Sebastian Overgaard m.m.

We are all masters of our own reality. Adventure is right around the corner together with laughter, magic encouters and smiling strangers. But often we forget this fact entangled in our everyday routines of to do lists, endless illusionary search for security and a thinner flat screen television.

Do you ever get the feeling that something is missing?

I do.

And since every day is one day closer to departure from this fantastic opportunity called life, I have to challenge everything that brings me into the trancelike state of modern living. Many years ago I found the three simple ingredients to do this:

Courage

Creativity

Change

Ok, they are not easy, but it’s all C’s. Beautiful. How does it apply in our world?

Well here’s an example: Street Dining – as the title of this blogpost indicates.

Street Dining is just one way to wake you up from the lifestyle of a comfort zone zombie. There are many other ways, but they all contain the 3 C’s!

Street Dining is an old idea of mine. It’s been wating for manifastation for more than five years. But when I suddenly decided to jump into this September 2010 there wasn’t much planning needed.

Besides setting up a Facebook page 30 minutes before we went dining for the first time, here’s the ingenious plan:

1. Find a table
2. Find some people
3. Cook some food
4. Remember plates
5. Take it all to a very unusual location
6. Enjoy you dinner
7. Smile to those passing by (on foot, bike, car, police car)
8. Enjoy the buzzing energy, thoughts, ideas and reflections whirling through your mind/body
9. Answer those who are curious and brave enough to ask: What is this?

Here’s an answer to that question:

“We are sitting here in the middle of two car lanes because it wakes us up. It’s strange and strange is good because it forces our minds to expand to grasp whats going on. While this is happening a certain energy builds up. This energy is usually a very positive and happy energy. It’s contagious. It makes strangers smile, laugh and wake up from their trance. They might start thinking that if this is possible what else is?”

Or whatever…

You could also just say:

Feel the magic of life

Connect with strangers

Bring a smile on someones face

It’s all about feeling at home  - and you can do that everywhere

And then hope that not too many will just reject this unfamiliar sight. Instead of hearing the wake up call a lot of people will put it in to a safe box such as

“Oh this must be some kind of art project or the set for a movie or commercial.”

Or even better

“What a bunch of loonies!!!”

A few weeks after my first Street Dining in Copenhagen with a lovely girl called Anna the Street Dining Facebook page has 400 fans. I’ve connected with cool people from Japan to Mexico, Iceland and US – likeminded who can see the potential of this innocent strange wake up call. Well this IS a few weeks after. So let’s see what’s going to happen. This is not plugging into mainstream. But I can’t wait to connect with more interesting and reflecting people. Maybe you?

At my second Street Dining I had the pleasure of eating with two Americans, Jennifer and Nic, who I met through the page. This dinner was filmed by MyDenmarkTv who contacted me within the first week.  The segment about Street Dining is three minutes and starts one minute from the start. Watch it on Street Dining on MyDenmarkTV.

This will not be the last you hear about Street Dining on this blog… But for now I hope to see you on Street Dining on Facebook or in the street, park, the square, on the roof etc etc…

Please share your comments.

There are so many things we could do that would make us more happy and feel more alive. Most of these things are not only FREE they are also extremely simple. It’s things like actually breathing, relaxing, laughing and so on. But as I sit here in front of my laptop I myself have difficulty taking the first simple action to feel really alive. Breathing.

Monks have found happiness for thousands of years simply by focusing on breathing. The right breathing enhances sport performances and women endure more pain while giving birth if they breathe in certain ways. Breathing is definitely a key to something I want. But my thoughts are somehow keeping me from doing this in a good healthy and natural way. I think more about what to write than to take deep breaths.

Maybe it should be the other way around? If I really start focusing on my breathing I might relax my body and mind so much that I’ll become more creative. You know what? I actually believe this is the case even though right now I’m more concerned about writing than breathing despite this belief.

It’s time for a mindjump. I have to do something out of the ordinary to trick my self into feeling my breath.

