From Vietnam with love

I've been in Vietnam for about 6 days now and I feel its amnesiac effect. I wish I can say  have reached great levels of spiritual enlightenment and made wonderful plans for 2013, but in all honesty all I've done so far is trying not to get ran over by the constant flow of motorbikes pouring down the streets from everywhere, making sure my food is coriander free (quite a challenge when in a country like Vietnam which generously uses all sorts of strong and fragrant green leaves in all the dishes) and getting drunk every day. The drinking part is not because I feel in any way connected to all the young backpackers roaming around (if I get too friendly, I could be accused of pedophilia, as most of them are barely out of high-school) but because I am alive, I'm on holidays and the drinks are cheap!

I don't cease to be amazed by the convenience of everything in Vietnam.  Literally every single cafe or bar provides free wi fi and you never feel too far away from 'civilisation'... I post stuff on Facebook as if I have never left London and somehow, despite being far away, I don't really feel I'm part of an adventure. All I do, is joining the tourist trail and knowing that I'll always be all right no matter what. A few year ago, this would have been enough, but now... I wonder... There isn't so much left to discover unless you try really hard and venture really far. Maybe even risk being eaten by a local tribe. Get bitten by a snake. I don' know. Something extreme... I feel safe in Vietnam and this is a wonderful thing, but I can't stop wondering what is it really that I'm looking for...

This year has been a bit a roller coaster and maybe it's taken its toll on me. Maybe I was expecting to experience some kind of revelations whilst in the far east... Maybe I'm longing for something else, closer to home. Or maybe, I'm just feeling exactly like I'm supposed to be feeling at the end of a really challenging year: spent! Maybe I'll wake up tomorrow in the dawn of a new year on the beach of Nah Trang feeling blissful and charged. Maybe 2013 will start with a massive hangover which I'll be sorting out at the Crazy Kim bar. Or maybe... I don't know. And it's ok not to know. I'm alive. That's all that matters. And the world we live in is full of wonders...

Today, I pledge to live my life. To inhabit my life fully. To stop expecting. To pray for those who are no longer with us. To try not to question why they're gone without a warning, there are no answers to life and death...

To an 'alive' 2013 everyone! 

Ready, aim, fire!

Source: feminema.wordpress.com

I've been spending a lot of time making plans for 2013. Despite having been kept busy by my ridiculous social life and significant workload in December, I made time to make plans. Not some airy fairy 'I want to exercise more', 'lose weight', 'stop smoking', 'find a boyfriend' kind of plans. I covered my room up in notes, questions, calendars and, soon, it will all make enough sense for me to feed it into a Gant chart at some point.

If 2012 was the year of change and challenges (a lot of the people I know share the same impressions), 2013 is the year of action. And when you go into action, you go into it fully, no time wasted, no resources spared. After years of planning, of brewing feelings and ideas, I can now aim and fire. I know exactly what my target is. And I know exactly what kind of weapon I am.

2013 will find me in a pretty good physical shape but I only plan on getting better. It will find me surrounded by friends of quality and people who can inspire me. It will find me in a great home, in a city that I adore. It will find me buoyant with creativity and looking for a studio space where I can work. It will find me wanting to learn about documentaries and film making. It will find me wanting to help others through storytelling. It will find me looking beyond the here and now, into the big picture. It will find me hungry for knowledge. It will find me in charge. It will find me with my guns charged and ready to fire!

The twenty somethings

'We're not getting old, everyone else is getting younger!' said a friend a few years ago and it is still very much true.

If this is not true then I don't know why everywhere I turn I see young, brights twenty somethings ruling the world. One is the head of the marketing department, another one owns his own company, another one is a tech whiz, another one has published books, and another is a talented designer selling frocks by the thousands. I may not be getting old but I feel just a little bit outdated already.

I'm taken aback by the speed of enlargement of the gap between generations. I am only 33 (in less than two weeks) and yet I feel like a zillion years behind all these twenty somethings. I mean,  I used to play with dolls, I grew up with two hours of TV broadcasting a day and electricity cuts, I didn't know what the Internet was until I went to University, I worked my ass doing Silver Service at Christmas parties and waitressing during my first years in London, I came to the UK almost 10 years ago with nothing but a pair of grease stained ripped pair of jeans and a cheap red back-pack full of dreams, so yeah, I guess I am old school. I have an old iPhone which I can't be asked to upgrade. I don't understand the purpose of tablets (I'm a writer, I need keyboards!), I hate  e-readers (although, in all fairness, they are more planet friendly than paper books), I'm overwhelmed by the quantity (and sometimes lack of quality) of the information available in the media (be it traditional or digital), I'm overwhelmed by this century. But it's the  twenty somethings most natural universe and they're all over it.

And they're cool, and you just want to hang out with them (rejoicing in the fact that you're young enough at heart to join their fabulous group) and you feel like twenty something again too! But I'm not twenty something. I am thirty something and I congratulate myself for making it so far, because frankly I do not want to be twenty something again. The twenties don't come with a manual. They come with lust for life but no freaking compass. They come with ideas but no desperation for meaning. They come with lots of ego and anything but peace. Or so they say.

So I am not jealous of the twenty somethings. I love their hunger and creativity, it's inspiring.

But like Carrie said: 'And then I realized something, twenty-something girls are just fabulous, until you see one with the man who broke your heart.'

 

The year of change

 

 

 

 

2012 has been an incredible year for me... If I were to use one word to define this year then that word would be CHANGE.

