The biggest adventure you can ever take is to live the life of your dreams. — Oprah Winfrey

I spend many hours during my pre-teenage days flicking through atlases and reading any copy of National Geographic I could lay my hands on, imaging faraway places and adventures on foreign shores.  The fact that I happened to be living in the Seychelles during this period meant it was not a foreign shore to me.  My ambition was to become a sailor in the Royal Navy whose ships occasionally graced the islands’ shores and whose officers graced my mother’s guest house whilst on shore leave.

Time passed and we moved to Zimbabwe where, thanks to my job after I left school, I got to travel extensively throughout the country; a thing many people do not get to do in their own countries.  We were not obliged to stay in hotels (in many cases there were no hotels) so we roughed it.  I loved that part of my work but it all finally came to a halt with promotion.

“When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable.” –  Clifton Fadiman

Fast forward some years and I am a married man and father of one living in England.  Here, I come to realise that many people take some sort of holiday every year, in some cases, two holidays a year, many times involving travel to foreign parts.  I never seem to have the finance to do that and for years, my holidays were spent fixing up the house or the garden.

What I came to realise about many of those who did go on holiday is that fact that they rarely got to know the countries they visited.  Many went to Spain and spoke no Spanish or knew anything outside the holiday area the visited, the Alps attract thousands of English people and many can’t tell you anything about the local towns near the ski resorts.  Many have been to exotic locations like the Caribbean and not even left the resort!

“A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.” – Lao Tzu

Eventually I could manage and with a much larger family, took a holiday in Wales.  We did it again the following year.  On the second visit, we left the resort and went to explore the major towns of Cardiff and Swansea on day trips.  Some years later we went to France and despite my initial reservations, I find I actually like France and its people.  My two eldest children then went to New York, I did Brazil and my two youngest accompanied their mother to Zimbabwe.

If anything, Brazil was the catalyst for me.  It no doubt played a part in my decision to leave work and do something new which led to Mixed In Different Shades project being born.  Planning and writing for the project awakened the dream of travelling and seeing the world and it led to the realisation that I wanted more from life than what the future held then.  The state of our marriage and my wife’s vision of her own future meant that we came to the realisation that we were both unlikely to achieve any form of long term happiness together and we agreed amicably to go separate ways; so much better than spending the rest of our lives resenting, with its negative impact on families, each other.

So here I am on the 1^st of March, 2011.  So far, there have been various reasons for why I have delayed stepping onto the plane, reasons that are starting to look like excuses and I do realise that I am apprehensive.  This month, I will take that first step.

“Not all those who wander are lost.” – J. R. R. Tolkien

This trip will not be one of comfortable hotel rooms and plush local foods – these comforts tend not only to make travelling expensive but they remove from the very people you travel to meet – so maybe a better description of what I am about to do is vagabonding.  Vagabonding requires stepping out your comfort zone, embracing experiences as they come along; a way to connect to the planet and its people and a way to find out who you really are.

May you find the balance.

Links

• Vagabonding
• The 50 Most Inspiring Travel Quotes Of All Time

Thanks and here we go again.  Life has certainly changed for me over the last few months and particularly since my separation.  I am currently in the throes of trying not to get buried under the enormity of it all and keep my project – which I also reviewed here – moving forward.  Have I practiced what I preach about balance over these few months?  No, and it shows in the stress level I feel right now.  No exercise, no healthy eating, all my mental capacity concentrating on what needs to be done and emotionally on a roller coaster.  At least, I feel alive!

Within the next month I will be leaving my home to undertake a sort of pilgrimage around the world, a sort of adult gap year if you will.  Now that of course does not do much for my contentment level at all.  Facing uncertain challenges is not the recipe for a happy person but I am hoping that once I get used to time on the road, I may find time to practise what I preach.  I hope to appreciate what life is all about.  Failing which, the lessons I will learn will no doubt be a source of some personal growth, if I don’t kill myself or get myself killed.  Maybe though I will find my true place in the sun where I can settle and attempt to achieve the balance I so seek in my life.

