Conversations with Georgie #11: Writing a Book... Made of Lists. 🤔📖✍️
Plus: Exploring the Parts of the Self 😒, Jumping on the Cohort Based Courses Bandwagon 🙋, Experimenting with Energy Supplements 💊, and more!
READ THIS FIRST. 👋 How do you normally consume this letter? You’ve probably got a script, a way you digest emails like this. So, my invitation to you is to just do something different. The opposite of what you do. If you read this on the go, sit down and stay put. If you read it as soon as it arrives in your inbox, then maybe wait until lunchtime. If you read it with others, try going solo. See what happens when you break your own script.
👋Hello Friends,
It feels like a long time since I last wrote. The reality is that it has been just over a month, and yet the duration of time feels somewhat different.
I had a conversation about the feeling of and our relationships to time this week with friends. Two questions arose: first (1), do we want it to go fast or go slow? Most people voted slowly as time and life are limited (but we all acknowledge there are times when we are bored, frustrated or not getting what we want and want it to hurry the hell up!). But this did then beg the question (2) of whether we would be more patient about wasting time if life carried on forever? Some said no, they would want to ‘eek’ out every moment, even if we had infinite moments. But there is a difference between having infinite moments and a moment feeling infinite - the reality is that moments are finite and therefore will always be impermanent, so we will likely still hang on to the beautiful ones (and seek slow time) and wish away the uncomfortable ones (fast time).
Which camp are you in right now? Do you want time to hurry up, so that ‘the new normal life’ can return/arise or are you savouring all moments and quite content with slow time? Even if its not what you want.
‘We have to live until we die’ (a lyric in the song “Dalai Lama” by a German singer ‘Rammstein) was shared in the time conversation and I feels like it resonates somewhat. We don’t want to die but because we are all here living, we have to keep living even if it feels like life drags on, especially with so much uncertainty, challenge and repetition.
It’s okay to be unsure where your thinking is on this, and to keep coming back to the question (I invite you to sit with it). I must admit, I’m quite unsure where I am right now.
But what I do know is that a large part of me is okay sitting in the unknowing. I’ve been exploring my parts and their agendas on an IFS-esque retreat recently (#2), if you’re intrigued. I’ve also been surprised to discover I’m writing what feels like memoirs, in the form of lists, as I approach my 30th birthday (#1). And in other news, I’ve also been surprised to find that I’m now delivering a programme across 4 continents each Wed (#3). Less surprising is the lack of PhD funding (#4) but I still feel like there might be some good news within this. And maybe that is surprising! 😛
Happy reading! And as always, there is no pressure to read it all. I still continue to love the conversations that emerge from these letters. Even when we don’t know each other well. Keep them coming :-)
Sending (Virtual) Hugs, Smiles & Love,
Georgie 🤗❤️
1. To Celebrate Turning 30, I’m Writing 30 Lists of 30. ✍️
I think I’m writing what could be a book. 📖
But it’s not the book I expected to write. For starters, it’s a book of lists. Lists that capture my experiences of (almost) 30 years of life.
I realised that as I approach this milestone year, my mind has inundated me with reflections and memories from the past, with questions arising about my past choices, about my expectations and about my future. And this combined with pandemic reflections has meant there has been a lot on my mind….🤔
And I needed to articulate it, to get it on the page.
So I started writing what feels like memoirs. 30 years too soon, I hear myself and you say, right?! I hear another critical voice…. what have you, a 30-year-old, got to say about life? I’ve got the answer: 30 years’ worth. And those 30 rich have felt rich, deep, exhausting, diverse, challenging, exciting…. when I think about my life to date, I see what feels like multiple chapters, multiple movies! So much has happened. And I don’t think I or we generally realize quite how much we have lived until we are forced to pause and look back. And it’s only looking backwards that you can ‘connect the dots’ (Steve Jobs).
So, what are these lists, you’re wondering?
Well so much for 30 lists… I came up with 112 ideas! Everything from ‘30 books I loved reading’ to ‘30 ways I’ve worked on my health’, ‘30 goals I didn’t achieve by 30’, ‘30 ways to engineer a meaningful conversation’.
And now have the difficult task of cutting them down. Well, good news - YOU can help! 🙋
👉 Here are the lists: 30 Lists of 30.
I would love your thoughts. So far, I’ve shared these lists with a few people and got some great ideas. I would be honoured to include yours! 🙏
I’ve given myself until my birthday at the end of August to finish this project - so you can look forward to reading them all then. Hello, accountability! 🔥
2. Bringing All The Parts Home 🥰
Image: A beautiful coincidence… some of the ‘ IFS parts’ I randomly picked out of the pack.
