Kate

The odds to get married in 2011 increase if your name is Kate. So far we know that John Galliano is designing one of the Kate-dresses. But who knows, may be he is the father of this year's royal wedding dress too.

Be your own observer

Flicking through the magazine, this caught my attention. What if you stopped and analysed your thoughts, words and actions on a typical day? What would they tell you about who you are?

Watch your thoughts;
they become words.

Watch your words;
they become actions.

Watch your actions;
they become habits.

Watch your habits;
they become character.

Watch your character;
for it becomes your destiny.

Upanishads

Three in one

Champagne in classy resto. Family celebration times many. Cheering in champagne to recognise everything that has happened in the last couple of weeks that we can be proud of and happy for.

Mai Tai in trendy hotel bar. A long discussion about writing. Cool coincidence that the first book we both read on how to write was by Stephen King, where he reveals his secret rules for writing a bestseller.

Cosmopolitan in French bistro. Crashing a party and catching a conversation on love and happiness.

Could have been three separate nights out, but as it was it all happened in one evening. The one thing that followed me throughout the evening (or was it me following him?) was my dear brother.

Lazy Saturday afternoon

Twentyfive years later

Last time I saw her she was probably nine, ten or eleven years old, playing in the garden with my sister. Small and blonde, pretty and talkative. Today she is an HR director looking for a new job. Still small, blonde, pretty and talkative. But the age difference has somehow diminshed. An interesting meeting, starting as an interview, closing as a dear catch up with an old friend.

The Royal Wedding

My invite must have got lost in the Royal Mail somewhere. But that won't stop me from coming. Flight booked to the wedding of the year (the one and only as far as I know). Plans with the girls are being formed. Some words to describe our theme: sparkle, pink, glamour, giggle.

Professor Balthazar

Make space before there is anything to make space for. Allow for space to exist without filling it. That is the challenge I was given today. Something to practice or just try out to see what happens. So when there is an inner voice giving orders to maximise performance and use of time, the trick is to do the opposite as an experiment. It's like having a personal Professor Balthazar inside of you; he invents something new by brewing a combination of already existing components. And you never know what will come out of the magic drops.

Some of the children's television programmes from the seventies have left memories for life. That's for sure.

Telly can be really bad

Spoiled American girls who all share one thing. They spend other people's money to finance their luxurious lifestyle. Put them in a house together, throw in some video clips of honesty from the family from outside. Tears, catfights and new friendships. Record it and hep! "You're cut off" in a nutshell. Can't believe I watched it even for four minutes.

Tip for restless minds

All afternoon I have had a feeling that I've forgotten something. Something that I should have done. An uncomfortable feeling of restlessness and a mind searching for reasons. Then I rolled out the yoga mat to let the body do whatever it wanted to do, just following the breath.

The feeling of restlessness? Gone.

Ready to go...

There is a first for everything

Today's 'first' is meeting Little B's (new) boyfriend. Judging from her talking about him, and perhaps even more from the sparkles surrounding her, he will pass the 'will-my-girlfriends-like my-new-boyfriend' test. And if he doesn't... I will keep very quiet as it probably says more about me than him.

The Gulasch is ready, the bread is sliced and the wine is chilled. Pity Adorable has called in sick for the big evaluation day. A detailed debrief by phone is planned for later this afternoon...

Pains and pleasures of a consultant

Six hours journey for five hours of meetings. The usual Gothenburg day, but the difference is that I can now send an invoice. The question is how much to charge for travel time and whether there is an additional charge for motion sickness. Something we haven't discussed.

It's been a while

Monday morning meeting

First meeting of the week. With myself. In a sunny, cold and wintery "conference room". The advantages of planning the day without having to report to anyone but myself.

Left or right

That is the big question. Something we spend so much time and effort to learn as children, all of a sudden it's time to pretend that your left hand is your right hand, that your right leg is your left leg. As a yoga instructor that is. It's doomed to get muddled up. But for the rest, I survived my first yoga class ever. The support and cooperation from eight smiling participants helped. It's all documented on a DVD to be carefully observed and analysed before I'm quality stamped as Yoga Instructor.

If I couldn't get the left and right instructions quite right (how hard can it be??), I'm at least proud of my attempt to market the abdominal challenge as an act of love to the backside in order to celebrate Valentine. Yoga romance.

