attention when convenient?
So during the first few weeks I would have replied :" no she "behaves badly" because she never sleeps- therefore screams all the time- and does not like anything besides the baby carrier that keeps her close to my body".
Now that she is more quiet and relaxed because she sleeps more people would tag her "a good girl".

I honestly do not like this attribute.
And I am writing about it because it is shocking how new mothers compare their babies and (while talking about their experiences) mask a reality that might question their motherskills or attributes their children as "bad". Others keep giving their unwanted opinions on how to treat a child that obviously has problems adapting to the new world and cries all the time. No. My then two-month old was not trying to manipulate me by screaming and was not consciously trying to "get what she wants". No. You can never spoil a baby by loving it. Love is healthy.
The attribute "good"/"well-behaved" neglects the fact that every child has individual needs and every child deals differently with adapting to a new surrounding. It insinuates that a BABY is calculative and a new born has bad intentions- trying to "manipulate" its surrounding to "get what it wants" (THESE ARE ACTUAL QUOTES!!!).
I believe that a newborn is driven by its needs (Freud would refer to the "id"). It has no other way to communicate that something is wrong than to scream and cry.

Its existence inside the uterus can be described as an "eternity", the closest you will ever get to feeling "right", at peace.
When baby enters the outside world- everything changes. Suddenly temperature, hunger, noise, distance, bowel movements become an issue. All senses are CONSTANTLY flooded with pleasant and unpleasant information and a baby feels much worse than you feel after work or a stressful day that needs to end in quiet rest- all the time!
And if you have a sensitive baby that takes in more than others or has more trouble handling these informational waves- a baby that does not fall asleep (and therefore never comes to rest, constantly feels "non-right"): do you really think it is okay to let it scream so it proofs itself to be "good"? Do you really think that a newborn has any tools to soothe itself? It has not even got a sense of self, it does not understand what it smells, hears, feels or sees, it does not know where its body begins or ends, it cannot move nor does it know that it has legs and arms that one day will be important tools. It is one thing: helpless.
This is why I say that a mothers/fathers love is the most selfless act of love: you become a babies tool to satisfy its needs. And as long as it has you to be its tool: it will learn to keep that sense of "right", baby will learn a "right" that is close to the most soothing place in his world: the womb, below its mothers heart.

A child that grows up this way will only know what emotional instability is when things go wrong but it knows what it is like to feel "right" and can therefore, in life, surround itself with things that nurture that sense of "right . A child that never learns to feel "right" will, in future, never know what to do to be happy.

Anyway. Such a unstructured blog but I am doing a million things at once. Sorry!
So People kept telling me that I was spoiling Maya and that she needed to learn to self soothe as well as understand that she could not dominate my actions.
Of course in a way the interaction with your child will promote certain behaviors.
However: we are talking about a baby. A baby wants nothing else but "to feel right". A baby cannot self soothe, a baby just needs to feel as much comfort as possible. Smell you. Move with you. Hear your voice, hear you sing.
If you let your baby scream or force it to lie in its crib, yes - it will stop screaming and will stop crying eventually, but not because it has learned to self soothe but because it has learned that no one will help him, it has resigned and accepted that feeling of loneliness and being miserable. Now what will this do to your babies soul and how will this support the development of a basic sense of trust?

I believe that during its first months of life a baby cannot be spoiled.
To "love" is healthy and it comes along with a healthy development of babies personality and mother/father-baby relationship. When time is right, things will be better.
Maya was really, really tiring. Hard core tiring. With maximum sleep deprivation you get to a point where you cannot enjoy it anymore but you are functioning.
We really observed her and we learned that only one thing would make her cry: emotional instability (nothing like teething or colics made her cry).
Out Maya is very sensitive. She cannot cope with people being sad, she cries when others cry, she watches you and only when you are happy she smiles. She is like a sponge- soaking in peoples emotions. She was emotionally unstable all the time because she could not deal with the fact that she was not safe inside my belly anymore. Everything was overwhelming. The fact that she never slept (not during day nor during nights, that causes irritability but it is also a result of irritability... vicious circle) did not help...
So she cried and screamed (literally freaked out hysterically) when you put her down, when you stopped moving while carrying her, when you took away breast or pacifier, whenever she got overwhelmed by information (which was pretty much all the time), she cried when you got angry or nervous with her. She cried and screamed all the time: except when you carried her close to your body and walked around. This way everything was okay. And it was a joy to see her at peace. This was the closest thing to "home" and feeling "right", and Maya desperately needed this transition time of being carried around day and night - until she learned enough (I.e. thumb-sucking) to self soothe outside mommies tummy.
Now she has understood that she is unconditionally (!!) loved and that she will never be left alone, her emotions are being taken serious. She can soothe herself by thumb-sucking and she is able to sit and turn around to look at things. She can hold her head now, she can watch things, she understands more about context and continuity, she can distract/entertain herself by grabbing and playing and if all does not help: We carry her. Close to our hearts.
The result -and we are proud- is a girl, that, whenever something terrifies her, will make eye contact with her parents and as soon as we reassure her she looks away and continues what she was doing. The result is a baby that sleeps through the night anywhere we travel, all by herself because before she starts screaming someone will be there to help her out. The result is that now she is even willing to fall asleep by herself and after waking up she enjoys some time for herself and then she will start babbling pretty loud - if that does not draw attention she starts complaining (but not screaming). It makes me smile :-).

So, knowing this about a baby, why would you call a baby girl during her biggest challenge in life -adapting to a new existence- "not-good"? In the end - what people mean is that a "good" baby simply does not cause their parents any trouble.

Again:
Love is a healthy emotion. It cannot spoil a baby. It will help your baby develop a healthy sense of self, a deep understanding of its needs, an important feeling of "right" which is a foundation to happiness in future, a good sense of self-worth.

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Waterfalls

2010-11-19T09:11:00.001-08:00

Maya rolls over for the first time- I cry.
Maya eats (wrestles) carrots (solid food) for the first time- i cry.
Maya has her first and second tooth- I cry.
Maya laughs out loud for the first time- I cry.
Maya sleeps through The night for the first time- I cry.
Maya takes a shower with daddy for the first time- I cry.

--> emotional times!

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A mothers love

2010-10-29T18:54:00.001-07:00

~~Mother's love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved. ~Erich Fromm~~

Pure, intense and selfless- these are the words I would use to describe a mothers love for her child, a strong and unbreakable bond between two generations. For some this bond already exists long before the birth of their child and for others it develops when they hold their baby for the first time... The bonding moment might be different from individual to induvidual But one thing all mother-child-bonds have in common: they never end.

My mom and her mom:

My mom, maya and myself:

No sleep, frustration, stress, fear, worry, disappointment...
Whatever negative emotion arises from time to time- the time and work a mother invests in raising a healthy and happy child stays the same. No matter what aggravating circumstances occur: a mothers efforts resist. This is what love is about. It's about willing to make it work. Not just about happy emotions. (you can apply this to any kind of relationship)

Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children. ~William Makepeace Thackeray

“Mother: the most beautiful word on the lips of mankind.”
Kahlil Gibran

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Three months later:

2010-10-29T05:25:00.001-07:00

Three months.
The first two:
They were really a handful. No sleep. Constant doubts. A baby that had obviously been scared by a stressful pregnancy of fear - parents who were drained by really hard times pre-birth. Babyblues. Breastfeeding issues. All other mothers seemed to do and know it better. And worst of all: all other Babies seemed to only eat, poop and sleep.

Now, after three months if motherhood, I finally feel really comfortable and confident as a mother. Magical moments take over moments of doubt and distress and I finally know when my baby-girl needs what. Not always - but most of the time!

I have more time for myself and we have more time for desijogi as mayas big sleeping issue is starting to resolve. The first months with your first child change your life more than anything else in this world. I hope that you are ready for the most spiritual and purest form of love: the selfless act of loving your baby. Selfless because your little angel has no tools whatsoever to deal with the new world. It has not even understood yet that it's arms belong to him/her!! A little fart wakes them up and terrifies them to the core!
I must admit that I am glad that I have already lived my life to the fullest- because now I can absolutely concentrate on my new role and the challenges it throws at me. I am happy because now I finally feel that I am able to help my child, our sweet Maya finally seems to have found a place for this new world in her heart and soul. Maya has arrived and probably more than ever again the feeling of home is only attached to two people: mom and dad. I was always aware of my duty of helping Maya arrive at home and helping her develop a sense of basic trust. With this mission of motherhood I stressed myself pretty much because let me tell you one thing: the majority of mothers will not know what their kids want many times a day! At least so in the beginning! So you feel helpless and you are afraid of causing damage to your Childs soul (and yes you are very hormonal...)
You need to tell yourself over and over that it is a good thing that your child is troubled from time to time because as in adults: inner conflicts trigger a quicker and more intensive learning process. An alert child needs to chew on all the new information it's surrounding feeds it with. When your baby cries and is fussy: know that it is growing and developing and is actively disputing with it's needs. A newborn has been traumatically taken out of intrauterine eternity and is exposed to helplessness and to a new urge to constantly satisfy it's needs in order to achieve an emotional and physical steady state. Everything a baby learns will shake up the world as known and over and over again your child will face a new reality while the reality that was familiar slowly disappears.
I will write this blog very honestly because the one thing that striked me most was how new mothers constantly try to talk a diplomatic language when talking about their mixed feelings of motherhood. It is hard if you have a child that demands more than food and sleep and a clean diaper. And if you have a child that does not only eat, poop and sleep: these mothers who permanently talk about their low-maintenance kids who never cry and never complain will make your life miserable until finally someone reveals the truth:
most babies make their parents mad from time to time. You will hit the wall physically and emotionally. Nothing is wrong with you and nothing is wrong with your child. Give yourself a break and surround yourself with mothers that are honest. We are not entering a contest of "who has the best baby" - these months are simply about one thing: survival!
After the first weeks of adapting (especially if you were dreaming about marshmallow land and illusions) to a new life with a child, as parents, as a family, after your baby has arrived in this world and has gotten used to some of its bodily functions-then you are a new person with new powers and a new self- esteem. Not all have a start this stressful but most will know what I am talking about- and this makes it all worth it!

Seeing your baby happy:

The peaceful sleep: seeing your baby regenerate.

Seeing how your child starts to experience it's own body and plays:

Location:Edgedale Plains,,Singapore

Jogi+desi=cliche?

2010-10-29T00:02:00.001-07:00

This is for those who have been pushing us as a couple into clishe-roles, this is for those who have been "talking" about the fact that Jogi took my surname and not the other way around.
This is not a time waste of justification but a short analysis of what the difference is between people who think it's negative/odd that we chose to do it this way and those who find it normal/good.
I am not upset about peoples need to talk- it seems necessary for survival in a group of people (at least in our modern world- i have never experienced this symptom with poor people who have more basic things to worry about) but it does fascinate us and did truly surprise us. We did not anticipate this effect of "us" and "what we do" on others. From time to time we talk about it but we never cared about others opinion- because being 100% convinced about the choices you make makes you strong and very stable. Our love makes us very rich. And to be enriched by non-materialistic things is our true gift of life.
The fact that Jogi took my name split our surrounding into those of flexible and those of inflexible mind set. I was pretty surprised about this separation because to us a name change means nothing (at the same time it was meant to be a message on multiple levels to the outside world): our lives do not change-we don't change.

Not only woman welcomed Jogis name change but also many (throughout young) man.
Pro
Woman welcomed it because they were upset about "having" to give up their maiden names and those man who did were tolerant and able to read between the lines. They knew what our message was about. As you know: everything we do needs to be meaningful to us.
Neutral
A small amount of people did not care about who takes what name.
Con
A clear majority was making negative statements about this (obviously behind our backs). I was pretty surprised that bad comments also came from class mates who have travelled the world with me. Naiv as I am from time to time I always assume that people who travel must be tolerant and open - minded (and I am not saying this angrily or with an insulting tone).

