Lior Bebera

Life is Not a Picnic

One Book

2020

Copyright

Life Is Not A Picnic

Copyright ©2020 by Lior Bebera

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www.lifeisnotapicnic.org

E-mail: info@lifeisnotapicnic.org

First Edition

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ISBN: 978-606-94915-0-8

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Your Mind Makes All the Difference in the World

As a writer you must never indulge your audience. The audience is your adversary. You must defeat them, which means your writing must have the power to change them.

- Anonymous

I do not buy books to build upon my apartment décor.

I buy books to read them.

As it is with many readers, I am drawn to literature I believe identify with my past, present, or my potential futures. I buy books to learn from them; to enhance my knowledge, my habits, my being. I seek for books which hold a weight worth baring change for. I search for impact. I search for widened perspectives. I search for reflection and growth.

This search brings upon the collection and development of answers – some partial, some full – to questions I ask myself. What do I want? What can I achieve? Where do I want to be? How far do I want to go? What is my place?

Frankly speaking, we are all capable of attaining a ‘good’ life. The practice and mental aptitude behind actually making a choice was consistently identified with achievements and accomplishments.

Our mental barriers and boundaries do define our results.

Though the actual past shapes the present – likewise with the actual present shaping the future – the gained perspectives from reflection held of both past and present do as well contribute to a change of one’s future. The negative moments in occurrence, are merely pieces which play in the bigger game of living. Both cliché and true, everything happens for a reason; one simply would not be who they are today if it were otherwise.

Yet, between the repeated complaint over loss and momentary failure, and the re-ignition and fuelling following a closed door as a push towards a greater gain, both hold their own respective contribution to defining the final achievement of the greater end-goal. Sometimes, a reminder of where, how, when, or what to push is needed.

I believe I serve the purpose of being that reminder. Not merely verbally, but with my actions and support. I have learnt and do continue to believe that in the grand scheme of things, I play my part in this world by using the tools and resources I have gained over the years of hardships, failures, and success, to now build a platform from which, as a leader, enables me to present greater leaders. I believe I serve a purpose of trying to give more than myself and impacts restricted to my lifetime to the future generations – what happens now is my opportunity to make my little contribution to a different humanity, one leader at a time. One mind at a time; one inspired self-belief at a time.

How It All Began

And suddenly you know: It's time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings.

- Meister Eckhart

Who Am I?

If I am worth anything later, I am worth something now. For wheat is wheat, even if people think it is a grass in the beginning.

– Vincent van Gogh

My parents are originally from Georgia. Following the birth of my eldest brother, they then immigrated to Israel in 1971 where the birth of my two siblings and myself took place. The financial crisis hit in the 1980s and in Israel, at the time, absolute everything came as a monetary expense, including educational resources deemed mandatory by the government. As there were four of us as children all baring different ages, expenses exceeded in tri-fold the entire household income. My parents committed to providing all of us the opportunity towards the best education they could afford so as to allow us to build upon a professional future full of potential success, even at their comfort’s expense. Germany was my second place to call home. Though my parents found it very challenging to relocate to another foreign country in their late thirties, having to start their life-gains from scratch, the new nation proved to be welcoming to the hardworking foreigners. I was four. Being that young, I remember very little from the time before in Israel and reverted to calling Germany my ‘homeland’. Though it has become the main place I have known as ‘home’, I remember not belonging as if it were my own. I was raised in Germany, spoke German, adopted local cultural practices, yet, I was not German. Neither could I identify my habits or being as Israeli.

To the Germans, I was a Jew. To the Israeli, I was a German.

Attending school as either was hard. Many of the students attending the same school were raised and educated by their parents to bare irrational hate upon the Jews and needless to say, I bore plenty of reminders of my difference and lack of belonging. Fortunately, not all were held to the same upbringing. The variety of students ranged from those who cared about background over their academics, to those who took upon pressure of the opposite. Germany taught me to strive for perfection and develop discipline to execute all I did properly, and accordingly to pre-determined standards. My placement in school was overall not one to pride myself with. I was by far not considered one of the stronger performers in school, was only actively involved in the classes I liked, and was usually among the few children who were watched with an extra pair of eyes. Continuing to go against the grain, I took a passionate liking to music and entertainment so much so that in the third grade I was hooked on this TV show for which I auditioned, and got the part. Six-months later, I was on TV, performing for over 12-million viewers.

From that moment, I built my life around the passion I had for music, as well as sports, and the identity I built in the Jewish community. I further identified my purpose to ‘become someone’. To my parents, my passion, career path, and life choices were not always easy to accept. Following my high school graduation, I decided to pursue an apprenticeship instead of a University education. I worked as a waiter, I cleaned rooms, and I washed dishes, and willingly started from the very bottom. My parents, having sacrificed plenty for my siblings and I to reap the benefits of a first world foreign environment and education system, constantly disapproved of my ways, and questioned my ambitions.

Is this what we came to Germany for? So you could become a waiter and clean?

Though in hindsight, I can only imagine their frustrations, it was then a difficult time for me to pass through, too. The lack of understanding I constantly felt from their judgements of my seemingly poor life choices, all the while not baring the fruit of my practical work, together bore a heavy weight on my shoulder introducing the vicious cycle involving the questioning of one’s self worth. The beginnings are known for not being easy – and this rule played no different to me. I did not want to fail. With so much doubt around me, I couldn’t afford to be wrong – more for myself than for anyone else. I persevered in silence striving with the belief that my efforts and results would hold the last word in victory.

There were days where I felt I was living in Hell on Earth. There were also days where Hell wasn’t as bad.

Moral of this first story; Hell on Earth is temporary. Everything is temporary - things do get better. And they did.

I hadn’t yet achieved my dream job, but I could see pieces gradually changing and re-forming for a bigger, better future. I would love to say that from that deep personal fall, all has been uphill since. But as gravity so rightly plays literally and metaphorically, what goes up, eventually also comes down. It is the human life that gifts us with the ability to get back up acting against the somewhat natural, sometimes expected fall down. And so my life continued.

I started working for a Jewish businessman whom, at the time, owned two hotels in Frankfurt. He offered me a management position which I held for a year and a half. By that point, I was 21, hungry to prove myself, impatient, quite decently paid, and appeared to have it all going in the right direction - professionally. Then, I met a girl, fell in love, and moved to Berlin. Yes, I gave it all up for blind love. Though I am not one to regret, in hindsight I see how it stunt my professional growth and definitely, even to this day, strikes as a strong reminder to how overwhelmed feelings bloomed from naivety. Whether right or wrong, my verdict now would definitely differ speaking to a younger self. My lesson duly came with the struggle to find employment for half a year following the arrogant rejection of great opportunities foolishly seeing them come at a wrong time. I eventually managed to find employment for a so-called marketing company, and it would be an understatement, even today, to say I had absolutely