The Balcony View

The Balcony View Audio Article- 12/08/2023 On Relationship with the Body. Part 2: Identity & the Body https://balconyview.substack.com/p/on-relationship-with-the-body-part-2 Hi Everyone, Over the last week, I moved house and hit 30 weeks pregnant with twins. This is alongside launching a programme for the US Air Force at eight bases across Europe with my company Team Triad and recording Season 5 of the Relationship Matters Podcast, which will go live in September. The over-ambitious part of me believed writing an article (or two) during this time was a reasonable target. Life, on the other hand, had other plans. So, whilst I began writing this article over a month ago, my experiences from the past few weeks and acknowledgement of what my body can and can't do right now have shaped what you're reading. Discovering flexibility in our abilities feels vital to finding balance in the changing tides of our lives. To quote Byron Katie: "If you want real control, drop the illusion of control; let life have you. It does anyway. You're just telling yourself the story of how it doesn't." Katie x In Part 1, I discussed the mind body battle many of us find ourselves in and my ongoing journey to feel connected and aligned with my body. In this article, I continue my exploration by considering the link between identity and the body. When our bodies undergo significant change, it can act as a mirror, causing us to re-examine who we believe we are in the world. And whilst this article primarily uses examples from my life, I encourage you to examine how your sense of self lives in your body. Instead of wishing for what is lost or has never been, how can we meet the body we wake up with today? The Body Project Last year, I co-created a podcast series called Conversations on Cancer with co-founder of CRR Global Faith Fuller after she discovered she has stage 4 uterine cancer. Across the 6-part mini-series, we interviewed cancer patients and their caregivers on what it means to find right relationship with a life-threatening illness. Throughout the conversations, a theme emerged: cancer acted as a mirror revealing who they believed themselves to be. This was often an uncomfortable yet powerful reflection to face up to. For Faith, her chemotherapy caused her to become more forgetful and less sharp. As a psychologist, who has spent much of her life identifying with her witty intelligence, this wasn't an easy reality to face up to. Yet, it made her keenly aware of how she identifies in the world. Other people on the podcast spoke about how losing their hair, or a body part, changed how they saw themselves in the world. In one particularly courageous account, a guest revealed how prostate cancer had altered his sense of masculinity and sexual identity due to the side effects of his treatments. These powerful conversations had me questioning the identity I have constructed for myself. There are certain qualities that I identify with; that I hold as me. Yet, as with everything, these qualities are in a constant state of emergence and can be impacted by our changing bodies in both small and significant ways. So, the "who am I?" inquiry is really more of a process than a product, in which we continually define who we are for ourselves and other people. Another side of self As mentioned in Part 1, I underwent several knee surgeries in my mid-20s that forced me to slow down. Initially, it felt like someone had pulled the emergency brake on my life, which was a jarring and uncomfortable reality to face up to. I distinctly remember a phone call with a colleague (taken from my sofa with my left leg elevated and iced) where I responded to: "How have you been?" with "Oh, you know, busy." Now my life had been many things in the aftermath of surgery, but being busy was not one of them. Suddenly, I became acutely aware of how identified I was with 'busyness.' It was a part of how I saw myself in the world. And when I dug a little deeper, I discovered...

