Friday, May 31, 2019

Marry? Divorce? Do it a little bit differently in order to continue to grow in happiness

Marry? Divorce? Do it differently. Or rather, do it differently than we did.
Last week it was 31 years ago that I got married. What a fantastic moment and what a huge beautiful wedding. For a couple of years we got a good time together. Unfortunately, that changed. Despite all kind of guidance and coaching we decided to quit and divorce about nine years later. No, not because there were others involved. The time that we made each other happier or could make each other happier simply was over.

That process went, in spite of the emotions it all caused and certainly also because we were taking care of two at that moment still young children, really quick. Within a week or six, with the help of a joint-friend lawyer, we were about to finish the marriage. Unfortunately, that seemed like that.
On the advice of a good friend of my ex-wife, a second lawyer was called in. Her good right to choose that of course and still… Several lawyers followed and all kind of legal procedures, investigations, calculations and meetings at the court started which took a total of around fourteen and a half years. My experience now is that lawyers can keep each other very busy and there is always something new to come up with.

In addition to a huge amount of unnecessary waste of money this also for years caused enormous frustrations for my ex-wife and me. Not even talking about the negative energy to the children. Frustrations, it’s just my idea, that ultimately degenerates into a feeling of hate. No more communication.
The good news ... two world citizens of children with whom I have a very open contact almost daily, regularly stay with me here in Thailand, and who are doing well.

Please note. Of course, you will not marry with the intention of getting divorced again. I thought it was really a personal downfall, a shame, that this happened to me. Until that moment I had a good example towards my brothers and sisters of how a good marriage is possible for the long-term.
Still, when you look back, we were not actually meant for each other. Two individually good people who are so different from each other that they definitely don't fit. It is great when I hear these kinds of statements from the mouths of our kids who saw, feel and discovered this completely. Not having any intention to harm both their mother or me. Now I think why we actually did not see and feel this together during our time of courtship. Maybe the pink glasses? An idea of ​​a brighter future together?

In my eyes you divorce after you have tried everything to both make a success of your marriage. To make, with the wisdom and experience of that moment, each other happier together. Despite that good intention, it appears that it is no longer possible to go for that higher level of happiness. And yes, if children are involved then the threshold of such a decision to separate may be even higher. After all you still both keep the responsibility to arrange a different but still good and neat way of your child(ren). A way in which the father can fulfill his father's role (not being a kind of Santa Claus) and, conversely, the mother still can fulfill the role of mother. Communication between both ex-partners about raising the children and their education would also be more than welcome in that situation. I know several ex couples who succeed in this in a wonderful way. A big compliment for them for the sake of their children. My ex-wife and I unfortunately did not succeed after all things that happened between us during the process to divorce.

By getting married, you want to go for being happier together than alone. And if that is ultimately no longer the case, then you have to stop. You are not married just to make each other ‘sustainable’ more unhappy for the rest of your life isn’t it?

I don’t think it is strange that on every "birthday" of our wedding day all sorts of things and thoughts come up in my mind. Not a surprise to put it this time on paper. Ultimately ... you learn by doing. And why not share in openness. After all, it is not at all the intention to harm anybody with my story. Maybe it can help other people to think before and only change a little bit in order to go on growing in happiness whatever circumstances appear.  

If the intention of your marriage is to be happier with each other more than staying single, then why all that struggle afterwards? A fight that never, really never, has a winner. Only losers. After all, is that money your victory or is it the freedom that you give each other back again and grant your joint victory? Why must that what once was called love so often degenerate into the opposite pole hate?

Going on with transferring lots of money to lawyers is that what you really want? Better make use of it yourself. Consciously or not extending the process. Not willing to let go and or even working on breaking each other down, is that going for continuation of growth in personal happiness? Misusing the children in the process who nevertheless came out of mutual love for the rest of their lives, for 50% from their mother and 50% from their father? Unfortunately, this are the daily ‘games’ happening in many places in the world. For the sake of happiness?

I have often quoted in my blogs texts from OSHO. In one of his stories he tells that when it comes to love everything has a beginning and an end and there is no wound in between. If something is over, think about thanking each other for the time you have had together. Even in a lost relationship, in the period it lasted, often there were much more good and beautiful moments than those that went wrong. Without each other, you would never have had the (life) experiences of today and you ultimately both grew no matter how you look at it.

