You might wonder looking at all the posts in this blog that life is only about sailing. It is and it is not. Sailing is for me to learn about myself. How I react to unforeseen circumstances (being too heavy to participate in the European Championships), how I deal with stress and anxiety (sailing badly during the SSL), how much I like to organize events where people feel comfortable and live up to their potential (regatta officer Eastern Hemisphere), and what tremendous will power my son and I have to loose 8 kilos of weight in only two weeks time. So sailing is important to me since it reflects real life in an uncompromising way. I can’t hide, the results are clear and not open for discussion.
That clarity is missing in most work lives. Intentionally I took a longer break this summer to see what is most important to me. I dove under a virtual blanket and hibernated. You might call it a sabbatical but then one without fancy trips to beautiful places (had already been there anyway). It was not all fun. It came with insecurity and a sense of disconnection to what really matters. Reading columns in newspapers about the disconnect politicians have to the real world and experiencing that myself gave a bit of clarity that I was not looking for. Feeling powerless about the refugees and the terrible pictures didn’t bring much comfort either. But now I start to realize that sitting with all the emotions -bearing witness in Zen talk- was supportive to my own development. It brings a new depth to what is important to me and what I stand for.
The past week was special. We were with seven beautiful people from around the world: India, Brazil, UK, Germany, Palestine and myself. One is already three times nominated for the Nobel Prize, another worked with most CEO’s in the world and the next was prisoned because of her political ideas, pretty special. We first presented at the UN Headquarters in Geneva and then had a three day meeting in France where we shared where we stand in our lives as ‘Transformational Change Agents’. The love and appreciation from and for each other has been life changing for me. The projects that come out of it are energizing and have woken me up out of my summer sleep with renewed passion and zeal.
PS: It seems that I am one of the few who is less enthusiastic about the EdX MOOC of Theory U. The videos are wonderful and the U process has helped me tremendously in my development the past 10 years. But the massiveness and consensus kind of dialogues are putting me off (-line). Luckily the case clinics are part of the MOOC and those are extremely helpful!