Again: So what is it that the gossip group has in common?
It is a lack of flexibility of the mind, thoughts being stuck in a rigid world of norms/rules. When you ask these people why they think it is wrong for a man to take a womans name- then the only smart answer is "it has always been like this". I believe that those who are able to share our joy profit from this (I believe that people who learn from us as individuals and especially us as a couple will shake up a boring mind set to enlighten themselves and be reborn more wise and tolerant- we too learn from people who are different- please read my entry on the ability to share joy http://patchdesi.blogspot.com/2010/10/ability-share-joy.html)

What is a cliche?
A cliché is an idea which has been overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, rendering it stereotype.

The only thing cliche about us our age difference and our working positions. This seems to be enough for others to judge us and make something so very meaningful to us sound ridiculous and impermanent.
Nothing about us as individuals nor as a couple is cliche. We follow many of societies rules -as much as living in a group demands from us- but we use every space of freedom we can to grow and develop as individuals and as a couple. More consciously than many arround us. The more interesting fact to us was to analyze WHO was actually trying to keep an image of us as a cliche alive and ... let me say it diplomatically: it is just a handful of people who do not WANT us to be what we are and therefore do not WANT to see what actually is. Love. That is all there is. Love and happiness. Truth. Destiny.
People: it is time to think outside the box! Don't just see what we DO (i.e. working positions) but see who we are. Strangers and friends all around the world have commented on our glow as a couple because they were without knowledge of our roles and able to FEEL us as a couple and individuals.

I have learnt a lot the past couple of years, months, days with Jogi and I am incredibly thankful for this vibrant feeling of freedom in thoughts and the fact that I have grown wiser and liberated myself from prejudice and judgement the past years by creating a deeper understanding of human nature in our surrounding and our society. The one thing I have learnt after returning to Germany 2001 was:

You never know who you are dealing with. Your perception is limited no matter how convincing and logical it seems. You never know everything about anyone and you never know what made them the way they are. I have learned to always focus on peoples good sides and I like even those I do not get along with. This is what love and compassion is about. Everyone deserves the benefit of the doubt.

Jogi+desi=cliche?

The ability share Joy

2010-10-09T05:14:00.001-07:00

It speaks for itself when you are able to be happy for someone else simply because they are happy.

We are free of jealousy and disfavor and i am honest when i say this. We used to be different when we were young and immature. We used to envy those who had what we wanted. But time passed and We grew confident and more conscious about our emotions. Understanding them was the start of inner change. My life as a globe trotter made it easy to be self conscious and flexible in my thinking. So being self conscious made it possible to focus on things that make me happy and invest time in collecting happy moments. Everything I do has to be meaningful.
With a treasure box of happiness (happy Experiences) you feel like you have all that you need within yourself. You feel strong and centered. You move away from gossip and jealousy and by mirroring someone elses happiness (a smile, happy eyes, laughter, a story that reminds u of your own, anything) you will be reminded of your own. It will enlighten you!

If we look at all those people who have been incapable of sharing our joy of having found love and having created family, who have been gossiping and questioning, We come to the conclusion that not only ignorance and inflexibility of mind cause inability of accepting and learning from something new (here: moving outside social norms by taking my name, re-marriage after divorce, a third child from second wife, a decade age gap, work cliche)...

The inability to share joy and the need to indulge in negative thoughts about others derives from deep inner discontentment. Why do some enjoy slandering so much? Spreading negativity? Because it moves their own lives into a more positive light? Or it helps them to stop thinking about themselves? Why not enjoy the refreshing effect of thinking positively (and be happy with them) about others and using the fact that something happens outside the norm to shake up rigid world?

We are proud that we are able to share joy. This is what Happiness is about. And We pray for those who still have to learn many things to get there. This is what we want to teach our child: to love.

Getting ready for a Second chance

2010-09-30T06:41:00.001-07:00

To those who have had to say goodbye to a dream called family or simply someone they love...

I am writing this because a couple of mails - carrying content that deeply touched me - have found their way into my inbox. Some authors have just separated from their husbands (with or without kids) others broke up with their partners.

My last entry moved these people to tears, reminding them of the hopes and dreams they had of a happy life with their loved ones. I am sure a couple of people derided my-beeing-in-love words and creating a rosy future.

Well... I have suffered and cried tears of pain...I have dissolved in desperation and have lost all grip.. Lost All that made me feel secure... Ending a ten year long relationship of highly connecting experiences was the worst thing I ever had to do... The pain... Inexplicable... It took me years to get over it... My capability to trust and to hope and to dream was left in pieces... And Meeting Jogi marked my beginning of a healing soul.

I am a self-reflecting person and One of the things I enjoy in life is analyzing human nature and needs.

I have been taught by my wonderful mom that all painful experiences make way for a higher and purer level of life. That all bad that happens prepares for something great.
It is possible to internalize
This and by doing so you are able to welcom still hurt but you trust in the passing and leaving you wiser.
And this is what I would like to tell those who are struggling in matters of love- those who just or are still experiencing loss. Those who are still deciding and those who Are experiencing an inner conflict, an emotional war.

I believe that the heart knows whats right but i know that pain and fear make it impossible to differentiate between messages of the heart and of the head. And worst of all is the constant question popping up all the tome: have I/we done the tight thing?!?
I cannot say anything that will make that pain go away (time heals...bla bla). I am sure you have been given tons of well-meant advice... I just want to tell you one thing:
Prepare your second chance to find happiness! True love, true happiness. Prepare by reflecting on i.e. These subjects and know yourself and understand human nature better so can make a wiser choice the next time.

I just mentioned a couple of things. Going into details would be a matter of a thousand new details!

1. love
--> what is love
--> what is your language of Love

2. Expectation
--> why are/were you in that relationship (sure not just loneliness and wishful thinking)
--> what do you lack/gain
--> what do you want from each other (careful: you expect more from a partner than all your friends!)

3. Scar
--> what pain have you gone through in other relationship (and also gained)
--> what pain origins in childhood
--> what have you learned by watching your parents

4. Strong foundation
--> what was/ is your relationship build on
--> what have you got in common
--> things you learned/did together
--> reasons for your relationship that are special for the two of you
--> how you manage fights and stress

5. Communication
--> are you clear and open about your inner development (which you can only be if you relflect!)
--> do you/partner listen to each other
--> do you understand each other on emotional or rational level (emotional: less frustrating talking needed because counterpart FEELS you)
--> what needs do you have? Are they similar?

6. Fear
--> what fear is caused by your relationship
--> what fear has been pre existent in past

I believe that life is about growth. You attract what and who you deserve according to your growth level. Only after knowing the mentioned points can you see and recognize and understand and therefore meet the one ur meant to be with. Then only follows the next step: work on your understanding then to enjoy ur second chance.

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e challenges. They

Magical moments

2010-09-27T04:30:00.001-07:00

6. A.m. ; Maya sounds hungry After her 8 h Sleep (which in itself is already fantastic). I carry het little chunky body into bed. She stretches and yawns and I start feeding her. I love listening to her squeaky sounds turning from greedy to content and then into deep constant breaths of sleep. At the same time Jogi wakes up-even though I try to be quiet- and I see his tired eyes opening up and he starts to slowly caress my hair just to show that he is with us. I love this time
Of the day when everyday life is far away.iit seems magical to be surrounded by the much mystery of mornings and love.

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Yes I do- again and again

2010-09-23T19:59:00.001-07:00

"I, Desiree, take thee Jürgen, in health and in sickness as my wedded husband..."

Jogis and my eyes filled with tears when I whispered these words. First I was pretty zen but then I started to halt. I was emotionally overwhelmed... I had to pull myself together to squeeze the final words through my lips, trying to focus my man through watery eyes.

There i was, and i did what i never thought possible. Without doubt, surrounded by an air of peaceful convincement, protected by our love and driven by unshakable trust, I said: "Yes I do!"

"I do."
When you say these words
You should be aware that what you feel at this very moment is vulnerable. It is transient. What you are as a couple will change. This happy moment might wear off as time changes who you are, changes your needs and interests, changes your priorities, changes the way you deal with a problem. One day you will not be the individuals anymore that said yes to spending your lives together.

Therefore it is so, so, so important to keep developing into a similar direction, create closeness and space for love, loving thoughts, connecting experiences, renew the spirit and enthusiasm to be together and everyday consciously chose the one you are with. One word summarizes it all: work! Work on it and you will be rewarded with the fruits of a healthy relationship- a relationship that changes because those in it change. At the same time those in it change by being in a relationship. To be in a happy relationship/marriage is an art of life. Practice, learn and invest. It is worth it!!! Watch and learn to solve problems before they scar you.

Routine is not only a side effect of time, it does not only make you feel a sweet sense of home but routine can also be a silent killer in a relationship. Keep your love alive! Love is not only a nice sentiment that comes along with butterflies in your tummy, goose bumps. The art of love is an art of work. To love , here, means to be willing to work on a marriage. Means to make time and be conscious about each other as individuals as well as each other as a couple. Repeating myself but it is so important!
Jogi and I talked a lot about these things and we came up with a little paper that covers our promises of basic yet important things that we believe are the foundation to a happy life together.

We know that we are perfect for each other but this fact is not enough to guaranty lifelong happiness. This fact simply states that we have a strong foundation, this is built on equal emotional needs, self reflection and therefore deep inner understanding as yet again the foundation of good communicational skills that our future can rely on.

I do.
Say it again and again, everyday make that choice to be together. this is what the words " I do" are about.

Sorry this is a little chaotic and I would like to write a more structured text because there is so much more in my head and so much we talk about... So much information I want to share... But Maya takes up a lot of time and the rest is for Jogi and myself. We do not just want to be parents- we want to stay a couple so time is precious!

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Strong foundation
Reflect, be conscious
Invest, work
Impermanence

Searching for a name

2010-09-14T09:30:00.000-07:00

When we were looking for a name we were looking for a meaning.
A name that reflects our babies purpose and mission in life. A name that is a message to this world. A name that presents her parents morals and values and therefore a part of her values and morals. So not only her birthday seems to have a deeper meaning (Independence Day!) but her name shall fill her heart with joy as it fills our hearts.

Maya Suhana.

We chose Maya because of its multicultural origin. It stands for purity, for love, origin/birth and also illusion. While the first meanings are obvious we actually like that Maya also means "illusion". Maya will teach people that what we see and what we receive as an absolute truth and what we judge is not what it seems to be. She will make people realize this not only by talking about life and philosophy but also by her simple existence. What we see and who we meet.... we are limited by our senses. Our limited perception combined with our need to judge is nothing but an idea of reality. Your own interpretation. To know this changes all that you are and adds a new dimension to your world of thoughts.

Suhana is and Indian name. We love India for many reasons. India's history. India's culture. India and the emotional ambivalence that it arises in people who have been there. India's many-sides. India's food.....
Suhana means "beauty" and we mean the inner beauty.

To us, Maya Suhana stands for "purity and beauty of the soul" and that we need to realize that we mostly move within illusions of reality and how important it is to be aware of this!

Giving Birth (3.7-4.7.2010)

2010-09-14T09:22:00.000-07:00

Prime of Life:

This orchid started to bloom (after months of tristesse) on the day Maya was born!!!

Mayas first foot-print

"Aren't you scared?" people kept asking me when we decided to induce labour. No- i wasn't. I was super excited !!!!! Super-duper!!!! I didn't know when but I knew: just a couple of days. I needed to see our healthy baby-girl!
Jogi had taken a few days off and of course he came along on the third of July!

This is me the day before:
16kg heavier than 10 months ago (with hardly any physical activity and no appetite, but I did not care about weight gain because the body does what it needs to do, all I can do is eat healthy and that is what I did)

2 weeks after due- date I developed light edema:

About inducing labor (just a short explanation):
You take max. 3 tablets of Prostaglandine a day. It is supposed to induce contractions that open the uterine orifice as well as shorten the length of the cervix. Nothing usually happens the first day as the body needs time to prepare however one is attached to the Cardiotocograph to monitor fetal heart tones after each tablet.

Inbetween you do what you can to help your body get ready: WALK!!! Stairs up and down, down and up! You stop when a contraction comes and breath them away. I was in pain but it was nothing you need do be afraid of. There is one mental trick and that is called : right attitude. Welcome each contraction and stay relaxed. Welcome them??? YES!! Each contraction brings you closer to the biggest wonder you have ever been part of!!!

