Looking back on 2011

2011 has set the tone for the rest of my life. Some major changes took place in a year which can be characterized as ‘slow living’.

Relationship

We have learned a lot from our relationship since it is pretty difficult to deal with burn-out. My partner Arnold is suffering continuous headache and had just about enough energy to teach capoeira a couple of times a week. Everything else weighed on my shoulders. There was no ‘us-time’, because there was no energy. I had to accept that if I wanted to do ‘fun stuff’ I had to do this alone or with friends. He didn’t even have the energy to think about ‘accepting the situation’. In stead he crawled into bed and in a later stage he could go out for walk in the forest or at the beach. And that’s about it. Being alone in a relationship is tough. This goes for the both of us.

My deep respect goes to what he did for my birthday. Even though he didn’t have the energy, he tapped into his willpower to surprise me with a gift on the morning of my birthday; a child’s seat for the bicycle. Our eyes filled with tears. In return I still haven’t done anything special for his birthday. I feel bad and than he reassures me: you do enough for me, thanks. Luckily our strong belief that these tough times would be for the better got us through 2011.

Parenthood
Every day our sun rose between six and seven o’clock in the morning. We are blessed to be her parents. She is cheerful and happy. She sleeps like a rose; 12 hours each night, and eats like a horse; everything we serve her. Where Arnold could loosen up the parenting I could be more clear in saying-no when she’s asking for the food on my plate while in fact she was done eating. All together we’re blessed that despite his illness both of us are on the top of things concerning her development.

Food
As a part of Arnold’s fysical and emotional development he started to bake his own bread. After a visit to a mesoloog; someone who practices the art of identifying what nutrients the body needs, lacks or is allergic to. He needed to avoid some nutrients so we started to do more grocery shopping at the organic food stores. So besides white rice, potatoes, pasta we added quinoa, pasta made from spelt, pancakes made from spelt, buckwheat, couscous, corn, taro, cassava and a whole range of pulses. In 2008 I promised my grandfather to avoid the deep frozen fish from the supermarkets. In 2009 he passed away. In 2010 our daughter was born. And halfway through 2011 I decided to definitely switch to super fresh fish: keeping my promise. Ever since we buy our fish in Scheveningen or at the Hague market. With regards to meat; we started eating more organic meat. There is no definite switch from my side and by exception I eat non-organic meat served by restaurants, family or friends.

Work
Summer 2011 we both realized what our focus concerning career should be. I discovered my path in coaching after having practiced coaching for 8 years both on individual- and group level.  This is coaching highly sensitive people on all topics of life and coaching people to act out of their core being; acting upon their intuition. Arnold decided to finish his third studies in the field of nutrition (bachelor food and dietetics) and continue working as a capoeira teacher for adults and children. I believe it was his ninth year of having practiced capoeira. So it seems that four years ago our lives have come together for a reason; sustaining and supporting fysical, mental and inner growth.

To conclude 2011: we learned that trust and accepting the situation as it is, makes for a solid foundation on which inner growth is possible.

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