Today I went to an outlet store in Las Vegas. This has been a big area full of shops, mostly clothing, similar to a mall, just without roof. So actually many little buildings organized in a way that you can’t get out, once in the labyrinth of shops. There have been all the famous companies and every label had its own shop.

I would have been very exited if I would have liked shopping clothes. But since I was there, I went through the labyrinth and checked out one or another shop. But unfortunately many other people had a similar idea. So it was pretty crowded, which resulted into some interesting group dynamics. First of all, people don’t walk in a comprehensive pattern. Shopping people walk completely unpredictable. They change directions in unforeseeable ways, just like that. They suddenly stop without warning or accelerate. It is almost impossible to predict the path of the surrounding humans when walking through the scene. This is a complex dynamic system.

Even more complicating becomes the exercise with all the fixed obstacles and barriers. There are garbage cans, billboards, even trees. Not to speak from relocatable objects like dogs. This is very confusing and requires top focus. You have no idea, shopping is such a pain and frustrating. Why do people do this? They call it shopping experience, I call it limbo or pre-hell.

Okay, but that’s not all yet. Some people even try to talk to you, well to me. Which is in general a good thing. Communication is a nice invention and prevents us from arguing with clubs. Unfortunately this conversation is rather one-sided. They want to sell you something you don’t need and you try to say politely: ‘get lost!’. If you are the more tolerant type, you can handle those situations for a while and keep smiling. But at some point even the more patient contemporary becomes a bit snappy.

For me it was the Jamaican guy who pulled me across that line. Well it was most probably an American who looked very Jamaican. A big guy, fit and strong, darker skin and rasta hair cut. A real sunny boy. He stopped me and tried to sell me a power wristband, one which gives me energy and balance and many other advantages. He even promised better sex and better sleep. I was tempted to answer: “Wait a minute, isn’t this mutual exclusive?!”. But he kept praising his power wristband. I was nice and explained that I had already such a thing and it didn’t work too well. But this didn’t stop his monologue and encouraged him even more. Okay, last chance: cliche. I tried to look as serious as possible and looked through my sun glasses into his and said: “I don’t believe in your voodoo”. Then I realized that it was not the most brilliant idea to call a Jamaican guy doing voodoo, especially not if this guy is much stronger than yourself. Luckily I had the element of surprise at my side since the facial expression of the guy collapsed. Obviously he had not expected such a comment. He was observably not amused. Okay, such a moment needs be used and I added that I do not want his placebo bracelet. This didn’t ease up the situation much. So I went away before he could decide to break my arm.
And suddenly this shopping tour got an interesting touch 😉

Recently I had an interesting discussion about society. It’s a burden, but you can not go without it. Wikipedia says society is a group of people involved in persistent interpersonal relationships, or a large social grouping sharing the same geographical or social territory. So you can’t do much about it. Most of the time you are born into it. You are raised in it and you are influenced by it before you have developed enough brain to realize it.

The funny thing is, society comes with lots of rules and even worse, it comes with lots of expectations. Society forces you to behave in certain ways. It demands what to do and what not to do. It influences your entire behavior, your way to interact with people, the way you are organizing your life. Simple example, have you ever farted in a noisy way in a restaurant? Probably not intentionally. Suddenly all people around ignore you with an OMG face or stare at you, trying to kill you with their eyes. It’s a normal body function, designed by nature to avoid random ugly human explosions. There is air inside your body which needs to get out, and there are not too many body exits. Everybody farts, but most of us secretly, pretending they never did. And the society stands in front of you, looking shocked and waving with a raised index finger, saying “no no no, you are not supposed to do that, you are a bad bad boy”.

Society forces you to suppress your natural body functions and needs, wow. Well, in this case I would support society in the restaurant case. Not because of the “oh noo, nice people don’t do that” reason, rather because this might influences my taste experience in a negative way. And I simply don’t wanna smell what the other person had for breakfast. But you get the point, society forces you to behave in certain ways and if somebody steps out of the row, society will punish him or her. There are so many examples, showing too much skin,  tattoos, faces full of metal, and much more. Just being different triggers the society punishment machine already. This is actually quite sad.