The Balcony View Audio Article- 14/07/2023 On Relationship with the Body. Part 1: A Mindy Body Battle https://balconyview.substack.com/p/on-relationship-with-the-body-1 We can apply the lens of relationship to everything. Relationships with a partner, child, or dog are often more apparent than our relationships with money, nature, or global warming. Yet looking through the lens of relationship, even when considering objects, concepts, or ideas, can provide a powerful paradigm shift for examining our interdependence. No person is an island, and by looking through this lens, we can appreciate that relationship is a two-way street. We are all in a constant state of emergence, continually shaping and being shaped by the web of relationships within which we exist. A few weeks ago, I wrote about the concept of Right Relationship. In this article, I explore the body through the lens of relationship. Inspired by my personal explorations from the past year, which have been amplified since becoming pregnant with twins (which you can read about here), I hope that my inquiry, whilst personal to me, might help you consider your relationship with your body. What does it mean to be in Right Relationship with your body? An unhealthy relationship I've got a confession to make: for over 15 years, I've been in an abusive relationship with my body. I've criticised it for being the wrong shape, mocked it for being too weak, and found myself frustrated when it was tired, sick, or slow. Yet, on the flip side, when it's been healthy, helped me hit a PB, or just simply supported me through a busy day, I've never thought to appreciate it. My body didn't always meet my high expectations, yet on the occasion when it surpassed my lofty goals, there was little thanks or praise. In my mid-teens, my knees started to give way. I'd wake up to find them locked in a particular position. Or I'd have to take the stairs one at a time, which was excruciatingly embarrassing for a 16-year-old desperately trying to fit in. As I later discovered, I have a rare condition called Osteochondritis Dissecans, which occurs when a lack of blood supply causes bone and cartilage to crack and loosen. This led to two big holes (or "craters", as my surgeon described them) forming in my knees. The adolescent condition usually only affects one joint; however, I hit the jackpot and was the first patient at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital to have a stem cell transplant in both knees, albeit not at the same time. After four surgeries in my early 20s, I found myself on crutches and in a chunky knee brace for the better part of a year. However, what this story doesn't tell you, is how positive this experience was for me. For the first in my life, I was forced to slow down. I could no longer live my life on a treadmill, and as much as I tried to keep up with my old pace, my body had other plans. It had its own recovery timeline, and it demanded to be heard. In the weeks following surgery on my left knee, I found myself easing into the slowdown and attuning to my body's subtle signals. And with these new insights, my yoga practice took on a whole new character. No longer was I restricting (or forcing) myself to a specific set of postures; instead, I rolled out my mat and allowed my body to dictate the flow of my practice (often accompanied by loud, upbeat music!) I adored this new-found mind-body connection which continued off the mat and into my life. Until it didn't. I remember feeling so grateful to walk again, only to take it for granted a few days later. Six months on, I went through the same process again, this time with my right knee. Same body, same condition, same surgery- so I felt confident I knew what to expect. Yet, it was entirely different. After my left knee surgery, I had been practising yoga balances after 2 days! However, after surgery on my right knee, I was in agony for weeks, and my recovery was much slower. It was another huge lesson. My left knee...

In this episode, Katie Churchman with Alexander Beiner about the power of storytelling. Across the conversation, they discuss how to use storytelling to make sense of complicated concepts and ideas, using storytelling to weave together seemingly unrelated disciplines, story as a bridge between different systems, the darker side of storytelling, and much more. Alexander Beiner is a writer, podcaster, and facilitator with a love for making sense of culture, hosting transformative experiences, and exploring how we can evolve and thrive in the chaotic times we live in. He is one of the founders of Rebel Wisdom, a popular alternative media platform that ran from 2017-2022 and explored cutting-edge systems change and cultural sensemaking. As well as publishing regular essays and articles on his Substack, The Bigger Picture, he is also an executive director of Breaking Convention, Europe's longest-running conference on psychedelic medicine and culture, and also co-created and co-facilitated a legal psilocybin retreat called Regenerative Stewardship. He is the author of 'The Bigger Picture: How psychedelics can help us make sense of the world,' which was released this month and is available on Audible, Amazon, and more. I would highly recommend picking up a copy- everything Ali writes is hugely thought-provoking and has me questioning my worldview. This was a fascinating deep dive into storytelling and how it helps us make sense of the world. Enjoy! Episode 2: We’re Wired for Story with Alexander Beiner Key KC- Katie Churchman AB- Alexander Beiner KC: Ali. Welcome to the Balcony View Podcast. Delighted to have you on the show. AB: Delighted to be here. Thanks for having me. KC: I'm very excited about this discussion today, and I want to start by talking about the fact that you use a range of different mediums and platforms. So you write, you podcast, you create videos, and across all of these, I've noticed a theme around storytelling. And so, I want to start by asking you why storytelling is so integral to your work and what you do. AB: Yeah, well, I mean, the first thing to say is that I love it, and I think many of us love a story. I have really vivid memories of sitting in school at the age of like six or seven for story time. A teacher will read, or my mum and dad actually used to read to me as well. And there's just something magical about it, I think. But aside from that quality of it, there are a few reasons I think storytelling is so important. One of them is that if we want to communicate ideas to each other, we generally do it through stories. And there’s actually a lot of neuroscience to back this up, that we learn much more through stories rather than just facts. KC: Right. AB: Which is, of course, why the news isn't just, this happened, this happened, this happened, this happened. And here are the statistics. We, of course, tell stories around stuff. In fact, we're just kind of completely immersed and wrapped up in stories everywhere. Our own stories, the people we're connected to, the stories we tell about our culture. So, the world is, in some way, the social sphere is made of stories. And so, if we want to communicate or make sense of it or hopefully change aspects of it, we have to do that. Not exclusively, but definitely a huge part of it is through storytelling. There's another aspect of stories which is that they are one of the most inclusive ways to communicate because it's cross-cultural; every culture has stories. It's part of how we're wired; we’re kind of like storytelling animals, in a way. And also, the stories that we tell have something more going on in them than just entertainment or even lessons. A Jungian view on storytelling would say that really what's happening in stories is that it's an external communication of a deep internal world that we all share and a kind of collective unconscious that we share as well. So people might be familiar with Joseph Campbell, who was a famous...