Just over a week ago I was fortunate to attend a small in-person retreat. The first in a year so it was pretty magical. Even more magical was the focus of the retreat - the parts of the self (also known as ‘Internal Family Systems’) - which you might have noticed me reference in my writing previously.
🥰I have fallen in love with the parts model and use it consistently on myself and with my clients to unearth and distinguish between the different and competing voices in our heads. Some of which we listen to so much that we identify with, others we don’t know exist because they’re never given the opportunity to speak and there are also parts we have disowned, are ashamed of or want to hide to protect them. It is fascinating to watch them in dialogue.
What do you mean by parts? Okay, let’s zone in on what is happening right now…
Well, there is a part of me that has been struggling to write this. That says ‘it needs to be deep, novel, emotional, curious, enticing….Otherwise, it’s not worth it. Don’t even bother’, it says, ‘wait for the inspiration'. Or, don’t even bother starting at all, few people will read it’.
Welcome to my Pessimistic Critic 😒. I guess you’re familiar with that part of yourself too?
And yet there is another supportive part that says ‘you know Georgie, it’s okay to just start. To just get something on a page, in the wrong order, in a less articulate form. And if it’s not 100% then so be it, come back to it tomorrow….But start today. You can do it.’
You can do it….. One thing I took away from the retreat was how much all the parts of me are pro Team Georgie.
Even The Boss Protector ⚔️who, when push comes to shove, is a true force of nature, putting up the barricade to stop me from getting hurt. He cares for my safety. The Community-Lover Part 🤗 wants me to belong, to be included.
They’re playing their role to help me out. They want me to win - even the critics. And actually, as difficult as they are - bold, narrow-minded, forceful and pedantic - they have great intentions. To keep me safe, to stop me from falling down the pit of helplessness… A place I fear to go. A place that I allowed myself to experience on the retreat.
Moving into the place of an exile briefly on the retreat, a Vulnerable Helpless Part 🥲from my past, I embodied a collapsed state, and just cried out, feeling helpless and disempowered. I could feel my Fighter Superhero ✊ part wanting to come in and give me the resources to save the day as she normally does, but I recognised the importance of just allowing my helpless part to fully feel her feelings, to be witnessed grieving her experiences until she was ready to stand up and move on. After that moment, I felt a great deal lighter.
Conversations with parts of yourself…. I think that these are perhaps the most important conversations we can have.
They have so much to say.
And yet we spend a lot of time trying to ignore that voice in our head that we don’t want to hear, instead of understanding its point of view. Or listening to it so deeply that we become identified with it: we think that we are that part.
When really we are many parts. Many voices in the room. Many that are too quiet to be heard. Desirable parts that are generous, hardworking or playful. Undesirable parts that are lazy and selfish that we often think it’s okay to judge. They are all pieces of me. They are all pieces of you. And they don’t go away even if you avoid them.
For years I identified with my Judge Part 😠 thinking he motivated me but he actually disempowered me and made me feel bad about having fun and playing 😛. Then I tried to tell him to go away but he didn’t like that and shouted louder. So eventually I welcomed him in and asked him about his role and how he helps me. He liked being seen and acknowledged and agreed to take a step back into the seat of presence (my true self, the witness) so I could listen to the other voices in the room.
Having awareness of my parts, I can see who is there. I can bring them all in. Say to them, ‘You are seen. I know you’re here to protect me. You did a great job and helped me when things got too much - I really appreciate that. You’re an important part of my identity and I’m not saying goodbye to you, but the times have changed, you don’t need to work so hard and I also want to include everyone else who is also here.’ 🥰
Sounds soft? Yep! It turns out that the heart is the way.
When we speak to all parts of ourselves with kindness, from the heart, the voices stop fighting. They’re allowed to co-exist, so they take their turn and start to listen.
And even more magical… when something softens in the way we relate to ourselves, something softens in the way we relate to others too. ✨
3. Teaching Transformational Conversations to a Global Audience. 🌍
Every Wednesday in June I’m delighted to be teaching the 6-week Transformational Conversations programme I designed to 12 participants across 4 continents: Europe (across the UK, Switzerland), Australasia (New Zealand), Asia (Oman), North America (Oregan, Michigan, California). 🌍 I love teaching and it is perhaps my favourite part of the week! The group is great - super diverse in terms of backgrounds and ages, enthusiastic and keen and willing to take on heavy amounts (Georgie style!) of reflecting and experimenting, in the zoom room and in real-life doing homework missions each week.
As I reflect on the diversity of places everyone is living, I can’t believe I didn’t do this before. This being going virtual. All my previous programmes were in person, in London. And whilst I still love being in the room with 3D people, the fact we can do so much online (rather than nothing) is seriously awesome.
And so awesome that I’m thinking of doing it again, and continuing to expand my reach. Unsurprisingly, it’s not just Londoners that want to learn the ability to engineer high-quality conversations!