Excited, just before we started:

Our guests and family:

Two hours after induction- after the first tablet, Jogi reading to me:

I developed contractions shortly after !!!!

Well. A short summary of the next hours:
All together 26 hours of labor.
While I was laboring I saw four midwives come and go, seven woman came, scream and took their babies home.

This is what my sister did while I was suffering:

She brought food but I could not eat:

Jogi walking around with me:

Me?
4cm dilation of the uterine orifice after 6 hours of labor.
After another 12 hours of labour: still 4cm! Yes!!! It got depressing...
18 hours after contractions began they got too painful. I was tired and they came every 1,5 minutes and lasted 1 minute. I asked for a epidural, I was not afraid of it and it did not hurt AT ALL but I cried cats and dogs... I felt exhausted and like a failure who had lost a test every woman had to take. It sounds ridiculous but you will understand it when u get there.
An epidural makes contractions less painful but you can still feel the tummy turning rock-hard. I watched the fetal heart tones when I suddenly noticed my bed turning wet. I wasn't capable of moving my legs nor feeling an urge to pee so i did not know if it was blood, urine or amniotic fluid so I called the midwife who said my water had broken. Then she applied some homeopathic medication and next massaged my uterus hoping for dilation to progress. The result: blood but orifice stubbornly staying 4cm.

6 a.m.: I sent Jogi to rest in his office but only an hour later I called him, him who has been hyperventilating with me, back because I had developed fever and Mayas heart tones were showing signs of stress. I quickly got an antibiotic and medication that reduced the frequency but increased the strength of my contractions. Yes we were hoping for them to burst my orifice open.

Around 10 a.m.;: My gynecologist decided that enough was enough and that the cervix-tissue was too rigid and scared from my previous surgery. I was happy because finally someone made the decision that actually brought us somewhere.With the diagnosis of fetal stress, fever and stagnation of delivery I was sent into the OR for a Cesarean.
Before going in i called my sister and my mom -who were dying waiting at home- to come in.

I was not scared but unbelievably excited. However from time to time I was worried about feeling cuts and so on because let's face it:
1. your are conscious when they cut you open and
2. you do feel the docs maneuvering and u do feel pressure but at no time did I feel pain!

10.30 a.m.: OR: (By the way, until now I had already lost all sense of shame ... )
I was happy because I LOVEEEEEE my gynecologist and I love the surgery-nurse Nicole who was there I LOVE the anesthetist and most of all I was inexplicably happy because Jogi was standing next to me...he was by my side as he had ALWAYS been the past couple of months... he was standing next to me not only as my man but also as Maya's Dad and doc... with the camera in his hand- ready to do the first examination of our baby.

By the way, while waiting, Jogi discovered how much bigger his feet were in comparison to those of my gynecologist, so he had to document this amazing fact:

I was dying to hear my baby scream and see that it was healthy. I was dying to see if it really was a girl (just before the cesarean we came up with a back-up name in case it turned out to be a boy) and I was dying to see what she looks like. Will she have dimples? Will she have my complexion? Will she have a lot of hair? Will the pre-assumed weight be correct? Will she smile, will she cry, will she.......
Patience: not my thing!
I tear up a letter right after taking it out the letter box. I have finished opening all windows of my advent calender before December has even started... just a few examples of how cutty I get when I have to wait with pleasant anticipation let alone seeing my first child after 42 weeks of carrying it in my tummy.

10.43: first cut.
10: 52: I feel massive pressure beneath my rib cage when they push my upper abdomen to help get baby out.
10:53: they pull baby out by the head.
I cannot see anything. I wait for the first scream that initiates baby body's adaption to the outside world. I hear a scream and my eyes began to fill with tears. I love him/her. I have not seen her but I love him/her. So much. I know that any second now they will cut the umbilical cord and lift baby above the cloth. Finally. I saw her. First I saw lots of hair, then huge alert eyes, I saw dimples. I saw a mouth searching for a nipple, I saw wrinkly hands. Jogi said: It's a girl! Maya was born. There are no words to describe this magical moment. Before you touch her you feel a strong bond that can never be broken. A bond of life. She is mine. This is my daughter. This marks the beginning of a whole new life. An exciting journey of motherhood. Parenthood.

Jogi kisses me. "I love you he says". I cry tears of happiness when the midwife and Jogi disappeared to examine her. I knew: thirty minutes until they are done "closing me up". Thirty minutes until I can hold my little Maya. The longest thirty minutes in my life. I saw the OR-light through my teary eyes and I think I was shaking out of joy. I heard Maya working her lungs and an eternity later Jogi came back with our baby, tucked into a warm cloth, he sat down next to me. They untied my left hand (still busy closing me up) and I could touch her. She stopped screaming and found peace in that little space between mommy and dad. I was overwhelmed.

In the meanwhile my mother and my sister have arrived in the maternity room. I think they did not know what they were called in for so they were very surprised when they saw me and Maya getting (in a bed) pushed towards them. Jogi proudly walking next to his girls. Yes. Maya was already born. Both of them looked at us through teary eyes. Overwhelming. That is what it is.

In the maternity room we got a half an hour of privacy. The whole hospital knew by now that both of us have become parents.

Mayas first picture:

Our first family pictures:

Grandma!

Aunty!!!

My dad could not be there but he immediately called:

Our first three-generation-picture:

My midwife (the last one :-) congratulating us:

finally, my appetite is back:

i am looking at my wound:

Everybody loves Maya! Here one of the nurses who knew me from the time I had my surgery. She was the only one who believed that Maya will survive....

Maya in MY first baby blanket:

The day after she was born. Our first morning together. Just the two of us:
Sugar for the baby :-) It had 39 Degrees... she needed extra fluid!

Due to her intrauterine position her feet were a little "twisted" so she got these sexy supporters:
A few days later (Jogi stayed with us in hospital) we were allowed to leave hospital.
A new journey (from time to time a bit bumpy) begins.

Pregnancy- third trimester - fear of preterm labour

2010-09-08T05:45:00.001-07:00

Strict confinement to the bed... Let me show you what everyday looked like for us for four months:
I did not only sleep in- I slept as long as possible to reduce the time I was awake, alone and afraid. I brushed teeth but showered only every other day (afraid to stand). I moved my weak body onto the couch in the living room, pillow beneath my butt. I tried not to pee to often in order to stay in the horizontal position. Red cross sent me someone to clean and buy food. I spent all day in fear and distress. Watching pregnancy and birth Videos (i swear- they gave me strength to pull through), researching....I was on the phone a lot and my friends came to entertain or simply distract me... They came to clean, cook, brought food, sent parcels.... They listened... Jogi called me several times a day to let me know we were in this together. He got up early in the morning to prepare All that I need during the day- everything I needed was in reach... When he got back home he had to clean up the mess I had made because I could not clean or pick up the things I had dropped. He made food and sat next to me on the couch while eating, I ate while lying down, everynight we watched tv (everyone knows that I prefere creative things but I was paralyzed with fear)... We felt numb. Monotone. That's what our day was like. We put all our plans and dreams on hold because we were not capable of thinking beyond due date. The only thing that never suffered: our love. We grew stronger and stronger. I am astonished that in spite of these intense and stressful emotions we did not turn against each other once.

Our first milestone was week 24. From that week onwards every day that passed wasn't about life and death anymore but about growing healthy. It all got easier when my belly started to grow and we felt baby move around week 20. We watched a him turn into a her. She grew from 2 cm and 300 grams (which she had when I was in hospital) to 1kg, 1,5kg ...3kg. Around week 32 we felt reborn and very positive but I was still taking it slowly. My dear friends celebrated Mayas life with a:

This babyshower was one of the best days in my life and for the first time I felt pregnant because everone kept talking about it.

Jogi and I were happy and around this time my belly started to reeeeaaaallly show:
Week 32:

Week 35

Week 36:

Week 38:

Week 39:

Week 40:

Week 41:

Week 42:

My mom and sis came around my due date. Maya made no effort to leave the belly so -impatiant to the max!!!-I did what I had to do: walk! 4-6km everyday, hills up and down, 38 degrees, ricinus oil, we went shopping, sight seeing, I massaged my tummy and bounced on my big gymnastic ball to induce labour naturally, drank special tea, went to acupuncture... Did it all! Nothing worked. By now we were best friends with my gynecologists and everyone else involved ( Jogi followed me to every single appointment, every week) :-) but even though we removed the cerclage : no signs of labour! We decided to induce! And I was happy my family was with me!

The day before: Jogi and I fooling around. The boxes are full of presents from ma and Meloni!

Part 2- pregnancy: Second Trimester/ fear of miscarriage

2010-09-08T04:46:00.001-07:00

When you're pregnant for the first time you know exactly how far along you are and you celebrate each week, each trimester like a little birthday. Being done with the first trimester comes along with a huge relieve as the risk of miscarriage is drastically reduced and you start feeling better physically. Even though I had hardly eaten the months before I managed to gain 4 kg by this time- so I looked chubby but not pregnant, haha! But I was happy because I actually had worried about weight loss.

I flew to Singapore (week 14) and I enjoyed eating again:

But a day after arrival I developed blood-spotting. For a change I was not too worried so continued moving around because the ultrasound showed that everything was ok. My mom noticed that it was time to reveal the truth about her painful experiences in order for me to understand the severity of the situation . She told me that she had 6 miscarriages before I (premature baby) was born. All of them began this way in early pregnancy and even though the doctors told her everything was alright she lost the babies inspite of rest and their medical reassurance. She made me realize that I was having preterm contractions (I was not aware of it - first of all I did not know what they felt like and second of all my uterus was not large enough for the contractions to be strong). But when she told me what to look out for I noticed how irritable my uterus was. Every touch of cloth on my belly, every movement or even a little breeze of air resulted in a little contraction, a noticeable hardening of my lower abdomen. So I lay in bed for my entire stay of ten days in Singapore and even though there was no evidence for them working at this point in pregnancy I started taking salbutamol and magnesium. My mother insisted . She said that she took both during the seventh pregnancy and that was the first one to result in a living baby. Both are meant to reduce contractions by relaxing the muscles of the uterus. But salbutamol comes along with a couple of side effects on the heart and circulatory system...
I flew back to Frankfurt and Jogi picked me up and brought me back to ratisbona (I was lying down flat in the car to reduce weight on my uterus). We went to our obstetrician immediately but I was not worried at all because contractions as well as bleeding had detained under a lot of rest.
This is her- I love her soooo much:

She did an ultrasound and immediately her facial expression changed. This change freaked me out and our fear reached its peak when she said: I am sorry but you will not have a happy pregnancy. She told me that my body is getting ready to get rid of the baby. Getting ready? Well
1.contractions and
2. blood that probably derives from a softening/opening of the uterine orifice.
3. Dilation of cervix

We were speechless. Shocked. And most of all: we felt that everyone thought that this will not end well. Mission impossible. I went home to rest because nothing could be done at this point in time anyway. This night I woke up around six in the morning and the bleeding has increased. I was worried sick and woke Jogi up. He packed my suitcase, I lay down in the car and we left home. We decided that we wanted a cerclage and a TMV (long story short: close the uterus) The doctors suggested we should rather wait and we felt that they were not too happy about us insisting to do the procedure (we just listened to our hearts, my mom was pushing because she had them done when She was pregnant with my Sister and myself) because it came along with a Risk of accidently opening the amniotic sac (which would have been the end of it), infection, it does not prevent contractions .... All in all we were the only ones (Jogi, me, mom) who felt that we needed to do this.
Since my mom told me that she miscarried within hours after a normal ultrasound I was paralyzed with fear which grew by the minute. I had to wait until it was clear that I had no infection ... I was so afraid that -for any reason- surgery would Be delayed... One Day a Doctor Asked me during an ultrasound if it was possible that A rupture of The membranes had already taken Place because there was only a Small amount of amniotic Fluid.... I freaked out. I cried and thought it was all over and I could not tell if I lost tiny amounts of amniotic fluid... Turned out she made a mistake but...from that moment on I was always looking out for any kind of "dripping"...this would have meant preterm labour and in consequence -depending on how far along the pregnancy has proceeded- death or massive disabilities.
Finally surgery took place and I prayed thAt contractions would halt. I developed a massive bronchitis and laryngitis and was coughing my head of. I was afraid of tearing sutures by this massive abdominal pressure and my catheter hurt like hell. I lay in hospital for two weeks- not allowed to move nor stand- nobody around us believed in a positive outcome... We were scared... Really scared...
- 10 more weeks until baby even had a chance of surviving ( with many typical disabilities of extreme preterm born)
- 16 more weeks of lying down until reduction of the risk of massive healthy impairment
- 24 weeks until due date

And then I started a four month long, VERY STRICT

regime that carried the title: a life in horizontal position. To lie down all day, head down, hips up. I promise that you do not, and hopefully never know what this means!

