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inspiration & influence

inspiration & influence transition

Living, working and connecting online in times of change – a webinar invite

March 27, 2020

COVID-19 has truly hit us hard across the world and so much has changed in a very quick space of time.

How are you feeling? How much has changed in your life lately? How many conversations are you having about doing things differently? What are you doing differently? How often are online solutions popping up as the way to go? What have you had to suddenly change? What opportunities are there to make changes now, perhaps ones you’ve been thinking about for a while? And how are you feeling about all of that – positive? apprehensive? excited? fearful? overwhelmed? uncertain? like it’s worth having a go because everyone else is now?

Change and transition

Change is the external events around us and the transition we make is how we respond. We often can’t change external events, though we can perhaps influence them. But what we can really work on and control is how we respond, transition, act and plan. How we practise self-leadership and be creative. How we work with insights about our personality strengths and be aware of our personal blind-spots or stressors.

Now is a time for thinking differently, trying new things, being creative, problem-solving, stretching ourselves and not being afraid to make mistakes! And responses will often involve technology and online options because of the physical distancing required. But that doesn’t mean we need to be socially distant or isolated! We can connect and work together to create, solve, share, laugh, chat, learn and support each other. People need community now more than ever before but in new ways!

Join me for a webinar chat on Living, Working and Connecting Online

So join me for a webinar chat on Living, Working and Connecting Online in Times of Change. These times of change prompt us to transition positively to new ways of working or building on existing ones. This requires creativity, self-leadership and working with our personality.

I’m sharing this experience and knowledge with you in a new way for me, via a webinar. This is so you can feel more positive, supported and encouraged to try out new things at this uncertain time.

We’ll look at opportunities, challenges, technology options, personality differences and mindset. I’ll share practices and tools and you can ask questions and share your experiences or issues. Whether you are a newbie or are more seasoned with online practices, this session will provide inspiration and options for negotiating these times.

Most of all it’s about support and connection. Let’s share what we are thinking of, feeling, attempting, desiring and trying out so we all can feel supported in trying out new things at this time.

My online learning leadership skill-set

As I have reflected on these times and what I bring to them, I have realised I have a TON of online learning leadership and practical experience. Here is my body of work in this space and what I bring to the discussion:

  • 20 years’ experience in leading shifts to online approaches in adult education including as an Australian Flexible Learning Leader in 2004
  • Certification in Online Facilitation Skills and study to Masters level in open, distance and flexible learning
  • Experience as an internationally certified life coach building a global online business for 3 plus years
  • Creator of online courses and coaching programs including 1:1 coaching, the Sacred Creative Collective Group Coaching program and Personality Stories Coaching.
  • Teacher and leader in adult education for 30+ years
  • Deep passion for and honed skills in social media and technological solutions and options.
  • Experience as a writer and blogger using technological options such as Scrivener and WordPress for 10 plus years.
  • Being an online learner of many varied programs over 20 plus years.

It took a crisis such as we are in now for me to realise all these skills and how they can link together! How they can help and guide you. Often we don’t value our own skills or see our expertise and how it can help others. So it’s a great time to look at this in your own life so you can see how you can pivot, shift and be of service.

And in a spirit of adventure and transition, it’s the first webinar I have led! So I’d love you to join me for this session where we can learn and connect together. Be a newbie with me! You will have an opportunity to ask questions too. And we will see where this leads!

Join us for the webinar:

Here is the invitation:

You are invited to a Zoom webinar.

When: Mar 31, 2020 10:00 AM Sydney time (AEDT)

Topic: Living, Working and Connecting Online in Times of Change


Further details will be sent to you once you register including support and guidance on how to use Zoom if it’s new to you. Don’t worry, it’s super easy!

We’ll chat for about 90 minutes. The session will be recorded if you can’t attend live for any reason. And I promise there is no hard sell on anything included. The primary focus is connection and support for transition in these challenging times.

Love to see you there and connect with you in this new way!

inspiration & influence planning & productivity transition

CONSOLIDATE: My word for 2020 + tips for consolidating in your life

January 7, 2020
consolidate

It’s 2020 and as always I choose a word to capture my intentions for the year. This year my word is CONSOLIDATE.

This word has been arriving for some time in 2019 through my monthly intention setting, morning pages and tarot practices. It came through a sense of appreciating what I already have and also through feeling overwhelm at having many things on the go. Books I’m not getting to, clothes I’m not wearing, courses I’ve invested in that I haven’t fully honoured.

Part of this overwhelm is a symptom of starting afresh and trying ALL THE THINGS to make it work. At a time like this, we can grab on to so much to help us but over time, we realise selectivity and focused effort is going to be far more effective in the long run.

My partner Keith and I also have a rental property business. We have worked on this together for nearly 20 years now and both have 25+ years of experience in this area. It is a key part of our income stream. I need to skill up and be more active in our partnership. With opportunities to combine my property and coaching skills, I want to promote a positive mindset and practical skills for property as part of a ‘multiple streams of income’ strategy.

The personal and beyond

Personally, it has been a huge transition time over the past three years, a big learning curve and time when my whole life pretty well changed in some way. Having set up two new businesses – Quiet Writing and our property solutions business – it is time to review where I am and look at how I can most productively and sustainably build on what I have created.

Currently, too we have terrible bushfires raging in Australia that have burnt out more than 5.9 million hectares (14.7 million acres) and resulted in immense loss of all kinds – lives, wildlife and homes. A national disaster that defies description and breaks my heart, it was sadly predictable. It has sharpened reflection for many on living more sustainably and appreciating what we have. With so many losing so much, it brings home what is of value and what matters. How we act, protect and look after what we have as a nation and as an individual. Head over to this page for more on what’s happening, responding and taking action including in creative ways.

