Remember to dance

I met someone on my journey
sitting by the wayside
watching the pilgrims go by
Now he is writing again

Magnificent, that’s what I thought of yesterday’s performance of Coppelia and other dances by the students of Manila’s Claravall Institute of Dance. Their display of skill and costumes was dazzling. The lighting was a feast for the eyes too.

A man sitting behind me grumbled about the three-hour sit, and I wondered if he would prefer watching a long movie in stead, like Pirates of the Caribbean 3. For me, I would prefer the dance anytime. Watching people perform on stage is alive and magical.

Meanwhile, change keeps happening in my life, and I keep responding. When I lead a change, it is a profound experience. I pick myself up from the wayside. I reaffirm my will to live and write rather than to follow other people's whims and my own short-lived feelings. I prioritize what actions I will do. I allow myself to shine.

In the past weeks I traveled half the world and back. I lived forward and inspired myself and others. Yet my pen remained dry, as if to signal the need for change from within, from my private wellspring. Don’t rely on anyone, don’t consume from others, said my muse. Draw authenticity from within. And I remembered what I wrote with 51 days to go about my first arena:

“It is about being true to myself, to live in the now, from inside out, about laughing a lot, like a Zorba the Buddha who appreciates both the spiritual and the mundane planes and lives fully in both. It is about the ability to be happy in any moment, without dependence on others or any particular reason. It goes to the root of knowing my purpose for being in this life, and being happy about it. Maintaining good health and energy are part of experiencing success in this arena.”

“I wish that every human life might be pure transparent freedom”, Simone de Beauvoir wrote long ago.

“The freedom to dance and to change”, I thought.

Photographs: After dancing, the flowers (top). A change to look forward to (below).

Fit your feet

“It is up to you to choose the appropriate mandala for the way in which you want to develop… just like you choose shoes that fit your feet!” – Lama Yeshe

I return to the joys and agonies of writing.

My week was filled with communicating with others. I led a three-day workshop, and I spent most of the days and evenings writing an article in time for tomorrow’s deadline of submission. I had so little time left for other tasks that I wrote a monthly column from 11 pm to 2 am to deliver on my promise.

And, strangely, I still feel as if I have not written enough. I want to write more. Yesterday I read the Tigers in the Lowland chapter of Gail Sher’s One Continuous Mistake – Four Noble Truths for Writers. As always, her message didn’t fail to inspire me.

“Part of doing anything is creating an environment that supports it”, says Gail Sher. Aspiring writers are not exempted. She encourages writers to examine their environment. “As you hold writing at the forefront of your consciousness, your life increasingly will provide a context for that activity, not only containing but promoting and inspiring it.”

Every time I thought of my approaching deadline, I also thought of the opportunity to enjoy writing more. And I reminded myself of my choice to make it one of my life goals to become an accomplished writer.

Nothing else to do then but writing, with a glass of red wine in hand and humor in mind.

Photograph: Beauty in Asia, Asian Civilizations Museum, Singapore.

Cold pizza

I noticed the bright green T shirt in my peripheral vision, and I suddenly realized that he had been waiting patiently for me to finish. Music was reviving me as I stood listening to some discounted CDs in the music shop, with the earphones giving some relief against the driving bass coming from the PA system. While I waited for my youngest daughter to finish watching Pirates of the Caribbean 3, the unadulterated rock on The Cream of Eric Clapton made me forget everything, and then Lisa Loeb’s Stay made leaving difficult.

Music also revived me yesterday and made me forget the last week filled with hard work. I accompanied my oldest daughter in practicing with Teacher Perpy for the annual vocalist recital next month. My daughter did well, and we also practiced my contribution on sax. Last year I played tenor and alto, and this year I also get to play soprano sax to accompany some of the young vocalists. Perpy’s husband Peter, an accomplished vocalist in musicals and hymns, joined our practice yesterday and helped to tweak our delivery.

After going through Con Te Partiro (Time To Say Goodbye), When You Believe from The Prince of Egypt, Vincent’s Starry Starry Night, and Where Is Love from the musical Oliver, we found that we still couldn’t stop and ended up singing two of the other recital numbers just for fun, The Prayer and Ave Maria. These inspirational songs will touch my heart any time, and when I sing along I feel myself connecting to unnamed powers of the Universe, regardless of what religion is expressed in the lyrics.

Afterwards, loud thunder and heavy rain accompanied us as we ate a vegetarian pizza that had lost its warmth while we were under the spell of music.

As I made way for the music lover behind me and walked out of the shop with three albums for the price of one, Eric Clapton’s line came back to me, I can’t stand it, the fooling around with my heart.

I need music!


Photograph: Tazo green tea in my favorite mug.

Continuous learning

Everyone needs a coach, according to the life coaching motto.

That includes coaches, so I decided to take one too and selected Fiona Harrold, England’s best. I signed up with her and I am now guided by her book Be Your Own Life Coach. 30 minutes per day, I can do that.