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Part 2- pregnancy: a new experience/ First Trimester

2010-09-07T00:23:00.001-07:00

Up to Mayas date of birth I went " I cannot believe I am pregnant" several times a day. It did get easier when my tummy measured 116 cm and mayas foot constantly hurt my liver -but it Never seemed normal to say "i am pregnant". The miracle of growing a child in me fascinated me more and more with every tiny/ grand change I noticed in my mind, my behaviour, body and soul.
Pregnancy- so far the newest experience in my life and even though it was not a picture perfect pregnancy I enjoyed to live it, I practiced a new level of awareness and I questioned and discovered so many things. Too many to write down... While being pregnant I was paralyzed with fear (See Part Three for explanation) and found no peace to write and blog.
Retrospective- what do I need to tell you?

First trimester:
discovering paranoia.

I moved slowly like a turtle to avoid shaking the unborn. I felt nauseas all the time and whenever I did not I worried about mayas embryo. Curious about the visible development Jogi and I became masters in prenatal ultrasound and did one a couple of times a week.

I became a specialist in all questions on healthy diet while I was forcing myself to eat when nausea was killing my appetite. also impatiently waiting for the belly to grow! I changed my gynecologist because she wasn't excited enough and I only told people about being pregnant who were capable of sharing the joy. I looked twice before crossing the road and I stopped bending over or sleeping on the tummy.
I read all the time. Books-for-all-mommies as well as medical-books on fetal development- with great astonishment. We bought preggy clothes around week six- pretty stupid as ass and thighs took up an unimaginable new dimension (bought new clothes around week 30). Bowel movement became topic number one and it was normal that I couldn't go for weeks. I kept wondering if constipation or uterus growth were the reason for my little bump!

Oh yes and the pain of softening ligaments and constant urge to pee!!!! Not to mention that within one months I was two cups larger...
I went to work as usual because nobody was supposed to know at that point in time - but I felt so awful (fell asleep in toilet and morning sickness lasted all day) that I involved a couple of people in order to get out of night shift.
Around Christmas we made it official! Making it official comes along with a new sense of reality but still I was far away from it feeling real!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Ratisbon,Germany

Part 1: Pregnancy- a new experience!

2010-08-11T05:34:00.000-07:00

Yes. WE felt her. No. I am not talking about fetal movements but about a spiritual moment- an enlightenment. Jogi and I believe that a soul choses the family it wants to Be a Part of.
I get goose bumps when I think about it: we were lying on the couch facing stomach to stomach. In between us a seemingly empty space of 10cm. We were just looking at each other- aware of how much we love each other. I then felt a tingling sensation of heat on my front side with maximum around my belly. I (with medical background..) wondered If that was caused by nerval irritation and disturbed sensibility when Jogis gaze changed and he asked: do you feel this too??
Him adressing it made us realize that there was something in-between us, within us and for us it was our baby girl checking our her home.

Blessed- that is what we felt when the second line on the pregnancy test turned blue a couple of weeks later. I remember the day we bought that thing. It felt absurd. Little desi is buying a pregnancy test and peeing on it might change her life forever. I felt nervous and excited and young and grown up but so surreal... I felt even stranger when (a month before trying to conceive) we bought folate acid ( a vitaming u take before getting pregnant to avoid spinal defects) - that was my first step to take responsibility for my unborn child. We wanted to give our babies soul a functioning home.

So there u go. Pregnancy test positive. A new emotion fills your eyes with tears and makes your knees weak, love emerges from every cell of your body and surrounds you and your Jogi. You feel hot and shaky and this emotion.... you immediately want to pin it down, look for words to describe it, you think by doing so it will be easier to grasp what is happening but soon you realize: this is new. Just feel. And know that your man feels it to. This is the joy you feel when something you wish for with all your heart comes true.
We were still absorbed when the boys came knocking at the door and talking about farting into our pillows. They made us laugh :-) and we thought: baby girl---- these are your brothers!

Location:Ratisbon,Germany

Introduction to a new phase in life

2010-08-08T12:07:00.001-07:00

It has been a while since I posted anything on my blog.
The past couple of weeks have been....i do not know what exactly...they have been ...something...a month long transition phase..now people: i am back in the game! Back online. With a huge need to communicate all that is new to me:

I am a mother.

Jogi and I are parents.

Jogi, Maya and I are family.

Maya has wonderful brothers ...

and ..... fascination makes me speechless....Maya is our love made visible.

We kept my pregnancy and Maya's birth away from anyone who is not close to us. We had a tough time until our miracle baby was born...So- unsure of our pregnancy's outcome we hid the truth like a precious gemstone that was of such value to us that only selected people were allowed to see it... so only a few knew about Maya. Coming up soon are posts on the following topics:

1. Pregnancy - a totally new experience
2. Labour and delivery - my story
3. A miracle of life: our child
4. The first four weeks
5. Watch, teach and learn
5. Challenge your relationship
6. A mothers love
7. When parents turn into grandparents
8. A cocktail of emotions

Baby girl Maya

2010-07-06T03:27:00.000-07:00

Sleep-deprived but unbelievably happy. This is my purpose and I love it. A new challenge- time to grow. Two days old and Maya is havin trouble dealing with all that's new. I teach and learn at the same time. I think that being a parent is about the most pure and selfless kind of love. But Parents often feel that they give so much because "getting" is often associated with purely positive feelings. But what we get from these innocent and unspoiled souls is something we have slowly forgotten in a process called "growing up". We get something spiritual - a sense of curiosity and eternity- we question what we have known and from time to time we reach- and while doing so- change/expand our limits. We learn and get so much- the question is: can we appreciate it? Can we appreciate the things that stress us and accept them as obstacles and teaching methods to learn about the most selfless act of love. Love. This is all that Maya is about. Maya stands for "purity"- we mean the purity of a child's nature and one day purity of our childs heart. "suhana" is an Indian name and shows not only our affinity to India but means "beauty". We do not mean physical but inner beauty! More soon. My daughter needs support while finding into life. At the same time I learn to question all the things that seem ordinary to me. Little Maya- our child of love. Thank you Jogi!!!!

Honesty, Clarity and Trust.

2010-06-14T12:09:00.000-07:00

Trust- what a precious emotional and what an important intellectual act.

I have learned a lot about the importance of trust and honesty in life. Without these you feel lonely and helpless and you yourself become the only one you trust in. What a sad and self centered world. I watch people get hurt and especially now that my life is changing and I am settling down I have time to think about what I and many others have been through. These are the conclusions of my thoughts about trust:
The sentiment of trust consists of two elements:

1. The emotional part of trust
You expose your vulnerabilities to people, believing they will not take advantage of your openness.

2. The logical part of trust
You assess the probabilities of gain and loss, calculate expected utility based and concluded that the person in question will behave in a predictable manner.

Expectations
The weight of trust and honesty in a relationship depends on the nature of the relationship.
What you expect from your lover is very different from what you expect of your friends. Probably this is one of the reasons why relationships between couples are much more complicated than friendships. It is not easy to meet up to someone's expectations when that someone loves you, has placed you in a central role in their life and has maximally opened up to you.
What I am trying to say: You trust your friends and you trust your lover but the content of trust that you deliver to your lover exceeds that kind of trust that you give to your friends, because in most cases a lover is a friend as well as your partner.

Everyone who has been in love or has loved someone, who has friends and family knows about the importance of trust in life. Everyone has been hurt or has hurt someone (purposely or accidentally) and everyone knows how hard it is to trust someone.

Clarity (to be "translucent")
If I compare myself to many of my friends, my desire to achieve full clarity between me and my man is much grander than what my friends want from their boyfriends. To them "full clarity" (the way I define and wish for it) is a mutilation of privacy and I do understand their argumentation but I simply feel differently about it. It lies in my nature to merge with the inner truth of others and I feel blessed when someone who knows all my thoughts and emotions, someone who knows the ups of downs of DESI still says that he loves me. Only with this clarity between a man and me can I enjoy the truth and beauty of love. What I need is honesty to enjoy the innocence of love and not the farce of illusion. It is not easy to maintain full clarity. It takes you back to things you are ashamed of, it exposes dirty stains on your clean slates. Clarity is about emotional and verbal honesty and can only be achieved by not only answering to questions but communicating everything you are. The magic of clarity not only lies in discovering the truth about love but also in two people discovering the truth about human nature. This is not always easy but I enjoy the intensity it brings to life. This can only be achieved with someone who honestly feels the same way about the essence of clarity to his life.

Honesty
My life has led me to this conclusion: Honesty/Clarity is all you need to develop trust and clarity AND UNDERSTANDING. You do not need love, you do not obligatorily need a friendship, you only need honesty.
As a result only can you develop honest emotions associated with trust and these include companionship, friendship, love, agreement, relaxation, comfort.
Trust is an emotion. The importance of trust fully becomes clear only to someone who is lacking that emotion. The safe feeling of trust, a sense of security that feels like lying in your mothers lap and without understanding anything in life - you feel safe because you trust in her.

Areas of trust
Trust in yourself. Trust in your life. Trust in others. It seems to me that many are not fully aware that they are suffering from a lack of trust because to guard oneself they have lowered their expectations of others or have chosen a simple path in life. Also it seems that not many people trust in life and in themselves ("I cannot do this, I cannot do that", "I do not want him/her to see through me, take it step by step", 'I cannot quit my job and look for a new one I...."). These are areas of trust that people are not very conscious about. The most obvious to everyone is: to trust a partner.

The origin of trust
To trust means to have faith. You find it easier trusting when you have experienced someones trustworthiness, when you were raised to have faith in human nature. A central term in psychology is 'basic sense of trust ". This term was introduced by Erik Erikson who conducted an enormous amount of research on developmental issues. One such issue is that of attachment. He indicated that children who have secure attachments with their parents have a general sense that the world is predictable and reliable (this is basic trust). This basic trust, according to Erikson, is formed by loving, sensitive, care givers and not from genetic makeup or to a continuously positive environment. Meaning: Developing trust becomes very difficult if your parents upbringing mainly based on fear on skepticism as a tool of security. I know a lot of people who suffer from a lack of basic trust. Especially when their parents marriage went bad. All of them have trouble to find trust in a partner and trust in the future of their relationship. If their parents were pessimists of life than also their children will have trouble to trust in their life and in themselves.

1. Predictability
Trust means being able to predict what other people will do and what situations will occur. If we can surround ourselves with people we trust, then we can create a safe present and an even better future.

2. Value Exchange
Trust means making an exchange with someone when you do not have full knowledge about them, their intent and the things they are offering to you.

3. Delayed reciprocity
Trust means giving something now with an expectation that it will be repaid, possibly in some unspecified way at some unspecified time in the future.

4. Exposed vulnerabilities
Trust means enabling other people to take advantage of your vulnerabilities—but expecting that they will not do this.

