Needing You, Needing Me

Needing You, Needing Me

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

When I looked you straight in the eye and told you that I didn’t need you; when I said I didn’t want your advice and when I insisted that I could do it on my own: I Lied.

Today I was reminded of how much one human being needs another to survive. Beyond the requirements for evolution, the human soul needs contact with another in order to survive. I need you as much as you need me and vice versa.

Last night I missed my old room. Sitting on my bed cross-legged, I closed my eyes and imagined myself surrounded by the glow in the dark stars that told me that I was in my old room. The duvet under me metamorphosed from pink swans to pastel pink roses and above me appears a ceiling fan, put there to cool down the hot African nights.
Should I wait until morning? I’ll see the light creep in through my huge window, hitting my crystal and spilling rainbow colours over my carpet. I’ll stretch my arm and turn on the radio before examining myself in the long mirror my dad saved from my old vanity table… around it will be all my photos of family, friends and loved ones. Above it might still be the map of the island I’m currently stuck in. Stepping outside, I can smell the fresh grass and feel its softness under my feet. Rocky will most probably try wrestling me for a hug or wrestle the other dogs for my attention.

The more I tried to imagine the house I once called a home, the more homesick I became and it was the sound of my own sobs that snapped me right back across the ocean into the bedroom I now call my own and that somehow felt colder than ever.
No matter how much I tossed and turned, I couldn’t block out the images that made me want to pack my suitcases get on the next flight out.
The faces of all the people that I miss tortured my resistance and when I could no longer take it: I called my Dad.

I suppose it’s a really stupid idea to call up the one person that you can easily contaminate with depression, not to mention how worried I’d leave him knowing how homesick I am. But taking a deep breath and finding my most courageous voice, I greeted my dad with “Hi Daddy… no I haven’t been up to much, I’ve just been missing you”.
It’s amazing how good you feel when someone recognises what you’re feeling. They recognise the message in your words and in your voice and bring it out from the depths of your mind by saying something like “I know baby, I have bad phases too”
At first your heart stops and you choke at the shock that someone is aware of your feelings followed by a huge sense of relief when you realise that they understand where you’re coming from.
I then realised how good it is to have dad around: to have someone who wants to listen and makes the effort to understand me. What a relief to know that someone cares enough about you to try and comprehend how your complex mind works? Dad then shared his thoughts and ideas with me and by the end of the conversation I realised that he had needed to hear my voice as much as I needed to hear his.

I’d barely walked into the office before I was dragged outside by my boss who proudly showed me the new sunscreens he’d put up on the windows. Before I could get out a compliment, he dragged me back into the office so he could brag about the new scanner that had just arrived and he challenged me to be the first to use it.
Standing below his hierarchy triangle, I failed to understand his need to impress me. And then the answer suddenly hit me like a ton of bricks: He needed me to recognise his efforts so he could feel more accomplished in his role. Already wishing I could kick the massive piece of junk out the window, I searched for my most sincere smile and congratulated him on the achievement of acquiring the darn thing for our office and even asked commended him on picking out a good model. He needed the motivation just as much as I needed him to ask me how my vacation was and be shown a little interest by my superior. To be told that I’d been missed for the week that I was gone might not even have been truly felt, however it gave me one hell of a start to the morning.

No matter how many times I get told that something I said or wrote made a positive difference: I still can’t help the overwhelming joy! The euphoric gratification!
Do I get a big head… of course I get my ego inflated!!! It makes me want to write more and attempt to reach more and more people. There is endless satisfaction in knowing that you made a positive change… it is so strong and addictive that it drives you to keep talking, sharing and writing the column with the intention to help someone else.

Today, gratitude came in form of an e-mail letting me know that my words were like the sprinkles of water onto a thirsty plant. At times, we all need just the basic words to help us get back on track. Gratitude is a compliment that humbles me; however it is its source that humbled me even more. Not to long ago, I looked upon this friend for words of wisdom. I asked for his guidance, studied his advice and my life was enriched by his experience…. Suddenly not too long after, I’m being thanked for the same compliment that I paid him.

No Wo(man) is an island, no soul was created to survive alone.

Whilst decisions and evolution depend solely on us, we depend on those around us to arise new questions, new options and stimulate our intelligence. They provide new ideas and different methods, helping us evolve through their understanding. A steady hand, a strong shoulder and different point of view is essential in all of our lives. This need is what creates the bonds of friendship around us and shows us how much we really need each other… even if it’s just to remind us of something we already knew, but just forgot.

The 18 Most Common Self-Defeating Behaviours in Business

The 18 Most Common Self-Defeating Behaviours in Business

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Although this work is not my own, the reason I publish it is because I consider the following to be important foundations to those who wish to succeed as business men and women:

1. Procrastinating: If you're always late on completing things, people stop relying on you; soon they start resenting you.

2. Getting involved with the wrong people: Yes, there are bad people in the world. If you keep giving them the benefit of the doubt, you'll be the one who has to clean up the mess.

3. Saying yes when you want to say no: It will result in burnout, loss of credibility, and loss of respect from others and yourself.

4. Assuming others don't want anything in return: It is human nature to almost always want something in return, even when people say they don't. Thinking ahead about what that might be can save you problems when others try to collect.

5. Playing it safe: The world is in a rapid state of change. Doing the same old thing over and over and expecting it to be good enough may turn out not to be sosafe after all.

6. Always having to be right: Know-it-alls who don't know what they're talking about are jerks, whereas know-it-alls who do know what they're talking about are merely asses. Always having to be right can create so much resentment that you'd better always be right, because you're building a constituency of people who can't wait to see you fall on your face.

7. Focusing on what others are doing wrong: This is a de-motivating habit. Focusing on what the other person is not doing makes it difficult for you to keep trying hard.

8. Not learning from your mistakes: Successful people don't make fewer mistakes than unsuccessful people, but they repeat fewer mistakes.

9. Talking when nobody's listening: This leads you to think that what you have said is going to be done, when in fact it's not. To make matters worse, you have to repeat the entire process. And this time you're going to be angry.

10. Taking things too personally: When people take criticism too personally, instead of seeing that it is about fixing a problem, the problem becomes larger and takes longer to fix.

11. Having unrealistic expectations: When you confuse what is reasonable with what is realistic (it's reasonable to want to re-engineer your business; it's not realistic to do it all at once), you set yourself up to fail.

12. Trying to take care of everybody: You can't take care of everybody and do a decent job. In attempting to take care of everyone, nobody, including yourself, will be satisfied.

13. Refusing to "chit chat": Politics, schmoozing, and small talk are all necessary in order to create connections needed to succeed.

14. Being envious of others: Teamwork is ruined when team members envy each other to the extent that they root against each other.

15. Quitting too soon: You have more control over trying or quitting than over success or failure. If you always quit, you'll never succeed; if you always try, you'll eventually succeed.

16. Letting fear run your life: You were bad at science and math. The Internet is coming whether you like it or not. If you let fear run your life, it just might run you out of your job.

17. Not moving on after a loss: When you spend more time NOT cutting your losses than you do moving ahead, you can't move ahead.

18. Not asking for what you need: What's important to you is not necessarily important to others. If you don't ask for what you need-whether it's something to help you do your job, or a promotion - you're leaving it to other people's imaginations. If you think your well being is a high priority to them, you have a good imagination

(19 and 20 are Sunshine add on´s)

19. Believe in yourself and your product: if you don´t, no one else will

20. Be Honest and sincere: a client that trusts you will keep coming back.

Relight The Fire

Relight The Fire

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Too often I hear the sound of requiem to one’s heart. Requiem is the music played to someone who had died, used at a Catholic mass for most funerals.
Why do people choose to kill the love and passion inside them when it is the very thing that feeds their souls?
At most weddings and bachelor parties I hear the whispers pronouncing the beginning of the end as if marriage will take away the fun and excitement from a relationship.
It usually doesn’t disappear, it goes by slowly, fading away the fire until mere embers remain. Then suddenly one day you wake up, take a look at that person lying next to you and wonder where the pleasure has gone.

Marriage is like a violin, after the sweet music has finished the strings are still attached.