Reading testimonials of people whose lives changed dramatically with Fiona's help took me by surprise. And a large mug of Tazo green tea made the exercises even more enjoyable.

Continuous learning is popular nowadays, and it was recently identified by the New York Times as the prime cause of living longer. My past week felt like a kaleidoscope of continuous learning. I studied about networking and collaboration. I learned a great deal from my kids.

I discovered new lessons in leadership, and in pain. I found out that Yellow Tail wine from Australia tastes… just to my liking. From friendship and quiz games, my knowledge of celebrities expanded. I rediscovered the magic of swimming underwater in the early morning.

I saw a friend taking steps to move forward in life to realize unfulfilled dreams, while another friend received a sought-after assignment from the highest authority in the land.

I felt the pressure of writing a column with a deadline, and realized the benefit of getting good last-minute advice. I read about a new type of position, a chief relationships officer.

I was stimulated by being surrounded by friends working on projects and writing papers at the same time, while a good friend was enjoying a break with cycling in France. I was inspired by colleagues in several talks about their projects.

I pondered more on leadership, what it is, and what it isn’t. I asked and received a change of tutor in my life coaching course. I helped my older daughter select a dress for a friend’s birthday party and walked with her in a mall while she was reading a book on Anne Boleyn’s sister.

I coached my younger daughter about reading her lines on life in ancient Sparta. I found out that I have longer breath in the afternoon when swimming the length of the pool under water.

What does this all add up to? No story, just my life.

Photograph: Variety in life – my daughter’s collection of guitar picks.

Morning laugh

Time spent laughing is time spent with the Gods
Japanese proverb


The morning is so fresh
it is perfect

I am reminded
how perfect the present moment is

There is no heaviness, guilt, or expectation
just opportunity

When I stop seeking my identity
in a world of forms
the essence of life comes
in a flash, totally pure

Nothing to do
it is just there

to enjoy
And I can only smile -
that is perfect too

Now I know
that laughing makes me

remember to smile

Life is whole, here and now
It takes silence to see this
to enter the moment -
light hearted, calm, magical

I keep writing
The mistake continues, to miss out
on the reason for existence -
suffering, sin, to miss the target
I am there
it is here

Words cannot describe, yet I write
Laughter reminds me
how wrong I am
Life is right here and now

Nothing to gain, nothing to loose
Yet everything is here
I straighten my spine
and Chi flows
Nothing is better

A sun ray touches my face as I write
and the foot of my young daughter
still asleep
Wholeness is here
I see it

A morning meditation
with eyes open and closed
in silence

I prefer the moment
over editing my lines
Touching the universe
over my To Do list

I hope no one dies
on this Philippine election day

Photograph: Morning rays

The Secret

Liberation is not deliverance.

Victor Hugo

Yesterday on the 5th of May my country celebrated the liberation from five years of occupation and oppression by Nazi Germany, now 62 years ago. In May 1945 American and Canadian tanks rolled into Dutch cities to a rousing welcome by people who had survived the winter eating little more than flower bulbs.

After the liberation, the wounds of war took a long time to heal. In a recent opinion poll, one in two people in Holland said that the two countries should work together more closely in the European Union. However, a large majority said they would now welcome Germans to join the national memorial day on May 4th. As Victor Hugo implied, the journey from liberation to deliverance can take some time.

Meanwhile, violence and oppression continue unabated in today’s world. Only a few days ago, soldiers in Iraq discovered a girls school under construction which had been booby trapped to cause carnage with an intent that was considered inconceivable until now. No day passes in that country without reports of further bombings that violently tear apart the fabric of society.

Across the Atlantic in the US, tales of carnage in schools also continue, yet the thirst for violence remains unquenched. The latest Hollywood product for family entertainment, Spiderman 3, is rated by the Motion Picture Association of America as PG 13 for its “sequences of intense action violence”. In the Philippines, the Movie and Television Classification Board rated the movie GP (for general patronage) without age limit, and when I watched it yesterday, even babies were admitted.

A reader from Africa blamed the editor of Newsweek this week for a negative article on Ban Ki-moon’s prospects as Secretary-General of the UN, saying that “you and George Bush are made from the same material: you find it easier to destroy than to build up.”

Watching Hollywood movies like Spiderman 3, destruction looks easy and spectacular, and the aftermath is made to look inconsequential to the stars shown to occupy the moral high ground.

Now switch your mind to another wavelength...

Simultaneous to what seems to be an unrelenting momentum for destruction, the world is also being touched by waves of positive energy at a scale never seen before.

Gurus and coaches, many of them American or resident in the US, abound with positive messages. The self-help or self-enrichment shelves of bookstores around the world are filled like never before.

Spirituality is making a “comeback” on a grand scale and in all colors of the rainbow. The blogosphere and other new avenues of communication are making a big contribution to this global “new age” movement.