The intention to consolidate

My intentions from around November 2019 on have been around the urge and desire to consolidate:

I consolidate my learning and effort, making connections in support of others and to grow.

This intention will stay with me as my mantra for the year. As always when we choose a word of the year, we never know how it will unfold. I look forward to learning from a spirit of consolidating this year.

What CONSOLIDATE looks like for me

My Morning Pages notebook is an integral planning tool in my life. On 3 December 2019, I did a page list of what CONSOLIDATE looks like in my life. Here is that list updated to now, noting those completed and in-process as I write:

  • Working on finishing the first round of the Sacred Creative Collective strongly with clients ✅
  • Sharing experiences from the SCC first round, gathering testimonials, sharing them (in process)
  • Crafting experiences from the first round of SCC and building on them for the next round. (in process)
  • Building client connections further, including connecting with SCC clients for mid-February 2020 start. (in process)
  • Working further on my website and funnels, applying learning from Soulful Sequences with Ellie Swift (in process)
  • Providing feedback to my editor on my Wholehearted book draft and thoughts as we progress the editing process.
  • Independently publishing my Wholehearted: Self-leadership for Women in Transition book
  • Working on property skills and upskilling on renovation, interior design and managing AirBnBs. (in process)
  • Upskilling in coaching mastery and mindset through working with a master coach. (in process)
  • Consolidating my work as a property business owner and coach.
  • Following up from the Australian Association of Psychological Type (AusAPT) Conference in November, sharing reflections, resources and learning.
  • Organising my AusAPT volunteer social media, website and state lead roles in a more sustainable and structured way.
  • Reflecting on 2019 via December Reflections on Instagram ✅
  • Reading, finishing books, getting to books I have been meaning to read that I already own.
  • Working on resources and courses purchased to maximise the investment and outcome.
  • Creating an inventory list of these resources and scheduling time to work on them and implement the learning.
  • Learning about Trello and using it for 2020 planning and action tracking. Thanks to Nicola Newman for sharing her experiences to inspire me including recommending Mastering for Trello for Business which is fantastic! (in process)
  • Organising and decluttering inboxes.
  • Organising and decluttering photos.
  • Tidying up electronic files/desktop so I can find things.
  • Organising and decluttering office and workspace.
  • Organising and decluttering my wardrobe.
  • Getting back to self-leadership via Morning Pages and Tarot Narrative as anchors. ✅
  • Writing a piece for Julia Barnickle’s What if life were meant to be easy? project. Join in for this community project in January! ✅
  • Sharing pieces already written in new ways.
  • Finding new markets for my writing.
  • Consistently writing inspiring content on the Quiet Writing blog and social media, streamlining ways of working.
  • Reviewing blog post categories; refreshing, reviewing all blog posts.
  • Finishing my Body of Work page. ✅
  • Working out how best to share Wholehearted Stories in ebook and other formats to inspire others. (in process).
  • Making Quiet Writing a more inclusive, representative space and community including looking at my own biases and privilege.
  • Becoming more informed about climate change and being more vocal about its impacts and the impact of non-action.
  • Look at where I can recycle, reduce, reuse.
  • Starting a podcast on personality and personal stories.
  • Getting back to playing the guitar.
  • Getting back to writing poetry.

“Phew!” I have written in my Morning Pages notebook next to that list. A big list, but it is great to get it down and share it with you as a form of accountability. It can feel overwhelming but getting ideas out is a great first step to organising them and being in action. Trello is going to be super useful in organising my projects and time this year to action these steps to consolidate. And I keep reminding myself I have ALL YEAR to work on these consolidating actions.

Tips to consolidate your life

So from the above, here are a few tips to consolidate your life:

  • Make your own list like mine of what a consolidate strategy might look like for you.
  • Embrace lists generally as your friend to keep track and also celebrate the wins and progress.
  • Learn about Trello or other tools to structure your desires, be in action and keep track.
  • Group your ideas into projects that can help connect and align them.
  • Work with a coach to help you be accountable and in action in consolidating your energies and shaping sustainable ways of living with deeper purpose.
  • Tune into what is worrying you or feeling incomplete in your life as a way to let go, move on and tie up the loose ends.
  • Honour your body of work over time and seek to build on it.
  • Look at what you have already done and see where you can reshape, reorder, repurpose existing material eg blog posts, guest posts, ecourse material.
  • Make an inventory of what you already have and make it able to be easily found.
  • Ask yourself, “What have I already got?” before you purchase or do something new.
  • Look at where you can recycle, reuse, reduce.
  • Explore links between existing skills and areas of your life to make new connections.

So how will you consolidate in 2020?

I hope my ideas have inspired you to look at where you can consolidate in 2020. Love to hear how you plan to make the most of what you already have and upskill, repurpose and make connections in your life. Share in the comments or on social media.

And if you would like to consolidate your life in more meaningful ways in 2020, the Sacred Creative Collective Group Coaching program kicks off mid-February. Join with me and a community of women as we explore sacred creative life skills for deeper purpose and intention. Especially if you are going through a time of transition or feeling isolated in your creativity, this is for you. Limited to 10 participants and value-packed, we work globally across group and individual dimensions to ensure your needs are met in an enriching online environment. Bookings for Discovery Call to learn more HERE.

sacred creative

inspiration & influence love, loss & longing

Australian bushfire emergency: responding + taking action

January 7, 2020
bushfire emergency

We are kicking off 2020 with a bushfire emergency in Australia.

