Finding Balance During Emotional Times - Day 12

Wednesday 12th December 2018

Twelve Days of Christmas, also known as Twelvetide, are the twelve days commencing
with 25th December and ending on the 5th January ("Twelfth Night"). In the song
"The Twelve Days of Christmas" (first published in 1780 in a children's book Mirth
Without Mischief) my true love gives a total of 364 gifts over the period.

I am really getting into the festive swing - I am starting this morning with a Christmas Breakfast party in Soho, will be seeing my son's godfather at lunchtime and am ending the day with a carol concert in the Long Room at Lords. I will go to bed tired, but with a grin on my face.

To make me even happier, I a delighted to welcome back to the Advent Blogs series my former colleague and good friend Katharine Bourke. She is a co-founder and Director of South West Growth Service (@SWGrowthService), a consultancy that supports small businesses, enabling them to develop, adapt and grow. Katharine is a certified mBIT coach (for those who don't know, mBIT stands for multiple brain integration techniques). Outside work, she is keen on walking and exploring the beautiful countryside where she lives. When Katharine and I worked together we were based in London, but she was born and raised in a farm on Dartmoor and she has returned to her roots (but not farming, although she is helping things grow). Since moving West she has founded a successful IT business and spent four years helping to deliver the government's Growth Accelerator and Business Growth Service in Devon and Cornwall, before co-establishing the South West Growth Service.

Katharine has many varied interests and knowledge that she shares. I recommend that you follow her on twitter (her handle is @KatharineBDevon). I her post this year she shares how she has found a sense of balance and harmony through breathing and meditation, which has helped her through times of emotional heartache.

As in some previous years, Katharine has selected her own illustrations.

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Heartaches, Hopes and High Fives:

How balanced breathing helps me through

Whilst attending my husband’s employer’s Christmas party last week, I caught up with another of the many partners who were there and we got chatting about how our 2018 had been since we first met at last year’s ‘do’. She asked me a good question, along the lines of ‘sum up your 2018 in one word’. I found myself pausing to reflect on the year, noticing a range of words that popped into mind, and the one that arrived first and kept coming back was ‘emotional’.

Reflecting on my choice of word the following day, I decided to look up the word emotional, to find that it derives from the mid-1500s when it was derived from the French word émouvoir which means ‘to stir up or to excite’ which in turn was based on the Latin emovere meaning to ‘move away, remove, dislodge’. Looking more into this, I found references to Paul Ekman’s classification of six emotions being those of anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness and surprise, and then of Robert Plutchnik’s eight primary emotions of joy versus sadness, anger versus fear, trust versus disgust and surprise versus anticipation.

As a woman in her early fifties, who appears to be going through the ‘change’, I suppose it is not entirely unexpected that I recalled the feeling of being emotional. I have noticed this last year that I have developed an uncanny knack of being overwhelmed by tears, often seemingly without reason, although rarely when in public or at work. This could probably be diagnosed as a mental health issue, but I’m not sure how that would help. My emotions are my emotions, and I feel like the right way for me to approach things is to stay curious, to allow them to emerge and in turn to move on their way, in their own time which so far, they have done.

One of my previous #AdventBlogofferings shared my experience of being overwhelmed by a flood of tears when I joined a Zen Leadership course at Sharpham House in Devon and found myself sitting in complete silence, eyes open, with tears streaming down my face, trying so hard to keep silent and stationary while the tears kept flowing…

When I said the word emotional, I didn’t mean that I spent the year weeping, although tears have been very prevalent, and sometimes overwhelming, especially when they seemed to come from nowhere. As a student of the multiple brain integration techniques or mbraining which enables people to achieve greater coherence through engaging more with balanced breathing and considering the wisdom each of our multiple brains can offer, I was able to reach for their collective support time and again during this year.

