[INTRO: I am extremely lucky, privileged and grateful to be here in Spain this week teaching on a pilot leadership course for girls centred around Basketball training and life skills. This one of a kind innovative pilot program is called Basket Talent Camp, creation of Santiago Puebla Sanz, general manager, strategic coach and expert in high performance teams with his company JOINTALENT. 

We are in the stunning 5 star corporate training facility of Gas Natural in Puente Nuevo, just outside of Avila, an hour from Madrid. I have worked on leadership programs twice before here at beautiful place however a pilot leadership program for children has never been seen before... ]

​Day 4 of Basket Talent Camp
[https://twitter.com/basketalentcamp

Today we were visited by a very kind dentist, Carmen from Strauman taught us how to brush our teeth properly! And I learnt a good thing here too. She had a really large model of a jaw with big teeth and invited the girls to show how it's done. Then she'd correct and explain some extra elements after one girl demonstrated. 

The teeth have 3 sides, the front, the back and the bite. So she suggested to first brush one jaw starting from the side, work the front teeth, back and bite, then do the other jaw. I thought, how different because I have always brushed my front teeth with my jaw closed and did both top and bottom together. So anyway I tried this method and it did feel more clean. 

All of these have to be brushed. And also brush the tongue! I thought this was a great reminder because although I brush my tongue when I feel it needs it, I don't do it every time and so now I will. She didn't mention a tongue scraper but I would also add that. Thousands of years old Indian culture can't be wrong!

She said that the saliva that the mouth produces also helps to keep teeth clean, (I didn't know that!) and so if you are doing sport or have a dry mouth, drink water. 

This next bit I loved and almost jumped out of my chair shouted hallelujah! (But didn't) She said to not drink sugary drinks, juices or sport drinks. Yeeeeeesssss! Finally some good health advice, I feel children eat so much sugar it's like their cocaine! 

So she advised to snack on fruit especially bananas for sport and drink water.

Good job!

Later the girls played a wonderful leadership game where they are in a line, and the girl in front is blindfolded and her team mates have to tell her where to go. Trust and leadership - great exercise which I will do with my adult groups! 

Another game was the right rope walk! This was so much fun. A flat strong band was secured over two trees each girl was coached to keep looking forward and not down at the feet. Great life advice too, thought I.

In the closing circle each girl was invited to share not what they liked, learnt and didn't like as in other evenings, rather to whom they were grateful and why. Most said thank you to Elena for teaching good basketball things and the girls really showed how much they have been enjoying learning to play and improving so much. The other coaches were also thanked and others were thanked for helping them and for making them laugh. 

I'm so grateful because I was also thanked for listening and for my openness. That was nice! 

This gratitude circle really touched me because if generates such positive and uplifting energy. I will also take this one away for my further group work. 

We finally went on to my 'goodnight' session where invited the girls to choose what they wanted to do and they all chose to do all the massage techniques in a circle and they'd remembered all of them, I was astounded. Then I invited anyone to sing a goodnight song and our very own Justin Beber, Carlos sang the cutest lullaby about a little cat going to sleep. I loved it so much I got them to sing it about 5 times! 

Then I sang one of my favourite songs, Hang on little tomato, by Pink Martini and played the ukulele. Oh and the girls loved the ukulele, two or three of them already played and I recommend thst everyone get one as its so much fun and so easy to play as well as super cheap. Win-win-win! 

[INTRO: I am extremely lucky, privileged and grateful to be here in Spain this week teaching on a pilot leadership course for girls centred around Basketball training and life skills. This one of a kind innovative pilot program is called Basket Talent Camp, creation of Santiago Puebla Sanz, general manager, strategic coach and expert in high performance teams with his company JOINTALENT. 

We are in the stunning 5 star corporate training facility of Gas Natural in Puente Nuevo, just outside of Avila, an hour from Madrid. I have worked on leadership programs twice before here at beautiful place however a pilot leadership program for children has never been seen before... ]

Day 3 of Basket Talent Camp
[https://twitter.com/basketalentcamp]

I am extremely fortunate to be part of a pilot program leadership journey for girls aged 8-11 and every day I am blogging about it. 

Today the girls were treated to something really quite extraordinary and life impacting. 

Cheija Abdalahe (superior degree in women and leadership) came and told of her story living and growing up in the Western Sahara desert that has been a Spanish Colony. 

The room was set out lecture style and she invited everyone to sit on the floor in a circle just like they would in their community. She said that sitting all together creates greater intimacy and it is connecting to sit on the earth. 

