#12: A starting entrepreneur in surf — Reflections on Life, vaccination, and pushing the frontier.

Whatever I do, it’s Patience that keeps me close to it’s teachings. Patience in getting to where I want to be in work, Patience in living with an eccentric landlord at the moment, and Patience for whatever future I envision for myself. Patience for love. Patience with the wicked. Patience with myself.

My eccentric hippie landlord sometimes talks my brain to a mashed potato. He is smart and he tests my intelligence, and mán, he can talk. And I have been listening to his words, so much, that I catch myself phrasing things like he does (like ‘because, mán..’ with emphasis on ‘á’). He cracks me up too, as his humor can be razor-sharpe. He’s a great cook. I find him adorable with animals, and non-conformistic in his ways with people (including myself), which is interesting. He teaches me words like ‘capricious’. I like that.

Some days ago, on July the 6th, I got my Pfizer/BionTech vaccination. This, in the German Ruhrgebiet produced cocktail, carries a tiny bit of SARS-Cov-19 or whatever the official name of this virus is. I felt hazy the first night. I fel a bit out of energy the day after. Dried up. It passed soon. I drank, and drank, and drank a lot of water. I took some paracetemol on night one and two after the jab.

Why I took the vaccination? Here’s my reasoning. Due to the global spread of this virus, I ought to think that one day, I will have to face this virus anyway. Whether it is through a contaminated armchair in a church, or a napkin I pick up from the floor at work, or the warmest most loving hug I have with a friend who just got back from a short holiday in Ibiza. It will happen. It’s like the flu. It’s among us. It is a new virus, and it can kill. Not likely to be me, but someone else maybe. Someone not as young, fit and fortunate as me. Someone with a history of lung disease, or an allergy, or someone who’s obese (whatever got him/her to become obese can be a random outcome of the dice life threw at that individual; it would be cruel to judge that person for this). The freedom I have to make the decision to fight the virus now, make antibodies, and potentially, lower the chance of getting the disease and infect others, or ignore the letter from the NHS and do exactly the same when I accidentally catch it; to that freedom I have been granted with, I do not want to be indifferent. Why not now, and help stopping the spread?

I’m no conspiracy thinker. I just do not believe mankind is organized enough, and cruel enough to do something of this magnitude, to manipulate a global population. Media might blow things up, but hospitalized death cases, and ICU numbers do not lie. Blaming it on the industry? Like some heads of a Board of Directors, sit behind their desk, stroking their white furry cats, with a big smile, conspiring against humanity? No. I just want to believe in the good. So I believe in good. And doctors, in my eye, are good people. Because most of them, and I believe the very large part of them treat people out of empathy, not out of their own financial interest.

Now, do not get me wrong. I am not agreeing with how Western medicine works in all its entirety. Having learned first hand from PhD graduates in Ayurveda in Mysore, India, how the body is a balance, and how adding chemicals, can affect that balance badly, I am very aware that the Western medicine way-of-working often ‘covers the symptoms’ rather than ‘treating the root cause of the problem’, and by adding more ‘artificial chemicals’ to the body, creates more imbalance, leading to new symptoms. This can, without proper adjustments to lifestyle and nutrition, become a vicious cycle. But with infecteous deseases that’s different perhaps. Ayurveda doesn’t claim that it can cure like Western medicine can. Science and philosophy need to strengthen each other. And I have faith in this bond.

I started this blog post entry with patience writing it with a capital ‘p’. And, more than patience, it’s acceptance, and the non-controlling of what is not in your control that carries the fruit of tranquility. Faith in good people sooths the soul, and brings forth more Love than hate. The ancient roman philosophers keep me close to their teachings as well. And, as I find these words so very compelling and sound, I like to finish this post on Life, and my ‘crown disease Covid-19’ vaccination, by pushing the frontier, and bring you a wisdom quote about what it means to be a good human, coming from Roman Emperor and philosopher Marcus Aurilius:

‘Be fatalistic towards the past and present. Cultivate qualities like sincerety, dignity, industriousness, and sobriety. Curb your arrogance, rise above pleasures and pains, stop lusting after popularity, and control your temper. Stop grumbling, be considerate and frank, be temperate in manner and speech, and carry yourself with authority.’

[source: A guide to the good life by William B. Irvine]

Take it easy, and get your groove (!) on.

IB.