People tend to have much more understanding for visible and tangible conditions which are, most of the time, physical illnesses.

Not to mention the correlating mind and body connection that a lot of people seem to forget way too quickly, body and mind are not two separate entities but one unity working together, influencing the other. Mental distress has numerous of physical consequences and, thus, visibility in itself, they just don’t get acknowledged as being part of the mental health issue but get treated like a choice people make (e.g. not being able to shower, losing/gaining weight).

This kind of bypassing leads to perhaps well-intended but in the end still very much harmful and insensitive remarks, such as:

“It’s all in your head.”> yes, thank you for noticing, that is also exactly where I happen to live or at least try to live.

“Just stop thinking about it.”

“How can you be sad when you have ___”

“Just snap out of it.”

“Come on, things could be worse.”

Forming analogies and metaphors helps, not only the others, but also the people living in the condition to better understand and grasp the nature of the mental experience, or so it has been reported by people creating the analogies and metaphors.

Building pictures and connecting the mental disturbance with something familiar offers a soothing, safe space of talking about it without feeling immediately threatened by it or directly identifying with it, it builds a bridge between the experience and the processing of the experience.

This article is an attempt to enhance the way people living in mental disturbances talk about and relate to them and also aims to encourage loved ones or people prone to utter above-mentioned remarks to allow some more space for understanding, instead of dismissing, by entering a part of the whimsical scenery of the others mind.

In the following I have collected analogies and metaphors about various conditions, these analogies stem partly from people I’ve reached out to and asked to formulate their experience, another part is regenerated by my memory of times I’ve talked with patients in a psychiatry and the remaining ones are derived from Internet forums where affected people talk about their experiences.

So, let us start this journey!

Depression

“Depression is a weight pressing down on my shoulders, getting up becomes harder, I begin to feel like I am being torn apart by the weight dividing in ‘the one that knows what should be done’ and the other weight holding down every thought of improving my state- resistance, the fight between the two is what tires me even more.”

“Looking back to my severest period of depression, I see a boy who is inside a black bubble, sure that in that place no one can hurt him, damage him or steal his dreams. […] the fear has taken him and he still does not want to go out because sometimes fear is stronger than reason. When after some time he finally leaves the bubble, he is weak, he cannot stand on his feet and is terribly hungry of acceptance and love.”

“It’s like trying to run under water.”

“A fog that appears in the early morning sky and never vanishes, blurring your vision and ability to focus, leading to confusion.”

“It’s like a black hole but you are not in a black hole, you are the black hole. You suck in every incident that could make you feel emotion but by absorbing it your mind turns it into darkness.”

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

“PTSD is like an invisible pen that randomly exposes its writing with unidentifiable blacklights. Different kinds of colours, smells and sounds will haunt me with flashbacks that always overstay their welcome.”

“Living with PTSD is like trying to listen to beautiful music, while someone is clanging pots and pans. No matter how hard you try, you cannot tune out the cacophony.”

“You’re driving down the road of life, trying to get somewhere, while a dump truck, full of your traumas, is chasing you, sitting an inch off your bumper. You try to switch lanes, but that truck is still right there, riding your ass. You cry for help, but nobody else can stop the truck, either. They may help to slow it down a bit, but it’s still there. Sometimes it taps your bumper, and you struggle to stay on the road. When it rams you, you spin out of control. When you crash, the truck dumps all over you.”

Panic attacks and anxiety

“It’s like walking down the steps and missing the bottom step. That mini ‘heart attack’ feeling. But it stays with you all day. Every day.”

“Like my skeleton is trying to escape through my skin.”

“Anxiety is like trying to memorise all of the conversations within a crowded restaurant but when this continued chatter is internalised, the disturbance becomes greater because walking out is not an option.”

“It feels like being the only person that knows the world is ending but everyone calls you crazy.”

Bipolar Personality Disorder (BPD)

“Driving a car with very, very sensitive accelerators but very poor brakes.”

,or as psychologist Marsha Linehan put it:

“People with BPD are like people with third degree burns over 90% of their bodies. Lacking emotional skin, they feel agony at the slightest touch or movement”- they don’t have as much emotional layers between them and the world as the rest of us.

“You are a warrior in a dark forest, with no compass and are unable to tell who the actual enemy is, consequently you never feel safe. It is a constant war zone in which someone is trying to destroy or is destroying your life, only that someone is you.”

Bipolar disorder/ Manic depression

“Think of Winnie the Pooh characters, it is like having a tigger and an eore inside of you, sometimes they each have their own days to occur, sometimes they appear on the same day.”

“For me bipolar is like a rollercoaster ride. With the thrill exciting going high and down and all around. When I’m manic it’s like my brain takes over and I have absolutely no control over my body or actions. And the depression is nothing but a bottomless pit.”

“Being bipolar is like riding a roller coaster blindfolded, it’s feeling a half step out of sync with the rest of the world. it’s never feeling secure in making plans, or promises because you have no idea what your mood will be, and know that more than half of the time your mood will make you bad, hostile, or even dangerous company.”

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

“OCD is like attempting to build a sand castle close to the water. The waves come and wash everything away. You tirelessly try to rebuild it over and over again which is a futile process. You keep on compulsively rebuilding because your obsessive thoughts tell you to do so, with no other way out for relief and it doesn’t occur to you that letting the sand castle being washed away is an option. Everything feels so pressingly urgent and unbalanced.”

“For my compulsions, I imagine my brain getting colder and colder as the thoughts become more intense until my brain freezes over and that’s when I can’t think about anything but the compulsion, I’m so stuck I don’t even think the compulsion in words anymore, it’s just an uncontrollable KNOWING that this has to be done NOW.”

“They both (obsession + compulsion) seem to me like an extreme itching feeling on the surface of your brain, and the only way to scratch it is by satisfying the obsession/compulsion.”

Anorexia

“Struggling with anorexia is like fading away- you are just a shallow vessel walking around, barely passing as a functioning human being. The anorexic, intrusive thoughts consume all your energy while creating the illusion of being in control. It is self-management gone wrong.”

“It is like being the donkey and the carrot at the same time but thinking you are the one holding the carrot.”

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)

“ADHD is like having 100 internet tabs open and they’re all making some kind of sound. Trying to focus on anyone specific tab is near impossible. Medication doesn’t close the other tabs, it just quiets the noise to make it easier to focus on one tab.”

