There are two words that can thoroughly spoil your joie de vivre. Whatever follows them is rarely pleasant. They are like weeds - no sooner have you pulled them out than they grow back again. The words are: "I should".

I recently planted a bunch of seedlings in the garden. Lettuce, parsley, leeks and other vegetables. The joy of gardening is watching the tender little plants take root, grow and become stronger. What thoroughly disturbs this idyll is the weeds. They grow faster, they thrive more vigorously, they are able to suffocate the tender seedlings. It is sometimes hard to believe how quickly they are able to grow back and spread.

It's the same with those sentences that start with "I should". Sometimes I have the feeling that they were invented especially for us women. Wherever society fails - in childcare, caring for the elderly, family-friendly working hours - they take women, put this burden on them and call it "private life". We should do so much, we should do it as well as possible and we should look good doing it.

The last few weeks have been a bit demanding. When you have two children, life becomes unpredictable the moment they are born anyway. As a one-person company, you're a whole company in one, so to speak. And then there's my relationship, the household and friendships that you want to maintain. I'm one of the countless women who try to do their best on all fronts. Not unusual. Just terribly exhausting.

I went for a walk with my husband the other day. We are blessed with a little wood near our house, you walk into it and when you come out you feel like you weigh two kilos less of mental rubbish. I felt myself getting lighter with every step, relaxing into this simple little happiness - birdsong, fresh air and two people enjoying their quiet happiness hand in hand. Until this mental weed broke through the brain-blood barrier and the words "I should still answer the emails" formed in my head.

Happiness and inner peace are skills that can (and should) be practised. Having been practising for years, I knew immediately what was happening here. I grabbed the phrase and pulled it out of my brain, which had just become so pleasantly squishy. Away with the weeds! I took ten steps in peace and the next sentence popped out: "I should put the leftovers in the fridge." Okay, I wasn't going to deny this one a certain importance. You don't let food go bad. But at that moment, all the other "I should" sentences must have got the feeling that they could land well with me, because they shot out like mushrooms after the rain.

I was supposed to transfer the money for my daughter's school trip. I should bring in the hanging laundry from the terrace. I should draw up a concept for the new edition of my book, the publisher is waiting for my reply. I should draw up a schedule for it. I should finally make the dentist appointment for my son. I should finally look at the new data protection regulations for entrepreneurs. I should, I should, I should!

My head was full of weeds in no time. Gone was the delicate little plant of relaxation, of presence, of the pleasurable moment.

Have you ever noticed that things are never finished? No matter how much you get done, the next "I should" is already waiting just around the corner. Sometimes you even get the feeling that the quicker you get things done, the quicker it comes. Like the dragon in the fairy tale. If you cut off one of its heads, two grow back. That's crazy.

It's crazy, because of all these things to do, there is little that is meaningful. So many magical intimate moments between me and my loved ones are within me for all eternity, their intensity stretching beyond all time. When I write, I am in the flow, I dissolve, I feel right. In good conversations with my sister, the world feels meaningful. When I laugh with friends, life feels light. I want a life full of moments like these. I don't want to work my way from one "I should" to the next "I should". I don't want to miss out on the birdsong and the closeness of my husband because all the "I shoulds" have eaten me up inside.

I wonder if the world will collapse if one day I refuse the "should"? What if the weeds don't sprout on their own, but my way of thinking and living is responsible?

I lived in Africa for a while as a child. In the countryside. Without watches. My father was an aid worker and, along with many others, tried to teach the locals how to work in the factory built by the former colonial power. None of the locals were stressed. This artificial restlessness that we brought with us was something they didn't understand. They smiled and kept their cool. They were late for work. Fell asleep on the job. And the world didn't end.

Our life is big and rich and complicated. But the essence of it is so unspectacular. It is the present moment, into which we could let ourselves fall right away if we wanted to. It is the breath of your loved one. A smile. The persistent beating of your own heart. I am there. And "should" be nowhere else at this moment but right here, where I am.

I should do so many things. I should be interested in new trends in the blogging scene. I should be on the spot for clients who are in trouble. I should finally clean the mirrored box in the cloakroom. It could do a good job as a fingerprint file in the meantime. I should go to the hairdresser again.

But occasionally I want to choose life. I choose humility in the face of reality, which quite simply only provides me with 24 hours a day. I choose to be compassionate with myself, who have only human powers and no inexhaustible super-magical powers. I want to be mindful of the moment. What doesn't work, doesn't work. Society, our environment and the media are constantly fuelling us with images and demands of how we could or even should be. It is not always easy to stand up to this and forgive ourselves for "just" being human. But if you are always nice and courteous to everyone, you are unkind and harsh to the most important person in your life - yourself.

Life is a rich buffet and we can't stuff ourselves with everything. We can't be everything we would like to be - successful in our personal and professional lives, financially well off, fit and good-looking, and of course popular and friendly to everyone. At the end of such a journey lies only the valley of the burnt-out. Because every yes is a no to something else. Yesterday's walk in the woods with my husband was simply magical. Feeling connected with yourself, with others and with the world is a quality of energy that makes life worth living. Yes, I actually had other things to do. When not? There is always something to do. But the urgent must not suffocate the essential. I want my life to be a colourful, flourishing garden. I want my heart to rejoice when I look at my life. I want to have lived it and not functioned in it.

It's not easy to be relaxed as a woman these days. The demands are limitless. You almost always fail at some point. One has no children, another has no partnership, another still doesn't know where to go professionally at the age of forty and yet another can't get her weight under control. No matter how much we do, it never seems to be enough. While we feel uncomfortable in our own skin and punish ourselves with unkindness for the audacity of the world, our lives are happening.

The forest is waiting around the corner. Its trees just stand there. The ones at the edge are more handsome than the ones in the centre. But they don't seem to care. The ones in the centre don't push towards the edge and shout "I want to catch some of the sun and finally be seen!" Conifers stand patiently next to deciduous trees, smaller, taller, thicker, and some of them already quite worn out. They breathe in and breathe out and calmly allow the life force within them to pulsate. They don't think about tomorrow and don't fret about yesterday. They live in the moment with their whole presence. They are naturally what they are, because they cannot be anything else. They don't need a brain to understand the art of living. Perhaps it is precisely our brain that prevents us from living really well. Being at peace with ourselves and the present moment.

As a good blogger, I should use more pictures here. I should include subheadings. I should improve my SEO. I should do so much again. But today I am simply writing from my soul. Today I just want to touch base with you, dear reader. A wink from woman to woman. Where everything is perfect, there is no room for liveliness.

With this in mind, I wish you a few thoughtless moments of happiness. Of presence. Don't believe everything you think. Don't think so much that you forget to feel good. Feel yourself and the pulsation of your aliveness. It is the great gift of the moment. And the moment is ultimately all you have at the moment.

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