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Newsletter
CoachingWe had a fabulous Autumn with business and personal clients benefiting from and enjoying sessions on the South Downs, Ditchling Common, the Ashdown Forest and the coast. The smells and colours of Autumn inspired us all and encouraged us to forge ahead with rolling out our visions, turning past difficulties into potent learning opportunities, and to find space and peace within ourselves. December ushered in heaps of snow, and yesterday I faced one of my challenges and took a 25 mile drive to the coast through gorgeous snowy country lanes to enable me to work with clients there. My sense of mastery was sweet, satisfying and strong, and I realised that in walking my talk and growing from challenges big and small I can encourage and enthuse clients. Quite a contrast from December last year where to joyful surprise I found I relished driving a 4x4 in 40 degree heat in the South African bush! Each experience of mastery and each new pleasure helps us grow; they are experiences to be treasured and nurtured. Come New Year I shall feel lucky if we have a foot or so of snow for a few days. After a busy Christmas with my German half sister Brigitte and an influx of friends I shall relish a few days of serene retreat to digest my professional/personal development and the events of 2010, and look forward to 2011, letting go of behaviours, thought patterns and goals that no longer work for me, and sowing the seeds for new visions goals and dreams. By the Summer of 2011 I'll be spending more time in South Africa....a seed I am watering and fertilising right now! Its been total delight to see clients face and conquer some big challenges, grow in confidence, improve their businesses and feel more relaxed and easier in themselves, often surprising themselves with the size and direction of their changes! There are always a few bumps along the way, for clients, myself, and sometimes in the work: all have been great learning experiences. Most local clients, both personal and business, I see at my home or your office. I am really happy to make home visits where appropriate space is available, and to have outdoor sessions near your home or office. Privately paying customers can work in professional rooms near Hampstead Heath, or for less private work, a quiet corner of a hotel lounge, for example, the Charing Cross Hotel, London. just ask! I offer phone sessions for long distance clients, nationally and internationally. And when nature indulges us with her simple but profound lesson that we cannot control her, and a foot of snow prevents us travelling! Other Business Work News As a response to the recession I have taken on two new roles, one working with Orbitols in a Government funded Macmillan vocational pilot for people effected by cancer staying in or returning to work, where that is their wish. Four of our small team of five work in businesses, and we realise the need to support managers too. Anyone in or around the Gatwick Diamond area of East Sussex is welcome to contact me if you would like to find out more about the project. We offer free focused coaching to people effect by cancer and workshops for people effected by cancer and their managers. Working as a peer support specialist for people with mental health problems is my second new venture, work I am passionate about and which is having strong positive impact on many people in the county. I feel moved and inspired by the work, impressed with our clients who have vast reserves of resilience and positivity in sometimes deeply distressing circumstances. Some clients have been in residential care for decades, and learning that life has more to offer them and, for some, that independent living or work is possible, is a massive shift. I continue to offer the successful Managing Difficult Conversations Well workshops with Kent County Council. Let me know if you are interested in booking a version for your organisation. The learning and development team in Kent will be happy to give you a reference.
iMfolosi Wilderness Experience, South Africa This venture has been on hold due to the impact of the recession on those who were keen to come this year. A great sadness all round. However!! Hopefully things are changing so for all of you out there who have an interest..be in touch soon!! I am gathering together participants for two or three groups to make up trips for 2011/2012.....and this will be the last time I will be offering the experience at the price of £1,500 (+ your flights) for the 12 nights. Prices at the Wilderness Leadership School who organise the trails rose considerably last year so I am sorry this is rather more than last years quote. If you are interested in coming in 2011 but cannot afford the full cost I may be able to offer one place at cost price, with you making the difference up by doing some work for the Wild Heart Foundation (see below). In future I'll be taking the experience up market. The wilderness experience will be the same, but accommodation for the 4 night workshop will be luxury rather than basic.
Wellbeing and Pampering Day All you wonderful women out there, a date for your diary! Saturday 5th of February, to be held in a wonderful light and spacious setting in Windmill Hill, East Sussex. Berry Winter and I will be co-facilitating. Details to be announced, watch this space! Enquiries welcome.
