Personally, I think this is one of the most harmful sentences, believes, thoughts & feelings we can have. It basically negates the importance of one of the two genders on earth and that is insanity for me.

But let me start from the beginning:

One of the lovely traditions here in the North of Sweden that I attend to every year is called “Betesläpp”, it is the moment the farmers release the cows on the pastures after having been inside during the cold and snowy winter.

It is a big event where it feels like the whole town is gathering, cinnamon buns & milk are given away, there are rabbit expositions, pony riding, games for kids and many picnic spots. And: of course the releease of the cows at noon.

We all gathered around a fanced field of grass and watched the cows running, jumping and rushing out on the meadow. Some of them are bit confused and want to go back, others jump, play and head bang each other… it’s a blast!

It was around 40 cows that were released and many of them had big, milk-filled udders. We wondered how many liters must fit in there as they looked super heavy.

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While watching them play, eat and drink water, I heard a person behind me saying to another one: “Well the bulls are not really needed in this type of business here.” The other agreed.

& I thought to myself: “Really? How is that? Why do you think that these cows have their udders filled with milk? Cos they gave birth to calfs and are feeding them AND their milk is processed so you can consume it. And how did the cows get pregnant? Because a bull impregnated them. And if it was not the bull, it was the farmer via an insemination with sperm from a bull.”

I did not get upset, angry or hugely triggered, but I honestly was wondering how it can be that something like that is said? I dont consider people stupid, but sometimes we say really stupid and completely nonesense sentences. That was one of them.

What else this reminded me of is, the fact that I observe this in the human world too: men are tried to be made obsolete, like they dont count, they are not worthy and not needed. Especially from certain type of women, who say that they can do everything on their own, dont need men, are strong, independent and bascially disregard the whole manhood.

For me as a woman, I think this is ridiculous, stupid and most of all very dangerous. Men are amazing beings and I am so happy and honored to have many great male human beings in my closest surrounding.

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I recently told a male frieend of mine, that I wouldn’t want to be a man right now, cos it seems to be freaking impossible. Everything you do, say, or are as a man seems to somehow be wrong. There is nothing you can do right without offending a woman.

I also observe the science when it comes to testosterone levels declining, fertility issues and fewer babies, mental health problems spiking in men, suicide rates increasing, relational problems etc etc.

All this does not mean that woman dont have issues and that woman are not amazing creatures as well. Cos both genders are: men and woman are fantastic creations of life and none of us takes away anything from the other in any way.

Men have their own innate values, skills, capacities and strenghs and weaknesses, just like woman have them too. We are not the same, we are different and perfectly complement each other. Saying that one gender is completely unneccessary is a disaster.

Lets get back to basic reproductive biology: a mans sperm fertilizes the womans egg and upon successful fertilization, the woman gets pregnant and creates a whole human being in her own body within 9 months. After giving birth, she is still the main nurturer of the baby, feeding it so it thrives and survives.

Now in the modern world we live in: in what freaking way is a woman supposed to bake a baby with her whole body and energy, keeping on to nourish and raise it, while also working full time, throwing the household with cooking, cleaning and everything else? All alone? Without any support? Its basically impossible. &in case she wants to go to work as early as possible: who but the father of the little human being should then take care of it? The state? Eehm, I guess nope…

SO, in my world, men are not only sperm-donors, they are the protectors and providers of and for life. Their own life, their womans and their childs life. And there is nothing, absolutely NOTHING unnecessary about that. On the contrary: being an amazing father, partner, dad and family member is one of the most important roles a man can take on in his life.

I am not a mom yet, but I can tell you as a daughter who grew up in certain family conditions, that a strong, reliable, trustworthy, engaging, loving, caring & providing father rolemodel is essential for a childs well-rounded upbringing.

Also there the data, statistics and science are clear: healthy, masculine, strong men, fathers & partners are needed beyond what many woman and people in the world realize. Luckily, I am very hopeful and see changes in these realms, many if I am honest, & I will keep on being the biggest advocate for men, at any chance I can get. Be it in my work or my personal life.

I will also always advocate for the health of woman. Both, men & woman need to be physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually as strong as possible to navigatee the current state of the world.

If we are all that, we will be able to create a better world for our future generations. No wait! I am sure that we are already on the way now!

Would love to hear your thoughts on that!

Love

Daria

So it is time for another one of my lovely rants, because I quickly released it today, the day I am writing this post, & felt that my system needs to have another release, in written form. It will be about the world of Science.

Maybe good for you to know: I am officially part of that world, I have studied biology, done my PhD and then started my own company & now I am illustrating Science for others. In addition, I work together with a scientific journal on the science-publishing & communicating side of this world.

Why I went into this direction in my life is, because I always loved nature and science & found it fascinating to find out about the world we live in, especially the plant-side of it all. I also always loved to read & write, solve riddles & all that is what we do as Scientists.

During my scientific career, I realized that I don’t fit into the current system; with who I am from my personality side, but also with my basic believes around science, the world & curiosity in general. It was a total mis-match.

