Writing the book is about the flow of writing and drawing. It is a way to observe thoughts and feelings without fear or judgment - allowing the pen to move freely.

The real foundation of the happy ApE project is writing the book. While the concept of ApE didn’t come about before 2012 - as I was introduced to and submerged myself into mindfulness - writing the book started several years earlier.

Childhood

As a child, I loved to write and draw. I wrote stories, kept a diary and practiced drawing. I don’t remember doing it to please anyone, and there was no encouragement. On the contrary, my love of drawing was extinguished by a single splash of ridicule. How fragile the young mind and spirit is.

The Crackbook

Luckily, I found back to writing on a wondrous trip to Brazil in 2008, when my friends and I (felt we) had so many wonderful ideas, insights, and quotes, that we could not keep it all in our head. That was the original Crackbook, so named because it contained all of the things that ‘cracked’ us up.

A year later, I took time off from work to travel to Africa and Australia, and an acquaintance had advised me to remember to write down what I experienced. What wonderful advice. 15 years and 100 books later, I see clearly how writing has again become my companion, healer and mirror.

Writing as Mindfulness

Writing the book started as a social endeavor - and it still is - but since mindfulness entered the picture, it has become more and more meditative. Writing has become a way to observe my thoughts without fear or judgment, allowing the pen to flow freely. This act of observing—of stepping into the role of the Observer—is at the heart of mindfulness.

Book of Life

Everybody has a book to write, a story to tell. Maybe it’s not meant for anything else than you, maybe that’s the best kind of book to write, the book that you write to understand life.

I’m more than 100 books in now.

I share it to see if there’s an audience, but I write for me.