Although it may sound silly before you get married, also arrange in advance how you would like to see things arranged together if it does not ultimately become what you expect together. Always based on the idea that you can be grateful that you are both willing to succeed in the relationship. And, out of love for each other at that moment, are willing to arrange that so that both of you, if necessary, offer each other freedom again to both become happier single again. It really saves a lot of trouble and it is a great test of both your love to discuss this in advance. If you are afraid to talk about this with your lover think about how your love really is. Of course, your intention is to make your marriage last forever. Freedom in bond and growth in mutual happiness have to be and stay main items. Nothing selfish about it.
Something in which in my experience, also in the undesirable situation that things would turn out wrong, keeping each other long-term hostages in proceedings to divorce does not fit.

And if you may be free again, then head for that happiness. Don't get stuck in all kinds of false speech, hatred and self-pity. Take steps forward and stop toxifying your past situations, your ex-partner, your children and your environment. After all, that is ultimately a poisoning of yourself.

Gangey Gruma (Frans Captijn)

Captijn InsightCatalyst in developing tranquility & in-sight to get in a sustainable way real connection, purpose, pleasure and flow in life, love, family, business, career and work again.

Friday, May 24, 2019

More is better? Wake up and create space to live joy!

There are continuous marketing campaigns for the sale of houses and apartments in Chiang Mai, Thailand. More than super-large billboards, showing mostly only the interiors of those houses, shouting for attention.
I think every fourth truck that drives here is pretty much a concrete truck. Chiang Mai is exploding. A huge amount of growth and development. It seems absolutely there is no economic crisis, although many apartments and houses are vacant.
  
On the way back from a funeral, I again saw large signs of yet another new project. With my background in construction and architecture I continue to find it strange that apparently a beautiful interior on the enormous photos has to sell the houses. You will not find the structure and layout of the houses. They all look like showroom. It seems like you are buying a house for the curtains, the bed or the couch.

This new project showed in bold written words: "More is better" and as you can see in the photo, even a bird did already shit over that 'slogan'. Perhaps that animal understands things better than many people do. After all, life is not about always more, let alone that you find lasting happiness in it. It are only companies and in particular marketers who help us to believe this. After all, money has to be earned.

Better is the exact opposite. Not more, but less. And less creates space to breathe, to enjoy quality and ... to be happy and grateful for what you already have.
Most of our houses are often already some sort of warehouses more than full of stuff. We continue to collect, sometimes we don't even know why we bought anything at all. And more could be added because that is better ???

Last week someone told me a great way to create space in your house again. It actually has to do with two things, he said. What he told me resonated in me:

  1. Just walk through your house. Take room by room and step by step things that are standing, laying or hanging in that room in your hands and ask yourself (be honest with yourself) "Does this still bring me joy, more happiness in my life? Do I still get energy from this? If the answer is 'No', just get rid of it.
  2. After that first action, creating space, you organize the things that remain. This is another way to have more room, get an overview and easier to find those things that make you happy when you need them.

More is better? Do not make me laugh. What is life all about? About the endless process of wanting more and more? Clinging on and guarding and protecting more because it makes you all so much more happy or robs you of space and freedom?

The desire to have more and hold more breeds anxiety. That anxiety makes us act out of fear of loss. When we cling to things, we become slaves of our (always only temporary) possessions. 

In my opinion, the greatest goal in life is LIVING. And for joy, freedom, letting go and space to breathe are the most important factors in that. That is something else than continuing to collect more because it would be better.

Wake up and create space to live joy. 

Gangey Gruma (Frans Captijn)
Captijn InsightCatalyst in developing tranquility & in-sight to get in a sustainable way real connection, purpose, pleasure and flow in life, love, family, business, career and work again.



Monday, May 20, 2019

Frans Captijn seven years in Thailand

Time flies. 
Exactly today I am living in Thailand for seven years. In the mean time I have not been back to my 'home' country. Being in Thailand actually feels much more home. 

My oldest sister asked me if I wanted to go back to The Netherlands and my answer was, if not necessary to go back, I want to stay here. 

