ZenGuide

I offer this reflection to writers, especially those who love physical books, but it is also relevant for anyone who has a project that they really want to get done.

So - you have three hours spare one day. Do you get on with your writing? Or do you do this:

The seduction of tidying your bookshelves is that you end up with a lovely neat bookcase - or even a fabulous YouTube video!

But what about that book, those poems, that personal project that you’ve promised yourself to achieve?

What are you being seduced by?

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.. is some pink leotards!

Happy Holiday Season to you and yours!

You can find out more about these two fabulous dancers via their live video web chat with fans on The Washington Post site, when their video went viral:

We watched Woody Allen’s “Play it Again, Sam” the other evening – one of my favourite films for its witty take on the power of films to inspire us to be the best of who we are.

In the movie, Allen plays, erm, Alan, a klutzy, neurotic, overly vocalising film critic whose hero is Humphrey Bogart – specifically, Bogey as Rick in “Casablanca”, the strong hero with few words who loves deeply but is prepared to sacrifice his personal happiness for the sake of the greater good. We follow Alan as he tries to date different women without much success – he is a bundle of nerves and too conscious of his personal failings, putting on a persona that he thinks is smooth and cool but ends up being ridiculous and embarrassing. Through it all, Bogey appears to him in his imagination, giving him advice and listening to his anxious, neurotic, worries. In the end Alan learns that it is only by being his authentic self that he can get the girl and that, without having to be Bogey, he has it in his own heart to make a big sacrifice for the sake of the woman he loves.

This was the film that first introduced me to Woody Allen. I was in my early teens, at that moment of transition when we all begin to transform into the adults we are to become. I’ve watched almost all of his films since then. His social anxiety and self doubt spoke to me – and still do! – as well as evident love of the world of the city: specifically New York but also other major cultural cities like San Francisco, London, Paris and Barcelona.

Alan in “Play it Again, Sam” holds in his imagination his hero, Bogey and looks to him as a mentor. His life begins to take the shape of the movie “Casablanca”, especially the wonderful dynamic of the scene at the very end where “the problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans” and he finally gets to be the hero he has always longed to be.

Watching Woody Allen again, it struck me that as Alan in the movie was inspired by Bogey, I’ve been inspired by Woody Allen and the world of his films. His vision of life has shaped mine. As a teenager, I wanted to grow up to be a New York Woody Allen type intellectual! Why? Because:

His films have been love letters to cities of culture, arts, film, and books. In his cities, you can meet quirky, interesting, intelligent and brilliant people. You can be all those things yourself! I’ve lived my life in London inspired by that theme.

His message to me was also that you can be anxious, nervous, socially awkward and still be smart, funny and have a bunch of interesting and supportive friends. You can be kind of funny looking and not very tall and still be a hero. It gave me hope as an awkward, anxious and bespectacled teenager.

Which film heroes (and I include both male and female heroes in this word) have inspired you? Who is the hero who mentors you inside your imagination?

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Pixar is the production company behind some of the greatest computer animation films - Toy Story, Finding Nemo and Wall-E. In the last two decade, they seem to go from success to success, as one of the dominant players in the genre. But did you know that they started off as a computer hardware company? And almost disappeared into oblivion several times before they ever made a feature film?

I’ve been reading The Pixar Touch: The Making of a Company (Vintage). It takes us back to the 1970s when computers were the size of rooms and used primarily by the military. Some computer geeks started working on animation using the clunky undeveloped tools of the time and in the process created and evolved the software that eventually made the genre accessible to the world. They were joined by a Disney artist whose knack was to make inanimate objects come alive as if with a personality of their own.

What is fascinating about the Pixar Story is that in different forms, the core team of geeks and artists worked for George Lucas, the creator of the Star Wars series, and Steve Jobs, the man who is synonymous with Apple, both visionaries in their own fields, but who were unable to see the meteoric potential in animated films. Lucas saw the team as useful for some special effects but not as film creators in their own right. Jobs bought Pixar because he was interested in the hardware and software for creating images and initially, had little interest in the animation side.

To me, looking at this story as a life coach, there are a number of inspiring themes:

# The Pixar guys had a vision to make animated movies with computer graphics back in the 70s, when the technology was at its infancy. They worked and worked at developing the hardware and software, finding funding by any means possible and perfecting their art for over 20 years before they were finally able to produce their first feature film, Toy Story.

# Their investors and patrons such as Lucas and Jobs gave up on them several times but they just kept going at what they loved, even if it meant pretending to be a computer company while they worked away quietly on their animation.

