My own Bedtime story

I do not have a lot to write about today, I just want to calm myself and get rid of some bad emotions before I go to bed. Writing normally helps me to do so, thus this small post.

When I started this blog, I was in a small mountain resort in Lesotho, Africa. At the moment I am writing from an apartment in Tatranska Lomnica, Slovakia, Europe. The two countries are fairly far apart - about 9000 kilometers if you make a direct line between the two. By car the fastest route would take you approximately 180 hours to get from point A to point B. That is only 7 and a half days. (Imagine living in a time where there was no cars?!) Introducing the Airbus a380! - It took me 33 hours to get from my house in South Africa to where I am now, excluding the two days I spent at a friends house along the way. Including stop overs, train rides, bus rides and a refreshing yet tense walk from a small bus stop in Poland to a 3 house town in Slovakia.

Okay okay, I am sure you get the picture. I am far from where I was when this exploration into relationships started. Both in physical and spiritual terms. Even-though I did not write continuously on this blog, I did think about human nature and relationships a lot. And by that I mean all of the time! Starting this blog really helped me to see a lot of things in perspective. For that I am grateful!

Coming back to the distance between now and then, almost everything in my surroundings have changed. The landscape looks different, the food is different, the language differs. The list goes on and on. There is one thing that did not change. One very sad thing. People. We are cruel and unforgiving, wherever we are and whoever we are. Whether we are black and tend goats for a living or white and tend bank accounts for a living. Last night I saw a young man, arrogant in his own ability, rejoice at someone else's failure. This young man did not know the person who failed, he didn't understand his circumstances and he didn't care about his circumstances. What's even worse, the person who failed didn't even compete against the young man. Not so long ago, I was that young man. It sickens me to think that I enjoyed other people's loss for no apparent reason. Only, there must be a reason, won't you agree..?

Let's talk about that some other time, okay? I am feeling quite relaxed right now - Mission Accomplished - therefore I am off to bed. Sleep well all ye readers! Or in case you are starting your day with this blog post, have a lovely day filled with Love and Peace (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7AHcg8t2Tk)

It is the small details in life that make it worth living. What do you see here?

Sludge-cake Icing.

Sitting in front of a computer. Alone, at a time when most people are asleep, I realized that I have a problem. In some areas of my life, I progress in leaps and bounds! Other areas, however, are pits of sludge, sucking me in, pulling me under, threatening to drown me.

Well, you guessed it folks - We're talking about relationships!

They say that time and distance heals everything, but in my opinion, it doesn't. It only puts a shine on the problem. You will think less and less about a problem the farther you are from it, but as soon as you come close, you realize that it is still there. Time is like a painter and distance the paint, to complete the analogy, we can style the problem as a crumbling wall. So, along comes the painter and he paints the wall. It looks great from afar, but once you start to inspect the wall, you can see that it is still crumbling.

You are probably wondering where this time/distance/paint thing fits into the scheme of things? So am I...
Haha, just kidding! I have problems that needs to be solved and I haven't really been paying attention to them. Every now and again they bubble to the surface and every time they do, they seem larger and more ominous.

Some of my friends make me sad. (Friends are not confined to the "humans only" category). These friends tend to make my life difficult by not wanting to get along with each other. What should I do? Try to be a mediator between the two parties or just leave it and let nature run it's course? Pick one over the other? Try to please them both, ignore them both? Aarghhh!!! I do not know what to do or how to do it, yet something must be done! In some cases it is easier to decide what to do, because society dictates that one of the relationships is way more important than the other. But in other cases it is not that clear. What if both parties are very important to me and both parties are wrong, how should I deal with that? Just put a stop to both relationships?

I guess what I need to figure out is this: Do I try to repair the wall or do I break it down and rebuild it?

Speaking of walls, look at all these marvelously put together walls! 

Back. Again...

I've been meaning to write for such a very long time now. However, meaning to do something and doing it is not the same. Good intentions are very well, but without application intent is about as useful as a shattered wine glass.

That is one of my greatest problems, I have all these very grand ideas in my head, but I rarely do anything about it!

For example, starting a blog to help myself act out some of my ideas was a good idea. And it worked for a while! until I stopped writing...

