The time of our lives

The (r)evolution now is in our hearts!
It is time to get ourselves out of the way
and let Life-Love come through

The call for action is the call of the heart
Mind, Body and Spirit will follow

It is time to Occupy that which your heart is calling you to
A square, a new house, a broken relationship, the train you take everyday to go to work...
And to bring the whole of who we are
To show up
To be present

Valentine Giraud - summary of talk given to YIP 2011-2012

Welcome Home!

To be back home. It is an act! It is a decision and a commitment.
After being on the move for almost 2 years now - with a few months still in Holland last year - it feels really good to have my own house to which call home and make my own.

The past months journeying in South America were great and have opened many many spaces in which ideas, plans and desires could grow. I have learned much about the fellow inhabitants of my continent and have been able to experience by my own the moves happening at this part of the world now. The whole experience of wandering into the unknown with Maarten has been amazing and super important to strengthen the foundations of our life together.

And now that we are back in Holland I feel we really had to leave to be able to be back and fully here. For the months we were away at several times I longed being back... Maybe for the first time in a long time, I longed being still and settled in one place. I longed being one place where people know they can find me, where I can connect with friends and partners whenever I wanted - not depending on crapy internet connection or buses schedules.

Being at home now also being me balance and some kind of quietness in the spirit. I feel more matured and grown - somewhat more adult and centered. Caring for the house, preparing the food and organizing our every day lives brings me calmness and wellbeing. In a way also brings balance to our man and woman dynamics, where I can take over the position which I also love of providing and caring, of mothering, of the feminine. A lot of times along our trips I found myself pending too much to the active, do-it, make-it-happen, directive side of the balance, and letting go of the soft, embracing, caring other side.

Now that we are back, established in our household, I tend to take back the part of me (and of the couple) that is providing and giving. Doing groceries and cooking is a pleasure, whereas while travelling it was a have-to, practical thing to do. And Maarten, on his turn, can take back the more masculine role, harmonizing so the equilibrium of our interactions.

Being home is an act. And I am loving it!

The curves the trip take

So here I am sitting in Valparaiso, in a living room that has become ours over the past week, in a house that has been generously lent to us by our friend Cristian. Here I am sitting with my lap top on my lap, writing email and messages to my friends spread around the world asking for ideas and advices of where to go next.

Here I am sitting with the almos existential question of what to do, in a ocean of possibilities. Bolivia? Peru? Where in Bolivia? Which bus to take? How much will it cost to stay there? What is it that I am needing the most now? What is the place and what are the conditions that can best nurture me now?

After having journeyed for 4 months, I am sitting with the need to actually be still and be living a rhythmic life, where you know where you are going to wake up the next morning, and the morning after, and the morning after. In fact I am feeling lost... With no sense of purpose any more... With no sense of enchantement and discovery, as if everything that is there to see I have already seen. Maybe not exactly the same place with the same colors and taste, but yes, something quite similar... And so I am asking myself, what is it that this journey is really asking for me to be, and to become?

Recently we were seriously talking about going back to Holland earlier than planned, as we felt a urge to be settled and start building on the ideas we are having here. And so we made a whole plan so we would be back beginning of May, instead of beginning of June. All was set and decided, we felt clear and happy about having a clear plan. Minutes later we call AirFrance to find out our ticket is not changeable! Yes, life was telling us it is not yet time to go... But then what? What is the plan, then? 

We were feeling that Bolivia and Peru would be a whole other chapter to go into, and somehow were willing to skip that for now. Bang! We are told, that in fact we can't... and we are subtly invited to think it through again, to reopen ourselves to another possibility behind the ones we were being able to see then. And that is when we say to ourselves: " It seems like we have to stay, and make the most of it. Maybe there is in fact something we are live there that will make it worth it."

The curve has taken us somewhere new, it has invited us to be open and to keep opening up, even when    you feel it is time to close. And now within this open closure, as we start to close the journey (we only have 1 month left) we are find it important to be clear. And that for me, goes beyond the schedule, the dates and the places to go, it has to do with being clear to what we want to live. To somehow be able to sense what is the next learning we need to have, being able to anticipate it and make ourselves ready to when it comes.

Loslaten

Later als ik groot ben

Laat ik alles los

De verhalen die ik heb verzameld

De beelden van toen en toen

De platen die ik draaide

De vrienden die ik ooit vergat

De keren dat ik faalde

Die ben ik vooral zat

Los laat ik de meisjes

Die sliepen in mijn bed

Los laat ik de spullen

Die ik ooit bezat

De zorgen van mijn ouders

Ik laat ze eerbiedig gaan

Vaarwel aan alle Goden

die ik ooit aanbad

Zelfs de tijd die laat ik rustig lopen

Nooit meer kijken op mijn klok

Alles wat mij heeft bevolen

Lieve mensen, rot toch op

Nu ik dit zo hardop zeg

En zelfs ook ergens meen

Zie ik dat ik met ketens ben gebonden

aan toen, aan nu, aan ooit

Aan hem en haar

Aan dit en dat

Jeemig...

Ik kan letterlijk geen kant heen

Maarten

2011

Ik versta je niet

We spreken

Dagen lang

Dragen dromen door stille beeken

Maar ik,

Ik versta je niet

Ik noem je naam

Al vele jaren

Ver voordat je eindelijk kwam

Maar ik,

Ik versta je niet

Jou taal

is toch ook de mijne?

Wij delen

toch een verhaal?

Jij roept

en laat me gaan

bent de enige die me ziet

Zelfs mijn zilte tranen

Als zeeen oneindig diep

Laat de liefde zich vertalen?