Here’s an idea. What if I suddenly tried NOT to breathe while writing this? What would come out of that? I’m intrigued. It calls for an experiment. I’ll try to see how much I can write while holding my breath. This will not only give me a completely new sensation and hereby an interesting mindjump – it will also force me to take a deep breath when I’m out of air.

Bare over with me if what I write in the next paragraphs is somehow incoherent: I’m breathing in…. in… in… and NOW I hold my breath.

Already now I feel a nice warm sensation in my legs probably due to my prolonged inhalation. I start exhaling now. Feeling embarrassed that… I can’t hold my breath longer. I’m getting disturbed by one of my colleagues. Try not to breath

Ok, it ended here. I’m dizzy, it’s not comfortable at all. My head is pounding. It’s not working. I was disturbed by a colleague who was talking to me and I was trying to answer while still holding my breath. I could see he was wondering why I was acting so weird, but I didn’t want to abort the experiment. I think the reason for my beginning headache is that my mind continued to have the control, so while my body was screaming for air I kept it too long.

I’m going to end my blogpost here. Not a very good advertising for breathing. But hey, if we knew the outcome of mindjumps they wouldn’t be mindjumps. I still believe that breathing techniques can help you into a healthy meditative state or just to enjoy the moment.

Maybe you’d like to try this mindjump? Hopefully you will have a better experience than me. Start writing a comment to this post while holding your breath (and then continue to write after you start breathing again to explain how it was).

“No one get’s into this world with a plan of being arrogant, annoying, stupid, disgusting or what ever we might think of someone.”

We all know the feeling of disliking someone. It can be someone at work, a taxidriver or just some random person we see in the street. We can find them annoying, provoking or even disgusting. The emotions we fill ourselves with are not very pleasant and they certainly won’t help us into a productive mood. So what can we do to transform those bad vibes into something more healthy?

Well, first of all remind yourself that what we see in our selves is what we see in the world. All the negative things you can find outside of yourself is also a part of you. So when you meet someone you dislike, you can start by asking yourself what it is in yourself, that you don’t like. This is not easy. And since we have a whole life to figure out who we actually are it can be difficult to automatically like everyone.

Luckily you can always make a mindjump and hereby trick yourself into – if not liking then – accepting almost everyone.

I came up with this mindjump some years ago when living in Berlin. Here I spent a lot of time sitting in bars and observing people. One evening there was a guy I couldn’t stand from the moment I saw him. He seemed extremely arrogant and full of himself. He made me fell angry inside. I’m sure I can seem full of my self in some people’s eyes, so this could be one of the reasons for my discomfort. But when I sat there judging him I got an idea. I started thinking about how I could accept him as just another human being like me. A man with feelings, hopes, dreams and worries. By using my imagination I came up with this really helpful mindjump:

When I looked at the guy I reminded myself that he once was a small baby. No matter how fancy and self absorbed he looked right now there was a point in his life where he was innocent and pure. I imagined how his parents would have looked at him as a baby – putting all their love and hopes into this little boy. I know that this might not have been the case. Maybe his parents were fucked up and didn’t care about this new life. But this doesn’t matter. For the mindjump to work you simply have to focus on love and innocence in it’s purest form – and that would be a small baby born out of love.

Of course you can ask, why don’t we just imagine the adult person we’re seeing as someone loveable? And yes, we can do that, but from experience I know how hard an exercise that can be if you in the moment have a strong negative feeling about the person you’re confronted with.

When I came up with the idea and started to imagine the small baby, it didn’t take many seconds for it to work. After a minute I could really see the baby inside this arrogant man. It took 90% of his arrogance of him – in my eyes at least. Now I looked at him with more understanding. I tried to imagine this boy growing up with a lot of challenges like most other people. And this made me accept on a much deeper level that no matter how he is acting right now, there are perfect reasons for it. No one get’s into this world with a plan of being arrogant, annoying, stupid, disgusting or what ever we might think of someone.