The past weeks have witnessed a spectacular upsurge in global awareness of the need to counter the environmental destruction and climate change that are affecting the planet.

The remarkable news was about the growing consensus for action to be taken. Scientists and government officials have suddenly found more common ground for moving forward with action, and mindsets have changed in ways and on a scale that politicians can no longer afford to ignore.

In Spiderman 3, Peter Parker concludes that in the battle of good and bad, we always have a choice. Adversity can be overcome.

And two and a half thousand years ago, the Buddha told mankind to “be a lamp unto yourself” and he encouraged his followers to “work out your liberation with diligence.”

In the past few days, my daughter discovered the law of attraction from reading Rhonda Byrne’s book The Secret.

It’s about the power of positive thinking. According to Wikipedia, this law states that “you get what you think about; your thoughts determine your destiny”. That can work both ways.

That violence begets more violence seems clear. And in the dualistic nature of our world, violence seems to cling to liberation like a shadow. Even so, the world’s gurus and coaches keep reminding us that we can experience liberation when we release ourselves from aggression and fear inside.

In our daily struggle between good and bad, the choice to experience deliverance is ours, at a deeply personal level. Ask Peter Parker and the Dutch – they seem to have found some practical answers. Or read The Secret and focus on positive thinking.

Photograph: Flowering from the mud – one of the most widely circulated photographs in the world (Water Lilies, from Microsoft’s sample pictures)

As is Where is

"Only those who have awakened know that they were sleeping."

From: As is Where is - by Jim Paredes.

When the silence is golden, it is just silence. There is no obligation, no pressure to do something or to have something.

People who realize this will seek silence for its authenticity. They know that silence is the source of enlightened consciousness for everyone.

“This is the silence that is open and free”, says Jim Paredes in his new book As is Where is. “This is the truth of simply being, the silence that has no requirements.”

It is his third book, after Humming in My Universe, Between Blinks, and Writing on Water. Jim discovered silence through years of living consciously in the way of Zen, and has released his creative genius in ways that inspire many people to follow a similar path.

When I joined Jim’s creativity class more than three years ago, he asked us to release ourselves from media influence for two weeks (radio, tv, music, books). The result was immediate for all who complied with his request, as our creativity blossomed.

Jim writes about always being ready to experience life as it is. “The way to the unknown is the unknown”, he says, advising us to “throw away your old map. Only a new road will get you to a new destination.”

If there is anything constant in our lives, it is change. Yet we tend to believe that our spiritual journey is based on constant truths. Until we discover that our appreciation of truth also evolves as we grow in our experience. For one, we realize that we attract what we need to grow, including unexpected encounters with life’s paradoxes.

In the introduction to his new book, Jim writes about noticing a different feel to the topography of his own spiritual journey. Leaving the green and lush behind, he encounters “dried patches of a new, arid landscape”. He shares how it spurred his sense of being challenged to “explore new territories where God is hard to find, or is unlikely to be, but is in fact present.”

Jim keeps challenging us to live forward and let go of things that supported us yesterday. “It’s as if we are flipping a switch”, he says, “from sleep to full awakening.” Seeking out silence is an essential part of that daily journey.

As I write this, I feel encouraged to be awake. In fact, this Sunday morning feels to me like no other. Peace is here as I allow myself to enter its realm of silence. I feel better connected. Thank you, Jim!

Photographs: Jim Paredes' latest book, and the author.

After a pause...

My blogging hit a pause...

Life kisses our faces
every morning. Yet,
between morning and evening,
she laughs at our sorrows.

From: Love Letters in the Sand – by Khalil Gibran

Just like a year ago when I started blogging, a visit to Singapore’s art world gave me unforgettable pleasure. I visited the National Museum and the Asian Civilisations Museum this time, and I was mesmerized by their content, presentation, and housing. So uplifting to spend a day drifting through the galleries.

This evening a friend of many years observed that for as long as she knows me I have been interested in culture and art. While our kids practised guitar with their teacher, we enjoyed a life conversation over cappuccino served in cups from Ubud. And we agreed that life transitions should be taken as fun, not too serious.

My good friend whom I think of as Mr. I Can Do asked me to have our first life coaching session this week. What a nice challenge! And I just received my home study course for a diploma in life coaching this week. Now I realize how changes can knock on your door. I am learning to listen, and hear the knocks. I know where I want to go.

Tomorrow I will take a loan to pay for the block of land in Ubud, Bali. It is another big step on my life journey. And another case of change knocking on my door. I decided to open. After giving careful consideration to the financial matters, I am living forward.

And my daughter will read Khalil Gibran in her class.

Photograph: Beauty in Asia – the Asian Civilisations Museum on the Singapore River.