I’ve become more aware that tears for me can be the physical manifestation of many different emotions. Sadness of course, but tears emerge from me when I’m feeling frustrated, under pressure, angry, touched and on occasion when I’m feeling real joy – such as when I see or think about someone I care very deeply about.

Most of all though this last year, as I reflect on that word ‘emotional’, I am realising that I have begun a journey to understand emotions better by understanding a little more about their purpose. And by allowing them to teach me what I need to learn. Mid-way through January I decided to recommit to my meditation. I returned to my favoured Insight Timer (which I use a little like some use Runkeeper or Strava or other exercise apps to keep track of their workouts) and aimed to sit once every day. More importantly perhaps I also committed to notice the impact it was having. There is no doubt that when I sit each morning and sit well, I make more of my day. Put simply, more stuff gets done!

That said, I’ve also realised how important a key component of my meditation time is, namely the quality of my breathing.

I stumbled across the power of the breath over 21 years ago now when I was pregnant with our first child. Living in Oxford at the time I was lucky enough to be recommended to a pregnancy yoga class where it was all about using one’s breath to better manage the experience of giving birth. Having worked in the Far East, where women got on with giving birth without much by way of medical support, I was keen to explore as natural a birth as was possible. All the more so as I’d realised that my amazing grandmother (mentioned in another previous blog) had sought out a natural birth in Blackheath in the early 1930s!

Understanding more about the physiology of birth, I was able to combine this with the confidence gained from hearing from other women who had used their breathing to manage their experience of giving birth left me well equipped for that long night when I rang my husband to let him know I thought I was in labour. He was working late, finishing off month end accounts so I took a deep breath (yes really!) and said he’d better get them finished before he came home… and with the help of two paracetamol, I managed to breath my way through labour to deliver our boy a little over twelve hours later.

Since then, I think I’d rarely considered how often I use the power of my own breath until earlier this year when I was on an NLP (neuro linguistic processing) course and we were asked to think about superpowers. Without hesitation, the thought that came to mind was that my superpower came from knowing that as long as I was breathing, I could cope!

And in that moment, I returned to being introduced to Viktor E Frankl and his wonderful little book, ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’, to the part where he talks about human freedom as being that one always has the ability ‘to choose one’s attitude in a given set of circumstances’.

I guess this year, more than any other that I can recall, I have made more space in my day for moments of balanced breathing. I will make time to pause in my car or as I get off a train, in a client’s reception area or even to make an unnecessary trip to the bathroom simply to allow myself a few minutes of deeper breathing. As an executive coach I find this helps to make sure that any challenges that one client may be facing do not contaminate the next coaching space I hold for someone.

After a four-year gap, this year also saw me back on the Zen Leader mat as I attended IZL2, my second course with the Institute for Zen Leadership, this time in Somerset. It felt good to be back sitting for about two hours a day (45 minutes to start the day, a few stretches, then another 30 minutes before breakfast, with a further 45 minutes or more to finish each learning day), even though it was possibly even tougher physically than I’d remembered!

Powerful things happened to me during the four days of the course, the most memorable probably being in a field as a group chanting as we stood together after practising some tai chi exercises, and being aware that a fly had landed on my arm. Through all the various om chanting exercises, this fly stayed with me, it didn’t fly off, it seemed to be enjoying the tranquillity in my body and possibly the resonance in the chanting.

Curiously, once the group chanting was complete, we all were invited to make our own ways back to the meeting space and I found that my legs had a rhythm all of their own. I felt a bit like a cyberman, taking very regular steps as I headed through the long grass back to the path and then along the path. I was in my own world, I kept the pace that my body seemed to want, feeling strangely out of body as well as completely in my body, noticing a feeling of real peace combined with an awareness of the little things that I am finding hard to put into words. It was several hundred metres before I realised that I was the only one left on that path, heading back on my own, as everyone else was already back in the room!