“My brain is like an inverted disco ball that’s spinning. And my thoughts are like a high-beam pointed toward it. Lots of rays of light bouncing everywhere from just one light source, and really difficult to trace a light beam back to its origin like that.”

“ADHD brains are like a race car that suddenly has to drive on the normal roads instead of on a race track. Sometimes they are going too fast, so they miss stop signs or directions. They don’t see events or people happening around them, not because they don’t care, but because they are moving too fast to notice.”

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)

“Imagine that every person with autism has an invisible Hula Hoop around themselves. They are in the centre of the Hula Hoop, and everything inside the Hula Hoop matters to them. Everything outside of Hula Hoop, not so much. This is not to say that individuals with autism are selfish, but their perspective of the world is sometimes or often limited to their own perspective. Individuals with autism, to varying degrees, struggle with taking the perspective of another. “ (side note: the root of the word autism is “auto” which means “self.”)

“You know how you can have a picture that is one picture but could be two different things. If you have some of those black and white photos where it looks like a butterfly or it’s actually two faces. Autistic people process things differently. What if touching a person’s skin felt like sandpaper to someone else when to you it is smooth? What if the sounds of a crowd are more like a scary waterfall when heard by someone else.”

If you made it until here, thank you for your openness to dive into the depth of other people’s experiences.

We can learn from this exploration of other people’s minds that the experience of life is much more colourful than the notion of a default-mode-brain might convey. There are things that are not reachable for us in another persons experience of life but that doesn’t mean that understanding cannot arise, understanding can arise wherever open listening is implemented.

So, before trying to lift people up with superficial remarks, or even discredit their condition, we should strive to see behind the obvious and give room for the invisible to become visible and assume as a naturalness that there is always an entirety more to a person than what they appear to be.

“The duality of art and reality, living life and treating it as such.”

-Matthew Healy

I remember reading this sentence a few years ago, it was one of those sentences that you understood but then, also not. It spoke to me deeply, that much was for sure and it certainly stuck with me for a long time. It held the kind of message you grow into as life moves on and experiences are collected.

I now know what spoke so deeply to my heart but my mind wasn’t quite ready to catch yet: The idea that we create life and thus ourselves, as much as, let’s say a painter, paints their painting.

What is interesting then is the entanglement, the duality of our living life: we are always the creating and the created, at the same time. Our life reflects our inner world, it is painted by our thoughts, feelings, intentions and aspirations.

We are created as we create ourselves, we create as we are being created.

I will mainly focus on the specific art of painting in this article, since the paintings you will see accompanying and complementing my written words are painted by me. Still, it is to say that this can be applied to all creative, passionate processes for all of them include the dimensions of creator, creation, aspects/tools and external context.

Preposition:

Creator/Painter: you. (co-creator, you are creating your path in cooperation with life)

Creations/Paintings: you, your path, the reflections of yourself

Colour palette: life forces, obstacles, external conditions, and situations you find yourself in

Brush: how we approach the external, how we utilise what happens externally, the junction between internal and external, our mindsets, intentions etc.

So with this preposition let us look into the spheres of life where we experience creative processes constantly:

The Intrapersonal Sphere

You create your reality through your thoughts and you are being created and transformed in the process.

You are not the product of external factors (colours), your essence shows itself through how you utilise (paint) those.

By discovering our transformative power we see that the situations we find ourselves in are not absolute but relative to us to creating a meaning to give to them.

Do you create or are you constantly being created?

Are you only creation or also creator?

We need both for the balance, creating by participating in life and giving it a course and also being created through knowing that you don’t have control over the outcome but you do have control over what you put into life.

Exactly in the way how often times paintings don’t turn out the way we planned to, that at some point in the creation, the colours of the painting (happenings in our lives that we integrate into our path) derive from our impact and unravel their own dynamic.

We can show the way through our intentions and sketch the shape (brush strokes) but how this shape will be filled and how the colours will interact with each other is not in our control- that’s our collaborative communication with life in creating our path.

It’s not about dictating life but about moving with the changes and the flow, going with the colours and how they reveal themselves on the canvas, they work themselves into something bigger, an interconnected network sparked by your inner world.

It all starts within, your inner world is what moves the brush and creates patterns. The vivacity of your path is determined by the way you interact with life, do you empower yourself to create with it, to create a unique life that reflects your values and intentions? Or are you solely created by it without bringing your inner world and values onto the canvas?

The Sphere of Communication with Life

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.” – Viktor Frankl

Our path (painting) is a reflection of our inner worlds (brush strokes, technique etc.) and how those interact with life (colours).

This describes our role of communicating and exchanging with life, there are colours given to us by life and just like a painting is a reflection of the artist’s inner world, we affect our path in a similar way. This existence gives us a canvas, life gives us colours and what is produced on the canvas is our unique path, guided by our values, thoughts, intentions (brush strokes).

We are co-creating with life, life unfolds itself as we make it ought to, it shines through our filter and it can only ever be as bright as we ourselves are. Just like a painting can only be as curious and bold, as the one creating it.

The profoundness of a painting is defined by the boldness of brush strokes- dare to fail and you will see that every failure is nothing but a new context, an offering for creation, nothing is ever really lost, it can all be transformed, reinterpreted, it’s all a matter of your perspective.

Just like Stoic philosopher Seneca said that the obstacle becomes the way, the colour becomes the painting.

The way we respond to the challenges of life shapes our path. The way the colour is painted on the canvas with the brush shapes the artwork. Each of us carry within the endless power of transformation. But to transform and integrate something, especially the more difficult emotions and happenings, we first have to accept them as being part of our path, embracing and experiencing the sorrow and being curious of how we can integrate it into our path to give it new meaning and direction. To unleash its creative potential.

In life we can always choose between embracing or pushing way. Between integrating or neglecting.

Life doesn’t happen to you but through you. You are utilising what happens- to create, to transform, to compose.

Suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning. -Viktor Frankl

An artistic approach to life shows us that just as an artist uses art to channel their hardships, we also can channel our sorrows and difficult emotions by giving them a meaning, by creating a meaning, instead of being blindly defined by the things happening to us, we shape the experiences.

Life provides us feedback in the shape of situations, people etc. Life is neutral and ready to respond to your thoughts (brush, painting technique). Anything that happens to you is neutral until you give it its meaning, that is our power of transformation, of creation. Just like colour is neutral until painted, until you contrast it, complement it and it unfolds its intrinsic power.

