Here I'm sitting now, it's 09:13 am, Monday morning, June 26th 2023, and in 7 minutes the boarding for my flight from Zurich to Mumbai will start. I don't know when I will return to Switzerland, I am holding a one-way ticket in my hands. I am sitting in the middle of an Indian family in the departure area of the terminal and somehow feel safe, although the Indian mum is looking at me quite skeptically. I am writing this article and want to reflect on my feelings that I have experienced during the last 24 hours. I find that often we deal too little consciously with our feelings and this moment in my life is an excellent opportunity to do this as an example. There is enough to write about it - believe me, it’s enormous what you can feel in 24 hours.

Love

Exactly 24 hours ago, my feelings, if I had to describe them in colors, were bright orange, pulsating red and sunny golden yellow. Warm colors have enveloped me into honey yellow light, I was caressed by sun rays like a sunflower. I felt I was very loved. I was wrapped in the arms of my loved one, his wonderful smell, his kisses and our lingering in a golden ball of light made me happy deep inside. Love whispers to you that you are in the right place, that you are connected, that you can surrender to the wave of happiness, because this moment is simply perfect.

Everything feels right

You flow with the golden energy and feel: "Oh, how much I am loved and how much I feel love in me." It is a beautiful feeling to be able to immerse yourself into this highest and most beautiful of all feelings and to bathe in it like in warm water. It is the most beautiful gift in life that I know.

Love has also been in every hug I have received in these special 24 hours of my life from people who have said goodbye to me. I love to be embraced by people and to feel the physical manifestation of love. I enjoyed each of the 9 hugs given to me to the fullest and felt the love of these people for me in their arms.

Sadness

Farewells make the preciousness of life clear to you. Tears show you the value of what you are crying about, and also the depth of the loss, because it hurts so much. The feeling of being alone is spreading, the severity of the loss weighs on my shoulders and the colors around me start swirling in crippling black and dense, dark, opaque blue. Clouds start sliding in front of the sun and I bend on my chair, at home, alone, and feel the emptiness and sadness without crying. The farewell of my loved one, without whom I will now continue my life path at the other end of the world. How it hurts.

The farewell of my neighbor, who not only lives next to me, but enriches my life with plates full of cakes on my doorstep and beautiful flowers in the mailbox and cheerful voice messages with invitations for dinner. When I return back to Switzerland, she will no longer live here and the meals together with her family will no longer take place. Oh, how this farewell hurts. Changes can make you sad, they can make you aware of how good your life is and how much you are about to lose when you reshuffle the cards of your life. Gulp.

Fear

This uncertainty. This incredibly great uncertainty. And this ambiguity, like a jump into cold water. Liquid, exploding shreds of color swirl around me in all shades, dark colors predominate, and repeatedly painfully hit my cheeks like shrapnels. I also feel the fear physically, it’s wrapping itself around my heart like an iron band. The nasty question that mercilessly haunts me the day before my departure: "What the hell were you thinking about the whole thing? What the hell, please, did you think? Taking 12 months an unpaid Sabbatical and flying to India?"

The inner critics shows up

My inner critics rears up and continues to torment me: "Why are you flying to India - why India? And then all alone? You have no plan what to expect there! You totally underestimate the challenges of this country! You hand over your apartment into someone else's hands and when you return, you won't be able to feel comfortable here again."

When packing my travel backpack, anxious worries are haunting me. I am constantly tormented by the question of whether I have made the right selection of objects and clothes, whether I have forgotten something important, whether I have packed the right things. When packing, I realize that I'm gearing up for an adventure that I don't even know. I realize that I leave all familiar people behind, leave my beautiful surroundings behind, leave my routine behind that gave me stability ... I just leave EVERYTHING and EVERYONE behind and set off into the unknown... a few brain cells from the Stone Age in my head are shouting at me that this was a highly shitty idea and that I may never come back alive from this journey without protection and social affiliation! Well, fear doesn't always have something to do with reality... but unfortunately that doesn't make it any less scary.

Gratitudet

In exuberant abundance, however, above all I have felt one thing in the last 24 hours to the present second: gratitude. Gratitude is like a pink scent that permeates everything with its silky scented smell and envelops you in a cloud of lightness and purity. Gratitude feels like a mixture of tears of happiness and amazement at so many good things in life and the certainty that all of this is not self-evident. It is nothing but an exclusive gift from the universe to you.

Do you know jam jar moments?

I like to collect jam jar moments. These are moments that are so beautiful that I don't want to forget them anymore and therefore put them in a transparent imaginary jam jar and preserve them there for eternity. Then I can take them off the shelf at any point in time and look at them again and enjoy their beauty. Within the last 24 hours I have collected a lot of jam jar moments.

I'll give you an example: I'm sitting in the plane on the runway in Zurich and we're waiting for take-off. On the screen at the seat in front of me there are commercials about watches and perfumes. I don't want to look at them, I'm not in the mood and close my eyes. When I am opening my eyes again, the following sentence just flickers across the screen:

«"Every trip is a challenge and a step out of the comfort zone. What the step is worth taking for are the unforgettable moments (Swiss Air)." (Swiss Air).»

My seat neighbor, an Indian man from Mumbai with whom I had previously briefly spoken to and who is informed about my travel motivation, nudges me and says: "This message was for You." Exactly THIS is a jam jar moment. The universe waves in your face and gently shouts at you that it loves you and supports you with all its heart. 

What feelings have you experienced in the last 24 hours? Take a minute to look back on your life and think about what situations you have experienced and with which kind of feelings you perceived them. This will train your self-awareness and allow you to get to know and appreciate your emotional richness better. All your feelings are valuable, just like you!