Summer in Australia is usually a relaxed time of being outdoors, beaches, barbeques, coastal holidays, country towns, driving on open roads and being out in fresh air.

This year it has been marked by intense and widespread bushfires. At the time of writing, here are the sad statistics according to CNN:

  • 24 people have died as a result of the fires including volunteer firefighters
  • more than 5.9 million hectares (14.7 million acres) has burned.
  • NSW, where I live, has been the most affected with 3.6 million hectares burned.
  • more than 1300 homes destroyed in NSW
  • it is estimated over 500 million animals have been killed in NSW alone including a third of the koala population.

We have also had terrible smoke for much of the past month including many days at hazardous levels. It has been hard to be outdoors at all even when a reasonable distance from the fires.

The whole world has changed. We are at the frontline of a climate emergency and feeling the effects of poor policy and action over the longer term.

Responding

The immediate feelings have been of sadness, anger at lack of leadership and action on climate change and preparedness, helplessness and fear. Our news reports are filled with story after story of loss. I’ve never seen so many people cry, especially men, the impact so overwhelming and sad. Our journalists, also first-responders at the frontline in telling these stories, often hugging people after interviews to provide support.

I feel it is important to be informed and witness these stories and I am not one to turn away from the media at this time. But as Nicole Cody wisely reminds us in ‘What to do when your beds are burning‘, it’s also critical for our self-care and wellbeing to have a balanced response:

Your number one priority is to tune in, and then ask yourself how you are coping. Binge-watching these tragedies unfold may not be helping you. Do you need some time out from your news feed? Can you go for a walk, read a book, watch a movie and give yourself a positive mental-health break?

Stay informed, but also manage yourself, and know when you or your loved ones need a screen or news break. No-one can live in crisis 24/7. That will burn you out. Fast.

Taking action

Taking action is a vital part of helping out and dealing with our responses and feelings. Whether it be donating, giving in other ways, sharing information and curating links, being out in the field volunteering or speaking out, the response has been heart-warming and strong. The extreme dangers and impacts have also heightened the need to look at our beliefs and personal actions in relation to climate change and what we do day in and day out in an ongoing way.

There are many ways we can take action. Here are just some of the ways you can help actively.

Donate

Donate to help those at the frontline fighting fires. Our firefighting effort is mainly made of volunteers organised at the state and local level. They have done an incredible job to save so many homes and livelihoods, putting their own lives on the line and often forgoing income to do this important work. Donate to help the animals impacted and those supporting them.

You can donate to support people at the frontline in many ways:

I found this piece by Maddie Pearce on her experiences of recovering from a bushfire very insightful and wise. She reminds us we are in it for the long haul, not just the short-term in supporting people experiencing loss.

Creative campaigns of support

There have also been some fabulous creative campaigns supporting the bushfire effort. People are banding together using their skills, creations and influence in new ways. Here are just some examples:

#AuthorsforFireys

This is a Twitter-based auction of books, writing services and all kinds of creative goodness. Created by Emily Gale, you can find out more information on the website and on Twitter via the #AuthorsforFireys hashtag. Bids are made on Twitter by responding to each offer with bidding closing on 11pm AEDT on 11 January.

I have an offer for #AuthorsforFireys over on Twitter: 1 place in my Personality Stories coaching program – we can focus on your personality, creativity and writing – or anything that works for you. All proceeds to the Victorian CFA. Place your bids over on Twitter! See the pinned post in my Twitter profile. Bidding closes 11pm 11 January Sydney time.

#SpendwithThem

Instagram based @SpendWithThem initiative created by Turia Pitt and Gracie McBride focuses on helping rebuild towns and businesses affected by fire through encouraging us to #spendwiththem. Buy online and support small businesses and communities seeking to rebuild.

Resources for impacts on schools

My cousin Lauren, a leading educational author and publisher at Teachers 4 Teachers Publications, is offering to donate some of their top-selling educational resources to help schools impacted by fire. Please read Lauren’s post and respond direct to her for assistance.

Animal Rescue Craft Guild

The Animal Rescue Craft Guild is busy making and coordinating efforts for joey pouches and all other kinds of designs to support animal rescue. With patterns and regularly updated information on what is required at any time, it is a great way for those with strong craft skills to contribute in a practical way.

Free AirBnB accommodation

AirBnB is helping to offer free short-term accommodation to people displaced by bushfires in partnership with individual homeowners.

Take care

A common theme emerging from the creative responses is how social media and online community enables them. We often see the negative side of social media but the opportunity to band together across the miles in innovative ways has been so heartening. It also helps us to be more informed and learn the facts to help us make change in daily habits and how we take action.

Here are some beautiful thoughts and tips on responding and auditing our lives in a spirit of yoga from my friend Emma Waters of Jala Yoga and Coaching:

So take care with your personal energy at this time and do what you can to take support those in need. Consolidate where you can. And keep shining, creating, sharing, speaking out and writing in your own way if it feels right. We need your light, creativity and energy to help us all get through this time as positively as we can.

inspiration & influence wholehearted stories

Learning to live on the slow path and love the little things that light me up

June 10, 2019

This guest post from Kamsin Kaneko looks at learning to live on the slow path and shifting focus to creativity and the little things in shaping a wholehearted life. 

the slow path

This is the 19th guest post in our Wholehearted Stories series on Quiet Writing! I invited readers to consider submitting a guest post on their wholehearted story. You can read more here – and I’m still keen for more contributors! 

Quiet Writing celebrates self-leadership in wholehearted living and writing, career and creativity. This community of voices, each of us telling our own story of what wholehearted living means, is a valuable and central part of this space. In this way, we can all feel connected on our various journeys and not feel so alone. Whilst there will always be unique differences, there are commonalities that we can all learn from and share to support each other.