People with experience have told me that after the passion dies, you see what a relationship is really made of. Only then can you discover the love. Not all passion leads to love and hence the divorce lawyers.
What they don’t usually confess though, is about their secret desires of strange men kidnapping and ravishing them, or how they’d like to grab that secretary with the short skirt from behind… While they smile and tell you that they love their children and worship their home and family, in the back of their minds they dream about being unfaithful or merely flirting with your spouse’s best friend.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that they love their family any less or that they’re willing to give up what they have for the possibility of realizing their desires… it means that the passion isn’t dead! That they’re not dead and below the mother, the employee and the spouse is a hot blooded human being that enjoys love, romance and passion at 80 as much as she or he did at 18!
We hide our desires under sheets of age, maturity and responsibility and feign boredom when someone brings up the subject of sex saying “My husband and I tried that once, but we don’t do those things anymore”… Why the hell not?!
When you look at your spouse watching sport or that soap opera, did it ever occur to you that in their subconscious they’re dreaming about the kind of stuff playboy earns so much money for? And why shouldn’t you be the one to give it to them if you yourself crave the same things? Don’t be surprised when someone who knows to provide those attentions removes either you or your spouse from your happy home…

One man said to me that only the second marriage is the happy one… you first have to stuff up in the first one so that you know what mistakes not to make in the second.
Hogwash!!!
Why let the first marriage or relationship go down the toilet in the first place? If you love that person why not make the effort to work on those things you feel are lacking. And if what lacks is passion then I have news for you my friends: it takes two to tango and relighting that fire is as much as your responsibility as your companions!

When was the last time you gave him an expectant kiss on the neck or whispered those naughty nothings meant just for the two of you? When last did you make a grab for him, surprised him with a evening just for two or told him about your latest fantasies? When last did you climb in the shower with him? Explored his body or asked him to explore yours? When last did things begin with “I won’t stop until I have you begging?” and end with “That must’ve been the best yet”. A call in the middle of the afternoon saying “I’ve been thinking about you the whole day and I won’t rest until I found out which underwear you decided to wear today”. Or a snake-like hand on their thigh under the table at a family dinner whilst keeping your most straight face? Where’s the adventure? Where’s the heat? If it can burn in you, it can burn in your partner too.

I once loved a man whom I had no desire to touch but soon I realised that the love I felt was what people call friendship and I promised myself never to confuse the two again. From that day on, I decided that love and passion, the desire to be touched and taken to different heights, go hand in hand. If you can’t kill love, you can’t kill passion.
Love and passion one will desire the other until the end of time.
Bring them together and you shall have a blissful and meaningful relationship. Tear them apart and you to will be singing requiem to your own heart.

Heartbreak

Heartbreak

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Just when you think someone can’t surprise you, life puts a twist in the road causing certain people to contradict your expectations.

Everyone has them: that person in the family that demeanours you into feeling worthless when compared to their ingenious. Mine just happens to be a cousin older than me by only two years. Not only does her model figure and bodily perfections make me feel like a reject from the Barbie factory but she also manages to make me feel sloppy with her incredible sense of taste. Five minutes with her and you’ll feel only half a woman wondering why you hadn’t taken more care with your make-up or worn something a little more in style. Tall, thin, wide hips and ample chest, her dark eyes and black hair guarantees her a place among any beauty pageant contestants.
If her Miss Universe Venezuelan looks don’t intimidate you, then her attitude will. Born to be a bitch, my cousin is ambitious and determined to the point where she’ll do whatever it takes to get what she wants. Labelled as arrogant by some and cold by others, she has almost zero tolerance and her in-your-face attitude repels the weak and doubtful. Knowing her for as long as I do, I wouldn’t call her evil because to my knowledge, she’s never purposefully rode over anyone whom she felt didn’t deserve it and her intentions aren’t to demeanour those around her, even if she does manage to make you feel like shit.
However, even though I understand her, our differences are simply too big for us to be friends. I suppose I could blame it on the fact that she hates animals and throws a tantrum each time my grandmother’s dog comes close to her. But the real reason is that our outlooks on life are simply too different.
I live by feeling, she lives by ambition and the night where she practically tore me apart for being heartbroken over a guy settled our current association. Trying to help by removing all feeling she showed her cruel side by refusing to acknowledge any good in the person that had broken my heart… that’s when I realised, we’d simply never see eye to eye.
The tough nut to crack is what most people saw her as, the cousin that would probably get the best marriage considering she’d never settle for second best (if she could only quit chasing soccer players!). She once told me that all men were alike so you might as well go for a wealthy and good-looking one. She can get any man she wants and in her viewpoint, all it takes is to pick something physically to die for and turn him into something you can bring to grandmas for dinner. I had no doubt in my mind that she was the next Victoria Adams to land herself a David Beckham.

Arriving only after we’d already sang happy birthday, it didn’t surprise me that she’d rather be next door with my other cousin who hadn’t bothered to pitch either rather than stick around for my little brother’s twelfth birthday. What did shock me was that she walked in only half the person I once knew. If I had seen her body on the cover of a magazine I would’ve immediately named her anorexic… my cousin has faded away. Her beautiful body is almost non existent; her arms look like match sticks and her face looks at least five years older. Trying to lighten the atmosphere I told her I preferred her with the huge ass she kept complaining about.
She almost growled at Snoopy when my grandmother gave her the slice of cake kept for her and I immediately decided that I didn’t even want to know her reasons for becoming that thin… however, I couldn’t avoid her when she grabbed my arm and dragged me to a more private spot.
Here we go, I thought… being the shrink in the family, I’m usually the first person my cousins run to when requiring advice and the last person they remember when having a party or a night out.

So my suspicions were right on the money! My cousin had finally met the soccer player that was different from all the others. Different because this one didn’t just take her for rides in his car or out to clubs, this one had taken her to meet his family and play with his little sister. He’d said words to her without her having to ask him to and he’d touched her far deeper than her Barbie Doll body. My cousin met a non-superficial male that had made her feel like a woman rather than a piece of meat. However, before my cousin had come in the picture there had been a girlfriend before her who now wanted her man back and whom he himself wanted back.
“She’s not even beautiful!” wailed my cousin showing me a picture of a girl that could easily have been mistaken for the girl next door or your average waitress. However, this girl that had nothing special on my cousin had won the heart of the man my cousin had fallen in love with.
I swallowed deep, regretting all the times when I’d whispered “What goes around comes around” each time I’d heard of another guy my cousin had gone through or each time she made fun of my emotional weaknesses. Instead I held back the “I told you so” I had reserved for this moment and tried to remind her of all the female power she’d lived on before that moment.
I felt sorry for her as I watched the tears fall down her face. I recognised her pain and I knew that it wouldn’t leave her that easily. You can’t unscramble an egg and I know she’ll never truly go back to being the person she was before this man. Even if she came back the full blown bitch, her heart wouldn’t work the same way because it would know what it is to be loved, to love… to feel.

What advice did I give her?... None!
What for? Nothing I say will diminish the hurt she feels. If I told her that the pain would eventually numb, she’d probably think I was demeaning her feelings. If I told her that she’d find better than him, I would be as big as bitch as she was when I got my heart broken. So I simply sat at listened.
Eventually she looked at me apologetically, silently apologising for all the times she’d under estimated my words, ideas and feelings. She asked me what I would do in her situation
(Right! Like she’s going to take advice from her average looking, single cousin!).
I smiled and told her we are simply too different for my opinions or viewpoints to matter but that in her place I would most probably phone him, thank him for enriching my life with his love and put down the phone. Then taking one day at a time, I’d find myself slowly again, rediscover the taste of food and focus on the colours of the world until one day I woke up and felt whole again, ready for another love.

My cousin looked at me as if I were insane; I didn’t bother to explain myself further. I’ve realised that certain things, people just have to find out on their own.
What goes around comes around? Yes I believe that it does. I believe that if you play with someone’s feelings or refuse to acknowledge their existence, eventually someone may treat you the same way. However for those of you that aren’t superstitious remember this: Play with fire long enough and you’re bound to get burnt. Even the strongest of souls aren’t immune to heartbreak.

Be careful whose heart you break – For God counts every tear and charges you double.

Getting to Know Me...

Getting to Know Me...

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

How did I know that my client was going to react that way? Why my friend was going to say all that he said and why my family chooses that kind of behaviour?
To know somebody… to really get to know somebody: You have to want to get to know them. To respect and accept them for whom they are and their beliefs without passing any judgement of your own… after all, that could be you!

Knowing others is wisdom, knowing thy self is enlightening.

Put yourself in their shoes. Be the client, be the friend; be the relative… be whoever it is that you choose to understand. Close your eyes and try to see things through their perspective. As hard as this may seem, it isn’t as difficult as people imagine that it is.