So what expects society from you? Are you expected to behave polite, honest, respectable? Certainly. Boys don’t cry for example, they are supposed to be strong. The interesting thing here is, society slowly changes its mind and it becomes accepted slowly that men can be sensitive and soft. Some decades ago no man would have agreed to advertise body lotions, no way. But this makes it even more difficult. Those society expectations are at times even contradicting. As before men are expected to lead, to be strong, to drive, to create, to establish, to make a point. And at the same time they are expected to be emotional, sensitive, romantic, caring and compassionate. This rarely works out. What usually happens is that girls are attracted by the first kind and then they try to transform the men after marriage into the second kind, which of course generates some friction. And know what, when they succeed with that transformation, then they complain that you are not the tough guy anymore they married some years back. Irony of society.

But same problems for girls. They have to fit into the current beauty ideal. which is almost impossible. But to give all girls some hope, the beauty ideal changes over time. In times of less food and starving we might switch back to the ideal from the time of Rubens. Current society expects girls to be beautiful, agile, sporty and sexy. And at the same time girls have to behave modest, polite, shy, cautious . This doesn’t fit. Men expect their women to be presentable, they wanna boast with their girls and at the same time they get angry and jealous of another guy gets attracted and dares a look. World is full of contradictions triggered by society.

Some people don’t accept the pressure from society and become rebellious. They actively behave against societies expectations. And there are many ways to do this, starting with fancy hair cuts, tattoos, piercings and different clothing styles. There are so many different scenes out there, revolting against the expectations of society. But most of them give up over time and become society conform, owning a little house, having children, running to work every day. It’s hard to fight society long-term.

And it’s also hard to escape society completely. Some people try, with leaving the country, moving to different parts of the world. But this is no real escape. They just move into a different society with different expectations and rules and sooner or later they will be caught by the new society and adapt. A very few people try to escape completely, living alone up in the mountains or deep in forests. This is the only way to get out of this game. But then you have eliminated also the good sides of society. Then you have to live without any health care, without dentists. In fact you have to do everything on your own, you have to get the knowledge and skills to survive without society. All the knowledge which is distributed over many people in a society, dentists, butchers, farmers, construction workers, … You do not have access to this knowledge anymore and you have to gather it as good as you can by yourself.

So, it’s hard to live with and without society. But a little rebellion can not harm. So next time you are sitting in a restaurant, fart as loud as you can and feel good about it. Or simply play with societies hate and say out loudly to your neighbors table with a shocked facial expression “oh my god, did you really do that here?! what the hell did you eat?!”. And then lean back with a huge internal smile and watch the show of society. Life is beautiful, isn’t it?

These days I am visiting the place I grew up. I spent so many years here. All here is so familiar, every tree, every house, every meadow. I am sure I will not be able to live here anymore. I would have trouble to reintegrate, but everything here smells like home, feels like home. There are the neighbors pulling me into conversations. They want to know how I am and what I am doing and within seconds I am the little boy again, living here, playing tricks on my neighbors, stealing raspberries from their bushes. It feels good.

This morning I decided to go out for a run. It was about 8am in the morning. Dark grey clouds passing low or hanging on the mountains around. Morning fog everywhere and the air was clear and humid. A deep breath and I started. I passed the houses of our neighbors and it almost appears that the time didn’t move that much forward here. Many of the former agricultural or industrial buildings are not used anymore and empty since a few years. They are decomposing or collapsing. Trees and bushes, nature is taking back the places slowly. It is sad to see this, the former bustle is gone, silence. But despite of all this, there is a feeling of peace noticeable.

This is my village, almost a feeling of security. All those houses and people, which appear so familiar, but also so unfamiliar meanwhile at the same time. Strange feeling. I am passing a memorial of World War II. As pupil I have been here many times with my school class. I remember the muster, hoisted flags and the battle songs.

I am running through the forests of my youth. Here I learned cross-country skiing. Here I participated so many competitions in running and skiing. Here are the places my dad took me with ski during winter times. He took me so many times on skiing tours into these mountains, explained the trees and animals living here, showed me traces and could name every mountain in visibility range with name and exact height. I haven’t been here for years but up here I know almost every tree. So many memories around. I also found the place where I knocked myself unconscious with a skiing stick. I was a kid and I wanted to show something with the ski pole to the guy behind me. I was fast and the pointy end of the stick hit a tree and within the next second the other end hit my head and knocked me out. I passed this place today with a smile.

