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This weekend I attended Gabor Maté’s online seminar called The Wisdom of Trauma. Yeah, that’s how I roll. If you haven’t come across this man yet, do yourself a favour and check him out. I’ve read two of his books ‘In the realm of Hungry Ghosts’ an almost painful but fascinating look at addiction and ‘When the body says no’, how disease manifests in the body as a result of choosing attachment and role playing over authenticity. I am particularly interested in his Compassionate Inquiry approach to healing and evolving past stuck patterns of reaction that keep us repeating the same experiences over and over again. I’m also particularly interested in his work on authenticity, as many of you know, I wrote my own book and created a simple system that gets us in touch with and then expressing the true authentic self. It’s simple and Gabor says the same thing; you have to feel the feelings, there’s wisdom in them, they will tell you what is right, what is appropriate, what is good for you. Health-wise, relationship-wise, work -wise, even what to eat/say/do in that very moment-wise. These were my key learnings during the seminar which I’m happy to share with you

It took me the better part of my life to accept that I am a perfectionist. So there it is, on paper for you to read. It took me a long time to admit because I couldn’t see it, I also thought it was wholly uncool. My perfectionism claim however comes with a disclaimer; I am only a perfectionist in the things I care about, and luckily for me the things I care about are consciously, carefully chosen and therefore not large in number. But when I choose to do or care about something, I am purist, perfectionist and then as an added extra; idealist. Things makes me super easy to be around I’m told ;-) It also makes me fiercely passionate and excited about the things I care about which also results in me expecting a mega huge amount out of life. The even more problematic part is that I have successfully found ways to avoid things I cannot perfect or idealize. You’d have to dig a hole into my head, turn yourself into a teeny microscopic camera and tour around my brain to understand the random way I’ve filed things under ‘Perfection Possible’ and ‘ Perfection Not-possible’. There is for sure no pattern and the filing mostly motivated, like most people by deep rooted fears.

Entrepreneurial Spiritual Seeker. The material and the Spiritual. I’ve been struggling lately and, in a sense my whole life with merging the Entrepreneur with the Spiritual Seeker in me. I’ve been struggling because these two ideas, culturally and socially, are problematic to bring together. With books like ‘The Monk who sold his Ferrari’, movements like Minimalism and the Purpose- driven job ideal, there is a (not-so) underlying belief that states that in order to be happy, in order to follow a life of meaning, you must also be prepared to sacrifice financial reward. Not only should you be prepared for it, but others will expect you to.