On Preaching & What Others Say

Davos, Switzerland, 17 November 2023

That everything is connected, I consider a given. As to how things are connected, I'm more often than not at a loss. Take this photograph for instance: I can't really see that what I'm now going to elaborate on has to do with it yet what came to mind when looking at this pic is this:

Lately, I spent considerable time with a book that pointed out that intellectuals rarely practise what they preach. In fact, they practise often the precise opposite of what they preach. It seems to me that such behaviour is very common, for everybody, not just intellectuals.

Therefore, it isn't really something to criticise, it is something to accept. Such acceptance, I think, has the potential to rid ourselves from useless expectations and will, hopefully, reduce our suffering.

What I'm preaching, I hardly ever practise myself; what I however hear others say or write often has quite an impact on me. What regularly comes to mind is. If you really want to please yourself, just forget your longing and attend to your daily life. In this we find goldenness. 

PS: For a long time it has been my habit to attribute quotes to the ones who have supposedly uttered them. Since I nowadays believe the what to be more important than the who, I will for once refrain from it.

Taking Pictures

After twenty years of writing on photography (mainly on press and documentary photography for which the stories behind the pictures are often more relevant than the pictures), I eventually started to take pictures myself. I soon discovered that this wasn't anything new (as I had believed) for I had always taken photographs. And, much to my amazement, mostly photographs of nature. In other words, pretty much the kind of photos that I'm taking nowadays. Needless to say, to become aware of something that I didn't know was with me all the time left me somewhat puzzled. So I took my time and thought about it. 

And, I began to realise that I've had this kind of experience on other occasions. I particularly remember a train ride with a friend I hadn't seen for some years and so we talked about what had happened during this time. I told her about my newest plans to write without restraining myself (self censorship I consider the biggest writing obstacle) and to simply let come out what I felt needed to come out, when all of a sudden she burst out laughing: But you've always been like that! Differently put: What I had perceived as a life-changing moment quite obviously wasn't one. Instead, it now seems to me, I have basically been the same person throughout my life, regardless of education and experience.

Some of my characteristics I can identify, others not. When some time ago I was about to cross the street in the village where I have my base, I heard a male voice shouting my name. I spotted somebody waving at me but didn't recognise him from that distance. Once he got near me I said: Now I see who you are. Well, he said, I was able to identify you because of the way you walk. That was new to me, I had no idea that I have a specific way of walking.

Other characteristics are however easy for me to spot. The fact, for instance, that whatever I like to do I do obsessively. The three pics on this page I took on the same day. The first one in the morning (by late afternoon the flower had disappeared), the second one demanded quite some patience and the willingness to not give up), and the same can be said about the third one for it was rather windy this late afternoon. Sometimes, obsessions are a good thing for they can teach us to be patient.

Learning from Thrillers

 “… I miss my father, and my mother, and my grandparents. It’s a part of life, missing the dead.”

On death and dying: “It’s like walking out of a movie. Being made to walk out of a movie that you’re really enjoying … It will always be an arbitrary date. It will always leave me wanting more.”

Lee Child: The Enemy

“Niebuhr’s guessing. He’s a shrink. All they do is guess.

Lee Child: One Shot

It’s an ancient rule: lawyers make enemies.

Greg Iles: Turning Angel

… she finally understood what had happened, for the world was this way because she was this way; and the world’s judgement of her was only as stupid and cruel as her judgement of others had been.

The idea that love is not enough is a particularly painful one.

Richard Flanagan: The Unknown Terrorist

Vom Wetter & den Zwängen

 Bin ich froh, dass es Morgen regnet, sagt der ältere Mann, so muss ich nicht aus dem Haus. Davon, dass es angeblich kein schlechtes Wetter gibt, sofern man sich richtig anzieht, ist er  offenbar wenig beeindruckt. Und meine Sympathie hat er obendrein, denn die, die alles unbedingt positiv sehen wollen, sind meines Erachtens Zwangsneurotiker (umgangssprachlich, nicht medizinisch gemeint), die besser unter sich bleiben.

Verblüffend ist es ja schon, dass man (klar doch, ich spreche von mir) bei schönem Wetter, das Gefühl hat, man müsse/sollte aus dem Haus. Auch so ein Zwang. Obwohl es selten geschieht, dass, wenn man dieser inneren Stimme nachgibt, enttäuscht nach Hause kommt. Vielleicht hat ja das Sich-Überwinden etwas Gutes? In meinem Falle schon, ich würde sonst oft nicht einmal aufstehen.

Santa Cruz do Sul, am 27. Dezember 2023

In der Nacht muss es gestürmt haben, abgerissene Äste liegen auf der Strasse. Ich stehe am offenen Fenster und höre dem Regen zu. Das ist magisch. Wie immer am frühen Morgen lassen sich auch zahlreiche Vögel vernehmen. Die scheinen ein ähnliches Mitteilungsbedürfnis zu haben wie wir Menschen. Regen beruhigt, denkt es grad in mir, als ein markerschütterndes Donnergrollen ertönt, das in mir die Vorstellung hochkommen lässt, im Nebengebäude sei eine Bombe eingeschlagen.

Laut der Wettervorhersage wird der Regen heute andauern und wie der eingangs erwähnte ältere Mann bin ich froh, dass ich drinnen bleiben und ohne Schuldgefühle einfach lesen kann, schliesslich will ich dieses Buch, das ich aus mir unerfindlichen Gründen zu lesen begonnen habe, endlich zu Ende bringen. Soviel zu meinen Versuchen, mich von den (zumindest teilweise) selbst auferlegten Lebenszwängen zu befreien.