I’m delighted to have Kamsin Kaneko as a ‘Wholehearted Stories’ contributor. Kamsin and I met via Instagram and shared interests in creativity, writing and gentle business. In this story, Kamsin shares how her focus has shifted to living in a slower, more focused, creative and wholehearted way in a different cultural environment. Read on!

Living life in the ordinary everyday moments

“Let’s eat out on the balcony,” my husband suggests. We are in the wine section of our local supermarket. It is a warm Sunday afternoon, and we’ve come to buy ingredients to cook dinner as a family.

“Sure. Sounds like a good idea,” I reply. One reason we bought our apartment was the spacious balcony. But we rarely sit out there to eat or use it for anything other than hanging washing out to dry.

This small act of cooking together and eating at home is one of the many small lifestyle changes we’ve been making. We’ve always wanted to do things like this, especially since we have a little boy who just turned five. But we haven’t always made the space in our lives.

We had got into the habit of going to the local sushi place on Sunday evening, which isn’t nearly as glamorous as it sounds in the context of urban Japan. You can wait 45+ minutes to be seated, it’s a popular family choice at the weekend. It’s cheap and easy, even if the quality of the food isn’t the best.

Nothing is better than a home cooked meal

We are home from the supermarket. There’s homemade pizza cooking in the oven, and the wine has been poured. We decide to move the dining table outside. As we’re doing so, our neighbour is taking in her washing. She laughs when she sees us.

The sun is starting to set over the trees and mountains behind our balcony and beyond; the light is perfect, and it is pleasantly warm. The inflatable paddling pool my boy was playing in earlier is still full of water. Alfresco dining by the pool, I quip.

A short while later and the food is on the table. My little boy closes his eyes, puts his hands together, and declares “Itadakimasu” (I gratefully receive this food), with energy and enthusiasm. My husband lifts his wine glass and smiles.

“I’m so happy,” he says.

the slow path

Shifting focus

If I focus my attention on the thick, ugly pillars that support the balconies, I remember this is still in urban Japan. Power cables criss-cross the sky everywhere you look, and people crowd around us on every side. I grew up in the countryside, at times I miss the wide-open spaces which are so hard to come by in Japan.

So, I focus instead on the food, the table, my family. With my attention focused on the things I love, we are nowhere but right here and right now. Exactly where we want to be. We have created space in our day, and in our lives, to enjoy the little things which had felt so distant in our busy urban lives just a year or so earlier.

Until recently, I felt like I was always making compromises. I didn’t want sushi or a “family restaurant” every week. It meant being stuck in traffic, having to wait to be seated, and a noisy eating environment and unexciting food choices. It wasn’t lighting me up inside.

Our eating choices weren’t the only area we were making compromises. But food is so fundamental to a well-lived life as a family. So why had we been living like that? And how did we get from there to here?

Looking for the answers right here not over there

I grew up attending church and evangelical Christian groups. I no longer believe the fundamental doctrines that they taught me. But I experienced something of the divine, and I wanted more.

I can remember singing songs about loving God with all my heart, all my soul and all my mind. But I felt that there were parts of my heart that were locked away and I didn’t have the key. How could I love God with my whole heart if I didn’t know how to access what was inside?

Over the years, my understanding of faith crumbled and evolved. I am less concerned with trying to name or understand what those early spiritual experiences were. At the current stage of my life, I am more interested in learning to trust and believe in the divine within myself.

Gratitude and moving on

I remain grateful for the community and the guidance and the love of people in those groups. But I no longer believe that God can only be encountered through a specific understanding of Christianity.

Perhaps I thought that I would find God somewhere “over there” in the setting of religious groups and Sunday services. But God was never there. S/he was always here in the space between our intertwined lives. We had to learn to slow down before I could even see that.

I stayed a part of the church even though it had long since stopped meeting my spiritual or emotional needs. We stopped going about a year ago because my heart was longing for more space and more slow simple Sundays. And my husband wasn’t feeling the same connection to the church anymore. 

Learning to listen to the longings of my own heart

In the last four years, I have been learning to listen more carefully to the whispers of my heart and act on what I hear. I’d got out of practice in doing that somehow. Through writing, journaling and mindfulness meditation, I started to find an answer to the question of how to access the locked places in my heart.

I was no longer going to give my time to anything which didn’t help my heart to keep expanding. I had wanted to spend more time with my husband and young son. I wanted the rhythm of Sunday as a day of rest.

The irony that by attending church, I wasn’t getting this wasn’t lost on me. But I thought because we lived in Japan, I would never have the slow Sundays I remembered from my childhood in England. Besides, times have changed, maybe no one lives like that anymore.

But we were living on autopilot rather than making conscious choices about how to spend our time. Now we often spend Sundays in our neighbourhood playing outside without any particular plans. We cook a homemade meal together and our little family has never been closer or happier.

Our slow and simple Sundays are one example of the ways that listening to what I want and need has led me into a more wholehearted life. Slowing down and believing that the longings of my heart can be achieved if I approach them with an open mind wasn’t as easy as it sounds.

the slow path

Learning to believe in the possibility of a wholehearted life

The first step was learning to notice the places in my life where my behaviour did not align with the things I said I wanted. I had to learn to do that with self-compassion and let go of any judgment.

I was tied up in a long list of “shoulds” and “ought to’s” all of which caused my heart to be locked up tighter than ever before. But I started to believe that I had choices about how I spent my time. I could say no to what I didn’t want and yes to what I did.