Doesn’t your finger hurt when you place it on top of a burning candle? Your reaction will be to immediately remove it… but take the example of someone who makes candles and is fascinated by the flame. Would it be fair to say that due to the person’s background they may attempt to keep their finger there longer? What about someone with a short temper? Would it be fair to say that due to their impatient nature they may blow out the candle or turn it over in frustration? And what about that insecure person you know? She or he most probably won’t even attempt to put their finger where it can be burned…
You see… it isn’t so difficult to get to know someone once you’ve figured out what drives them.

Beware of presumption.

Always give the person space to surprise or disappoint you. After all, we’re not machines that are pre-programmed and the power of decision makes us the fascinating creatures that we are. Never elude yourself to think that you know somebody completely, for people grow and develop and what their thoughts are today might evolve into different thoughts tomorrow. Scary isn’t it? That you never truly know someone completely? Or relieving that you can rediscover someone you care about every so often? That none of us are prisoners to routine or limits to evolution?

What drives You?

What makes you think and react the way you do? Why choose this over that or decide which principles and guidelines to live by? Take a time of introspection and ask yourself the question you ask others but are too afraid to ask yourself.
Are people’s reactions so strange once you’ve placed yourself in their position?
Spend more time with your mirror.
You will find that once you begin to understand yourself, others are not so complicated after all.

Make the Connection

Make the Connection

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

They saw less and less of each other until the break up became the inevitable. Exams and friends had gotten in the way and they gave each other excuses about have little time for each other. Then he saw her at a distance and suddenly a rush of emotion and regret washed over him. He didn’t want her back and yet, what was this he was feeling at the pit of his stomach?
He complained that she was too shy, that she’d speak to him one way over the internet and then grow quiet when they were together, so I couldn’t resist in asking:
Did you ever take her aside, look her in the eyes, hold her and tell her some of the things you told her online? Did you ever ask her to open up to you; to talk to you and be with you with no fear... While looking her directly in the eyes?!

Speaking over a computer screen has one big advantage: You can tell that person whatever is going on in your soul without feeling vulnerable or exposed. However it’s when you look each other face to face that suddenly you’re attacked with anxiety and doubt. Suddenly words hold more weight and you can’t seem to find the right tone of voice or get those words that express what you feel. You feel stupid, scared and vulnerable and after a couple more personal encounters like that… you run!

What? You think we’re all made of iron that we don’t feel insecure when we begin to lose control of our senses around somebody else? No matter how confident a person is, they are prone to insecurity. Usually the more confident and in control they are of themselves, the harder they find it to let go to an emotion that requires the loss of control. When doubt settles in and your brain accuses your heart of feeling too much… isn’t it the most natural reaction in the world to stand up and leave?
Men call this “hard to get”… I’m glad they see it that way because it means they don’t know the power they have over our senses that causes us to run. Oh yes boys, you have us by the rope when we’re digging up excuses to disappear.
At some point we acknowledge this failure but it won’t make us turn around… why? Because by the time we turn around, you’re gone! Who wants a man that leaves at the first sign of resistance?
Getting over it… next!

A woman wants her man to fight for her… No, we don’t want this to impress us or to somehow lift our egos (then again, there are females for every whack desire…)
However, real women need her man to grab her to keep her from running from her own desires! To look her in the eyes and let her know that you’re real, that you’re there and that you’re not going to run at the first sign of trouble or resistance. Take this back to the cavemen era… do you honestly think a woman would accept a man who didn’t know how to take charge of his family and his cave?… not to mention he’d be a worthless hunter if he were a coward. Let her know that you’re not an illusion of her heart and that you do love her and don’t plan on going anywhere and you’ll have her fighting just as hard to make you believe the same thing.

“But that takes balls to say something like that to her”… Damn right it does! But rejection is a much better fate than walking around with feelings you can’t express or get rid of!!!

How to tell her?... (or him, there are guys who do their fair share of running as well…) The soul projects through the eyes, so that’s where sincerity comes from. Just before she leaves, take her by the arm, look straight in her eyes and tell her that before she leaves she’s got to look you in the eyes and tell you that leaving is what she wants to do. Look at her in the eyes, be honest and repeat the words she’s running away from. She’ll reward your courage with honesty, believe me! Don’t doubt it; simply ask yourself if you yourself wouldn’t be completely sincere at that point.
If she walks then she never corresponded with that feeling you felt… aren’t you glad you know the truth now? But if she feels the same way… she’ll stay. And you can build up from there.

That Tie… that connection we all search for. It’s not something that lives and dies… it’s a hidden bond that is touched base by those who have it… basically, if you think you are begging to lose touch with the person you’re in a relationship with then you’re guilty of letting go… Take her by the arms… look her in the eyes. Magic doesn’t disappear, people bury it! Don’t let the person you love turn their backs on the words that are hard to say and even harder to admit that they exist… grab them, kiss them, pin them against a wall if you have to but never let that bond break.

Live

Live

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Challenged to once again write on the topic of experience; I searched my brain for something new that I could teach to someone with twice my time in existence.

Try explaining the joy of travel to someone who has been around the world or the taste of food to he that has tried every cuisine. What can I possibly share with someone who’s probably lived far more experiences in life than I have? Where’s the novelty in my words?
Yet, it doesn’t surprise me, when I can teach my own father and mother something about living or when my little brother shows me a different way to see and feel things.
There are those that have everything, been everywhere and have experienced absolutely nothing!
Experience isn’t prone to opportunity but to one’s attitude at that moment. It’s how you choose to live the moment that defines it and so gives you what people call “Experience”.

Closing my eyes, I recall the streams of tears that fell down my face on the day that a friend I had fallen in love with, told me that he didn’t feel the same way. Fifteen at the time, I knew no other way to express my pain other than cry ashamedly in front of him.
Years later, after getting my heart broken again, I cried the very same way in front of friends and people I worked with. I didn’t want to cry but the tears wouldn’t stop pouring down my face. My friend who had rejected me years ago, sat down next to me and putting his arm around me I recall him saying:
“Girl, he’s a loser who one day will understand just how much he’s lost today. He’s not worth crying over, no man is. And you should know by now not to let yourself get heartbroken this way, you’re too emotional, you feel too much”.
At the time, sitting on the bathroom floor looking like I’d just gotten ridden over by a train, I still managed to give my friend a smile and respond with the same conviction that I still believe today:
“Be happy that I’m crying this much because it means that I loved him as much. If I wasn’t crying it would mean every moment I spent with him was meaningless and that I didn’t live something special after all.”
My frustrated friend managed to laugh and warn me:
“You do realise that you’re just going to keep getting hurt, and it gets worse with time”
“Maybe that’s true, but if protect myself from getting hurt then it means I also protect myself from being loved and then there’s no point in it at all”.
Just for score’s sake: the guy who made me cry says that his infidelity is one of his biggest regrets to date.

What is the point of Paris if you can’t scream “Jetaime” from the top of the Eiffel Tower? Or the point in visiting in New York if you can’t hopscotch on Time Square or take a bite of an apple whilst humming to yourself an old Frank Sinatra song? To live life… to really experience it is to embrace it with your soul.
Live the Moment.

There are things you won’t live twice (I reckon Bungee jumping is one of them) but why not try it at least once?
Crash and Burn: how will you ever know how fast a car can go and how far it will get you if you don’t have the courage to step on the accelerator?
Take it slow… drive just fast enough to feel the wind in your hair and the sun on your face and the blood in your veins.
Dance: Shake your hips until the vibration in syncs with the beat of the music and the rhythm of your heart and then take it down to the gentle sway of a romantic melody.
When you take away the fear of falling on your face, you begin do dance life with desire and learn how to keep a better balance. Keep taking life to its speed limits and soon you will learn when to put on the breaks or when to take that turn.

To live, to really live… is to risk losing, hurting or dying. Learning has nothing to do with experience. The gain of experience lies in each individual’s will to do so.
I began living on the day I stopped fearing life itself.