Milestone

As a lingering cough from an earlier cold turned into a full-blown throat infection last week, I had the pleasure of visiting an SOS medical clinic for the first time while traveling. I don’t like taking antibiotics, but there was no escape this time. Three days later, after many days of operating at 60% of my usual strength, the medication I received in Jakarta started showing results. During this time, I realized that days of sickness are a challenge to pratice the “better living habits” that I have adopted over the past years.

I woked up in Bali today, and the morning lived up to the reputation of this paradise isle. Apart from the fact that my cough had abated a bit compared to the previous days, the freshness of the morning and the scenery surrounding the small hotel in Ubud were stunning. Even after only one night there, I felt refreshed in body and spirit.

Yesterday was a milestone for me as I signed a letter of intent to acquire a piece of land about 20 minutes north of Ubud, with a view to settling there after retirement. The secluded block of land includes some ancient rice terraces at the top of a hill and slopes down into a valley with a small river. My real estate agent is still negotiating for me to lease a part of the neighbor’s rice terraces as well, to use as a garden. In Bali, leasing land is common.

I also used the opportunity of my overnight weekend visit to Bali to buy several attractive books on traditional and contemporary Balinese architecture to start me off with visualizing the house I intend to build there later on. And today I met a well-known Dutch architect living in Ubud who gave me further advice on build a suitable house on the block.

Now that my strength is returning from the weeks of cold and throat infection, I am happy to live forward again.

Photographs: View of the block from the lower terrace (top), and beautiful Ubud morning (bottom).

Good team

I spent yesterday with a close friend, talking about the changes in our lives. He was visiting Manila for a week, and it was good to catch up and compare notes. He is older than me, at least biologically, and I usually get some good advice. Yesterday was no exception.

He told me the story of a group of Harvard graduates who had been subjected to research about the success they achieved in their life after graduation. The message was that only two graduates of the group had set themselves goals, and that these two had achieved more than all the others put together.

So we took some time discussing life goals and the importance of taking action to achieve them. We discussed the elements of a life goals chart. Mission, vision and values at the top, together with dreams, and below that specific life goals, and under that the goals for 2007. And at the bottom the available resources and, importantly, the activities to drop and avoid from one’s life. Because, while we can do almost anything when we put our mind to it, we certainly can’t do everything.

Our range of topics also covered the benefits of early retirement, pursuing life-long education, doing business and reaching out to people, drinking good coffee, speeding up our computers, and living in Bali, a place he loves too. He gave me good advice about the piece of land I am considering. How to clear it, put in drainage, and start building in phases, beginning with a small pavilion that can serve to try out design and building materials, and can become (his) guest quarters later on.

All in all, it was a rewarding day. And when he texted me this morning from the airport “we make a good team”, I agreed. It is good when friends team up to help each other.

Photograph: My friend with a wallaby (top) and one of my actions this week: ordering a life coaching home-study course (bottom).

Open spaces

If we don’t change, we don’t grow
– Gail Sheehy

Without change, growth is impossible. Living forward, therefore, is about embracing change. Even looking for it. Not change for the sake of change, but to ensure that I keep my living space open. And, let’s face it, my living space is often more walled in than open. I hold on to what I am accustomed to. I treasure what is comfortable to me. I resist when someone tells me to try a new approach. I am not naturally open to change.

I was thinking today about the value of living with an open space concept, and I compared it with what I saw in Bali. During my visit last February, I wondered why the people there treasure open spaces so much. In fact, I found that much of traditional Balinese architecture is about open space, exemplified by the pavilion, the balé. It is a structure that creates a space that can be used for many purposes. Most importantly, it does not have walls.

I was even more amazed when I visited some Balinese temples, like Pura Samuan Tiga. I found it full of seemingly empty space, and images of deities were nowhere to be seen. The gods are in heaven, I was told by the helpful guardians, and they come to visit the temple once a year during the temple’s annual festival. So it seemed that the temple also served as an open space, which only truly came to life when the gods visited.

In fact, every pavilion I saw in Bali, from the small balé in the corner of my hotel room garden to the community halls of villages and the grand pavilions of temples, seemed to have its own character and atmosphere, yet they shared the common qualities of providing an open space.

Then it occurred to me that these pavilions somehow resemble the lives of truly great people in this world. To me, the greatness of these leaders is characterized by their vision, their openness, their strategic foresight, and their capacity to listen and respond to the needs of people from all walks of life, backgrounds, and opinions.

Would it be too much to say that a pavilion is a unique structure that links heaven and earth yet does not divide people on this earth by the construction of walls? For sure, if my life would have no walls, it would be much easier to see the changes happening around me, and to adapt my life to these changes.

A strong structure, yet no walls, what an interesting metaphor that is for a life that embraces change. In such a beautiful open space, there is nothing to hold me back from growing.

Photograph: A pavilion in Pura Samuan Tiga temple, Ubud, Bali.

Stock taking

At the end of the week, I take stock of my results and experience.

