Grow big.

With the social media of today many of us know plenty of what's going on in the world, and alot of it can wake some strong feelings and reactions in us. We see wrongdoings, exploitations, lack of empathy and humanity. And we feel disgust. Wishing things were different or didn't happen. We feel bad inside, our hearts affected by what we know is wrong. But we don't do anything about it. We only feel bad about it. We might talk about it with our friends or accuaintances, but it ends and stays there. We'd never dare really raise our voice and stand up against the wrongdoing - because we tell ourselves noone would listen. But there's always someone who listens. 
    A voice isn't always heard by an ear. There's this great thing, that really listens to what we say, called our conscience. Our conscience is a powerful tool. It thrives and grows from us doing good and standing up for what we believe in. Making ones conscience proud is one of the easiest ways to feel good about oneself, to grow and to feel as a better human being. It helps us love ourselves. Respect ourselves. And with that, we grow stronger. Our voice grows stronger. And the world grows stronger. 
    So to make a change is a simple as letting the world know what we think. That's all there is to it! We can even start by whispering - it doesn't matter - as long as we speak. Our whispers will become stronger as our conscience grows prouder. Because remaining silent is the same as quietly agreeing with what we think is wrong. And our conscience knows that. And we end up thinking less of ourselves. 
    So never underestimate the power you have. There is no such thing as a greater person or a stronger voice. We all have the same opportunity as the next. Every voice is as strong as the next. It's just that the strongest one is the one with the proud conscience.

Love,

C

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Don Quixote.

Many times I have been told that I am so "lucky". That good things just "seem" to happen to me. I know all of this is meant only well, but I would like to tell my side of that story. Because it isn't really how it might seem to be. And I do feel it is unfair to all that I do do, when someone puts all that happens to me up to luck. I do understand though, that unless one is on this side of the story one wouldn't know how much work it takes to help bring all that "luck" into ones life. To help make all of those good things happen. To help make. Because, as in everything in life, it takes work. And jumping into a dream head first in order to make that dream a reality takes alot of work. Luckily - I love work. As much so, that I have two definitions for work: physical work and elevating work. Physical work produces physical result. Elevating work helps us reach and preserve what we have achieved. What we love. We work on staying healthy, we work on our marriage, we work on our relationships, we work on being happy, we work on becoming better human beings... Luckily (again) I love both kinds.

    So now... Good things happen to me because I work for and on them to happen. I work on both works. I physically work and I work on myself. But, when I set out on a life dedicated to following my dreams, I never could have imagined the amount of elevating work that needed to be done. The amount of work that needs to be done on oneself in order to overcome all the obsticles one puts out there for oneself is mind-blowing. Seriously, we do not believe in ourselves enough. How little we believe is exceptionally apparent when the belief is put to the test. But also, we only find our true strength when in our weakest moment. 

    It's easy to work hard physically. But to create a world of ones own, to continue believing in ones vision when that vision for so many is considered naive or unrealistic, is not easy. It's like batteling both worlds of the story of Don Quixote. One side of oneself as Quixote himself believing so hard in the vision, and the other the reader who tells you it's just a fantasy. That's where the work really needs to be done: in continuing to believe in that ones dream is reality. Otherwise it isn't, and therefore never will be.

    So when you see someone who is living their dream, know they are working for it - really hard. And please support them in that dream. For the biggest battle they face is not with the world, but in persevering in believing in themselves. 

Love,

C

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Bring it.

You know when you dream something so strong and beautiful that when you wake up you really feel what happened in your dream was real? Because it felt real, it smelt real, the touch was real. With every cell in your body, with every emotion in and around you - it was real. And you already start to miss everything you experienced. So you try to hold on to that feeling for as long as possible, thinking about it throughout your day, painting over your reality with the softness of it, wishing you could still be there. But slowly life gains its strength and the magic of the sleeping moment starts to fade and weaken, and you eventually - after trying to grasp on to that feeling for as long as possible - tell yourself it was all "just a dream". And life goes on...
    I think many of us know this feeling. And we're probably all as sad to see the magic of that dream fade away. But we don't need to let it fade. We can work on finding and holding on to that feeling in our reality aswell. It just takes some faith, perseverance, dedication and determination. And soon we will be there again: in our dream. But in life this time.
   That's how dreams are made in to reality: you never stop believing that the reality of your dream was real.