So many paths I almost forgot, but I know them all. And there the little lake in the forest. Here we built a raft out of self-chopped trees. We have been kids. How many times did I pass these trees on skis. Uncountable times. Meanwhile the clouds vanished partly and the first sun beams are falling through the trees. This forest smells even more like home.

This morning I passed many of those places. There are so many memories around here. A herd of cows was interested in me and followed me as long as the meadow fence allowed. Funny scene when about 200 cows are coming towards you and run for some time next to you. Obviously not too many people are coming to those lonely places. And I also saw some deers in the forest and on the meadows. Everything appears so intact, almost untouched and nature is taking back every sign of former hustle.

When I returned the sun was shining and warming up the landscape already. Most of the clouds and fog were gone and a beautiful new day started in my home village. Nice to be back.

Hello Dad,

more than one year past since you left us. So many things have changed within this year. But I do remember very good your last days. Those days have been so intensive, so much suffering, so much pain. Those days have been soul-crushing and those days changed me.

Seeing you disintegrating in such a short time frame, such a strong man. And at the end only skin and bones left. I remember as it had been yesterdays, you could hardly speak anymore and you tried to tell me something. You called my name, but I was not able to understand what you tried to tell me. You have been so weak already. I moved my ear as close as possible and I tried so hard, but you have been too week. Your eyes told me it was important to you, but I will never get to know what you tried to say.

The heaviest moments have been when the doctor asked me to help to turn your dead body to determine your death and later on when the hearse drove down our street with you. You were gone. It was so final.

But Dad, despite all this I am happy that I could be with you, that I could spend those days with you, your last days. We might not have had the best relation and you drove me crazy many times, and I probably you as well. But I always knew that you love me and despite you never told me, I know you have been proud of me. You have been such a stubborn man most of the time and so I was as well. And I still am. Remember how many fights we had? About politics, about news, about values, about attitude, TV channels, about everything actually. I tried to change you and you tried to change me and it never worked out. But you influenced me so much. I am driven by fears and I am acting out of fear, same as you have been, the fear to fail, the fear to disappoint, the fear to be rejected. You are responsible for my be-strong-drive. I want to achieve things on my own, without help. And I have a high need of appreciation, higher than others. Since deep inside me I am insecure. Remember my early years in cross-country-skiing? I never was fast enough for you and I failed your expectations so many times. This changed me and shaped my behavior patterns for the following years. Today I know, you wanted to help me, you wanted me successful and happy. You had the best intentions and I appreciate this.

We haven’t seen us that much, only on weekends. You worked far away. Nonetheless you had so much influence on me. You have not been the perfect dad, and I have not been the perfect son. But I loved you and I know you loved me. I never told you and now I am regretting that I never did. I am proud that you have been my dad. And I am happy for every minute we spent with each other, fighting or not.

And you taught me one thing within your last days. Life is precious and fragile. Life has to be lived actively and every moment counts. There is no value in living in the past or fearing the future. Important is the here and now, the very present moment. Put all your effort in this current moment and everything else will fall into place.

Dad, I wanna say thank you. I am happy and proud to be your son. I miss you.

You know, if possible I like to avoid public transportation. Why? Well, I don’t feel too comfortable with crowded locations. So I’ll try to go by bike or car if possible. But at times I am facing the adventure ‘public transportation’. In fact it’s quite interesting since you see and meet and sometimes at hot summer days even smell other people. So the morning starts with a first social event, city railway.

Already while arriving at the train station you can recognize two different types of people. The are the regular travelers, which are here every morning, again and again and again. They accepted their destiny and are usually looking bored, even pathetic, trying to ignore everybody else, starring holes into the air or the ground. Some of them carrying books, which will be read in various positions. The atmosphere is almost like in a zombie movie. So let’s refer to them from here as ‘zombies’. Already this would be disturbingly funny if there wouldn’t be the second type of people, infrequence-travelers. They are the ones walking around, looking confused, irritated, puzzled, trying to read time tables or trying understand unclear loudspeaker announcements. Let’s refer to them as ‘newbies’. They even try to ask the experienced train users (aka zombies) for help, which will result into a grumbled mumble-answer, presented with an as bored as possible facial expression, which tells you non-verbally: “How dare you to talk to me in the morning?!”.