Since every grown up person you’ll ever meet has been a baby once, this mindjump works with everyone. So try it and start liking everyone. It feels great.

If you try this mindjump then please tell me what comes out of it. What did you feel and experience? Please share it in the comment section below.

“If you have goals out of the ordinary, you must surround yourself with people who are out of the ordinary.”

Since I was a kid I’ve always felt different – set apart from others. At times I’ve looked back on my somehow lonely childhood with regret and a slice of self-pitty about not being a part of the mainstream – about being an outsider.

BUT of course now it’s a whole other story.

My life has turned into a mindjumping adventure. I’ve challenged and explored myself. I’ve experienced a great number of successes by being open to all the fantastic possibilities life has to offer. I’ve dared think differently and I’ve acted in accordance with my inner beliefs and passions. I’ve lived several lives already.

Being an Outsider is now a very precious thing for me. And 5 years ago I started dreaming about a gathering a movement of Outsiders in a world often run by the mainstream majority.

My idea was that Outsiders gets a bigger picture of the world because they have the reflective thirst, the creative ability and the personal courage to “step out” of normality. And because of that Outsiders can change the world.

The only problem here is that Outsiders per definition often is alone. And by being alone it will always be hard to fight the power, opinions and beliefs of the majority.

This is where Outsiders Empire comes in

Until today I haven’t managed to manifest my dream about creating an empire of Outsiders, but shame on me if I don’t use the power of social media to throw my intentions out into the world once again.

If you answer YES to most of the 9 questions I hope you’ll read the following 5-year old thoughts about Outsiders Empire and give me your feedback in a comment.

1. Are you curious?
2. Are you a reflecting person?
3. Do you have a thirst for the unusual?
4. Do you seek adventure and living life?
5. Do you always have respect for others?
6. Do you feel something is wrong in our society?
7. Are you trying not to waste life on TV, junk or…
8. Do you have ideals and ambitions out of the ordinary?
9. Do you believe you can and will change the world?

Welcome to Outsiders Empire

Outsiders Empire is a place where you can be amongst kindred spirits and recharge you’re creative batteries. Where you can be deliberately naïve and follow your passions without anyone suggesting that you should “be realistic”.

Like a seed needs water and nourishment to grow into a plant, every dream or idea must be nurtured, supported and motivated to turn into reality.

Creative outsiders are surrounded daily by people who don’t understand them. Outsiders are constantly being suggested to go with the flow. And in the end – with enough pressure – many of them fall in line and give up their passion or dream.

There seems to be a rule in life, that you can’t create something without energy and motivation. Human beings are extremely sensitive and adaptable to the environment they’re in. They will eventually go with the flow. Biologically and physically we align ourselves to the people we are close to.

It’s basic logic that if you have goals out of the ordinary, you must surround yourself with people who are out of the ordinary.

The alternative?

The majority of people in this world are going through life defending the status quo. Mainstreamers rather not ask questions or stand out. They are afraid of being labeled and alienated so they usually do what is considered “normal”. That is: What everybody else is thinking, saying or doing. Mainstreamers are also the commercial cash cows of industry because they are driven by the predictable fear of exclusion of the society.

Why do I feel the need to create an Outsiders Empire?

As an outsider I’ve always had goals out of the ordinary. I’ve always been searching for answers and alternatives to what is considered “normal”.

I’ve often been disappointed when sharing my thoughts or ideas to friends and family because even if they love me they often can’t understand ideas that are too unorthodox. Therefore they can’t support me. In their eyes the best for me would be to do what is safe, proven and normal.

I get a good feeling when I’m around someone who has the same passion as me – also when they’re not necessarily doing what I’m doing. When I meet a kindred spirit I get motivated, energized and feel alive.

That’s the main reason why I’ve created Outsiders Empire.

Well, it’s not created yet. But that’s why it’s even more important that you write a comment and let other Outsiders who find their way to this blog know YOUR thoughts.

I like strangers. Strangers are natural catalysts for mindjumping. And the great part is… there are so many of them.