Love,

C

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Unhappy lovesongs.

Is this world determined to be unhappy? Even lovesongs (so many of them!) are unhappy. Crying over what is not anymore, what should have been, what never got to be, what we or someone else did wrong... Isn't love supposed to be a happy thing? (Yes.) Every ounce of love we get is a happy thing!
    I recently accompanied my beloved dog friend Doni to higher grounds. For 6,5 years he was my best friend, us together always, through thick and thin. I got to enjoy his splendid company for 6,5 years. I would have wanted it to be 13. At least. Of course it's not easy losing a big part of one's life. To lose someone "before their time". That in itself is an excellent excuse to find life is being unfair to me now. I could justifiably spend my time crying, mourning and complaining over the 6,5 years we didn't have. I could feel all the shades of unfairness. How life is treating me unkindly. For he really was the biggest part of my life. Anyone who knows me knows that is true. So I could sing my unhappy lovesong right now. Or: I can be thankful. I can choose to rejoice and be happy for the 6,5 years that we did have. And I do. So many people choose the former though... Choose to feel they are being treated unfairly - by life or by other people. Choose to complain over the weather that it is not. Choose to count the money that they lack. Choose to stress about the time they don't have. Choose to focus on the blessings other people have, staying blind to the blessings they themselves do have. I find this to be sad. Why not be thankful for what we do have? We all have so much. If we only choose to see it. And appreciate it. There is nothing we will regret in life more than not living life. And we live life through appreciation for life. Appreciation of the moment. Appreciation of our loved one(s). Our health. Each other. Time. Rain. Money. Nature. Animals. Ancestors... Everything is worth being thankful for.
    I know I am finding my dear Donis passing to be easier to deal with because I did appreciate him when I had the joy of having him here. I have no regrets because of that simple thing called appreciation. I kissed him, I cuddled him, I took good care of him, I was thankful for him and I told him that almost every day (yes, of course I spoke to my dog). I loveloveloved him! And thanks to him continuing his journey (and me "losing" my friend) I now know how to live life without regret. And I am so, so happy and thankful for that. I know now to never love halfway. To never take anything or anyone for granted. To not waste time and life on complaining. As I already said: we have so much. And yet all we do is choose to complain. We have love. But we choose to sing unhappy songs about it. Let's not.

Love and a HUGE thank you to my Doni,

C

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Only human beings regret.

A life not led to the fullest, feelings not felt to the deepest. Love not expressed, moments not appreciated. Only humans regret. Only humans wish they would have had "one more chance". No other being on this earth lives this way. Every other being lives every moment as if it were the last. Therefore never regretting only giving half, only enjoying a little, only loving some.
Live without regrets, and you'll die happy - no matter when your time comes.

Love,

C & D

One.

To stand on ones own. To do for oneself. To have no one else as a filter for public opinion, criticism, feedback, thoughts... No one between oneself and the rest of the world. No company, no boss, no other person's ideals and visions. One easily becomes hard on oneself in this position. One easily scrutinises every aspect of what one does. What one says. The impression one gives. Every word one has written, every post, every painting, every product, every picture, every meeting... In a moment of insecurity can become the source of brutal inspection for oneself. And one becomes too hard on oneself. Because one only represents oneself. One does not represent anybody but oneself. One is therefore stripped down, bare and naked in front of everybody else. 
One feels surprisingly naked and vulnerable when one exposes ones heart in doing, showing, sharing - and standing behind - what one cares about the most.

Love,

C

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Imagine love.

I am an idealist. I have been ever since a little girl. Nothing touched me more than listening to John Lennon's "Imagine" and Michael Jackson's "Heal the world". Like them, I just couldn't understand why things couldn't be good. Why we all just couldn't join hands and stop treating eachother and this earth so bad. 

I still don't. And I never will. I will never comprehend the explanation "Just because. It's not realistic!"

We have created a world where kindness is considered weak. Where optimism is considered ignorant and idealism is defined as "unrealistic". How foolish of us to rule out the hope for change. 

Another definition for 'idealist ' is "impractical person". I couldn't care less if it's impractical - I'm still going to paint the world pink. And if we all paint the world pink, it will become pink. That's not ignorant or unrealistic, that's plain logic. And I am a true lover of logic.

Love,

C

(And of course, pink here symbolises the ideal 

thing called 'LOVE'.)

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Sprinkling pebbles like fairy dust.