The Balcony View Audio Article- 09/06/2023 I'm Pregnant. With Twins: My story, the day after I found out I was pregnant with two... http://balconyview.substack.com/p/im-pregnant-with-twins CONTEXT: This article was written when I was 11 weeks pregnant, before my husband and I shared the news. I’m now 21 weeks pregnant, and the four of us are healthy, happy and well over the halfway mark! It was lovely to re-read this article from 10 weeks ago, as I can appreciate how much I have grown on this journey so far (and no, I’m not just talking about my belly!) Yesterday, my husband Dan and I discovered we’re pregnant with twins. Yes, we're having two. At this moment in time (11 weeks and 1 day), we haven't shared the pregnancy news with anyone, partly because of the risks in the first trimester but mostly because we liked the idea of settling into this new chapter and dreaming about what we want it to look like, before sharing it with the world and being shaped by other people's thoughtful - yet sometimes intrusive- experiences and expectations. We’ve spent the last six weeks imagining one child, and now we’ve just discovered- to our complete surprise- that we’re having two. As Dan said, seconds after seeing two babies on the ultrasound screen, “we’re going to need more space!” So far, so good… From a pregnancy standpoint, my experience so far has been straightforward and uncomplicated. I've been slightly tired and have napped occasionally, but other than that (and peeing more), I really can't complain. I was skiing at seven weeks (I’m a very competent skier and trust myself on skis more than I do running around my local park). At nine weeks, I led an interactive training for leaders and pilots from the US Air Force. And whilst I wisely cancelled my hot yoga membership early on, I started working out with a PT for a more personalised and pregnancy-friendly approach. So far, so good. In fact, days have gone by when I’ve barely thought about being pregnant. It was exciting and not all-consuming, which felt like a lovely space to be in. Ignorance is Bliss Given that this is our first and that we are relatively naïve to all things pregnancy and babies, I was confident that the playful yet curious energy that Dan and I were bringing to the process was impacting my experience. And whilst a lot of luck is involved (I haven't been sick once), I still believe there is a valuable lesson here. As I discussed with Mark Ovland on The Ways of Looking Podcast, the lenses we look through will be shaping our reality to a certain degree. Suppose I had spent many hours on Reddit, reading up on #pregnancyproblems, I'm sure certain aspects of my journey wouldn't have felt quite as light and manageable. It may have caused me to view my experiences- like intermittent backache- through a 'challenges' lens instead. There are many things that could go wrong. But I don’t believe that means we necessarily should know about all these potential issues. Just in case. I must admit that being a complete beginner has been a blessing up until now, as I don’t know what I don’t know. (A friend, on the other hand, who specialises in paediatrics, was worried sick at every stage of her pregnancy because, to use her words, “I know too much.”) After spending most of my life trying- and sometimes pretending- to be an expert, there’s a great relief in not having to know. Instead, I figure if and when things show up, I will learn and work it out along the way. As one twin specialist shared with us, “If it’s your first and it’s twins, then you’re lucky; ignorance really is bliss!” Comparison vs Trusting the Gut I also appreciated the space to ask questions without finding answers immediately. Our phones give us access to so much information, often at the expense of our own wisdom. We seek to understand through other people's experiences or from the advice of experts- neither of which is wrong- but when they become primary, can cause us to ignore the signals from...