“Nothing is absolute. Everything changes, everything moves, everything evolves, everything flies and goes away.” – Frida Kahlo

Creation is endless, as we move through life-through the process of creation- we are changed and recreated constantly.

Art, thus life, is about transformation and exploration not about arriving and finding oneself. It’s about the constant flow between creation and integration, the flow of transformation. It is all dynamic, ever moving.

Life as art, and art as life show us the endless process of exploration and everything being an everlasting continuous artwork; always in the process and yet, or precisely because of that, a masterpiece.

Nothing is ever really finished, we never really arrive, all grows and transforms through new knowledge, new eyes to look at things, new perspectives, new contexts, different people added to the whole picture revealing a different effect.

So don’t be in such a hurry to arrive somewhere; look around, you are already where you are supposed to be: at the only point for creation, the here and now.

Nothing is ever really static, so dive into the exploration, take with you as much impressions, knowledge and experience as your heart can carry and see that life is not about arriving somewhere and finding yourself but about creating yourself and discovering the constant changes.

The Interpersonal Sphere

“There’s nothing more truly artistic than to love people.” -Vincent Willem van Gogh

Art does not end with the creating, in fact it is constantly recreated, reinvented. Through interaction the colours find a new way of expression, the painting reveals different dimensions through different understandings.

The connecting with others is crucial for self-knowledge, for increasing the contextual dimensions in which we can exist, just how a painting looks different to each and every one of us and therefore is never a total, completed thing but changes in expression and meaning any time it is exposed to someone experiencing it.

Other people also work as colours in our lives, we relate to them, they relate to us, colours already painted on our canvas get a whole new meaning by being contrasted to theirs.

Just like red suddenly looks whole different being contrasted to green than it does being contrasted to blue.

People and interactions in our lives give us space for re-creation, for seeing ourselves and the settled colours through a new exposure. We constantly re-experience our essence through finding different ways of expressing our essence with others.

The process of creating ourselves is self-awareness, but sharing this creation with others is where self-knowledge can arise.

This approach of life being art and art being life can also help us to understand that there is no absolute truth- only perspective and subjectivity of perception.

Becoming aware of the knowledge that my green is not your green can spark empathy and compassion towards our uniquely different experiences of life. It can help let different conversations arise with less judgment and more understanding regarding the other person’s life. Considering each person has their own path (painting) and that this path is unique to them since it reflects this specific person’s inner world. Everyone mixes colours differently, uses different painting techniques, has a different perception and preference of using colour.

So, it can also help us letting go of unhealthy comparison and wanting to live another person’s life. The other person’s life is not a fit for you because it is entirely created by the world they carry inside and you yourself have a whole different, uniquely beautiful world to discover inside of you, a painting waiting to come to live.

So, your painting will never have to be like another’s painting, we need the differences for exchange and learning, that’s the beauty of diversity.

“The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.” – Alan Watts

You yourself are your greatest work of art.

Everything is a prompt for creation, dive into life and let the colours fill you up. Be painted by life and paint life, that’s the correlating balance. Embrace every happening and don’t try to escape life and instead face it with curiosity and wonder.

By living our emotions, by living colour, we can paint more colourful pictures. By inviting everything inside of us to come to life, we can paint more honest pictures, live more sincere lives.

The next time you are feeling blue add some yellow.

Transform it into something brighter. Contrast and complement to understand the essence of both bright and dark.

Your life is a painting, make sure to let courage and compassion lead the brush.

This approach can help us empower ourselves to not live life on autopilot but actually engaging in it and live it in a way that postulates our power of creation. A way of life which is curious about all the colour compositions to work with and not worried about how to fit them in.

And it is not just about painting or using painting as a guiding analogy to live life. Find your passion and live your life after it. Whether that be learning about life through pottery, through creating music, through photography, through surfing or other physical activities.

Ask yourself what it is about this thing that makes it your passion and how those attributes can also be applied to serve as an analogy for living life and moving through hardship.

Find your passion and let it inspire you to new ways and approaches to live life.

“For the world is in a bad state, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does his best.” -Viktor E. Frankl

The world’s a pretty messed up place, not only right now, it always has been. The struggles may occur in different costumes and voices, but it is still always the same broken script. The script that keeps on writing a dominator model that postulates a “power-over” dynamic, instead of “power-with”.

Things are not getting worse. Circumstances and conditions that have always been ‘bad’ are solely being uncovered and that is, after all, a good thing. It is our chance for recognition, insight and the mandatorily resulting change of mind, actions, and behaviour.

Maybe now, with the world in vigorous agitation from all directions, more than ever it is vitally important to find a safe standing point, a secure sense of stability within oneself.

Maybe now, more than ever, it is no longer an option to be aware of one’s standing point and one’s self, but a collective responsibility.

“The one thing you can’t take away from me is the way I choose to respond to what you do to me. The last of one’s freedoms is the ability to choose one’s attitude in any given circumstance.” -Viktor E. Frankl

Street names are getting changed, external adjustments are made. This is a common causality of the society we live in- doing to be something instead of being something to then be able to do something.

We think that changing something externally, will sustainably change something internally but we must be and understand the change if we want change. Changing street names and every other external way of spreading awareness is a good thing, don’t get me wrong, it’s performative and it draws people’s attention, makes them open their eyes. But having open eyes doesn’t necessarily postulate the ability of seeing.

It cannot and should not stop in the external. Change gets triggered from the outside but it happens and keeps growing from the inside.

External change opens our eyes to something bigger than our experience of this world, internal change ensures that we won’t look away anymore.

External changes can be arbitrarily eliminated, internal changes cannot; your freedom of change starts in your mind. Your power starts in your mind, don’t make yourself powerless by underestimating what a change of mind and behaviour can do.

Self-awareness means enhancing our self-reflexion and thus being our own compassionate critic. Meaning, we reflect on our privileges and the resulting actions, mindsets and prejudices we carry but instead of beating ourselves up for them, we acknowledge them as something we carry with us but not as something we are. This step of acknowledgment creates the necessary distance to not identify ourselves as impotent to something bigger than us but instead full of the power to transform what we find when we start seeking inside ourselves, when we start becoming aware.

About intellectual humility and freedom

“As I have said, the first thing is to be honest with yourself. You can never have an impact in society if you have not changed yourself. Great peacemakers are all people of integrity, of honesty, but humility.” -Nelson Mandela

Intellectual humility is all about the recognition of the possibility that the things you believe in might be part of the problems you see in this world and using this awareness of your ignorance and blind spots as catalysts for improving yourself.