I am more focused on results now, especially positive ones. Living forward needs keeping track of the road traveled, and what I experienced along the way. Doing that regularly is a good thing.

In fact, the end of the day, and the end of the week are good times to reflect and taking stock. Celebrate and enjoy the successes. And learn lessons from what did not go as expected, and then let go of it.

A friend shared this week how coaching was helping her move forward with her life, with some important changes coming up. And these changes had been triggered by some unexpected tough experiences.

Another friend started to discover how focusing on personal talents and strengths with a positive attitude might help to get a new job with a better salary.

And I was touched by the initiative of a colleague at work who arranged dinner to “reach out” to a friend who was going through a rough time. He told me later how friends had done the same for him years ago, and he had never forgotten how it had helped him.

I read a good book on coaching in China that focused on the person (Ren) rather than on the issues.

And my friend Jim Paredes announced the publication of his latest book, As Is Where Is, through Lulu.com.

In Ubud, meanwhile, an architect took a look at the land I am interested to buy, to advise on what could be built there. As a result, some more questions need to addressed.

And creative ideas for new enterprises were born involving designer jewellery and yoga training.

Today I bought a screen protector for my new Nokia phone. And I got myself a pair of new Merrell sandals, nice and comfortable.

And I kept reading more and more about life coaching training, the topic that keeps attracting my interest, and which I have included in my goals for this year.

Sadly, the family driver left this monring. I released him and he released me. Continued squabbling between driver and helpers was affecting the atmosphere in the house.

For most of the week, I was able to maintain a positive attitude. And yet I learned that actions taken with a positive intent can still be perceived differently by others. Even with a positive mind, I need to try and understand how my actions come across to others, and tune in to their feelings.

It’s good to keep track of what happens in and around me. And now I realize I should do it every day, because it is so much easier to do when it is still fresh.

Photograph: Woman carrying light, Hanoi Hilton Opera hotel.

Connecting people

An unbelievable delay? I can hardly believe it myself. It took me all these years, ever since the first clunky Motorola handphone, to become the proud owner of a Nokia!

After the cloneable Motorola, I had a Philips with voice activation, then a Sony Ericsson P800, and finally two XDAs, the IIs and now the Atom Exec. So why get another phone now?

My powerful Atom developed a problem – I can only hear sound and speak through the headset (I use a bluetooth Jabra now). And the O2 service center told me that they need to replace the motherboard. But I can’t live without a phone!

And then, I travel abroad frequently and roaming costs are high. So having a second phone for using local sim cards makes good sense. Meanwhile, I keep my international phone on roaming so that my loved ones can reach me anywhere, anytime.

I had only one condition when I entered the Hello cell phone shop today – the new phone had to be red! No problem, my two daughters came with me and advised me which phone to select, and I liked it too: the new Nokia 5300 Xpress Music.

Connecting people, just what I want.

Photograph: Connecting people, creating life.

The Chi Connection Code

The fountain lives by virtue of the water that flows through it.

- David Peat

Imagine energy flowing deliciously through your body. Your warm feelings create a sense of wonder about the world around you. Your vitality is strong. We all enjoy moments when we experience this. And we want to stretch them, recreate them, to feel really good more often. Do we have to create such feelings, pump up such energy? Or is there a way we can attract them to come to us? Speak a magic word to invite them, like a genie out of a bottle?

When I and my fellow classmates joined morning exercises with teacher Mantak Chia a few years ago, he told us the secret, and I have nevery forgotten it. In fact, I think about it often, and I use it successfully. Master Chia said that it is as if we are swimming in a pool of Chi. "It’s all around you, he said, wherever you go. But most people don’t see it, don’t know it. That’s the secret," he said. And with his body shaking with laughter as usual, he told us “It is so easy, just connect to the Chi that’s all around you. You are swimming in it!”

I guess all of us who had gathered on that field at Tao Garden outside Chiang Mai in the early morning wondered quietly if it could really be that simple.* We smiled politely, and we tried. And in the following days, our smiles sometimes hid the agony of stretching muscles and tendons as we bent our bodies into ancient postures of peacock looks at its own tail, monkey prays with elbows and several other Tao Yin or “guide and pull” exercises that are older than Tai Chi. The Chinese already found out millennia ago that revitalization and longevity come with daily physical exercises that open up our spine. Stretching is good!

On the other hand, I have come to see that the worst thing we can do to live better is trying too hard. Trying hard is not enough to create good energy and nice feelings. This is also true with exercise. The real benefit comes afterwards, as you relax and consciously open up and focus your awareness on the moment. “Chi follows where our awareness leads it,” Master Chia explained. After we open up, as we focus our attention one by one on different parts of our body, Chi follows as if magically attracted to those parts. Try relaxing and focusing on the crown of your head, lift your closed eyes upward, and you will feel energy coming in. Stretch out your arms and twist your wrists, and you will feel energy entering your body through your hands.