I absolutely loved this and could witness straight away what impact this had. What it did was to dissolve all barriers of here is the speaker and here are the ones listening. It was a cosy and warm gathering of sharing. Already a wonderful learning and inspiration for me because I am fascinated by intimacy and circle gatherings as this is how our ancestors and our native people always gathered and connected. 

She started by saying that it is a society where women lead because the men were out fighting a war. 

She lived in Western Sahara which is a Spanish Colony and so it was dependent on donations from Spain. They grew up speaking Spanish and Arabic and some French. 

The women made their homes out of mud bricks that they would build into a hut with a door and two windows. If it ever rained, these huts would melt down and get destroyed. 

She said that in her community the women do everything so they are natural and great leaders. And if anyone has any doubt about a women's power to just consider that it is the women who bring life into this world. Whether you choose to bear children or not just this fact and this possibility makes us women magnificent. Here here I say! 

One of the questions the girls had for Cheija was how do they get water. When she was young they would dig for water for days until eventually they'd find some and drink that. But sometimes they would dig and dig and dig for days and not find any water at all. Her generation have all grown up with teeth problems and health problems due to drinking this infected water. Eventually it was outlawed to dig and drink the water and every home instead was allocated a metal container which would get filled up with drinking water which was full of chlorine and this would kill the little bugs in it that could be seen at the bottom of the containers. 

The children that grew up on this type of water were much healthier than here generation and did not suffer the same conditions that she did. However the water often ran out and there would be no delivery. 

She underlined to the girls that water is white gold, it is the most precious commodity in the WHOLE WORLD and without it we human beings would not survive. 

Likewise with food there was not so much food around, they had to rely on donations and again she underlined that they just ate what was available. There was no room for being picky about food and saying I don't like this food or that food. She said that the hardest thing about growing up was the hunger and the starvation. As a school child she would go from 12 noon till 9pm without food and feel very hungry a lot of the time especially when the young body needed a lot of food to grown during the ages of 9-11 which is the age range that this group are exactly. 

It made me really appreciate food even more than I already do. She said she can never see food being wasted and asked the girls not to ever waste food because there is always some child of their age somewhere in the world that is going hungry. 

This made such a huge impact on me because I grew up as a kid watching Live Aid on TV and all the starvation in Africa but today I actually met someone who experienced that in their life. It was so humbling. I wanted to share this blog just to expand that awareness and gratitude of everything that we have today. 

A girl asked about GPS satellite navigation and how do they find their way. Cheija responded that they use the stars. That you can find your way by knowing the stars. I just melted when I heard this and found it just wonderful.

She talked about the family having a goat whom she adored like a pet and she looked after her with much love. They shared a lot of their lives together and the goat very generously gave milk which was such a commodity.

She spoke of education and that in the desert there is no choice about it, you either study or you study, there is no way out otherwise. There were no schools where she was so she along with a lorry full of other young children were taken off to boarding school for 3-9 months at a time without seeing their parents. Phone calls were about one a month with great effort and she said this was extremely difficult. On top of that at school they went very hungry and one day there was absolutely nothing to eat at all but some old bread that was rock hard and a few months old. So they poured hot water over it and ate it nevertheless. 

She is one of 9 children and her mother was traumatically married off to someone she didn't know. She suffered so much as a result that she never forced her children into arranged marriage. 

For the past 10 years Cheija has lived and studied in Madrid and is interested in being a voice for world change and women in leadership. 

And what about play? Did they ever get bored?
Never, they as children would always play just like children do everywhere. They'd play at neighbours homes and be brought back to their home asleep carried in arms. They'd play with the sand (being as there was plenty of it) and enjoy burying their feet into it and then taking it out and that would be a house which they'd then decorate with any bits lying around. That would be a long and wonderful game. 

They didn't have any games or toys so they would make their own. They made dolls from bones and rags and today she did a workshop to get everyone to make a similar doll, only not made of bones as they are too sharp!

The girls enjoyed this activity very much and I, as a doll maker even more! I do believe everyone everyone no matter what age of background should make at least one doll because it's the most creative, amazing fun thing ever that draws on any resource that is readily available. 

They didn't have a fridge until the 90s so to keep drink or water cool they'd wrap it up in much cloth and keep it wet and this would keep the drinks cool. And very strangely with watermelon, the way to keep them cool is to actually cut them and put them in the sun! She doesn't know why this is but it works and cut watermelon can always be seen around the place. 

Despite all the hardship that she has experienced growing up she said that if she had to do it all again she would choose exactly the same life and circumstances because her experiences have made her who she is. This made me reflect on my own life too and I am also in agreement. 

