The things we come back to…

It’s been quite the year…or two

 

To back up I came back from my time abroad and after really considering what would make me truly happy I decided to go through and intensive and comprehensive 11 month fitness and rehabilitative pilates plus certification and I’ve never been happier.

 

I’ve now been practicing since last spring and have never been happier.  Truth is the only thing missing was the time I was taking to write, so I decided it was time to get back on it.  I know this is not an exciting way to start but it’s honest.  Writing allows us to say the things we need to say out loud.  Sometimes the things we are scared to say.

 

This year I have learned so much and the more I teach and the deeper I delve into my self practice the more the concept of pause and explore really reveals itself to me.

Love or Fear? cont…

That’s when I wondered which is a more powerful motivator: love or fear?

I want to continue to explore this idea because I believe it ties in deeply to the idea of pausing and exploring where we are, what we want and what will make us happy. I believe many times fear is the motivator to keep doing something, a job that pays the bills but will never be more than that, the idea of a relationship for security or to just get to that next stage, a fear of being alone, or singledom because of the opposite fear, the fear of opening up and trusting in someone. We’re told trust our instincts, cross the street if we see something shady, that people are inherently good and bad choices and situations often come out of a lack of options. Fear.

Fear of something being our last shot? Not finding another opportunity for love, for a child, for a career jump or even a journey before we are ready or before we have found the exact right option for ourselves.

What would happen if we did the opposite?

I sometimes wonder if that’s what motivated decisions in the past. Staying at a job too long, being the responsible one, doing the responsible thing. Meeting someone, staying with them, taking the next steps until I couldn’t tell myself anymore it will be okay, that just because everyone around me is “there” that I should be too, that it’s time for something.

Yes, fear can also be a good thing, it’s part of our survival instincts and techniques, but I believe for something to truly be the right choice something pure and good should be motivating us as well.

This journey I am on came out of a motivation of self love. I loved myself enough to stop following my life and take charge and explore it instead. Within that choice I had fear. I sold the only grownup home I ever knew, I walked away from a job with a reputable company and I kissed the modern comforts of manhattan goodbye for faulty air conditioning and a chance to really get to know myself. I was scared out of my mind, it felt so irresponsible, but that fear was my survival instinct kicking in, the honest truth was this choice, this journey was motivated by love. It was motivated by the support of people I loved and who loved me letting me know they respected the decision I made to do something good for myself and as fable-esque as it sounds the start of that decision, doing something that was motivated by love and taking charge even if it meant finally letting go of my safety net, that opened up my eyes and my soul to other paths that are absolutely without a doubt in direct correlation of making a decision and a complete life change motivated by love instead of fear. I was selfish for myself, for what I needed in a way that wasn’t hurting or effecting anyone else – and it allowed me to get to know myself.

I share experiences but I often keep details to myself – as usual I will but I will share the big picture – and no it’s not some eat pray love my life will be totally different discovery. The truth is I like who I am. I love my family and my friends and so much of what surrounds me, but I also learned that I can be me, and be responsible while trying to do something that satisfies me. I met someone amazing who “gets it” and gets what I’m going through and has been nothing but incredibly supportive and encourages me to enjoy every moment of this journey and to be selfish with it and get what I want out of it while still being there and being a part of it in his own way and finally I am going for a complete career overhaul to something I had never even considered before. If I was only motivated by fear then I would never have left, I would never have sold the apartment that was probably the lowest cost of living in Manhattan I’d ever find, I’d never have taken a leave and tries this and gotten to experience the things and people that I have. The truth is, I almost let fear motivate me this week, the kidnappings from last week, the boys being found, the riots, the bomb scare – they were all easy excuses to leave, to book a ticket back home and run from this place that I’ve idealized for so long, but I set out on a journey of discovery, I’ve found so much of what I’m looking for, I’ve found a comfort just being with myself that drowns out the noise that most cities never let you just enjoy and will I say I’m happier than I’ve ever been? Well, every day is different, but as a whole I’m appreciative in a way I haven’t been before and I’ve reconnected with myself, I’d say I’m truly motivate by the right things now.

Love or Fear?

I recently talked about motivations changing, evolving, but even within that I talked about them changing through things we connect to or care about. These past few weeks I haven’t written enough, I’ve been studying a new language and processing: the loss of our three kidnapped boys in Israel; the rioting; the rockets being launched in town I love at people who have touched me, and finally my own personal experience last night, the first bomb scare and evacuation of a place that I was a part of.