My thoughts on breathing and meditation are simple. They are offered here only as a sharing of what works for me and what has helped me to work my way through a wide range of emotions this year without falling apart. There are many good quality meditation guides out there, so please know that this is offered from someone with no formal training in meditation simply an ambition to encourage others to breathe better.

Find a space where you are comfortable, not too hot, not too cold. Make sure you are sitting on your sitting bones (whether cross-legged on the floor or sitting on a chair) and relax your arms into your lap. If you are cross legged on the floor, make sure you have three points of contact with the floor using firm cushions to make yourself comfortable yet active. Your sitting bones should be able to support you to feel as if you grow up out of the ground as your breathing deepens – at least that’s what happens for me.  If you’re sitting in a chair, make sure your feet are flat on the floor and they support you as much as your sitting bones do.

Then breathe, allow your breath to flow in and out naturally, and allow that breath to ease any areas of tension. I often find my neck is stiff, as are my shoulders. Breathe into any areas that feel tight, encouraging tightness to release and let go. I find that counting my breath helps me into that beautiful quiet space within, allowing thoughts and emotions to come into consciousness before I release them as I stay present, focused on my breath. I often count to ten, one on the in breath, two on the out and so on. And when a thought comes to mind, I’ll acknowledge it, let it go and resume counting from one again.

I invite you to join me in the Insight Timer community, where you will find many far more experienced guides than me, along with all manner of music and sounds of nature to sit with including om chanting as options to accompany your breathing. I hope you will also find your own way into the truly remarkable and powerful space that I believe is within us all. For me, when I’m there, my emotions seem to find their own way so that when I emerge, I feel reinvigorated simply by being present with my breath.

The Wisdom Within - Day 45

Day 45 (Sunday 14th January 2018)

45 years - the length of time that Margrethe II of Denmark has been on the throne.
She was crowned on the 14th January 1972. Margrethe is the first queen to have
ascended the Danish throne since 1412 and the first Danish monarch not
named Frederick or Christian since 1513



Today I am driving to Durham.

It gives me huge pleasure to welcome back to the Advent Blogs series my former colleague and on-going friend Katharine Bourke. She is a co-founder and Director of South West Growth Service (@SWGrowthService), a consultancy that supports small businesses, enabling them to develop, adapt and grow. Katharine is a certified mBIT coach (for those who don't know, mBIT stands for multiple brain integration techniques). Outside work, she is keen on walking and exploring the beautiful countryside where she lives. When Katharine and I worked together we were based in London, but she was born and raised in a farm on Dartmoor and she has returned to her roots (but not farming, although she is helping things grow). Since moving West she has founded a successful IT business and spent four years helping to deliver the government's Growth Accelerator and Business Growth Service in Devon and Cornwall, before co-establishing the South West Growth Service.

Katharine has many varied interests and knowledge that she shares. I recommend that you follow her on twitter (her handle is @KatharineBDevon) and she assure me that 2018 is the year when she is going to resume writing - so watch out for her posts, articles and blog...

PS Most of the pictures have been provided by Katharine herself.

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Darkness and Dawn: The people who inspire us and our wisdom within

As another year draws to a close, so begin the flurry of ‘best of’ summaries, which always make me reflect on the year that has passed. When Kate asked if I’d like to contribute this year, I thought long and hard and the topic that keeps coming back is a memory of someone really important to me which aligns with thoughts about the wisdom we have within.

With all the distractions of modern day life, it has become all too easy to ignore our inner voice, distracted by the next ‘must watch’ series on Netflix, whatever is trending on Twitter not to mention the constant challenges of keeping our home and work lives in some kind of balance. Everyone I speak with seems to have a tale of how they started searching for something on the internet only to find themselves somewhere completely different before they go back to what it was that they were looking up (and I blame the growth of digital remarketing for some of this!).