Chi is all around us, and it follows our lead, our focused awareness. We live at a time when the Da Vinci Code has aroused the interest of millions around the world for the mysteries that surround us. Many other authors have jumped on the bandwagon and wrote about other codes. Yet one of the most powerful codes of all has been with us for as long as millennia. I would call it the Chi Connection Code. We can tap into it anytime. It used to be the secret of Tao alchemists and spiritual recluses. Masters who only passed it on to their most trusted pupils. Yet in this age of Aquarius, where spiritual growth is spreading like never before, modern masters like Mantak Chia have decided to disclose the secret way to anyone who wants to hear, all around the world. Just visit your local bookstore and you will find out. Look under New Age, Self-Enrichment, or Health.

* To watch Master Chia lead an early morning exercise, visit the Tao Training Center website and click on “internal exercise for morning” to see the video clip.

Photograph: Tao Fountain of the late Frank Polman.

Connecting dots

Today is Nyepi, the day of silence that falls on Bali’s lunar new year. It is a day of silence, fasting, and meditation, and even the island’s airport is shut down. What a great idea to dedicate the first day of the new year to silence. I wish I was there joining in the silent celebration of the day. For me, today was a travel day, flying from Manila to Hanoi through Hong Kong. However, I did spend time quietly reflecting on my life as I sat in my airplane seat.

Aldous Huxley said that “the more powerful and original a mind is, the more it will incline towards the religion of solitude.” I reflected today on what it means to have private space where one can enjoy solitude. Private space can be virtual, meaning the type of space we can learn to create anywhere and anytime through our mind. For example, I could sit in an airplane full of people yet experience my own private space.

However, private space can also refer to physical space that is especially created with the idea of celebrating solitude. Part of my dream is to create a physical space that combines a studio with private living quarters with an outdoors bath and a walled terrace overlooking a green tropical valley. A space where I could be both private and intensily creative. Who knows, some day I might be able to realize this dream. I am working on it, actually.

For me, and many other introverts, I need to regenerate my energy in solitude before I can comfortably mingle with friends and acquaintances. One is a condition for the other, is how it works for me. Finding private space and private time become critically important. John Maxwell calls it “growth time”, and he encourages his readers to find such time every day.

Against the backdrop of a spectacular view of Hanoi by night, my discussion over dinner this evening centered unexpectedly on how life is marked by changes, how different these changes are experienced by women and men, and on the opportunities to make these differences work to complement each other’s needs. I realized that unless we learn to know and love ourself more, it would be different to help others. In fact, there is a Vietnamese proverb that cautions against trying to help others before being able to help ourselves.

The more I practice being quiet and receptive in my soul, the more I realize how rich I really am in the universe around me. The dots in my universe are connecting mysteriously whenever I care to take a look. And I am more and more excited to find ways to share this magic with people around me for their benefit. I am glad to be reborn at 50, and sometimes I wonder why it took me so long to find out life’s lessons. Oh well, it just takes longer for men than women, it seems!

Photograph: Wake Up - Espresso cup from Ubud, Bali.

How you want it

I missed writing the past days. A nasty cold kept me from doing anything apart from the most urgent tasks that I could not avoid. A test confirmed that the infection is viral, not bacterial, so no need for antibiotics – that was good news. And I was struck by the number of people who advised me to drink lots of water. Everyone seems to know this nowadays. Nice for a water expert to hear this.

Days of feeling physically low pushed me into “conservation” mode. I long to get back to “regeneration” and to feel more energetic again. But since I take life as it comes, I also embrace this feeling of conservation, being careful what to do and what not to do. The importance of rest becomes clear. Not taking adequate rest seems like a clear and present danger to me now. That’s good.

Even when low, however, there’s lots to learn. In fact, I found that listening becomes easier. Switching to receiving mode also helped me to get more ideas, and I’ve been writing these down as soon as I could.

Life is how you want it to be. And the sky is bright blue here!

Photograph: Temple in use, outside Ubud, Bali

Chaser to maker

This clipping from my first collage sums up how my life has changed. When I met Jim Paredes in his Tapping the Creative Universe seminar in Manila in December 2003, he challenged all of us to forego tv, radio, and books for the two week duration of the classes and to work on unlocking our own creativity in stead.

Apart from writing daily morning pages, one of the assignments was to make a collage at home about our life and what we saw changing in it, and to present it to the class. Those were touching moments. We all lowered our defences and opened up to connections with the creative universe, and many of us took the opportunity to embrace changes in our life.

In the four years that have passed since that class, I have spent a lot of time reading, writing, playing music, and sharing time with family and friends. And I realized today that I hardly ever watched tv anymore in all that time. I keep up with world news by taking a quick look at websites every day, but this takes me minutes rather than hours.

