English Writing By Non-native Speakers Of English Group Forum About myself ...

Dear all,
I'm a 43 year old woman living in Europe.
My passions are: reading, writing, poetry, blogging, languages, nature, walking, making friends. Curious? Who am I? That is a very short question which I'll provide with an extensive answer! According to our family tales, I was born on October 20, 1964, a foggy tuesday morning, at 8.15 a.m. in Brasschaat, a small town in the north of the province of Antwerp. My earliest childhood I gladly spent with my dearest grandfather (my mother's dad), very much his own person, who stimulated me to develop my own strong will… this gave me a lot of self confidence, however, also stimulated the inevitable misunderstandings with the local nuns, at the time I first entered one of our local kindergartens... Now I'm still grateful to my grandfather (1900 - 1977) for the feeling of selfconscienceness he provided me with. The education that I received from him, has given me the courage to choose my own path in life. In hindsight, I already knew as a child what I wanted in life: from my childhood on, I have a large interest in what thrives and motivates people during their lives. This curiosity, I also displayed in school and in my friendships with other children. If there were some things that could drive me mad as a child, it would be petty schoolground fights or school bullies. Let's say that the underdog always could count on my support… I am a person with multiple interests. During my teens I already had some knowledge of alternative medicine and was familiar with a few of it's disciplines, because of my uncles is an alternative (holistic) general practioner. As a teenager it was my dream to be able to practise alternative medicine, because I myself have benifited much from it. From the age of 14 I have seldom or never taken antibiotics and I want to keep it this way. At home (the book) 'the little doctor' by Dr. Vogel was frequently consulted or else the 'herbal lexicon' by Mellie Uyldert. Sometimes I also tried to find out whether plants from our garden were medicinal or not… The basis of my current interests were already laid during my youth. In the meantime they have expanded a lot: Reiki, healing hands, reiki and Lightwork, homeopathy, bachflowers, reflexology, metamorphosis through massage, hypnosis, ayurveda, magic, alchemy, sorcery, wicca, holistic counselling, foreign languages, art, music, (Reggae and Belgian bands) poems, literature and reading and currently: translating a variety of texts on various subjects. And of course, I love to write myself a lot too, otherwise this wouldn't be my writer's site. Taking a close look on this list, I can only come to the conclusion that only maths do not captivate me in this way;) During highschool I had my eyes more set on foreign languages and old languages like Greek and Latin, in which the spirituality struck me like lightning! After my highschool graduation, I studied for 2 years at the department of Germanic Philology at the then stil called 'Ufsia' (Universitary faculties Sint Ignatius Antwerp, now incorporated in the university of Antwerp ) I would have stayed on there, because I wanted to be absorbed in my favourite languages English and German… Because of the extreme political ideas of some students and the lack of communicative and didactic skills of some professors, I then have taken the decision of taking up a study in a different direction… My motivation to study languages was as it happens, promote the communication between several communities, to have a good basis to educate children in a child friendly manner and to be able enjoy literature… to make a long tale short, put things gently, I could not connect with students who (at that time) studied German in order to achieve political ideals instead of for love of the language and didactic purposes. Fortunately I had a better relation with the student pastors of the UNIVERSITY PARISH, who although I was not at all religious, they then gave me the necessary inspiration and motivation I needed later on to focus entirely on my current profession: social worker. My knowledge of languages in any case, has come in handy, being a social worker! While studying to be a social worker, as a matter of fact, I came in contact with the spiritual texts of Khalil Gibran but what at first seemed mysterious to me, now still captivates me. In hindsight, my study has given me a good background for a holistic approach of people whom I counsel during my professional occupations. To use a holistic approach still is very important to me. Above I listed a complete list of numerous alternative ways of medicine and esoteric interests. Of some disciplines I have certificates or I have obtained degrees (reiki mastery). To my great stupefaction I come to the conclusion I have followed courses in very diverse disciplines and that subjects like magic and alchemy were not exactly ignored at home… As a small little girl I have witnessed my father busy manufacturing a pendulum or making an apparatus for making Kyrlianfoto's (aura - photography). (Al)chemical experiments also were no stranger to him or vice versa ;)... I've always liked burning incense and lightning candles. As a result I've build up a rather big stack of both items in my house and I'm in search of my own rituals. At present I am reading about magic, wicca and sorcery in a solitary manner in order to continue my life path. After due consideration I feel mostly attracted to the magical side of living, because using attributes and other parafernalia attracts me a 'little'. I will never become a real witch, because according to me, magic cannot be called through the use of tools, but rather is the result of your own mindpower. As you can notice I am certainly very busy developing new ideas… I want to share my knowledge with others and using this site I want to create a safe haven for other also interested in spiritual, paranormal, magical topics and alternative medicine. However, I want to state very clearly that I myself don't treat no customers nor patients. I only want to share information and am as a matter of fact not legally allowed to treat customers nor patients.