 

I have changed in so many ways. I guess a lot of the change has happened naturally as part of the growing up process (I am beyond doubt now a fully grown-up person and ain't nothing I can do about it! - sigh!)  but there has been another kind of change which I willed upon myself. Never before I have been so determined to transform myself. In fact TRANSFORM and BECOME are also good words to illustrate the CHANGE I am talking about. I have diligently worked on myself to BECOME the person I wanted to be. And that's what this year has been all about. About the person I am now.

 

I am a person who makes choices. I am a person who makes things happen. I am a person who understands. I am a person who forgives. I am a person who has something to say. I am a person who won't blame. I am a person who will keep on walking. I am a person who doesn't complain. I am a person who IS and DOES. I am a person who seeks and finds. I am a person who is inspired and inspires.

 

But above all, I am a person who chooses to be happy. Because happiness is not something that comes in a nice wrapping. Happiness is something you earn because you want it bad enough and you work on it every single day. I am that person who won't give up even when the day looks cloudy and grey. There's always sun beneath the clouds. I am the person who sees the sun.

I had a list of plans for 2012 back in January. Some came to fruition (such as keeping up with my exercising regime and completing my first half-marathon, being a better professional, exposing myself to culture more often, taking a language course,  finalising my styling course and website, giving more love to the world, taking a tango taster, taking writing more seriously etc.) while others haven't (I did not complete one single piece of writing, I did not go to Argentina and the USA this year, albeit I am going to Vietnam, so not a bad trade off, I did not just give love and expecting none in return, I kind of wanted to get some too, I did not go surfing and did not do any climbing, but I tried flying trapeze, guess that counts too!), but with so many plans I'd be surprised if I had achieved everything on my list in a meek year's time.

 

But there should always be a level of flexibility when it comes to specific tasks. After all, CHANGE is a matter of attitude.

 

Thank you 2012!

 

My week in words

Source: http://eunichick.tumblr.com/

It may be the imminence of my trip to Vietnam or my forgotten gypsy soul knocking at the doors of my rational incarnation of self which works in an office, delivers projects to clients on time and leads a respectful and uneventful civilised life, that made me stumble upon references to travelling this week.

I haven't travelled in a long time and I feel the world is calling out for me. I feel like Ulysses imprisoned by Circe and smothered with love by the too familiar. My soul wants to drink the 'poison' of strange worlds. So I kept pinning things like that on my Pinterest Inspiration wall the whole week:

Source: 25.media.tumblr.com via Iulia on Pinterest

Source: thefreshexchangeblog.com via Iulia on Pinterest

Source: londons365.tumblr.com via Iulia on Pinterest

Source: justbesplendid.tumblr.com via Iulia on Pinterest

Source: quote22.com via Iulia on Pinterest

Source: allthingsstylish.tumblr.com via Iulia on Pinterest

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Source: music-lyrics-words.blogspot.com via Iulia on Pinterest

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Source: captivating-quotes.tumblr.com via Iulia on Pinterest

Or in the words of David Mitchell in 'Cloud Atlas' (the only book I've been managing to steal reads from this week during my daily commute)...

“...there ain't no journey what don't change you some.”

“Travel far enough, you meet yourself.”   

I'm ready now...

Just get on with it!

Source: stevensonfinancialmarketing.wordpress.com

Life keeps serving me lessons these days. They sort of come by hand fulls lately, which is pretty amazing. I'm like: 'Wow, another week, another lesson? I can hardly keep up with it anymore.' It feels like I've been stuck in an evolutionary-less pit all these past years and I've suddenly been rescued out of it, so all the lessons I was supposed to learn until now started to come at me at once. Like I've won the jackpot and the coins are all cascading noisily from life's fruit machine, like I've just been to the Life Vegas and finally landed a winning hand.

Honestly, I don't know what was about 2012, but it's opened a new portal in my life, things are happening to me with the speed of light. They say every cell in our body gets renewed every 7 years, I think I've just about renewed every atom of my soul in the last 7 days. And I can't wait to see what happens next, I'm taking myself on a new adventure every day and I'm loving every minute.

I notice how I'm letting go of patterns of behaviour and compare the results with the past and I must say I'm pretty pleased. It's quite nice to challenge yourself and see a different outcome, it's like playing, it's fun!

The lesson I've learnt last week is very simple. It's about just getting on with things! Without complaining. I used to be one of those people who got annoyed when things got a bit messy, mainly out of habit. I hate mess, it really messes with my head. And when things are messy, I sulk, I get annoyed with the mess maker (whether is a project at work or a sock lying around in the kitchen) and place a mental blame on the person who upset the status quo. I almost felt the same when I was handed a project at work without much a do and with very tight deadlines and full responsibility. But rather than allowing my traditional reaction to the situation to take its course, I decided l could either get annoyed and not resolve anything or just get on with it. And I did just get on with it. And it felt good! It opened up a whole new world of possibilities and made me realise that placing blame doesn't really do anything but feed your ego who always wants to be right. However, doing instead of sulking and complaining is liberating and shuts the ego up! So I learnt the lesson of just getting on with things. And stop wanting to be right. Being right means somebody else has to be wrong. And that doesn't help anyone. Especially myself.

So I'm really amazed by how things unfold in front of my eyes, because these days I challenge almost everything about myself. Every reaction gets scrutinised and, whenever possible and not too late (hey, I never said I was perfect!), I try a different attitude. And it's amazing. Just getting on with it, you know. It's good for you!