Taking UlpanOr my Hebrew skills are quickly growing but are not quite where I need them to be to understand what’s going on when panic ensues. Language barriers, people leaving their tables mid meal and walking out, police tape, flashing lights, but quiet. That’s when I found myself standing outside a restaurant on Pinsker and Bograshov receiving broken translation, I am told the police are about to blow up an “item” – they are unsure what it is, if it’s a bomb or someone simply forgot something, but at least this way they contain and control and possible outcome.

What motivates you?

Then the sound came. A gun shot but louder, all encompassing. That’s when I wondered which is a more powerful motivator: love or fear?

When Priorities Evolve

It’s so easy to get caught up in life.  Day by day there is always something that has to get done, work, family, a friend or activity – and often a curve ball that comes up and you just have to get done.  We are bombarded daily by social media, advertising and marketing showing people put together and doing it all while looking like we just stepped off the runway.   

 

There is a myth that we can and should want to do it all.  The truth is life is about priorities.  We can do it all, and have it all, but not all the time – and “all” isn’t the same to everyone.   

 

I was ambitious about my journey, I wanted to travel, have people visit, take class, volunteer, learn a new language and write.  Maybe that sounds like a lot to some people, to others without a normal work schedule seems easy as hailing a taxi with your smartphone.  We can try to do all of it every day and feel like we’re always a step behind and we don’t give enough to any one thing; or we can pick and chose.  I learned while I have people here visiting they will take a serious amount of my time and attention and to get one or two of the other things in I truly have to schedule the time and decide what is most important to add to that day.  For me its two things, one thing for myself: class, writing, working out; or even as simple as laying in the sun with a book.  And something with others, seeing a friend, showing someone around or just making time to connect with my friends, family or someone special back home.  

 

Part of this trip was pausing and learning that it’s okay to prioritize.  That it’s not dropping the ball but instead picking a few for that day.  I have learned through this a lot of what is important to me.  For me it’s the simple things.  People.  I want to have the experiences here, and I make sure I do, but connecting with the people who are a part of my life, sharing these experiences just enhances them for me just as I love hearing about the places my friends visit, taking their advice and sharing it all over a long call or a bottle of chilled white on the terrace at sunset.  

 

My experiences have been incredible: the conversations I’ve shared; the overheard conversations on the beach or in an airport; the beautiful magnificent sunset with old and new friends or on my own with my camera and a laptop; or last but not least how Israel itself always seems to know when I need something a little deeper and a random last minute thrown together shabbat dinner brings new friends and somehow manages to include cameos of old that I didn’t even know were in this part of the world.  

 

Being away from everything I know, structure and my comfort zone, has taught me what is important to me; what anchors me.  It has shown me the difference between a perfectly nice content day and to pause, explore and do the things that truly make me smile.

Have you had a moment in your life where you wondered just when those priorities evolved or when you realized you accomplish so much but not the things that are most important?

That place…

People travel the world looking for inspiration, for something.  Many spend half a lifetime searching for that spark, muse, great love, sign or guide.  We, as humans, want that definitive guide to we’re doing it right.  Sometimes found in science often found in religion or philosophy it is deeply rooted in our nature to seek approval from something we often perceive as greater than ourselves.

I am in the epicenter of the worlds three major monotheistic religions, where they started/grew/meet and even disagree.  I am in the place a large portion of the world comes to seek this catalyst and find something larger then themselves and the truth is it reminds me of the same feeling I got in The Louvre.  Some people search all day for something, go from site to site, kiss the stone Jesus was layer on, bow to the dome of the rock, kiss the Kotel and connect to hundreds and hundreds of their ancestors that came before them – these are all within steps of each other  Why is it we feel it so much more there but not walking by each other in the street? – But I digress.  In The Louvre I saw people who wanted to get it, who were there because they should be, because they understand there is a beauty and a history but were striving to connect and then every once in a while you see someone who just “gets it” and connects in a way that makes you take notice.

Tonight I sat with someone like that, her enthusiasm and true love for this simple wall that connects so many people, so many generations, so many tears and prayers; the wall that holds so many individuals deepest hopes and secrets and she was like a spiritual junkie, she couldn’t get enough, she couldn’t get away from it.  Not because she needed others to see or to prove it but because something in her soul connected so deeply to it that it overcame the need for sleep or warmth or food: and it was beautiful.  It made me want to go and see her dynamic and relationship with this place that makes so many fall to their knees and others just want to snap a picture and head to the proverbial gift shop.