A piece of London in Stockholm!

Our own local! A proper English pub just around the corner from where we live. The fish and chips was delicious. The selection of lager was impressive. The clientele even spoke English. A few of them at least. Two pints of Czech lager and celebration of Beautiful J's latest news. Something tells me we will become regulars.

Tip of the day

Hot off the press from my British spy, alias best English friend...

Kate + Longchamp spring collection = True

French Touch Absolu and Butterflies Fever

The perfect match to sunglasses and heels.

Berry Rose obviously

Glowie Ballerine of course

May be something for the next business meeting

When did we stop tickling each other? From the earliest age we teach babies that tickling is fun. That when you are being tickled, you smile. Or if it's a real good tickle, you laugh. Yesterday I was made aware of the fact that laughing as a result of being tickled is a learned behaviour. Something we do because we realise it's beneficial to us. It only takes the baby a few months to realise the benefits of smiling and laughing when being tickled. Somewhere a long the line we stop tickling each other. And we stop laughing as much as we used to. On average children laugh three hundred times per day compared to adults laughing only fifteen times.

Laughter can make us happy; we can trick the brain into a happy mood by forcing ourselves to laugh. The conclusion seems obvious. A little tickle moment at the beginning of every meeting at work...

Today's agenda:

1. Tickle time
2. Status report
3. Budget
4. .....

It's back

Outside the comfort zone

Making a colleague redundant, having a pre-pitch conference call with a potential new client who has sent me tons of incomprehensible strategy documents, preparing and teaching first live yoga class ever (plus recording it). All classified as rather distressing in my world. All happening in the same week. The 'outside-comfort-zone-week'.

Observing the horizon

The planned Gothenburg day was cancelled and an unplanned day in my home office has started. Vast possibilities. Like diving into the ocean, swimming towards the horizon, having no idea when an island will appear. There is also the possibility of staying on the beach, enjoying the view of the horizon, knowing that it will always be there. May be time to consolidate the last couple of days' actions, meetings, impressions and intentions. May be time to remind myself why I'm doing this in the first place. Not to get caught up in action, but to actually stay in the slightly uncomfortable zone of just being and listening. My brain is running in all directions, wanting to find answers to all the questions, solve the problems. As quickly as possible. That's the role of the brain I suppose. But as no life threatening situation is to be dealt with, I may just challenge the brain to relax, wait, do nothing... The biggest challenges of them all.

When there is no inspiration to write...

... there is usually a longing to read. "Shantaram", the thickest book I've read since the Swedish law book, lasted longer than my trip to India. Couch, candles, book, tea. Not too bad on a Monday night.

Sent

The send button has been pressed. The giant exam paper went through cyberspace and hopefully landed safely with the yoga examinators. Relief. But also emptiness to separate from my loyal companion for the last ten days.

And you wonder where did the time go?

Fourhundred guests. Champagne and seafood. Entertainment worthy of the royal family. Male majority. More champagne. A hotdog, some lipgloss and a taxi. Oups, all of a sudden hitting the nightclub jungle. More champagne. Twentyfive year old trying his luck. Giggle and headshake. Hugs and honesty. Oups, all of a sudden it's past four in the morning.

Head full of business issues with a yoga flavour

Yesterday evening's discussion revolved around how to grow yoga into a profitable business. The most fantastic and knowledgeable yoga instructor, running a seemingly well established, growing and healthy yoga institute told me about the challenges in the industry. The costs of having employees. Quality versus quantity. Finding the right marketing channels. A growing competition. And perhaps a market coming into the mature stage. All familiar issues in any kind of business.

But then there is a sublime, idealistic layer to it. Be successful but not too successful. Making money on yoga and commercialising something that should be opened to everybody, regardless of financial ability, can be problematic. Now my head is spinning with ideas of how to package products, how to grow a business while maintaining profits and how to prioritise the time of the key person involved. The role of a board member of a yoga institute!

Flying start

First day as an independent consultant started with a couple of hours in my new office. My home office that is. Lovely. And then it just came to me. Through the grapevine and through a chain of recommendations. The opportunity to pitch for my first new client. A multinational company in need of a facilitator at their global HR directors conference in March.

Setting the date for your intention is like telling the universe that you are ready. I'm going to try this in other areas of life too I think. Just as a test...