I feel I began to understand that we all had inner wisdom thanks to the wonderful relationship I had with my grandmother. She was physically disabled by a car crash near Dawlish in 1971, when I was 4, and as a result she lived with or near us for most of my childhood.  She was a remarkable woman, an avid reader, a lover of classical music, good coffee and great chocolate. Some of my fondest memories were Sunday mornings when she would make good coffee and serve it along with something extraordinary. I may not have drunk coffee in those days, but as a little girl growing up on a Dartmoor farm in the 70s and 80s I loved trying all the tasty things she had discovered! When I started working in London, I spent many hours in an era before the internet, tracking down a chocolate maker she had shared stories about, none other than Charbonnel and Walker, who were then only available from their little shop in the arcade off Bond Street. This was of course long before anything like an internet search engine. All I had to go on was her tales of them being delivered to the Scottish estate where she was working, and a London telephone directory or two. I was thrilled to find them and be able to give her a box similar to those she’d told me about on those mornings, wishing her a happy 90th birthday in lettered chocolates:

She also encouraged me to listen to music and put into words what I heard, what it meant to me and how it made me feel. It was like a game then and I loved giving it a go. Listening to Chi Mai, used as the theme tune for the Life and Times of David Lloyd George in the 1980s, always provokes a happy tear as I remember sitting in her lounge, trying to describe what I was hearing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-0UhCjwUeg Try it. Do you hear a river? Or do you hear something else…?

Despite her physical frailty, she continued to live her life as fully as she could with the adaptations that were available to her then (a walking frame to start with and a pretty basic wheelchair as she aged). She listened to her music, and as her sight deteriorated with age, and audio books were only just beginning, I loved spending time reading her favourite books to her onto cassette tapes as I was no longer living at home. I still have the recording I made for her of Richard Bach’s ‘Jonathan Livingstone Seagull’ along with one of Krishnamurti’s ‘At the Feet of the Master’.

In her late teens and twenties my gran spent time with all kinds of discussion groups including Theosophists which culminated in a visit to Ommen in the late 1920s to hear Jiddu Krishnamurti speak. I will always remember the way she described being out walking in the woods when she came across him, walking alone between sessions. Her recall of that moment was powerful. She spoke of the way he made her feel even though they didn’t speak, how he seemed so serene and peaceful, at ease in his body, taking time out in the beautiful woods near Castle Eerde. This photo reminds me of that moment, even though it is one of him in front of a large crowd:

I still remember having conversations with her about world religions and particularly her readings of Krishnamurti and his thinking. She spoke about having an inner voice, a place within us where we have the answers we need if we make the time to listen:

“I have found my Liberation and because I have attained that Kingdom of Happiness which dwells within me” Krishnamurti – Ommen Camp Fire Talk 1927

Blessed with the time I spent with my gran after school most days and at weekends, she introduced me to the quietness we have within, to a form of meditation which began for me as that young child sitting quietly, listening to beautiful classical music in silence, then talking about what I had heard and how it made me feel.

Having spent more time meditating in these past few years (see http://kategl.blogspot.co.uk/2015/01/what-is-this-life-day-49.html) I’ve realised that for me this has been the missing link for so many years. I feel different when I don’t make time for those walks or to meditate each day. I notice that I’m not as productive at work, it is harder to stay focused, and as an Executive Coach, harder to be present for my clients if I don’t make time to be still before a session.

Amidst the many other distractions we now have, I have found that time spent out walking, something that most of us are physically capable of doing, or sitting quietly, noticing our breath, is invaluable. And I know I’m not the only one! There is evidence that we make better decisions when we press the pause button for a moment. Business leaders talk about how they meditate or use mindfulness to aid them in making good decisions. Medicine has also recognised the link between our physical and mental health. Have a look at the number of articles that connect depression with irritable bowel syndrome and indeed how meditation has been found to help many sufferers.