The issue is not whether we carry oppressive tendencies inside of us- because, quite frankly, we all do- it is about how we choose to handle this situation: do we choose destructive denial or constructive accountability?

The most certain form of freedom we as humans can attain is the freedom to know and reflect ourselves. To know the depths of our fears, the broadness of our joy and the heatedness of our anger.

To know yourself so profoundly no one else can try to tell or convince you otherwise, it gives you the stability to make up your own mind about a situation, enables you to unlearn damaging beliefs and gather enough emotional maturity to see that discovering a gap in your knowledge is not a failure but an opportunity to seek and invent new ways of behaving, speaking and ultimately, living.

Getting to know yourself will decrease the chances of being malleable play-doh dough that can be moulded into any convenient shape because the lack of stability.

“Those who have the privilege to know, have the duty to act.” – Albert Einstein

Simply spoken, all forms of oppression and discrimination are learned and date back to a time where racism, sexism, queerphobia, ableism etc. were reflections of the lack of knowledge and information available, theories people clung to in an attempt to get a sense of safety towards the things that were unfamiliar and unknown.

The source of oppression is-at it’s core- always fear and fear will always continue to be an issue of knowledge.

We live in an age where we cannot afford to be led by fear and ignorance anymore. Knowledge and education are available. The majority of us have all the information accessible, and those who haven’t most certainly belong to some kind of minority, which makes it even more crucial for those living with certain privileges to acknowledge them and USE them to amplify those voices barely heard.

I refuse perpetuating the past and thus living in it, when there is a present to enhance and a future to build.

There is no future to be afraid of if we realise, we all have the power to create it.

In the search of solutions, we must learn to ask broader questions. Questions that come from a place of awareness not of denial. Questions that show that we are not merely the product of what happens to us but a product of our own thoughts and actions. Questions that target action and change and not only movement. Don’t get me wrong, we need movement to start action, but movement alone is not enough to cause any lasting change if it doesn’t transmute into action. As Hemingway said: “Never confuse movement with action.”, they might feel unexpectedly similar, but they differ in intention, intensity and consequence.

Let us gather collective strength and merge our movements into actions of change and hence realise inter- and intrapersonal effectiveness as a mechanism of social change.

Egal, ob es die rapide Verbreitung eines Virus’ ist oder eine andersartige Krise- eine hochsensible und/oder intuitive Person treffen und betreffen solche Zeiten auf ganz anderen Ebenen.

Durch diesen Artikel möchte ich alle tieffühlenden Menschen wissen lassen: Ihr seid nicht alleine. Und ihr seid nicht schwach, weil ihr euch so überwältigt fühlt. Bitte, macht euch selbst nicht kleiner, als ihr seid- ihr habt immenses Potential in euch diese spürbare Dunkelheit mit Lichtfunken zu zieren.

Ich nehme an, dass nicht jeder weiß oder versteht, was „hochsensibel“ oder „Highly Senstive Person“ bedeutet, im Folgenden eine kurze Erklärung.

Der Begriff “Highly Sensitive Person“ wurde von Dr. Elaine N. Aron etabliert. Sie selbst begreift sich auch als Highly Sensitive Person (HSP) und leitete über die letzten Jahre mehrere Studien, um diese angeborene Charaktereigenschaft wissenschaftlich tiefer zu ergründen.

Eine hochsensible Person hat eine profunde Verbindung zu ihren Erlebnissen und Wahrnehmungen und prozessiert diese sehr intensiv. Sie reflektiert, arbeitet aus und schafft Assoziationen. Aufgrund der sogenannten “sensory processing sensitivity“ nimmt sie unter anderem auch all’ die Subtilitäten ihrer Umgebung wahr, die anderen Menschen vielleicht in der Wahrnehmungsprozessierung verloren gehen, da HSPs ein sensibleres Nervensystem aufweisen.

Selbstverständlich sind diese Hinweise und Ratschläge nicht nur für HSPs wichtig aber besonders für diese.

Ich denke es ist wichtig Minderheiten, zu denen HSPs zählen, in diesen Zeiten gehört und gesehen fühlen zu lassen, indem man ihre Perspektiven thematisiert und anspricht. Da ich selbst zu dieser Minderheit gehöre macht es umso mehr Sinn diesen Raum zu eröffnen.

An all’ diejenigen, die mit einer mentalen Krankheit diagnostiziert oder mit einer anderen Bedingung leben, die es derzeit umso schwieriger und belastender macht, mit Ungewissheit zu leben:

Du bist nicht vergessen. Lass dich nicht von diesen Umständen überzeugen, dass du schwach oder schwächer, als die anderen bist, weil du eine intensivere und emotionalere Reaktion auf all’ das zeigst.

Stärke zeigt sich nicht darin, keine Schwächen zu haben. Wahre Stärke findet man in Schwächen und der Auseinandersetzung mit genau derer. Man findet sie in der Verwundbarkeit schwach zu sein; da wir gerade alle ziemlich verwundbar sind, ist das doch ein ziemlich guter Zeitpunkt, um Stärke und Hoffnung zu finden, wo man sie am wenigsten erwartet hätte.

BOUNDARIES, BABY!

Vor allem geht es hier um das Setzen von Grenzen(Englisch: boundaries).

Meine Ratschläge werden dich mit dem Verbalisieren und Setzen von Grenzen konfrontieren, denn einiges an Überforderung kann Resultat von zu locker gesetzten, persönlichen Grenzen sein. Es kann unfassbar wohltuend sein, zu entdecken, was für einen funktioniert und was nicht- sich selbst besser kennenzulernen.

Vielleicht ist genau jetzt die Zeit gekommen, in der du deine Beziehung zur Setzung von Grenzen reflektieren und konfrontieren solltest. Dabei ist es weniger relevant, ob du dich selbst als HSP beschreiben würdest, oder nicht.

Gesunde Grenzen sind für jeden unerlässlich für das individuelle Zusammenspiel mit der Welt.

Entdecke die Kraft, die sich hinter deinen Bedürfnissen und der Entdeckung dessen, was dir gut und was nicht, verbirgt.

Grenzen bedeuten NICHT Begrenztheit, so ziemlich das Gegenteil ist der Fall.