Maar ik,

Ik versta je niet

Maarten

2011

Heaven called Mata Altlantica 1

"I'm often ashamed to be human," I say to Valentine. My eyes are red of tears and my mind is numb of sheer disbelieve. We are driving from the beautiful fazenda of Valentines' grandfather near Sao Paulo to Serra Grande, Bahia. It's a three-day drive that takes us through the states of Sao Paulo, Minas Gerais and partly through the beautiful state of Bahia, Brasil. Valentine replies with equal emotion, but with a voice of resignation. She already knows. As far my eyes can see, I only see grasslands. Grassland with only some emaciated cattle scattered around. Grasslands with patches of red earth; earth on the verge of becoming dessert. This beautiful Brasilian soil finds it way to the roads and highways. It finds its way to the tires of cars, feet of the horses and to the shoes of people sauntering up the steep hills. It scrawls into the villages covering the houses, streets and squares. The blood red soil finds her way to the hands, feet and eyes of the people. Mother earth is bleeding and she makes it very clear.
Once, all this land was covered by what is called the 'Atlantic Forest' (Mata Atlantica). It is one of the most biodiverse forests covering our earth. And it was huge. It would cover the complete Atlantic coast of Brasil and as far inland as the eastern border with Paraguay. Clearly a treasure of immense proportions and human importance. But since the colonial times most of this forrest is systematically cleared for cattle, sugar cain and human settlements. Valentine also told me it was also deforested out of esthetic reasons:"Green fields are more beautiful than the forest where dangerous snakes live. They can bite and kill you." 
I drove for three days. I looked and listened for three days but there was no considerable piece of forest left. I  just could not believe it. It made me very sad and intensely angry at the same time. How can people be so indifferent and careless with what they are given? At the same time I realized that this war on the forest waged in a different time; a time in which people felt no other possibility than clearing the land and growing sugar cain and raising cattle. Just by means for survival. But when I heard there is still no ceasefire and the war just continues, except for some patches protected by UNESCO, my hart decided to stop for a while.
It only started beating again when I woke up at Fazenda Juerana Milagrosa. A magical place at the Atlantic Ocean owned by Catharina and Zsolt Makray (Valentine's parents). A cacao farm that in fact contains a stretch of genuine Atlantic Forest. Deep in myself this line of an epic song by Pearl Jam reappeared once again:" I wish I was as fortunate, as fortunate as me." This immersion was intense and profound. Wandering through this dense forrest of threes stretching up over 100 meters, with trunks three meters across dating back long before any European set foot on these lands. Birds twittering stories with an intensity yet unknown to man. Ants marching, cutting and building like they're preparing themselves for the apocalipse. Monkeys shouting; bugs hissing and snakes looking up to see these strange foreign upright creatures; pondering for a while and then continuing there path into the unknown. I honestly felt it as a spiritual experience. To be surrounded by so much life in so many forms in so many colors and shapes. I couldn't help thinking that if Darwin would have arrived in Bahia and used the Atlantic Forrest as its object of research, his On the Origin of Species would have a different outcome. No struggle for life based on a notion where the most fittest creatures survive but a flowering of all life based on sheer abundance. The Atlantic Forest is often called ' The Green Hell'; I felt like I was visiting Heaving. I deem Heaving worth fighting for.  
I also realized that I was struck by the deep power of experience. I already knew about the complete devastation of this forest, somewhere. I think I red an article once in the newspaper just before going to the market. After reading it, I swallowed once deeply; shouted in myself "how can they do that"; gulped down my last bit of coffee and went on to buy myself a nice Dutch herring. But now I am confronted with the facts. I see it, I smell it, I hear it, I feel it, I cry it and I shout it: I experience it. It is transforming. For me this transformation went along with a mantra of constantly repeating questions:"What is my responsibility in this issue?; what can I do to stop this?; Why do people do not realize that this 'game' it finite?; what have to happen to not only protect but also restore this forest?; can we find a model that actually makes a standing three economically more worth that a cut down tree replaced by grass for cattle? So on and so on.
Catharina and Zsolt are beacons of light in this tragic, but familiar story. Also Tamas Makray (the grandfather of Valentine) who is a pioneer in several reforestation projects. 
Lets stop the madness of deforestation and start reforesting the world again! 

If anyone who read this has some more links to share or questions to pose, please do so!


Check also: http://www.sosmatatlantica.org.br/ 

Maarten Asuncion, Paraguay
               

A few notes of Finite and Infinite games by James P. Carse

Just like to share a few insights from this original book:

1

There are at least two kinds of games. One could be called finite, the other, infinite. A finite game is played for the the purpose of winning; an infinite game for the purpose of continuing the play.

2

- The rules of the finite game may not change; the rules of an infinite game must change. 

- Finite players play within boundaries; infinite players play with boundaries.

- A finite player plays to be powerful; an infinite player plays with strength.

- A finite player consumes time; an infinite player generates time.

- The finite player aims for eternal life; the infinite player aims for eternal birth.

3

It is an invariable principle of all play, finite and infinite, that whoever plays, plays freely. Whoever must play, cannot play.

4

Society is finite play; culture is infinite

44

Therefor 'poets' do not fit into society, not because a place is denied them but because they do not take their place 'seriously'. They openly see their roles as theatrical, its styles as poses, its clothing costumes, its rules conventional, its crises arranged, its conflicts performed, and its metaphysics ideological.

94

A culture can be no stronger than its strongest myths.

95

Myths are told for their own sake, are not stories that have meanings, but stories that give meanings.

100

Infinite players are not serious actors in any story, but joyful poets of a story that continues to originate what they cannot finish.

101

There is but one infinite game...

So on and so on...

A little book of joy; a little book of life!

Maarten, Asuncion, Paraguay

Maarten, Asuncion, Paraguay