Summary:
What have you got, when you are unable to trust someone? What do you do if you are unable to reduce that bitter taste of dishonesty? What do you do when your fear of dishonesty turns out to once again be right and ones again it becomes true to you: you can only trust yourself and skepticism is a sad but reliable and trustworthy tool that keeps you from being fooled... over and over again.. Trust is somehow a one way road and every lie will kill the growing seed of trust as well as the capability to clarity. True love is not selfish and true love wants happiness for both involved. Be honest. Do not just answer a question honestly but BE honest as a person and do not let your other half live in a secure illusion. It takes only a small lie to have someone who believed in the innocence of love question your entire bond. And if that someone already has trouble in believing in trust and honesty : every single lie will feed skepticism and destroy belief and hope in something real. True love is not selfish and therefore supports a healing process for all that have been hurt. And its most important tool is HONESTY.
From all my heart I wish all couples to learn to fully open up to each other and let honesty and love run through your bodies and heal the wounds of the past....

The self, who am I?

2010-06-14T04:28:00.000-07:00

This topic has been inspired during a conversation with someone who is pretty stressed out at the moment. He talks about work and how much it drains him (even at home he feels knocked out and has trouble to "let it go", he says that he 'actually' is a happy and relaxed and easy going person, a person who 'normally' is .....

I thought: "you are not just 'that one trait', you are all that you ever have been, are, will be, you are not only who you are aware of, you are also many things that you are not aware of, many things only come to light, when the right situation illuminates it. You might not be stressed out all the time, you are as well a person who is relaxed, who gets stressed out at work, someone who loves milk or a hot bath, someone who is impatient or late, someone who is honest and direct, someone who...... or simply a person who is trying to separate his different personalities, you 'are' all that you do, think, feel, you unite all the personalities you could be, all that you have been and will be, you 'are' everything and nothing at once... you are a whole lot of reactions to the same situation- depending on your mood and your experiences and your life circumstances".

1. The Self, I, Identity

So I ask you: are most of us living and illusion of identity? How many people are aware of the grand content of "I"?

I wonder: what is that sensation of 'identity', that emotion that separates "you" from "them", that gives you a 'sense of self'? What brings the simple letter/noun "I" to life and fills it 3 dimensionally with past, present and future?

Reflection should be your most important tool in life.

2. Reflection --> Find the Self, I, Identity

In the past I have recognized that self-reflection is not very common. The knowledge of what the heart needs and wants is restricted and even more so the will power to achieve peace of mind when obstacles seem hard to overcome, especially emotional problems (I have heard pretty often "I am like this-I can never change my reaction about.... because it is too hard"), while other things, like an extremely hard exam, might be frightening, but it this challenge will be tackled without a question because a good exam is necessary to achiever further steps in career in life where else... to challenge ones own weakness does not seem very attractive. I have come to notice that

a. it is not only fear to fail oneself it is also

b. a lack of interest in oneself.

Where can we learn the courage/patience to heal our weaknesses and who teaches us to show more interest in matters of our heart?

3. Education --> Parents (amongst others) should raise children to reflect more

Children are being indoctrinated since the moment they first see light. They learn how to behave properly, they learn the rules of life that come along with the necessity/beauty of living in a society. They grow up to control their instincts. Freud would say that growing up is about developing a super-ego that controls the id. We learn to restrict ourselves in order to survive in the times of our community. The rules of restriction are based on the values and norms of our system so in some ways the restriction that we learn is also a foundation to personal growth because we learn to differentiate the things that are permanently important to us from the things that are just of temporary pleasure. But still - I believe- that the core personality is often suffering from these restrictions and that matters of the heart get a raw deal. It is very important to find a balance between restrictions and individuality. Reflection shall be the tool to bring "the self" to life in an optimal way that allows us to be true to ourselves and continue life in a society. But for this to happen parents need to raise their children to be more conscious... take in and question. Reflect.

Parents must teach their children that life should find its roots within the heart and that self-discovery and self-creation shall be the basis of all actions (which is a good thing if we assume that our wise nature is "to be good"), but nowadays it is assumed that everyone knows who they "really" are. So there is no need to invest time for deeper reflection because we need time for other things.

Kids have learned how important it is to earn money, to achieve a degree, achieve a further degree, to safe money, to buy a house, to marry, to have two cars, a washing machine, to have children...all these things are visible to the eye.

But just a small number of parents have taught their children to find/know their nature (it is not easy if you did not learn it at home).

There are two main ways to do so:

a. Either you already feel your nature and remove all disturbing factors that keep you from living it or

b. you remove all disturbing factors and then become clearer about you nature.

Meaning: you need to be taught to overcome your fears (becoming aware of them), be raised to become conscious about what happens around AND within you, then understand how the inside and outside interact, to really UNDERSTAND human nature and its role in life, on this planet. Understand the "I" and then live the life that was chosen for you.

4. The Connection between reflection, finding the self and happiness.

We are too busy hunting for a better status and collecting things on the outside that seem to make us happy. But in my eyes happiness that is found in transient things is nothing but a short hedonistic pleasure that distracts us from things that truly matter and become in terms with oneself. The aim is not to be fully independent of "the outside" but the aim is to be fully dependent on our "inside" and use the outside to support our achievements in life but not the other way around. In modern times we do need security to lead a certain life style, depending on what your self-realization (and not self-illusion!!) consists of.

A very old saying: happiness comes from within.

People always excuse/explain their current behavior and their disharmony/unhappiness (inner life) with the inconvenient outer circumstances, this seems to take away some responsibility for their own selves.... People need to learn to be in charge for themselves and discover a complex network of emotions and thoughts that become the illusion of "self/I".

5. So what is "I/the self"?

We came to the conclusion that everyone has a core personality.

Some call it god within, some call it heart, some say it's the soul, some say it is the seed of our personality that re-incarnated over and over again but needs to be re-discovered and re-invented over and over again too... Whatever you call the core personality- It IS what it WAS and always WILL BE.... IT is that part of you that comes alive when you are free, when circumstances are ideal and allow you to grow and become the best you can. When you listen to that drive inside you: It matures your emotions, it widens your intellectual capacity and capabilities to it's endless maximum. And when you live that self: you come closer to wisdom- you will develop an aura that attracts other peoples hearts (and sometime frightens their ratio) and maybe your glowing and happy heart will help people wonder about their own lives, it will open them to the possibility of a conscious and happy life that can only derive from living out who you really are. One day you will notice that your happiness does not depend on ideal circumstances -as I said earlier/ bur your happiness will CREATE optimal circumstances!

And this is the connection between the topics I mentioned "reflection"--> "find the self"---> learn to live in "harmony of inside and outside" -->"happiness"

Reflect to find what your "self/I" is, bring the inner self in harmony with the outside self and feel the soothing effect of peace and wisdom, a calm and sometimes overwhelming experience of truth: happiness.

Many keywords that deserve a million pages of definition, but :

self? I? Soul? Heart? God within? Light within?

It is our life's mission to find and live our core personality. It will be rewarded with a happy and secure life.

WHO

2010-04-20T07:23:00.000-07:00

If everything goes as planned Jogi and I (kind of...) will take part in a three-day- meeting arranged by the WHO in Geneve. Subject: Preterm Babies.
(YouTube: march of dimes).
To quickly summarize what they do: research, to improve survival rates of preterm babies, reduce associated health complications I.e. For personal reasons this topic has become central to us and Jogi (more than I) faces the challenges of preterm birth everyday !
We not only look forward to be a part of the WHO, connect our brains for higher efficiency in the WHO building, meet fascinating people from all over the world with a common interest but also we are excited about Geneve and the illuminating effect of the sun on a country and our spirits.
Very, very excited! I hope we learn a lot! And that brilliant minds will change us forever!

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Preparing for a new phase of life!

2010-04-15T02:45:00.000-07:00

The past months have been hard. I stayed away from blogging and twittering because only a selected amount of people were let into my life. It is not like I chose who I wanted to be a part of it, more than so did they choose to "be there". Friends have been seperated from friendly acquaintances and family has proven why family should and always will be the center of my life.

I am happy. Truly happy. I have avoided everything that has no importance to me and surrounded and padded myself with the love and energy of everything and everyone that feels right for me. It kept my mood astonishingly positive and life's value has yet reached another level. A more conscious and thankful level. This happens whenever I think that I cannot be more grateful for this life! I do not think my quantity or quality of gratefulness has changed but it has matured.
I have matured.
We have matured.
And once again I need to thank those who walked the walk with us.
Who gave us water when we were thirsty.
Who listened to us when we cried.
Who smiled When we laughed and who gave us strength when we felt weak.
We are incredibly thankful and feel blessed by the love that surrounds us.
I did wonder if I deserved all this but this challenge has proven that in some form the love that you radiate will come back to you.
I am proud of myself, proud of my Jogi.
We are proud of where we are at now and our relationship had the opportunity to show how strong and true it is. I do not know how couples who are not 100% in harmony can manage this amount of fear and pain, stress, hystery, panic...
Jogi: I love us! And It has become so clear that love is not a high concentration of endorphins that runs through my body but it is our desijogi-atmosphere. It is the result of "us" , our meeting, our union. And it has never felt so right for me to use the word "love".

We are still preparing for the things to come but we finally feel like everything is going to be alright and one day we will be (we already are actually) rewarded. I am looking forward to all those who will be here soon to celebrate the miracle of life with us. This party shall be a reminder of what really is important in life.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Auf den Höhen,Lappersdorf,Germany

Where I would like to be now:

2010-02-05T03:42:00.000-08:00

EAST COAST SEAFOOD CENTER WITH MY FAMILY!

Hospital emotions

2010-01-17T03:21:00.000-08:00

I have been in hospital for a couple of days now and even though I am strictly restricted to
Staying in bed : hospitalization has given me one of my most precious treasures, time.
Time to think, time to read, time to write, the luxury of being bored and lonely from TIME to TIME, time to reflect, time to worry or dream, time to be absorbed by greatfulness and love. These days have been a crazy-roller coaster ride! The reason for hospitalization is private so do not bother to ask but do not worry: I am alright!

First of all: the heater is working hard so it feels kind of cozy to be in a large private room that is illuminates by the snowy roofs and trees outside.
I LOVE my doctor so very much and if it wasn't for her medical competence and grand knowledge as well as her energetic and caring personality- I would not feel this ...good. As I am a doctor myself I get a little... Priviledged treatment and even though this is against my morals I appreciate the effort!

I am so incredibly absorbed by greatfulness and love and this is why:

1. Friends
My emotionally close friends have been such a support, they keep calling to entertain me and
In spite of their busy schedules so many of them offered to spend a week-end with me that consisted of no more action then sitting beside my bed and talking to me. Even my sweetheart from america keeps calling me everyday to morally support me. I adore and love and appreciate my friends so much and having these intelligent and caring peolple in my life makes me feel honoured and showed me that I must after all not be a very bad person. Jogi sat next to me yesterday and caressed my cheeks and noted: I am so proud of you because people love you much. Indeed- that is what I feel currently: love.

2. Collegues
Lying in the same hospital that I work in comes along with a wave of gossip that spreads like a bush fire. But my greatest surprise was the number of people that came by to show they cared and bring paper to write on, sweets for sad times, DVD for boring times, a book for intellectual times and especially
One Thing i got from Every single one of them: compassion. True And honest compassion. Even From people I thought I was not getting along with.
And I truly mean this when I say it: this is my personal reward for loving people around me
No Matter How they treat Me.
What really did surprise me
Is the fact that none of my supervisors have been here, all of them Keep Asking yogi regularily how I was doing so I know they care. We talked about this and wondered If this phenomenon was related to a certain urge to stay professional (and therefore distant and not too priate) or if
It is an inner insecurity like:" I do not know if she wants to see me "and "I feel uncomfortable in
The Unneutral situatin"
Or whatever. Very interesting thought that does trigger a lot of new critical comments on our society, its morals and values and especially the emotional development of its members!

3. Family
A lot will be the same as in the next paragraph!
My family cares unsurprisingly perfect for me, especially my mother, I love her so much that just talking about her fills my eyes with happy- tears!!