This period of seven years a lot of things happend to me and around me. Actually like in every person's life. And is this life better? Many experiences for years already I shared in my weekly blog. 

I always say living here is a different experience, you cannot compare. For me it still feels as having got the gift to live two different lives in one lifetime. It made my world much bigger and smaller. 
Bigger in a way of thinking and awareness. Seeing things that made me sometimes upset in a total different way and order. How small The Netherlands and all that's going on there is in the big, big, world. 
Smaller in being less and less affected by negative energy produced by what all is happening in the world and on (social) media. I do not follow any media anymore. Does it really matter? I am still and happy alive. 
I am very thankful for all that. 

Plans and ideas for the future? The main thing is to try and hope to stay healthy. 
And yes, several ideas. Even of leaving Chiang Mai and start to live at a different location in Thailand. I am open and willing to start to build a small project by myself. Not as a goal to reach but as a path to follow. And there is more. Just a way of going with the flow and enjoying every day I get. 

How all these new ideas will work out? Time will tell. Just follow my blog ;).

Gangey Gruma (Frans Captijn)

Captijn InsightCatalyst in developing tranquility & in-sight to get in a sustainable way real connection, purpose, pleasure and flow in life, love, family, business, career and work again.

Friday, May 17, 2019

Lift the quality of your life. Start after waking up with doing nothing.

Two weeks ago again two good friends, nearly same age as me, passed away. Also I got some emails to respond to from former guests of my programs. All of these gave me inspiration to write this week’s blog about how to easily start a higher quality life and lifestyle and to become the manager and in charge of your life (again).  

It is too easy to think, or not even to think about, the sun will rise again for you tomorrow. Ever thought about the idea that every day about 155.000 people pass away? That’s nearly two every second. Maybe for you nothing is sure but it is sure once you and I will be part of that ‘day-group’.

Our life is short. If you live a happy live, at the end you think is was very short. If you live, or made yourself, a miserable live, it feels longer. Still actually not really a very long time. So you can ask yourself how do I spend my lifetime? What’s the meaning and quality of my life? Do I live life or am I listening to everybody around me how I need to behave or live my life? Am I myself or afraid to be myself and playing only a (happy?) life show. Why do I follow all the ‘system’ rules that actually do not make me happy like going on doing things I do not like doing anymore to get for instance my full pension at the end and possibly ruined my health to fully enjoy? Why do all kind of things bother me so much to respond or maybe even become angry and do they actually really matter? Why do you waste the short time of your life with so many silly things?

There is an easy way to heighten the quality of your life and it does not even take you every morning a couple of minutes time. This is how it works:  
After you wake up, still being in your bed, just take some time to do nothing. Don’t immediately satisfy your digital addiction. Just be silent and feel. Feel that you are alive and start to become happy with that. Whoow!
Life is not granted and you can be happy and thankful you got another day to live.
Think about the people you really care about. Your partner (if you have), maybe children and or parents, some real friends. Do they also got another new day? Maybe another whoow moment.

This is called living with mortality in mind. Once, a long time ago already, I wrote a blog about the black crow on your shoulder as free adviser in your life. Living with mortality in your mind helps you to heighten the quality of your life. You make different decisions, do not bother about things that actually do not matter if you think about the idea maybe the sun does not rise for you tomorrow.

You are much more happy and grateful with the things you have (isn’t your house already actually a warehouse?). You start caring (again) about the things that really matter to you in your life. You are more and more yourself (again) not bothering about what other people maybe thinking about YOUR life.

All of this by starting every day with just a few minutes doing nothing being aware of the wonder you are still alive and can make the day by being yourself making choices that really matter to you.

Gangey Gruma (Frans Captijn)

Captijn InsightCatalyst in developing tranquility & in-sight to get in a sustainable way real connection, purpose, pleasure and flow in life, love, family, business, career and work again.



Friday, May 10, 2019

Don't be so idle. Do normal and just be yourself. What do you actually propose?

It was a bit of a laughable show at the King's day party in Bangkok last April 27th. Together with my son and my girlfriend we visited the by the Dutch Embassy organized King's Day party. For my girlfriend the first introduction to some Dutch culture I thought and of course the introduction for her of the Dutch ‘Kroket” and ‘Frikandel’.