Not For Profit Quick update: I have had to put action on this on hold due to the demands of the recession on my work time. However, registering the charity remains a firm goal, and I am talking with two skilled, trusting and supportive friends about them becoming trustees. I am desperate for help in admin to get the registration underway, help with awareness raising and fund-raising; any offers big and small would be gratefully received not just by me but by those whom the not for profit is designed to support. The aim is to help develop fisher people, not dole out fish, and the work I was able to sponsor from personal funds pre-recession has proved its worth. Let me know if you'd like more information on this. As Previously: Five weeks in KwaZuluNatal over Christmas and New Year 2009/10 enabled me to see my vision more clearly, and I am now ready to begin fund-raising for committed individuals to train in nature guiding and get properly kited-out. This enables not just those individuals to reach more of their potential and make a living, but through their families, trickles out into the wider community. Thanks as before to offers of help including Anwar, Andy, Sarah, Richard, Brian (you know who you are!) and Chris Lilly, my business mentor, all who have offered help, Deb, who has kindly put the not for profit trails on her work website, Jo Roberts who kindly allows the trails to be advertised on the Wilderness Foundation UK website, David who has offered a donation once the organisation is officially registered, Dale Bulbrock of WebDesigndsLtd who has construct a website for the Foundation pro bono www.wildheartfoundation.com (draft) , and my great clutch of friends and family who are wonderfully supporting. The final vision is the same: The Wild Heart Foundation will work with previously disadvantaged South Africans and conservation. My aim is to build a small strong organisation to train up local people in KwaZuluNatal to train others and develop their confidence, training and leadership capacity, facilitating the integration of the work into traditional culture in whatever way that works locally. I aim to work across generations (and with a wealth of experience working with alsorts of children I am well placed to facilitate this) and cultures, facilitating depth understanding and relating. Ultimately the aim is for the Wild Heart Foundation to be run by locals for locals in KwaZuluNatal. There will be a business model, based on taking my work and the work of a core of colleagues into businesses in South Africa, building capacity, deepening and improving relationships and communications, and developing management and leadership skills.I hope to raise money through businesses to put into the Wild Heart Foundation. Any of you with an interest who would like to help or, better, join in in any way PLEASE get in touch!! I am seeking to build a core group to further the work and spread the word, and I welcome enquires from the UK and SA. Help in donations of money, time and services are all welcome, and last but not least, help in practising my Zulu!. Day in the iMfolosi Wilderness, KwaZuluNatal, South Africa
Waking with the earth, I stir deliciously slowly. The still cool air reverberates with promise. I feel gentle excitement. Lapping and plopping, the river carries the message that regular visitors are refreshing themselves in its it soft shallow water: five years of drought have left scars. I feel the coarse grass in my hands as I half turn on my sleeping mat and push my fingers hard onto the burned reddish earth and drink in the pungency of the bush. Quiet and slow I rise- ngivuka in the language of those this land was once home to. I feel serene, a serenity born of being in this moment wild-heart, part of nature, seeking to thrive and respond, not control and exploit. Tuning in to human murmurs I mosey over to the fire at the centre of our intimate group. Peacefully we stoke the flames with sweet camphor and other wood, take our early morning teas and coffees, making contact with each other and the bush. Ambivalent about missing the instant of capture, I experience inner tussle. Wanting to face the truth, the killing, the death, and yet feeling softness and sorrow for a life taken violently and after sustained fear. Simultaneously feeling grateful that the wild dog has nourishment for his day, and revelling in his wildness, his freedom to be. The same freedom that allowed the death of the impala. I absorb the contradictions and feel eternally grateful for this wilderness for offering up her lessons so richly. The warm flesh and bloody hands are salutary, and as we stash the meat safely for the day we are thoughtful. Walking quietly, we move through the day, the bush communing with us through heat, smells and experience, the little sequence playing in our minds and hearts. According to the rhythm of the day, at dusk, the fire warming the cooling air, we come together to prepare our meal. Mandla knows well how to season the impala flesh: old meat needs tenderising. I don’t want to take a share but I do. I eat meat and I feel a need to be prepared to kill for my supper. This is as near as I have got so far. Full of conflicting emotion and ethical questions, I eat. The meat is tough and strong. I don’t like it, but out of respect for the impala I eat it all.
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