In this episode, Katie Churchman talks with Mark Ovland about the Ways of Looking approach, a framework for meditation. What if your deepest happiness and freedom had less to do with what happens and more to do with how you're relating to what happens? Across this conversation, Katie & Mark explore the Ways of Looking framework as developed by the late meditation master Rob Burbea and discuss the impact that different lenses can have on our lives. They investigate the idea that the way we relate to the world affects our perception of it - for instance, bringing more ease, freedom, and joy into our experience - and, thus, how this approach can create more flexibility, expansion and empathy in our lives. In this discussion, they focus more on the everyday application of the approach than on the formal meditative training behind it all. Mark Ovland began practising meditation in 2008 and is currently training to teach within the Buddhist Insight Meditation tradition. He has lived and worked in various monasteries and retreat centres around India and the UK and has spent around two years on intensive silent retreats himself. Mark helped to pioneer mindfulness courses within the UK prison system and was one of the co-founders of Freely Given Retreats, a charity that runs weeklong silent meditation retreats on a donation basis. In 2013 he and some friends set up DANCE (the Dharma Action Network for Climate Engagement), and in recent years, he has been particularly engaged with environmental and social justice issues. Mark was a close student of the late meditation master Rob Burbea. Get full access to The Balcony View at balconyview.substack.com/subscribe

The Balcony View Audio Article- 12/05/2023 A Both/And Mindset: Synthesise polarities and stretch your leadership range https://balconyview.substack.com/p/a-bothand-mindset If you've ever received a 360-feedback report, what did you focus on first? I estimate that 95% of the people I've worked with scroll right to the bottom and scrutinise areas for improvement. Whilst this feedback can be invaluable for understanding growth opportunities, it can also cause us to underappreciate our strengths. Our brains have evolved to prioritise negative experiences over positive ones. When our ancestors lived on savannahs (approximately 2 million years ago), this kept us safe and away from danger. However, in the present day, this outdated operating system in our brains isn't so helpful. Like when reading your 360 and learning that one of your colleagues finds you "too direct." This happened to one of my clients, who immediately took it to mean that she should bring more of the opposite to her communication style. So, she suddenly stopped speaking up in meetings and began volunteering for fewer projects. Before long, she was receiving the opposite feedback. People wanted her to bring more directness to her work. So, what happened? As many people do, my client read her 360 and interpreted "too direct" as bad. As a result, she marginalised the part of her that is 'direct' and focused on bringing the opposite, which in her case meant evasiveness. Leadership Range This approach to feedback can lead us into binary thinking or a 'this or that' approach to leadership when, in fact, what excellent leadership needs is range. It's about knowing when to dial up directness and when to dial it down. The adult development company Andiron, which founded the Key Polarity Indicators Assessment, argues: "Many leaders, teams, and organisations innocently and unconsciously approach polarities with an Either/Or mindset — either I have to do this or that. However, those using a Both/And mindset outperform those who don't. They direct and empower, exude competence and warmth, take action and step back to reflect. The key is knowing how." As the company explains in a video discussing the power of a Both/And mindset: "Polarities are seemingly opposite states that must co-exist over time if we are to be successful. They require a Both/And mindset, because leaning too heavily in one direction or the other will likely lead us into trouble." Both/And is an integrated approach that allows us to zoom out and hold all qualities- even the so-called 'negative ones' - more neutrally. From this perspective, it's less about right or wrong, but rather, what does this situation call for? When we can value all qualities- even the ones we have marginalised within ourselves- we find great opportunities to stretch our leadership range. The Best of Both In my own life, this approach has helped me to lean into parts of myself that I had previously marginalised. Fearful of being labelled bossy, I have spent much of my adult life defaulting to friendliness. This wasn't an intentional choice but rather an unconscious reaction to some early life experiences. I was confident as a young child and was often called bossy by teachers and other kids. This culminated in me playing the lead in the aptly named school Christmas production, 'The Bossy Christmas Fairy'. That role- more than anything else- cemented my status as bossy throughout primary school. So, as I moved into secondary school and into the awkward teenage years, I came to over-rely on friendliness. I wasn't even aware of this pattern until my early 20s when an acting coach asked me why I was smiling in a scene where my Grandma had just died. This feedback absolutely dumbstruck me because I hadn't even realised I was smiling (!) It was just my default facial expression by that point. This is not unique to me. Numerous women have reported being labelled ‘bossy’ or ‘feisty’ whilst their male counterparts were called...