What more can I say?

May you find the balance.

“The first symptom of the process of our killing our dreams is the lack of time. The busiest people I have known in my life always have time enough to do everything. Those who do nothing are always tired and pay no attention to the little amount of work they are required to do. They complain constantly that the day is too short. The truth is, they are afraid to fight the Good Fight.”

Read More here

According to Wikipedia, “although the human brain represents only 2% of the body weight, it receives 15% of the cardiac output, 20% of total body oxygen consumption, and 25% of total body glucose utilisation.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain#Brain_energy_consumption).  Assuming of course that working the brain, like working the body, ups energy requirement and considering that I have spent over 2 months sweating my brain on a thinking treadmill getting my new project off the ground, I would expect that I would have lost some weight.  Alas, that does not appear to have happened. Why not?  Answers on a postcard, please.

Regular readers of this blog know that I propose balancing aspects of life in order to achieve some happiness.  Since leaving work at the end of July and working on my new project I have to admit that I have neglected my own advice.  However, as I have the initial part of project up and running now, I have recognised that I have to return to earth and have to deal with other earthly matters such as my emotions, health and wealth.  I am so much aware of my growing midriff and my growing unfitness.  This is what prompted my musings on the brain.

The truth of the matter is, I have never been a physical type of bloke.  Any physical endeavors, apart maybe from walking,  requires a major effort on my part and the only successful times I have engaged in any long term physical activity was when it was incorporated into my daily routine.  Any break in that routine, and it requires concerted effort to restart.  It seems so unfair that life expects a ‘geekish’ person like me to take up physical exercise to stay fit and healthy, so unfair.

Even my spiritual time, contemplation and day dreaming in my case, has been dominated by the project.  There are other things I need to contemplate though and I am becoming so aware that time is rushing past like an express train and I will need to deal with some of these matters very soon.

It would appear that being so engrossed in an activity can, at least for a certain period of time, overcome any shortcomings in your life balance.  I must admit I have not been particularly unhappy and I have been enjoying the change of working situation.  I know I have been firing on mental overload and emotional and physical suppression but I can feel I am heading for a ‘sugar crash’. 

Now the project is in the sort of ‘act, wait and see’ stage, I need to turn my attention to other things and my physical aspect is the most pressing need and that needs lots of work, rats!  Ah well, it means I can post more regularly again.  Any suggestions of a weight loss exercise regime for one of the laziest people on the planet will be gratefully received.

May you find the balance.

Here is one man’s view of how the simple, not necessarily the easy, can make you happy.   Though written from the sense of the simple home in the Brazilian favelas compared to the high life in the USA, it is the emphasis on simplicity, difficulty and community that the sense of wellbeing is being found – What is Home?

In exactly one month’s time, I will change my status once again from employed to self employed.  Since it has been a long time since I have took stock of where I am, now would seem to be an appropriate time to do so.  This is where I think I am currently…..

Note, I said self employed as opposed to unemployed even though it is hard to claim self employment with the current income outside my salary in the 10s as opposed to in the 1000s.  This employment status change, and the other change charging towards me stemming from it, comes with some heavy emotional baggage and I will not be telling the truth if I were not to admit that I am somewhat apprehensive, maybe a bit more like frightened.  After all, the recent change of UK Government does not bode well for the under and unemployed.  When you make a commitment to change, a chain reaction is set in motion. This may be the reason that many people find change scary.

Having said that, the anticipation of being able to pursue projects that have been on the back burner for some time now and the thrill of having the time to do so has my mind working overtime.  There is one thing that the unemployed and under employed are rich in, time.  I plan to make full use of my time to create an exciting new phase of my life.  Will to be successful?  Who knows?  I have I track record so far, after all, I’m still here am I not?

I do not forget that I can be thankful that I have this opportunity.  I truly appreciate the fact that many people, many, many people do not ever get the opportunity to try to achieve their plans and schemes.  I try to find the time early in the morning to contemplate both this fact and other things and to feel at one with the universe for a while.  This spiritual time has fallen victim to the racing mind lately though.