Das Verbalisieren und Setzen von Grenzen wirkt befreiend auf dich, da deine Bedürfnisse ausgedrückt werden und dadurch auch die Wichtigkeit des Respektieren und Annehmen eben dieser. Deine persönlichen Grenzen sind es wert, formuliert und angenommen zu werden. Grenzen lassen auch deine Interaktionen mit anderen auf einer freieren Ebene stattfinden, da alles, was du sagst und tust, aus völliger Aufrichtigkeit stammt und nicht des Verpflichtungsgefühls wegen übermittelt wird.

Es ist weniger aufrichtig „Ja“ zu sagen, wenn du eigentlich „Nein“ meinst, es scheint nur höflich und aufrichtig. Tatsächliche Aufrichtigkeit zeigt sich dadurch, dass du deine Bedürfnisse -und dadurch auch Grenzen- authentisch und aufrichtig kommunizierst.

Es geht darum deine Bedürfnisse und deine Energie auszubalancieren, sodass du in der Interaktion mit anderen authentisch aufblühen kannst.

Jeder profitiert von der Setzung deiner Grenzen, sie sind Ausdruck von Respekt vor dir und Fürsorge für dich selbst und da jede Beziehung in unserem Leben eine direkte Spiegelung der Beziehung ist, die wir zu uns selbst pflegen, ist es nur logisch, dass jegliche Beziehungen in deinem Leben, davon profitieren, dass du auf dich selbst aufpasst und dich um dich selbst kümmerst.

Jetzt wo wir gelernt haben, dass Grenzen und das Verbalisieren derer vollkommen angebracht und in Ordnung sind, lass uns mit den Ratschlägen weitermachen!

Wie du dir selbst als Freund gegenüber treten kannst, wenn du dich überrannt fühlst:

Bewusster Medien- und Nachrichtenkonsum

Das Sammeln von Wissen und Daten, kann sehr beruhigend sein, vor allem hinsichtlich des Umgangs mit Ungewissheit. Dennoch ist es wichtig, dass die Thematik uns nicht vollständig konsumiert.

Sich von der Welle an Information überschwemmen zu lassen, kann sehr schnell und unbemerkt passieren, denn was sich für dich wie das Schwimmen in den Gewässern des Wissens anfühlt, angetrieben von Verantwortungsbewusstsein, ist in Realität eigentlich nur das Dammbauen aus Informationen, um dich vor der wahren Flut zu schützen: das überwältigende Gefühl der Ungewissheit. Wir versuchen dieses mit dem Anhäufen und dem Zuführen von Information zu kompensieren.

Daher ist es von Bedeutung deinen Umgang mit Medien und den Nachrichtenportalen zu beobachten und eine Grenze zu setzen, sobald es zu konsumierend und kräftezehrend wird, es ist okay sich zu distanzieren und stattdessen eine gesunde Auseinandersetzung mit solchen Thematiken zu kultivieren:

-Welche Quellen sind seriös und vertrauenswürdig? Wie viel Zeit möchte ich tatsächlich in all’ das fließen lassen? Was möchte ich wirklich wissen? Kann ich die Antworten wirklich bei anderen finden oder verlangt das Introspektion?-

Du darfst die Gefühle, die nicht dir gehören, loslassen

Es ist okay und völlig in Ordnung die Gefühle, die nicht zu dir gehören loszulassen, es ist nicht deine Verpflichtung sie zu fühlen, um die Welt zu entlasten.

Aufgrund deines enormen Bewusstseins gegenüber der Verzweiflung, des Schmerzes, der Unsicherheit, der Zerbrechlichkeit und der destruktiven Wirkung unserer derzeitigen Lebensweise und wie diese uns zu Situationen wie dieser führen, fühlt es sich so an als würde das Gewicht der Probleme nur auf deinen Schultern lasten und dass du aufgrund deines intensiveren Bewusstseins gegenüber der Probleme auch eine größere Verpflichtung hast, diese zu lösen.

All’ das auf dich zu nehmen resultiert in konstante Überlastung und over-arousal- ein Zustand in dem du dich so fühlst, als würdest du alle Herzen schneller schlagen, alle Stimmen lauter schreien und alle Sirenen auf einmal ertönen, hören. Aber all’ diese Empfindungen ballen sich zusammen zu einem riesigen, überwältigend belastenden Lärm zwischen dem du nicht differenzieren kannst, zwischen Geräusch oder Stimme, Klang oder Melodie, du fühlst dich einfach nur gelähmt.

Folglich, musst du dich nicht nur distanzieren, du solltest es auch. Dich emotional zu distanzieren (in diesem spezifischen Fall tatsächlich auch physisch) bedeutet nicht, dass dir die Situation in ihrer Fülle nicht wichtig ist, es bedeutet genau das Gegenteil.

Genau weil es dir wichtig ist, musst du dich emotional distanzieren, um die Situation klar betrachten zu können und nicht durch die verschwommene Linse der Überwältigung.

Es ist wahrlich mehr als in Ordnung das Gefühl alles tragen zu müssen, loszulassen. Indem du jedem seinen Anteil der Situation zurückgibst, können wir alle in unsere Kraft treten, für unsere eigenen Handlungen und Gefühle Verantwortung zu übernehmen.

Du kannst die Welt nicht alleine verändern und du kannst sie erst recht nicht nachhaltig verändern, wenn du dich nicht um deine mentale Gesundheit kümmerst.

Finde heraus, was dich beruhigt und was dir gut tut

Es ist vollkommen in Ordnung dich hinzugeben und diese zusätzliche Zeit dir selbst zu widmen. Dich selbst in Panik zu verlieren würde-nebenbei bemerkt- die Situation an sich auch nicht ändern.

Du hast nun die Chance die Balance zwischen dem dich um dich selbst zu kümmern und dem dich um andere zu kümmern, wiederzufinden und zu kultivieren.