I had to find processes to gently allow me to listen and believe I could act on what I heard. Journaling and meditation and carefully chosen books, podcasts, and safe spaces online are showing me how to do that.

I had spent too long allowing other voices to drown out the voice of my own heart. It takes time to learn to tune in and act on what you hear.

How writing and early motherhood changed everything

When I was in my early twenties, there were three things I wanted to achieve in my life. One was to travel and live abroad. I’ve lived in China, Japan, Bosnia, and then Japan again. When I married a Japanese man, Japan became my home.

The second was to become a mother. I’d given up on this idea for a long time, but it happened five years ago when I was thirty-eight. It wasn’t an easy process through miscarriage, medical error, and 2.5 years of trying to get pregnant. But my son is the most delightful little person on the planet.

The third was to be a writer. And it was that final goal which has proved to be the hardest. I took my first writing class as an undergraduate back in the mid-’90s and others on and off over the following twenty years. But it was only after my son was born that I began to unpick the places in my heart which had been standing in my way.

Motherhood in Japan was the key to unlocking my heart

As a new mother in Japan, I was stressed out and struggling so far from home. I felt like I was drowning in cultural norms and expectations, which I was never going to live up to. But I wasn’t about to settle for a slow descent into bitterness and resentment, which seemed to be where I was heading. I wanted to enjoy my little boy and life as a mother. But I needed help.

I began to meditate through the Headspace App. And when someone gave away their copy of Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way I began to keep a journal. Something I hadn’t done consistently for years.

Through these two activities, I found the key to access the locked up places in my heart. I’d felt that wholehearted wasn’t something I would ever achieve all those years ago singing about loving God with all my heart. But over time, all the things which had been leaving me feeling overwhelmed, including unhealed trauma from childhood started to feel more manageable.

Writing is leading to radical transformation: that’s why it’s so hard 

The more I wrote, the more I understood that I’d neglected the craft of being a writer and I had a lot to learn. Through online writing classes and working with tutors and writing coaches, I started to understand how to create a scene and a character.

I had a background in academic writing. But to tap into my neglected creativity, I had to bring my writing into the world of sensory detail. I had to connect the emotions and the details that ground a story and bring it alive to a reader.

And that is that process of getting out of my head and into the sensory details of everyday life that is allowing me to unlock my heart. In powerful writing, it is often the little details which bring the most magic to the page. The same is true in our everyday lives.

the slow path

Writing through the dark to find the light

But I didn’t want to feel the painful things. I tried to go straight to being grateful and finding positive affirmations to help me overcome writers’ block and self-sabotaging habits. I didn’t want to feel the painful things that had been locked up inside of me. But the only way out was to go through.

Thank God the Universe provided me with gifted teachers in the process. This time last year I took an online writing course by Martha Beck; there were guest lectures from Elizabeth Gilbert, one of my favourite writers, and it was completely transformative. Hard work and painful but amazing.

The course comprised the most incredible set of lectures which blew everything I thought I knew out of the water. The writing exercises were designed to take you into the hell of your worst moments and keep writing until you brought everything out into the light.

As I wrote, I kept finding feelings of being unworthy, and crippling fears of never being good enough. A numbing fear that if I spoke my truth, I would be judged, criticised, and rejected. I was so good at avoiding those feelings I’d been unaware of how much they were driving self-sabotaging behaviours like procrastination and perfectionism.

I could only learn to be wholehearted by looking at those feelings of shaky self-worth in the eye. And writing through them to find the validation I need within myself. Perhaps I will never believe that I am good enough to be a “real writer.”

But I have learnt to trust the voice inside of me that says I need to write. And if all I ever achieve is to heal the fractured places in my own heart, it will be enough. I pray also that I can gift my readers a tiny bit of courage to continue on their own wholehearted journey.

Key book companions along the way

The Artist’s Way – Julia Cameron

Big Magic – Elizabeth Gilbert

Martha Beck – Finding Your Way in a Wild New World

Loving What Is – Byron Katie

And the poetry of Mary Oliver

About Kamsin Kaneko

slow path

Kamsin Kaneko is a writer, mum, teacher, and traveller, not necessarily in that order. She writes about living a wholehearted life of depth and meaning. You can find her on Instagram most days capturing small moments of beauty in the urban sprawl of her home in Japan. Get your free gift: I Believe in the Magic of Everyday Moments. Kamsin Kaneko’s website The Slow Path can be found here.

 

 

Photographs #1, #2, #3 + bio image by Kamsin Kaneko, used with permission and thanks.

Photograph #4 of pen on page by Debby Hudson on Unsplash used with permission and thanks.

Read more Wholehearted Stories

If you enjoyed this wholehearted story, please share it with others to inspire their journey. You might enjoy these stories too:

Year of magic, year of sadness – a wholehearted story

From halfhearted to wholehearted living – my journey

The courageous magic of a life unlived – a wholehearted story

Dancing all the way – or listening to our little voice as a guide for wholehearted living

Tackling trauma and “not enough” with empathy and vision – a wholehearted story

When the inner voice calls, and calls again – my journey to wholehearted living

Maps to Self: my wholehearted story

The Journey to Write Here – my wholehearted story

Ancestral Patterns, Tarot Numerology and breaking through – my wholehearted story

Message from the middle – my wholehearted story

The journey of a lifetime – a wholehearted story

Gathering my lessons – a wholehearted story

Grief and pain can be our most important teachers – a wholehearted story

Breakdown to breakthrough – my wholehearted life

Embracing a creative life – a wholehearted story

Becoming who I really am – a wholehearted story

Finding my home – a wholehearted story

My wild soul is calling – a wholehearted story

Our heart always knows the way – a wholehearted story

How knowing your authentic heart can make you shine

Keep in touch + free Reading Wisdom Guide

You might also enjoy my free ‘Reading Wisdom Guide for Creatives, Coaches and Writers‘ with a summary of 45 wholehearted books to inspire your own journey. Just pop your email address in the box below.