Everything seems to pass from one generation to the next, though. My daughter is now a fervent tv watcher. She seems perfectly content when she sits in her "command center" corner with computer and tv arranged closely around her and ipod available at all times. But then, she’s also investing much time in creativity, like singing, figure skating, guitar, and drawing Japanese mangas. She caught the creative bug as well.

For me, the tide in life has clearly turned. I am happy to live more inside out, in stead of letting my life be dominated by consumption as before. Like the shepherd boy in The Alchemist, I have come to realize that the treasure is buried at home, right where I am. So I continue walking on my path to grow and to help others. And it’s an exciting journey every day.

In between my coughing and sneezing this weekend, I managed to complete a number of tasks that increased my motivation to do more. Yesterday, I registered a domain name for a website that I want to develop this year in support of my life coaching plans. I also put my goals and targets for 2007 on paper, so I can prioritize my time and focus my energy.

John Maxwell quotes a Gregg Harris as having said that 67 of the 100 people he surveyed had set goals for themselves (that percentage includes me now!). However of those 67 people, he said, only 10 made realistic plans to achieve their goals, and of those 10, only 2 people followed through and made them happen. Ouch! What a powerful reminder to stop procrastinating and get on with our life as it should be lived! Except that each person’s purpose is different. So it is a personal journey of inquiry to figure out where each of us should go, how we get there, and to make sure that we do.

I am walking in that direction, and I am happy to have a better map in my hand after this weekend’s work. The other hand still holds a hanky for my sneezing.

Photograph: Detail of my life change collage in December 2003.

Easy choice

For the past two nights, I let my mind go blank and fell asleep early, in stead of staying up late blogging, reading, and web-browsing. I have been down with a cold, but not serious enough to stay home. I stuck with my daily routine, more or less.

I was buoyed by a friend today who shared that she was going through a midlife transition and had chosen to take matters into her own hands to change her life for the better. I found her experience remarkably similar to my own, and we felt encouraged by each other’s choice to live forward positively.

My teacher and friend Jim Paredes made a comment on my completion of the Reborn at 50 blog that also warmed my heart. Sharing life with positive people is so beneficial. And the opposite is equally powerful, as negative energy clings and is not easily shed. The choice is left to us. And it’s an easy choice to make after having discovered the power of being positive.

Once in a while, a storm will enter our life unexpectedly to shake us out of daily routines, hold up a mirror of self-reflection, and remind us of the journey ahead. Keep walking. Don’t stay too long in your comfort zone. Usually, the storm is short lived. And when our positive attitude takes over, storms cease to matter. Light always illuminates darkness.

I learned a lot this week about the benefit in taking small steps every day towards my goals, my dreams in life. I realized that each step counts and gives a surprising satisfaction when accomplished. Like magic, my motivation increased to take more steps.

Over the past few days, I started a new email address at GMail, learned about setting up a website for e-commerce, followed up on practical matters for the piece of land in Ubud that I am interested in, and enjoyed checking out websites on how to tie a sarong. All in a minimum of time, yet with great pleasure.

I discovered that spending time each day doing something I really enjoy, and hanging out with positive-minded people, are two great ways to charge my battery, especially when I’m feeling flat with a cold.

Photograph: Serious looking guy in the Archeological Museum of Bali in Pejeng.

Bulgarian spring

I observed my body as I was lying completely quiet in the bath tub. It was only the second time I used the bath in the three years I live here. I prefer showering.

But today, I went in recovery mode. A sore throat and aches attacked me suddenly this afternoon, the onset of a cold probably. I quickly took additional vitamin c and echinacaea tablets, but for the most part, I was just quietly relaxing and tuning in to my body’s signals.

I observed that while I have good stamina to continue working when I am not feeling well, my system is telling me to slow down and reflect on regeneration, to pay attention to my body and physiological systems, and my energy levels.

And so I slowed down this evening after coming home, and observed how I felt, and how my body is reacting, and my mind as well. It is such an interesting experience to be one’s own observer. Strangely enough, then, I felt I have to write about it, in stead of just turning in early and sicking it out.

I was touched today by a small red and white cloth string worn around the wrist by my Bulgarian colleague at work. He told me it is an age-old custom in Bulgaria to wear this string in early March to mark the coming of spring. We both remarked how similar it looked to wrist strings worn in several Asian countries to celebrate spiritual and community connections.

So spring is coming, at least in the northern hemisphere, and with it ideas of freshness, new growth, new opportunities. Fertility too, perhaps.

A shocking contrast with my journey home this evening on a road full of smoke-belching buses. I thought of severely polluted cities in other parts of the world that have been able to clean up their act, like London with its infamous and deadly smog in decades past.

What would it take to see air quality on the roads improve in this city that I have called home for many years now? Laws exist but lack enforcement, and what action is attempted is circumvented by operators who seem to put their dirtiest smoke-belching buses on the road in the evening and night when it is dark.

