Those Whom We Envy

Posted on April 7, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

A fifty-five year old man glanced out of the window and saw his neighbour, who was the same age as him, going for a walk. “He has it goodis lucky”, he sighed. “He can enjoy his retirement already, and I still have to work.” “Don’t you know that he’s nearly blind?” I informed him. “That’s why he is no longer worksworking.” “I didn’t know that”, said the former, and pondered.

“This reminds me of what my nephew told me. He said: “When’When I park in front of the school with my big car, then many of his fellow pupils say: ‘You have it goodare lucky – with those fancy wheels.’ Sometimes I would like to answer one of them: ‘At least you still have a father.’ But mostly I keep quiet.”.’”

“That reminds me of an old friend”, I replied. “I phoned him recently. ’I’ll be in your area tomorrow. Could we perhaps meet up again?’ We agreed on a time. I looked forward to seeing him again. ’Is your girlfriend coming, too?’ I asked. She is a delightful young woman. The two of them are a wonderful couple altogether. My partnerships were never as balanced and harmonious. To be honest: It hurt me a little to thinkcompare my own situation with theirs; I live alone. ’I’ll ask her if she’ll come along‘, said the friend. – ’This is a singles’ meeting‘, were his first words when we saw each other again. ’My girlfriend and I split up earlier today.’”

Merciful

Posted on March 24, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

We talked about music. “The ear is merciful”, she said. “It hears what is meant, and not what is actually played.” The woman who said this was a piano teacher. She had taught pupils for decades and had thought about how ear and brain process the music. “The ear is merciful”, I repeated. “How do you mean that?” She said: “When we hear music as an audience, then we blot out the mistakes. We hear what is meant. What arrives in our consciousness is the complete melody. The artists and teachers pay attention to the mistakes, but the audience hears the music.”

In the Country of Begonia

Posted on March 17, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

As a traveller I once had to cross the country of Begonia. They really have a very strange custom there.

That is to say, on the streets and pathways of the country they don’t have any signs which could help you to find your way from village to village or from one town to the next. But at every crossroad there are flowers which you can ask in order to get directions from them. According to the way in which they give directions, one differentiates between point-around guides, point-away guides and point-toward guides.

The point-toward guides are especially pleasant for all those travellers who simply want to get to their destination as fast and as comfortably as possible. They tell you kindly where you should go.

The point-away guides are often crude and blunt in their speech. They can sound very spiteful. Nonetheless, they can also be very useful. They tell you where you should definitely not go, so that you will keep misfortune and trouble at bay.

Last, but by no means least, are the point-around guides who speak to you in a peculiar way. They speak in riddles. They start to advise you to go one way and then continue with the other direction. They tell you about the destination, but not how you reach it. They ask you questions rather than give you answers. They tell you things, the sense of which you will not understand until later. Some travellers see what the point-around guides say as useless stuff. Yet others only find their destination through these guides.

Roadhouse Talks

Posted on March 10, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

The furniture van stopped halfway. We took a break at a rest area. I got out along with the removal men. I was freshly separated from my wife, and was suffering from the parting and loneliness. We spoke about partnership, separation and the resulting house moves. “You know why me and my wife get along so well?” asked the removal man. “Because we hardly ever see each other.”

Therapy

Posted on February 17, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

She complained about the neighbours’ children who were talking too loudly in the corridor between the flats. She complained that the staircase had been cleaned with a three day delay last week. She complained about the garlic smell in the house yesterday. She complained about the neighbours’ guests, who had come back home late and let the door shut loudly. She complained about a dog that had shaken the water out of its fur on a rainy day. This had left brown stains on the wall next to the door.

“I would like to tell you something”, her neighbour said to her one day. “If you continue like this for a while, you will become a hard and bitter old woman who nobody likes, who everyone avoids and to whose funeral no one will go.”

From that day on she was polite to all her neighbours.

Treasure Hunting

Posted on February 10, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

“In a land deep in your heart, there once lived a people which was as happy or unhappy as any people, and as rich or poor as any people, and as satisfied or longing as any people, and among them lived a boy who had a dream which many boys have: He wanted to search for a hidden treasure. Now this may not seem so peculiar, but this boy was lucky enough – or would you not call this lucky? – not only to have the dream of such a treasure but in fact to have found, in a secret hiding place in the garden, a key to just such a treasure. He had the key, the treasure belonged to him! But how should he find the treasure now, since he did not know where it was hidden? The boy sat down pondering.”

An Angel for your Way

Posted on February 3, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

Two centuries ago there lived in our region a man who came to be renowned because many miracles occurred around him. People who had been declared to be incurably sick became healthy again after he had prayed for them. He also had a particular custom. When he bid farewell to someone he often said: “I’m sending an angel with you on your way”. This surprised many people. On the one hand there were already in those times many that did not believe in angels. And of the others many may have said: “How can he send out angels? For angels will only follow the word of God.” I don’t know if this can be true. I even doubt that such people know anything about angels. I just know that many people who visited him took with them a deep peace, and that they knew from then on that they were protected. Therefore I don’t care what other people may think if I say these very words to you: I’m sending an angel with you on your way.

Island Map

Posted on January 27, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

“Look here”, said the old seafarer and rolled out a map. “This here is the Island of the Blissful.” His grandson regarded it attentively while the man stood up and took another map from the shelf. “And this here”, he continued while he unrolled this second map, “is the Island of the Ill-Fated.” “But that’s exactly the same island!” exclaimed the young man. “Perhaps it is the same, and perhaps it is not”, said the old man in a mysterious tone. “But I can tell you this much: The maps were drawn by two different cartographers. Both have visited the island. One went to all the bleak and desolate mountains on the island and measured all the spaces. The other went to all the beautiful, fertile places, and measured the island from there. Look here: they have also drawn in the paths along which they wandered. Whoever makes his way with the first map, looks from one beautiful peak to the next, and the dreary areas are hidden by the beautiful mountains. However, whoever makes his way with the second map, looks from one desolate peak to the next, and the beautiful scenery landscape remains hidden behind them.”

The Seafarer

Posted on January 20, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

He was a seafarer. He sailed with freight ships to different countries along the coasts of Europe, Africa and South America. I asked him if he had ever experienced a bad storm. “I have experienced many storms”, he said. “I have experienced some storms where I thought: “We will never survive this!” And he stood before me and had survived, and could tell me about the adventures he had experienced.

A Parable

Posted on January 6, 2014 by Stefan Hammel

One day they asked the master: “What do you do if you run out of parables?” “I tell a parable about a man who ran out of parables”, the master replied. “Tell us this parable!” his disciples begged. “Not now”, the master replied. “For as long as there is this one, I have not yet run out of parables.”

HYPS

Blog by Stefan Hammel

Category Archives: Personal development