# They didn’t do it for the money - they had a passion and a vision. These are the only motivators that can keep you focused on a seemingly impossible goal for more than 20 years, especially while others around you think you are deluded. The key artist of the Pixar band of brothers, John Lassiter, was invited to become a director at Disney but he turned them down. He turned down Disney! He could be a director at Disney, he said, but he would rather stay where he was at Pixar (at that time with nothing but a few short films of under 5 minutes to their name) and “make history”.

And make history they did.

Their films and also their technological developments have changed not just the genre of animated films but also how films are made. Computer generated graphics are in most films and even TV shows now. The wonder of computer graphics is how it can take us into impossible spaces and amazing worlds and even make the world on screen seem animated with a reality that is more real and alive than our ordinary world. It has changed they way we tell and take in visual stories - and in so doing, it is changing the way we look at the world around us.

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Here is one of their first short films, Luxo Jr, that was inspired by a lamp on John Lassiter’s desk:

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Awhile back, I was invited to the book launch of Awang Goneng’s second book A Map of Trengganu which follows up from his bestselling first book Growing Up in Trengganu. Awang Goneng is the pen name for writer Huleimi Wan who developed his books from his blog about his memories of his home state of Trengganu on the East Coast of Malaysia. The launch was in Tukdin, a great Malaysian restaurant near Paddington Station - a suitable venue as we all know how we Malaysians love food!

The books are collections of recollections about his memories of childhood growing up in a small village in rural East Malaysia and also his musings on the changes over the last decades as the nation has become more prosperous and modern. They are written from the heart and play an important part as a personal view of a landscape that is transforming fast.

I was touched by what Wan told us about how they’ve been received in Malaysia, and especially in Trengganu, a relatively rural state compared to the more urbanised West Coast where the metropolis of Kuala Lumpur sits. His blog is largely in Malay but the books are written in English. Many who came to his book signings were of the older generation of Malays who could not read English but they bought the books anyway. They wanted their children to read the books because they felt it was important for the next generation to know what it was like, growing up in “old Malaysia”. They felt that his books preserved a part of Malaysia’s history, as a legacy for the future, holding on in words to a world that will soon be gone.

The books have also been bestsellers in Malaysia for the reason that there are few books that speak to Malaysians about being Malaysian in a reflective, contemplative style. What I draw from his books is that we all want to read stories about Us.

We learn about who we are and how to live through books and stories and it is so important that we can find images of ourselves and lives in art and narrative. When we find our own personal experiences reflected in books, it is as if we have been seen and our lives witnessed.

As a writer myself, I was approached by many readers at book signings in Malaysia, telling me how much my novel The Flame Tree felt true to their own lives. It meant a lot to me to hear them their stories of which parts of their lives were reflected in my book. Now years later, as a coach, I have the privilege of reflecting back to my clients face to face in real time the amazing human beings that they are - and I know that it is a powerful experience for them to be witnessed in this way. I can see it my clients’s faces - the strength and power this acknowledgement gives them and how it can allow them to see themselves fully.

So I hope that Wan keeps publishing more books so that he can keep reflecting back to his readers the stories of who they are and where they have come from.

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Photos: my collection

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I’ve been offline for a few weeks, working on some plans I have for rebranding my coaching and consultancy practice here at ZenGuide. As with any intensive project, I have needed to prioritise my resources and creative energy and so, I cut back on some of my other activities, including posting here on this blog. The process is ongoing and I have popped back online to share some of the personal learning that I’ve experienced, which I hope may be helpful for you.

Priorities shift and dance all the time

I initially felt guilty about not keeping up with my many activities - such as blogging here. But I realised that priorities shift all the time in our lives, like a dance, and the most empowering thing we can do is to go with the flow. At each phase we need to identify the top priorities and to focus whole-heartedly in them for those moments - before moving on to the next phase and the next priorities, which may include previously low priority items now coming into their own. Otherwise, we are heading for stress and burn out as we try and perform all the phases of the dance at once!

What kind of dance are you performing with the different priorities in your life?

Living your personal values

As part of my rebranding process, I’ve been looking at my personal values and how they can be a strong foundation for my coaching practice. If we are living our personal values, our work has deeper meaning and we can approach it with greater energy and drive. Here are a couple of key ones:

Being authentic - for me, this means embracing both my creative and also my analytical/ strategic side and responding to others in a way that is honest but also sensitive and respectful.

