“Notice everything. Appreciate everything, including the ordinary. That’s how to click in with joyfulness or cheerfulness. Curiosity encourages cheering up. So does simply remembering to do something different. … You can … just go to the window and look at the sky. You can splash cold water on your face, you can sing in the shower, you can go jogging – anything that’s against your usual pattern. That’s how things start to lighten up.” ~Pema Chödrön
When my son was born many people were asking me about my wishes for him, about who I would like him to become, about who I would like him to be. As much as I like people to ask me questions, I disliked being asked about this one. It disagreed with my conviction that these little beings are separate beings and it is to freedom that we are bringing them up and that it is freedom that first and foremost we should allow them to experience. You see, our children are institutionalized from such an early age, their growth is formalized and lifestyle made formulaic. They need space and time that is free from our influences, and free from others. They need space and time where all that they hear is the chatter of their own minds. Uncluttered time, uncluttered from our wishes for them, however well-meaning they are.
At some stage I was really provoked by someone to answer this question: Who you would like your son to be? So I answered: I know that my ambition for my son is really my ambition for myself. If you hear me saying that I would like him to be a writer and a peace-maker, you know that this is really what I want for myself so I will be pushing myself to create the best sentences I can and pushing myself to learn the art of conflict-resolution, I will not be training my child in it. All that I need to do is to give him space for his own dreams and ambitions to emerge and flourish. Freedom comes first and our ambitions for our children can really lead us to understand what ambitions we have for ourselves.
So if they want to run, let them run.
I grew up in a village partially surrounded by wide stretches of open land. In a building that comfortably housed my grandparents, my parents, me and my sister. There was a large garden behind our house, with other farm buildings and a field where different things were grown depending on the year. My cousins’ house was on the same yard as ours and not a day passed by without us playing together and visiting each other. I grew up in a warm-hearted community surrounded by beautiful natural spaces.
It wasn’t until I started living in the UK that I realised how strongly my well-being is related to the open countryside and to kind-hearted interactions that come with communal living. I think that these two aspects of life are so strongly ingrained in our systems that without them we stop thriving. Of course, we thrive in some communities and in some spaces more than in others, but it is a task of an adult to figure out exactly where we thrive.
A while ago I listened to a wonderful conversation between Kirsta Tippet and Maria Popova. They discussed a different type of space to the physical and the communal that I mentioned above. They were talking about the moments in our day when our minds are least burdened, the moments when great ideas pop up in our heads, when we shower, for example. The moments of unburdened cognitive space.
I often think about questions related to good leadership. Partially because I think that a role of a mother has to do a lot with good leadership, but also because I would like to be a good leader for myself. (Who wouldn’t like to lead their life beautifully, eh?) I really feel now that in order to be a good leader in our overloaded times we need to be able to create for ourselves and others as much unburdened cognitive space as possible – sometimes that space comes with a reduction of tasks, sometimes with a reduction of judgment that we throw at ourselves and others, and other times just with holidays or a daily meditation. But the most space we get is when we practise all of those… with great quantities of love. The more we love ourselves and the people who we are with, the more we strive for balance (rather than praise or control). Only then can we become for others what we always hoped for: a delicate and energizing light.
Postcards Without Stamps 