4. Jogi
Now, Michi complained that girls always glue to their man, but
Michi: this is one of the reason why life centers around the one you love, because the one you love is ALWAYS there for you in
The best possible way. The one you love brings light into darkness, gives you a voice when you cannot speak, he wants not only your ups but feels honoured to be part of your downs. He finds pleasure in discovery- using an unfamiliar situation to discover things he did not know about you. He is the one persons who is physically and emotionally always close to you, this closeness becomes a bond with an intensity and depth that only the two involved can grasp and understand.
If he is the one you can talk to and laugh with, in whose heart your heart feels at home and finds peace... then he is the one
You will spend Most Of your time With -in a healthy way if
Course. :-)

Luckily Jogi Works Here too so I see him a couple of times everyday. He speaks to the doctors, looks through my file, tells me my blood results when others take too long, he keeps bringing food and sweets that normally trigger an animal-like appetite, he brought balloons (it now looks as if I was celebrating my birthday Here) he brings Things That Remind Me of Singapore - Like tiger balm And tee tarek, he brings Bollywood movies for US To watch.
The magic is: he does All this without me asking for it.
Why do all these actions make me happy? Because they show me how considerate he is. Because I have the same needs as he does so things that
make him happy make me happy to: this way one avoids a tiring and unnatural brain-wrecking-search for ideas. It comes easily, naturally, no serious conversations in individual needs and emotions. Harmony.

Does he do all this only to please me? No! Jogi does what he does because he finds joy
In the actions themselves: to care about someone, to be compassionate, to surprise someone, cook for someone... these traits belong to him. I mirror them. I Love to receive what He gives And I understand all his little gestures, While receiving I feel what he felt
While he was giving, I appreciate it all so much! Nothing He does while showing affection annoys me, while others Might find His or my way to show love suffocating. But everyone has different needs and I feel loved by jogi's great heart. Why?
We enjoy to giveJoy and when we see thatThe other One Is Happy it makes us Happy. This is Why we are good together.
We speak the same
Language of love, many same
Dialects, may they be: make presents, care, compassion, spent time Together, try new things Together, dream about the life we wish for... We do not ever Feel restricted By one another but enriched in so many ways.
True love is not a Compromise. With the right partner you never have the feeling of missing out on something, a feeling that even couples that are getting married deny...
I always envied those who believed in true love- but with
Jogi I feel the peace and joy of belonging together. It is overwhelming!!!

Now people, applause, I have tiped all this:
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Dechbettener Straße,Ratisbon,Germany

Singapore here I come!

2009-12-28T10:42:00.000-08:00

I can't wait to see my sweetheart sister in january and go eat seafood in Singapore and just be and feel at home!

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Merry Christmas!

2009-12-24T07:18:00.000-08:00

:-) this time, christmas will be
Beautiful! We have a Christmas tree!!!!!!!!!

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Turkey

2009-11-26T01:19:00.001-08:00

Istanbul - different names and different faces remind us on its rich and magnificent history. Most notable names are probably "Byzantium", "Constantinople" and "Stamboul". These names stand for an era of Greek rule, of the Roman Empire, the great Ottoman Empire and many more. These times of religious, political, economical and cultural change, times of setting and re-setting the "countries" frontiers.... These times are the reason why Turkic languages are one of the most spoken languages. With Turkeys wish to become a member of the EU many changes have been made in regards of infrastructure, political rights etc... there is just too much to say about Turkey and Istanbul and I hope that everyone who travels to this place finds time to read a little about its history.

Jogi and I spend five days only in Istanbul but we enjoyed it so much. The streets are alive, Turks smile and laugh and play backgammon in the middle of the road, you haggle, you get scammed, you eat fantastic food, you travel back in time and take part in religious travels while being astonished and amazed what mankind can come up with (Hagia Sophia, The Blue Mosque, Topkapi palace as a great example of Ottoman architecture).

Oh I can go on and on and on.... :-) But right now I am working on my homepage so you will just have to be satisfied with the next couple of pictures, if you want more, click on http://gallery.me.com/desiratay#100573&bgcolor=black&view=grid

A good book to read while being in Istanbul is "The Missing Rose", the first novel of young Turkish author Serdar Özkan,

Birthday trip

2009-11-19T23:57:00.000-08:00

We are spending five days in Turkey and right now we find ourselves in beautiful Istanbul. I am absolutely speechless. I love the feeling of being in Asia, the blend with Europe. I love the lights and the prayers of the blue mosque (competing with hagia sophia it seems), I love to see old turkish men sit in the middle of the road and play backgammon, the wind that carries the send of turkish coffee past my nostrils, the smell of shisha tobacco... i love it! I spend time yesterday to read about a long and complex history and will indulge in the cultural blend of architecture later. What a great place to celebrate birthday - Sunday (turning sweet 28-maybe finally my parents see me as a grown up :-))- on a bosporus river cruise. I love river cruises!!!!!

Tired Tired Tired

2009-11-13T08:33:00.000-08:00

That is all I am....tired and ill... oh my god...I want to sleep all day! Call this winter-depression????? No. First Trimester!

To Sleep-in

2009-10-20T03:41:00.001-07:00

I Love to Sleep until i cannot Lie down anymore! (yogi said:"lazy bone" :-)) I love it when sunrays hit the window and illuminate my face, when i open the window and a cool breeze wakens my skin and the blueness of the sky enlightens my mood- the rustling of the leaves when the wind demands their respect.....

Illusion of safety vs. the healing effect of love

2009-10-17T05:32:00.001-07:00

One thing that really amazes me is how Jogi and I- two really hardcore self reflecting people- can still discover new things about the self or each other while being together. He describes it this way:"to tease our emotional injuries out of each other through love" and it feels what it hopefully sounds like: gentle, caring, honest, healing.

One line in a new song by Xavier naidoo:

Original:

" ich werd auch in dunklen Zeiten zu dir stehen
denn durch dich habe ich erkannt
was es heißt
wenn man durch liebe
seine tiefsten Aengste zeigt...."

Semi-Translation:

"I will stand by you during dark times
because through you
I have come to realize
what it means
to be able to
to show your deepest anxieties/fears
because of love"

Question: what are you afraid of?

You can probably divide the content of your answer in four main categories:
1. Things that will inevitably happen
2. Things that are unlikely to happen
3. Things that will never happen
4. Things you worry about so much until they finally come true

The quality of your fear can be either conscious or unconscious.
a. the conscious type of fear
- makes it easier to tackle the problem and therefore puts you into a state of tension because you find yourself in a situation that clearly needs to be changed if you want to find peace.
- If you are afraid of snakes for example you can either therapy this fear or you can move to a place that has no snakes and for get about this fear (this is what I call the "illusion of safety").

b. the unconscious type of fear
- can be unconscious because you have learned to successfully repress it or
- because you do not understand it.

i.e.: Lack of understanding
If you need to plan your vacation in detail months ahead then you are definitely organized in some ways. BUT what you also need to understand is that you might too worry about chaos, unpredictable problems and be afraid of inefficient travel experience. When you have understood your need to "plan" then can you question how parents have raised you and why you have incorporated certain values into your lifestyle and personality ....many questions can evolve from here!

i.e.: Repression
Once you have admitted to yourself that you always fall in love with someone who is not available you might be manipulating yourself unconsciously because you are not ready for opening up your heart an this again can have a million of reasons. You have repressed that fear and started using an unconscious form if manipulation to avoid pain as a result of something you might fear .

This is just a short brain-storming on fear. I am currently on my way to work so I cannot really concentrate to analyze this more deeply. BUT what I was actually getting at: Jogi and I feel so incredibly comfortable with each other - we have fully opened up to each other as a foundation or even the result of an unbelievably energetic form of love that surrounds and wraps us into a warm and honest shell of safety. We are so opened up that from time to time a repressed fear comes to live that we did not even know we had stored. But it comes to live because we love each other so much that we have given up all form of emotional distance. Emotional distance is a tool that helps you close your heart a little to avoid pain.
And when that fear comes to live one of us will notice it, feel it, absorb it and catch the other one while falling. This is only possible because we have such a strong similarity of emotional needs. Strong similarity? I believe we have exactly the same emotional needs and this is our foundation to total understanding of each other. Total understanding.... our reason for harmony.

"Deine Blicke fangen mich auf
wenn ich tief in deine Augen schaue"

" Your glance comforts me
when I deeply look into your eyes"

Bye bye Carlos

2009-10-11T01:51:00.000-07:00

Carlos past couple of months were rather sad and lonely so we decided to give him to someone who will truly love him and spend more time with him and we found her! Her rabbit passed away last week (cancer, at the age of five months) and she was looking for a new "companion".
I thought it is better to give Carlos to her because the other option would have been a snake-breeder who was looking for some nutritive, furry proteins. I told him that I would rather not have Carlos killed and that I think his hungry baby-snake will choke and die from trying to swallow that massive peace of fur. He thought that 50 Euro for one heavy meal were de facto a little expensive so he hung up. Good for Carlos! (No- I would not have given him to that man anyway).
I am feeling a little blue about Carlos farewell. The last thing I saw was his offended chubby butt (he gained a couple of grams after his ...balls...were cut off).... Carlos- i believe that this is the best for YOU! Bye Bye and I hope you have many little jumps on the carpet of Bianca's living room!
Love, desire.

Yesterday night Micha and I went to party.
I am pretty boring and conservative so this was THE night of the year for us: two anti-alcoholics heavily dancing at a teenager discotheque. Before our headbanging action began we went to eat sushi and almost fell asleep after dinner, went to a bar to drink espresso (to stay awake) which was pretty disgusting and then (with a plastic bag filled with left-over sushi) went to the hip-place -to-be: The Suite.
The good thing:
the boys were on an average a head shorter than us and were trying to fit their muscular upper bodies into skintight muscle shirts (walking on skinny chopstick-legs), meaning: they could not see our faces and were busy balancing that upper body on that lower body and concentrating on breathing (Chest extention is a bit difficult in those tight shirts that are meant to accentuate the six pack you have been working on to compensation cerebral insufficiency. No time for flirting with older woman. Very good!
The bad thing:
We felt old when we had to sit down and let our cardiovascular system rest from time to time.

:-) No, just kidding! It was a very funny night and it was even funnier because no one bothered or groped us. But we did notice that we are older than those around us which was pretty funny :-) too. We had a blast!

Breakfast treat

2009-10-01T03:34:00.001-07:00

10 a.m.:
Night shift- check.
Scary moments- check.
Happy moments- check.
Post-night shift- relief- check.

I deserve it. Everyone has survived the night, including me! And life itsself is worth celebrating, isn't it?

In a cafe: Having a cheesy breakfast, chai latte, fruit salad for breakfast. Sitting in/on a couch that feels like a waterbed and my eyes, they feel pretty heavy...I feel heavy... I mean- I AM heavy but this... this tiredness in every cell of my body derives from sleep deprivation! My muscles scream for rest. 2 hours of sleep and I am still not relaxing horizontically!

-- Posted from my iPhone

Good times!

2009-09-26T04:59:00.000-07:00

I am fully dissolved into work at the moment. I do create time to clear space in my head and organize my thoughts (a good thing in a brain that reflects and absorbs 24 hours a day!) but more often then never I have to use my free time to pay bills, go to the post office, wash and dry clothes, clean carlos cage, etc.....
Work with collegues and nurses = pure harmony at the moment!!!!!!!
I have passed a phase in life during which I need affirmation and approval from others to feel secure about myself (this is the benefit of 'knowing what you want in life' and consciously developing the attributes that you like about yourself and challenging ones weeknesses). But still - once in a while- it does refreshen your motivation if some one compliments your work or your personality!
The day before yesterday our most respected senior physician made a comment during our daily midday-conference about my way of documenting clinical findings in our morning rounds. This means: the one who I thought dislikes me the most complimented my work in front of all other doctors! I first thought he made fun of me and asked him after the conference if he was ironically mocking me but he said (in a dry manner): no I would never do that in front of an assembly but I thought that you werde doing good work and everyone should know about that. He made me cry. Tears of happiness of course. Hihi...
Yesterday a mother complained about a nurse (a little mix-up had happened beforehand between mother and nurse) and she wanted to speak to the chief of medicine about the evil nurse who deserves to be fired (you can indeed judge a persons quality when you know them only for 30 seconds and also it is very just to project your unrealistic interpretation of a nurse into everyone working in hospital...)... Normally when injust things happen I always side the victim and start defending them in an aggressiv (it hurts me personally when unfair things happen to others) manner. But when I spoke to the mother (whose emotions I respected and whose position I understood) I stayed pretty calm. When I talked to her I spoke in a calm and mature manner and I was surprised myself by the side I secretly (without my knowledge) I had developed. Two nurses where standing behind me and listening and I was being very diplomatic and cautious about my choice of words and the notes I was hitting with my sexy and silent voice :-). While mami was being extremely pissed off - her usually angry child started smiling at me, magical! Haha! Anyway - after our talk I was pretty proud that I had not instigated a battle between desi (in this context the word 'desi' ist standing for a person who is avenging all the victims that have been wronged) and the mother ('the mother' standing for all the people who are emotionally involved and therefore blinded by a subjective and impaired reality).
Au contraire!
I had calmed her down.
We left the room and I wanted to continue rounds (ready for breakfast...) when one of my friend nurses said: very good talk.
Me: Really???
The other nurse: your example (I was explaining something) was very good! You will be a brilliant doctor when you grow up!
Me: Because of my example?
The nurse: I have known it the second we met.
I once again cried tears of joy!!!!