The Balcony View Audio Article- 28/04/2023 - What does it mean to be in 'Right' Relationship?: Exploring the world through the lens of relationship https://balconyview.substack.com/p/what-does-it-mean-to-be-in-right-relationship Over the past year, I've heard the term 'Right Relationship' used more frequently. And interestingly, it's shown up in various contexts, including therapeutic, spiritual, religious, and activist spaces. People ask: What does being in Right Relationship with my partner mean? With my body? With the planet? With plant medicines? With God? Right Relationship is also used in systems coaching, where I was first introduced to the term… Relationship Matters CRR Global was the first company accredited by the International Coaching Federation (ICF) as a systems coaching training provider. Twenty years later, what makes the training unique, even within team coaching and systems thinking spaces, is its focus on Relationships. However, back in the 90s, when co-founders Marita Fridjhon and Faith Fuller started this work, organisations weren't interested in relationships; they were all about productivity. As Faith writes in her upcoming book 'Relationship Matters: A new paradigm for an evolutionary leap in Relationships': "It was all about how do you squeeze more out of less- whether it's people, tasks, or materials? CEOs were actually confused when we talked to them about Relationship Systems. After all, what did relationships have to do with productivity? From their work perspective, relationships were messy, unprofessional, and something to be avoided if possible. Relationship brought up emotion, and emotion should be left at the office door." The Center for Right Relationship The CRR of CRR Global stands for The Center for Right Relationship, the company's original name. However, this created much confusion. People questioned if the name referred to the far 'right' in terms of political ideology. Or wondered, if there is 'right' relationship, what does ‘wrong’ relationship look like? So, they simplified the company name to the more widely recognised CRR Global. Even still, Right Relationship was embedded in the company branding from the start and is central to the work. So, whilst many groups and communities have their own links to the term, I want to acknowledge Marita and Faith as pioneers in bringing Right Relationship to organisations. Back when relationships were not considered ‘relevant’ to the workplace, they stood in the fire and declared that "from the living room to the boardroom, we believe relationship matters." Full disclosure, I am both a faculty member and host of the CRR Global podcast Relationship Matters. But I came to these positions because of a deep fascination with the work. My first course with CRR Global was a real 'red pill, blue pill' matrix moment; once I started seeing the world through the lens of relationship, I couldn't go back! I can personally testify to the fact that Right Relationship has completely transformed the way I live my life. It's a paradigm shift that continues to change how I interact with the world. So, what even is 'Right' Relationship? CRR Global defines Right Relationship as the following: * According to what is correct for a particular relationship situation. * The best or most suitable of several possible behaviours for a particular relationship event. By this definition, there is no 'Right' Relationship. It is an ongoing enquiry that requires constant attention and discernment. I appreciate this interpretation as it keeps us on our toes. We never arrive at Right Relationship; it is a continual dance that requires intention and attention. What might feel like Right Relationship in one moment might look completely different in the next. For example, Right Relationship with your work when on a family holiday might mean switching off your work phone and requesting that your team reach out on your personal phone if something urgent arises. Doing...

The Balcony View Audio Article- 14/04/2023 How to listen effectively...but not now: Creating agreements and boundaries in relationship that support a need to tune out https://balconyview.substack.com/p/how-to-listen-effectively-but-not In my last article, I discussed energy and listening. Listening is an essential skill set for fostering healthy relationships. At the same time, I also know there is a time and a place for listening to others: sometimes listening, or being listened to, isn't an accessible or wise choice. So why and when might you choose not to listen? Or not to share? And how can we hold this in a way that still serves the relationship? I'm embarrassed to admit that the evening after sending out my last article, my husband Dan and I argued about... listening! A significant work project had landed on my plate, and I enthusiastically shared the details over dinner. By the end of our meal, I wasn't feeling listened to, and he was ready for a time-out. I've yet to mention that Dan had just returned from a long day at the office with an afternoon of back-to-back meetings. In my excitement, I had dived into sharing without even considering whether he was willing or able to listen. I went in with the expectation that I would be heard without even considering the other person's needs. 30-minutes later, when we reflected and laughed about our little tiff, Dan admitted that his capacity for listening was on the lower side. He hadn't shared this, but I also hadn't created space for him to do so hence, where we ended up So, this article looks at ways to craft subtle agreements and time boundaries that encourage listening and letting go. How can we create spaces in our relationships that recognise the importance of tuning in and tuning out? “Me” Time After facilitating a 3-day coaching session, I crave 'me' time to recharge and reconnect. I love my work, AND it takes a lot out of me. I give a lot of myself to the groups of people I work with. So, the day after a workshop, I will create space for "me time", where I take time to tune in with myself. Last year, I interviewed Leigh Marz and Justin Zorn, authors of ‘Golden: The Power of Silence in a World of Noise’, and during part 1, they discussed the different types of noise that take us away from silence: "At one level, there's this silence that's the absence of noise. It's the space where nothing is making claims on our consciousness. But then there's also this deeper level of silence which is not just the absence of noise, in our view, but also this presence unto itself. And it's not something we can easily define for you […] because it's subjective. It's something that each of us knows and can explore in our lives, but we can say that this silence as a presence is a place of humility. It's a place of not having to know the answers, of not having to know what to say, of not having to show up in just the right way; it's a place of expansion and rest and renewal." When I tune into an internal silence that, as Marz and Zorn describe, is not just the absence of noise but the presence of something else, I find I can return to myself. From this presence, I feel more at peace in myself and more available for the people in my life. So, after a big delivery, I will try to take time off the next day. If that's not feasible, I will aim to go for a long walk, preferably through nature. This might seem indulgent, but I know from experience that I am a much better partner/friend/coach when I've taken the space to check in with myself. It appears that listening to oneself is critical in listening deeply to others. Transparency around capacity When I've been working away, the first evening at home is not the best time to have a DMC (deep, meaningful conversation)! Whilst I can avoid scheduling dinners with friends during these times, there are relationships in my life that require regular tending to. So how can we balance a need for "me" time alongside these primary...

