I write this in front of our Yorkshire woodburning stove, planning our return to Portugal.
It's been a colourful 6 months, about half in the UK and half overseas.
The work has been in bigger chunks, so it's not been manic, but deep and absorbing.
Last winter worked so well that we are doing it again. We leave two days before HallowBrexit, and hope to return in Arpil, depending...!
People. The moment I stop to look back over these six months it’s people, relationships and rich conversations that shine out, jewel-like. Actual work completed, and journeys, and outcomes, and content planning, are all just backdrop for these vivid, lovely, evolving, generous people.
Coaching has made up a greater proportion of my work- the most since 2016 actually. My clients currently range from 20’s to 60’s and include creatives, techies, leaders, and innovators; from satisfied and in flow, to yearning and in potential. They stretch, dazzle, baffle, inspire, charm and astonish me. I can feel myself creaking with all that learning; I love it. (AND I’m working as In-House Coach for a stylish start-up company with arguably the best view in Britain!)
In July, we held Module 3 of the Ignatian Leadership Programme in Loyola, Spain. It’s a potent place; a muscular landscape (top right) full of history and dreams and choices. The group are as impressive as ever.
Some participants have the time and capacity to engage fully and maximise the learning; others use it more as respite and refreshment and solidarity. I applaud that too.
I was in China for nearly a month this summer. We began with a team-building week for the trainers, and then went into Year 1 of the new 3-year course, with 29 carefully selected trainee retreat guides.
The course itself was good and the trainees are an excellent bunch. For me however, the significant milestone was the teamwork- more below on that.
And there has been an intriguing flurry of new business conversations too; four concerning leadership, three on spirituality, two HR and one university, to be exact! Four have begun already, and a few of the others should firm up soon.
Embodiment and the Somatic. Cycling has been a key part of the last six months, and I’m beginning to understand why: it feeds my brain and sense of self as much as my physical health.
More and more, I’m seeing how insidiously my education and culture has taught me to divorce mind, body, senses, emotion, and spirit. So whilst it’s not exactly a Eureka moment to ‘discover’ that I am an embodied and not solely cerebral being(!), I have certainly lived most of my life privileging the intellectual, logical-rational, and work-related.
And it’s not just me; so do the vast majority of people I work with. That’s changing for me now. My coaching supervisor is a Somatic whizz, and she is really helping me with the integration stuff.
Desk-based consultancy isn’t me. It would make so much sense with my circumstances, doing more desk-based consultancy and design work. But I find it deadening. And I’m beginning to trust that.
Pretty much all of this next 6 months we’ll be based in Portugal. We’re going by boat, and I’m aiming for as few flights as possible. I’m glad so much 1-2-1 work and even meetings can be done online.
In January it’s Northern Ireland for the final Ignatian Leadership Module. The topic is “Leading into the Unknown” (even more pertinent now than when we planned it a few years back!).
It will be the end of an era: our team are all branching into a range of leadership initiatives across different countries.
My own leadership work will be changing too. And after that, it’s retreats, coaching, training courses and a few leadership team days to usher in the Spring.
Thank you for reading!