The best year of my life

This is the best year of my life. Last year was the best year of my life and next year will be the best year of my life. But this year is extra special because London is hosting the Olympic Games. 



Did we think it was going to be so special? Probably not. In true British spirit, we all feared it was going to be awful, disorganised, busy, messy. In reality, I don't think I've ever seen London so eerily quiet and yet so buzzing. I'm having the best commutes to work as half of London's left the city for the Olympics and the other is watching the games. The way London feels these days reminds of the summers when I was a child when we used to have lots of friends and relatives visiting and it felt like a continuous celebration, family dinners and events. I feel like the whole world is on holidays.

I've been an active person for a long time now and I have a regular fitness regime, but even so, I now feel even more inspired. I feel inspired by sports I wasn't inspired before, I'm excited about learning the rules of games I wasn't familiar with, I feel like a child, happy and free.

There's more communication between people, everyone's tweeting and facebooking about their countries' latest medals, we congratulate each other for our countries' performances and we all suddenly feel just a little bit closer.

We didn't know it was going to be so special but it is. All the way!

I'm sure next year will be the best year of my life too, but 2012, well, it's something else!

A world without labels

'Identification with your mind creates an opaque screen of concepts, labels, images, words, judgments, and definitions that blocks all true relationship. It comes between you and yourself, between you and your fellow man and woman, between you and nature, between you and God.'
(Eckhart Tolle - 'The Power of Now')

Prejudices are useful things. They are generalisations, concepts we extrapolate from our own experiences or things we read and hear, concepts which help us somehow make sense of the world. Our brain is conceived to fill in the blanks, the brain is abhorrent of chaos, hence we feel better if we understand something, if we reach a conclusion, if we put a label on things. But relying only on prejudices is a dangerous thing. It reduces us to mere reactors, we don't try to understand a situation, we just react to it, the way we always had. And sometimes, we can be wrong...

I recently lost my inner balance a little bit. Again! Oh well, isn't that what life's all about, losing balance and getting it back?... Anyway, I was going through a minor crisis and tired of annoying my friends with the exhausts of my mind, I decided to go back to the Power of Now, a book which I've read last year and which impacted me positively at the time . It's fascinating how this time, because I needed it from a different perspective, I noticed different things than the first time I read it. This time I got to thinking about labelling.

I am guilty of labelling things, people, situations, countries, nations, meteorological phenomenons, you name it. Don't know, I guess it makes me feel better if I file something away and use it next time to make decisions. But does it really make me feel better? It got me thinking about all the times I assumed things which may not have been true, how I am devoiding my life of discovering new things, of that feeling of wonder, I am not allowing people to surprise me. I realised I am not courageous, but coward for using labels for everything around me. So I took a big decision: I will try to live in a world without labels and let it surprise me.

'Why does everything has to be black or white?' I complained to a friend the other day.

'It seems to me you're the one seeing life in black and white.' he answered and that's all he had to say.

Hello grey!

A jacket for life

I've got many jackets. I've got more clothes than I need, to be honest. Suppose most females do these days. All the result of impulse purchases, sales, obsessive compulsive behaviour. All to make me feel better about myself.

Last year, on my way to India, I bought this black leather jacket from All Saints. Just perfect. Practically lived in it since I bought it, come rain or shine. Makes all my other jackets and coats completely useless, as I've not been wearing any of them since IT came into my life.They're just taking up space in my tiny room. I'm thinking about getting rid of them all. In fact I'm thinking I should be getting rid of all the useless pairs of shoes and bags I've accumulated over the years, all gathering dust in boxes under my bed, on top of my wardrobe, inside drawers, in storage. Things I don't need!

But this leather jacket, I tell you, is so special.  It makes me feel like myself. It makes me think: this is me today, as I intend everyone else to see me, it makes me feel strong, resolute, flexible, natural. It makes me look good! Like it's been there layered over my own skin all my life.

It got me thinking about how there comes a time in one's life when you stop being so wasteful. With one's money, energy, thoughts, relationships etc. The more we live the more we realise the time is precious and we maybe only need one fitted little black leather jacket to survive. But this leather jacket, man, it needs to be so special. It needs to feel like an extension of one's self. A jacket for life.

I've been on many dates. I've met lots of people. I've kissed a lot of frogs. Suppose most females do these days. All the result of alcohol, impulses, desperation, fear of being lonely, obsessive compulsive behaviour. All to make me feel better about myself.

Now I feel like I want to get rid of all of that. All that ballast, drop it  in on a hole in the ground somewhere and pour a ton of dirt on top of it.

And find myself somebody for life. Somebody who's going to make me feel good about myself and it's going to feel like it's been there layered on top of my own soul all my life...

Alcoholics united

Source: www.liveitwell.org.uk

I've never been one to shy away from drinking. My father used to drink a lot (guess he had a drinking problem!) and I suppose it's fair to assume I've inherited his genes. I can hold my drink and after almost 14 years of experience in 'social' drinking I became something of a savy in what drinks to avoid and how to get a pint of  water in between drinks so I don't get drunk too quickly or wake up with a horrible hangover the next day. And yet, once in a while, I go overboard... Sometimes I have a really big night when I can't even recall how many drinks I had or what did I have. It's all a fuzz and I'm sure I had fun, if only I can remember it...

I know, we all do it, we all have those nights sometimes. The problem is I don't want to have these nights anymore. I've already resolved it with myself that NOW I am a responsible adult who knows perfectly well the damaging effects of alcohol on health. But I also know that if I'm really honest with myself, I don't think I can live without alcohol...

Which makes me wonder: are we perhaps a generation of alcoholics?...

When I was going through my recent depression, I experienced a disgust towards drinking and instead of going out I prefered staying in most days and isolating myself from people. Mainly because I didn't enjoy anything anymore and even if I did go out,  I prefered not to drink.  Not drinking turned me into a spectator of other people who were merrily getting drunk like I used to. Being sober surrounded by drunken people is not fun. It is actually worse. Sometimes I think I drink only to avoid seeing that.

It's a well known fact that people in the UK drink above average. 'The United Kingdom has been experiencing an epidemic of alcohol-related health and social problems that is remarkable by international standards' - is quoted in an Alcohol Concern report - and, despite the fact that we all know that, most of the times we chose to ignore the alcohol consumption limit on a weekly basis.

There are a lot of stupid things I did in my life and I have been beating myself up about. But if I stop and think about it, I realise I probably wouldn't have got myself into any of those situations if it wasn't for alcohol. If there's one thing I SHOULD be beating myself about is DRINKING! Sure, I'm not really going home and drinking wine all by myself until I pass out every day, I exercise, I drink sensibly (most of the times!) but if there are still times when I feel like 'I just want to have fun' and pour drink after drink down my throat as if I'm trying to win a contest, maybe I am one of these people: 'many problem drinkers are not dependent on alcohol. They could stop drinking without withdrawal symptoms if they wanted to. But, for one reason or another, they continue to drink heavily' (www.patient. co.uk).

Should we be worried?...