You will receive access to the Wholehearted Library which includes the Reading Wisdom Guide and so much more! Plus you’ll receive monthly Beach Notes with updates and inspiring resources from Quiet Writing. This includes writing, personality type, coaching, creativity, tarot, productivity and ways to express your unique voice in the world.

Quiet Writing is on Facebook  Instagram and Twitter so keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community. Look forward to connecting with you and inspiring your wholehearted story!

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Joy in travel and seeing new landscapes – a photo essay

January 3, 2019

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you’ve imagined.

Henry David Thoreau

travel

Joy and travel align so beautifully! This post explores how the joy of travel and new landscapes helped refresh my senses and provide new perspectives.

Joy as my Word of the Year in 2018

Joy was my Word of the Year for 2018. I’m reflecting on my experience of JOY last year in a series of posts here as a way of rounding off the year and stepping into 2019.

I’ve realised that each quarter of the year delivered a new lesson and experience about finding joy:

  1. alongside deep grief
  2. and resilience in challenging times
  3. in travel and being away from home (this post)
  4. in creative work and my calling (to come soon)

I hope you find these reflections valuable for your own journeys with joy, grief, resilience, creativity, travel and wholehearted self-leadership. And I look forward to your thoughts and experiences too on these issues and feelings.

travel

Finding joy in travel

It’s pretty well nearly always joyful to set off on an anticipated overseas trip. But this one was so long in coming, it felt extra joyful.

We were just about to go overseas when my mother was diagnosed with cancer and so of course, we cancelled that holiday. In all, we cancelled six holidays over 18 months as we dealt with the challenges of late 2016 into early 2018 and focused on supporting loved family members.

Finally in the second half of the year, we set off overseas for a trip to Europe and the UK. We travelled first to Singapore and that evening after arriving, we sat in our favourite hotel with a drink relaxing and I felt quiet tears of joy.

It meant things were okay and settled down now. It was a desperately needed change of scenery, an opportunity to relax and see new places, and fulfil a dream of going on a river cruise down the Rhine. We also planned to visit towns in Germany where my ancestors departed from to travel to Australia, to catch up with online friends I hadn’t met in person, and to connect again with family and friends overseas. It was the most joyful of times. 

travel

Joy and travel revisited

Just as absence makes the heart grow fonder, so the inability to travel made me yearn for new landscapes. Until I could travel again, I would follow other’s journeys with such wanderlust, eager to also embrace travel as we had planned for this time of our life. This whole experience helped me to take nothing for granted. After the challenges of the previous months, I immersed myself in every new place and experience so in the moment.

In Singapore, we love the orchids and visited the National Orchid Gardens and the Gardens by the Bay as well as the zoo. We indulged our senses in every way in the humidity of Singapore, surrounded by flowers and animals. It was so refreshing for my jaded sensibilities.

We then headed to Frankfurt as a base for exploring Germany and connecting with ancestral places. I caught up with my friend Kerstin Pilz of Write Your Journey. First connecting online, we had met face to face in my village in February in 2018, then found out we were both flying into Frankfurt, from Vietnam and Australia, within the same 24 hour period. What synchronicity! It was such a joy to connect and have lunch in the Römerberg Square in Kerstin’s home-town. Catching face to face with online friends was a special feature of this journey creating such treasured moments I cherish.

travel

Joy, travel and family history

A key driving factor in our holiday planning was heading to see the places in Germany where my ancestors left from to travel to Australia. Much of my family is from England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales, but my paternal grandmother’s grandparents came from Germany. So I was so very keen to see the places they lived in and where they once walked and lived.

We visited Würzburg, Wertheim and Eichel on the outskirts of Wertheim where they lived. I went to the church where my great, great, great grandfather Johann (Jakob) Leonhard Roos was baptised in 1826. My ancestors were vineyard workers in this region of Germany and then came to work on Henry John Lindeman’s vineyards in the Hunter Valley, north of Sydney. I could feel their ancestral presence everywhere in this region of Germany and felt so much at home.

travel

travel

travel

joy + travel

The joy of river cruising

The central part of our trip was a river cruise from Amsterdam to Basel. We’d never been on a cruise of any kind and thought a river cruise would be the best way to commence our cruising experience.

It was sublime. From the moment we stepped on, we enjoyed every moment. A combination of the pleasures of onboard experiences with onshore excursions made for such a pleasurable journey. Once you are aboard, you unpack your bag and just kick back for the week and watch the world go by.

travel

We had also never engaged with more organised travel with a structured itinerary and tour guides. Again, we enjoyed this as it meant we didn’t have to navigate and could learn from guides with local knowledge. You could choose to opt out of onshore excursions and stay on the boat often cruising to the next stop. This was an occasional introverted treat when all the interaction and input got too much.