Personal responsibility - I believe that we are all responsible for our actions and also reactions. We are responsible for ourselves and to each other. It’s about stepping up when it comes to our health, our interactions with others, how we live our lives. It’s about the best that we can be as individuals and also as part of our communities (whether among family and friends, at work, or in our neighbourhoods).

Living your story

I’ve been wondering how I can pull together the different skills and passions in my life to serve my coaching clients more effectively. My training as a lawyer gives me my analytical and strategic planning skills and my current part-time asset management role gives me daily experience of the challenges faced by many of my clients who work in a business environment. But what about my passion for writing and stories that have so far found an outlet in my novels, my business book and my blogs? How does that passion contribute to the work I am doing as a coach?

I analaysed how I work with my current clients and realised that I am working with their stories all the time. They have stories they tell themselves about what they can and can’t do in their life. One client felt trapped in a box and when we explored who had put her there, she saw that it was she herself who had locked herself in there - and that in fact the key was inside with her. It was up to her to let herself out - and to do that, we worked on changing the ways that she was constraining herself.

For all of us, our stories tell us what kind of a place the world is - a battlefield, an adventure, a safe haven: having a particular of the world means that we approach every day and other peole with a particular mindset. If you go to an event telling yourself that everyone is better and smarter than you and will judge you the moment you walk in the door, this will affect how you hold yourself as you enter the event and how you engage with those horrible, judgemental people. But if you go thinking of it as an opportunity to meet some interesting people - who may all be as nervous as you are - this will also inform how you walk into the room and talk to those lovely people.

So as part of reviewing my services, I am working on how I can bring out this theme of story coaching as a more prominent part of my brand here at ZenGuide. This will mean deeper exploration for me of how I bring my own story to everything that I do. I will be blogging about that in a later post as I progress along this journey of discovery.

In the meantime, what’s your story? How does it influence how you view yourself and the world?

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Photo: thanks to paulcoxphotography from flickr.com (CCL)

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Recently, I blogged about how working in the garden can be an inspiration to do some “gardening” in your life and business to help them grow and flourish. As the spring sun has got brighter and the air warmer, I’ve been allowing myself a break from the hard work of gardening in order to enjoy the glorious weather and colourful flowers. There is definitely something to be said for being lazy.

I’ve been sitting in my garden this morning, just doing nothing. I came out here with my coffee after breakfast and sat down on the bench at the far back, away from the house. I’m shaded by a eucaplytus tree and in front of me, the Mexican honey bush is just bursting into white, scented flowering. The birds are tweeting their hearts out all around me.

There’s a part of me that looks at the weeds and flowers sprouting through the cracks in the paved area where I’m sitting and thinks: I need to get round to pulling them out and making this area look a bit tidier. This part of me also sees that the lawn is due for its next haircut. And it sees the bindweed creeping round the base of a shrub nearby. The dead twigs cluttering an area of the flower bed that need to be cleared away.

But my heart sees the cycle of nature. How amazing it is that plants can find a way to grow through hard paving! How life jostles and pulls itself out of the earth to reach for the sun. And how, when the energy is spent, it falls again to the ground, to become nourishment for the new. I am sitting very still and the birds have forgotten I am here so they fly close by, pause on a branch, a worm in their beaks, hop on the earth and pick up a twig. Their song seems to trill louder from all sides. I could get up and start work on the gardening - but, neaaah, it’s much more pleasurable just to sit here doing nothing. Being lazy.

Gardening, like life, is a process. There will always be things to do. Nothing will ever be perfect - or if you do manage to achieve perfection, it will only be for a moment in the whole scheme of things. And while we all know what perfection is meant to look like - manicured lawns, perfect edging, immaculate paving… - there is also perfection in things as they are right now. This perfect moment of just being in nature, being lazy, being myself. Just being.

Just being refreshes our souls. Clears our heads. Enlivens our hearts.

More so than the perfect perfection that we think our lives should look like.

When was the last time you found a moment to just Be? If you haven’t managed it for awhile, start as soon as you can - right now, even! And if you have managed it recently - do it again!

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Photo: thanks to Living in Monrovia on Flickr.com (CCL)

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Now that the evenings are lighter, I’ve been spending more time in the garden - which has been sadly neglected over the winter. There’s a lot to do - cutting away the dead twigs and leaves, mowing the lawn, pruning shrubs to encourage new growth, cleaning the mossy patio… the list goes on! But I’m enjoying the lovely spring sunshine and fresh air. I’m also looking forward to getting everything back in order after the wet, grey winter. And I’m being rewarded by spring flowers popping up and the sign of new green shoots appearing!