Dreams. And the road that leads to dreams. Seems this road is percepted to be an impossibility these days. Something we are only capable of dreaming about: the road to our dreams. So we settle. We only talk about our dreams. Long for them. Dream about them. 

But actually dreams are much easier to achieve than we are tought. One needs only do one thing: stop listening to ones voice of "reason". Or other people's voice of reason. Even worse to listen to that one. If we choose to listen to a voice inside ourselves, why choose the voice that restricts us? The voice that narrows us and our lives? 

I make my dreams come true with pebbles. I actively build the road to my dreams with them. I sprinkle my pebbles around like fairies do fairy dust. Every pebble being a small action in the right direction - the direction of my dream. And here's the key word: small action. Who cares if you don't achieve everything at once or if you don't succeed greatly and galantly straight away. No one! Only you care. So stop being so hard on youself and fill those pockets with pebbles instead of mighty stones, and start sprinkling those pebbles all around you. And every time your faith starts to waver, google a picture of a beach and look at the amazing result of a thousand teeny tiny pebbles.

Love,

C

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Old and grey.

My ultimate goal in life is to be able to contribute - in a big way - in providing the elderly with a life worth living, until the end. A life respected as a human being, not treated as a scary and gray burdon. Death and age is something none of us can escape from, no matter how hard we try to shut our eyes to it and hide the ones reminding us of it away. 

We will never stop needing love around us. We will never stop needing the feeling of being appreciated. We all want to be seen, to be touched, to be loved and cared for. 

I now ask of you to please share your thoughts and feelings with me about what a good and happy elderliness would look like - for you. Please forget about all that we are told is 'possible' or 'impossible'. Forget about the lack of time we nowadays feel we have to take care of our own. Let your heart speak, and visualize what your perfect world would look like when you're old and grey. 

I promise, I will do my best to make those dreams and visions a reality one day. It's what I want to do in life, so that's what I'm going to do in life. 

Please feel free to write to me at cgruner.art@gmail.com

Love and thank you,

C

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Let's not.

Few things make me as upset as when human beings exploit defenseless animals. Animals are to be respected just as much as humans, or even more. Since animals still have the wisdom and knowledge in them to respect nature instead of destroy. The human being is destroying a world which we all are depended upon, our children's survival is depended upon.
So to hunt for only the "glory" of ones own ego, and then to teach ones children that it is the right way... Makes my blood boil and my hope for humanity crumble. To kill away the rest of the animals on this planet, as if we aren't already contributing to that enough just with the way we live, is just pure stupidity. We are not above the rest, we are the lowest until we get it.

Love,

C

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"No. I'm happy now."

Hello, my dear ones. I am back in the world of writing.
A while back a good friend of mine asked me if I had done any writing lately (she knows writing is important to me), and my answer was: "No. I'm happy now.". Already, in the moment when I said it, it felt weird. Like a really bad excuse not to be doing something you love: because you're happy?! I thought about my answer, and I realized that the problem for me is that it's so much easier to put the bad into words, than it is the good. When I feel bad I know exactly how to express myself, finding words for every emotion, endless synonyms for describing every inch of every layer of darkness inside of me. But when I'm happy... Then what? It ends there: "I'm happy."? One word to describe the feeling that this whole world seems to be pursuing? Sounds - and is - ridiculous.
So why is it, that it's easier to put words on the bad than it is on the good? I am sure I am not the only one with this little issue. Is it because of the fear of losing the good if we express it? A "Hide the light in the dark, that way no one can find it and take it away from us" mentality? I think yes. And I think it's because we are brought up to pursue happiness. That way, when we finally get a glimpse of it, we automatically fear losing it. Because, in our minds, happiness is hard to get. Something not for everyone, like winning the lottery... So what would happen if we were taught that happiness is attainable - in every situation? That it's not something you pursue, but somethig you already have. You just have to focus on it, find words for it, express it, talk about it instead of pointing out the sh*tty weather. At least one part of the population knows how to pull this off: our children. So what is it that, at some point in our lives, decides that the state, which for a younger human being is natural, isn't an OK state for an older human being? Something to think about maybe...

I have so much more to say about this, about the good and the bad. And this blog, I'm sure, is going to be about both. However, I'm going to leave you with this thought for now and make a promise to myself to learn to write when I'm happy.

Love,

C

Dedicated to my friend, Darya.

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