Outside my boxes – Act II

This is the second post from my sabbatical trilogy.

The sabbatical concept is very ancient, from the Greeks to the Bible. It means literally “ceasing”, a rest from work; a break that usually is used to travel or to achieve some goal. In my case it wasn’t that clear, I just felt I wanted to stop my routine in a moment of my life when I felt good about myself, and had the energy, and the experience, to revisit those things I always wanted to do, but never got the time or the mind space to do them. Those things that have always been in the back of my mind as “I’d love to do that someday” but didn’t want to spend my holidays on them. Holidays are generally about disconnecting, forgetting, and I wanted to connect. Reconnect with my curiosity.

It could take me a book, and not just a blog article, to write about everything I lived in the past months. And it wasn’t just about the different things I did but how I experienced them, the effect they had on me. The sabbatical gave me the freedom to look outside the boxes I have piled up around me during the course of my life, without even realising it. Once released from my everyday obligations, I gave permission to my brain to wander to new places, to ask new questions. I reconnected with my childish side, eager to learn, to question, and to revisit some beliefs and habits that I didn’t know anymore where they come from, and why they were part of my life, untouched, for so long. My sabbatical was ruled by two basic elements that we tend to lose in the adult life: curiosity and time. And what a powerful combination that is!

So with that in mind, once the sabbatical decision was taken, I started to fill my agenda with a variety of activities, courses, trips, a wish list of a lifetime. And here are a few of them and why they ended up being more than just a tick on my bucket list.

I will start with a few trips and leave other activities like courses for the next post.

TED Women in Monterrey, California – During three days of conference I watched over 20 talks from amazing women and men in the quest of bringing more equality to the world. So inspiring! One of the talks that really impressed me was  “Why gender equality is good for everyone” by American sociologist Michael Kimmel. He presented a thought that really caught me : “privilege is invisible to the ones who have it”. I think this is a powerful insight for all inequalities we face in the world and, in the case of women’s, it made me understand why it’s so difficult for many men to engage with this topic…

Washington – I think everybody knows what a great nation the US is, and how influential they are on so many fields, but I think I never really got what make them so unique as during my trip to Washington. And it wasn’t the imposing city, the celebratory monuments or the amazing free museums; it was at the National Air and Space Museum watching President Kennedy’s speech to the Congress in 1962. In that speech he presented the case to get funds to win the Space Race, and put the first humans on the Moon before the end of the decade. Now that’s done and past, but I imagined how bold and progressive that would have been at that time. I realised why the US is a country that, in so many areas, pushes mankind forward. They do believe anything is possible and the fact that nobody has done it before has never been a barrier, but actually an incentive to be the firsts. It made me look at that nation with a new kind of respect. I just wished all this pioneering and forward thinking is not replaced by the narrow-minded and xenophobic ideas of Mr Trump…

London-Brighton cycle ride – For the first time in my life I joined a charity race. I cycled over 60 miles (almost 100 km) from London to Brighton. Before this race I have never cycled more than 10 miles on a row so this was huge. And I made it! I got completely surprised by what my body is able to achieve and not because of the training or any natural cyclist ability. It was the result of being totally focused and supported by the energy of hundreds of people sharing the same goal, the same pain. That joined energy does move mountains, or at least, it moved my legs! I’m sure that if I would have tried that by myself, on any random day, I wouldn’t have achieved half of what I did that day. Felt so alive!

Hiking the Dolomites – Love the mountains. Miss the mountains. So I joined a completely random  hiking group for a week in the Italian Alps .

I don’t think there is a more peaceful place in the whole world than at the top of a mountain. That’s my cathedral. Which looked even more stunning during summer, coloured by green meadows and an endless variety of Alpine flowers. From basic gorgeous country flowers to beautiful tiny orchids, which are born every year during spring and die with the arrival of autumn. And that happens every year! I know this is obvious but when I was walking through those mountain trails I was delighted to realise that absolutely every year nature manages to give birth to all sorts of flowers, including perfect orchids, from scratch, from nothing, after everything is gone, dead. And we, the superior species, often struggle to keep our New Years resolutions or simply don’t have the patience or courage to start things over when facing obstacles… I think humans must be the most spoiled of all living being.

Berlin – I’m sorry London and NY but I think today Berlin is the coolest city in the world. It’s a welcoming, vibrant city, full of culture and open to embrace new initiatives for a better community life, such as the hollowed tree in the picture where you can exchange second hand books. It’s hard to believe that only 60 years ago this city was totally destroyed, defeated, humiliated, and today they stand as one of the most progressive places on Earth. The transport system is also an example to follow. Not only because is flawless, and can take you to every corner of the city, but also because of its trustful operating system. Once you pay for your ticket that’s it, no controls nor barriers. You can simply hop on and hop off freely on trams, trains, underground and buses and never being asked for a ticket. The big assumption behind is that, if you want to enjoy such an amazing transport infra-structure, you will have to pay for it, so why wouldn’t you? A system that could be questionable given that we are talking about a city that gets invaded everyday by thousands of tourists that surely are not used to that practice in their own countries. Admirable. No wonder Germany is one of the most open countries to receive refugees in Europe. Totally consistent.

Edinburgh Festival Fringe – After many years living in the UK I finally managed to attend the Fringe festival, the largest arts festival in the world, which happens every August in one of the most beautiful towns in Europe, Edinburgh.

It is a fest of creativity, where you can choose from over 3.000 different performances in all sorts of artistic fields. It’s the place where artists go to try new ideas and where viewers go to be surprised and provoked. With that amount of options of course not everything I saw was great, but it didn’t matter. I just loved to discover the existence of a space where performers and viewers are so committed to experimentation, in pro of developing something great, that failure is part of the fun.