The reason that I stopped writing, you would like to know, is because I got lax and lazy. I was, after the first few weeks of being alone and unhappy, enjoying myself way too much in Lesotho to think about any of my future plans or for that matter, of my plans with this blog. Having come back down to earth after an amazing three months filled with snow, sunshine, beaches, festivals, food, drink and lots of interesting people, I realized that I still need to do something with my life. Something other than seeking my own pleasure and improving my skills.

I realized that I still need to work at relationships.

With the realization came some insight into my own way of handling problems. Mostly I don't handle them, I run away from them. I find other things to fill my time and other places to feed my imagination. Thus avoiding old problems and sometimes creating new ones.
What to do now? Keep running, keep on creating new problems? No. Keep writing. In writing I find that I come to startling conclusions about myself, my relation to the world, and the world and it's relation to me.

So, I will continue the work that I have begun here. I will persevere until the end, for clearly there is a lot of writing that still needs to be done.
With the writing will come new topics to write about and new problems to solve, new horizons to discover and new skills to master. But it will also bring me face to face with some very old problems of mine.

It is my intention and hope that I will be able to sort out my past, be content with my present and look forward to a future filled with adventure and companionship.

What a beautiful addition to our garden, this table that my dad built with his own hands.

And then there was two (or four)...

A bit of experimental photography at a night session in the snow park here at Afriski. 

Wow, I am really a very bad example of self-discipline. It's funny, when I am enjoying myself it is more difficult to write than when I am unhappy. I wonder why...

As Mia commented on the mother/child relationship, not every mother looks after her child and not every child looks after his parents when they are old and unable to fend for themselves. That is very true. We live in a broken world where relationships are far from perfect. That is why I am writing though, to try and figure out how relationships should be. I think I have said this before, even when your mom doesn't look after you and you despise her, you still live in relation to her. A great deal of what you are comes from the way your mother treated you. You will always live in light of the fact that your mother was not there for you, whether you do better by your children or do the same.

More on mothers later. Let's see what happened when you got a sibling. Out of a selfish point of view, you lose some of the attention that you received on a daily basis. At first your mom only had to take care of your needs, but now you have a brother/sister so it is just logical that she will divide her attention between the two of you. At first she will most probably give more attention to the newcomer, seeing as he/she can't do anything for themselves. It is natural that you will become jealous of your sibling at this stage. Hopefully, as your sibling grows older, your mother will give both of you the same amount of attention. That attention might differ though, seeing as you and your sibling will have different needs. This might also lead to jealousy on both parts, one sibling might think that the mother is putting the other siblings needs ahead of his/her own needs. Once again, hopefully this will work itself out. Relationships based on jealousy is never a good idea. It tends to turn messy and hurtful.
In all of this we have only looked at the fluctuations in your relationship with your mother. But there is also a new development here. Your relationship with your sibling. If you are the older one, you might have a kind of protective attitude towards the younger one. The younger one might have a sort of respect/adoration for the older one. Or at least, that is how it was in my case. I have 3 older siblings and for all of them I have the deepest respect and love. In each of them I see characteristics which I wish I had. And I think all of them feel somewhat protective of me. Obviously at this point in time, I feel protective of them as well, but that wasn't always the case. When I was younger I thought they were indestructible, so I used to hurt them without really thinking about what I was doing. I never understood why they got angry when I did that, but looking back on it now, it makes sense.
I used to have sword fights with my brothers (we used broom sticks for swords) I always thought that I was better at it than they were, because I used to win more often. Later I realized that I always won because they were fighting with reserve, whereas I fought without a thought for their safety. I hurt them while they were trying to protect me. (As julle hierdie lees, ek is jammer vir al die kere wat ek dit gedoen het. Dit sluit in die Tongvrou, Hoof van die Orde van die Silwer Papawer en sy Army)

That last part is in my native tongue, written for my siblings. Anyway, I got sidetracked a bit there. The application of what I wrote is this; Seeing as we siblings were jammed together in the same house for a long period of time, we were forced into relationships. It wasn't always moonshine, but we got through. At first those relationships developed because of shared interests. What do I mean by shared interests? All of us were dependent on the same pair of people to feed us, clothe us, give us housing etc. We came together because of what I'd like to call a "common giver". Out of our relationships with our parents came our relationships with each other. This principle can be applied to various other types of relationships and how they develop. In my next post I will discuss the development of sibling relationships in more detail as well as the common giver.

