The wind is blowing my hair but I don't mind. Not this time. This time it's okay. I am slowly turning my head to the right. Trees. I am smiling. Now I am turning my head to the left. Trees. I chuckle a bit. I am taking couple of steps forward. I look down. I am stepping on weird square-shaped stones but I don't mind. They look pretty to me. The stones are gone. Now it's wood under my feet but I can't feel it because I am wearing shoes. I take off my shoes then my socks. I go couple of steps barefoot. I am moving slowly. I am not in a hurry. I stop because I reached the end of the pier. I look around. Everything is quiet. I can only hear the wind playing among the trees and the birds talking to each other. My mind is not that peaceful. I have things to figure out about my future. Who doesn't? I am taking a deep breath. My thoughts starts to slow down. I take off my jumper around my waist and place it carefully on the edge of the pier. I roll up the sleeves of my trousers and sit down on the piece of cloth. My feet touch the water. First it feels cold but a bit later it is just perfect. I take a look around again. And again. I see the water. I find it funny. The wind is surfing on the top of it. It's making ruffles. I see a dragonfly just now. It is blue. I like blue. Blue is so warm and pleasant for my eyes. It was just a second. Now it is gone. Now I notice a leaf bubbling around. It is yellow like autumn left it behind. It is alone but doesn't seem lonely. It seems just fine. I look at my feet in the water. I am streching my toes like I would like to reach something. I am slowly moving my legs up and down making small waves. I can feel the water running through my toes. I close my eyes for a second. I imagine my friends there playing in the water. I can almost hear their laughter. For a second, I would like to share this moment with them but then I realize, quiet is not the same for everyone. I open my eyes. The scenery is beautiful. I am smiling now. I am alone but I am not lonely.

These are my feelings from yesterday when I spent a lovely day in a cottage next to a lake. Being here in Finland for nine month now, made me see the things around me. Moreover, it made me see the beauty in them. Often times I saw everything around me and I appreciated them. I felt lucky to be able to experience everything that has happened to me in the past years and yet something was missing as I realize it now. I do believe that it was the true beauty of being alone and not feeling lonely at the same time. My life is taking me to a lot of places and after a while I just learned how to enjoy my own company. At least I thought I did until it took me to Finland. Being alone last year and being alone now is two completely different feeling. I like being with myself now more. After all, I am the person who I spend my whole life with. Finland teached me how to create a deeper connection between the nature and myself. Don't get me wrong, it did not happen overnight nor did I woke up one day feeling 'Uh, I have a deeper connection now with the nature'. It would be silly. Rather this was a feeling that builded up inside me little by little without even noticing it but after a while I started to feel the impact. I really like mornings. I liked them before coming here, too. My whole day has a different mood if I give myself time in the morning to be alone. No distractions from the outside world. Just me with uncombed, pinned-up hair in my pajamas. Doddering in the flat, going to the bathroom and the kitchen. I often stop in front of our massive window and I look out. It's either green or white, dark or light. I prefer light as I learned about myself. Everything is sleeping outside or at least it seems like it. Depending on my mood, if I'd like to immerse myself in quiet I just make my breakfast in peace but there are days when I'd like to listen to music or podcast.
After breakfast if I have a lot in mind, I bring out my bullet journal and take some time with it. Writing out my thoughts and keeping track with everything that's important to me is another thing that I started to do here. I can not tell you how much of a good impact it has on me. Sorting my thoughts out and having a clear mind is essencial for me to be productive day after day. Actually seeing that I have done exercise almost every day in a month is something that makes me feel good about myself and also motivates me to keep doing it. It's also shown if I have skipped a whole week though. Time flies so fast and I wouldn't be able to hold myself countable without my bullet journal.
Speaking of exercise, a lot of people do some kind of daily activities here despite of the age. I see little kids, teenagers and older generations gathering together for their own health. Every time I see them, it just amazes me. Seeing it this often made me realize that I also need to do more for my own health and treat my body as a temple so I started to exercise more and I am conscious about the food I'm eating as well. I can safely say that I am more healthy now than I have ever been in my life.

These are just couple of things that Finland teached me about myself but there are so much more I can't even make a list. Coming to this country was a great decision. I would even say I do believe everyone should come to Finland at least once in their life and spend some time here. It really does teach you a lot about yourself, the world and not to mention about discipline. Also, I am sure you leave the country with at least one new friend: yourself.

For closing this post let me share with you a part of a nice poem that I recently found from a Finnish writer, Marja-Liisa Vartio. This part really touched me, I felt like she was writing about me. Unfortunately I couldn't find the exact date of releasing this poem but it was around 1960 which just makes it even more unbelievable to me.

The Woman and Landscape

"I comb my hair this side and that,
from morning till night I comb my hair,
for the parting is not right,
for this stiff and long hair of mine
won't fall smoothly on one side of the other.
There's a mirror in my hand, but it doesn't show
my face.
The mirror doesn't give me my face.
When I raise it to eye level,
I see only a landscape,
only a mountain, water, plateau and horizon,
only black and red rivers crossing the plateaus,
only a landscape resting behind my shoulder.
I've changed places, I've sat against the airy void,
but when I raised the mirror to eye level,
there was only a landscape there.
Where could I go, I the hair-trimmer, I the mirror-holder;
wherever I went, the landscape followed me in the mirror."

The harder you work, the luckier you get!

Klementina