Hard landing in Sydney

Sydney, Australia.

My previous post was written in the airplane from Bali to Bangkok. I like to write posts in planes. It makes me feel I am using my time well and it makes me feel very spiritual: there is this guy who has these profound reflections while he is in the sky. That feels a lot better then being caged in the small amount of space that is available to me in the plane. It goes even a bit further: when I am writing in my chair I feel that I can be free even when I am confined.

Nowadays there is quite often free wifi on airports. The idea was to post my previous post when I was in Bangkok waiting for my plane to Sydney. It makes me feel very transient and tech savvy when I do that: my words come out of the sky and after hardly touching the ground they are already send back into the Universe. But the internet in Bangkok was not working on my laptop. So I hasn’t been posted yet and I just read it myself: I was curious how I felt when I was still on the plane.

My landing in Sydney was a hard one. After meeting my host and going through some trouble to get myself connected (first thing to do in a new country: get a local simcard to get your iPhone working) the first email that I saw with my jetlagged eyes was a message from my now very definitive ex-girlfriend: she moved on. I think it’s for many people a painful moment in the completion of a break-up and it certainly was for me. I had barely landed and I was already hit over the head. I felt numb, sad and disheartened. And I certainly wasn’t in the mood to cheerfully post whatever blabla I wrote on the plane. To make matters worse: the weather shifted from to nice to completely crap and seemed to reflect my state of mind.

I could barely eat yesterday. This morning I woke up literally sick in the stomach but I managed not to throw up. Isn’t it amazing how profound an email from the other side of the world can influence the body? It was cold in the house and I was chilly. When I stumbled to the bathroom of this unfamiliar house I suddenly faced myself unexpectedly: I didn’t know there was a mirror behind the door. What I saw was not reflecting how I felt: I saw a tanned, muscular man with a healthy skin and a masculine unshaven face. A day of fasting is a good way to bring the abs out, I guess. In the shower I realized that I have no other option than to take good care of myself. Feeling sorry for myself will certainly not make me more attractive to anybody and being good to myself will. I felt the life energy flowing back into my body. I felt happiness and relief that the solution was so obvious and near.

My jolt of joy didn’t stay for long and I spend the most of the day mourning in the Royal Botanical Garden from where I could see the famous Sydney Opera House. But then I reached a conclusion: it can’t get any worse than this. So I must have reached a tipping point. And to reach a tipping point when I am exactly at the other side of the planet also has beauty to it. Not that I feel it that way but still: it is a beautiful image. I have to admit that.

I have a million issues around (fear of) feeling unwanted, rejected and abandoned. The feeling of losing love resonates with the feeling of being deeply inadequate. But I know where they come from (childhood: duh!) and I will address all my demons and make them into my friends. I see myself as unfit to just give up the battle and know this is part of the problem. But I do see myself as being capable of coming full circle: one day I will come home and realize I always was.

And now I am typing in some cool ice cream and coffee place in a Soho like district of Sydney. Before I got to this paragraph I saw my previous and still unposted post in the Word doc that I use to write this stuff. It is about hospitality and guests and hosts. Not only am I host to everything that comes and goes in and out of my life but I am also a guest that comes and goes in the lives of others. As a guest I should know when to leave and to be grateful for all I have received. In a literal sense I think I am doing a fairly good job. Now let me find the same graciousness and gratitude in my emotional life. Because as both guests and hosts we did the best we could. Thank you.

Below a poem I saw today. It touched me:

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