Dealin' With Myself

Yesterday I published a list of the things done since I'm in Holland . Once the list was in front of my eyes, I noticed how much I had left out of it! I also noticed how much some of the entries weren't written in the best of ways! For example: - " Learn Ducth " - this is misleading, even for myself! I have been learning Dutch since I arrived! Each day I listen to it, I read words, I add words to my vocabulary, I understand a little bit more, even if it's only for Duolingo's sentences or small sentences on flyers ! - Same goes for " Get a Job " - I do have a job next week, I will be working as a cleaner, but that's a job, that's an opportunity to feel useful, to enter the job market and to generate some income. So I am happy I decided to create a second list where I put down even more stuff done in less than 2 months in Holland ! Next list: lay down as many options and steps/tasks to follow the Learning of Dutch and Getting a Job.

I started this blog when I was feeling stuck in my career and struggling to find a job . I felt the need to share with others what I was dealing with, inside myself. Most of this struggle comes from the fact that I spent many years fighting with myself and only recently I discovered that I have ADHD, and I that there are ways of dealing with it. One of the ways is Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy . I won't write much about it. I will just say that I discovered it in the last months in London, so i need had the chance to try it. I was reading a bit about it though. I decided I would give it a try at some of the principles. I always made a big effort to remind myself of what wasn't working in my decisions and actions, after reading about CBT, I decided I would try and show very clearly to myself what WAS working. This is a non extensive list of what I needed to do while moving from London to Arnhem. The list shows a certain obsession to find a job (not so helpful) but it als

A special attention to the musicality of the sounds around me, or just another great procrastination opportunity?

Have you ever played that very simple, yet difficult, game? You lose it when you think about it. That's it! When you think about this game, you lose it. I don't know who was the brilliant mind who created and spread such a simple concept, but I would love to meet that person! The Breath Game I have been trying meditation . One simple instruction that appears on each session is something like: observe your breath, without breathing in any special way, just noticing! Yeah right!!! This one I can never achieve. As soon as I start noticing my breath, I simply can't stop myself from breathing actively in some sort of way, or many ways to be accurate... As a professional didgeridoo player  I work with breath. I have been breathing for 37 years. Yet, if there is something that I struggle so much with is to simple observe my breath, while I'm doing it. When I'm not thinking about it, I breath naturally, the moment I think about it, I start breathing in funny ways.

It costs money, it ain't good for the stomach and I feel it alters my optimal brain functioning, but sometimes it's just so hard to resist it! Especially when my brain creates all the excuses and reasonings to go and get another coffee!

I spent about 13 years of school HATING my own notebooks. It always seemed like everyone around me had really nice and effective ones, I do remember seeing some nastier than mine though. After school I didn't care much more about it. My notebooks became more graphical and filled with to-do lists or notes. Now that I'm starting to try to teach myself Dutch, I look at my notebook and it's again quite repulsive - this makes that I will probably never be able to access anything from here, so it's more about the process of writing it down than to access it again in the future. A way to improve this situation is by using drawings - by concentrating and making the drawing, I access a better memorisation. Some people use colours but I normally just get all lost in the different markers and pens and mostly, the colour scheme in use; then there's no more consistency and it becomes an extra distraction.

When I started to work at the Barbican, last December, I went to a Occupational Health appointment. I wanted to understand what I could put in place to perform better with ADHD in my role. The doctor suggested, among other things, that I try Headspace . He wrote it on a post-it note and didn't even explain what it was (the appointment was supposed to be one hour and ended up being 1:40, this tends to happen quite often in situations like these). After a few days I researched it and discovered it is a Meditation App. The idea of meditation kept coming to me very frequently in the last years so I decided to give it a try. I wasn't happy that this was yet another app wanting things from me, but I decided to give it a go. To be frank, I wasn't very engaged with Andy Puddicombe's voice. He is the co-founder and "narrator" of the sessions. Every now and then I would also question some of the concepts or ideas he introduces. But I decided I would give it a go a

Why do I like this kind of music? I have been researching for ways of making music with others . During the last couple years I have been noticing a tendency to create these sound art pieces in which I try to reflect on experiences of togetherness. These pieces use the sounds of interactions and they sometimes feel quite chaotic. I have noticed that my brain resonates with pieces like this because they somehow mirror how it works: so many things happening at the same time, it becomes more about the momentary interactions than about a composition. I can't articulate an explanation about how it feels to live inside my brain, but these pieces provide a quite clear picture of it. Everything is possible, everything is something, there's little prioritisation, not much planning and most of all: everything is valid and worth of attention. If you listen to it, will you give me some candid feedback on it? Some of my best critics have said about a couple of these that they wer

When a morning trip to the local market with the family feels like a massive joy, even if it's such a simple thing. This is my brain: the ability to create massive emotions from small moments. When these are good, I get overwhelmed with joy; this uncontrolled amplification also happens with small difficult moments that can very fast turn into seemingly-end-of-world situations.

Great talk and words about what is to live with ADHD. I lived for 34 years with it, without naming it or understanding it. Now I'm trying to come to terms with it. Sometimes with help from my amazing wife and sons, sometimes just observing it... Living and learning.

 I had my first job interview today. It felt good and I would really like to work with those guys. This is my brain: stuck and nearly hopeless in the morning, feeling good after a job interview. It did feel good to be called in because they wanted to learn more about me and my work. 

I feel completely stuck in my career and practice. After a month of looking for a house, wash machines, removal services, flights and paper work, I don't even know how to look for a job. The fact that I don't speak the language of the country, only amplifies the whole feeling.