Portugal

2009-09-22T03:58:00.001-07:00

I just found out that I have to work tonight so : no time to write but enough time to post some of our pictures online. Please click here to see more:

Mobile me Gallery

The Day Before Time Out

2009-09-16T03:14:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

I am sitting in Jogis Office right now and I am extremely excited because I have a huuuuge surprise for him! :-), we are celebrating our first birthday together, and he will be entering a sweet new decade next sunday. Oh...I am being cheeky....
I cannot tell you now, because he might find out! But you'll be updated anytime. By the way, i have decided to spend more time posting blog entries again. I am kind of boykotting the whole 'sitting in front of the pc thingie' but I came up with a sensational idea: I have an ipod, and whenever I sit around have wait or need to take down notes or feel inspired to write something, whenever I fell like it, I write long notes, and those could be postet on this blog, actually without spending half the time i have in life with going online. I admit, I have been a computer addict and still am, I just love to write and create stuff. THIS IS THE ARTIST WITHIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Here and Now

2009-08-17T05:56:00.000-07:00

I am sorry people,
I am neglecting this page and therefore you. I am on my way to Mannheim, tomorrow flying out to Dublin for a week with my ozzy-girls, I cannot wait anymore! Get closer to what life should be about!
Last weeks were mind blowing, learned a lot about myself, about Jogi . Learned a lot about kids and about my position as a role model /educator/ friend/ adult. More soon.
For now, I am in dire need of a short trip, break free of this mind-mutening routine, enlighten my mind, enliven my senses!
Ireland, let me be a part of you because you will be a part of me soon!

Our project

2009-07-25T05:09:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone! This is a very chaotic entry for my blog but I am extremely sleepy!!

Jogi and I wanted to make a big presentation and invite many people, give away flyers, create posters ... we wanted to share the happiness about the work that we did in Guatemala in order to raise awareness of a whole different life style, working style, interaction style and country. We wanted to make people think and learn from a new impression. Learn from it in whichever way but feeding them with information that would not have been known of otherwise. What they do with it should have been up to them... We know that what we did in Guatemala was nothing that can be established here (for now-for many complex reasons i.e. cultural differences and a (probably typical) german need to keep up a certain distance between people, may it be emotional or physical, but this distance creates security whereelse in Guatemala distance creates insecurity...there are just cultural differences in interpersonal interactions and I am not judging these). We wanted to create a questionaire and hand it to each parent and wanted to find out what can and cannot be done on pediatric ward in a modern and western hospital. We were not only curious about the results of this but also knew that we can only help if we adjust to the needs of those we are trying to do good for.
It is like travelling: we do not want to try to make you love a place because WE love it, we just want you to see it, because knowing about it will broadens your horizon, and whichever way you will use this knowledge... it is up to you. Same with human interaction: we just want you to see something new and what you do with it is up to you. Many people extract things that are useful to them and this is all we wanted to do: feed you with new information to give you a broader mindset to chose from. We have no wish for you to do exactly what we do because it is our communities beauty that everyone one is different.

We presented our idea yesterday to the chief but unfortunately we ran against a wall with it. Our chief is a wonderful man but working in a complex and rigid system demands certain rules of conduct (which is just a statement and nothing more) and with him being the head of department he is probably more aware of the consequences of certain actions.
We also tried to make it clear that we are NOT on a missionairy path. What we want is NOT to tell people how to behave and we are not intending to imply that only OUR way is the RIGHT way. We do not feel superior to anyone because of the way we like to do things. Sadly enough this was not believed and I almost slipped into defending myself as if I was a little girl who needs to justify her interests. But I noticed this early enough and stopped the discussion about our intentions because I knew that I was not going to get anywhere in this conversation.
I was not giving up but I knew that this was not the time and not the place and I knew that my chief, who gave me the fatherly advice to establish myself first as a competent doctor and THEN integrate my madness into work (to avoid disharmony and hatred from others), was right for now.
I was a little disappointed in the fact that our intentions were degraded into something bad.
Jogi and I felt extremely...sober...afterwards..empty... we were not upset, neither frustrated or sad. It was something else, probably a huge surprise of how this conversation went.
We must have gone in pretty naive and blue-eyed. We were also reminded on how important it is to keep our relationship at home in order to avoid future problems.
Work problems (I am not aware of them because nobody talks about it but I hear that people do not like me going out with Jogi and people do not like my style of compassion)...
I have not got a problem with anyone at work. I like everyone and everyone has something good in their heart even though I do get scolded and people trash-talk about me..
I know that this is what people do when they cannot see the whole me and therefore ignorance leads to lack of comprehension and this again leads to judgement. To me, I am aware of this human side and that is why I have no negative feeling towards those people. I hope that their opinion will change when they know me better and I do get disappointed in interpersonal behaviour but I still like them for the good things I see in them.
The problem that I actually have is our social system in itself. We do have a great system and thank god for it. But it has some weeknesses and this is normal because it involves human beings... wow, going nuts now, i cannot concentrate on just one topic!
One problem that I have with our system is the image people have of competence and professionalism..for sure my problem with it derives from personal issues..but never mind, i will let you take part in my opinion and also: thank god everyone has their own opinion.
This is the beauty of our society. That individuality (with certain boundaries) is allowed. But what happens when an individuals feels impaired by certain boundaries...does this make an individual anti-social? Am I anti-social? Or is this something I share with millions of other third culture kids, those people who have never belonged to a certain society and have developed a personality that is dissolved into many many societys and therefore have trouble adapting to just one..
This makes no sense but here... an original picture of desis tired brain!
I am excited. What a challenge!

Blog ipod

2009-07-09T08:45:00.000-07:00

Oh greeeaaat!
I ordered a laptop, a printer, a cable to connect laptop and beamer, an ipod to navigate on the laptop ... and I feel extremely creative and motivated, I want to give birth to a new idea and I want to make a little change in the way some interpersonal things work.
I will speak about this once I have started on the project and once the chief of medicine here gives his okay. Anywayyyyy. My ipod goes online, hihi, how cute, and I did manage to write the title 'Blog ipod' with the ipod but I am writing now on a pc (I got a little annoyed by the not-keyboard!) I love to carry something around that captures my ideas.

I was extremely drained the past couple of days, tired and nothing went right at work and ill at the same time (bronchitis, sinusitis with drilling pain when I move and when I cough, fever and chills once a day) so I felt the lowest low of my energy level for a long time. I do not like that I do not have time to dream, to relax, to create, to think, to dance, to converse, to develop and read.... I know that I need some more time to build up convidence and knowledge at work. I know that the first years of work are very taff and I am up for this new phase of life as well as the responsibilty that it demands from me. But I do NOT want to belong to those people who keep saying: just a couple of months more like this THEN I start living again. 20 years later you wonder where your initial ambitions and dreams have gone, you have gotton used to routine.
Sure. In some ways routine is a good thing, but then again it kills a part of consciousness and I want a conscious life. I just do not know how one can become a skilled doctor (and not only a compassionate one) when there is so much more to be done than work (to feed my personality with the input that it needs)!
Anyway, I still do not know how to manage the split between work and personal-growth through quality leisure time. But all this energy and love and passion and my dreams -they are overflowing from time to time and as I have said a couple of times: grand times are ahead, i can feel it and sometimes I get impatient. Jogi and I will create our own life, our own lifestyle and our own surrounding and our love for each other as well as our love for people around us shall help us lead an extremely productive and fulfilling life of passion and our compassion will give love to anyone who is willing to receive it.

To love and to trust

2009-06-28T11:07:00.000-07:00

George MacDonald:
To be trusted is a greater compliment than to be loved.

People say that 'to love' means 'to trust'. If this was right, it would mean that no one loves anyone because hardly anyone trusts another person, sometimes not even (in) themselves.

Now most of the people reading this will say: 'I trust my family, I trust my partner, I trust my friends...I DO NOT have an issue with trust!'. Well, it is all a matter of perspective. I found an online definition saying: 'firm belief or confidence in the honesty, integrity, reliability, justice, etc. of another person or thing; faith; reliance'. In my eyes, the capabilty to trust someone else is much more than what this definition summarizes with a couple of nouns. 'To trust' someone is marked by a deep feeling of safety and security. The capability to do so in this point of presence is a result of parentel education, bad/good experiences, media, growth, self-reflection, etc...
To me 'to trust' someone is the deepest sign of connection that I can have. I do not believe that trust and love are obligatory linked to each other. I love people. I love human kind. I love my family, I love my friends. But hardly anyone knows what I am deeply afraid of, what hurts and scares me, what bothers me. If your trust is exploited and the knowledge of your weeknesses is used to attack your soul as a tool of power then sincere trust is easily ruined. The problem with this is that not only trust towards the attacker but also trust towards other people can be damaged.

Now I would like to adress all of you. Who do you trust? Are you capable of 100 % trust?

Yes?

Okay, then think about this: who knows about all your fears and insecurities? Who knows about bad things that have happened to you and things people have done to you? Who knows how much money you earn and who knows that you have stolen money in the past? Who knows that sometimes you do selfish things and make them look selfless? Who knows that you are terribly afraid of death or your future? Who knows that you do not really love your partner anymore and that you are just afraid of breaking up, because a break up means that you will be alone (do you even know this?). Who knows that you are having an affair and who knows that you have killed a rabbit? Do you always tell your partner what bothers you or do you pretend to be alright or use another problem to focus on? Does your partner know that he hurt you with the phrase he said yesterday? Who knows that you just told a lie? Who knows YOU with all your ups and downs?

Are you able to be transparent? Or do you feel umcomfortable with it?

Then why do you feel umcomfortable with it, why can't you fully trust anyone?

You might be afraid to be judged.

You might be afraid to open a door and get hurt.

You might be afraid to not-be-perfect anymore.

You might be afraid to open up more than the other person.

You might be afraid and do not know why.

You might not even know that you are afraid.

You might have to work on your image and therefore have to hide a part of you....

There are many reasons, but what I am trying to make you ask yourself: who do you REALLY trust?

And what happens when you feel that your trust is misplaced , what do you do to recover and how long does it take to regain this kind of trust that is -for sure- one of the pilars of real connection between two people (friends, lovers, family....).

I am writing about this because I wondered about the nature of trust, I have wondered about the nature of love and I cannot help but reflect on their interrelation, because in my eyes, you can love someone without giving them 100% of your trust. And trusting someone as a consequence of them loving you is not something that seems to happen a lot. I hope that this entry helps people to realize that everybody needs someone to trust fully and just a small amount of people is capable of doing so. To trust someone with my money, to trust someone in achieving something, to trust someone to keep a secret, to trust someone with a task...these are minor symbols of trust, compared to that kind that I am talking about:

to trust someone with the knowledge of my entire personality.

A little provocative:

William Shakespeare:

Love all, trust a few.

Things we need to learn while interacting with another human being.