The combination of those two types of people, zombies and newbies, has a high value of entertainment. You can even improve those funny moments with smiling into random zombies faces with a loud “Good morning, what a wonderful morning!”. The resulting looks are price-less. Try it, it will make your day. The visible confusion is a mix of “What the hell do you want?!”, “Do I know you?” and “One more word and I’ll kill you with looking angry at you!”. Enjoy this moment, wish the confused person a nice day and look for the next victim. Life can be wonderful.

Even scarier becomes the zombie scene with all the used smartphones. Observing smartphone controlled people is very funny. And almost everybody has such a device now. Most of the people at the train station are starring into that tiny device, not realizing what is going on around them. You could dance nakedly between them, they simply wouldn’t recognize you. It becomes even funnier when they use those devices while walking. But that’s a separate story.

Then the train arrives. The zombies are positioned already in front of the right door. They just step forward into the train without even looking off the book. They simply melt into the train and their bodies know what to do and you can see that they don’t even think in the process. Highly optimized and very impressive. And there are the newbies. They usually stand right in the middle between 2 doors and the decision process which door to use to enter the train is visible on their foreheads. You can smell the fear triggered by early closing doors or insecurity. In fact this permanently on-going confusion state is fascinating.

Once in the train the zombies collapse at any free seat or attach to the walls, continuing what they did all time, reading, smartphoning or looking bored. But all the zombies have something in common, not a single facial muscle moves. The newbies instead are telling stories with their facial expressions. They stop as soon as they entered the train, no matter if they are blocking the entrance, the aisle, the toilet or whatsoever. There is only one thought, orientation, now! Everything else around does not matter, first they have to scan the environment to handle the situation, usually combined with a 3 minute look to the cities train network map, followed by questions to random people around to get confirmations to be in the right train. They usually are.

Yesterday such a newbie lady has been directly behind me in the train. Both of us wanted to leave the train at the next station. There had been some delay and the train schedule was screwed up already and the train stopped for whatever reason shortly before entering the train station and the woman behind me tried to convince me to open the door since she needed to get out here. It took me some time to explain to her that the door does not open here whatever I try since the doors are locked as long as we are not reaching the station platform completely. Then the train started again to roll into the train station and I don’t know why, but I made a little joke towards that woman that we missed the station now and the train will not stop again. Oh boy, I shouldn’t have said this. I could see in her eyes the different scenarios she played in her head to throw me out of the train, if the door would have been open. Never ever make jokes about elderly newbie ladies. I still get goosebumps when thinking back to that situation.

But hell, even if I don’t like crowded places. This morning experience is worth it, definitely. A great start into an awesome day. A wonderful good morning to everybody! Yay!  😉

Well, it times I get the feedback to be indecisive, as happened recently again. Once in a while I get the complain that I do not have an opinion and I do not know what I want. That’s probably not a big deal, happens to many of us. But the interesting part here is, I don’t experience myself in such a way, not always. I think I know quite well what I want and most of the time I have an opinion about everything.

Looks like a clear disconnect between my sense of self and the awareness of others. Again nothing which is that unusual for humans. So where does this disconnect come from? One of my problematic habits is that I want to understand what’s happening and I keep thinking about those things until I have found a reason or an solution which fits into my view of the world. Some would argue that I am just whitewashing my weaknesses. Maybe, but at least I became quite good in self-reflecting meanwhile. And at times I am even learning something while doing so and change my behavior, at least for a while.

So, now you are curious what my excuse is to be indecisive. Here it comes. My drive for harmony is fooling me here. As you might found out when following my blog, I am one of the guys who are trying to preserve harmony. One of those guys who get along with almost everybody, who is trying to suit and please everybody around. That’s the heritage from my parents, with all its good and bad sides. But how does this influence my decisiveness? Well, it does not, or not to the extent you might think. But it definitely has an impact on the way I am communicating my decisions.

