Once you have started your journey everything you do and don’t do is your journey. You are a snake in a bamboo pole too. The journey is towards becoming more authentic, more real, more conscious of what is going on inside and outside. It doesn’t really matter if you spend your waking hours in a ‘spiritual’ way or not. The important thing is that you now are aware of your desire to deepen and slowly (or not) become aware of all the inner and outer obstacles that try to prevent you from doing that. Now you can ask yourself why you are not doing what you want to do. Every self-confronting question answered honestly is a gain in your process of self-development or – as you wish- spiritual growth.read entire post »
Eeerrmm.. it is not often that I don’t know what to say or how to say it. The whole idea of my practice on this website is to just sit down and write what comes up. But this time.. well, it feels kind of inappropriate because the one who I have most to say about its sitting next to me, chatting with her friends.
I can tell you it is quite an experience to first start off with some sort of virtual relationship and then try to translate that into real life, especially when both parties made each other into symbols of respectively masculinity and femininity. Turns out the symbols are pretty human too.
There is a saying that goes like “if you think you are enlightened go live with your parents for a week”. I feel similar. If you think you have done a lot of work on yourself try living in the same room with a woman from a different culture for a week.
Tonight my life will look different again. I am on the plane from Hong Kong to Bangkok. Then another plane, a bus, a boat and a taxi and I will meet the girl I haven’t seen for a year. When we met for the first time there was no romantic interest, not officially anyway. Neither of us was available then. Things have changed.
I know her and I don’t know her. I have met her in real life but we never dated or kissed. 
I feel quiet, I feel content, I feel human. My second tour of Hong Kong is coming to an end. I worked pretty hard, had a couple of amazing and a couple of humbling experiences, made a handful of brilliant interventions and made a couple of humiliating mistakes. I have felt a loser, a winner, a hero, a threat, a traitor, a friend, a lover, an asshole, a writer, a coach, a promoter, a businessman, a student and a master. I have felt victorious, misunderstood, ashamed, desired, loved, humiliated, angry, horny, hated, appreciated, wise, warm, lonely and deeply connected. My confidence in myself and others has grown, I have become more humble, my flexibility is growing, I have less fear of failure, I have more trust and I have less often a knot in my stomach.
I see it as my job and my duty to contribute as best as I can to more awareness of self and others. Especially I want to try to bring it to unconventional places and in original ways. Now is the latter debatable. Because it is only an unconventional place because somebody thinks and or says it is an unconventional place. In the end it is always about people, that is not unconventional, that is universal. And trying to be original or inventive is also from all times. The reason that there are so many paths to Rome is because so many people have tried to get there before me. Anyways, I enjoy the challenge of trying to get a team of co-workers of a company to join me on a journey of self-discovery.
I see so many intelligent, talented, energetic and hard-working people who don’t have a vision. Young men and women spending 60 hours per week in the energy draining snake pits they call the workplace so that they can climb up the corporate ladder to get to positions of leadership. To lead what? A company who advises on media strategy? Where they tell you where and how often you should advertise your diapers commercial to maximize profits? Want to work in the beauty industry where you sell lotions that do not make you look younger? Or want to research when the African woman is ‘ready’ for more expensive hair products? Do you want to be remembered as the man who sold a lot of vacuum cleaners for his multinational company? Want to work for Pepsico and compete with Nestle for 'share of stomach'? How do you motivate yourself to sell sweet unhealthy stuff every day?
This whole journey seems to be a very long road towards self-validation and self-appreciation. Am I worth something? In the very beginning of this journey I asked myself if I was doing all this just to be appreciated and to get the approval I never received from my father. Step by step I am getting closer. Yes, I still feel the need to raise the bar because I fear to become stagnant. But with every challenge that is conquered I find peace, calmness and – indeed – the much-wanted confirmation that I am on the right path. The spiritual laws can be applied universally; I now know this not just from insight but also from personal experience. Speak and listen from the heart unconditionally, face your fears, serve others, don’t take yourself so fucking seriously and be generous and healing will happen: I have been testing them over and over again and they still have not failed me. On the contrary: I am being rewarded all the time.
It keeps blowing my mind how the situation changes and changes and changes. I keep wondering if there are people who experience life as linear, who just go from a to b to c. For me it is not like that. But I do feel I am becoming very flexible and I read the signs fast. When the communication came to a halt around the primary location (no response to text messages) I knew I had to make a decision immediately. When the registration didn’t happen I stayed remarkably calm, being able to suspend the decision (and the panic). I must say, in a weird way I am enjoying these lessons.
I have 2 more weeks of Hong Kong ahead of me. I am so curious what will happen. Will I feel like a rock star again? Or will I receive teaching in humility? The openness of not-knowing calms me.
It is still smoggy outside. My throat is less sore though. I have no idea if that is a good sign or a bad sign. I have understood from people who have been living here a long time that the body gets used to the smog. They don’t get irritated eyes and clogged sinuses anymore. Not something I look forward to.
When I was in China I received a question from a reader. I just decided I will take a shot at it. It is a tough and complicated one but I will do my best.
Before I start I want to say how much it keeps amazing me how these things work. I would have never expected such a letter to come in. But I see something or live through something and write about it and then it opens up a thought, pattern or issue on the other side of the world.
You are visiting the blog of Atalwin Pilon. Since January 2012 I am traveling around the world in search for goodness and meaning. I named my quest "the Quest for the 21 Century Warrior". On this blog I share my adventures, my struggles and my insights. It's all about being human. If that speaks to you and you want me to help you with finding more wisdom, courage and compassion in your life, work or company feel free to
Think and grow rich
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