The Balcony View Audio Article- 30/03/2023 - How am I listening? How our energy impacts the way we listen https://balconyview.substack.com/p/how-am-i-listening I've been wondering why listening is so hard. It's a simple skill, yet it seems at odds with our fast-paced, busy lives. It's hard to listen to oneself sometimes, let alone pay attention to what my mother, a curious check-out assistant or an excited colleague is sharing (sorry, mum!) Yet, even when we remove distractions, like when on a holiday or retreat, listening can still be challenging. These pockets of time have been ring-fenced for connection and are primed for deep & meaningful conversation. However, they don't guarantee that we will listen or be listened to. Removing distractions and busyness isn't enough- we need to update HOW we listen by considering our energy. In this article, I explore how our energy impacts how we listen. We are sometimes unconscious of the energy we bring to our relationships. But we can also be conscious and intentional about our energy to create a particular impact. So when we’re listening, what impact do we want to make? And what energy is going to best serve the relationship? Task-orientated vs Relationship-orientated Our progress is primarily measured by our ability to do specific tasks throughout our education and careers. Awards, promotions and pay rises are given principally to the people who get things done (and often, the quicker, the better!) However, this task-orientated approach is often at the expense of our relationships. Being task-orientated brings a distinctive energy: it’s a lens through which we see the world. However, when we're listening, this filter can have us treating the person in front of us as a task to be ticked off. I made this error recently when a friend started sharing several challenges in her life that were making her feel quite overwhelmed. She clearly needed a shoulder to cry on, yet I went straight into advice-giving mode: "have you tried this?" and "have you looked into this?" Whilst the sentiment came from a caring place, the impact was sloppy. As someone who has been on the receiving end of an exchange like this, I imagine my friend felt unheard and dismissed. She was longing for a place to ground out her frustrations, but instead, my task-orientated, fixing approach likely supercharged her insecurities about not doing enough! Conscious and Intentional Energy In my work as a coach and facilitator, I draw on the world of theatre and my experience as an actor to help people raise their awareness around the energy they bring. At any given moment, we can choose to bring a different energy to create a certain impact. Some of us do this instinctively; we might find ourselves putting on our 'game face' for a big presentation or party. However, it's a massively underutilised communication skill. Most of us go from meeting to meeting (or zoom to zoom) with the energy we've got. How we show up is how we are. Which is all well and good if that energy is serving us. However, if it's not having the desired impact, we can consider tuning into a different energy. The more aware we are of our intention and impact, the more choice we have. With this awareness, we can continue to close the gap in our communication between our intended impact and how it lands on other people. By reducing this gap, we increase our impact. So, when we listen, we will show up with our default energy unless we consciously and intentionally choose to bring something different. Whilst these default energies might be qualities that help us to thrive in a fast-paced, task-focused world (like direct, efficient, or practical), I am questioning if they are the most helpful for active listening. Because even if we create the space to really listen to a colleague or family member, a task-oriented energy that wants to 'get stuff done' will impact the quality of our listening and the way we process information. The Levels of...