2009-06-22T04:23:00.000-07:00

1. be open for another individual and accept that you can only take a snap-shot, grasp a part of the entire personality, keep in mind that your perception of another person is restricted by your past experiences and your lack of flexibility, that misjudgement is sometimes disguised as intuition.
2. listen and find out what the other person has to say, discover the beauty of individuality and by doing so you will not only learn more about the person you are talking to but you will notice that it is a privilege to meet people who are different than you are because they open your eyes in many senses.
3. watch those you talk to, watch those around you, observe not only others but also yourself. This way you will notice how quickly things change, you feel everything come to live and understand more about inter-personal interaction and the impact every meeting and every stimulus has on one.
4. read between the lines when someone talks to you-you do this by looking into their eyes, listening to the words spoken, the voice that brings those words to life, you complete everything you receive with things you have received from that person in the past and keep on piecing the puzzle together, keeping in mind that this puzzle of life underlies constant change and will never come to an end.
5. do not enclose yourself in a wall of prejudice, or at least: be willing to revise your formed opinion. Prejudice is a preconceived idea and very often derives from character traits that you carry within. I would like to use this point once again to remind you how important it is to:
6. know yourself! You can only begin to understand the complexity of human kind if you are aware of your own disentanglement, aware that there are parts of you that you have not even begun to explore let alone to understand. It is time to feel what it means to be 'human'. With this knowledge you will get closer to a state called 'wisdom', you will dissolve your presence and your soul becomes a part of the past, of the present as well as the future. It is a state of being where you just take everything in that you can, where you are a part of everything and everyone. You hear, see, feel, smell and taste all that there is. In this state you will live the knowledge that everything constantly changes and that you are a part of this change. In this state you know yourself and you know that this knowledge is limited. With this limitation and this insight you are able to just 'feel' without any active cognitive action. With this open feeling you start to discover a universal truth. In this state you know how to receive and understand other people. Because right now, you are probably not aware that I (I take myself as an example) AM NOT what you see in me. I am dissolved into my past, my presence and the dreams of my future, I left a part of me with everyone I have met, I have not discovered all I am and I am subject to an extremely conscious type of change. Everything I see, feel, hear, taste and smell, all my thoughts...EVERYTHING changes me, and this change is happening so fast that no words can keep track of it, this change is enormous even when I am just lying in bed and you are watching me sleep.
7. do not judge the other person, you might not like their actions but you do not know them well enough to judge their complex personality. Learn to differentiate between what someone DOES and who someone IS. This is a very, VERY important task for everyone on this planet!!! This is something you can learn and the capability to differentiate between the two of you will free you from a lot of negative energy. I used to hate it when people did something that was incorrect in my eyes (see, very subjective!). Then I used to hate it when people thought they were right and their vision on things was impaired because they only had two eyes and those were all they could use. With time, I learned that not everyone has the tools to understand and not everyone has the motivation. I still do not like it when people do not even make an effort to change for the better but I have come to understand that it takes a lot of will, strength and understanding of the human being to change oneself. Right now I am very proud with where I am. For example: the nurses kept gossipping me, they disliked ME because of things I could not do at work, they expected me to be secure at work even though I am still a beginner. I felt very sad about this, because i still liked them very much and I still do, but i think it is unjust that they judge me because the do NOT know me and I do NOT judge them EVEN THOUGH they dislike me. The unjust thing in my eye is: hardly anyone will earn anything else than compassion from me, no matter what they think and say about me. Sure, there will be times when even I have trouble giving someone love when they are being unjust, but this is what life is for: practise, change, learn and become the best you can.
8. be compassionate, i mentioned a couple of things on compassion in the text above. I will write a million pages if I start discussing this beautiful word and its meaning to me. I can only say this to you: I want to have the best and purest heart I can and I hope you want this for yourself too.
9. ask questions, be curious : be curious, learn consciously, understand, change. By the way, to me, asking questions, gives me a sense of freedom. Questioning people and things enable me to move around between my perception of this world and yours. So : the more people I ask, the more I can learn about their view of the world, and this is pretty amazing, because as they say: the truth lies somewhere in between?

The Art of Asking Questions Part 2

2009-06-22T04:15:00.000-07:00

So:
You have active and passive listeners.
The passive listeners take part in what you say and they find it interesting.
The active listeners will put themselves into the position of the one talking and while trying to get an overall picture of who the narrator is what he feels- a whole bunch of questions arise, to which the answers will help them understand exactly how his heart and his brain functions.
A much deeper sense of understanding -yourself, your surrounding and human kind- derives from curiosity and the art of asking questions.

So why do I write about this topic:
I love it when someone asks a lot of questions. Questioning is the only way to produce an active conversation that challenges those who are involved. Any topic can be illuminated from a million of angles when questions are asked. You will not only learn about the topic spoken of , you will also learn more about yourself and each other.

To me, asking questions, is a symbol of curiosity.
Curiosity is one of many dialects of intelligence.
Curiosity is the seed of compassion.
Curiosity is the foundation to knowledge.
Curiosity is the energy pushing towards further growth.
Curiosity is the strength two people invest to build a relationship with closeness and understanding.
Curiosity is all that you need for a conscious and fulfilled life.

I miss curiosity in our everyday company. Sure. You are not allowed to be friends with a patient and therefore not allowed to ask too many unprofessional questions. Your co-workers are just colleagues and not friends so private themes are hardly a topic.
I have reduced my level of questioning to a minimum because from time to time I still have trouble dealing with the disappointment of a lack of questions in return , it gets truly one-sided sometimes. Most of the time I do not care because I enjoy finding out who I am dealing with. But at times, when my energy tank is almost empty, it gets tiring. For a while now, I have had that feeling that my time in Germany is over. I want to surround myself with question marks and exclamation marks with dots and commas and more question marks.

I do not know who will be able do understand this topic.
But I honestly hunger for a more passionate and curious interaction between human beings, based on an open and non-judgemental heart. I believe that this is one of the pillars of a peaceful coexistence between all races of human kind, and not only that: as a basis to a harmonious cooperation between individuals.

The Art Of Asking Questions Part1

2009-06-21T23:16:00.000-07:00

I just read this again and some things made more sense in my head, especially the connection between the differen topics. I'm not very organized when I write but I hope u still understand what I am trying to tell you, I cannot be bothered to revise!
Desire

I am referring to one of my old blog entries of last year.
I talked about the 'Art of asking questions'.

One of the things I noticed during the past couple of years is the seeming lack of interest of someone in someone else. I mean...a genuine interest in regards of 'who am I talking to'?
I can give you just a couple of questions so you know what I am talking about:
What does the counterpart fear? What have they learnt during their travels, who have they met, what was their most impressive encounter, have they had a life changing moment, what do they love, what gives them goose bumps, when was the last time they cried, what is their biggest dream, how are they planning ahead in order to achieve those, why are they interested in hiking, do they drink coffee everyday and what have their parents taught them, how different are they from their parents, what have they learnt about themselves during the day, what are their weaknesses and are they working on those... so many questions.... I used to ask much more questions. The question mark is my favourite punctuation mark!

I have learnt that some people feel uncomfortable once they notice that you are digging into their soul, heart, brain, memories. Keeping distance is something, especially in the western-western relationship, that creates an illusion of some kind of security. Let no one know too much about you! What people are worried about is to be hurt, to be judged, to be an object of the gossipy kind of curiosity.

But what I am really, honestly interested in is that sort of curiosity that is created by the grace of charity, the grace of loving someone else, just for 'being': for being on this planet, for being a mother, a father, a child, an artist, a homeless and especially: for being different.
To 'be distant' is a description often used to describe Germans when you ask someone on another Continent. In this society norms have been used to create a distant and sceptic relationship between people who do not know each other, based on 'different is scary, different is not good'. Different? You will be judged!
People do not open up, especially not emotionally because they are ashamed and afraid to share what is inside. To open up in this country is a deep sign of friendship and trust (which also is a very positive trait).
People wonder why I put my thoughts and my feelings out there by posting them on a blog. Well to be honest: I have nothing to hide. Ask me- I will tell you! In fact: I would LOVE for you to ask me!
Unfortunately those mind blowing questions that leave you responseless do not rise up too often so I have to question myself by losing myself in the world of thoughts from time to time. Growing by questioning, growing by conversation, growing by blogging.

Let's structure this a little:

When you talk to someone you either
1. face someone who is not interested in you, meaning: they do not listen or they do not care.
2. face someone who is busy with their own thoughts and that's why cannot concentrate on what you are telling them.
3. face someone who talks about himself
3.a. talks about things they have done during the day, listing facts.
3.b. talks about emotional matters, metaphysical facts.
4. face someone who likes to listen
4.a. because they are curiously listening to your words.
4.b. because they themselves think that they have nothing interesting to say.
5. face someone who asks you questions
5.a. because they do not want to talk about themselves
5.b. because they think it belongs to a communication
5.c. because they genuinely interested in what you have to say.
6. face someone you have a give-and-take conversation with.
--> you are lucky!

There are several kind of questions, that can be asked, they can either concern someone involved into the conversation or something/someone else:
1. Questions asked about facts and figures of your life - where have you lived, what pets do you have, what do you do for a living...
2. Questions asked about matters of your heart - why are you upset, why are to tired, what did she do to hurt you?
3. Questions asked to ask for something - Can I have the butter, would you help me move on Saturday, do you want to join the movies....
4. Questions on philosophical matters, or questions that are used to dig into a theme on a deeper level - what did you think of the presentation by Algore? Why can birds fly? Why are frogs green? Do you think Aristotle's theories on eudaimonia are good?
5. Questions that are used to find out who the other person is: Do you believe in aliens or spiritual encounters? Are you afraid of entering a new relationship after your divorce? If you could turn back time, would you make anything different? What do you love about your wife and how has she changed your life? Do you believe in a life after this one? Who really knows you (this question actually was asked my Joshua, a guy I have only known for a couple of hours , and this single question helped me become aware of many things)? Were you afraid in Africa? What were you afraid of? Would you do it again? What did you feel when you saw the poverty? What changed inside your intellectual and emotional character? Has this change passed the test of time? And why do you eat your chocolate this way? What is it that you like about dolphins? What was your first thought when you landed in Guatemala? What was your last thought? Who are you?

Like many of my friends who grew up as a third culture kid, I have learnt that it is not easy to find a conversational partner who challenges your thoughts especially in regards of this lifestyle, it is hard of course if you grew up in a whole different world (values, experiences, culture, nations, history, school system).... perhaps I have trouble understanding your world and your life. I do not know, challenge me, I am curious to find out about what you have seen, felt, heard, thought...

When I returned to Germany 2001 I suffered from a deep cultural shock as well as a profound identity crisis. I was squeezed into a role that was not me but I had trouble manifesting myself the way I was because everyone questioned my personality, my aims, my lifestyle. But besides Eva, NOBODY was interested in who I am and why I behaved differently. My identity was held together by the other third culture kids who were suffering from the same issues and we needed each other to keep it together.

I have mistaken the lack of questions in the past for a lack of interest in my personality and my world.
In the meanwhile I find that the curiosity I passionately long for ...that this curiosity and the questions you ask...are a direct reflection of the experiences you have had and the amount of self-reflection you do. Sometimes someone who never has travelled asks me more fascinating questions than someone who has travelled a lot. Sometimes someone on a lower academic level asks me more disturbing or stirring questions than a genius with several academic grades. The curiosity inside of you is a multiform product of many things, such as genes, surrounding, past, experiences, self-reflection...but now I am repeating myself.

Different faces

2009-06-21T23:11:00.000-07:00

Take time to analyze those you interact with:

Who am I?

(please read the newer blog entry too)

greedy

sweaty

not a morning person

sexy

sweet

egg-shaped and lazy

hiding to feel ill and active

sensual

hungry

philosophical

stupid, sometimes slow

reflected

hot temper

a traveller, thirsty for knowledge

a clown and creative

passionate

nerdy and chaotic, d-uh style.
I chose who I want to be. Over and over again.

It is time for a funny entry... but all I could think of is pretty serious. Alamak!!!!