Hot swimming pools, sunbathing and full relax :)

GEOTHERMAL HOT POTS  

Going to the hot Icelandic swimming pools outdoors with hot pots is like an addiction. When the sun is strong it gives you a feeling of being somewhere at the Mediterranean Sea, doesn't matter if the air or the water has 38-42°C. The pleasure and fun is so big!

Last days, almost 1 month since the end of April, it was so sunny every day, beautiful Icelandic summertime! Even it's 10°C outside, the air is so dry because of the geothermal water, tectonic rifts and Golf-stream, so it is really warm here!

I am feeling like a dolphin, water is my natural habitat.. just like in my childhood: I didn't want t go out of the river, now I enjoy the hot water of outdoor swimming pools and don't want to go out of the pool. I go there once or even twice a day. It's such a great fun! And it's great place to sunbath, my skin is very brown now, it looks like I was back from some Mediterranean country.. :))) I've never expected to be so tanned in Iceland!
I also love to observe the people when I am there, Icelanders and the foreigners, kids and old, just to learn more about the Icelandic lifestyle.



SWIMMING POOLS EVER DAY

I met my Italian maestro at one of the outdoor pools. Hmm.. in fact he met me in a hot pot. It was very sunny Sunday in late April, and was quite crowded there. While he was passing from one hot pot area to another just spotted me and intuitively decided to sit next to me in the hot water.. And after few minutes of silence he started a nice conversation that lasted for hours.. He wanted to see me after the pool and I felt in the same way, we were having such a nice and cheerful chat.. Feeling to be friends from the very beginning.

We continued to walk to down town from Vesturbaer pool together, I was with my bike and he gave me an apple, very good organic one..  We went for a delicious dinner together to my favourite Kex Hostel passing by his place situated in Moroccan style house at Tjörnin lake. And even later, we had a walk by the sea to watch the sunset after 22.. It was such a cheerful and harmonious encounter,  so nice and natural, we had so many interests in common: the same sensitivity.. seeing the world in astonishingly similar way. When we were at the pool he even proposed me that I could stay at his place for the next 3 weeks until he's in Iceland.. I hesitated and rejected this offer politely, even I wanted to move out so quickly it wouldn't be good to live together not knowing each other that much.. Still I had this stereotype in my head that all the Italians are too much crazy about women in general.. so I didn't think about involving myself more in this story on that first day.

And yes, he texted me the next morning and we started to meet regularly, after two days I was almost living at his place, big old-style apartment just by the Tjörnin lake. Beautiful sunlight was reflected over the lake. He just came back to Iceland for the series of concerts, straight from Rome, although he's from the north of Italy..

Yesterday, we just say goodbye at the same pool where we met for the first time. Just short meeting in a hot pot one hour before the sunset. The light was so nice and intense. He was very tired after the long days of rehearsals, this time Mahler symphony, so we didn't have a dinner together. Yes, it was the last goodbye. Maestro will be back in the middle of August, 2,5 month is quite a long time and life goes on.. That's why I was feeling a little bit sad about it..

SELF-DEVELOPMENT

I am meditating regularly when I go to the pool, practising thankfulness and sending more positive thoughts to this beautiful world around me.
And I feel free again. Now I would like to learn how to keep this feeling, how to keep my freedom to myself and not commit myself too intensively when I just start to be in a relationship.. I'd like to maintain the balance and harmony. I just started to read a new post in one of my favourite blogs for self-development, and this is exactly what I need to learn: accept myself completely and do not try to change myself in order to be loved and accepted by others, do not struggle to find true love.. That's new challenge and new life.


And one more important thing: non-violent communication with myself and other people. I'm listening to Marshall Rosenberg lectures and reminding myself about being in contact with my own needs. 

'We are conscious that the root of feelings are needs. Behind every feeling there is a need. Certain feelings tell us that there's obstruction in our thinking.  (...) Anger, depression, guilt and shame. Those feelings are very valuable, they tell us that at this moment I am not directly connected to my needs.'
'Let's connect our heart with needs because needs give us the most power with people (not over people). To bring people attention to our needs that not being met. It increases people's joy of giving to us.'
'All needs are universal. Every human being in the world has the same needs.'

So, as Marshall Rosenberg says: let's be courageous to try many new things in life: 'You never know what you want until you get it'.