At the start of the party is was about people watching first. A strange experience to hear nearly all people speaking English.
At a certain moment a man entered the garden where the party took place. His partner followed him at some distance like a dog on high heels. He took quite a bit of space and entered the place in a somewhat majestic and self-important manner. A way of looking around as; Does everyone see that I am here?
And yes, his performing worked because you saw several people talking about his behavior and his wife or girlfriend following him. He suggested to be someone important, or at least he thought he was. I had never seen him before. With my experiences of today wholeheartedly I had to laugh about it. It was a kind of theater show. Dutch culture? Not real but still...


Although my son Rik tried to do his best, he did not succeed introducing more than half a kroket to my girlfriend 😉.

Back home I accidentally ended up on a website where the growth of the world population was shown live. Seeing that I thought, The Netherlands? What and where is that in this big world? That man? Who is he?
Actually I felt a bit anxious to see how our globe becomes more and more full of consumers. Probably good for the economy and certainly it also has other sides where we are increasingly experiencing the consequences more and more and day by day. But that is something else.

When I saw numbers of more than 7.5 billion people and thought back to this man, I actually thought he was a bit miserable. Why do you act like this? What are you worried about? How distended do you put yourself in the spotlight? What are you actually proposing? Really important? What a pathetic presentation to get the energy of attention so you can survive in this self-taught role.

My parents would say; "Doing normal, is already crazy enough".

For sure, every person in his or her own way is unique in this world. However, the invitation in life is just to be yourself, nothing more and nothing less. And with that uniqueness, in my eyes,  you don't have to show you are more or better than others (because you are not) or start a marketing campaign to promote  yourself…

Gangey Gruma (Frans Captijn)
Captijn InsightCatalyst in developing tranquility & in-sight to get in a sustainable way real connection, purpose, pleasure and flow in life, love, family, business, career and work again.

Friday, May 3, 2019

You can achieve everything if you believe in yourself and don't give up? Forget it!

At the beginning of April, I traveled with my girlfriend to India and Kashmir. A country with no less than 1.3 billion (from 7.7 billion at the moment worldwide) inhabitants. Second in the world ranking of largest countries by population after China.

In particular of course the cities of Bombay, Delhi, Agra (with the Taj Mahal) and certainly also Kashmir came across to me as an infinitely moving mass of ants, people, continuous honking cars and in between cows, horses, goats and thousands of street dogs enjoying themselves the waste that you really couldn't ignore.

People who almost attacked you to sell you something. Beggars everywhere from (very) small to large. A future for these people?

The experiences we had were countless in this multicultural country. And because you not only look at it but are also literally moving in the energy, it makes you think and reflect. Many things came to our minds.

One of those things in my mind was that in many training sessions that I followed, I was often told that you can achieve everything if you believe in it, go for it and never give up. You can live your dream. I also often wrote about it in my blogs. After this experience in India it has become a utopia for me. It is not true for all of us.

Yes, I live my dream and have achieved what I (and especially my parents) had in mind. I have more on my shelf and I trust that it will work out. But is that normal? Will you succeed as long as you don't give up? No absolutely not. It really needs a little (no a lot) more and that has everything to do with your base.

I have had no influence on the place where I was born. Not on the parents I had. Not the opportunities that were waiting for me in the culture I grew up with. Not on it that I actually never had lack of necessary money. Not about luck factors.

Being able to live your dream is not only about your own dedication, but also about the basis on which and with which you ended up here on this planet and lots of luck.

India is "underprivileged" for the vast majority of people born and living there. Sometimes I have to be deeply ashamed of my beautiful stories. We regularly fell silent there. And at the end of our journey we told each other how grateful and happy we can be for the places where we were born and the opportunities we have had and will have and that we could make this journey together.

Nice to have been able to feel that deep inside. What do we propose as not even being a ‘pinhead’ of the population on this earth? Why we make ourselves upset about to many things and do we worry? We may not be happy, no, we have to.

Gangey Gruma (Frans Captijn)

Captijn InsightCatalyst in developing tranquility & in-sight to get in a sustainable way real connection, purpose, pleasure and flow in life, love, family, business, career and work again.