Category Archives: way too personal

Thanks Marijke, thanks Klaas.

Last week we said farewell to a friend. Marijke died after fighting cancer for two years. Her husband Klaas and Ton were best friends at university. They were roommates for several years and stayed in touch afterwards. When someone you know well for such a long time (over 20 years for Ton, 12 years since I [...]
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Bye, bye oboe

When I was nine my parents brought home an oboe. I knew what it was, since both my parents played in an orchestra and music was a big deal in our family. They borrowed the oboe from their orchestra for a week to see if I liked it or not. I held the black wooden instrument [...]
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Somethings happening (50)

While I was in Switzerland, my friend Brigitte gave me a treatment. She is an osteopath and during the week I spent at her and her family’s house, she stuck many needles in my skin, three times in total. Don’t ask me what she treated exactly (I’m not even sure myself), but it has something [...]
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Why did I stop? (14)

Sometimes I wish I was better at drawing. I often have ideas in my head that I ’see’ when I think about it, but can’t translate that into images so I can share it with others. The other day I was reflecting on why I’m not that good at drawing and came to the conclusion [...]
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Mindfulness and ACT (5)

Since 6 weeks I participate in a 9 week self-help course on how to live ‘the full life’. The course has been offered by the relatively new Psychology department at Twente University (based in my home town; where I got my degree from a different faculty) and they want to test the effectiveness of this [...]
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Being introvert (3)

Today I came across an article about introverts in the workplace. The article says something about the preference in general for characteristics that come with extraverts, but that organizations should become more aware of the skills introverts can bring to work: analytic, observant, not judging immediately. Some other characteristics: introverts need more ’self-time’ to recover [...]
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Taking what I do serious (2)

This week I’ve come to realize that a lot of the time I don’t take my work seriously. In the sense that I’m always playing down what I do. I have a hard time being convinced that what I do has value. This realization hit me in the face and could easily knock me out if [...]
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The story of my teeth

When I was eight years old I had a bicycle incident. It wasn’t spectacular. I was cycling a bit on the sidewalk when I made a manoeuvre which made my front wheel turn too far and block my forward motion full stop, resulting in me getting to know the non-plasticity of the pavement. The unlucky [...]
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Now here’s something to watch

I’ve just finished watching all chapters of RiP: A remix manifesto. This is a brilliant documentary by Brett Gaylor about issues of copyright in the information age, mashing up the media landscape of the 20th century and shattering the wall between users and producers. Here’s the intro, as an appetizer. Watch all the other chapters online. With [...]
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Big plans for 2009

But before I’ll tell you about those plans, I thought I’d share with you that peer pressure took its toll early on in 2009. I got my first skiing lesson from a dear friend. More about my plans to come!
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