three weeks in the forest
letters from the now #10
hello friends,
I find myself happily surrounded by friends for the second day in a row. Yesterday we went dancing, today we’re having a hackathon (or a get-your-shit-done-Sunday). Despite the holy nature of Sundays, I do like them to do my writing and to prepare the week. I think when it comes to doing nothing I prefer Saturdays.
There is such a delicious feeling that begets me yesterday, as I settle in at the party with my homies, and I realize I have no great need for connection from the large party audience, because my cup is full, my friends are here.
My nervous system spots all my homies in the room (among them
and ) and I’m part of a field of joy. We all have our own realities and desires, but we’re also here for a shared purpose, the purpose of being together and showing up somewhere together, the purpose of being, of being a gang, of walking in lockstep. I feel the music in my veins, I feel my dance moves expanding, I feel myself syncing up dancing energies with , I feel the others in the rear view mirror. I’m surrounded by intention, energy and love.As I am today — ducking a tiny hangover — now together with
, , and others, writing, planning, scheming, shirking the Sunday’s holiness on account of non-doing, but respecting it by being together, again. A bunch of more or less adult kids in parallel play. And this is just the beginning.We’ve been putting some efforts towards gathering people together in Berlin and it maybe the most rewarding project I’ve ever worked on, especially when I count TREEWEEK towards it as well. It feels like we weaved solid social fabric in 2024, which had a great peak at TREEWEEK. Since then it feels like we have a scene, which we are now feeding with regular office hours, regularly receiving old and new friends.
These are the grassroots, the mycelium, the bare minimum. At the same time, I’m trying not to be unaware of how fucking precious this is. This is what I’ve been yearning for. This is so damn precious. This is how we beat the system.
These are the roots that grow a golden age.
three dogs, one is limping
Life is about friends, but what about work?
Rhetorical question, because I’m pretty sure that in the life, love, labor triangle, everything is about friends. And somehow I’m still learning that, especially in the labor department.
I’m great at connecting with people, finding community, even building community, but somehow I haven’t integrated this with my work life and it’s time for this to happen. As one can follow in this here series, I’ve been scratching at the door, behind which I know there to be a deeply fulfilling work life, and somehow it’s a rocky road.
On Friday I wake up, ready for a job interview I (think I?) deeply care about, the sun is beaming a fat ray into my room, I giggle to myself, I slap my mattress, dust shoots up, tiny RGB particles turn the sunbeam into 3D blocks in mid-air, I gaze upon them for a few minutes, I see God, I’m grateful.
I get up, I check my phone on the toilet and the interview and the whole process is canceled with what feels an obfuscating explanation. Ouch.
This was now 10 days ago. I spend these past days in transformative anguish, knowing that I got an important message from God.
There are good reasons to say, hey, you had two job interviews processes, those are rookie numbers, get them up.
There are equally good reasons to say, nice try, but there is a lie hidden in your process: Do you really want a job? Did you spend years learning to take control of your calendar to now trade your time away to a corporation (that doesn’t even know how to appreciate you as an applicant)?
On the same day of the canceled interview, my friend and I take a phone call with a potential client, to whom we offered organizational consulting but they just wanted mediation. Perfect, actually and the call goes very well.
It makes me think about mediation. I’ve been battling the identity of being “a coach” for years, mostly because the coaching business model is sometimes a bit backwardly incentivized. Those who need coaching the most, are the least aware of it. Not always true, but certainly can be.
Whereas mediation is a technically fantastic concept from which most coaching and advice flows.
The mediator positions himself into the middle of two or more parties, realities, stories. He has the special skill of holding and understanding multiple viewpoints. He builds interfaces or bridges that allows others to see and walk across the chasm of misunderstanding. When the bridge is stable he leaves and life is a little better.
And isn’t coaching the same thing, in a way? The two parties are then conflicting stories and behaviors within one person. How often do those who seek advice from me tell me about the plans they want to execute, which are held back by an inner voice? How often is that my very own reality? :D
The coach then becomes a mediator between “you and you”, or different parts of you. That’s what IFS does so well, literally splitting you up into parts and helping you negotiate between them, who all have good intentions for you in their own way. Aren’t people just parts of the world spirit? Shan’t we aim to build bridges upon bridges to bring them together?
Since Friday, I’m thinking about this, and I’m noticing how innate the mediator skill is in me, how much I’m committed to this craft since day 1, and how little (zero) ick it has. It just fits, it just makes sense. Coaching and advice is downstream from mediation, holding multiple stories and realities is the core skill here.
To me, it’s a clear one-two punch from the lady upstairs.
While the “job”-entity is an unkind operator with little respect for me as a person, which is infinitely frustrating, an old business connection turned “potential client”-entity eagerly spills out their problems and asks for our help. It feels like we can be useful just by listening in an initial session. Very satisfying.
While I’m conscious not to be too flip floppy on my intentions, it is a clear sign. I did my best to engage with the job market, but neither the results nor the process were satisfying.
Self employed life beckons again, but it asks for commitments. God closes a door and asks me to double down on the one that’s left open. It’s scary, but it’s time to step through and commit. Plan Bs are nice, but now is not the time.
The Time Is Now to go go go.