As I found out I am trying at times to wiggle out of question where I know my answer or opinion might hurt the asking person. So it happened that I made a clear decision, but did not communicate this decision to the affected people since I did not want to hurt them with this decision. Crazy, isn’t it? The decision had been made, but I did not communicate clear and crisp what I want I not want. Instead I tried to preserve harmony. You do not need to be visionary to realize that this strategy does not work out as expected. Not communicating a hurtful message will not make the underlying truth vanish. In the contrary, it will make all involved people suffer more.

So I don’t think there is a disconnect in my self-awareness and the awareness of others regarding my decisiveness. I need to learn that communicating straight is the better strategy, even if the truth hurts. Since everything else is just procrastination of the pain, which usually multiplies it. It’s so simple, isn’t it?

Looking back to my life, 2013 has been the worst year ever. Of course it wasn’t entirely bad, but in average it was way worse than all the years before. So many things changed for me in 2013. I have lost many things I didn’t want to lose. I gave up many things I never thought I would give up. And most importantly, I’ve learned that life is fragile and can end any time.

In fact life is not fair, not at all. It never has been and it will never be. But there is no point in complaining or whining about that. The point is to accept that and to make the best out of it. But this requires to let go certain things. Letting go of beloved people, taken out of your life suddenly, letting go of family members, letting go of material items, letting go of emotional items, filled with memories, letting go of dreams and plans, letting go of habits, letting go of comforts and life style, letting go of expectations. And all this is damned hard. But if I have learned one thing the last year, desperately trying to keep and hold things simply does not work. On the contrary, you’ll lose them even faster and there is a high chance to fall ill or become depressive during the process.

And what do we do? We have our arms full of items, more than we can carry. And we are trying desperately to avoid that one or more items will fall down. We bend ourselves and make lots of efforts to hold all the items. We are so focussed and busy managing all this that we don’t even have the chance to look around us, to look forward, to think if we really need to hold all these items. And more items come on top every day. And what do we do? Putting even more effort to hold all of them. Maybe placing some on our shoulders and head if the arms can’t carry more. Yes, just a little bit more effort and it should be doable. Until it really becomes too much and we break down because of the weight or we’ll run out of power and everything will fall down at once, in the worst moment.

But there is no need to. The solution I’ve found for myself is to let go, consciously and continuously. Embrace the change and let go. Put items on the ground you don’t really need to carry. Reduce the amount of items you carry to the essential. Restrict the number of items until they fit into a box you can carry under one arm and let go everything else. And suddenly you have the capacity to look around you, suddenly you realize the beauty of life, suddenly you can see the path on front of you. And letting go is the key. It’s so easy, isn’t it?

These days I’ve been at the place of my childhood and one of the first things I did was to visit the grave of my dad. It still feels kind of surreal to stand there and to read his name on the wooden cross. And within this moment it becomes very clear again, nothing is forever. The time given to us is restricted and it is our own decision what to do with the time we have.

It was a beautiful autumn day. The trees turned colorful already and the sun was covering the cemetery with brightness. The contrast of the colored leaves, the blue sky, the sun and all the flowers on the graves was breath taking. And the beauty of this autumn day was overlaying the prevailing mood of sadness and death of this place.

So I decided to go on a bicycle tour, as I used to do when I lived here many years back. I followed my standard tour since I wanted to see the paths and places I have been so many times before. I wanted to experience the peace and solitude of the mountains of my youth again. And so I did.

As said, the day was especially beautiful. Blue sky, lots of sun and it was cold, how I like it. Approximately 2-4 degree Celsius. The air was cold, but clear and fresh. In the shadows the grass had been still covered by hoar frost from the night and the ice crystals gave a lovely contrast to the colorful trees in front of a blue sky. I stopped a few times, just to absorb the beauty of this scene. I had forgotten already how beautiful this area here is. I love this endless forest, which covers the mountains near the country border. Not many people come up here, that far from the next villages.