She also said that the human being is designed to survive and where she is from people do survive. I was astounded by this incredible example of human resourcefulness. She said that even if she was put in freezing cold Alaska she would find a way to survive. 

She said her childhood was extremely happy and even when they got a tiny black and white TV in the 90s and saw how other people in the world lived for the first time, she still didn't regret where she was and how they lived. 

About the heat, in the Sahara it's so hot that some day she put a frying pan out in the sun and then broke an egg into it and it fried!!! 

Upon being lucky enough to listen to such an extraordinary life experience I really believe that Cheija has a powerful role in leadership with heart and creating empathy, awareness and gratitude. She is such an inspiring woman who's gentleness, kindness and humility radiates such reverence and gratitude for all things. I honestly feel that her story (and if you're lucky enough to meet her even netter) is attitude changing and life affirming. 

I am left, after just day 3 feeling more grateful and inspired than I knew possible. 

​Day 2 of Basket Talent Camp
[https://en-gb.facebook.com/basketalentcamp]

Today we were connected by hi-tec across the world to listen to Rubén Turienzo, head of Talent Telepizza & Director of Influencia Social speaking from Honduras to offer the girls a method of mind training that will guarantee that you ALWAYS WIN! He is an on motivation and consults with government and politics. 

He uses the Spanish acronym GRITA which translates as scream, and it breaks down as follows: 

G - UN GRAN MOTIVO, a great motive. Find your motivation, what drives you but the clue it's never to win! It can be to improve yourself, to be the best team for example. (I created a goal for myself around health and being the healthiest version of myself.)

He went on to say, Imagine a goal you'd like to achieve this week. 

So as we are on a basketball talent camp I then created a goal about being able to participate in a basketball game, which is really unlikely for me as I don't really do team sports and at the end of our program we have to play a game with the parents! 

So a motive is what will I personally do better (or at all in my case!).

Next comes the 'why' do I want to do that. Close eyes and ask yourself, why do you want to achieve this goal and notice what arises...

For me what came up is that in Brighton where I live there is a basketball court on the seafront and there are always guys playing (who are very tall and very good!) and I just wondered, imagine if I could join in with them one day... I appreciate the collaborative nature of basketball.

R - RECURSOS POSITIVOS, positive resources. Everything I already know or know what to do, this is already a positive resource. Take care with things that I tell myself constantly that I believe. Don't say I'm the best, say I'm doing it great otherwise I won't make effort and learn. 

He asked the group of girls to raise their hands, 'who is good at defending?' And only one hand came up. Then he asked knows how to defend? Most hands came up! So there was big difference, and I personally really learned something from this. 

He also did it with another question, he asked who is good at singing, and again only one hand came up. Then many more to most came up with the question, 'who can sing?'

Feed yourself positive messages about yourself, you can do this, you know how to do this. Reassure and affirm yourself. 

I - IMAGINACION, imagination. Imagine your best scenario. Create a memory in your mind and return to it again and again. Squeeze finger and thumb together and this feeling will return! Yaaaaay!!! NLP at its best.

T - TECNICA, technique. Learn from the best people you can all the techniques you need. YouTube amazing for watching the best. There was a man in the last Olympics that taught himself everything from YouTube! When learning something ask yourself why is this helping me? This will enrol you more into what you're doing .

A - ACCION, action. Do it, take action. 

Rubén was noticeably moved when all the girls were cheering and taking on his ideas. The whole video call was a very inspiring and life changing experience because he is so full of life, passion and conviction himself and so his energy was doing the motivating. He shared of his very tough and humble beginnings where the other kids told him he'd never amount to anything and he always affirmed that he would - and he did. 

So with that living example these things have a big impact not just on us adults but particularly on the young girls on this training for whom these positive inspirations may really change their lives and the way they operate in the world as well as how they communicate with each other. 

Santiago Puebla Sanz, general manager, strategic coach and expert in high performance teams with his company JOINTALENT, who is the brainchild of this project was mentoring the girls at the end of the day re-iterating that when you speak to each other make sure it's uplifting and it makes the other one bigger not smaller. 

On the learnings for the day final session, Santiago asks everyone what they enjoyed or learnt that day and what they didn't like, making it okay to not like things. 

Again I feel this is so progressive and good because I don't remember ever been told as a child that it's okay not to like things. This seems to me a mature and respectful way to operate and it offers a deeper self-inquiry for the girls to reflect with no judgement. This is also incredibly positive emotional intelligence coaching so I can only imagine that after a week of this they'll come our self-actualized! 