Physically, I have not been too brilliant.  Still too much drink, too much nasty fatty foods and too little exercise.  I know I need to do something to be healthier but currently I am not stressing too much about it.  Too much excitement and the knowledge that in just under a month, I will be able to set aside time for exercise.  Then I’ll have to work on the drink and food.  Like I said though I am not stressing too much which oddly enough has reduced the odd aches and pains that seem to plague me a few weeks ago.

Overall, I feel good and so I will enjoy for now.

May you find the balance.

Dr Martin Luther King once said “The curse of poverty has no justification in our age. It is socially as cruel and blind as the practice of cannibalism at the dawn of civilisation, when men ate each other because they had not yet learned to take food from the soil or to consume the abundant animal life around them. The time has come for us to civilise ourselves by the total, direct and immediate abolition of poverty.  Man was born into barbarism when killing his fellow man was a normal condition of existence. He became endowed with a conscience. And he has now reached the day when violence toward another human being must become as abhorrent as eating another’s flesh.”

Over lunch recently here in the UK, my colleagues and I were discussing the ‘lazy’ unemployed  that were scrounging off the state and how our new coalition government was going to put an end to that.   The lazy scroungers must be left to fend for themselves.  I, surprisingly, found myself in a minority of one in that discussion.  What people don’t seem to realise is that it is the system of handling and managing the lazy free loaders that is flawed and not the system of helping those who through no fault of their own find themselves less fortunate that the rest of us.

My point that even counties like Brazil and Zambia (allAfrica.com: Zambia: Cash Transfers Transforming Lives of the Poor) have introduced financial help for the poorest of their citizens for a reason and I hypothesis that it will lead to a more comfortable standard of living for everyone.  After all, stepping over starving children and dodging hungry beggars does not make for a contented lifestyle does it?  Unless we commit ourselves to a minimum standard of living for all, peace and prosperity is but an illusion that can be shattered by the anger of people who have nothing to lose.  Don’t believe me, look around the world and ask yourself where there is happy poverty?

We all have responsibilities, and I tell my children this all the time, as members of a family, as members of the village, as members of our various communities and as members of our society.  The minute we believe we are above meeting any of our obligations, the standard and the level of happiness in our life decreases along with it.   Maybe, we in the Western World have forgotten what real poverty and misery is, but paying less tax, refusing to help our worse off will mean 6 foot walls and armed guards around our houses and little islands of comfort in city centres surrounded by a sea of discontentment, an environment unlikely to make anyone happy.

The always some good in remembering that ‘there but for the Grace of God, go I’.

May you find the balance.

‘I am going to be a star’.

Many young people dream this at some point in their lives.  Sometimes we try and discourage them and in other cases we encourage them. Sometimes, reality sets in and they settle for what’s on the plate. Sometimes, as seen on such TV shows as ‘X-factor’ and ‘Pop Idol’, more times than not these dreams come crashing down like a ton of bricks. 

But then there are those who refine the star to ‘pop star’, ‘film star’ and even ‘geek star’ and slowly work away at achieving this lofty goal because it is what defines them.  Along this way, some lose the requirement to be a public ‘star’ and just become ‘star’ in their field,  a star where they are held in high esteem but their peers in whatever the field, others discover new routes and new interests that turn them from being a ‘football star’ into a potential Noble Prize contender and still a star.

I had a surreal conversation this week where someone asked me about my future plans after I leave work in July.  How would I survive without a job and income?  Thinking about it later I realised my attempt at explanation would have made me appear like I was heading for a mighty unprepared crash.

 How do you ask someone to explain their dreams?

I think that if I had sat the person down and explained my dreams and hopes for hours on end, the result would have been the same.  As author Paulo Coelho (he keeps appearing in my posts) wrote recently ‘If you have a dream, don’t waste your energies explaining why’.

I cannot guarantee my dreams will come true just as much as they who play it safe can guarantee that they will remain in such a comfortable situation.  I, at least, will have had a go and crashed and burned in spectacular fashion and I could be a ‘failure star’.