We travel the world to find, to seek, to connect and sometimes it’s half a world away but I was thinking about what makes us, us.  How we can connect to the world around us in a different, deeper and more honest and fulfilled way.

I urge you all to stop running for a minute and find out what close to your heart and home gives you the inspiration and spark that so many search for and remember to cherish it and stop always looking for the next one, the one thats bigger and better or further or seemingly more impressive.  Find that place that no matter what you have the comfort of home with the inspiration to always do better, push yourself and create something beautiful.

From head to heart…

I’m sitting in Tel Aviv – the white city – pure and beautiful. Boarding the most beautiful beaches with the buzz of life at all hours that only a city can provide there is always something to do. Tonight I opted out of the every day drinks and dinner for something a little deeper: an evening with a very special Rebbitzen. Who I’ve been lucky enough to hear many times. The words I’m hearing tonight…as I type to you all…are not new. But as I’ve discussed the same words, pictures, art or even person in a different context can effect you differently.

Tonight she talks about the difference between head and heart. About how we evaluate the people around us. She is talking in a context of dating and love but I think it applies to so many parts of our lives. Love. Business. Friendship. Tonight I take two things I want to share with you all in my journey to pause and explore and understand the difference between content-ness and true happiness.

1. So many people get caught up in the “head” and it makes our generation “lost their heart”. We date so much we have so much access to everyone around us and the truth is it allows us to think with our heads and forget to just stop. Pause. Listen to our hearts and explore that.

2. This woman is know for being an international matchmaker. She talks about the exterior qualities we look for. That internal mental list: looks; a sense of humor; ambition or proof there of hard work; and, other similar quantifiable surface qualities. But how often is a good heart in that list? If there is no good heart she explains all those qualities can be turned: from a sense of humor to mean spirited teasing; financial stability could become a form or control; and, the list goes on. But a good heart. A warm family. The qualities you can’t quantify but only a heart can tell you is what is important.

These are not new concepts. This is not a lecture I’ve heard in relation to the Torah and young Jewish communities for the first time. But it is something to share to help you all stop and think. To pause and explore.

We are often content when we think with our head but when we really stop and think with our hearts I believe is when we really reach true happiness.

Do you have an example of a decision you’ve made with either your head or your heart and how they turned out?

My next favorite art form…

With all the travel and legitimate want to share deeper thoughts I often neglect one of my favorite topics and art forms: Fashion.

 

Please take a look at a piece I did for one clique shoes on what I was wearing, where!

 

Around the World with Me!

 

 

Finding Mona Lisa

I know I’m supposed to like it – possibly love it – everyone does, everyone expects you to, they are waiting for that rave moment about the charm and romance, about what it showed you, opened your eyes to, taught you, the je n’ai sais quois so many people reach for…but I just didn’t.  I didn’t see it, I didn’t feel it, I barely wanted to stay the planned two and a half days…to me Paris was just average.

What did you think I was talking about?

But really, I love to travel.  To me there is nothing more thrilling than that moment a plane or train takes off, that moment of taxi or your gps says go – not only for the destination, the sites, the culture, the art and the food but for me it’s the people.  I want to talk to people, to have a double espresso at their favorite cafe, street art on their favorite side street and shop in their favorite stores; but to do that the locals need to actually want to share these things with you.

I did have one can’t miss destination.  The Louvre.  No matter what I felt, thought or how much longer I wanted to stay my deep appreciation for history and art and the origin of a people and a place made me know I couldn’t miss this treasure chest of images, color and inspiration.

So I found myself at The Louvre standing in a beautiful lush blooming courtyard and a line that rivaled Manhattan’s most popular lounges in the early 2000s and I waited and looked and listened to the languages being spoken around me, the things people were excited about and other thoughts that I couldn’t seem to pry out of locals.  The Louvre is an impressive structure, it is art itself, besides the iconic pyramid and the beautiful gardens that surround it and pop up on every tourists pictures from our grandparents days of slides to facebook to insta #ofcourseIcametoParisandtookthisunoriginalphoto but people forget once they get inside.  Everyone wonders what piece resonates with an individual.  Everyone asked me – a street, photography and modern art lover – if anything grabbed me.  The truth is a few things things really truly resonated with me but not what most people expect.