Cleaning House

Santa Cruz do Sul, 21. 12. 2023

December 2023: I'm in the process of cleaning house, or to be more precise, I'm cleaning my mail box in which thousands of emails have accumulated over the years. Many I'm just glancing through, others I'm reading from beginning to end. The most astonishing: I seem to have not changed at all – my opinions have remained essentially the same over the years. Insights that I thought to be recent proved to have been gained many years ago.

A primary school reunion comes to mind: most of us hadn't seen each other for thirty years and nothing had changed. The loud mouth was still the loud mouth, the shy was still shy. The careers, the achievements, the social standing – nothing seemed to matter. It strangely felt as if time had been standing still.

Similarly was my feeling when going through my old emails. There was however a difference: the primary school reunion I experienced as strangely unreal and could be thus easily dismissed yet having in front of my eyes the evidence that my world view, my values and insights had been amazingly stable for many years let me suspect that I had only become ripe and not mature.

So did all my learning not contribute to a better understanding of the world? It surely doesn't look like it. Moreover,  it seems to me that it is the other way 'round: our conventional wisdom is a distraction for it hinders us to see the world as it is. I've got no problem with this – as long as I take our way of thinking not too seriously.

Wie das Gedächtnis so spielt

 Etwas Eigenartigeres als das Gedächtnis kann ich mir so recht eigentlich nicht vorstellen. Dass es macht, was es will, ist das Eine, dass es vergisst, woran ich mich erinnern möchte, das Andere. Das grösste Rätsel, zugegeben, ich rede von mir, ist jedoch, wie es die zig Milliarden von täglichen Eindrücken sortiert, also so ziemlich fast alles über Bord wirft und einen winzigen Bruchteil behält. Für eine Weile zumindest.

Wie immer gibt es Leute, die behaupten, sie wüssten weshalb das Gedächtnis dies und nicht das mache. Für einige dieser selbsternannten Experten lässt sich das Gedächtnis bei seinem Tun und Unterlassen von Nützlichkeitserwägungen leiten. Das leuchtet ein, ist also vermutlich falsch.

Heute bin ich auf dem Heimweg vom Supermarkt an dieser Pflanze am Strassenrand vorbeigekommen, deren elegantes an der Wand Emporklettern mich entzückte, worauf mir die Ingrid aus Graz

Santa Cruz do Sul, am 28, Dezember 2023

durch  den Kopf ging, die ich vor über dreissig Jahren in Basel kennengelernt und das letzte Mal, auch vor etwa dreissig Jahren, in Berlin, wo sie anschliessend wohnte, besucht hatte. Anders gesagt, wenn mein Gedächtnis von Nützlichkeitserwägungen geleitet werden soll, so sind mir diese definitiv nicht zugänglich. 

Stattdessen beobachtete ich meine Gedanken, die mich in der Folge nach Berlin führten, wo Ingrid, die damals Schauspielerin war, mir im Zoo erklärte, dass, wenn sie eine Rolle einübe, sie die Bewegungen der Geparden beobachte und versuche, sich in diese einzufühlen. Vielleicht, schmunzelte ich so vor mich hin, könnte ich mich ja in das elegante Emporklettern dieser Pflanze hineinzuversetzen versuchen ... und so stolzierte ich die nächsten paar Minuten mit einem wesentlich leichteren Körpergefühl durch die Gegend.

Wann immer ich mein Gedächtnis nicht zu begreifen versuche und mich ihm einfach hingebe, kriege ich eine Ahnung davon, wie es funktioniert: schnell, leicht und nicht fassbar. Irgendwie ist das beruhigend. Und auch befreiend. "Wie arm sind die Menschen, für die es nur Begreifliches gibt", dichtete einst Jeremias Gotthelf.

A Day in December

In the morning of 30 December 2023, I noticed these flowers by the side of the street. They were rather small yet the zoom of my mobile phone helped me see them up close. I felt so fascinated that I decided in the late afternoon to go and take some more photos – but the short life of these plants had already ended.

When reading online news during that day I noticed that a filmmaker, whose name did not mean anything to me, had suddenly died. Shortly before his death at 45, he had felt an occasional headache that he however didn't pay much attention to. When after a trip to South Africa, he didn't feel well he went to see a doctor, was diagnosed with an aggressive braintumor and died shortly after the surgery, twelve days after he was diagnosed with cancer.

To me, these two events bring to mind that life is not only short but also, in the case of the 45-year old, totally unpredictable. And although we know that, we do not understand it. At least I don't. Generally speaking that is. In this very moment however I did.

In the evening, during an animated discussion, I quoted a Zen master who once said that most people when asked what they expect from life say: to die serenely and peacefully. That is wrong, the master opined, they should live serenely and peacefully. And then added: And this is easy. You simply have to do it. Whenever I take the time to think about this, I experience some moments when I know for sure that this is true.

Well, to live serenely and peacefully might be easy when you live in a cave or meditate on top of a mountain, when however you have little children and got tons of things to do ... remarked a young mother at the table. Everybody laughed and I asked myself what the Zen master would have said to this. I would think something along these lines: to try to live serenely and peacefully is an attitude and shouldn't depend on the circumstances. Needless to say, this is a very high goal – and this is why we are well advised to pursue it. Sure, we will most probably fail – and then have the chance to try again. For this is, in my view, what we are here for.