For me it is normal practice to spice up everyday life  by embracing strangers. Yes I’m one of those annoying people who talk to you in the train, at the cafe or just walking next to you on the sidewalk. I can’t count how many adventures I’ve experienced because of my passion for strangers. Some of those adventures will be featured in other blog posts a long the way.

What happens when you encounter a stranger is that your whole system will be working like an understaffed factory to adjust to the situation. This is because your mind is constantly trying to put the world into familiar boxes. It wants to understand. It wants security. And it will do everything it can to try to grasp any new interference. It’s not at all relaxing for your mind, but as with any other hard physical work it builds strength. In the case of the mind it creates new pathways. It has to reconnect in completely new ways to return the comfortable feeling of status quo.

While your mind is working overtime you might feel the effect by feeling uncomfortable, sweaty and embarrassed. Many people have these sensations when being confronted by total strangers. In an unfamiliar context that is. It doesn’t count if you’re working in a music store and a stranger comes and ask for the new album with Justin Timberlake. You have to feel the challenge to feel the change.

This post is not about meeting strangers in the physical world, but on Facebook.

For me it’s an amazing mental kickstarter to browse random friends of friends friends and then send them an innocent curious message. Sitting in front of my computer most of the day it’s an instant adventure just at my fingertips. And as a novice mindjumper you might want to start in this safe environment before you hit the streets. After all there are 500.000.000 Facebook profiles to chose from if we imagine that everyone has an open profile.

When I’m doing my random browsing – and read carefully because this is the mindjump – I try to imagine that the faces I see are actual human beings. This sounds like a joke, but think about it. How often do you take the time to contemplate about this? If something on Facebook has “789 likes” do you ever imagine these Seven Hundred and Eighty Nine people standing in a room. Like real people in flesh and blood with families, memories and dreams. I don’t. Often I just see them as a number or faces appearing on my screen.

When I’m actively mindjumping I get into an optimistic, excited and naïve mood. I focus on a belief that something interesting will come out of this. I imagine that my random browsing and messaging will lead into an unseen innovative relation. I will meet someone on the other side of the world or someone who turns out to be my neighbour. And in this random meeting we will both learn something important about life.

All this can sound quite complicated, but actually it’s not very time consuming. In 2-5 minutes and a few clicks you can find someone in Nepal and write a personal individual message to that person. If that person is responding positively your mind is now connected to Nepal.

An hour before writing this blog I randomly found a person in Los Angeles – someone that really inspired me. After reading his quotes on his semi-open Facebook profile I wrote him a short message and curiously googled his projects. He’s a film maker and a “seeker”. I have no idea of what our connection can lead to, but I believe…

You might get inspired by the energy he has put into this trailer:

By the way. There are many different ways to approach strangers. Some better than others. This will be explained in other posts.

Do you like the view of mountains in the horizon? I do. Mountains are for me a symbol of peace and grounding. But they also make me think of time. How little of it we got and how small we are. Standing on a mountain is unexplainable profound. Looking at mountains… almost just as good.

Well, I live in a country with no mountains, but luckily Denmark’s got many clouds. And when I was I child a got this ideas for an imaginary play with my vision. If I simply look at the heavy clouds lying out there in the horizon I really see the mountains. Sometimes I have to concentrate for a few minutes, but if I really imagine that they are mountains the illusion is amazingly close to the real deal.

Even though it sounds easy, I know that some people can have a hard time really seeing the imaginary mountains in the horizon, so here’s a few guidelines:

-       Start focusing on where the clouds touch the horizon and tell your self that this is the bottom of a mountain far away.

-       Imagine that somewhere on this mountain there is a path where people are climping the mountain right now. You can’t see them because the mountain is too far away, but try with you eyes to follow the path from bottom to the top.

-       Defocus your eyes and pretend that you’re only watching the silluette of mountains.

-       If you’ve seen mountains in your life, then remember how they looked while you continue to stare at the clouds. This way you can transfer some of the feelings of looking at real mountains to the clouds.

