I asked to my friend and artist Brian McCafferty to create this painting based on a photograph I’ve taken earlier this year back in Namibia, whilst we were making an air ballooning tour in the Sossusvlei region. It was a difficult moment for me and I needed to have another perspective. Thank you to Brian for this magnificent work.
I want to share some of those thoughts and emotions that this painting gives to me. The empowering realization I had and why this is important to me.
Deserts are places where the conditions are extreme and life can’t develop the same way as in the rest of the planet. Generally very hot during the day, generally very cold during the night; there is no water, only sand, wind and sun.
I was contemplating that powerful and incredible view from an air balloon, thousand of miles away from home. Yes the kind of experience one doesn’t have every day back home, does one?
And in this air balloon, surrounded by other people, I realized that the real desert in that moment, in that place, wasn’t the one I was contemplating, but in me in my heart, I was carrying it with me. This is one of the worse realization one can have; you are in a group with other people. Alone. You’re not technically alone. But you are.
The place reputed for being deserted suddenly becomes something else, like a refuge, a much preferable place to be, than the one you are.
You are in one of the most beautiful places in the world and suddenly you just want to go home. but you have no way out of there.
You have no other choice but to stay there and dive into the contemplation of that marvelous landscape, coming to understanding that place, generally mysterious, sharing your secret with the sand.
And finally you understand. Yes you understand. In reality you are not alone. You have the desert, yourself, your heart and you have the knowledge.
You are alone only if you allow yourself to be alone.
It’s not the people around you that make you feel that way, but you.
You and only you have the control over your life. You can decide to run away and fail or you can decide to stay and enjoy what can be enjoyed. In the end of the day, you are the one that really matters to yourself.
I let some desert’s wisdom enter into my heart and continued my journey.
Breakfast with Max 