Lmao, as I’m writing this my old band mate Nico becomes the first paying subscriber to this here project. What a blessing. Thanks brother. Nico is a great photographer and is making his name in the very scene where we did took our babysteps as a band. I wrote about our story here:
17 Feb 24: Making real friends on the internet since 1998
My other friend Nico, who I met randomly on the bus (different story, please remind me to write about all the people I “randomly” met who ended up playing major roles in my life), became the singer of my band and a big music guru for me. This guy was hanging out online all day, knew all the best music, and also knew a bunch of people in the German metal scene. So he told me to sign up to the Metal Hammer forum, and that was a life changing experience. He is now a very skilled photographer and, as always, a great tastemaker.
three birds, one song
In the aftermath of this Frustrating Friday I have three conversations that get me back on the path.
Phil
Phil and I rant a bit about our situations that are not too dissimilar. I’m on my bike cycling to a party, just leaving Tiergarten. Phil asks, “but dude, do you actually WANT a job? What do you actually want here?” And I hear myself replying, “well, if I could get what I wanted, I’d have a bunch of wonderful, well-paying clients”, and I guess that makes things quite clear to myself?
Dad
My Dad and I have been in close contact during this time of change in my life. One of my wishes for employment was to take myself out of the “leader” / “father” role I’ve been feeling in my life so much, and to be a son, to be embedded, to be taken care of. My Dad has a very sophisticated understanding of my situation, I think I have inherited my vagabond-y nature from him, and we are in good sync about my job & financial situation. The support he offers me is reassuring to say the least, life changing and healing to be more accurate.
Maeby and I take a walk during the hackathon and talk about work. I’m trying to convey my frustration about work, and how it still seems like such a separate thing to me. It’s like I and the working world are disconnected by a glass pane — I can see it clearly but I’m not part of it. I used to have this with social connection in the city, it healed over time. I can see that I can heal it. Maeby tells me she’s had some professional success ranting about it earnestly on Twitter. Have I done that yet? I say no, again, because it feels so separate. Twitter is my friends-sphere, I don’t bring my work there. But of course, that is exactly the edge I’m pushing. Maeby says, do the basics. Send a Tweet that says what you’re good at and what you want to do. Start talking about it. I say, it feels weird and difficult, but yes, I will, thank you.
three weeks buried
Another 12 days pass. Easter comes and goes. I’m in deep transformation. This is the first time I’m breaking my weekly writing and publishing streak, since I started it at the beginning of the year. This makes perfect sense to me. A third of the year is over, and once again, the table needs clearing.
Yet, I know I must write, I know I must come back to this page, I know I must publish this. I pledged at the beginning of the year that whatever happens to my, I’ll “write through it” (instead of “about it” later). As I’m getting back into this piece, I read back on what I’ve written, and I see how the things I’ve written down in the last 3 weeks have had the strongest memetic grip on me. The power of the pen in self-direction. A wild feeling.
Today Maeby tells me she might have a “hole day” today. We coined this term as a day that feels like depression on the surface, so we need to hole up, but it’s actually a day of transformation, so we need stillness in order for change to take hold in us. So it goes from “hole day” to “holy day” real quick. I say to her, go with open eyes. What does that mean?
In my case, I go through the last three weeks with intensely open eyes. More than ever before. I can sort of track change in me in real time. I can see doors and latches opening, closing, loosening, negotiating, clarifying.
In classic video game fashion I can see the main road I need to go down to progress the main quest and its storyline, but before I do that I have to try out all the side paths before I turn to it. This actually proves quite fruitful.
One of the side quests is a co-founder relationship that needs intense care and sorting out. The door closes for now, but the gust of wind it causes as it does, brings forth many shadows and misconceptions that help me understand myself and my vis a vis much better. It had a grip on me, and I didn’t see how much I was the gripping one, and how much my grip kept me away from what I needed.
The other side quest is really actually the goddamn main quest of my life, which is my Mom and I properly working on our relationship. And I feel like we finally have a major breakthrough? Which happens exactly in tandem with the co-founder story. And I do think they are connected in some mystical way. A lot is connected here. But yeah, I mean, this Friday I had a conversation with Mom that I’ve been yearning for, for about … 15 years, give or take?
How weird is this? Those are the 15 years that trained me to be a mediator and storyteller and people-understander. The years of my mom not understanding me, not being able to see the world through my own eyes, the only wish I ever really had. It now happened, and while there is a lot of wounded tissue to bring back into order, it comes in with a vehemence and instant rightness that I can’t even process it fast enough, not matter how open my eyes.
I always had a wish to do my life’s work with as little shadow as possible. Now that the shadowy package that forced me into the role of the mediator is mostly back to sender, I can be the mediator of my own volition. One that does it from free will, not from the chip on my shoulder.
third secret thing
What if I had gotten that job on the Frustrating Friday? Would I have had the patience to ask my Mom to understand me, for real this time, without giving up at her resistance? Would I have committed to being my father’s son, asking for the help I need right now? Would I be shaking my own hand on an upcoming business venture instead of chasing after a co-founder? Would I be realizing how much my friends are willing to help me, even if they don’t directly profit from my business?
Maybe.
But this is how it is, and I’m eternally grateful.
Please excuse my absence and the resulting lengthiness. I hope you enjoy this.
It’s been a rich time around easter. I took the opportunity to be reborn, and I think it happened. It probably happens to everyone. Did you have your eyes and ears open? Tell me your story please.
I’ll surely talk more about my plans next time. Hope to see you then.
Sending you much much love, and many many blessings
S