In the last ten years or so neuroscience has also proved that we have centres of intelligence in our cardiac (heart) system and enteric (gut) system. With all the same hallmarks of the brain we all refer to in our heads, our heart and gut also have large numbers of neurons and ganglia, neural cells and the functional attributes that include perceiving and assimilating information. Is it any wonder we often feel a bit sluggish after a big meal?! Or hear how people have followed their heart when achieving a goal? We talk about passion in business these days, something I don’t remember when I started my career nearly 30 years ago.

All too often we ignore the wisdom these other brains offer, hence this attempt to encourage you to make a bit of time to be able to hear them. And to suggest that next time you shed tears unexpectedly, consider whether your heart may be trying to tell you something. Or when you take a really deep breath, perhaps your gut is inviting you to listen...

I will always fondly remember those quiet times with my gran, and am guessing that you may well have someone like her in your life, someone who encourages or enables you to be closer to the calmness that is within you. Someone who inspires you with their ability to face up to life’s challenges. Many have already contributed to Kate’s Advent Blogs this year and in previous years.

I hope this will have encouraged you to reflect on who you are and what makes you the person you are today. Please make time to listen in for that inner wisdom. Start with a few minutes each day and allow it to build. Making time each day to sit and breathe or take a walk can deliver powerful results. And when you discover what works for you, do more of it and enjoy exploring that peaceful place, the calm that leads towards your inner wisdom.

What is this life? - Day 49

Day 49 (18th January 2015)

49 - the number of days Siddhartha (the founder of Buddhism) sat under
the Bodhi tree before attaining enlightenment.
Above image - The Enlightenment (2nd Century BCE) - a fine example of 
Gandhāran carving - part of the Silk Road transmission of Buddhism.

Today's piece is by a wonderful lady, Katharine Bourke, who was a former colleague of mine over 20 years ago. I have very fond memories of our times together during the pioneering days of the recruitment industry. She stood out from the crowd for being ethical, honest, proactive and quick, without any hard-sell. She was very good at her job. We renewed contact through Twitter in 2014 (her handle is @katharinebourke). We met in London, but Katharine is a country girl at heart (she was born on a farm on Dartmoor). She now lives and works in Devon and Cornwall, looking after her family and helping local businesses thrive (she is a business growth specialist and takes delight in helping organisations and people to achieve their true potential).

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When Kate invited me to write for this blog, she mentioned the story I told earlier in the year about Pirate Joe. 'Pirate Joe' was my attempt to engage two typically boisterous children (aged 2 and 4) in spending a quiet moment sitting looking out to sea, so that we could catch our breaths during whole days spent together at the beach, when they were little. 

Rock Beach, Cornwall, UK

There were always stories to tell, often collaboratively, based around the little yacht with the red sails which was sailed by 'Pirate Joe'. It usually involved consideration of where the boat was going, what it was doing, and who was on board. To this day (they're both teenagers now) if I mention 'Pirate Joe' they still remember the story of Pirate Joe, even if they don’t remember all that much about those moments by the sea. Moments which I will always treasure and which made me first recognise the power of storytelling.

The picture above of that little boat with the red sails was taken on July 16th 2014, which would have been my father’s 88th birthday. Having booked the day off to spend it with my Mum, we took the opportunity to head across to Rock in Cornwall to visit St Enodoc’s Church and in particular Sir John Betjemen’s grave, somewhere she’s always wanted to visit. In the process we came across a beautiful poem which had been put there in Sir John’s memory and which read:

30th Anniversary 19th May 2014

If you can look for a silver lining,So that others around may see,And you show them the sun is shining,You’re the fellow for me
We shall arise from the times of sorrow, To a world as it ought to be,Lend a hand for the new tomorrow,And you’re the fellow for me.

Written by the late Ralph Reader CBE (1907 – 1981)

So, in the spirit of storytelling and with 2015 upon us, I would like to share with you what was possibly the most profound experience of 2014 for me. And even thinking about it now brings me to tears – in a good way! 

I received some information about a Zen Leadership course being held at Sharpham House in Devon. The place and the subject resonated with me so powerfully I decided that I had to take time for it and booked myself a place.

