What am I grateful for looking back at 2007?

I usually note down what I feel grateful for most weeks. And having more time over the holidays I started to contemplate everything that had happened during the last year. And then suddenly a few days ago when looking back at 2007 I realized that I felt grateful for everything. Yes, EVERYTHING. I felt startled for a moment. Do I really mean it? Look again – and I did. Yes was the answer, I am grateful for everything. For everything that I recognized as a blessing straight away, and for everything that was a challenge, a difficulty and that I recognized to be an important part of my growth, a blessing sometime later. Now if I would want to grade my gratefulness then the outcome would look something like that:

Most grateful for list

• The awareness that all difficulties are opportunities for growth
• Realizing that being in-joy with myself brings joy to whatever situation I am in
• The awareness that being in-joy with myself means to embrace all aspects of myself and not being against anything I feel or think – no judgement
• The love and support of my husband
• Good health and Yoga
• All the inspiring teachers I have worked with including my coach
• Having the courage to follow my intuition and walk my path
• Opportunities to encourage and help others to walk their path too
• Connecting with others in workshops and coaching sessions
• Learning from the world around me
• Old movies, good friends and living close to nature.

I invite you to do the same. Take a look, make a list and share it with others on this blog, just enter your list as a comment. I would love to hear what YOU are grateful for.

The Wisdom of Pooh

During the holidays I spend time reading one of my favorite books and I like to share some of Pooh's wisdom with you .

The 'Tao of Pooh' is an inspiring little book by Benjamin Hoff in which he interprets the ancient Chinese principles of Taoism through the ways of Pooh, the bear and hero of Winnie the Pooh. It is one of the most fun and yet insightful books I have come across.

With the song below Pooh captures in his own, unique way how gaining clarity of Who we are is an important part of the overall vision for our life (‘know thyself’, to quote from an ancient Greek wisdom). Hoff explains it this way: ‘Being authentic starts with recognizing "Who we are, what we have got to work with and what works best for us.

’What do you think Pooh? How would you explain it?’
‘With a song’ says Pooh
‘Go ahead’
How can you get very far
If you don’t know Who you are?
How can you do what you ought,
If you don’t know what You’ve Got?
And if you don’t know Which To Do
Of all the things in front of you,
Then what you’ll have when you are through
Is just a mess without a clue
Of all the best that can come true
If you know What and Which and Who.

‘Thank you Pooh’.

So you may want to spend a bit of quiet time over the holidays and ponder on some of those questions Who you are - What you stand for and what your values are.

Why visions matter

A few days ago while relaxing with friends, someone in the group talked about how much he admired what I had done over the years, how I had followed my ideas and visions and made them reality. I thanked him and was almost ready to move on to the next subject when I suddenly stopped and returned to what he had said.

Does this not hold true for everyone? Doesn’t everyone create what they envision? I threw the question back into the circle of friends and received some puzzled looks. Then they came back at me, sharing different scenarios of where things could have been different and the reason why they didn’t get or achieve what they believed they really wanted.

Those reasons were usually related to outside circumstances, Family, Partners, Work, Society, Government – you name it. I accepted that outside circumstances certainly were a challenge, but still insisted that within that challenge, each had created and realised their vision of life. How? Because, I argued, our visions are connected to our beliefs, concepts and perceptions of ourselves, and life in general.

I took my own life as an example. What had my vision for life been when I was 18? What had my priorities been, my values? I wanted to work, earn good money and stand on my own two feet as fast as possible. I wanted this work to include irregular hours (not 9-5), give me the opportunity to help others and the option to work and live anywhere in the world. There were limiting circumstances (my grades, my lack of knowledge what I was good at and really liked) but within these limitations the vision became reality. At the same time I would have liked to be in love. I had no idea though want kind of relationship I was looking for and was scared to truly commit to someone. So my relationships reflected this vision and I ended up living with constant doubts about every relationship I was in for some years.

And over the years, as my visions changed, my life changed. The more I clarified what I really wanted, the more inspired my visions became, the more whole and satisfying were the outcomes.
At the same time, when my beliefs limited me the outcomes were also limited. Whenever I said “ I would really like, but……”, the desired outcome did not happen.