Faithfulness

Faithfulness

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

I was asked today what this word meant to me and I stopped all other trains of thought to concentrate on the significance of it to me.
Is fidelity broken when one chooses to have intercourse with someone other than the person he’s committed with? In which case he’s innocent if he keeps it to a simple make-out session… Where does one draw the limit line of betrayal?
Every person I speak to draws their limits differently, who’s to say which perimeter is correct?
It’s hard playing a game where you don’t know where your boundaries are. I’m not referring to those set to you by your partner but to those that you set upon yourself.
When would you say have you overstepped the line?
In my opinion, fidelity goes hand in hand with sentiment. You don’t have to take your clothes off to be unfaithful. To me, betrayal happens when you surrender your heart to someone else other than the person you’re committed to. This doesn’t go to say that other people cannot occupy a space in your heart… those who live and love know all to well that there are those that touch our souls and engrave their names in our hearts forever.
However much you may love these individuals, to keep them in your heart is divine… to surrender your heart to one of them is to betray the person you’ve committed your soul to. It’s the same as taking the key to your house and making copies for every other person besides the significant other that you share your house with, or taking a piece of cake that you gave to one person and giving it to someone else.
At this point most (most as in male) jump up and vehemently state that in this case sex does not qualify as a form of betrayal considering that sex can just mean sex without any emotional strings attached.
I don’t argue this fact especially since it’s true for many… however, I still consider any form of sexual activity as infidelity.
To touch, to kiss… to have intercourse with another human being requires taking off your clothes and exposing yourself and your desires. To act upon these desires is to want to be with that person, to share and surrender a piece of your soul and in direct proportion… your heart.
Romantic idealism? Perhaps?...
However this above statement does not come from the books, the wise or opinion polls, it is the Sunshine outlook.
I am not a woman capable of being with a man without there being some kind of a connection. Without it there simply is no point… this isn’t to say that being in a committed and loving relationship I wouldn’t feel the desire for someone else… this is to say that I would not feel the need to act upon it or give my heart to anybody else.
To have sex without meaning is to betray myself, my beliefs and to highly disrespect the person I’m with considering they wouldn’t fully have my presence.
There are those that say that betrayal of sentiment only occurs in women considering that men do not think about the emotional links involved… however, the man I choose to commit to will have to be the kind that shares my point of view of fidelity choosing to love and respect me enough to only share his bed with me.
This of course does not rule out flirting or getting to know people who touch our souls… it simply means that while my thoughts can belong to every man, my body and soul will only belong to the one I choose to give my heart to.

Seducktion - Game Played by Two

Seducktion - Game Played by Two

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Temptation, persuasion, attraction… seduction is far more than the luring of another into copulation. Seduction is a neutral art that is defined by the intention. We say that there are those that ooze seduction either consciously or sub-consciously.
Attraction, temptation, alluring and persuasive… to seduce is to captivate the interest and the desire of someone else into wanting to please you.
To seduce is to attract by desire.
I was challenged to write about seduction in its various forms and levels and managed to break it down to: Commercial, Professional, Personal and Intimate…

Comercial Seduction

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Why that blonde model in the magazine sells perfumes…

Well, the fact that she tilts her head back, pouts her lips and closes her eyes implies that she might be in the middle of a major orgasm…
Psychologists say that girls buy it in the hopes that its magic will give them a piece of whatever it is that puts that expression on her face, and the boys buy it because they hope that its effects will result in pretty much the same hoped for reaction in their girlfriends.
Personally, I think that girls buy it because its smell will remind people of the blonde bimbo and they’ll know she’s in with the latest fragrance… and guys buy it because that blonde was the prettiest one in the magazine. The fact that she was in the magazine also tells them that it’s the latest of fragrances and therefore more expensive and consequently will earn them higher points with the girlfriend…

Advertising is the God of all Commercial seduction… visual, audio… wherever we turn our heads there is something seducing; put there specifically for the consumer to spend his well earned wages on.

Will that new Loreal Hot really straighten your hair like Beyoncé´s?... Hell No! Take it from someone who’s tried everything… the only way you can get your hair that straight is through effort and a strong hairdryer… there are no magic formula’s! Yet we buy these products because we want something that the seducer has that brings out the best in us… in this case: the straight hair.

And the Prize of Persuasion of the month goes to….. Coral Beer! As you can see in the picture above, our local beer suppliers took advantage of the Easter Season to add the traditional bunny and the seductress to their advertising. Translation: It’s the season to come out of your hole. Imagination of the consumer closes the deal.

Professional Seduction

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Just picture that gorgeous person that serves you coffee every morning and seduces you with a smile. He may not be trying to purposely to attract you but does so because he knows that a warm smile invokes faithfulness in his clients… they’ll keep coming back for more… errr… coffee and smiles.

Seduction in the work environment?!

It’s everywhere and it’s not necessarily destructive. Professionalism is not compromised by a little flirting. In fact, I believe that it creates the lighter hearted atmosphere that holds the satisfaction and success of most major companies. If you are able to take away the naughty connotation in the word seduction, then this concept becomes much easier to grasp. Respect is what keeps flirting healthy.
Who hasn’t been able to convince a colleague to help you by either pouting your lip or asking in your softest low-keyed “I’m desperate” voice?
My latest seduction victory was on my boss. I took advantage of his fresh haircut by telling him that he looked like this friend I had back in high school. His ego immediately inflated triple its size, first because he imagined that I implied that the new haircut made him look younger and perhaps even more jovial and attractive. With this victory, I managed to keep him in an exceptionally good mood for the first half of the morning and got him to approve over 20 credits that I’d been begging him to do for over two weeks.
It doesn’t go to say that he wouldn’t have approved them if I hadn’t simply said “Please approve those credits”… after all, he wasn’t doing me any special favour by doing his job. However the fact that I managed to make him feel good about himself, immediately created the urge to reciprocate, and so he chose to do something that he knew would please me.

We take temptation further into seducing our clients as well. Whoever said that seduction isn’t professional: obviously never tried it!!! Having network problems thanks to the installation of new 3rd generation antenna’s, I was bombarded by calls from irritated clients who were none too impressed by the fact that their calls kept failing. Explaining that the reason was because we were in network testing didn’t exactly help to calm my client down until I told him: “We have to test out our networks to make sure that the next phone you buy allows you to see your beautiful wife on the other side”
To this remark my client starting laughing and told me that the kind of technology I was talking about was going to be the cause of marital problems. To this I couldn’t resist replying in my most innocent voice:
“Aww, don’t say that! We only have our costumer’s best interests at heart and with this kind of technology just imagine how faithful our costumers are going to be! With this in mind, we’ll be saving marriages instead of putting them in jeopardy”
My two comments aren’t part of my job description nor are they necessary to the satisfaction of the client however with them; I won a happy client that ordered a new 3G Samsung Z107… why did he choose it over the Nokia 6630? Maybe because I also mentioned that I myself own and love my Samsung. So let’s count our gains again:
1. Satisfied client that is no longer threatening to change operator
2. The sale of another mobile contract
3. Managing to keep the department’s budget down by contracting the cheaper and more reliable of the 3G cell phones.

Seduction can also be veiled into being called “negotiation”. You tell me what you want, I tell you what I want we negotiate for something in between…
There are those clients who get all that is expected from me due to professionalism. And then there are those clients that get all that and more because of the seduction they practice. Either they are wise enough to ask me about my weekend or they call me nicknames like “sweetness” or “darling”. One particular client likes to call me princess and makes a point of always calling before she comes to see me.
As observed, sales seduction is something that is not limited to gender.
That client that always walks in as if he walked out of a cologne factory does serious damage to my olfactory senses. And that client that insists on touching my hand each time I pass him a document or folder, sends dangerous electric signals up my spine. That’s not to mention the sultry voices I often get over the phone, but it’s those that grasp eye contact for more that the usual 3 seconds that really manage to mess around with my sensory functions. I am then forced to pause in order to recompose myself!
Of course I have learnt certain techniques in order to combat these sensorial attacks, however to reveal them would be to leave myself unprotected! On the other hand, I will disclose that the answer lies somewhere in: An eye for eye, a tooth for a tooth!

Personal Seduction

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Why do some people have more friends than others? Some say they possess honey that attracts people like bees to a flower… What is this magic if not seduction?
In order to seduce someone, one would have to press buttons. To press buttons means to search for what it is that captivates that person’s interest… once you found it, you milk it for it’s worth!
This is why we can have friends of all walks of life. All it takes is finding the common ground between you and you find the solid foundation to a relationship. To relate is to share a common interest and explore it.
Accused of being an incorrigible flirt, I was stunned at the statement by one of my best friends and decided to investigate the facts.
Analysing recent e-mails that I’d exchanged with a good friend, I decided to reread them with the mind of a stranger that knew nothing of the friendship between us. The result was uncontrollable laughter as I realised that we’d been playing the seduction game quite close to the edge. Fortunately (or unfortunately: it all depends on perspective)… my good friend is happily married, old enough to be my father and living at quite a distance away. This means that the implied kisses and second meaning words are no more than good clean fun… And why do we do it?
Because we love that anxiety of waiting for the e-mail that you’re sure will get your imagination working and your mind asking “Now what did he really mean by that…”
Intelligence and a good sense of humour has always been a turn on for me and the challenge to accompany those virtues is what makes the blood in my veins run...
That friend I hugged or the one I winked at and even the one I danced with… it isn’t commitment proposal… it’s seduction. I search for his interest so in turn he wills to reciprocate into searching for mine...