May you find the balance.

If you regularly read my blog, you will know that I tend to take anything sold by the ‘quote a minute’ self help American gurus with a large pinch of salt.  One of the central planks of the success brigade is that if you decide where you are going, the world will conspire to help you.

The Alchemist

I must say though that since my ‘Your Place In The Sun’ post, I cannot seem to get away from Brazil.  For example, I am currently reading a book titled ‘The Alchemist’ by a Brazilian author, Paulo Coelho.  I have always intended to read the book after watching a Will Smith (the actor) interview, long before my holiday, in which he mentioned the book.  The book does not have anything to do with Brazil but one of the main themes (I have yet to finish it, so far so good) is about how the world appears to help you when you on your journey to your purpose in life!  Weird or what?

Since I made my decision to move on and do something different with my life, I seem to see lots of opportunities popping up all around me. I do not believe it is the world that is conspiring with me, it is me.

Once you make a decision, you open your eyes to the possible routes to achieve the target.  For example, if you decide to change jobs, you will not see the greater opportunities until you commit yourself to the idea, just saying ‘I need a new job’ is not going to cut it most times.  There will be ‘no jobs out there’ if you are making a half hearted attempt.  If you have to either out of necessity or because of your strong commitment, you will see job opportunities that you would not otherwise have considered.

This effect is real. If you need or want to change something in your life and the opportunity to do so appears elusive, question your motives and your commitment.  Sometimes we desire things that deep down in our hearts we know are impossible for us, I want to be a pop star but I can’t hold a tune.  If you recognise those fantasies then they cease to make you unhappy, they become your little indulgencies, your little escapes.  What you should be left with then, are those things that are true for you and it is those things, once you are committed, that the world will conspire to help you with.

May you find the balance.

“If you cannot be by yourself for an hour, or for a day, or for a week then you don’t like yourself” so rants ‘Payroll da Pimp’ in his ‘Rebirth’ audio book.  [WARNING :  Do not look this book up if you are easily offended – whilst the book is positive – the language used to deliver it is likely to upset, if you are over, say, 30 .]    Dr. Wayne Dyer, internationally best-selling author of ‘The Power Of  Intention’ is reported to have said “You cannot be lonely if you like the person you’re alone with.”

Being alone does not necessarily mean being lonely and when it does; it does not mean that is necessarily negative.  Many life coaches, self help gurus and other modern day motivators recommend a bit of ‘me’ time and certainly many faiths prescribe quiet contemplation, meditation and prayer. Even Jesus got 40 days of being alone in the desert! 

If you think about it, prayer is like talking to yourself, isn’t it?  You tell God what it is you want, what you need, what help you need and sometimes to be thankful for the small his or life’s small mercies.   Sometimes you mention others, like the sick and poor, and sometimes you moan about the damn politicians and their constant messing?

I truly believe that to truly understand who you are does require you to be alone with your thoughts on a regular basis.  If you use that time to examine the influences and the environment you live in, you may surprise yourself.  You might find out what YOU feel is important not what other want you to feel is important or maybe how funny you are or how clever!

I take my ‘me’ time very early in the morning before the family wake up for the day.  I try to have a little time every day but that’s not always possible.  Sometimes I take a walk and sometimes I just sit there with a hot cuppa and contemplate any subject that comes to mind.  Many times, those thoughts slowly build into decisions or plans of action or inaction.

Do not be sold on the growing cultural disdain for loneliness, it seems to be a pressure to stop you thinking but thinking is what us humans do and I would not hesitate to add, need.  If you have never made time for you, try it for a month and see if you won’t make it a habit.  And if you do find, you do not like yourself, maybe it’s time for change?

 May you find the balance.