And with the rise in ‘Cohort Based Curriculum’ (CBC) in the Ed-Tech World, this is the right time to be jumping on the Bandwagon. Maven, whose founders are ex-founders of AltMBA, Udemy etc., is a platform that hosts CBC courses and has just raised $20 mil. for their Series A. The world is (re) waking up to the fact that community-based learning delivers connection, interaction, inspiration, accountability - all ingredients for an effective and enjoyable learning experience.
4. Carving Out New Possibilities For PhD Funding 💰
Photo by Ante Hamersmit on Unsplash
👎 The bad news is that I didn’t get the PhD funding I applied for earlier this year (to focus on human connectivity design at Imperial College).
👍The good news (there is always good news, right?!) is that I am looking for and open to other ways to make it happen.
One of the thoughts I had and have started to explore is to base myself in a company part-time. The upside of this for a company is that they gets\ pretty consistent access to my mind (ideas and research), plus all my skills in project management, coaching & training, facilitation, community-building, entrepreneurial thinking and more. One thing I like about this plan is that I would have the opportunity to deeply get to know an organisation, and have the space to test, experiment with and fix things that no one realised were inefficient or ineffective or had time to fix them. And be part of a greater team - something I have always enjoyed.
The other plus for me is security - both financially and having a longer-term plan. It is the classic freelancers / entrepreneurs challenge - every few years, desiring a break from the hustle of selling and being a lone ranger, just for a bit. It is a conversation I have had with at least 5 friends in the last few weeks as they lean into the possibility of employment.
The other conversation we are all having (and this includes my employed friends) is the wish that organisations would wake up to the idea that working 5 days a week doing a 9-5 is just not the most effective use of time in terms of productivity plus it reduces space for the essential elements of life - our relationships, creativity and health. I’ve designed my working life to work around my energy levels, which includes accepting that some hours of the day are less conducive to real work and should be allocated to long breaks full of creative, joyful or community/connection pursuits.
As I write this, I’m feeling productive and excited as I’m literally minutes away from taking one of those tea and stroll breaks in the park with a friend before I return back to my desk to reply to emails and run my programme training.
My friend Andrew - an ed-tech entrepreneur and exec coach- wrote a beautiful blog recently about his 2-hour lunch breaks that allow him to properly reset. And The Economist recently published an article highlighting the challenge of decision fatigue throughout the working day and the need for proper breaks if we want to be productive. The evidence is there. Now it needs to be implemented.
5. Life Experiments & Useful Finds.💊
💊I. A New Energy Boosting Supplement I’m Trying.
Exergenesis. The personal research I conducted in response to my health challenges over the last few years kept bringing me back to the importance of having healthy mitochondria as the foundation for energy creation. There are a number of supplements that can contribute to building mitochondria but it gets expensive buying them individually, not to mention the saga of taking 20 pills a day. I’ve got that t-shirt! This powder supplement is a cocktail of 20+ ingredients and says it actually raises your baseline (real) energy levels over time, unlike caffeine which boosts your energy for a few hours before you crash (and then need more caffeine!). Many years of weekly reflections have indicated to me that the most important element to a successful week is how much energy I have each day - it impacts my mood, productivity, creativity and passion for life. 🔋 If this supplement can give me even a 25% boost then, despite the £70 month/6 week cost, I think it will be worth it. And… to cut down the costs and get a better testing sample I’m taking it alongside 2 friends - 1 very healthy, 1 with medium fatigue and immune challenges and then there is me - good but could be more consistently energetic. So far the 2 of us who have started it are feeling positive effects on productivity and mood.
🐕II. A Daily Ritual I’m Still Following and (Mistakenly) Inspiring Others With.
Walking my (imaginary) dog - Last month I wrote about this new ritual I have devised in lieu of a commute to work - taking my imaginary dog for a walk in the park every morning and evening. I can’t believe how even 10 minutes of walking amongst trees makes me a much happier, kinder and enthused person! It has been so good that I’ve started sharing it in my conversations with new and old friends, and few have even started trialling this mind-hack themselves. Plus taking it to a new level by giving their dog a name. Something I held back from, lest I become a crazy (imaginary) dog/cat lady. Perhaps it is too late for that, as I’ve been led to believe by others that craziness is apparently a quality that already permeates various parts of my being. I’m still unsure whether that is a compliment!
🔗III. A Tool I’m Enjoying:
AccuWeather - After spending a few days in Devon with thunderstorm and rain, Erica (🙏) introduced me to this awesome app that helps you take advantage of the non-raining short periods by providing weather reports accurate to the minute. So far, surprisingly accurate!
A Parting Quote 📖
“The struggle ends when the gratitude begins.”
— Neale Donald Walsch