05 September 2017

I am back - at least for now.

Ok - let's do this.
Gather some thoughts and spread some internet love once again.
Because I missed it - having a place of my own where I say my thoughts out loud and share things I love.

And because I have promised myself that I will not reply to any more emails / texts or messengers from people asking me where to go and what to eat when they are visiting a place I have been or lived. Even though most of the people are friends and I love to help - hey I am a not a pleaser for nothing !!! But you guys are just too many. You have no idea how much time I spend writing these. It's always like: OK, just a few things, it will only take a minute - nope. It never does.

So from now, I will just redirect them to this litte safe haven of places I have been and which I loved and other things on my mind. Because it's not called called - if I could choose for nothing, right?!

Something that really takes up a lot of my energy at the moment is finding balance.
Without sounding like a crazy hippie - girl gone dreads and over night wheats over here. Finding balance is becoming more and more important to me.

One way of figuring out where my balance is, is reading.
Me time, yoga, being bored and staring out of the window. It's so difficult and I never feel I have the time but I am trying. That's a start.

The three books I have on my night stand right now is:

DON'T GET A JOB ... MAKE A JOB: given to me by my man. I am in a Limbo. At least job-wise. For the past seven months I worked as a wovens designer for a danish company, designing womenswear. It was a maternity leave cover so when it was over in July I was out. The politics around maternity leave in Scandinavia are GREAT just so hard to handle when you are the one covering for someone. Because they tend to come back wanting their job back and no matter how hard you worked, there isn't always room for an extra. But the good thing is that it made me think about the business I have spent quite a few years in and how little it develops and how much better it could be. I am really good at fast fashion - I love following up the numbers and strategically designing garments people want to buy. But in my head it doens't make sense to keep on producing and very often overproducing all these garments. Creating a whole bunch of garments without a real demand - the demand is something you create and hype up after the design process.

What happened to product follows demand...

The entire sustainability discussion and especially slow fashion and circular design are focus points I yet again thrive to get my hands dirty in. Let's see what happens but I am pep talking myself - networking with interesting people and figuring out how I can change something from where I stand.
And in the meanwhile I am working at the airport again. It's hectic, it's international, great people and even though it's crazy hours it beats being unemployed any day!

THE SUBTLE ART OF NOT GIVING A FUCK: this on the other hand a sweet, sweet friend gave me for my birthday. She keeps telling me to stop being such a pleaser. Admitting that things are not always fine and start to give a fuck a whole lot more. Working on that - hoping this book will be a game changer. Will keep you posted. Love that my friends push me like this. I am so good at giving other people advice, pep talking and pushing people to get better. I would love to instead use that energy on myself for some time.

I LOVE DICK: The same friend who gave me this, also gave me: We should all be feminist by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and it was such an eye opener. I have never considered myself a feminist, what was there to fight for ?! I had always felt equal, and never even considered that being a girl at least in this part of Europe would be any different from being a boy.

That was until I started to work in big corporate businesses. How come all the CEO's in the companies I have worked in by now are men. Even though there are mostly women in the sections below - some with more experience and more education than the big bosses on the top. Why are the wages not equal if the work done is the same? Why do some women wear red lipstick, cleavage down to their belly button and high heels to meeting when the big boss is in town but otherwise come to work in jeans and a t-shirt? Girls and boys are different, no doubt about that. The best teams I have worked in, have been the ones with a good blend of both.  But feminism has become a theme in my world again - gender equality and bias connotations, communication through what you wear and how you behave suddenly seams so relevant to talk openly about again. So I will read some more, applaud tv series like insecure and girls showing us different types of people in public media, embrace tolerance and wear red lipstick on a Wednesday and not only to board meetings ...

Talk soon, over and out.