You see them after travelling peak hours in the UK, every weekday, shuffling on the buses with their free passes, in some places trying to get on the bus before off peak time.  You see them once or twice a week queued up outside post offices and if you happen into a pub (bar), they are there, nursing a pint of something for hours sometimes playing cards or dominos or choosing horses or greyhounds from some broadsheet newspaper and sending the ‘bookie’ runabout to place a bet for them.  You might also spot them in the local butcher or at the Wednesday market buying two sausages for ‘tea’.  My wife will tell you that nothing frightens her husband more that joining the ranks of the ‘one foot in the grave’ brigade. 

If anything should motivate you to aim to do something with your life it should be these poor souls who appear to be waiting for nothing but God.  Oh, they do look forward to some things like if lucky enough, to the grandchildren coming round once in a while, the Christmas family meal and the once a year trip to the seaside but the rest of their life appears to be waiting…..  I do suppose that the middle class and upper class old folks have a somewhat different experience but stories like this and this do not convince me that retiring is an acceptable option.  And yes, I do not believe those smarmy pension salespeople trying convince me that it will be different for me, you only have to look around to see what is happening to the pension schemes.  Even the UK Government is not averse to screwing a pensioner or thousand or so  (see http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/8568970.stm).   Pensions are the worst investment you can make in my opinion and it is a disgrace that we are nearly always forced to contribute.

To not want to retire means you have to be doing something you love, otherwise you will get tired and old.  I just want to keep going until I keel over, hopefully in my sleep surrounded by those I love.  Whether they love me or not at that time, I suspect, will not be not very important.  If however, by some cruel twist of fate, I get to be unable to live a reasonably independent life to the age of say 85, wash myself, dress myself, wipe my own behind and enjoy a hard-on, then my family should, by now, be under no illusion as to what I expect of them.  (On this note, some additional reading about the matter.)

I suppose this mentality means that I can contemplate the uncomfortable options that are ahead.  They are not as scary as the alternative of staying where I am, keeping my head down and hoping that my current comfortable situation continues for the foreseeable future and maybe through retirement.

If there is a God, he is going to have to send something to drag me kicking and screaming from this world, because I will not waiting for Him.  What about you?  Do you want to spend the last few years of your life with one foot in the grave?

May you find the balance.

“As you move into your forties and fifties, the recognition of your own mortality becomes more and more a part of decision-making. You realize that you’re not going to be around forever. Your choices become a lot more precious. The gap between your dreams and what you’re actually doing narrows, and you start living your life more directly. What you’re doing is who you are. And who you are becomes more important to you.” See the full article this was taken from @ Is Your Job Your Calling (extended interview) | Fast Company.

If things had worked out as expected, I would now probably be in the middle of planning a move back to Africa.  My intention was two fold, one to invest in alternative fuel production in Africa which I already have done to a small extent and the other was to create a new business, also in the alternative fuel field, but with a very different approach to the current foreign investments in the continent.  My idea entailed empowering local communities by partnering with them in the commercial production of electricity primarily and bio-diesel from alternative sources.  Electricity is a big need in Southern Africa, nearly all the countries suffer from an electricity production shortfall.

This alternative fuel vision is a fairly new one and was made on the basis that I believe in its worth and that I would be able to afford starting it up. I suspected I may have had a bit of a hard time convincing banks and investors in my business model and so I needed a working prototype.  Even though this particular vision is new, I incorporated my long term wish to live and work in a place that had ‘sea, sand and sun’. Having spent my formative years in the Seychelles, my intension has always been that I will return to the ‘sea, sand and sun’ despite being born thousands of miles away from such an environment. So the choice of base was restricted to coastal countries such as Mozambique, Angola, Madagascar or the Seychelles. 

So when the disappointment had sunk in, I knew it was time to move on, time to close this chapter.  I reached back into my dreams and thought of investing in me.  When I moved to England many years ago I came with the intension of going to university and getting a degree but life somehow got in the way. I have always thought and said that I might obtain one at some point in the future.  I even dared to harbour, secretly of course, the thought of earning an honorary one from some prestigious university!   Silly me! 