The Balcony View Audio Article- 16/03/23 - Who drives the story? An essay on Storytelling, Relationship & Formula One https://balconyview.substack.com/p/who-drives-the-story Last weekend, I started watching the latest season of Drive to Survive, the Netflix documentary that offers a backstage pass into the lives of the people behind Formula 1, the most popular motorsport in the world. I absolutely loved season 1. In fact, it was what had me fall in love with the sport. It showcased the human stories involved in the Formula 1 circus and the complex web of systems that work to get two working- and preferably point-scoring - cars on the grid. I found it to be a fascinating exploration of high performance, inadvertently showcasing the impact of different leadership styles, decisions and strategies. What I loved most of all was the storytelling. And what do I dislike the most about the latest season? The storytelling. The difference is the way the stories are being told. In season 1, it was as if the production team sat down and watched hours upon hours of footage until the stories popped out for them. The lived experiences led to the seamless storytelling of season 1. In season 5, it's as if the stories were predetermined, and everything was shot with a particular 'angle' in mind. Like in episode 7, which covers Sergio "Checo" Pérez's journey during the Monaco Grand Prix. I'm convinced every driver was asked the same leading question: "what do you think of the rain in Monaco?" because the episode shows 5 different drivers saying a version of "driving in the rain in Monaco is hard." It's not that what they're capturing is incorrect (as someone who hates driving in London because of the angry drivers, I can testify that driving in the rain around the Monaco track at 200mph does look hard!) But that's precisely it. It's unimaginative, unsurprising and feels somewhat contrived. Even though it’s based on reality, it's as if the whole episode has been filmed and filtered to support that one story. One narrow and limited version of reality. And whilst I'm sure this approach probably saves a lot of money and time in post-production, the results are, well, a little bit meh... Story first. Life second. As many of you know, I am passionate about the power of storytelling in everyday life. I believe storytelling can be a powerful tool for reimagining ourselves in the world. For example, I've spent a long time trying (and failing) to create a regular meditation habit. I found it much harder to change my reality until I shifted the story I was telling myself. So, instead of being someone "who wants to mediate," I now wake up every morning and tell myself," I am a person who meditates." This simple shift has made meditation a part of my identity. It's not something over there that feels unachievable and secondary to who I am. It's a part of me that has helped me build- and keep- a regular morning meditation habit. To use the words of James Clear, author of Atomic Habits: "True behaviour change is identity change. When your behaviour and your identity are aligned, you are no longer pursuing change. You are simply acting like the type of person you already believe yourself to be." This way of utilising storytelling offers us more agency over our lives: the stories we tell ourselves now will impact how we experience our lives. Put simply: the story comes first. I have learnt so much from this principle having replaced some unhelpful stories with life-affirming narratives. Like for example, with a gratitude attitude. Gratitude is like a muscle; the more we work it, the more we feel grateful. So every evening before going to sleep, my husband and I will share 3 things we're grateful for (they can be tiny!) Just looking for something to be grateful for will change the neurochemistry in your brain and train you to look at life through a gratitude lens. The more you do this, the more the world feels like a 'glass half full.' Such a simple...

The Balcony View Audio Article- 02/03/2023 - The Inside World: Embracing the 'self' not as one thing but as a system unto itself https://balconyview.substack.com/p/the-inside-world As a systemic coach, I help groups of people- teams, departments & couples- leverage the power of collective intelligence. The challenges of our contemporary world are complex and ever-changing, and no one leader can have all the answers. Increasingly, leaders are looking for ways to elevate how they collect and connect information and intelligence within their organisations. However, I've become increasingly aware of the value of bringing a systemic lens to individuals, both in my work and personal life. Throughout this article, I will be exploring different ways we can take The Balcony View with the intention of embracing the 'self' not as one thing but as a system unto itself: the system of ‘ME’. Working systemically with individuals isn't just a nice to have in our leadership/coaching/parent/partner tool kit: it's an essential competency for holding the complexity and breadth of the human experience. The Gemstone Analogy The system of 'ME' is a way of viewing an individual as one person with many sides. Faith Fuller, co-founder of coach training school CRR Global puts it eloquently in her upcoming book 'Relationship Matters: A new paradigm for an evolutionary leap in Relationships': "None of us are a single entity. Instead, we are more like cut gemstones. We are one single, beautiful gem of a person, but with multiple facets. As we move through our day, different facets of our character pop up. All these dozens of facets make up who we are." The gemstone analogy offers a powerful paradigm shift that supports the growth-orientated approach at the heart of coaching. We are one thing but with many parts. And every experience, interaction and relationship will shine a light on the different pieces that make up who we are. Whilst this is a coach approach, it’s a perspective that can add value to many parts of our lives. At the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic lockdowns, my husband suddenly had to set up his office in our apartment living room. For the first time in our 10-year relationship, I overheard Dan's 'work voice' and was surprised to hear that he was a "let's take this offline" person (!) He wasn't entirely different; instead, other qualities were more dominant in a work context (like professional, concise, and knowledgeable) than in our marriage (where he is often funny, playful and relaxed). Other sides of Dan's 'gemstone' showed up in ways I hadn't witnessed before, which was both a humbling and hopeful realisation. Even in our most intimate relationships, there is always more to learn. This includes the one we have we have with ourselves…. The Discomfort Zone When I hear my clients say the words "that's not me", "that's not authentic", or "I'm not that", then it's a cue to start revealing their internal system. Instead of spiralling into binary thinking ("I am this, but not this"), we can step back and explore ourselves in terms of range. In an article for HBR, Herminia Ibarra writes: "Career advances require all of us to move way beyond our comfort zones. At the same time, however, they trigger a strong countervailing impulse to protect our identities: When we are unsure of ourselves or our ability to perform well or measure up in a new setting, we often retreat to familiar behaviours and styles." Outside of the comfort zone is where the learning happens. But it might also cause us to feel vulnerable, exposed and, well... uncomfortable. A common theme that comes up in my coaching sessions is confidence around public speaking. In fact, this study found public speaking to be America's biggest phobia (followed closely by heights and bugs!) So, let's imagine you’ve been promoted and want to feel more confident in high-stakes presentations. You feel comfortable talking to your peers but notice yourself feeling unconfident...