1. I was told by an american tourist in an old school espresso bar that there is enough individual pieces of art in the Louvre that if one spent a minute on each it would take over 3 months to see it all.  With all that art it felt like there was a constant set or breadcrumbs from the entrance to the Mona Lisa.  This iconic piece that has become such a part of pop culture and common lexicon to the point where I’ve heard my male friends have described women they meet as a “Mona Lisa: beautiful from afar but not so special up close,” has books and movies with it in the name and is featured in so many other ways.  The truth is everyone seemed excited to find her, to meet her, but I didn’t see one person stop and really look at her, be moved by her, understand the enormity of what she’s done and how she effected each and every one of their cultures.   It reminds me of a line from The Devil Wears Prada:

This… ‘stuff’? Oh… ok. I see, you think this has nothing to do with you. You go to your closet and you select out, oh I don’t know, that lumpy blue sweater, for instance, because you’re trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously to care about what you put on your back. But what you don’t know is that that sweater is not just blue, it’s not turquoise, it’s not lapis, it’s actually cerulean. You’re also blithely unaware of the fact that in 2002, Oscar De La Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns. And then I think it was Yves St Laurent, wasn’t it, who showed cerulean military jackets? I think we need a jacket here. And then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of 8 different designers. Then it filtered down through the department stores and then trickled on down into some tragic casual corner where you, no doubt, fished it out of some clearance bin. However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs and so it’s sort of comical how you think that you’ve made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when, in fact, you’re wearing the sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room. From a pile of stuff.

2. I loved observing the people and the way different individuals react to art.  The school groups; the tours; people who actually look or even just take pictures and look later; the people who you see have to restrain themselves from touching the sculptures and statues; and those who want to “get it”; and, my favorite, those who are so moved their reaction allows you to see a piece you may have missed.

3. The Louvre itself.  The structure, I found myself in awe of the way it was built, its grandeur without being imposing or intimidating as I slid my hands over marble banisters.  I looked up at the ceilings, the walls that were perfect and those that had to be restored from years of others doing the same.  The magnitude of the space was in itself an incredible story and piece of art.  I was overwhelmed.  Then I was underwhelmed by the way the actual pieces of art were presented.  It was like a quilt, semi connected, connects and totally unrelated pieces virtually touching each other, no uniformity of framing or even medium in most cases.  It made it difficult for me to connect or be moved by a specific piece because my eyes couldn’t hold focus with just one.

 

This struct me as a metaphor for life.  You meet people, friends, business partner, love interests and depending on the circumstance the same meeting, catalyst and personalities circumstances change.  They progress differently? Something unique amid a and assault of other eye catching items is not the same, just as the thought consuming experiences vs the same infinitely special piece for example in a white walled gallery put where you can see it feel it observe and experience it uninterrupted, privately and without other influences is a different experience and once the outside noise is taken away the same special qualities but seen in a time and evolution differently.  I think this is important to consider in relationships and life – to avoid the noise, friends, smartphones, social media, family. How we should pause, and explore whatever we are entering into on our own.  No noise, no oust side influence.  Not following pop culture’s breadcrumbs to what we should be looking for or reaching for.

 

So tell me.  How do you all stop and make sure you are listening to only yourself, only your own instincts and making the decisions that are right for you – even for me down to not responding with the expected of course I loved Paris because that’s what others want to hear but with holding true and being honest in even the small details.

Choices

Something that keeps hitting me on my travels is the difficulty I have ordering coffee.  

Yes.  That’s my deep thought of the day.  But it’s more than that, we live in a world with so many choices and even more interpretations of any given option based on influencing personalities and cultures.

How do all these choices effect us?  Do we make them or do we avoid making them or do we just chose the easy options?  This pertains to my journey and struggle because I consider our parents and grandparents generations and how they learned to stick with something in a way I think my generation struggles with.  This has become clear to me in two very prevalent and prominent parts of life: work and love.

I was working with a friend who graduated a few years after me on her resume last week and she asked about the longstanding rule that a resume should never have exceeded one page.  That was fine when only a small portion of the population attended college and a smaller portion attended post graduate education and you took a job or selected a field and perfected it, learned it, grew within it and stuck with it till retirement.  Now people switch industries like hair styles, not quite on a whim but also as one grows out they don’t necessarily feel the same need to perfect and grow into a role, instead they believe they have outgrown it and look elsewhere for who or what can do more for them.  Where we used to stick something out five years, wait more than an earning season for a promotion, and sometimes only work for one company our entire lives the standard now is if someone seems to stick with a company more than a year or two.  Is this the fate of our generation to always pursue greener grass rather than grow a position into something that is really amazing for themselves? Or is it a larger symptom of always thinking something else will make us happier and instead of a pause explore and then go with the right direction are we a constant pause and reset generation?

