Reborn

About a month ago I wrote about doing a lot of internalization. I focused on the inside. I started doing that in late November/December. It has been almost four months now since I started doing that. I believe that it is time to move out of that phase and begin to refocus on externalization. I am an extreme extrovert and being so focused internally can have very depressing repercussions on me. My grandfather’s passing has also forced me out of my shell. I can’t spend too much time internalizing and let the world pass me by.

Over the past four months I have been able to get in touch with the person I want to become. I am more disciplined now, more in control of my emotions. Although these changes are new, powerful and very positive they have yet to solidify completely. At the same time nothing in life is clear cut and you can’t expect to reserve X amount of time for healing and X amount of time for whatever else. There is always overlapping. I am focusing once again on looking to a life beyond US soil. Instead of being obsessed with specific nuances I have decided to take a different approach; take things easy (what a concept!!). I am going to shoot my resume everywhere with no clear time frame in mind just yet. I kind of want to see what kind of responses I will get and then go from there. Don’t get me wrong I still have standards, i.e. I am not going to just take any job that I get a response from.

The past month has been really good. I got to focus on myself, I look and feel better than I have in years, I managed to fit into size 32 jeans again (I was almost 34 in Aug), and the best part is I threw in some international travel as well. To top it all off I have someone very close to me who is nearby for the next month and a half. In fact it was this person’s presence which catalyzed my move to externalize again. I think that my grandfather’s passing really set off some explosions internally and that week before I left the States for my small vacation, a lot of pressure was building up within. This person reminded me what living life was like once again and reminded me that the whole reason for my realizing so much when I was away in Europe was because I was searching for (and temporarily found) something to inspire me.

Another person, who was once very close to me, also told me not long ago to “do something that inspires you.” So I went away a couple of weeks ago on a five day journey to a country I have never been. Not only that but I went there with someone who could quite possibly be one of the coolest travel partners I have ever had the pleasure to travel with. Needless to say, I was re-inspired. Life has been up and down, left and right for me these days I guess, in terms of self direction and momentum but not in terms of outlook; I’ve never really dropped my positive outlook in life. I have been doing a lot more things differently and have been enjoying it in the process.

.....Cont'd on 3/26/07......

I just got back from the Virgin Islands. I have been waiting to post this until after I had returned. A new me has emerged and I like him a lot. The picture above really captures what has happened to me over the past month. I took this picture while I was in Mexico at a rooftop Shisha lounge called Fumari. It was a beautiful night and the picture inspired me to do exactly what I had captured....to finally break away, to solidify everything new and look forward. Sure there are some things which tag along but those are the pieces of the essential "me," the person I was looking for, a more refined me, that I took with. Its funny how once I finally break away, things can now finally come together, and it definitely feels that way.

Image: "Reborn"
Location: Cabo San Lucas, Mexico
By: S. Tobler
3/2007

Faking the Books

My current state of mind.......this one is called Faking The Books by Lali Puna

We’ve been done before and now we try to forge ourselves

We’ve been done before and now we try to forge ourselves

I’ll be true again

But until then I fake the books

‘Cause everybody knows

This ain’t heaven

Until everybody knows

We’ve been wrong before

There is a lot that we survived

We’ve been wrong before

There is a lot that we survived

I’ll be true again

But until then I fake the books

‘Cause everybody knows

This ain’t heaven

Until everybody knows

- Lali Puna

To Ernst...

Life is such a funny, fickle thing. Its twists and turns excites, inspires, breaks, angers, and awes us. Our fascination with it and our absolute clueless application of such a power leaves us so lost in it that we forget how valuable it is until it is taken away, much like many things in the world.

My grandfather, on my Swiss side, passed away last week at the age of 87, 88 in August. We were never very close, we never went fishing, we hardly spoke to each other, although we did do a lot of walking and when we did manage to talk to each other it was one of the most gratifying feelings. He saved my life once, well, indirectly. During the second world war he was contemplating running away to Argentina to escape the possibility that Hitler would invade Switzerland. He is not Jewish so his exodus would not have been for the sake of religious freedom (or preservation of life due to religious affiliation) but rather to escape the possibility of a complete nut dictating his life. Thanks grandpa, for deciding to stick it out.

The last time I saw him was in September 2006, during my amazing trip through Europe. Over the past ten years, each time I visited him we got a little closer, and this past vacation was no exception. I saw him in his usual form; busy. He was always a very active man, never once did I see him not do anything physical. His passion was his garden where he grew fruits, vegetables and flowers. It was his church, his life, love, and true home. He won awards for it, but beyond that its true merit lies in the fact that everything that grew out of that garden was pure in perfection and was a true representative of him. Having grown up on a farm it must have been the one thing he had that reminded him of his youth, much like how traveling is my one constant, my true love and passion...that garden was his gateway to eternal youth. Most of all, much like my passion, his garden was the ultimate expression of his love for life and very reminiscent of much better times, a much better world.

Whenever someone passes they inspire. They leave the world with people looking to their memory and remembering all the potential in their lives. Sometimes it is a sad thought, that the fact that you weren’t close to the person that passed reminds you of what you could have with your loved ones at the moment, in turn inspiring you to make more of an effort to be better...a beter grandson, son, daughter, mother, father, whatever.

I miss my grandfather tremendously, I know that we never got the chance to be close, given the fact that my father’s profession required him to travel significantly. Now that I know when I go back to Switzerland he will not be there, Switzerland will no longer be the same place in my mind. You see, people like me, we are a rare breed of humans. I still do not have a country as a home. The world is my home. Going to Switzerland is like walking from my living room to the family room. Imagine if a major component of what evoked the feeling of family in that room suddenly disappeared or was rearranged; that room would never be the same again.

I could end this by saying “I wish I had ______with him.” There is no need for for me to say that because I could go on forever. I only wish to be a better person, I only hope that I could become half the man that he is. My father, brother and I are his legacy, and the least I can do is to focus on the great adventure of life; his best gift to us.