Travelling by river means seeing so much you cannot see any other way. A highlight was the mid Rhine River lined with castles and vineyards, the Lorelei a central feature we snaked through. We sat atop the vessel as we wove our way through, seeing castle and after castle and wondering how such immense structures were able to be built.

travel

We visited cities and towns along the length of the Rhine River, hearing of their history and traditions. A broad-brush approach perhaps but a fabulous way to get a sense of place and identify where we  to return to with more time to explore. We especially loved Colmar, Strasbourg, Rüdesheim, Cologne and Koblenz. A visit to the underground Maginot Line in France near the German border was an incredible insight into the lengths taken to defend against the potential reoccurrence of conflict after World War I. Our hosts went to every length to make sure each port provided opportunities to taste the unique flavour and history of each place we visited. 

travel

travel

travel

travel

And then to Vietnam

Shortly after we returned home, I headed off for a solo trip to Hoi An, Vietnam for a yoga and writing retreat with Kerstin Pilz. It was my first solo trip overseas at 57 which caused much mirth in our family. But it was truly great to set off alone for a week of writing and yoga in beautiful Hoi An, a place I’d long wanted to visit. Having my trusted friend Kerstin, a local Hoi An resident, leading and shaping the retreat meant I felt well looked after and knew my needs would be supported.

They were supported and so much more. I’ve written a full review of the retreat here. Following on from time away in Europe and the UK, it was all about seeing with fresh eyes in every respect. The week was pivotal in getting back to both yoga and writing practices after my time away. I made enduring friendships and my senses were refreshed and revitalised, bringing a deep joy after an at times challenging year.

Having stretched both my writing and yoga muscles and revitalised my senses in every way, the scene was set for the last quarter of the year and experiencing joy in my calling and new work in the world.

joy + travel

joy + travel

Photo by Nigel Rowles

Find Your Word process + tools

First though, some information on the process and tools that can help you. If you have never worked on a Word of the Year, it’s a powerful process. Susannah Conway has a fabulous free Word of the Year ecourse available each year that I often dive into. It works really well alongside the Unravel Your Year process and free workbook that Susannah also creates and generously shares each year. I’ve been working through both processes to review my year and plan for the next one since 2014.

I credit these practices with contributing to deep realisations about where I was stuck and needed to make change. For the first few years, I found I was writing the same goals each year and not achieving them. This was mostly about writing books and making space for creativity in my life. Each year was swallowed up by work and my creative goals kept getting lost. 

In 2016, I started doing things differently. I began to make my transition. Now at the end of 2018, I am two years in to my change journey and life is very different. It’s much more in line with the dreams and visions I had way back in 2014!

Amy Palko also offers My Word Goddess Readings with suggestions for your word for the year linked to a Goddess of the Year. Also a practice I have invested in for a few years now, it provides valuable intuitive insights and suggestions for words that might help drive your year’s energy positively.  

joy + travel

You might also enjoy:

Joy and resilience in challenging times

Joy and grief: the paradox and wisdom of finding joy alongside deep grief

Finding JOY in the everyday – reflections on my Word of the Year for 2018

Joy – 18 inspiring quotes on enjoying what you do and love

Writing retreat in Hoi An review + photo essay – seeing with fresh eyes

Grief and pain can be our most important teachers – a wholehearted story

Keep in touch + read the books that shaped my story

You might also find inspiration in my free 94-page ebook on the ’36 Books that Shaped my Story’ – all about wholehearted self-leadership, reading as creative influence and books to inspire your own journey. Just pop your email address in the box below

You will receive the ebook straight away! Plus you’ll receive monthly Beach Notes with updates and inspiring resources from Quiet Writing. This includes writing, personality type, coaching, creativity, tarot, productivity and ways to express your unique voice in the world.

Quiet Writing is on Facebook and Instagram – keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community. Look forward to connecting with you and inspiring your wholehearted story!

inspiration & influence transcending

Joy and resilience in challenging times

December 27, 2018

For a wise woman once

told Her that Her tears

were the most

healing waters of them all

Rise Sister Rise – Rebecca Campbell

resilience

Can joy be part of resilience in challenging times? This post explores how developing resilience and a kind of joy in small moments can help us through the most difficult times.

Joy as my Word of the Year in 2018

Joy is my Word of the Year for 2018. I’m reflecting on my experience of JOY this past year in a series of posts here. 

I’ve realised that each quarter of the year delivered a new lesson and experience about finding joy:

  1. alongside deep grief
  2. and resilience in challenging times (this post)
  3. in travel and being away from home (to come soon)
  4. in creative work and my calling (to come soon)

I hope you find these reflections valuable for your own journeys with joy, grief, resilience, creativity and wholehearted self-leadership. And I look forward to your thoughts and experiences too on these issues and feelings.

resilience

Joy and resilience in challenging times

In the second quarter of the year, we faced extreme challenges as a family. Circumstances that took us all into unfamiliar territory. Again and on the back of the first quarter’s experiences, I had to work out where any sense of joy and optimism sat alongside all of this.

A book helped me immensely at this time: Rick Hanson’s Resilient: How to Grow an Unshakeable Core of Calm, Strength and Happiness. Practical, positive and based in neuroscience, this book focuses on 12 hard-wired inner strengths and how to cultivate them.

I read this book as an audiobook while driving and also an ebook when at home, dipping into its wisdom whenever I could. A toolkit of psychological resources and strategies, it helped me realise the resources I already had for navigating this extreme time. It also provided simple but powerful tips for changing my mind-set as I dealt with significant pain and challenge.

resilience

Resilient practices and joy

The two practices prompted by reading ‘Resilient’ that helped me most were:

  1. Honouring my psychological resources
  2. Feeling the beauty of joy in small ways as well as feeling pain

Honouring my psychological resources

Having been through a fair amount of pain, challenge and loss in my life, I’ve built up psychological resources to be more resilient and strong. We all do this. Everything we go through teaches us if we are open to the lessons.