I consider the same with relationships.  My parents met forty years ago, they dated three months got engaged and said “I do” a mere three months after that.  They were in love but they were pragmatic, they talked about their good and bad traits and they were also madly in love.  They made a decision to make it work, and they did through all the good and bad.  Through a very humble poor start to good fortune that came with hard work and through my mother’s defeat of breast cancer and my father’s eventually terminal struggle with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.  They truly embodied, for better or worse.  Our generation can’t seem to get this down.  We are used to the best, to options, to everything down to our jeans and suits custom made just for us, and even those we grow tired of entirely to hastily.  We wait till we’re older, set in our ways, stubborn and independent to then try to merge our lives with someone in exactly the same place.  The generations before didn’t wait for “what can this person offer me” they decided to make a commitment, grow and commit to love, not to their own and then their partners careers, and they grew together.  They had a faith in each other that as a team they could make it through anything.

When I started this project I was very much of the mindset: pause. reset.  Because that is what I had just done.  But the truth is that can often be the problem with our generation which is how I got to: pause. explore.  There are times in our life we should hit reset, not everything is for everyone, but its a button to use much more selectively than our generation does.  There is so much in this world worth exploring, worth holding onto, but we only know that once we do.  Once we grow an our of college entry level job into running a department and being in expert in what we do.  When we chose a partner have it be for the person, the team you are together and know that every team has winning and losing days, weeks even, but its the practice in between that makes you great and makes something sustainable – the commitment that is lacking in our generation.

4 countires. 2 weeks.  One coffee order infinite different ways.  Iced double espresso.  At home to me this means a cup of ice with a double espresso poured over it – I can doctor it myself with a drop of milk or some course brown sugar.  In the rest of the world it can vary from an espresso with one ice cube to an (specifically asked not to be) iced americano, to an espresso poured over ice then the ice melted quickly into an iced americano with steamed milk and so many other ways in between.

Why is this? Do we have too many options?  Is this how our culture is meant to be a smaller world but so many different ways to ask for or do something that nothing ever feels quite right?  Or do we just forget sometimes that the world gives us exactly what it should and we should find a way to work with that?  

 

What’s the greatest work or love story that gives you goosebumps and makes you want to emulate it?

Reliance.

From the beginning of our lives we are reliant. We rely in our mothers and fathers and caretakers to keep us safe. We interchange reliance with trust as we get older. Trust is a natural and healthy state of being. We trust our teachers to teach us what is true. We trust our spiritual leaders, our doctors we trust things around us will work a light switch or running water. We are programmed to trust, to be reliant because we can’t do it all ourselves: we aren’t created to.

I think about this in a few lights. Mother’s Day: thank you Mom and all the mothers and fathers and big sisters and brothers that play the role. You all allow us to grow up knowing someone will always be there – that it’s okay to trust.

I’ve been in 4 countries in the last week or so and I’ll tell you about something I rely on. My phone. In the modern world we rely that we can trust our technology will work. In Istanbul with some help my phone decided to work then inexplicably it just stopped. A day later in Israel it was fine and normal and now in London it doesn’t seem to want to pick up a roaming network even though all settings indicate a “go”. But when traveling it’s occasionally nice to be disconnected

My friend just made Aliyah and ordered a sim in the mail (it’s one of the ways they do it in Israel) and she had the same issue with Golan Telecom that I did – it got lost and had to be re-sent. But the funny part is it can be nice to be disconnected. She came to meet me over the weekend and at the point where I was sure she should have been there I got worried and went to look for her. Walked up and down an are (albeit with an amazing iced espresso and a banana) for about 40 minutes before I found her. I was worried she got lost on a new public transportation system in a language that she is not quite fluent in. It made us wonder what we did before all this technology if it’s a good or a bad thing for us to be so connected and reliant on it…but every time my phone doesn’t work I am reminded how much I do from this tiny machine.

That said I’m about to lose my wifi connection in search of a SIM so I can rely even more on google maps on this trip…

Any thoughts?