TED Community » Anna Hoffmann

About Me

I want to share love and understanding through writing. When I was young I studied creative writing and drama, courses that did not get me any degree. Then I became so involved with the local meditation center that the volunteering I did there, became more important than pursuing a career. For many years I was doing different projects with my meditation friends, like running a restaurant with a discotheque, while having other part time jobs outside. Those jobs were for example cleaning, substituting as a teacher, being a janitor in a school, an art model and a caretaker of disabled persons. I traveled to India, USA and in Europe participating in meditation practice. I learned massage, oriental dance and other body awareness techniques. Later I started and ran a small cleaning business. During the years I ran that business I became interested in Voicing, a technique for using the singing voice for self exploration and as a path to meditation, created by Pratibha de Stoppani. I trained with her. Then I decided I wanted a proper academic degree and started studying Physical Therapy. It took me ten years, with a five year long break, to get my BS, because I was split between my own more holistic approach and the bio-mechanical approach I confronted when I first started at Karolinska Institutet. But time was on my side. After my five year break the global medical science community had developed enough for those two approaches to meet half way. I noticed it in the students as well. This time many fellow PT-students were massage therapists, singers, dancers and yoga practioners, not just ski athletes and soccer players. After graduating I have worked as physical therapist; with elderly patients in geriatric care, with disabled adults and young persons, in home rehabiltation and with neurological patients. I am also trained as facilitator of mindfulness.

Location:
Sweden, Stockholm
Gender:
Prefer not to say
Areas of expertise:
Jack of all Trades - Master of None, Anyone can put expert as a title. Intelligent people do not beli
I am:
Brainstormer, Care taker, Connector, Global soul, Job-seeker
Associations:
LinkedIn
Languages:
English, Swedish
Universities:
Uppsala Universitet, Karolinska Institutet, Medical University
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Transforming passion into compassion.

An idea worth spreading

The neuro-matrix.

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Comments

  • TEDCred score: +5.50 TEDCred reflects your contribution to the TED community.

  • +2

    A comment on Conversation: A contradiction within itself-New Age Spirituality

    7 hours ago: New age, what is it? No one I know would say they belong to New age-spirituality, but some of them would probably say that about some others and it would be different persons who got labelled, depending whom I asked. I sometimes use the label and it never has a positive value when I do.
    So it´s easy and there is no risk involved if you bash New age...

    About judgement and ego: In meditation- and through teachers of meditation, masters of meditation, poets, sages, mystics - I have seen the possibility to watch the judgement and watch the ego- just watch- and you will see how much more there is to existence, then those two small concepts. No need to stay all caught up and entangled - even if you wanted you can´t because everything is changing...

    Life is full of contradictions and anyone who gets upset over that will have trouble!

  • A comment on Conversation: Lottery vs. "The Lottery"

    7 hours ago: Real beauty is very close to vulnerability - when we appreciate beauty we open up our hearts and minds. It is creative.
    And in existence nothing is created without it´s opposite, it seems.
    The ugliness, the strength, the urge to attack and destroy.
    When you grow older you might accept this play of opposites and feel more happy, just letting it happen.
  • +1

    A comment on Conversation: Create a filter on the TED website that allows individuals to filter based on area or region

    18 hours ago: Very good idea. Global change starts local.

  • A comment on Conversation: What makes a good conversation? What draws you in and engages you? Let's build TED-capacity by sharing what we're learning with each other.

    Nov 1 2011: A good conversation is one that I am really taking part in, by sharing and expressing something or by listening/reading with interest and openess. This conversation seems to be one of those. Hi Pradee, Frans, Tanzi, Lezlie, Christopher, Linda and Muhammad! Nice to meet you here :-)

  • A reply on Conversation: How could we relate to the world around us without the concept of time?

    Jun 13 2011: Oh, the Tralfamadorians! Hello past reading experience, nice to see you again!
    It feels, though, that if you want to be treated with respect, not seen as a crazy dreamer, you are supposed to believe in time as a straight line. They say your life starts when the sperm meets the egg and ends when your brain shuts down. I can't believe that, and never will. Which makes me uncomfortable in some situations, but what to do?

  • A comment on Conversation: What is freedom?

    Jun 13 2011: I have heard that freedom is our very essence.

    But I think we are afraid of ourselves and the power we have when we express that.

    I am afraid...

  • A comment on Conversation: Thinking in Thought, Not in Language

    Jun 13 2011: Hi Ian,
    What is a thought?
    I am not sure. Many things go on inside. (If you ever tried meditating zen style,you would know.) Body sensations, emotions, inner images and inner sounds. And some of those sounds are words. If you are a mathematician some of your images might be mathematical symbols. Numbers and math are also a kind of language. If you are a musician, you might hear inner music = a kind of language. Etc..
    Our brains many times take input it gets from outside and creates something new by reshaping it. I do not know if it ever creates something out of nothing. If it does, maybe the existence itself is a something, created out of nothing...

    Maybe every conscious process in the brain, that is not a pure sensory reaction, is a thought? And maybe language (verbal, body language, signs, music, math etc) is that process expressed and shared?

  • A comment on Conversation: War. Do we really understand the consequences of it?

    Apr 28 2011: The outer war is a reflection of the inner war.
  • +2

    A reply on Conversation: Who do you trust more to help you understand world events, the press, politicians or your friends/family, or someone/something else? Why?

    Apr 28 2011: It sounds selfish, but you can also see it as being responsible. If everyone really looked after him- or herself in the most optimal way, instead of meddling with other people, a lot would be easier. True happiness and wellbeing is contagious and overflowing. A fulfilled individual contributes to mankind's wellbeing just by setting an example.

  • A reply on Conversation: Don't agree: Language skills reveal real genius, English is no more than a tool for them.

    Apr 10 2011: I agree with you Nichola, about that the change and evolution of language is a inevitable. But maybe because my native tongue is such a small language, I believe in the power of professional translation.
    Basic skills in a foreign language (and a little beyond basic, too), are something any intelligent person can acquire. But in order to really be a master of that language you need to be born with a certain gift, as with any great talent. If someone who has an idea first have to struggle with writing it in a foreign language (English) and then has only readers, who also might know English only as a second language, the whole meaning of that idea might be lost! The world needs more understanding, not more misunderstanding. And a really good translator can help an idea to spread much faster!
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