Jeder hat andere Methoden der Bewältigung, finde deine:

Bleib’ für den ganzen Tag im Bett und hole all’ die Episoden deiner Serie nach für die du sonst keine Zeit gefunden hast, mache einen langen Spaziergang in den Wäldern um dich aufzuladen, verlier’ dich selbst in einem Buch, oder in Songs und der (Wieder-) Entdeckung von Künstlern oder alten Künstlern, von denen du total vergessen hast, dass sie existieren. Fang’ an zu malen, zeichnen oder schreiben, verleih’ deinem Inneren eine Ebene des Ausdrucks. Spiele Brettspiele mit Familie oder Mitbewohnern, geh’ nach draußen und tanz’, bleib’ drinnen und tanz’, koche oder backe, lass’ es zu mehr profunde Antworten auf Fragen, die dich beschäftigen, zu suchen. Ergreife und Begreife die Chance und die Notwendigkeit jetzt emotionale Nähe zu pflegen und trau’ dich die Fragen zu stellen, die du sonst nicht stellen würdest. Verwöhne dich mit einem Tag voller Körperpflege und -fürsorge, widme dich der Planung eines Projektes, für das du jetzt endlich Zeit finden kannst, miste deine Kleider aus, hab ich eigentlich schon TANZEN erwähnt?

Kümmere dich um deine Körperkommunikation

Ein reguläres Körperbewusstsein, ist als HSP enorm wichtig, da dein Körper Reize in einer ganz anderen Sensibilität empfängt. Dabei geht es vor allem um eine bewusste, ausgewogene Ernährung und einen konstanten Schlafrhythmus. Jenseits dessen solltest du nun auch beachten, dass basierend auf deiner „sensory processing sensitivity“ dein Nervensystem besonders erregt und stetig im Wachsamkeits- und Kampf-oder-Flucht-Modus ist.

Nimm dir die Zeit, um dich mit deinem Körper auseinanderzusetzen und mit ihm zu kommunizieren. Scanne deinen Körper und lass’ alle Anspannungen, ein Muskel nach dem anderen, los. Übermittle deinem Körper, dass du dich in keiner Fluchtsituation befindest, dass du sicher bist.

HIER nicht dort, JETZT nicht dann

Diese Zeit eröffnet die Gelegenheit uns tief mit dem Gefühl der Dankbarkeit zu verbinden.

Je dunkler es zu sein scheint, desto heller scheint ein noch so kleiner Funke im Kontrast.

Besonders wir HSPs haben großes Potential darin, die glühenden Funken im Dunkeln zu entdecken, die subtile Schönheit wahrzunehmen, die sonst unentdeckt verweilt, die kleinen Dinge zu sehen, die jeden Tag gleich machen aber dennoch unvergleichlich mit dem vorherigen.

Lass’ uns dieses Potential nutzen, um Dankbarkeit und Bewusstsein uns dabei helfen zu lassen zurück in diesen gegenwärtigen Moment zu finden.

Zu bemerken, dass wir Dinge vermissen, die wir normalerweise für selbstverständlich erachteten, bietet uns eine immense Chance diesen mehr Dankbarkeit und Anerkennung entgegenzubringen;

Die Einfachheit einer Umarmung, die man jetzt vermisst, die banale Tätigkeit im Zug zu sitzen, umgeben von anderen Menschen; die Selbstverständlichkeit sich im Restaurant fürs Abendessen bekochen zu lassen oder seine Freunde im Park oder einem Café zu treffen.

Aber ist es nicht auf eine Weise wahnsinnig schön, zu bemerken, dass etwas fehlt? Es kann uns daran erinnern, dass da jeden Tag so viele Dinge sind, die wir in ihrer Schönheit und Bedeutung gar nicht bemerken, die uns jetzt erst so konkret bewusst werden, weil sie nicht länger verfügbar sind. Was uns natürlich zu dieser Frage führt:

Mit was sind wir jetzt gerade umgeben, dass wir gar nicht bewusst wahrnehmen und wertschätzen, weil wir zu sehr damit beschäftigt sind, uns das zu wünschen, was uns gerade nicht zugänglich ist?

Wie zum Beispiel die Tatsache, dass wir einen sicheren Ort haben, in dem wir heimkehren können, Zugang zu klarem Wasser haben, beobachten können wie die Erde sich ein wenig erholen kann, jetzt wo sie von menschlichem Gebrauch ein wenig verschont bleibt, die Zeit haben einen ganzen Tag nur draußen mit Nichtstun zu verbringen, den Vögeln zuzuhören, den Geruch des Regens genießen können, die Möglichkeit trotz sozialer Distanz verbunden zu sein dank der digitalisierten Welt, Tätigkeiten wieder entdecken, von denen du total vergessen hast, wie viel Freude sie dir bringen. Deine alten Kindheitsfilme anschauen, zu diesem einen Song tanzen, der dich immer aufmuntert. Deine Rolle als Pflanzenmama/Pflanzenpapa ganz neu aufblühen zu lassen, endlich die Zeit zu haben, dich über Themengebiete ausgiebig zu informieren, die dich schon längere Zeit interessieren. Mit der Familie oder den Mitbewohnern mal mehr bewusste Zeit zu verbringen, um sich möglicherweise auf ganz anderen Ebenen zu begegnen.

Fühl’ dich frei die Liste weiterzuführen!

Wir können lernen, dass es bei Dankbarkeit nicht darum geht, erst dankbar für etwas zu sein, wenn wir es nicht länger haben können, sondern eben exakt dann dankbar zu sein, wenn es für uns zugänglich ist, gerade weil es für uns zugänglich ist.

Wir haben die Chance zu realisieren, dass Gegebenheiten unseres Lebens für selbstverständlich zu halten, das größte Hindernis der Dankbarkeit darstellt.

Bleib mit anderen verbunden

Nachdem du dich aufgeladen und deine Sicht geklärt hast, kannst du dich darauf fokussieren, wie du anderen helfen kannst.

Geh raus in die Nachbarschaft und biete deine Hilfe bei Einkäufen, fürs Gassi gehen oder für sozialen Austausch über FaceTime oder ganz klassisch übers Telefonieren an.

Nutze dein Gefühl des erhöhten Verantwortungssinnes und anstatt dich von diesem lähmen zu lassen, nutze es konstruktiv, indem du es in Gewissenhaftigkeit und Aktionismus umwandelst!

Denn, was dir all’ die Überwältigung und Sorge am aller meisten zeigt, ist, dass du dich kümmerst und das sehr. Und das ist- trotz allem- eine wundervoll menschliche Reaktion.

Sehe und nutze das Potential dieser spezifischen Situation

„The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.“ – Alice Walker, poet and social-activist

Viel Verzweiflung und Gefühle der Machtlosigkeit resultieren aus Gedanken, die uns machtloser darstellen, als wir es tatsächlich sind.