Someone once told me that the world would be heaven if only man treated his neighbour as he wishes to be treated. With this concept in mind, imagine the revolution in the world if each person decided that the kind word or gesture parted from them first… The world would be heaven on earth.

Intimate Seduction

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

What kind of an analysis would this be if I didn’t add the intimate and the naughty of seduction? This is the beginning of all foreplay and all that joins two people.

I’d say it was that look in his eye… the way he looked straight into my eyes as if he was looking straight through me. The enchanting smile and words thick with charm resulted in forbidden thoughts. Perhaps it was the whisper in my ear that or it was the warmth of his breath that blew shivers onto my skin and warned me that I was tip toeing close to the edge. I love the way he so very lightly traces my arms with his finger and plants a kiss on my wrist. The very scent of him tranquilizes my senses and yet leaves me with an acute sense of awareness. I can scan more details, feel more, taste more, smell more and even hear better as the sound of his voice tempts me to take his breath away with a kiss.
The whole mechanics of a kiss fascinates me and implores me onto further exploration. Maybe it’s the friction created by two pairs of moving muscle combined with the warm potion found deep inside and motivated by the discovery of the curious tongue. It’s a technique perfected with time and personal touches, I particularly love the light suction of my bottom lip or the slight graze of teeth. This technique is also particularly successful on earlobes which in turn leads to the much desired kiss to the neck.
A kiss to the neck will give guarantee this man’s successful seduction unless I can reverse roles and continue the natural trail of a kiss onto his chest… past his heart and down to his stomach.
Perhaps this is too much heat, too much… too fast but there’s no use pulling away because he pulls me right back into his embrace.
I love the way he wraps his arms around me, the sound of his heart beating and the warmth of his breath and the way his hands fumble with my shirt… There’s something awfully erotic in slowly removing someone’s clothes…

If seduction and imagination were sins, I’d be condemned to an eternity of a fiery hell… or an eternity of heaven, depending on the perspective you choose to see it as…

Seduction VS Manipulation

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

The difference between seduction and manipulation lies in intention. What are you aiming for? Is the teasing all good clean fun or are there second intentions behind your flirting? Who reaps the benefits from the results produced?
Be sure to know exactly what your intentions are and how far you’re will to go before attempting to captivate someone’s attention. To dance upon the edge is to risk falling so be sure you know your steps and your limits before the music starts. To fall prey to seduction is a choice and therefore there are no victims. Because seduction is not compromising, you are free to pull the plug at any moment, leaving no room for excuses.

How to be tempting and seducing? Well, you can start by forgetting everything that magazines and television tells you. Attraction lies on different aspects for each person… what attracts one person will repel another; wouldn’t it be a nightmare if we were all attracted to the same things?! So there is no full-proof formula or pattern you can follow in order to become Don Juan…
In my opinion, seduction starts in finding your self confidence and being yourself. The minute you discover the things you like about yourself, others will discover it too… Be honest and sincere and you’ll produce what is known as seduction. Manipulation is using seduction techniques with ulterior or secondary motives.

Those who seduce and are seduced ride ecstasy to heaven… as for the manipulators, also known as players: beware of the universe’s law of justice for what goes around comes around.
He who plays with fire eventually gets burned, what makes you think you’re immune to a spoon of your own medicine? To be manipulated by someone you choose to seduce is the most fitting of punishments for the player. Don’t forget that manipulation causes far more damage than rejection ever will.

To he that challenged me to write this and to she who accuses me of being an incorrigible flirt… I confess and make no apologies!

I´m Sorry Lequicha

I´m Sorry Lequicha

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Of all the awful feelings that a person can possibly feel in the world… the worst is a guilty conscience. And not just any kind of guilt, the kind that stabs you right in the stomach and makes you wish you’d never been born. I’m guilty of forgetting one of my best friends on a night which all my closest friends should have been there. I had told her that there was going to be a dinner but on that eve… I forgot to call her. Not only did I forget to call her, I only realised it today… two days later.

Quicha…
I always said I’d never use names in my column so forgive me if it upsets you that I put yours on here. However I want people to know how important you are to me and how much your friendship means to me. I know this may mean very little after forgetting you from that dinner, but words cannot express how sorry I am….
I would never forget you intentionally, nor would I ever want to leave you out of any special moment of my life… please believe me when I tell you that even though I didn’t realise it at the time, after it hit me that you weren’t there suddenly the whole dinner felt dim and bleak. I can’t remember one enjoyable moment, because you weren’t there.
This isn’t to undermine the good friends I had there, this is to say that the fact that you were missing makes the evening now one of saddest ones I’ve ever had because I hurt your feelings by failing you as a friend.
You’re right, I probably would’ve only remembered in a week from now if someone hadn’t told me. I respect our friendship too much to lie to you or sugar-coat the truth, you’ve always been straight forward with me so I’ll always be straight forward with you.
I’m hoping that you’ll remember that I’ve always been honest with you and always will be, so please believe me when I tell you that I never meant to leave you out.
If I tell you that I had a lot on my mind, that I didn’t particularly want that dinner or that it was at a place and a time that you probably wouldn’t have been able to make it to… it would all be true. But these are feeble excuses to the truth that nothing was so important that I shouldn’t have remembered to call you! I should’ve been thinking a little less of myself and my problems and more of the people that I care about: I wouldn’t have forgotten your presence at that dinner!
Words, be they written or spoken can never truly describe a person’s disappointment or their guilt… I’m so sorry Quicha and more than your forgiveness I wish I could just take the hurt away and the disappointment I caused you.
I know that lately we’ve had less in common. You live for your family and your thoughts concentrate around your beautiful daughter, I can’t begin to tell you how much I admire you for that. I on the other hand have very little to contribute to your world, the only nappies I’ve changed are my brothers and managing a family under one roof is something I have very little experience in.
I realise that the kind of conversations and ambitions that drive me no longer interest you and at times we can be left very little words to say to each other…
However I’ve always believed deep down that no matter how different we are and how differently we develop that there exists something is real and lasts beyond all that: our friendship!
I know that you’re there for me should I fall or forget the keys of my apartment at work!... Until today I hoped that you also felt that you could count on me for anything. You can Quicha, I know I didn’t prove myself very reliable by forgetting to call you but I pray you know that I didn’t do that intentionally, that I am here for you when you need me and that nothing could be worse than if I lost your friendship.
I wanted to tell you all this personally, I practically ran to your house when I realised what happened… and I got stuck in your garage because I thought you wouldn’t open the door thanks to my selfish behaviour. When I didn’t see your car and I realised that I couldn’t say all this to you, I was left with tears of despair.
In the twenty minutes that I was stuck in your garage waiting for someone to open the door, I sat and relived every wonderful moment we’ve lived together. To lose your friendship would be one of the greatest losses possible, I know I don’t tell you enough and perhaps I haven’t appreciated you enough lately… but you are and always will be, one of my best friends.
You could argue that I’m writing all this to relieve some of my guilty conscience, that would also be true… but I hope you find the sincerity in my words and find it in your heart to forgive me… I truly am sorry.
On Saturday night, I lost two friends: One that I should’ve gotten rid of a long time ago and another that I never wanted to lose for all that’s precious in the world.
Please tell me that I haven’t lost one of the strongest reasons I still believe in this island. I don’t want you to accept my apology… I want your forgiveness!
I am so sorry… I just don’t know how to make it more honest than that.

Your Best Friend,
Carla.

(PS. Joe… can I make it up to you by baking you a whole cake?)

Death of a Dancer

Death of a Dancer

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

I recall the nights on which the music dictated the movement of my body. On these specific nights, it felt as if I’d lost control of my body which in turn had been taken over by rhythm. Never taking dance lessons in my life, my every move has come from a place that only rhythm has access to… a secret place in my soul that only music has the key to. To dance is to lose control, to let loose and let every desire manifest with the beat.

Dancing: The vertical expression of a horizontal desire.
Let go…
Lose all constraint and move with the free rhythm your body was born with.
I don’t know how to dance, I simply move with the music.