I believe that the heart of development lies in people themselves, both individual and in organizations. But admittedly, I find it hard to imagine how the good efforts of so many citizens in this city can continue to be negated by the folly of a few who still refuse to take responsibility to care about the environment.

So the best for me would be to make sure that these noxious fumes will no longer enter my car, as they do at the moment since my air inlet seems to be malfunctioning. But today’s experience was a lesson about what pedestrians, jeepney passengers, and straphangers in buses suffer on a daily basis. How sad, and what a reminder of great opportunities for improvement.

Regeneration can come at all levels, in body and soul, and in organized society as well. Is that why people these days refer to civil society? I associate the word civil with the knowledge and ability to do the right thing, and to live inside out from love and care for ourselves and our fellow citizens.

Perhaps the bus operators in this city could be given a holiday in Bali and learn from the people there who innately believe in the importance of maintaining balance between people, the spiritual world, and the environment around them.

Meanwhile, regeneration can start everywhere, and all the time. And I experience my part of it now, even as I am not opening my mouth because of a sore throat.

And I salute the Bulgarian custom of celebrating the promise of regeneration by wearing a small red and white string on the wrist at the start of spring.


Photograph: Harmony in pond and bamboo, at the Ayala Museum.

Culturally infused

Let me be honest… it is not everyday that I feel good, even if I know all the ways to live well from the inside out.

I got up late this morning with a burning desire to get out and do something enriching. The friend with whom I had planned to visit Ayala Museum couldn’t make it, and I decided to go anyway, to make good use of the morning mood.

The visit turned me on, really. I felt alive and vibrant! And by what, whom? By an unlikely combination of culture.

As I passed the M Café at Ayala Museum the Sunday morning brunch was in full swing, flavored with crisp sax sounds by Vince Lahorra. I found out his name in passing when I asked a waitress who he was. I listened for a few spell-bound moments, and then decided to continue what I had set out to do. I walked the few more steps to the museum entrance.

The Ayala Museum is seen from top to bottom, literally. You travel up by lift to the fourth floor of the stylishly designed modern building, and it’s all downstairs from there. Except when the exhibits are so good that you linger on each floor. As is usually the case. And although I had visited several times before, today it felt as new.

I was mesmerized by the exhibition on Chinese Diaspora – Art Streams from the Mainland. The Peranakan Legacy display of art objects, clothes, jewellery, and others from Southeast Asian countries allowed me a fresh peek inside the lives of the overseas Chinese who have made this corner of the world their home since they started migrating there from the mainland in the 15th century or earlier.

The beauty and creativity of each piece struck me, as did the humor in assuming the reasons why some pieces had less diamonds than in the original design, hinting that paying off gambling debts might have been to blame. In one case, a beautiful silver and golden belt had additional panels added over the years, presumably to accommodate an increasing waistline as years went by.

Most of all, I was touched that the beauty of the art and the intent of their creators and owners transcended time and place to meet me this morning. As always, there were some sad tinges too, like the wartime story of a family in Penang who plucked a diamond each week from their heirlooms to buy food. A remarkable case how art allowed them to make ends meet. They were lucky to have enough of it.

Another fascinating story was the evolution of clothes worn by overseas Chinese women. From long pants and conservative long-sleeve shirts (baju panjang) into the voluptuous sarong and kebaya introduced in the 1940s. The sarong sensually hugging a woman’s hips. The kebaya intricately designed to show ever more of the woman’s beauty through sheer material that retained traditional form only as a transparent whiff.

One century later, and after spending a week in Bali for my rebirth at 50, I admired the batik garments on show with a realization how they continue to adorn women today with a timeless sexy attraction.

And then there were the spended colors and designs of the batik designs, and of the porcelain. A feast for the eyes, in bright colors that merged the cultural origins from China with those of the Southeast Asian locale, in particular Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore.

I also learned that Damian Domingo, the first great Filipino painter who established the first Philippine art academy in 1823, was a Chinese Mestizo rather than from Spanish origin as had been assumed. China Gaze by Valeria Cavestany proved to be an enchanting collection of light boxes in a darkened room, with mixed media works depicting Chinese identity in foreign settings.

After more than an hour of feasting my eyes and imagination on the Chinese Diaspora exhibition, and dipping into a few other exhibits as well, I left with a promise to return soon for more.


Descending further and exiting the doors, I was greeted once again by the jazzy sound of Vince Lahorra at the M Café, and I enjoyed his musical hospitality over cappuccino and a pandan sans rival cake. After he finished his gig, we met and chatted, and he invited me to jam with him next time. I felt as if the Universe sent me a nudge to practise more on my sax.

Life without music would be a mistake, a store sign in Singapore said last year.

Today, I got a vivid reminder how much art, culture and music can do to invigorate my life and introduce new friends, connecting more dots. Neglecting that would indeed be a mistake.

Photographs: Ayala Museum Café (top), Chinese Diaspora exhibition (middle), and Vince Lahorra on sax (bottom).