Sabbatical: Developing new skills

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After the introspection, observation, and learning about myself and others phase, it was needed to focus on the second and no less important part of the sabbatical: developing new skills. Although, which ones? I would like that it could be something truly new for me, nothing related to any other experience that I had in the past, and, of course, that challenges me.

The challenges: woodwork and farming
During the pandemic, I became a sailboat fan (👀) and, as a consequence, interested in woodwork. Building something with my bare hands and seeing the result after would be fascinating, especially for someone who always builds things untouchable. Learn about woods, make budgets for the materials needed, buy equipment, plan the construction, transport the goods… A lot of new activities will come ahead. Great!

I was always interested in staying close to nature during my sabbatical because it makes me feel good and I would like to develop something related to it so farming is the obvious way to stay close. Not for the money but for the countryside living, for the opportunity to see nature grow, work with the land, develop new solutions to help me in the tasks, and see what I could learn in this process. Wonderful!

With these two goals in mind, the question that remains was where I will develop them. After a talk with my brother and my mom, I became responsible for a semi-abandoned 2 thousand square meters of land that we own near my hometown. It could not be better! Let's do it!

The excitement of the new
There was a lot of time that I was not part of a very new project for me. I mean a project with almost no knowledge about the area that I will work on and the key moment of this excitement in this project was when I bought a kind of expensive woodwork equipment and I was transporting it to the land. It was not about the price tag but the fear of not knowing how to use it, for the fear of not getting the project done. After a little time, I realized that these fear were the things that I was looking for, the fear of the new, the unknown, the learning.

But it is impossible to leave our knowledge aside. Little by little I started to see some parallels between the things that I was doing (plannings, projections, draws, measurements…) and the things that I was used to doing in the projects that I had worked on in the past.

From intellectual work to handmade work
During my life, I always made intellectual jobs, with little or no physical work. I was always seated down in a chair thinking, debating, or presenting ideas. Then, I saw myself worried about waking up very very early to be able to work until the sun is not so hot, putting some bottles of water in the cooler to freeze so it will be possible to drink cool water after the sun unfreezes it, to have some breaks for each half of hour to restore the breath after all the effort done, leave the work because of the hot sun and be back after it cool down and stay in the land until it became dark. It was not easy, not romantic, and not noble but it was enriching, enlightening, and to be jealous of the strength of the people that have to make it in their life. If you could, prize them!

Life in the countryside has another rhythm, another flavor, another beauty. During the time that I was developing these challenges, I split my life between my hometown and the countryside. My life rhythm was completely different from my hometown and in the countryside. Besides the hard work on the land, there was a lot of moment of pure contemplation of nature! Seeing every detail, walking for each centimeter of the land and always seeing something different, seeing the plant colors changing with the hours and the sunset, seeing the grass that was cleared off days before, growing again without caring about the effort done, day after day seeing the nature doing her job with perseverance and ignoring the man interventions.

What did I learn?
In these 4 months (Jan-May) that this project was run, I asked myself a lot of times why I was developing it but as in the first phase of the sabbatical, I was completely confident that I will understand in the end, and here is the short list of what I did learn:

• As bigger and more complex the challenge is, the more I will give myself to it.
• Learning is addictive, and knowing that I am capable of is a gift.
• See the result of days of effort and dedication is extremely rewarding.
• Stay in contact with nature in daily life is a complete pleasure.

Unfortunately, I had a problem for buy fertilizers for the plantation and I aborted the plan because the soil of the land is very poor in nutrients, and without fertilizers, it is not possible to continue. I would not say that it is a goodbye for this project but it is a see you later. 😃

And I would like to say thank you…
First of all, to my brother and my mom that agreed to borrow me the land to develop the project, second to Neo that helped me with some tasks and gave me hints in numerous others and third to the people that had doubts about my mental sanity in developing this project, these doubts always were and are the biggest incentive to achieve my challenges ❤