My father yelled at me many times when I was younger to turn down the music, he warned me that one day I’d become deaf… I never thought that would be true.
The last time I heard the music, truly heard its sound was at an Indian music where Stevie Wonder declared that he’d just called to tell her that he loves her.
Stevie Wonder is blind man – it never occurred to me so much as it did tonight.
I sang the words that I knew so well from my childhood and smiled as I heard the crashing sound of my heart breaking. Did you know that your whole body feels the moment when your soul breaks?
It doesn’t take a big reason or a lot of pain to break down someone’s soul… all it takes is an accumulation of various disappointments that build up over weeks, months, even years… once they’ve gained weight, they become devastatingly heavy on a soul… until one day something triggers it to crashing effect. You let you soul give into the weight, burying it somewhere deep and unreachable.
Wide awake and with a smile on your face, you feel your soul cave in… the beat stops, the rhythm dies and along with it… the music.

When the soul dies so does the rhythm and no matter how hard you try to coordinate your body to the moves and steps of the sound… your movement becomes nothing more than effort.
I listened hard for the music, I tried closing my eyes and making contact with my soul. If only I heard that beat… that sound… my body would respond.
Nothing…
I could hear nothing but the deafening sound of disappointment. Surrounded by people in a great atmosphere where they played my favourite songs… I heard and felt nothing.
Desperate for sensation… feeling… anything, I turned to the potency of alcohol… when all else fails: go for the nearest glass of wine…
As I felt its poison run in my veins, I closed my eyes and listened… soon I’d hear the music, feel the beat and once again let go…
But nothing…
Maybe I hadn’t drunk enough… so I had another, and another… and nothing… The beat was gone, the rhythm was dead and along with it so was my soul.
I sang with the music, hoping my heart would recognise its melody but it couldn’t hear it.
I moved the way I’m supposed to move when I’m having fun, but I couldn’t feel it.
Facing the sad reality that my soul had deserted me, in the middle of the dance floor tears threatened to fall. I listened; I strained so hard to hear it… nothing.
I saw the people, the faces of the people I care about… and nothing, no rhythm, no passion… nothing.
I’ve lost the desire to dance duo. I counted weeks and days for the opportunity to dance with someone who knew how to make my body move… tonight I counted the hours to go home. Not even when I was lead by someone else’s rhythm could I bring my own body to feel alive once again. When the soul dies, the rhythm dies and the music dies with it.

I don’t want to dance anymore. I don’t see the point...
I realised that part of the reason I couldn’t feel my soul is because I simply no longer wish to… this is how bitches are made.
They lose their soul, their rhythm and the music in life stops playing

Perhaps tomorrow I’ll feel a different way… but for now, my feet are sore from dancing on my own… I think it’s time to sit it out.

Eleven Minutes - Paulo Coelho

Eleven Minutes - Paulo Coelho

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

In the drought of my life, the last theme I wanted to read about was love and sex. At a point where I feel that the light is fading from everything good in the world, all I searched for was the comfort and hope needed when walking down a dry and windy road. The Alchemist was the book by Paulo Coelho that saved my dreams from dying at a stage when I was told that I was not allowed to dream much less believe and follow those dreams. By reading this book, I recovered all the strength needed to preserve the very essence of my being, my light, and my dreams. Unaware of the context of the book, I hoped Eleven minutes would somehow add something to spark a dying flame.

“Childhood traumas” is such a psychological condition; a mouthful to those who say it and an easy excuse to those searching to cover their failures. But what do we really know about the effects of our little childhood failure? I bet you still remember what went wrong in your very first relationship and how it made you feel. In this book, Maria refers to a little boy who had asked her for a pencil and how at the time she had not been able to respond with more than handing him the object. She then goes on to explain how that incident brought about a change in her thoughts and attitude. Then there was that first kiss in which she hadn’t known the art of an open mouth kiss… all these little first times, tiny falls and insignificant failures… define our thoughts, our attitudes and in turn… the things we choose to believe in (or not).
The whole book is based on Maria’s insight into the world. Somewhat defensive from those tiny disappointments we all get from life; Maria soon saw how superficial the world truly is. Beautiful and attractive, Maria knew exactly which buttons to press and the reaction that they would give. Men were and are simply predictable.
At one point, a man offers her a job in Switzerland as a dancer, one that she accepts fully knowing the dangers and the adventure of the quest. Wanting more than a mediocre life, she goes to a foreign country intent on living the moments that are considered exciting in the town which she came from. Like many of us, she makes the mistake of falling in love with the wrong man who shatters her soul to the point where she believed that she had none and so, when there is no longer a soul to define moral principles: you do what you have to in order to gain what everyone wants: Money.
Good money without a higher education and keeping it in the legal system can only be found in prostitution. Without a solid intention, Maria found herself in Rue de Berne and in the most respectable whore house on the street. She was told that if she wanted to work, then she should start straight away, if she turned her back she would not return. And so, she accepted a drink, danced and opened her legs to earn 300 francs.
From there on, prostitution was her profession. The book did little to teach me anything new about the business of sex. However, what kept my interest, my intrigue was this woman’s insight and outlook on life. To her, prostitution was not just a means of payment, but a career one that also implied rules and regulations. She demanded respect from her surroundings and clients just as I do in my own, mediocre job.
I was fascinated to read her concept on competition and fair play. Like any woman in search of attention, she’d do her part in dressing and acting desirable, however she would never move in on a client, especially if he’d shown interest in another girl. The ritual in a whore house is that the man would first buy the girl a drink and offer her a dance before taking her to his hotel. Imposing respect on her client meant that she would not leave without him respecting her with this ritual, failure to do so meant that she’d be offended into politely declining his intentions. She also chose not to allow a man to kiss her, for there was more in a kiss than carnal desire and would not accept invitations to private homes as what they were paying for was a night of illusion with her and so reality was to be kept out of the business transaction.
In a year of prostitution, she made friends only with a librarian who had no clue of her profession. Despite her job, she reached no orgasm while being penetrated and like most women: she faked it. Why? Well, more for the benefit of the client than herself, a man can only feel like a man if he thinks he made his woman loose all control. If a prostitute can fool a man into believing that he gave her an orgasm, he’ll be coming back to her.
The more I read, the more I wish I could’ve met this woman. I realised that your profession can never define the person you are. Should Maria and Sunshine have met, they would’ve discovered that they were not alone in their train of thought. Despite the story I read, it was comforting to read that someone else thought the things I suspect.
What I did learn that was new was the definition of Sadist Masochism. Maria one day got what they defined as a special client that offered her a different form of sex. The positions didn’t differ, just the method. For 1000 francs, Maria was willing to allow herself to be sexually humiliated. She did not do this for the money, she did this in hopes of discovering a new sensation, something more real than the boring sex she was forced to sell. This new sensation is called pain. There’s a fine line between pleasure and pain. She found that being bounded and disgraced with dirty words was a form of letting herself lose control. In this way, she managed her first orgasm after working a year in prostitution. Although the definition was new to me, the concept was not. We all spend out lives controlling everything that happens around us that at some point, nothing that happens can so much as shudder the walls we build around us. Come what may, you don’t break… you drink, you smile but you don’t crack… until someone forces you to, until someone forces the words you silence in your head.
The smack or whip is bittersweet for the pain it inflicts relieves the pain in your soul. As if you were being rightfully punished for all your tiny failures. Humiliated to that point forces you to let go until you orgasm. Is perhaps the reason to the addiction of women who return to abusive relationships? Sadist Masochism.
Eventually in the book Maria meet Ralf Hart, a painter, an intellectual that is bored of sex and whore houses. This concept of pain and pleasure is not new to him, however it is one that he had overcame. What did this painter have to teach her about the art she knew all about? Nothing.
What he did was bring her and himself to rediscover the light we all are born with and that most of us kill with time…. Time and tiny failures.
The book ended with Maria discovering that the best orgasm is the one inflicted by love and the book ended like most romance novels: the painter and the prostitute together in love. Of course it ended this way! The book wouldn’t sell if it didn’t! Who the hell wants to read that their eternal desire and search dies with them? We’re all in search of that missing piece of our souls inside someone else, that is the pain: pleasure is finding them.