Das gerade ist eine Zeit der Unterbrechung. Diese Unterbrechung bringt die Chance mit sich, zurückzutreten und die Dinge nicht innerhalb des Geschehens, sondern überhalb- dort wo sich die Konnektivitäten klarer und ersichtlicher zeigen- zu betrachten.

Wir haben derzeit das Privileg in Zeiten einer Krise “einfach“ nur Zuhause bleiben zu müssen, während andere fliehen müssen.

Dieses Zuhausebleiben, kann aber auch ganz klar seine Schatten mit sich bringen- individuell betrachtet abhängig von den jeweiligen Umständen die in deinem “Zuhause“ herrschen und ganz kollektiv betrachtet, weil es dieses Gefühl von Passivität und Innaktionismus umso mehr nährt. Doch wie im obigen Zitat erwähnt, geht es darum unsere Macht und Kraft zu begreifen und folglich zu erkennen, was wir kontrollieren können und was eben nicht.

Was wir nicht kontrollieren können: die Zukunft und wie das Leben die Dinge verknüpft

Was wir kontrollieren können: die Gegenwart und unsere Handlungen, Überzeugungen, Intentionen und Aspirationen in diesem gegenwärtigen Moment

Wir können nichts mit kompletter Gewissheit absehen, aber das muss und sollte in uns kein Gefühl der Ohnmacht auslösen. Lass’ es uns doch mal so betrachten:

Wir erleben die Zukunft nie als die Zukunft selbst, sondern immer als gegenwärtigen Moment. Denn wenn die Zukunft uns erreicht, dann ist sie hier, in der Gegenwart, das ist der einzige Ort, an dem wir jemals sein können. Die einzige Zeit, in der wir handeln können.

Möglicherweise liegt die Lösung darin endlich die Kraft dieses Momentes zu erkennen und all den Raum, den er für Entscheidungen, Intentionen und Handlungen bereithält.

Wir können die Vergangenheit- als einen Ort der Referenz- und die Zukunft- als ein Projekt- mit der Gegenwart: der Ort für Handlung, verbinden.

Diese Zeit der Unterbrechung, der Überleitung, zeigt uns- vielleicht mehr denn je- wie viel ein einzelner Mensch bewirken kann.

Jetzt, genau jetzt, ist es an der Zeit, dass wir die Macht und die Wirkkraft, die unsere Entscheidungen in sich tragen, erkennen.

Was gleichzeitig auch bedeutet, dass die Zeit, in der wir uns kleiner machen, als wir sind und somit blind unsere Kraft abgeben, auch ein Ende haben muss.

Ich lade euch alle dazu ein Fragen und Antworten aufkommen zu lassen:

„Wenn das alles zu Ende ist, möchte ich, dass alles zur Normalität zurückkehrt, oder sind es genau diese Zustände, die uns- als globale Gesellschaft- hierher geführt haben?

Was kann ich in meinen Handlungen und Einstellungen bzgl. Konsum, Lebensweise, Ernährung, Wertesysteme, soziale Disparitäten und dem Klima nachhaltig verändern?

Und am aller wichtigsten: Was hat sich in dieser Zeit als ersetzlich/unersetzlich erwiesen?“

It doesn’t matter if it’s the rapid spread of a virus or another crisis- being a highly sensitive and/or intuitive person during times of uncertainty affects you on different levels.

With this, I want to let all deeply feeling people know: You are not alone and you are not weak for feeling like this. Do not make yourself small- you carry great potential to transform darkness into light.

I assume not everyone knows or understands what the term “Highly Sensitive Person” means, so let me quickly explain.

For those generally interested, the term ‘Highly Sensitive’ was first introduced and studied by Dr. Elaine N. Aron. Being an HSP herself she conducted several studies following this innate personality trait of sensory processing sensitivity.

A Highly Sensitive Person (HSP) has a more profound connection to their experiences and processes everything much more and reflects on it, elaborates on it, makes associations. They are also deeply aware of the subtleties in their surroundings as they have a more sensitive nervous system.

Of course, the advice given is not only relevant for HSPs but especially for them.

I just think it’s important to make minorities, which HSPs are, feel seen by addressing their issues during such a time and since I am one myself it only makes sense to reach out.

To everyone with a mental illness or another condition that makes it hard to cope in the face of uncertainty: You are seen. Do not let those circumstances convince you that you are weak or weaker than others. Strength is not about having no weaknesses. True strength lays in vulnerability and since we are all kind of vulnerable right now it is a great time to find strength in the unexpected.

BOUNDARIES, BABY!

It’s all about the boundaries here.

My advice will confront you with the vocalization and setting of boundaries. Because a lot of overwhelm can stem from loose boundaries and it can be incredibly soothing to discover what works for you and what doesn’t: get to know yourself a little more.

Maybe now the time has come that you will have to reflect upon your relationship to boundaries.

Metaphorically spoken you can use the weight of the world, those rocks, that are sitting on your shoulders and build your healthy boundaries with them, to walk more unburdened.

It really doesn’t matter if you find yourself being an HSP or not; boundaries are critically important in your interaction with the world.

Step into your power of saying and discovering what is okay for you and what is not, what makes you feel uneasy and negatively overwhelmed.

Boundaries do not mean being limited, quite the contrary.

Boundaries set you free in expressing your needs and through that sending the message to yourself and others that your needs are important enough to be uttered and considered. They set your interactions free, since all you do and say only stems from a place of sincerity. It is not kind to say ‘yes’ when you actually mean ‘no’, it only seems kind. Being kind is about expressing your needs sincerely and authentically.

Boundaries are here to balance out our needs and our energy in order for us to thrive authentically in the interaction with others.

Everyone profits from your boundaries, they are an expression of self-respect and self-care, and since every relationship we have in our lives is a direct reflection of the relationship we cherish with ourselves it’s only logical for any relationship in your life to also profit from you taking care of yourself.

Now that we have learnt that it is okay to create boundaries, let’s move on to the advice.

How to treat yourself more kindly in the face of overwhelm:

Conscious media and news consumption

Gathering knowledge can be a soothing tool in dealing with uncertainty yet it is also important to not let the topic consume you completely.

Being consumed can happen very quickly and unnoticed because you will feel like you’re just being responsible and caring by staying informed while what you’re really doing as soon as you crossed the line is not gathering knowledge but solely amassing information to create a feeling of security and safety inside of you, it’s an act of compensation.

Therefore you should really observe your behavior around media and news consumption to draw a line where it becomes too consuming and draining.