Another great day and high fives all round ending with a large pizza delivery, games, dancing and my calm down and relax good night routine. 



Looking forward to what wonders tomorrow will bring! 

I am extremely lucky, privileged and grateful to be here in Spain this week teaching on a pilot leadership course for girls centred around Basketball training and life skills. 

We are in the stunning 5 star corporate training facility of Gas Natural in Puente Nuevo, just outside of Avila, an hour from Madrid. 

Today saw the long awaited arrival of a very fortunate 20 girls and the welcome kick-start session was fantastically facilitated by the Santiago Puebla Sanz, general manager, strategic coach and expert in high performance teams with his company JOINTALENT. 

The opening session was a warm welcome and a jtrailer giving the highlights of the upcoming sessions through the week. They were told of a group of children who were very special and intelligent, so much so that they get overwhelmed by all of their mental capacity and find it difficult to relate to others. And these autistic children would be coming in to share a creative workshop with us and the girls were invited to think of any questions they would want to ask them. 

The questions were set up as a global cafe style which worked beautifully - and this amazed me because I've never seen this leadership tool be used for children. 

So this is what inspired me to blog about this today was that the answers that came from these young girls shocked us all in the most amazing way. They were so full of depth, understanding, compassion and kindness that we (the adults) were left with our mouths open in wonder. 

The group of girls aged between 8-11 wanted to ask the autistic children: 

What are you afraid of?
How do you feel?
What makes you nervous?
Is it easy to make friends? If not, why?

Santiago commented that in that first round of the global cafe, there were deeper, more powerful points than he'd ever seen and that was just round one!

He then went on to dig deeper and enquire to what is it that makes the girls afraid. One girl had the courage to say, "I am afraid of being alone."

Once again, a WOW powerful silence of presence filled the room. He immediately validated the brave little girl saying, "Thank you for saying that, who else feels the same?" And two thirds of the room including adults raised their hands. 

Already creating unity consciousness the group delved into another fear, another brave girls said she was afraid right now because she didn't know what was going to happen. Santiago again validated her and said he also has the same fear and doesn't like it when he doesn't know what is going to happen.

Imagine if all children were validated with such respect and taught that being vulnerable is a powerful strength. 

What kind of a world would that create? 

Children and adults would not feel like there is something wrong with them every time they felt something uncomfortable and they would be able to talk about it and express themselves freely and extremely emotionally intelligently.

This kind of work is ground breaking if you consider the positive impact it's creating with our adults of tomorrow.

Another speaker that was coming in is a woman who grew up and lived in the Sahara desert in a very humble way and would come and tell her story. So the girls had the following questions for her:

How did you do everyday things?
How do you get water?
How do you enjoy yourself there?
What work do you do in the desert?
How do you survive in the desert?
Do you ever get bored?

Once again, extreme emotional intelligence with depth and empathy beyond their young years. 

I found the session so inspiring and physically uplifting. I hadn't slept hardly at all last night and was yawning tired. By the time this session begun I was wide awake and so full of amazement, energy and joy!

How exciting to even imagine what will come in the next few days. 

Another question was quite fun and futuristic, so there will be a woman from Toyota coming in to talk about dreaming into the future and visioning anything to be possible, so the girls were invited to think of car questions: 

Can you make a car that travels into the future?
Can you make a car that flies?
Can you have a car that drives itself and you tell it what to do?
Can you have a car that changes into a cube that you can put in your pocket?

Amazing awesome comments once again and the known imagination of children really comes to a fore here. I am touched by the magical innocence, heart and wonderment that I was grateful to witness today. 

Then we all went swimming and now they are playing games on the grass. I will facilitate a calm-down-and-relax-and-let-go-of-the-day Body Intelligence practice before bed time this evening. 

So good night and thank you from day 1! 

​Yesterday I delivered a day of mindfulness to a business team from Shire with a difference. I'm in Spain at the stunning 5 Star corporate training resort of Gas Natural Fenosa at Puente Nuevo. [http://www.campuspuentenuevo.gasnaturalfenosa.com]

I looked up the definition of mindfulness:
"Mindfulness is the basic human ability to be fully present, aware of where we are and what we’re doing, and not overly reactive or overwhelmed by what’s going on around us."

I was interested to deliver a training for mindfulness that was truly useful and applicable to every day situations, both at work and in life. 

I have personally attempted the practice of being in the now and not allowing distracting thoughts to interfere with my state of being present and to be totally honest I couldn't ever really do it! And I have been practicing meditation for 25 years... So I have always been aware that there is something about mindfulness that was missing for me and I was interested in this training to explore that and offer something that would be truly helpful.