We all create what we feel is possible. So what about starting to create the impossible? What about starting with the ideal and then choosing to go for it? What about asking yourself what is it you really want, how do you want your life to be and feel? What do you value most? Where are you and where would you like to be?

Then just look at your answers and decide to take the first step towards turning your ideal into reality.

Seeing the bigger picture

I still marvel at the many different aspects of coaching, especially when speaking with people about their visions and dreams. It is when we invest some time to ask ourselves what is meaningful to us that we get a sense of how we would like to live and feel. Have you ever asked yourself “what moves me, what do I what to create, what kind of world do I want to live in, what do I want to contribute?”

In India they have a beautiful practice, it is called SEVA, an ancient Sanskrit word meaning selfless service or compassion in action for the common good. It is based on the understanding that what we do for others we do for ourselves and that what we fail to do for others, we also fail to do for ourselves. It is also based on the observation that giving to others or working for common goals is when people receive the most joy in their lives and the most meaning.
It is the sense of community that inspires people to act with compassion, working together, feeling part of a bigger vision, feeling connected.

If that holds true on an individual basis it also holds true on a collective basis. If, as a human race we would have a dream, a great vision of how to live our lives lighter, distribute our resources better, connect to our essence deeper we would create a different reality. Realizing that there is enough for everyone and that everything we think and do effects everything else we would act accordingly. Energy follows thought. The way we think and feel determines the way we act and behave.

Saving our Environment - NOW!

It was only a few months ago that I joined an Organization called Clean up Greece (www.cleanupgreece.org.gr), a branch of clean up the world, which has been working for years to educate individuals, schools, businesses, municipalities and governments how to better respect and protect our environment.

Growing up in a country with a "green" movement, I developed an awareness for using and promoting environmental friendly practices. From cosmetics to cleaning materials I buy "green". Now the time had come that I felt the urge to do something on a bigger scale, to work together with others for sharing information and finding solutions.

I started talking to people on the island where I live and found that everyone I spoke to was interested in exploring the possibilities of better rubbish management, re-cycling and a cleaner island. So we had some meetings, put a loose plan together and made some proposals. We spoke to the Municipality, head of Schools, parent associations and individuals. Some schools promised to contact Clean up Greece and organize educational workshops for the students. Some of the grown ups were game to participate in a clean up day.

So we decided to have a go and last Sunday a few of us went off and started to collect rubbish from the roadside. I have to say that I was blown away. We had planned to walk and cover a large area, but the amount of plastic bottles, tins, paper and cigarette butts we collected on a strip that was only a 100 m long and 3 meters wide on each side of the street was overwhelming. We filled 16 large bags and it seemed like we had done almost nothing at all. I was amazed.

Plastic bottles and hundreds of cigarette butts each taking between to 1 - 5 years to disintegrate while poisoning the ground and water in the process along with all the rest of the stuff and this was not even the tip of the iceberg.

I know that experts have been warning us for years to treat our environment with more care and collecting all that rubbish really brought it home to me. I ask myself "what is it that keeps us from taking the warnings seriously? What compels people to throw rubbish into the road, the sea, the forest and the beach like it doesn't matter? What keeps the rest of us from standing up and speaking out and doing all we can every day for the protection of the environment we live in?
Do we feel so disconnected from our surroundings that we fail to realize that it is our very source of live which we are damaging? What are we waiting for? Lets face it - together we can make a difference!

For more information on ways to act more environmental friendly consult http://www.cleanupgreece.org.gr
http://www.cleanuptheworld.org

After the summer or Kalo chimona (Greek for wishing you a good Winter)

It’s been some time since I have posted anything on the blog and I mainly blame the summer. After Easter everyone starts to get ready for the summer months and then between July and August you lose touch with people (unless you go on holidays with them) and finally re-unite in September.

So what have I been up too? I gave some workshops, coached old and new clients and re-designed my website. In August we (my husband Steven and I) decided to go camping with friends. It was great. It was only the second time that I camped and I just loved the feeling of being in the middle of so many people, listening to all the different conversations, discussions and of course music. No Greek fun time would be complete without music. It is strange how the things that may bother you at home (llike hearing noise from the neighbours) enchant you when you are on holiday. We ate lots of wonderful food, spend most of the day on the beach and played Beriba (Greek card game) at night. Eventually after a week of enjoying feeling totally Greek we returned home to our island and started to re-connect with our various projects.

