18th to 27th of February 2025.
I never planned for any of this to happen.
People who don’t know me generally think I have my life mostly together. I have a PhD from one of the strongest math departments in Europe. I have a job that is 100% remote which comes with a lot of freedom. I have friends where I can crash in every corner of Europe.
The truth is, I’m just winging it nonstop. I work ridiculously hard.
When I was 13, I went to a life-changing summer camp. I talked to a camper a few years older than me who told me that he was taking computer science classes even though he was still at high school. Did I mention that I was extremely nerdy back then, much more so than today? I was extremely nerdy. I found this idea of pursuing “higher” education during school fascinating and inspiring since I had had no clue that this was even remotely a possibility. Yet, it would take me almost another year until I realized: hey, I could do that too! And if there is something you need to know about me, it is that I like to go through life just saying “yes, and” and watching things unfold. Most people don’t know this about me, but by one of those formative coincidences, this lead to me studying mathematics for over ten years. How that came to pass is another story.
Now, 13 years later, I am bidding farewell to mathematics and continuing in the same whimsical spirit. My plan was always to apply for a job, have an apartment, maybe move a couple of times and then settle down in a city more or less. Yet, in a strange repetition of coincidences, I piggy-backed of someone I knew and ended up with a 100% remote job.
Goodbye Zurich. I don’t miss you, at all. I don’t miss my inviting flat. I don’t miss running to the Zürihorn to see the mountains in the distance as the Sun is rising. I don’t miss . I am surprised. I have no aching for Zürich whatsoever. I do not regret going there, but I am also glad I am gone, because it was time to move on.
Blue hour arrival in Amsterdam
- Depth of the rooms, the pristine white window frames, inviting sensation of spaciousness, the great lighting
- Feeling in the wide streets, the canals, … a sense of openness that I didn’t know I missed.
- Various shades of red of the brick stones, the reflection of the sky in the windows, that I am seeing at an angle.
- So many bicycles
- Even my hotel has this sense of spaciousness. It is by no means an expensive hotel, slightly outside the city to save money, but so it is for the first time that I experience what a bathroom floor heating feels like. After reassuring myself with some online research that floor heatings are not worse energywise than regular heatings, I indulge in this creature comfort.
I am looking for qualitatively new experiences and color me cheesy, but: I’m in Amsterdam, so there’s something I’ve got to do. (Pick up the experience again when writing about Keiryuji.)
Making the world a better place. Anne Frank House. Throw in some Vivi Atsumi. I had decided to lower my donations. This gives me the needed nudge to reflect on this topic again. I increase my donations back to the amount I . Write one or two really meaningful paragraphs here.
Comfort crisis audiobook. First thought: a week of offtrail hiking in the Norwegian wilderness, climbing peaks off the beaten path, off any path. I write a message nto reach out to the only person I know crazy enough to willing- and knowingly engage in a daring venture that will push our boundaries. This is just a kindling of an idea.
The feelings the book “Was ich Dir nicht sage” have evoked within me can best be described…
If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.
A deep longing has been stirred.
Count Basie Straat, John Coltrane Straat, Chet Baker Straat, … Bessie Wil… something. Definitely throw in a female one. Then realize I haven’t listened to Bill Evans in quite a while. Back home I sit down, at the desk, do my daily meditation, put on Jazz Jane, and get to work.
When I
I listen to the CPTSD audiobook by Pete Walker. I have had this book lying on my night stand for years now, and I always avoided reading it. I know in my bones that know the time is right to read it.
I cry until Schaffhausen.
Goodbye Zürich.
Running into Jorrit, wrapping up the book.
Journaling Meditating, I try but it does not work. I feel an anxious ball within me and struggle to stay present.
Hania Rani (Ghost Premiere in Warzaw on YouTube, and her Arte Piano day concert, both sublime)
Slipping, sticking the head out
Panic attack
May not have had a good time without my Buddhist training. Wakening this act that in Buddhism w call self. Swept away. Hard for me at first, letting go of my conscious mind.