Thoroughly enjoying this book, I recommend all to read. It will give you a different perspective on love, sex and prostitution.
Unfortunately, it did not contribute much to the road I’m walking if not perhaps helping define it. No comfort is found in the lack of direction. Where do you go when you’ve been everywhere? A good friend of mine said to me this week “Good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere” Where do you go when you’ve been everywhere? I wanted to ask him: I didn’t because I knew he’d have no answer for me, or perhaps the answer would be: “heaven”.
Love is what Sunshine truly writes about… read her columns, it’s there… in every word, in every sentence, in every topic. Sometimes I wonder if she doesn’t grow tired of desperately searching for that light and love in things and in people around her. Can’t she see that it’s fading? That people choose to kill magic rather than to suffer for its discovery?
I grow tired at looking at a desert, it makes one want to give in to the scorching heat and dryness and simply shrivel up and die. If it weren’t for the Sunshine that keeps my soul, it would long be dead along with empty bodies I meet everyday. Trapped within your body? We all feel this way, read this book and you’ll feel less alone.

(Thank-You my Norwegian friend that recommended it... I hope you find what you´re looking for)

Tangled in a Dream

Tangled in a Dream

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

You made me wake up in a sweat! I don’t often dream about you but when I do they’re so realistic that they keep me thinking about you long after I’ve woken up.
I dreamt that she had broken your heart and shattered your dreams. You were uncharacteristically broken with your surface shattered as it was within. Your anguish and pain frightened me for I don’t believe I’ve ever seen you without control of your emotions and in my dream I watched in disbelief as you spoke of your broken heart.
Quietly I listened to you speak and I wondered if it was merely a dream, somehow I knew that the moment couldn’t be happening and when you were done I stared at you, frozen by surprise. I longed to reach out and take you in my arms but pride kept me from doing so, knowing that the rejection of you turning away from my embrace would hurt more than my courage to try. It has been simply too long since we’ve last touched… I recall the last time that I laid my hands on you… giving you the message that I owed from a bet that was lost, I somehow forgot about the hard, massacring massage that I had intended and instead let my hands explore on your back. It wasn’t that I had never given a proper massage before; however I recall feeling marveled by the texture of your back and the way my hands felt and the slid from muscle to muscle. It was the sharp words, your two hands that gripped my wrists and the look in your eyes that scared me into adventuring any further from that day on… I knew then that to touch you would be to walk closely upon the edge of the peak of no return… so I no longer did.
Here in my dream, I listened in agony with the urge to comfort you with the touch of my hand bound by the pride that held it.
When there were no more words of despair or comfort between us, the energy left in between created a dangerous magnetic pull. Afraid that I’d give in to my weak resistance, I asked you something stupid that I already knew the answer to. I asked you who this woman was that broke your heart.
Standing up and looking at me as if I were a stranger, you bolted from my presence as if you’d been offended; as if you felt that the words you’d found such difficulty in saying, had fallen on deaf ears. Chasing you as fast as I could, I still could not prevent that heavy sound of your bedroom door slamming between us.
Staring at the white door, tears began running down my face as the sticker pasted on your door clearly accused me of a sin I did not commit. The “No bullshit” sign is the only one of all the signs on your door that I can still remember.
Knocking and pleading with you did nothing to help open the door. In desperate exhaustion, I leaned my back against the door and slid down to hug my knees. Frustration is a loud word that screams between two people that only have a door to separate them from touching each other. Two people that didn’t say the words they meant to say.
Knowing that it was all a dream did nothing to ease the knot in my throat, yet I urged myself to say the things I wanted you to hear. Praying that you were listening from the other side of the door, I began telling you that I was no longer scared of the things that used to frighten me. I now knew the importance of speaking my mind and my heart and I wasn’t afraid to say the words. I wanted you to see me for the courageous person that I’d become. Not for the life I chose to lead, but for the person I found the courage to be. If you only opened the door, I know you could see it in my eyes as I said the words I’d been too frightened to say until now. The opening of that door would mean that it wasn’t too late to still take you in my arms. You wouldn’t have to say anything; you just needed to open the door.

Dreams can often be our subconscious’s way of reminding us of the failures we still haven’t forgiven ourselves for or perhaps the fears we hold within. Sometimes they serve just to remind us of the people we care about or once held dear to us. However well you think you’ve overcome something, it may haunt you in a dream even if just to remind you not to repeat the same mistakes. I’ve learnt that you regret more the things you don’t do and say than those that you risk and fail.

Allow the dreams of tomorrow to define your plans today, your dreams of today to define your plans of tomorrow and the dreams of yesterday to guide you through every step of every day.

Here’s wishing you a good night’s sleep and pleasant rest… May Mr. Sandman send you the dreams fabricated by angels.

Twenty What?

Twenty What?

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

I could swear that just yesterday I went to bed at sixteen and suddenly this morning I woke up and my ID tells me that I’m twenty three.

What happened to all the time in between?!!!

I recall thinking that it would take an eternity to reach eighteen and then one day I woke up and I was already nineteen. All I did was blink my eyes and the next thing I knew I was being told that I was twenty one so imagine my shock when today I congratulated my mother for that final push twenty three years ago that announced my arrival into the world.

It isn’t the fact that I’m getting older that bugs me. I don’t feel any older and my intellectual growth isn’t affected. Wisdom cannot be measured by years gone by.
However, it’s the fact that I’m not getting any younger that really tickles my melon!
If I could have it my way, we would’ve all gone through human development backwards! Dying would be first so you could get that over and done with, then you take advantage of retirement to take the time to appreciate the stuff you never get round to appreciating while you were working. Working to pay your college tuition, you begin varsity with the clear knowledge that the studying will only get easier and eventually it will be all play in preschool. Finally when you’re done running around in diapers, you suck your thumb and end it all off in a magnificent orgasm!

Whilst most people hate being reminded of their date of birth... I can’t deny that I absolutely love it! Four phone calls from South Africa, two from England, one from Australia and over 50 text messages makes you feel amazingly special. The fact that someone remembers you on your birthday tells you that you hold a special place in their thoughts, if not their hearts. It’s the most rewarding feelings that a person can experience.

You stop getting great presents somewhere after twenty... people suddenly assume that you’re an adult and they no longer possess the imagination to get you a cool yo-yo or that soft squishy thing that you can play with… don’t they know that teddies are classics!
However... there are those that know how to overwhelm you! My jaw dropped when three BEAUTIFUL bouquets of flowers got delivered to my office. When I was younger, I could never quite grab the concept in the joy of receiving something that would die in a couple of days... I guess time certainly did well on correcting that concept.
To receive a bouquet of flowers is to know that someone thought of you with so much care and tenderness that they carefully picked out something beautiful to combine with their thought of you... it is one of the highest compliments you can pay a woman.

Tulips were chosen by my most courageous friend whose care and friendship knows no limits. Their delicate nature and bright colours reminded me of her strength and her promise of an honest friendship that I can always rely on.
The second bouquet was an armful of red and white carnations. In between you could find daisies and strings of pearls decorating the most overwhelming bouquet of flowers I’d ever seen. Flabbergasted, I was flattered by the wonderful gesture which managed to capture my attention with its bold statement.
The third bouquet is the one that withdrew most of the comments. Someone who knows me very well couldn’t resist stating that whoever had sent it knew me best. Perhaps it was because it held perfect white roses, my favourite of all flowers! Slightly closed, but open enough to guess their beauty, the white roses were surrounded by pink roses and guarded by three massive sunflowers. However, what gave away the fact that this person knew me well was the beautiful blue butterfly that accompanied the bouquet for decoration. I couldn’t hide my smile that stretched from ear to ear when I got them. At times, you feel that no matter how much you express yourself, the world cannot see you. It is at times like these when someone sends you a symbol of how they see you that makes you realize that they’ve paid attention. Being told later that every detail including the blue glitter sparkled over the roses had been thought of, you realize how special your friends are and how at moments like these, they’re still able to surprise you!

Candles, a vase, books and Cd’s... this year I was simply spoilt! I would’ve been happy with the simple fact that people remembered me on this special day but I cannot help but confess that their gifts were a clear indication of how well they know me! Each and every gift that I got was something that I would’ve picked out myself! Being content with whatever I get, and not ever having to hint... my dearest and closest friends surprised me with the gifts that said “I know the real you”.

Celebrating with Chocolate!