Unfortunately we returned also to the news of many devastating fires, which was heartbreaking. As a result a lot of people started demanding better environmental policies and to think about what they can do to act more environmental friendly. We started a movement here on Spetses and I am going to write about our progress regularly and also publish suggestions of what we can do in my Newsletter.

In September a friend of mine came from Miami and invited me to give a talk there in November as well as a workshop. We decided to join our forces and create and run the workshop together. We both love coaching people and sharing our experiences, and we always have a lot of fun together, one inspiring the other.

That brings me up to date and I promise to keep on sharing and posting ideas, insights, knowledge and leads on a regular basis.

Socrates' wisdom

Have you ever observed how many times we voice views and opinions on subjects or people we really know very little about? Often our information is second hand (we read or heard it elsewhere) and we make assumptions based on our own believes and concepts.

The next thing you know you are defending what you have heard with great passion. And while your opinion at that moment is not actually based on something you have observed yourself, you end up identifying so strongly with what you have heard that you defend it with all you have got. You may even end up arguing with anyone daring enough to challenge it.

And this is the point where a bit of Socrates wisdom provides an inspiring alternative:

.....after the Oracle had answered there is "non wiser than Socrates", Socrates was surprised and thought this was a riddle. He went off to speak to all the clever men in Athens and questioned them on a variety of subjects. After spending days and weeks doing so, he finally realised that they indeed knew very little. Contemplating his findings he came to the conclusion that he was wise only in so far as he was AWARE, that in essence he knew nothing. He impressed his listeners by openly stating "I don't know".

Try it and experience the relief you feel when you can just relax and listen without feeling the need to provide an answer. Celebrate not knowing while enjoying finding out!

One of my favourite quotes

"Freedom will not come to you by knocking at the door to love and waiting for someone else to open it. Freedom comes when you open the door. In fact there is really no locked door. Your mind and your qualities are independent of the actions of others" - Manuel Schoch from the book "Healing with Qualites". http://www.tune-in.ch/en

Enjoying life and having fun

It was about 10 days ago while sitting down and looking at how I was dividing my time between, work, friends, husband, community work and recreation that I suddenly realized that something very important was missing in my life most days; feeling joy and having fun!

There seemed to be a sense of heavyness and duty about everything I was doing which often expressed itself as anxiety and impatience. I sat back on our sofa and took a good look inside, asking myself 'How long have I been feeling this way?" Slowly I started to realize that this heaviness and this tendency of taking things too serious had been present on and off throughout my life. So what was I to do? How could I re-introduce fun and joy into my daily existence?

I started to take my mind back to all the times I remembered having fun, wondering if I could figure out what they had in common and what I did then I was not doing now. A friend suggested to take some time out and play like a child, to buy some toys or do anything else new that came to my mind.

So I went off on a search for a toy shop and while looking around started to remember my favorite games I played as a child; painting with water colors and playing with plastic toys of cowboys, Indians, knights or anything else on a horse. I finally purchased two shining knights on fabulous horses and some watercolors and went back home to play. It felt wonderful, just like when I was 6 years old. What a treat. It made my day and suddenly all kind of new creative ideas came into my mind, ideas for my workshops and the community work I was involved in and I felt light and adventurous.

For the next few days I made it a commitment to do something fun, something different every day; I danced with my husband in the street while passers by were cheering us on, we played catching an imaginary ball on the beach and I went running over fields catching butterflies made out of air. And even though I was engaging in having active fun for only a few minutes every day, it changed my attitude and feeling about everything else I wanted to do that day.

I enjoyed it all. Eventually I understood that I could bring this sense of fun to everything I was doing. It was all about attitude. Instead of thinking of a fun activity every day I developed a fun attitude to everything I wanted to do. Cleaning the house, ironing, writing, working with others, teaching, relating to people - was much more fun when approaching it by looking at it in a new way, a new light each time. Instead of remembering the way someone or something was yesterday I now keep an open mind and look at how the same person or thing will be different today. Nothing and no one stays exactly the same; everything is changing all the time. Approaching everything with an attitude of curiosity and " what can I contribute to this work, this situation today" keeps life fresh and enjoyable; and yes - it's ok to make mistakes - it's fun, as long as you don't take yourself too seriously.