I followed my old route and I passed many familiar places. How many times have I been here, most of the time in winter with ski. I do remember as it has been just a few years back how my dad brought me here. How he showed me beautiful hidden places in the forest. Points with great views over the hills, beautiful creeks, very old trees. I still remember the stories he told me about these places, fairy tales, legends and myths, but also happenings from his childhood, how he carried his skis many miles to reach these hidden places in winter. He taught me to see the beauty of nature and to respect it.

Today I visited many of these places and many memories came back. I somehow got lost within these memories. Together with the awesome autumn weather and the exhaustion from the bike ride it has been a very intensive experience. I became melancholic, but I felt free and happy. Thank you dad, you influenced and shaped me more than you thought. You taught me to see and appreciate the beauty of nature.

What a wonderful melancholic autumn day.

Do you know there is a difference between having options and keeping options? We have been told from early years on to evaluate possible options before deciding something, in the optimal case all possible options. We weight them, list pros and cons of all options. And then decide for one. Should be easy then, since you have enough information to make a solid decision. Done.

Problem is, life makes it more difficult for you and just takes some information out of the game. Means, usually you don’t know all possible options or advantages and disadvantages of the known ones. So your picture is incomplete, consciously or unconsciously. Oh my god! Nah, it’s not omg. Then just decide based on the knowledge you have. You might be wrong, sure. But you have decided based on what you had and you will decide exactly the same way if you had to do it again under the same circumstances and knowledge. That’s life, at times you’ll win and at times you’ll learn. And on top comes, even if you have all the knowledge you need to decide, even then your decision might turn wrong if the surrounding conditions change afterwards. There is no need to be afraid to decide wrong. Making a wrong decision is way better than not deciding at all.

Some people tend to procrastinate decisions if they are major, uncertain, if the knowledge base for the decision is too thin. They keep evaluating options again and again in case of unpredictability, in case of risks. They just don’t decide, hoping the issue will vanish by it’s own. I have this tendency as well and I know this makes life not easier. Nonetheless I keep looking at the options instead of nailing the decision down. One of the reasons for it is, I am more a head decider and I don’t feel comfortable with decisions made out of the stomach or based just on feelings. But the head comes into trouble if the pros and cons are kind of in balance. And even if they are not balanced and it’s clear, I am looking for missing options. Stupid, isn’t it?

So the trick is to become aware of this pattern. well this leads at times to the negative effect of overdoing the counter movement, means some decisions might be terribly wrong since made with consciously avoiding to evaluate the options logically. But hey, better than no decision at all. Why do I think this way? Since at times not deciding or procrastinating has bigger negative side effects than you see and the problem is, at times not only for you. For example if your options influence others or depend on others. It might happen that procrastinating a decision will hurt people or destroy something.

At times it appears so easy not to act or decide, but sometimes the consequences might make you and others pay a price you never wanted. So just go and get this damn cone of ice cream 😉

One of my habits is the want to make right decisions. Now everybody defines ‘right’ in a different way. For me ‘right’ has two aspects. The first one, of course, is selfishness. I want to decide in a way its beneficial for me. We all do. But there is also a second aspect, kind of heritage from my parents. I tend to make it right for everybody, which has advantages and disadvantages. Nonetheless it influences the way I make decisions, especially in a private environment. It means I am trying not to hurt the people influenced by my decision. You can imagine that this doesn’t work all time. Some decisions are just too fundamental, the two options to decide just too opposed, that one party will be hurt definitely. It can not be avoided. On top comes the contradiction with my selfishness.
So some decision can not be made without violating my own values and beliefs. As a result I become hesitant in these cases. I am trying more hard to find a solution which does not violate my values. Deep inside me I know there is none, nonetheless I try to find one, and here starts the stupid part. At times I don’t realize that this hesitation might hurt others too. At times even more than actually deciding against something. Interesting, avoiding to hurt can turn into the opposite. And the harder I try not to, the more I’ll hurt.
So, what am I now? Am I a coward regarding certain decisions? Feel free to think so. Am I hesitant? yes, I am in many cases, especially in the important ones. That’s my personality. Will I be able to change it? I don’t know, but I will definitely try.
But if my wish to avoid to hurt people makes me a coward, I am glad to be one.