"Observe the present moment as it is. The aim of mindfulness is not quieting the mind, or attempting to achieve a state of eternal calm. The goal is simple: we’re aiming to pay attention to the present moment, without judgement. Easier said than done, we know. 
Let your judgments roll by. When we notice judgements arise during our practice, we can make a mental note of them, and let them pass.

The part that is easy about mindfulness is to just focus all the senses on this moment. The part that is not so easy is to actually do that. Why? Because the moment I take a moment of reflection time it's highly likely that all of my pending to-do list will let me know of its presence. Add to that all of my unresolved issues, emotions and frustrations. 

So this outlook doesn't look very inspiring as a lovely relaxing mindfulness meditative moment of calm...

Here there are two things that crash into each other. 1. My desire to be peaceful and calm and 2. My inner world gushing up like a fountain to let me know of all the things I've been ignoring. 

So what's the solution?

Mindfulness practice suggests to simply observe the thought coming and then passing by just like a cloud, with kindness and no judgement...

But what if the thought I'm trying to 'let go of' is so taxing and pending that I can't actually do that? Then I'm left feeling like a failure and that I just can't do this mindfulness thing anyway...

What I know is that there is another way. 

The thoughts and feelings come up for a reason - they want my attention. Otherwise they wouldn't bother me. The thought and feelings that are uncomfortable, that I don't like, that I wish would just go away and leave me along are only arising because they want my loving attention. They want to be acknowledged. And only I can acknowledge those thoughts. 

One thing is to let go and put it in a cloud and pass by, and this is a great technique if you're in the middle of something that you need to focus on. But afterwards when you have a moment, there is the invitation to face that thought and explore why it is that it's paying you a visit. If the thought/issue/feeling is not acknowledged it will go deeper into the unconscious.

So we're not denying or ignoring anything. We are acknowledging our thoughts and ourselves. 

This is mindfulness with a heart. And this is for me what really works. This is why and how I teach mindfulness. So I invited participants to notice their thoughts and feelings and to absolutely everything that came up, to say; it's okay to think this, it's okay to feel this way. 

And it worked, I could see it. 

Their faces changed, looked lighter, looked more relaxed, as though a weight had been removed from their shoulders. I could see the transformation tangibly. 

There is nothing worse than fighting with a thought or a feeling into all infinity because the more I resist anything the more it will persist. And I know this to be true because for most of my own life I tried this strategy and it created massive inner conflict. 

For the next state of the training, I went onto the kind inner voice. How you speak to yourself in your mind when something goes wrong? Do yo reassure yourself and say, "it's okay, I love you, I'm here for you no matter what my darling." Or do you berate yourself and judge yourself for being so stupid?

We move into going down the kind loving voice route and this self-kindness can only be an inside job which then radiates outwards. 

And what of world peace? Is there anything I can do?

Ever get the feeling you're not enough? Ever get the debilitating pang of pain and worry when you see what's going on in the news and to the planet? 

Imagine if everybody spoke to themselves with kindness and compassion. Imagine if then that lovely vibration was projected outwards into conversations and relationships...

And if things go wrong, as they so often do, there's no panic and big drama - in its place instead "it's okay, we'll get this, I'm here with you by your side, I'm holding your hand, don't worry, it will be alright, I'm with you, I love you."

What kind of a world would we collectively create?

Would this impact world peace?

So my group went away happy, smiling and with a new energy and lease of life. In the closing circle of sharing what word are you feeling like right now some were: positive, inspired, happy, relaxed, optimistic, grateful, peaceful.

I think mindfulness is due an upgrade. 

So I'm upgrading mindfulness to kindfulness.

Later I discovered that in the evaluations I'd been given 10/10 so I'm just delighted :)

To find out more about being kind to yourself see www.truedivinenature.com and watch Matt Kahn's videos or get the book Whatever arises, LOVE that. .

.30These figures speak for themselves, stress is costing businesses a lot of money. 
I am creating a conversation around this to discover what you are experiencing at work with view to being the change that I've always wanted to see in the workplace because I know that working at a higher level of human capacity and fulfillment is possible. 
​
I'm interested to know:

• How much stress you are under (from a scale of 0-10 where 10 is the highest)?
• What is your experience of stress at work? 
• What do you think could  be some solutions? 

I will be doing a YouTube live Q&A on Wednesday 31 May at 7.30pm GMT  - see below for the recorded video. 

In the mean time send me your questions by commenting below or if that doesn't work, email me on the contact page.