What better way to start off a new year than to try something you’ve never attempted before. To celebrate my twenty three candles, I decided to bake a cake worthy of upholding them! And not just any cake from Grandma’s recipe book... a chocolate cake! The kind we crave to take us to heaven and back!
Do you know that Google has 1.160.000 websites available on the search for “chocolate cake recipe’s”… and here I thought “sex” was popular!
After finding the perfect recipe, shopping for the ingredients and promising myself a diet, I decided to take advice from the wise by facing baking the same way I face life: with reckless abandon! To the sounds of Def Leopard and Bon Jovi, I whisked, mixed and beat the life into my cake! Adventuring a little off the recipe, I decided to cut a bit on the sugar and add almonds and vanilla essence as my special touch… soon I began wondering if I shouldn’t have just stuck to the original recipe!... Somewhere in between I confess that I began worrying about its future. Maybe it was the fact that I didn’t have to beat the egg whites like with other cakes, or the fact that a chocolate milkshake was thicker that the batter I had made… the fact is that I began thinking that my awesome idea would turn out to be an awesome flop!
I’ve decided that cake can only be a feminine identity… if you want to see what she’s really made of; you’ve got to turn up the heat! Within the high temperatures of my oven, I watched my cake grow into something that resembled the picture I had seen on the website. I almost couldn’t believe that it had come out that good! After I’d frosted and decorated it, I was almost sorry that it eventually would be eaten! If I don’t achieve any other accomplishments within the next 364 days, at least I can say that at twenty three, I baked the perfect chocolate cake!

Gifts, messages, calls and cakes aside... what made the day most special was the fact that I share my birthday with a person that I deeply love and admire. The day which my cousin and I celebrate our existence couldn’t be better spent than with each other! Watching her leave right after a game of Trivial pursuit where her boyfriend kicked both our asses (of course we helped and he cheated, hehehe)... I had the pleasure of realizing that there was no better way to have celebrated my birthday and if the next one is this good, then getting older is not so bad after all.

All Roads lead to Rome.

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Even an atheist cannot stand indifferent to the death of an eighty four year old man who pledged his life to his belief. Along with the millions around the world, I watched a man let go of his life slowly. Like many that watch the developments from their television, I sat back and watched sadly with the feeling of utter powerlessness to do anything about it. And so, when there is nothing more humanly possible to be done… we turn to our faith and pray.

I pray for a man I have not met, but whom I feel has left such a positive impression on the world. At first I prayed for a miracle, but then I asked God that if he was to take this man, than to do so quickly. It was but a question of time before Jean Paul II met his maker. And so, I prayed that his death was painless, that his hurt minimal and that God ended his suffering along with the rest of the worlds´, as quickly as possible.

More spiritual than religious… I somehow still cannot ignore the deep sadness I felt during the last days and last hours of this dying man. I didn’t consider him as Jean Paul II – Pope at that point. To me, was a dying man, a man like any of us that had managed to live his life according to his beliefs. That on its own is a worthy accomplishment, which on its own deserves the empathy and prayers of those who accompanied his last hours. Those who choose not to recognize him for the religious figure that he was, that at least recognize him for the man who managed to live his life in the best way possible: according to what he believed in.

I wondered about this man that was dying. I wondered about his thoughts. No doubt, he reached out to the God that he has lived in function for. But putting aside his religious beliefs… what were the thoughts that crossed his mind? Was he scared? Was he doubtful? I believe that any man or woman would be. The Bible tells us that Jesus was… what makes the Pope any different?
Did he recall his life until that point? Did he remember special moments? Special dates, special people? Was there ever a woman in his life that touched his heart? Or a family member he hoped to see at the other end of that tunnel?
Did he feel any regrets, or any special thankfulness for the good that which he was able to do during his life on earth? Did he wish to live? Did he wish to die? Did he for even a second, wish he’d chosen a different life? Regardless of the spiritual and religious leader that he was, regardless of what he represented to pilgrims and to the rest of the world… he was but a man and my thoughts went out to that dying man.

There is an old saying that: All roads lead to Rome. Of course this is logically and physically incorrect however its symbolic meaning depends on the believer. All days come to an end, all life eventually dies and every body returns to being dust…
Most reporters claim that today this saying is true to the fact that most people are in Rome with the pope, if not physically than in thought and prayer.
When there is nothing left to do… when hope is all that is left… we pray. We hold on to our faith and believe that somehow there is a chance for life, for continuance.
Jean Paul II is physically dead; however I believe that his memory will be immortalized in the memories of many who believe in him. Why?
While some may argue that it is because he was a celebrity or because he was a spiritual leader, I argue that those reasons aren’t good enough for anyone to remember who was the 50th president of any country or the name of their local priest.
The reason his memory becomes immortal is because of the way he lived on earth. Like any of us that die, our memories are cherished by those who knew us… by those whose lives we touch and by those who by one form or other loved us.

I’m humbled by the power of prayer and faith of the people I see on TV around the world. I don’t care much for the voice of critics or hypocrites, instead am more interested in the heartfelt faith of the common man. His death touches my soul as the death of any admirable man that lived his life to the fullest would. I pray that this old man felt the presence of the world with him as the laid his thoughts to rest. I pray that he heard the prayer of each individual praying for his health and I pray that at the other end of the tunnel, the only tears shed are those of joy.

Rest in Peace Karol Wojtyla
2 April 2005 20h37

APRIL FOOL´S!!!!!!!!!!!

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

You´ve been officially April Fooled by Sunshine!!! Fortunately for some and unfortunate for others... I pulled your leg! Vodacom has no knowledge of my existence and for now I won´t be leaving the island for professional purposes... However, even though the 1st of April calls for the only fabricated piece of writing you will ever read on Sunshine´s Column... I would once again like to stress that the truth should not be played with... Always be aware of your choice of words and their purpose.

Love Always,
Sunshine

April Fool´s Nº 1 Prank!

April Fool´s Nº 1 Prank!

carla.ornelas@gmail.com

Waking up this morning, the first thing I did was remind myself that today I’d be tricked, fooled, manipulated and lied to blatantly. The difference between today and all other days is that today it is socially accepted, one could even regard today as one of the most honest of days considering that eventually the trick or lie is unveiled.

My boss was the first to catch me out by calmly asking me what is was that I had on my shirt. I practically bent over backwards before I realized that I’d just been fooled. It occurred to me that in fact it was a wise prank… it’s with the little lies that we’re easily fooled.

I myself caught out a few of my clients by telling them that I had resigned and that one of my colleagues would take over my work. I was surprised to find that most of them immediately caught me out by saying that there was no way that it could true and those that did believe me got extremely upset and said that they were going to phone my boss to revert the situation. At that point it humbled and humoured me to play that particular prank; I now realize that I should’ve picked something else to play with…

Have you ever gotten one of those April Fool’s jokes that wasn’t an April Fool’s joke? At first you laugh and chide the person for trying to pull that particular prank on you and then your spine goes cold as you feel the truth fall on you like a bucket of cold water. Just as I was switching my computer off to go home, I finally got that call…

Vodacom chose a pretty shitty date to tell me that my resume had been accepted! I listened carefully as the woman on the other side told me that they had been impressed with my curriculum and that they were interested in positioning me in their Sandton branch as a call centre team leader. I started laughing and told the lady that it had been the best April Fool’s joke that had been played on me all day. After insisting twice that it was no joke, I had to check to my phone to make sure that the call was being made from a South African indicative. It was when she asked me about my availability to begin at my new position that I realized that it was no joke.

“And you’re sure this isn’t an April Fool’s joke?”

The woman laughed and we traded contacts arranging to speak next week after I had settled my real resignation with my current company. I stared at my colleagues that were leaving in absolute disbelieve. Should I tell them that I was leaving? What was the use, they probably weren’t going to believe me anyway, especially since I’d been fooling around with that same joke all day!

The joke turned against the joker…

As I went home on the bus, I remembered a good friend’s wise words: “Be careful what you wish for, one day it might just come true”. I also recalled wanting to live in one of the most popular cities in South Africa and for the last year I’d been hoping that a company would finally give the chance to prove my worth… I get this all on the day it’s supposed to all be a lie.

I’m contemplating on how I’m going to break the news to my dad, my family and my friends. No matter how much I rephrase the words in my head, I just can’t find the best way to tell the people I love. Deciding to get my resignation letter over and done with, seeing as I should hand it in first thing Monday morning, I realize that there is simply no easy way to put it. Swearing with frustration, I rewrite the letter for the sixth time… it occurs to me, that there are some things that simply cannot be well expressed in words.

April Fool’s day will end in a few hours and tomorrow my news will weigh far more than it weighs today. At this point I have no concrete conclusions excepting that next year, I’m going to be more careful with the jokes I pull…