At times, I have had to dig deep and be reflective, talk to special friends and professionals. I’ve learnt when to spend time alone, when to practice self-care and how to balance my needs with others. Tough lessons all and with more challenges stretching me, I dug deep into my learning this year and I learnt more. I am much better at contacting people and talking when I need it now rather than battling on alone. 

I sought help from a psychologist to check in on my well-being and psychological resources at this time. This was positive and encouraging as someone trained and objective listened to what was happening and how I was dealing with it.

She provided valued feedback that I was doing well at this challenging time considering all that had happened and was happening. This helped me feel more self-compassionate and self-confident even as I felt overwhelmed. Perhaps not a feeling of joy, but it certainly helped me immensely. I was ready for a series of sessions if need be. But I found for this time, one session and conversation was enough to feel stronger and self-reliant, drawing on my personal resources.

Feeling beauty in small everyday joys as well as feeling pain

A big learning this year has been that it is okay to feel the beauty and joy of everyday things even as we feel immense pain. 

Rick Hanson reminds us we can take an approach of gratitude:

Thankfulness is not about minimizing or denying hassles, illness, loss, or injustice. It is simply about appreciating what is also true: such as flowers and sunlight, paper clips and fresh water, the kindness of others, easy access to knowledge and wisdom, and light at the flick of a switch.

This ability to acknowledge and feel concurrent truths helped so much. One helps to balance and provide grounding for the other. I have found special joy in swimming, reading, writing, tarot work, sitting in the sun, cups of tea, coffee and connection with special friends and family at this time. These simple acts were a blessing and wisdom that helped me move through so much.

resilience

Feeling all the feelings

Sometimes we just need to acknowledge and accept that things are terrible and dark and find the points of resilience and strength that will get us through. In this way, we can discover transcendent energies we can tap into. They fuel us and help us strengthen wholeheartedly for life.

As a person with INTJ Jung/Myers-Briggs® personality type preferences, feeling is something I have worked on over time to balance my natural tendency and strength for thinking and logic. I am much better at working with both the head and the heart now. Through this time I learnt to experience feelings more deeply – sadness, anger, exhaustion, helplessness, frustration, fear, worry, pain. There were plenty of feelings moving through me. 

I’m more open to going through feelings as a process step to the next stage rather than going around them. Especially through my intuitive work with Amber Adrian over time and her writings on All the Feelings, I’ve learnt to lean in and really feel my feelings. Crying and physical expression of feelings were part of this too. Amber has reminded me to ask “What next?” with feelings. In this way, we can move on and through, clearing out and moving onto the next stage of what we are dealing with and our response.

resilience

Joy and resilience

So there wasn’t so much joy in this second quarter of the year. It certainly didn’t feel joyful and at times, it was just very dark. In response to my post on joy and grief on Instagram, Cheryl Haezebroeck aka @the_intrepid_goddess shared that:

I love how a word of the year is such a learning experience because not only is the Word featured but the shadow is there too for our awareness and healing.

This is true. We can’t expect it all to be our stereotypical version of a word. Nor can we expect it to be all sunshine and light just because we choose a positive word, as lovely as that would be.

The lessons are often deeper and more long-standing involving shadow work. As I learnt with joy and grief, understanding the ability to live with paradox in challenging circumstances made all the difference. I was able to carve out small spaces of the day to manage self-care and practice resilience as I dealt with the most extreme worry.

And in the smallest moments, joy found a place in my heart and kept me hopeful, optimistic and confident that I knew what to do. These moments sustained me and kept me strong as I drew deeply on my resources to care for both myself and loved ones.

Have you experienced something like this? How have joy and other positive practices helped you with being resilient? What have dark circumstances taught you about the paradox of joy and resilience? Share your thoughts in the comments or on social media – Facebook or Instagram.

Find Your Word process + tools

First though, some information on the process and tools that can help you. If you have never worked on a Word of the Year, it’s a powerful process. Susannah Conway has a fabulous free Word of the Year ecourse available each year that I often dive into. It works really well alongside the Unravel Your Year process and free workbook that Susannah also creates and generously shares each year. I’ve been working through both processes to review my year and plan for the next one since 2014.

I credit these practices with contributing to deep realisations about where I was stuck and needed to make change. For the first few years, I found I was writing the same goals each year and not achieving them. This was mostly about writing books and making space for creativity in my life. Each year was swallowed up by work and my creative goals kept getting lost. 

In 2016, I started doing things differently and began to make my transition and now at the end of 2018, I am two years in to my change journey and life is very different. It’s much more in line with the dreams and visions I had way back in 2014!

Amy Palko also offers My Word Goddess Readings with suggestions for your word for the year linked to a Goddess of the Year. Also a practice I have invested in for a few years now, it provides valuable intuitive insights and suggestions for words that might help drive your year’s energy positively.  

You might also enjoy:

Joy and grief: the paradox and wisdom of finding joy alongside deep grief

Finding JOY in the everyday – reflections on my Word of the Year for 2018

Joy – 18 inspiring quotes on enjoying what you do and love

Grief and pain can be our most important teachers – a wholehearted story

Keep in touch + read the books that shaped my story

You might also find inspiration in my free 94-page ebook on the ’36 Books that Shaped my Story’ – all about wholehearted self-leadership, reading as creative influence and books to inspire your own journey. Just pop your email address in the box below

You will receive the ebook straight away! Plus you’ll receive monthly Beach Notes with updates and inspiring resources from Quiet Writing. This includes writing, personality type, coaching, creativity, tarot, productivity and ways to express your unique voice in the world.

Quiet Writing is on Facebook and Instagram – keep in touch and interact with the growing Quiet Writing community. Look forward to connecting with you and inspiring your wholehearted story!

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