On a long and utterly enjoyable train ride last year from Hamburg to Alessandria, I have discovered the following:

The world outside a moving train moves both fast and slow. The pace of this movement depends on what you focus. If you point and adjust the objective of your vision on the closer objects outside, like trees, building and turnpikes framing the tracks, they haste by and you feel being in a race competing the world outside. But as soon as you widen the objective range to panorama setting and include the farther situated objects, the world slows down to a graceful dance full of harmony.

You can have both. Haste and grace. But not at the same time. At any given moment you have to choose on what to focus: to be fast, not noticing the world around you and trying in vain to catch the details of the blurred images rushing by, or to slow down and enjoy every single detail of your surroundings, no matter how far they may reach.

There are moments when you need to be quick. But focusing on yourself doesn’t allow you to be quick in time. Because, the close-by world just rushes past you and blocks your view onto the wonderful world behind those hills spreading with their infinite possibilities and colorful adventures in time and space.

Picture: A happy attempt to hug the whole world, Vienna, Sep. 2013.

Many of current philosophies and spiritual techniques are talking about the art of being present, mindful, being in the moment. I find the approach introduced by Ariel and Shya Kane, instantaneous transformation, the simplest to grasp and most helpful. They talk about awareness, about non-judgmental seeing and listening, about anthropological way to observe ourselves and others.

Their approach helps me to experiment with the way I view my life, myself, people and basically everything around me.

Today, I was thinking about listening and thought of the German word “horchen” or rather the imperative “Horch!” The latter calls you to listen, to be attentive. The word “horchen” can be also used when describing children listening attentively and with awe to a story or a fairy-tale.

And then, there is the word “gehorchen”, the root of which is again “horchen”. This word means “obey” or “do as told”.

And when I thought of these two words I had an “AHA” experience.

Ariel and Shy say that not many of us can or want to do what and how told. Or as they call it, not many of us can surrender. Ariel and Shya make difference between surrender and succumb. They say that we surrender with our hearts, because we then embrace the idea or request of the other person as our own and we fulfill it with all our hearts.

But in order to be able to surrender we need to listen. Really listen what the other person says, from this person’s point of view. And only then we will be able to truly surrender. So, if you are able to “horchen”, listen to another person as though you are a child listening and being in awe with every word of the story told, then and only then you can truly “gehorchen”, surrender with all your heart.

That was a fun discovery and made me fall in love with different languages even more.

And here is a bonus, side-effect discovery: the contemplation above showed me that different languages are not necessarily misleading, as suggested in the legend of the tower of Babel and as we experience sometimes. Considering same words in various languages can also clarify and help in understanding tricky nuances of our lives. Because different languages offer different perspectives on the same thing.

Picture of a beautiful fairy-tale world around me: Aalborg in snow.

Christmas holidays are packed with many impressions and events. And these events – meeting family and friends, going to Christmas market, going to cozy restaurants, cooking, going for a walk, to a playground, and many other – come with incredible density, that we often can only grant a first look on what we see and experience.

Photographs are the wonderful means not only to catch a memory but they also give us a possibility for a second look.

Here are some pictures of my holidays these year and my discoveries upon the second look.

A fir tree in front of a house: something caught my sight and made me to make this picture. And when the picture was made I noticed the harmony and how all three fit together: the house, the pattern on it and the tree had a sharp top, all pointing up and the contrast in colors making the bank in front of the house calling to take a seat and catch a breath and look around.

Hot coffee is one of my favorite drinks. Noticing damp raising from a hot drink in a picture, of which I thought to be at first of bad quality, made me sigh with pleasure.

The lights on the tree, above and under it, add a special magic to it. This Christmas tree is framed with light. I discovered this while looking at the picture. Upon the second look.

The picture below was made by mistake on our way to a Christmas market. And now upon a second look I really like it. Many of the pavements we walk are very special and we fail to see them while trying to reach our goals. I am grateful to this “mistake”. It made me appreciate the way I took.

The two pictures below attracted my first look, but looking at them together while writing this post made me realize that we humans are able to make wonderful things out of seemingly mundane things: cabinets with electrical equipment and walls can become eye catchers and smile bringers.

What do you answer when you are asked this simple question: “Where are you from?” Do you answer “I am from” and then put the place you live, or you were born, or grew up in? Well there are different possibilities to it, but I guess many people will answer this starting with words “I am from …”.

Do you know what my standard answer was until recently? It was: “Well, it’s complicated.”

So, I did that when I was asked by a taxi driver where I was from, while he drove me from a train station to the office I work with, in a small Danish town close to Copenhagen.

When I said “It’s complicated”, he was quite confused, so I gladly started to explain that I was born and grew up in Moldova, yes-yes the little country between Romania and Ukraine, then lived long time in Germany – twelve years! – and became German citizen, and now I live in Denmark since five years.”

The driver appeared even more confused. I guess I expected him to be amused and being impressed, but he wasn’t that at all.

After a pause he said: “Well, I wanted to know whether you would like to pay in Euros or Danish Crowns.” After a startled moment of silence and exchange of glances in the rear mirror, we both burst out laughing.

“Then I am definitely from Denmark!” I said.

We had a wonderful chat afterwards and the driver found out for me that all places I lived for a longer time were on a mainland, whether it was Moldova, Algeria, Germany or Denmark. An unimportant but fun information.

But there are two lessons I learned from this seemingly simple but for me unforgettable exchange.

The first is that we are afraid, consciously or sub-consciously, to appear simple and unsophisticated and tend to make things more complicated in order to appear more interesting.

And the second was that the thing I was scared most, misunderstandings, could be the cause of very funny and wonderful encounters and can make life even richer. On that day I started appreciating misunderstandings.

What misunderstandings made you laugh? When was the last time that your mind played a practical joke on you?