Running in the autumn forest with my inner child
Taking my inner child and swimming away from the shore with him, into the deep waters. Initial throwback to my fear of deep water.
Longing for someone to be patient with me, to take their time, to be genuinely interested, to be slow in their approach with physical intimacy.
Feeling all of the little strains placed upon me through racism, people with privilege not understanding, … But also feeling how I shake loose if them and then feel my sense of self expand.
Dark with blue and red and yellow sprinkles appearing.
Seeing the rain in the music
Blue green shimmering light entry around the inner child room
Some Haina Rani song with an organ type sound sweeping in, leading into a montage of opening my inner kids room every time the organ hits and reconnecting with him.
Diving out of the mask I am to others.
Floating towards the ceiling
Hawaii Oslo Finale
Sabina message:
You are correct in so far that it’s not something I’d ever do regularly or casually but in general, I like pushing myself outside of my comfort zone in many ways and that seemed like an obvious thing to do in Amsterdam for a qualitatively new experience. Especially since I have experience with microdosing and wanted something new. I prepped the entire experience quite thoroughly with extended meditation and prepared journaling prompts. Haha, I was so naïve. 🤣 Let’s just say I tried journaling for one page and then gave up because I was all over the place. I became super anxious and honestly scared because I could feel my sense of self and my grasp of my focus dissolve and no matter how hard I tried to employ my Meditation skills, I couldn’t focus on my breath because I suddenly had an acute ball of anxiety in my stomach that just kept growing stronger. I understand now why they say that you’re not supposed to do this alone because I could feel it building up to a panic attack. A lot happened in a short amount of time but essentially I went for a certain Buddhist technique for ego dissolution in order to encourage the entire process. Without that, I may well have had a terrible time. But it’s something I definitely did right. The other thing I did right was the sound track I picked – I love this artist even more now than before, her music was like a guide through the entire experience. I feel I’d have gotten a bit lost without. I don’t know how much point there is in sharing the actual insight since it’s about an experiential felt sense and less about something cognitive. For example, there was a sequence at the beginning that had a water theme and a visceral sense of surrendering to the ocean, and there were moments where I would dive outside of my “self” that really deepened my intuitive understanding of various Buddhist concepts surrounding the self and the nature of suffering. And that was one of many sequences. 😅 But I thought it would be crazier and scarier in terms of visuals, but instead it just brought my personal sense for aesthetic to life in a kinesthetic way where I could see mesmerizing visuals of the music and also control them on a high level. It’s not how I imagined psychedelic visuals, I thought they’d be more involuntary and out there. There are one or two things I could turn into beautiful art if only I were blessed in that regard. I now have an idea of why some artists and creatives do psychedelics. Another sequence was about relaxation & body tension and is helpful even now to better understand the base level of tension in my body and where it’s coming from. I definitely feel more in touch with my body now. Then, there was a long sequence where I found a shimmering room and inside was my inner child and we reconnected and went on various adventures and forged a relationship in a short amount of time that built a lot more deeply felt trust than had been there before, and that feeling prevails until now. Another sequence was about some wishes concerning a romantic partner that I had never verbalized or felt this strongly. For example, a desire to experience a sense of (not necessarily sexual) surrender suddenly bubbled up that was much stronger than any similar feeling I had experienced so far. It must have always been in a corner of my mind and now that I’ve been there, it’s easy to go back to it and other such feelings that found their way to the surface. I could go on… every song was its own emotional sequence and the whole thing lasted three hours, so there’s more stuff of this type. :) So… there you go!
Zürich. Looking at the word evokes within me a strange blend of feelings.
It has been a bit more than two weeks now that I have left Zürich. Formally, I have moved in with my grandma in my childhood hometown, Pfullingen, but that is just so that I have a fixed place of residence: somewhere mail can be posted, somewhere I pay my taxes. For the next year, I intend to spend little time there.
The very last hours I was in Zurich, my breathing got heavy. I got into the train and it all came out. I sobbed until my train reached Schaffhausen.
ADDITIONAL SENTENCE FOR RULE OF THREES. This has been one of the most impactful weeks I have experienced in a long time. And this is just the beginning.