Oops, this should have been posted on the 25th of June...

Guys, this should have been posted on the 25th of June. Please read this before you read the previous post.

What Architect said in his comment on the send/receive post is very true. Gratification plays a very big role in what we choose to do with our time. If you do not like doing something, you are more likely to give up on it. On the other hand, if you find something that you like very much and that is quite easy to do, you will spend more time on it. A lot of times this is a form of instant gratification, a disease of our time. We want everything and we want it NOW! Do yourselves a favor and go read Architects post, it fits in quite well with what I have written so far.

Using gratification as a starting point, let's see why we neglect certain relationships and spend too much time on others. If we take the example of studying, it is very often the case that we do not get instant gratification out of our studies. It is tedious and time-consuming, we spend a lot of time studying and we do not see the results we would like to see. Thus we start doing other things in the times we should be behind the books. Computer games, for instance. Anything that is easier than studying and gives instant gratification. We should try to avoid this. That is why we must encourage ourselves to work at the relationships that will give gratification in the long run! Completing your studies and getting a proper job that you enjoy is gratifying beyond that one instant of euphoria when you realize you have outsmarted you opponent in an online game. (Or so I think...) To me, playing Beethoven will be more gratifying than playing twinkle twinkle little star on my violin, but to get there, I must put in a lot of effort and get to know my violin as well as I know myself, even better than I know myself.

I think that one must prioritize one's relationships. Family and friends must come first in my opinion, then work and then play. In my case, I have put play ahead of all of those way too often. There is no balance in playing all the time, actually all that you are doing is wasting time. Instead of doing something constructive that might give you gratification in the long run, I was just squandering away my time for short lived moments of happiness.

Sorry for jumping around like this guys, I am really trying to write in a way that people can follow the flow of thought, but sometimes (most of the times) a comment triggers something in me and I write about the comment in stead of  what I promised to write about. Maybe I should stop saying what I am going to write about next time? That way you don't get too excited about something that often as not, doesn't happen. And you get a surprise every time. "Now what you got to say about that?!"

I walk through this "tunnel" at least ten times a day. Do we pay attention to the things that we see every day? This is just a walk through under a wooden deck, but if you look at something from a slightly different angle than you normally would, you might see something new every day.

Temporarily AFK (Away from keyboard)

Hey guys! I am extremely sorry for my absence from the world of Imagery & Insights into a Day-Dreamers sleeping habits. We have been very busy at Afriski over the last two weeks, so I was just too tired to write at night. That is not an excuse, I know. But sorry anyhow. Maybe I can use this as a prime example of my laziness! Didn't write because I was too tired!? Bah! I must have more self discipline than that, wouldn't you agree? That is how a lot of us act though, when we are too tired we just give up. We shouldn't. No, we MUST NOT!!! Being tired is not an excuse to stop doing the things that we must. Rather cut out on the things you do for fun to do what you must. Work first, then play...

All these tips on laziness and addiction is getting me down. Let's try to get back to why I am writing this in the first place - to sort out my relationship to everything else. In order to do that, we must examine relationships in detail. Not too much detail, mind. Just a bit more detail than we normally would.

Let's go back to the mother/child relationship. I think we can start off here and then move on to other types of relationships. Why do I want to go back to this relationship? Because it is one of the most unavoidable relationships you will ever find. Every single one of us has a mother, whether you love her or hate her, you have her. How will we explore this relationship? Simple, we will look into how it starts off and then how it evolves.
It started off when you were still a fetus in her womb. She fed you, she sheltered you. You fed off of her, you took from her without really giving back. Later on, when you were a baby, you still took from her without giving back - you kept her awake at night, you suckled at her breast, you annoyed her with your crying (I never did that ;p) At first, if we can use the biological term, you were basically a parasite, feeding off your own mother. Only when you grew up a bit did you start giving back. At first only through showing appreciation for what she did. Later on, the relationship probably grew deeper than just a "you feed me, I say thanks" relationship. You started sharing your thoughts and experiences with her, you started drawing her little pictures, gave her flowers and gifts (although the gifts weren't expensive or beautiful, I bet you she still cherished them!). As time progresses, your relationship will change and evolve, as all relationships do. Eventually the roles might swap around altogether. You will be the one looking after her in her old age, when she cannot look after herself anymore. Just like she looked after you when you were too small to look out for yourself.