To spend three days learning about Zen Leadership, including learning how to ‘sit’ Zazen style, in silence, eyes open and without moving was a powerful experience for me. I have enjoyed learning about mindfulness and have meditated off and on for many years, but never with my eyes open and never all that regularly. On the second day, as the first morning meditation started at 6am I found myself overwhelmed with emotion. 

Tears poured down my face, I wept, and amidst all the chaos going on in my head, I managed to keep it to myself. Seemingly no one noticed. I was silent, unmoving, not even raising a hand to wipe tears from my cheeks. Quietly observing the tears running down my face, keeping still, and focusing on my breathing. Counting 1, 2, 3 and on up to 10 with each breath. Then back to 1 again.

For 45 minutes I managed to keep that to myself, finding myself back in the room aware of my wet face, then observing so many thoughts flitting past and which the counting enabled me to dismiss so that I could return to that peaceful, quiet, place in my mind. The wooden blocks that signalled the end of the meditation brought me back into the room in more ways than one and I know I moved pretty fast out through the door beside me to wash my face before returning to the next session!

Before you ask, I do know what was behind that powerful surge of emotion, a part of which is to do with allowing my work life to take over my personal life, and constantly feeling frustrated at not having enough time and always feeling like I’m either wading through treacle or just running to stand still. I love my work but it is all consuming, I’d lost my enthusiasm for cooking, I was not exercising regularly, and I was definitely not taking any time for myself in the midst of being a working mother with a husband who works away a lot, teenage children, and an elderly Mum who is in need of support and who often takes priority over my children, not to mention my dear husband!

And it’s not that I’m unaware of my emotions. I’m one of the many people who will cry when there is a sad news story, I often shed a tear when I hear stories of personal sadness or tragedy, as well as stories that I find touching, heartwarming. I’m very comfortable with my emotions now, which I’ve realised quite probably goes back to the day when I was presenting my strategic plan to the directors of the company I used to work for in Oxford, and when challenged on something that I really cared passionately about, I burst into tears. The first time I’d done that in business. At the time I suggested that it was because I was 6 months pregnant and emotional, but on reflection I think there was more to it than that!

Since that weekend, things have changed. I made myself a promise, that I would keep an hour a day for myself. And surprising myself, I have kept to it much better than I’d expected. Mostly an hour at the beginning of the day, often a short (15 minute) Zazen meditation followed by a walk, or an hour spent on my ‘shenanigans’ – the only possible word to describe my version of a daily run which is more like 80s-style aerobics in a straight line, where it is all about the music!

Dawn Zazen, by artist, poet & potter Lawrence Barrow

Several of us on the course observed that we rarely keep the promises we make to ourselves. Since the course, I have found that I have been much more consistent with taking that time for myself in a day. It enables me to clear my head and focus on those things I need to do that day which are the most important. I certainly notice the days when I don’t make time to ‘sit’ at the start of my day and if the pace of the day gets too much (that feeling of having so much to do that you really don’t know where to start?), I will take a few minutes to reframe what is going on around me.  And those few minutes are usually the best possible investment I’ve found.

Sharpham view through the autumn leaves

I am so very grateful for the shared experience of the course at Sharpham. It has provided me with much needed head space to reflect on what it is that is important to me. The challenge I’m setting myself for 2015 is to harness the energy I have and the connections that I have been fortunate to make along this path to rebalance my life and enable me to support the businesses in my community that it is such a privilege to spend my working time with.

View from Sharpham window

With that thought I’d like to leave you with this poem which my wonderful grandmother introduced me to many years ago. Seems apt for my experiences in 2014, and will be a focus for my 2015.

Leisure by William Henry Davies (1871 – 1940)

What is this life if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs

And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,

Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,

Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,

And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can

Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this is if, full of care,

We have no time to stand and stare.

 Reflections at Devil's Point

Louis Armstrong singing What A Wonderful World