Have You Ever Experienced A Conference Like This?

Check out Kylie's Iran conference experience here:

I so <3 this girl right now and everything she has gone through.

She mentions that this conference was "minus just about every hallmark of a conference. No dances, no shouts, no booze, no plenary, no nothing."

But I think reading between the lines I don't think she could have come closer to a truer conference experience that many of us would normally take for granted i.e. need + hard work + overcoming challenges = impact

Keep up the great work Kylie!

And Now Some Words From Steve Jobs

I love how TEDTalks is collaborating to bring attention to presentations around the world that haven’t happened at TED Events but are thought provoking and should be shared nonetheless.

One of their Best of the Web videos is a presentation by Steve Jobs: “How To Live Before You Die.”

Jobs shares three stories about connecting the dots, love and loss, and death.

Connecting the dots:

"You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life."

Love and Loss:

“You've got to find what you love.  Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.”

Death:

“Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

On Cultural Chameleonism

Itchy Feet?

Throughout much of last year I often felt a yearning to travel and be overseas once more. It’s nice to know that I have kick started 2010 in the right direction and have followed that little voice inside my head.

So far this year I have been in Koh Samui, Bangkok, Poipet, Siem Reap and Singapore. In the coming months I will be in Hong Kong, Melbourne, Sydney and Wellington.

In between passport stamps, booking flights and airports, something has slowly dawned upon me: It’s definitely not the packing, nor the actual flying, that I enjoy the most – in truth, it’s actually the impact of what I guess could be called cultural chameleonism that fascinates me the most.

In every relocation I’ve made and every trip I’ve taken has resulted in a mini re-genesis of sorts.

Travel gives the ability to leave behind parts of yourself and take on new things to adapt to your surroundings. Change is a natural part of life. But perhaps sometimes it is only being a totally opposite environment that this becomes more evident.

There will be things that you don’t like, strongly disagree with or maybe even despise. But there will be others that you will love immediately and compliment you with such grace and ease you will wonder how you lived any other way. And, somewhere in between, there will be elements that you marvel at, find interesting or have no other choice but to put down to being just downright weird!

It is in these situations you need to be able to step back and ask “Why? Why is it like that and why does it make me react in the way that it does?”

With each visit, each conversation, each opportunity to open up all of your senses to everything around you, you are in fact closer to truly to finding out the truth of who you are.


Be brave.

Surround yourself with difference.

In it is only in recognising the similarities and diversity that you really understand who you are as an individual.

What Is That Thing That Matters To You?

"I wish to do something Great and Wonderful, but I must start by doing the little things like they were Great and Wonderful"

- Albert Einstein

Let the 2010 journey begin...

Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind

I would rather remember every memory (both good and bad) than to have never experienced any of it at all.

And even though my heart isn't there yet, my head knows this to be true.

A Look Back At The Year That Was

In 2009 I...

welcomed in the 2009 New Year while dancing at a smoke filled club in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam

experienced a week long 40 degree heatwave with no electricity and melted train tracks

witnessed first hand the impact of the global financial crisis on organisations and their leaders

travelled on 14 planes

ran an event, which nearly didn't happen at the eleventh hour, for over 550 corporate, government and not-for-profit guests (making a three year high profit to boot!)

wore thongs on a winter's day in the rain

went from a long distance to living together to long distance relationship yet again

started questioning the meaning of life

was a foot model

left

forged life long friendships in the fire

shared the worm from a bottle of tequila with an old friend

got caught up in the motions and lost direction

discovered Orion's Belt for the first time while sipping champagne and stargazing with friends

made some hard choices, and left some questions open and yet to be answered

had many a life saving conversation over hot chocolates and chai lattes

realised becoming an Australian citizen would be a lot more difficult than simply taking a Citizenship Test

survived swine flu (I think)

travelled and had many a fun-filled adventure with friends in cars, planes and boats

resigned from my job in favour of autonomy, mastery and purpose

contemplated how I have changed and stayed the same and why

locked myself in a bathroom

had two unexpected deaths happen in the space of two weeks

was a beautiful mess

missed my family

spent my last day of 2009 lost on a beach at a Full Moon Party on Koh Phangan Island, Thailand

"When was it that I realised my jandals were an essential part of my summer, of my wardrobe, of my identity?"

My love affair - with jandals