Thus the circle is continues. Your mom looks after you, you look after her. You look after your child, he looks after you. Your child looks after your grandchild, your grandchild looks after your child...

In my next post I will talk about sibling relationships. They tie in nicely with the mother/child scenario.

Please tell me when if I repeat myself too much or if I start boring you...

It always comes down to this, doesn't it..?
Food food food!!

One step at a time

This was done in the middle of the night, when I should have been sleeping...

Fighting laziness is more than just making a decision and sticking to it. Do you know why? Because making a decision and sticking to it is more difficult than it sounds. Therefore I suggest that we try to figure out how to stick to a decision, once made. 

First we need to find out why we are lazy. Are we just born lazy, like Martin said, or is there something more to it? I think in my case there is something more to it, yes I have always been lazy, but in some areas I am more lazy than in others. Why is that? There are two causes that I have identified so far... 

• The first one is this: If I find that I can do something to a reasonably acceptable degree, I do not work at it. For some reason I am satisfied with doing well at beginner level, but never taking it further. Let's use my violin playing skills as an example - when I started out I did very well with my first examinations. Then, when it got more difficult, I simply gave up. Why? Because I was being lazy! I enjoyed sounding good (as beginner) without practice. Therefore I wanted to keep on playing without practice. Needless to say, my relationship with my violin isn't nearly where it could have been, if I had worked at it. I want to make it public now. I WILL get my violin up to standard, even if it takes me twenty years to do it. I will play Vivaldi, Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Beethoven and all the others. Even if it is only for my grandchildren
• The second reason is that I always find excuses to do other things instead of doing what matters. I usually take something that is not difficult to master and focus all of my attention on that. The problem with this is that it is more than likely that the thing I am working at has no real value in relation to the thing I should be concentrating on. We can use playing computer games as thee prime example in my life. I have spent more hours playing online games in the last year than I have spent on any other relationship (human or inanimate) . I think it is safe to say that I spent more time playing a specific game than I did sleeping. Replacing what is important with some senseless relationship is a form of laziness and it is definitely a form of addiction. So here we deal with two problems at the same time. Everything in your life is truly entwined. 

Now that I know some of the reasons for being lazy, it is already easier to fight laziness. But just knowing is not enough! We have to do something about that knowledge. Take small steps in the beginning of your campaign against laziness, otherwise you will overwhelm yourself and just fall back into being lazy. 

How do we take those small steps? What is a small step and what is a big step? 

Small step: Pick up the violin and do scales

Big step: Pick up the violin and try playing Mendelssohn's violin concerto

If you start of by trying the concerto, you will frustrate yourself and put the violin away in disgust (believe me, I know). If you play scales, you will at least hear an improvement in the sound you produce. Playing scales once isn't enough though. We need to do it consistently, on a day to day basis. That is where the difficulties starts creeping in. How do you keep yourself motivated to keep on keeping on? This is where I struggle a lot! I'm not afraid to start something, but once I get the hang of something I usually set it aside. or when I do not get the hang of it easily, I shove it very far away!

Ugh, I get sidetracked way too easily! Keeping yourself motivated. Right. Set up a roster or a time-sheet. Put it where everyone in the house can see it. Follow it strictly, otherwise there is no point in making it. Why put it up where everyone can see it? So that the other people in the house can encourage you to do your thing, duh!! 

So that is one small pointer on how to overcome laziness, in my next post I will add a few more of those, and I will try to address the addiction factor as well. 

PS - I boarded today. It was a lot of fun! This crazy Dutch instructor helped me to correct my balance and to put rhythm in my turns. I still look a bit awkward, But I fell only once during the two and a half hours I spent riding. That's progress right there!! :D