Our time here has come to an end and I'm glad about that. Even in this last week, I've been counting the days until we can move on. There are a thousand reasons why I don't feel comfortable here. Sometimes it's just good to move on and leave something behind without having to look at it again. And sometimes you have to get rid of something to get closure. But I have big problems with that. 

I have difficulties expressing myself whenever it's about me and especially when I'm not happy with something. I was not brought up to believe that I am worth and that I am allowed to name and defend my values to the outside world. I was taught to conform, to duck, to give priority to others and, if anything, to vent about it behind my back. Anyone who talks about others but not with them has never learned to express themselves. This person does not have a healthy way of expressing themselves. And this is me. 

How much anger, which should rightfully flow outwards, has built up and become stuck inside me? How much of it is still boiling inside me that cannot flow out in a healthy way and is poisoning my inner system? And how much do I feed this all with my lack of expressing myself? 

Healthy communication is particularly difficult, if not impossible, if it has never been learned. There is always fear. Fear of doing something wrong. Fear of saying something stupid. Fear of being wrong. And then there is anger, about not knowing how to do this, not being capable of doing it in a mature and healthy way. One thing is crystal clear, someone who values themselves never feels that they and their opinion are wrong. 

This topic stays with me, even when we are gone. 

I was primarily here to get things done. Doctor's appointments. Office hours. Meeting a friend. The doctor's visits were largely wasted time, they didn't provide any new insights. I am healthy, they say, but I don't feel like it. I feel tired, often overwhelmed by life and sometimes without every hope. I went to the office only four times. And I didn't meet the friend or talked to him. He doesn't even know I was here. 

This four weeks feel like wasted time. Expensive wasted time. 

So I leave Berlin with a lot of mixed feelings. But I also leave it with relief. I know that I have to return in a couple of months or maybe earlier, if work calls me. I am tied to this place, even if only loosely. In this time it feels more like being bound to hard to this reality. I hope I will be able to completely detach myself from this all in the near future.