‘And then I cried,
till my name was LOVE’
This book is a poetic rite of passage, my own life adventure in consciousness and a discovery of what love is.
It’s a door into my heart and what my work is about. A window into the interconnectedness of all—our healing, our relationships, our systems and communities—all interwoven, interbeing, interdependent.
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A prolog from the book
As a child my curiosity and joy of life were radiant. I had a lot of energy and I was constantly fascinated by nature and the world around me. I loved being close to both humans and animals. I would wake up early on Sunday mornings and prepare breakfast for the entire family. I would create hand written cards for my friends’ birthdays. Whenever I was in a group of friends, I would do everything to make sure there was no one left out and feeling lonely. Making others happy was the way I chose to channel my unending joy for life and inexhaustible vitality. I remember feeling like I was overflowing with joy and love.
This is the childhood I remember until my grandfather died when I was 15 years old after we had shared the same bedroom for two years. He was my best friend and companion and the only family member with whom I had been able to establish a deeply nourishing connection.
I started to notice much more about the world around me once he was gone. I noticed the chaos at home, the oppression at school, the lies my friends told themselves and each other, the ways I was struggling in my relationships, and the many small daily cruelties adults did not mind indulging themselves in. The more I noticed, the more I reacted. The more I reacted, the worse my internal suffering got until it resulted in depression and anxiety at age 21. By that time, I had already left home: Istanbul. My world had collapsed, and I left its ruins behind—escaping the harsh reality of an unhappy life in an increasingly oppressive country.
I could easily sum up my internal state at that point in my life in one word: confused. I simply didn’t understand. I did not understand why people seemed so inflexible about their religious beliefs, why they seemed willing to get into a fight to defend their soccer team, why fathers could kill their daughters to protect their family name after their daughters had gotten raped. I did not understand why some politicians lied, why corruption was accepted as the norm, why some teachers were authoritarian and mean, and why my parents did not seem to be aware of a lot of the things that were simply driving me mad.
I also did not understand myself. How was it that my grandpa was gone and I was feeling extremely lonely? How was it that I did not want to live anymore? How could I get so upset and angry over certain things? How could being aware of unfairness and injustice was turning me into a bitter and cynical person? Why had I lost all desire to get out of bed? And since when had I stopped looking at the night sky in awe and wonder?
But the days would come when I would once again look at the sky with the same awe and wonder—in a way I had never known or expected.