In addition to that, you might also need to know that I am very interested in life, art, philosophy, psychology, group behavior, personal development and spirituality. I love it all! To me each of those are also a type of science, with their own methods, ways and at the same time very essential for humanity to understand.

So I don’t believe in “one-way-only-science”, black-&-white-science, right-or-wrong science, that natural science stands above social sciences, that only positive results are valuable, that scientists are objective and never subjective (quite the opposite actually), that it all needs to be seen separately, divided…

But it can’t, cos all these sciences are not separated within us…

I am a human being, I have a physical body, I also have emotions, thoughts & feelings & their respective bodies, I have a soul as well, I interact with others daily & I have an effect on my surrounding. So just because I have the scientific title of Dr. Daria Chrobok, does not separate me from all that…

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Maybe you can see a bit of an overthinking pattern here, maybe even past tendencies of a people pleaser, or whatever other psychological or behavioral term. And yet, if you read this now, I have decided to post it, no matter what. And that is something I am happy about, to have overcome these patterns.

So now off to the reason for this triggering or potentially off-putting title post:

I am a Scientist myself, studied Biology & did my PhD in Plant Physiology. After that, I decided to leave academia, start my own company & become a scientific illustrator. So now I am illustrating science for scientists.

And I can honestly say: it has been a freaking blast! I love my journey so far, I have had such amazing clients & feel so honored to help them out every time! They are passionate, caring and motivated and truly amazing human beings, while being super great scientists at the same time!

So, I do not refer to my clients when I speak about “ The problem with hardcore scientists”, I speak about the observations I made while studying, being in academia, teaching, interacting with such scientists & observing them on social media & in society.

I generally believe that anything extreme and radical is not ideal, mainly because it goes too far into one direction & disregards everything else, it becomes hardcore, unpleasant and narrow-minded.

To me, some of the core traits for scientists are: curiosity and an open mind, ESPECIALLY towards things that we have no idea about. New things, alternative ideas, pathways, approaches.

And yet, there are so many of such “Hardcore Scientists” that do not believe in anything else than hard data and numbers; if they can’t see it, measure it, assess it in some quantitative way, its nonsense, bollocks and should be discarded. Bäm, done, that’s it.

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This means: “alternative”healing methods are bollocks, no matter the thousands of years that e.g. TCM has cured and helped people; no matter that an ayurvedic lifestyle has benefitted millions of people; no matter that energetic practices have helped and relieved people; no matter that soul-diseases have been assessed in the east, while called nonsense and WooWoo in the west; no matter that astrology is seen as one of the oldest sciences in the world by so many people…and so on, and so forth…

The one thing that many of such “hardcore scientsists” who despise any of the above mentioned practices & healing methodologies have in common is: they have most likely never tried them, not spoken to an expert in the field, never experienced any of it. They just simply bash those knowledges and that’s that.

How scientific is this approach? Not at all, if you ask me.

How curious is it? Zero.

How much open-mindedness is there? None.

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In life, we feel different emotions, they are often categorized as “good” or “bad”, or “positive” and “negative”. Positive emotions are joy, happiness, love, gratitude etc… and negative emotions are anger, rage, sadness, devastation etc… supposedly. I assume many people are aware and try to be mindful about it and realize that emotions are just emotions, they have no such grading.

In my life, I have often suppressed those “negative” emotions, exactly because of that: they are bad, I am not supposed to feel rage or anger. Recently I have learned to healthy express those emotions.

While I am generally an optimistic person, very hopeful and usually see the glass half full, I also have moments in which I am annoyed, irritated, agitated or just speechless about the ridiculousness of a situation. I am trying my best to stay relaxed and calm, not be judgmental etc, but sometimes my heightened state of energy needs a release.

Lucky me, I have friends and mentors in whose presence I can release these energies in a healthy way and I usually laugh at the end and say “rant over”. Those friends have told me many times, that they like those rants of mine, they truly enjoy them even, I was very surprised about it & it made me think… in those rants, I believe I am still respectful, caring, understanding, I try not to judge, but I also try to not hide my disbelief of the situation. I see the human-ness in the external and my own and, when I share my thoughts, I speak in a heightened state of energy, while I am usually very calm, so it is an interesting mix I think.

I recently encountered a situation that truly left me speechless, it irritated me so deeply, that I couldn’t fall asleep for 2 hours, and I usually fall asleep within 5 minutes when I get into bed. As it falls into my recent thoughts around “values”, I decided to write about it here in form of a “Lovely rant”.

I also decided to only share it with paid subscribers, cos this part of me is a part that I dont show to everyone and it could be taken wrongly, so best to have a type of protective border around it, while still sharing how I see the world in a safe way :-).

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So here we go: today I will share with you a recent situation in which I was asked for everything, but told that I get nothing in return - a story around my personal and professional values. I will share with you why I think this is never, truly NEVER! a transaction that should be agreed upon…

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