The Balcony View Audio Article- 16/02/2023 - The Shadow Side of Self-Esteem: Is an obsession with self-esteem fuelling competition, separateness and narcissistic behaviour? https://balconyview.substack.com/p/the-shadow-side-of-self-esteem In November, I had the pleasure of attending a day-long retreat in West London. This was the first time I'd experienced a day retreat, probably because in the past, I would have assumed that I needed to 'go' somewhere and put in 'proper' time to feel 'real' benefits. Once again, the 'go hard or go home' approach had failed to appreciate the subtle ease and the compounding effects I would experience over the coming weeks. In short, the retreat was an excellent way to press pause during a busy period of life and sit in various nourishing and reflective practices. Whilst the feel-good glow from the retreat experience faded with time, one message continued to circle, as if it had been seared onto my brain with a branding iron: society's obsession with self-esteem is contributing to a crisis of narcissism. Could a cultural obsession with self-esteem be fuelling competition, separateness and narcissistic behaviour? Panacea or Poison? The self-esteem movement emerged throughout the 80s and 90s. Many psychologists viewed self-esteem as a critical indicator for measuring mental health during this time. And there was a good reason for this because lots of research linked low self-esteem to various mental health problems, like this study which found that low self-esteem prospectively predicts depression in teenagers and young adults. Yet, over the past two decades, researchers have questioned whether this hyper-focus on self-esteem has been short-sighted, inadvertently creating its own mental health hurdles and social challenges. A Double-Edged Sword Self-esteem refers to our sense of self-worth or how much we like ourselves. And it's a mixed blessing because whilst low self-esteem is more obviously problematic- leading to a lack of confidence or motivation- focusing on increasing our self-esteem can create its own challenges. This is because self-esteem is usually based on how different we are from others, how much we stand out from the crowd or are unique. Fixating on this can lead to self-absorbed behaviour. According to Dr Kristin Neff, author of 'Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself', self-esteem refers to "the degree to which we evaluate ourselves positively. It represents how much we like or value ourselves and is often based on comparisons with others." Neff argues that our self-esteem is primarily determined by how we measure ourselves relative to others. From this angle, self-esteem appears individualistic and insidious, with the potential to fuel competition and separateness over interconnectedness and community. Two sides of the same self-absorbed coin Throughout secondary school, I was weighed down by what Neff would have described as low self-esteem. It crept in through a variety of different channels: standing on the scales after my best friend and realising I was a stone heavier; at my 13th birthday party when my friends presented me with a pair of jeans that were "way too big for Chloe but should fit you just fine"; or at a camp when some of the girls remarked that my short hair made me "look like a boy." Little ways that, over time, left me stuck with a sense that the way I looked wasn't good enough. (N.B. My secondary school experience aligns with research that shows that self-perceived attractiveness, self-confidence in appearance and body esteem all significantly predicted self-esteem, more so in women than in men.) Like many people with low self-esteem, I claimed not to judge others or hold them to such high standards: my perverse perfectionism was reserved just for me. Yet hindsight offers a humbling balcony from which I can see the paradox: when we judge ourselves, we also judge others to understand where we fit in the great comparison games...