As with so many mindjumps this is not rocket science. But the point is to do it and even if you only spend 1-3 minutes on it you can really free your mind for a while.

I’m sure this post about imaginary mountains has given you some ideas, memories or reflections. Please share them in the comment section below.

Some years ago I took a 5-month vacation in Berlin. While I was there I spend my time walking the streets, experimenting with human interaction. At one point I came up with the concept of Street Coaching. This is basically about offering complete strangers a new take on some of their deeper personal challenges.

If I met someone at a bus stop or in a café, I would start talking to them and within a few minutes ask about something on a personal level. Most people would quickly open up and talk about a problem that was troubling them. I would ask questions. Honestly and curiously. And then offer them to meet the same place next week. I only saw people 2-3 times, but it was fantastic to see the energy and new insights it would give these strangers.

My philosphy behind Street Coaching is that many people never get the right questions and objective attention to their issues. Most people would never go to a coach or a therapist, but instead turn to their friends and relatives to talk about their problems. But the challenge here is that a friend is rarely objective. He will very often try find a solution because he doesn’t like to see his friend suffering. This will pay disrespect to the person with the problem and may create even greater harm. No matter how good a solution he will come up with, the result will always be damaging, becuase on a subconsious level it tells the person with the problem, that he is not good enough since he can’t solve his own problem.

When I as a stranger start asking someone personal questions, I’m not coloured by past experiences with that person. I can be curious and honest. And when I’m asking my questions, the other person is not coloured by our relationsship and shared memories.

At the same time there is a unique energy surrounding a “first meeting”. When two people meet for the first time, their whole system is trying to figure out each other. This happens on a subconsious level in our mind and body.

What I did was not very different from what “normal” coach or therapist would do. But my hope and idea was that by offering my help randomly (and for free, by the way), I could maybe help someone who would never turn to a professional for help. If just one person could change his or her life into the better because of a weird stranger it would have been worth it. And it was.

My dream is that this – for many people – far out idea of Street Coaching, would somehow be a normal implemented part of society. That we would understand the limitations in our personal relationsships, and then turn to the potential 6,5 billion strangers, that could help us simply by being objective and curious strangers.

I do 30 – because I want my planet as clean as my pants

I do 30 is trying to do something that might not work: We are trying to get attention about a topic as uninspiring as low temperature washing – a subject with no sex-appeal, little hipness, and limited conversation value. Not exactly something that lends itself to a catchy slogan.

But it makes sense to try to bring it up. Doing laundry is one of the most energy consuming processes in our households, and we could easily just turn down the dial. It would still mean clean clothes, you would save money on your electricity bill while reducing washing wear and tear, and – most importantly – if we all got together, we could make a real difference for the environment.

By joining I do 30, you are sending a signal that:

•You want to wash your clothes primarily at 30 °C
•You want to help spread the word about 30 °C washing
•You want more climate friendly choices in your everyday life

The I do 30 campaign is created by ThinkHouse, Mindjumpers and is powered by Novozymes

Join on facebook.com/ido30

or read more on ido30.org

As a personal friend of Kim K I’ve been asked to advertise for the following:

******************* BIG NEWS ***************************

Recently Kim K Kristiansen, one of the best lifecoaches in the country, startet appearing on the dr.dk – the website DR (Danish National Televison).

The talentet and goodlooking and generous coach Kim K appears in the new format PIRAT TV.

PIRAT TV shows small snackbite pieces for young viewers. The best videos are with Kim K, but there are also old videos with “Drengene fra Angora”, “Banjos Likørstue” and other programmes that didn’t get as much succes as Kim K and his Coaching Videos. He is still the best.

Kim K is coaching a policeofficer called Henrik, a popstar called Søren Bregendahl and a bunch of kids in a classroom. Se the videos in danish here:

http://www.dr.dk/pirattv/klip/coaching-med-kim-k-politimand/coaching-med-kim-k-popstjerne/