So here I am, committing to spend the next three years of my life learning a totally new set of skills that will turn me into a scientist of sorts.  Science and particularly genetics as relates to inheritance and behaviour has always fascinated me and my favourite regular read is the New Scientist magazine  which I subscribe to.  I like the New Scientist because I intend to write, whilst I am getting and after I get my degree, about science specifically for the lay-person, which The New Scientist does superbly. 

Writing?  Why?  Because I have always written, I love writing. I have done very little writing in the last few years but have nearly always been involved in the publication and distribution of content even in my work as a web developer.  In fact, I originally got into web work with no commercial experience but based on the websites I had created outside my day to day job at the time, though the content was job related.  My first web job title was Website Editor as I was to be the content guy!  I have been writing as a hobby since the age of 13 or 14 and some of the poetry on my poetry website was written as a teenager.  In fact I have a few poems published previously but I digress.

So last weekend, I dug out my old writing stuff with the intention of reviving an old manuscript that I had intended to get published many, many years ago.  I was utterly shocked to see all the stuff I had been doing at the time when I was hell bent on being a writer.  There was stuff I had obviously used for my websites but in this box of memories was the aforementioned manuscript, 2 fiction novels in various stages of completion, one of which handwritten, countless unfinished poems and articles and two self published booklets.  One of the booklets with Christmas poems was distributed at a local primary school but the valentine poems booklet was never really marketed.  Money was tight in those days. What was shocking is just how much I had done and forgotten.  If I had not been sidetracked by the web work, would I be a professional writer already?

It is like once the decision was made and steps taken to change, all these dreams, new and old, some remembered frequently and others filed away in the subconscious, are now vying for their time, their chance, haunting me with their promises.  The ‘sea, sand and sun’, the degree and the writing all waiting to be weaved into my coherent future. 

I am thankful that I can even consider a new direction; I know many people do not and will never have the chance to even think about it.  And I am scared.  Oh yes, the potential for ‘crash and burn’ is large, maybe even huge, but ‘a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do’.  After all, I’m not going to be around forever and when my time comes a smile on my face would be nice.

What about my African dream?  I suspect it is being quietly stored in the unconscious for the time when it will be possible to revive it sometime in the future.

If my experience can help you face your own ghosts, make your right decisions in the near or far future, I am glad.

May you find the balance.

‘Place in the sun’ – a place/environment that promotes a sense of success, happiness, or prosperity.

I have a friend who likes to go to Thailand.  For the past few years, he has visited at least once a year and in some years twice.  He has been to other parts of the world but his Thai visits are regular and appear to be getting longer each time.  The other day he mentioned that he could have gone to so many other parts of the world if not for this obsession with Thailand.  I had to say to him that sometimes we find ‘our place in the sun’ and naturally we like to be in an environment where we are comfortable.

 The discussion reminded me of my early working experiences, working for a Ministry in Zimbabwe.  This technical Ministry had a number of expatriate engineers and technicians, the vast majority of them English.  Many of these people had been renewing their 3 year contracts for years and though they sometimes spoke of missing the ‘green fields of England’, which many saw once a year, not one of them envied me when I decided to up sticks and head for the UK.  How could they?  Though they were not earning the kind of money of their compatriots were, they were living a life style that only earning 5 or even 10 times more could get you in England. 

These expatriates drove new cars and lived in detached houses with gardens big enough that the dogs do not need to be taken for a walk every day.  Many would have had a barbeque area and an outdoor swimming pool maintained by a full time gardener.   Their wives did little or no housework which was taken care of by the full time ‘house-girl’ who relieved madam of mundane tasks.  If you found yourself in such a predicament, would you not be renewing your contract every three years to avoid the return to underground commuting and terraced housing, too?  I have no doubt that many of those people are either still in Zimbabwe or at least living and working somewhere in Africa.

My stepfather has lived in the Seychelles for well over 30 years now.  I suppose most people there regard him as an expatriate.  We left him there and he has found no reason to leave despite the difficulties for foreigners to earn a living there.  I seriously used to think that he was a loser, lazy to do the right thing and leave and use all his skills in setting himself up in life.  Now that I am 45, I truly understand why he is there.  If you don’t, you need to find out about the Seychelles!  Two of his friends left at one stage but both returned within a few years.  It certainly is one of those places where I suspect I would like to hang my hat.

