William Shakespeare once said: “There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so”. Our thoughts can make and break anything in a split second. They can make the impossible possible. They can make something good, seem bad and something small, larger than life and vice versa. And yet, we are not our thoughts, we only have them. They’re ours, without a doubt and we are free to play with them any way we want. Like with the ‘Lego’ in the photograph above: by rearranging the Lego (our thoughts), we can create anything we want. This photo, by the way is made by Kevin Poulton. After he and I had contact, I discovered more of his creative photography. It’s definitely worth some of your time, especially when you are into Star Wars and up for a big smile: click here!

Yeah, what does make you happy? Such a simple question, right? Maybe even so simple, that it’s easily forgotten? Until of course sometime later (or even years) when you realize you’re caught up in all kinds of things, not entirely sure anymore if that really makes you happy. And then you wonder: who am I, what does make me happy? And even when you know, the question is: do you succeed in giving that enough attention? Anyway, simply by being still for a moment, to listen to your own breathing and by asking yourself that question: “What makes me happy?” you will start to bring peace to your mind. And from this peace an answer will present itself to you. And if it doesn’t, don’t force yourself, just smile at it. You can make the question smaller: “What would make me happy today, this morning or this moment?” It may be a very simple thing, the point is: Where focus goes, energy flows. You’ll start to focus on what matters to you and on something positive. Your actions will follow that focus. And from that point on you can explore until you have a clear answer to what makes you happy in any situation, and dance your way through life accordingly. Alright, maybe not dance, but flounder – or somewhere in between. Either way, to give you an inspirational kick start, do yourself a favor and watch this film. It alone will make you happy, if only for a moment.

Here’s a fun and interesting film about deception. For most of us the word deception has a negative connotation. To deceive someone or to be deceived is considered wrong, for it is dishonest. But that is not necessarily so. The magician Karl Germain (1878-1959) once said: “Magic is the only honest profession. A magician promises to deceive you and he does”. In this film you’ll see Swiss magician Marco Tempest using 3 iPods to deceive you or better: to create magic.

I love lullabies. Yesterday I stumbled upon this one, by My Brightest Diamond. It’s a wonderful song and video, filmed during a music festival in Berlin, august 2011. The filmmaker: “After the concert I finally dared to ask her what I wanted to ask her that morning, to sing us this lullaby that struck me down. It’s Sunday morning, a morning of hangovers. The whole hotel seems suspended in the air. We ask her to get to the bar, to make it sing for her, to sing for her son (for whom she had written this song). We erase ourselves. She, she doesn’t. After we’re done filming, I cry. She cries too.”

As kids we are care free, as adults we are (or try to be) responsible. So far so good. But many adults think that in order to be responsible, you must be serious. And so, in an attempt to be responsible all the time, they are serious all the time. Simply playing without trying to achieve anything, or laughing until your stomach hurts – such a common thing among kids – becomes a rarity. That’s too bad because playing is like meditation and laughter is a great stress relief. So I thought of a little ‘play’ exercise that will make you smile – and hopefully laugh out loud. All you need is a pen. You can ask someone to play with you but even when you’re alone, this will give you a fun moment. Alright here’s what you do: draw a little face on your finger and give the finger face a name, like Fred, Enrico, Isabella or Trudy. You can add titles like: Uncle or Miss or doctor etc.. Obviously your finger face can’t speak out loud, so you’ll have to do that for him/her. Preferably with a silly voice. And a French, Spanish or Russian accent alway works. Yes, don’t be shy – be silly. Like me, when I started a fight with my finger face, for he gave me a big mouth. Anyway, here’s some inspiration for drawing your perfect finger face. Go play, have fun and don’t worry, it’s a very responsible thing to do.

“If you worried about falling off the bike, you’d never get on”, said Lance Armstrong. The seven time Tour de France winner knows like no other that in order to win, you must focus on what you want, not on what you don’t want. As for Danny Macaskill… well, he for sure is focussing on what he wants. It’s amazing what he does with his bike, how he does it so precise and how he makes it look so easy.