It got me thinking about how caring for the garden can be great metaphor for how we can take care of our lives.

• What can you prune away in your life to make room for new opportunities? Perhaps old, unhelpful habits can be chopped so that new, energizing ways of doing things can start to emerge.

• Where can you tidy up and sweep away winter leaves? What about sorting out that client database you’ve been meaning to tackle? Or sorting out your receipts and expenses, ready for your tax return?

• How can you enjoy the process of “gardening” your life or business (ie living your life or tending to your business)? It may be hard work and you may be made tired by it but what is around you that you can draw energy from? Perhaps it’s a moment of enjoying a laugh with your colleagues. Or appreciating the funny dimple in your son’s cheek. Or a good meal out with friends.

• Where are there bright blossoms you can enjoy? Take the time to appreciate what you have in your life or business right now - think of three things that are great for you right now and fully take them in, enjoy them with all of your focus, drink a toast to them with your friends and family tonight.

I also like to think that one of the by-products of working in my garden is that I will get catch some sun as well as building up some muscles (pruning is great for the arms) and toning my abs (weeding does wonders for that six pack) so not only will my garden look fit and healthy but so will I! So - enough with sitting at the computer, I’m off to “Get Physical….!”

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Photo: thanks to angela7dreams from flickr.com (CCL)

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When we see performers on stage, especially dancers, we see only the beauty and brilliance of what they can do. The very best dancers make everything look so easy. We are taken in by their performance and the seeming glamour of it - how wonderful to be able to glide through the air with such grace, look so gorgeous in such tight tights or so beautiful in those tutus!

But behind any success is hard work, focus and dedication. And for those at the world-class level, pushing through the pain and exhaustion and doing things again and again until you get it right.

The BBC’s 3 part series following the English National Ballet over the course of a year was an amazing study of what it takes to put on world class ballets - aptly titled The Agony and The Ecstacy. Here is a slice of the show. The dancers are rehearsing the balcony scene dance in Romeo & Juliet, which goes on for a mere 6 minutes, but is a marathon in ballet terms because it is so demanding. Seeing the two principals wilt as the dance progresses - and even grinding to an exhausted halt at one point - and hearing their panting really pushes home the gruelling practice and fierce determination it takes to get to the top of the ballet game.

This clip does not show the resulting performance on opening night when the two dancers perform the piece with seemingly effortless athleticism and grace. It is a huge success, especially for the male lead, who is dancing this headlining role for the first time, having been plucked from the corps de ballet.

I’m no prima ballerina but I found this series of programmes fascinating for the clear evidence it shows of what lies behind any success - whether that is success in performance, the arts, business or anything we try our hand at.

We may not all be ballet dancers in a first rate ballet company dancing to Rudolph Nureyev’s choreography but whatever endeavour we are dealing with in our lives takes a level of hard work and dedication to do well. Sometimes the going can get tough and we are tempted to give it all up. Those who achieve success keep on working at it, correcting each mis-step in order to improve. They work together as a team, encourage each other, dig down for more energy, more stamina than they thought they had. And they focus on what they want their results to bring them - recognition, applause, the beauty of the dance…

If you find that things are tough for you right now, think of these dancers pushing through, going on dancing especially when they are at the point of collapse - all in order to create a seemless and amazing ballet for their audience. How can you translate that image to your own endeavour? What is the glittering prize/ opening night at the pinnacle of all that you are working towards - can that hold your focus and help you push through? How can you embody the spirit of a world class ballet dancer to get through this tough moment?

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I love it when I’m surprised into seeing the things around me in a fresh and different way. The best art does that. You go through life thinking a a broom is for sweeing, match is for striking a light, a chair is for sitting on, a newspaper is for reading. But then one day, you see that no, they are all much more than that. They are musical instruments. Or rather percussive instruments. And you can make dance and rhythm out of anything!

Stomp is the brilliant musical/ percussive show that opened my eyes. Each piece often opens with one performer - sweeping, or reading a paper, or sitting on a chair - and then builds as he/ she starts tapping or beating or crinkling the paper to create, first, noise, then rhythm. And other performers join him/ her each creating rhythm from every day noises.

Heck, it’s easier if you just see for yourself.

This video shows them using brooms:

I love this piece, using metal folding chairs. It’s a slow build to an amazing piece of theatre:

For days afterwards, I found myself tapping and trying out rhythms on all kinds of things around me - my stapler, plastic bags, pages of books…

What has made you see things in a new way recently?

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