One of my favourite pastimes growing up, I was a bit of a swot, was to open up and atlas and spend hours imagining what it would be like to live in some of the presumed  exotic named places around the world.  Some places like Tahiti and India and Madagascar always had some sort of draw but I knew as I felt the lump in my throat and the swelling in my chest looking down at the runway as we landed in Rio de Janeiro that Brazil was going to be my place in the sun.  It is a very difficult to explain to anyone what it is like to realise that something you have wanted for so long has finally come to pass.  The carnival was my excuse to go to Brazil but in reality it was Brazil drawing me.

Since my return to the UK, I have not been able to stop thinking or dreaming of what it would be like to live and work in Brazil and in Rio in particular.  I am sure everyone is sick and tired of me talking about it but now without a doubt, it has become part of my future plans.  Mozambique and Africa may have to wait a very long while for my return.  Brazil without a doubt is my place in the sun.

Recently, like many times before, I have heard discussions about where to go on holiday.  Many people decide a budget, check what they can get for that and choose from the array of choices presented to them.  I suspect not a very good strategy for finding your place in the sun.

Have you found yours yet? Do you suspect, as I have always done, where your place in the sun may be?  Finding it may guide your future decisions on your journey to find fulfillment and contentment. 

May you find the balance.

A news story this morning caught my attention.  It was about the fact that bonobos, one of our closest primate relatives, prefer to share their food rather than eat alone.

“Dr Hare said it could be purely altruistic, or more selfish motives could drive this behaviour because sharing could be exchanged for future favours. The researchers hope this work could also shed light on what drives humans to voluntarily share.”  See more of the story at BBC News – Bonobos opt to share their food.

If you are one of the people who subscribe to self help books, CDs DVDs and other resources, you will recognise the advise to be altruistic as one of the required attributes of success and happiness.  This is on the basis that what you give away will be come back in multitudes.  Some gurus would claim that is the way of nature.  Thinking about it though would suggest that all altruism is somewhat selfish even if it is just the ‘feeling good’ factor that makes a person do it.

One thing is for sure and that is that altruism has evolved for one of many reasons and it may be wise to practise it often, after all, if it makes you feel good then it contributes greatly to your contentment.

May you find the balance.

It struck me very strongly this week that in the week that Auschwitz survivors mark Holocaust Memorial Day (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8482760.stm), I happen to be reading Viktor E Frankel’s “Man’s Search for Meaning“, Dr. Frankel was an Auschwitz survivor.  In the same week, news coming out of the disaster in Haiti cumulated with the story of a teenage girl who was pulled from the rubble of Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince, 15 days after the earthquake struck (http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/rss/-/1/hi/world/americas/8484317.stm).

These events reminded me of a poem I wrote many years ago entitled ‘Lie Down and Die’ which I think I wrote around the time our TV screens, at least in Europe, where filled with images of Ethiopian children dying of starvation.  The poem questioned why someone why they just didn’t roll over and die when faced with some of the most horrible experiences that any being can bear.  Dr Frankel uses his experiences in the concentration camps to try and explain why people hold on and how that can help those who feel they can’t keep going.  I will probably return to this discussion in some future post as the first part of the book is fascinating reading.

I am not sure but somehow these events this week may have finally made me commit to registering as an organ donor (http://www.organdonation.nhs.uk/) and adding my picture and my 2 pence worth to the Wall of Life (www.walloflife.org.uk), after all I can’t take anything with me when the ‘deal is done’.  If anything, there will be at least one reason for my existence, my life and like I said on the wall, I can’t take it with me wherever I am going after this…..

The point though is that your life, all our lives, has to be worthwhile. Live it, live it and at the same time try to be content, be happy, it only comes round once.  It is your duty to show to yourself and all those who look to you how to make life worthwhile and from that worth, hopefully, will come contentment and peace.

May you find the balance.