Present

It's strange when you are first in a new place. That rebirth moment where nothing is familiar – yes there are people and buildings, but you look around and all those words mean nothing to you, there will be no faces in the crowd that you recognise and you don't know what is around any corner. It's such a pure feeling that lasts only an instant before your brain begins to memorise those images. That safety mechanism that automatically takes a picture so that in times of 'danger' you can pull out that file from your brain and aid whatever situation you find yourself in.

And repeated actions. The body remembers that movement or sequence of steps so they become auto pilot and you don't need to 'think'. Our brain is very good at constructing pathways for us to follow so it feels that we don't have to use it so much. But perhaps it's always wanting more, it's just storing thoughts to make room for new.

Part of me is glad that I have settled here so quickly, but at the same time, that awe and wonder feels like its slipping, especially on days where you find yourself making those repeated trips that have already been stored under 'auto pilot'. Sometimes it's fun when something becomes automatic – learning how to set up a warp was one of those times, the less you thought about it the more naturally it came.

But how can you retain the beauty of the new as long as possible? Is it even possible? It's so hard to live 'now' to realise every moment as it happens and not think about the past or the future, immediate or distant. Think about language, we use the past and future tenses far more than the present (I think anyway) because we never talk about 'now', it isn't good enough for us any more. What are you doing right now? Stop. Think about what actions your brain is controlling – your eyes are perceiving colour and movement, every inch of your skin is feeling something, you're breathing, you're alive.

It's almost too much for our brain to process at once.

Have you ever thought you were content with a state of being only to discover something more fantastic you could never have imagined? And now you can't go back to what you once thought of as living. Like Plato's cave – content in naivety, but once opened to more, you cannot go back to that original state (I guess Higher English did teach me something!).

I think that's how I feel. That feeling of endless possibilities didn't truly exist for me until the last year or two. To think about how I used to think seems so alien. I don't want to leave Finland yet (time feels like its slipping already – no, don't think of the future, think of now), I'm not ready to, but I've become too settled in this little flat; living next to the supermarket, getting the number 18 bus to town. I don't like the security of routine, to me it feels more smothering than safe. So I guess it's my job to go find it. It? Anything. That feeling of mapping new areas of your brain – it's fairly addictive.