You could set up some rules for your researches: Which sources are reputable and trustworthy? How much time do I really want to spend on this? What is it that I really want to know?

You don’t have to feel it all

It is okay to let go of the feelings that do not belong to you, you don’t have the responsibility to feel them all.

Due to your immense awareness about the despair, the pain, the insecurity, the fragility, the destructiveness of our current way of life and how it leads us to situations like this, you feel like the problems are weighing on your shoulders only and you have a higher responsibility toward them.

You don’t need to feel bad for enjoying your life. You can’t change the world on your own and you certainly can’t change anything if you don’t take care of your own mental health.

‘Feeling it all’ only results in constant over-arousal and overwhelm- a state where you feel like you hear all the heartbeats racing, all the voices talking, all the sirens ringing but they all clench together and emerge into one huge, overwhelmingly incriminating noise where you can’t understand anything or make distinctions, you are just paralyzed.

Conclusively, you don’t only have to distance yourself, you need to. Distancing yourself emotionally (and physically in this specific case) does not mean you do not care, it precisely means the opposite. You do care about this which demands you to see the situation clearly and not blurred by overwhelm. Truly, it is okay to let go of the feeling of having to bear it all. By giving everyone back their share of the situation we can all tap into our power of taking responsibility for OUR actions and feelings.

Find out what soothes you

It’s okay to indulge and to invest the additional time you now have in yourself. Loosing yourself in panic won’t change the situation either.

You can now reconnect to or even find the balance between taking care of yourself and taking care of others.

Everyone has different techniques for coping, find yours.

Stay in bed the whole day and watch some series you never had the time to catch up on, go for a long walk in the forests to recharge, we all know what a powerful source nature is for us. Loose yourself in a book, or in music and the discovery of new artists or old ones you totally forgot existed, start to paint or write, play boardgames, go outside and dance, stay inside and dance, cook or bake, tap into the answering of more profound questions, see the chance and necessity for fostering more emotional closeness between each other and dare to ask more deeper questions, indulge into a whole day of body-care, dedicate yourself to a project you never had the time to plan, declutter your clothes, did I mention to DANCE?

Take care of your body

Beyond your regular body-care such as eating healthy and getting enough sleep it’s also useful to see that on the basis of your sensory processing sensitivity your nervous system is now especially aroused and on constant alert and fight-or-flight mode.

Find some time to sit down and notice tensions in your body and relax them, one muscle after the other. Breathe deep belly breaths. Communicate your body that you are safe through relaxation of the muscles and conscious breathing.

THIS not that, HERE not there

Now, more than ever, we can finally connect to the feeling of gratitude on a more thorough level.

The darker times seem, the brighter the even tiniest of spark shines in contrast.

Especially we as HSPs have great potential to discover the sparks glowing in the dark, the subtleties of beauty that go unnoticed, the small things that make each day the same but still incomparable to the other days. Let’s use this potential and let gratitude and awareness help bringing you back to this present moment and out of the feeling of hopelessness.

Noticing how things are being missed that we normally took for granted offers us a great chance to feel more gratitude and acknowledgment towards those in general.

The simplicity of an embrace is now longed for, the mundane activity of being on a train among other people, the naturalness of going out for dinner or meeting friends in a park or café.

But isn’t it great to find something missing? It means that there are so many things that go unnoticed which we experience day by day, each holding unique significance, that we now become aware of because they are no longer there. Which leads to the question:

What are we surrounded with right now that we may take for granted because we’re so busy yearning after those other things not accessible to us right now?

Like having a safe place to be, having access to water, seeing how the earth can recover as it is being spared by us humans for a while, having time to spend intense time outdoors, listening to the birds, smelling the rain, observing nature, staying in bed and drinking hot beverages, having food to eat, the leisure of cooking in general, being able to stay connected thanks to digital devices, rediscovering activities you forgot about, playing board games, watching your childhood movies, dancing to this one song that always cheers you up, having time to clean and actually being able to enjoy it, caring for your plants, having more time to inform yourself about topics you’re eager to know more about, spending more conscious time catching up with your family or room mates, having time to self-reflect and for journalling.

Feel free to add to the above!

We can learn that gratitude is not about feeling grateful for something when we can no longer have it but also exactly when it is accessible to us, to not forget about the value of something just because we have it but appreciate it precisely because we have it.

It is our chance to realize that taking things for granted is the greatest inhibitor of gratefulness.

Stay connected to others

After you recharged and cleared your vision you can focus on how you can be of help.

Get yourself into the neighborhood and offer your support for groceries, dog walks or quality time over FaceTime or by a simple, yet connecting, call.

Feel your heightened sense of responsibility and don’t let it paralyze you but instead transform it by constructively redirecting it by helping, reaching out, providing comforting words and safety to others that may also have a tough time during this.

It helps to transform overwhelm and worry into an energy of conscientiousness and action. Because what all this overwhelm and worry truly shows you is that you care, you care deeply, and that is -after all- an incredibly human and loving reaction.

See and use the potential of this specific situation

„The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.“ – Alice Walker, poet and social-activist

A lot of despair and feelings of powerlessness can stem from thoughts that make us more powerless than we actually are.

This is a time of interruption; it allows us to step back and redirect. We have the privilege to find ourselves having to sit at home during a crisis which can of course also be tough.

Individually, depending on your circumstances and collectively, because it can make us feel even more impotent but as mentioned before it’s about realizing our power and thus what we can and cannot control.

What we cannot control: the future and how life turns things around.

What we can control: the present and our actions, mindsets, intentions and aspirations in this present moment.

We cannot foresee anything with any certainty but that doesn’t mean that we’re powerless or even helpless. Look at it this way:

We never experience the future as the future but we only experience the future as the present moment for this is the only place we ever are. The only place where we can take action. So maybe the solution is to become aware of the power this moment and all the decisions, intentions, actions attached to it holds.

We can connect the past-as a place of reference- and the future-as a project- to the present: the place of action.

This time of intermission, maybe more than ever, shows us the large impact one single individual has. Now is the time we realize the power and impact of our decisions which means that the time where we make ourselves and our power smaller than it is shall also be over.

I invite all of you to let questions and answers arise:

“After all this ends, do I really want things going back to ‚normal’? Or isn’t that exactly what brought us here? What changes in my actions and attitudes toward consumption, lifestyle, nutrition, societal disparities and the climate can I implement? and most importantly: What has shown itself to be dispensable/indispensable during this time?”