I slept for 12 hours at the end of the second day at Alive in Berlin. It’s been years since I slept for that long. Probably the last time was after a student night out at ‘The Tunnel’ nightclub in Glasgow or after a Summer Ball that lasted until 8am in the morning straight through from the night before with a ‘Survivor’s picture’ taken in the morning, finishing with eating scrambled eggs on toast while dressed in a ball gown, while a string quartet played. (I love it when odd combinations of real life give it a dream like quality, don’t you?) There was just so much inner change going on, I think the 12 hour sleep was the caterpillar in the cocoon stage. I wonder how many other ‘Alivers’ found themselves turning into sleeping beauties after the event.
The second day of Alive in Berlin was amazing. Ben Austin spoke masculine and feminine energy. His speech title included some words that would seriously mess up my search engine results, so I’ll leave you to look at the Alive in Berlin 2014 website to find out more about this. His work draws on David Deida’s work on masculine and feminine polarity and on Tony Robbin’s work on the use of focus, physiology and language but Ben makes this completely his own. John Whittle then read his own poem and it had the cadence of Burns.
Dr Carolyn Eddlestone spoke about Traditional Chinese Medicine and opened the door to really understanding how these different energies and elements affect our everyday lives and to how we can begin to balance them.
In the afternoon I did a dance workshop with Coco Berlin. She has an amazing free you tube channel with dance classes that you can do at home. As a former teacher I really appreciate her teaching skills and how carefully she described the movements.
For the second half of the afternoon I attended Sarah Peck’s workshop entitled ‘The Power of Connection: Learning Your Own Story, Connecting to Others and Finding your Tribe.’ I loved this workshop as it was so simple and yet so impactful. We told stories about ourselves and learnt what to do when you go into a room and don’t know anyone, or arrive and can’t at first see the people that you know. I love Sarah’s work and look forward to reading more of her blog ‘It Starts With’ and reading some of the books she recommends. I have begun to read 40 pages a day as was suggested in a link she posted as a way of reading 52 books in the year.
Lea Holtzer spoke about how to make the most of your life. I love the way she catalogues her life using index cards. Each day she writes her achievements, her magic moments and what she is grateful for. She then distills these into a weekly card. She keeps all of the cards in a small index card sized ring binder. She also makes quarterly boards which celebrate what she has done over each three month period. They looked like vision boards, but were instead gratitude and appreciation boards and as you do get more of the feelings that you have this seemed like a very good way of amping up positivity in your life.
Chris Guillebeau was the final speaker. He spoke ‘On Quests and Extraordinary Adventures.’ He advised to turn into what people were asking for on your blog and to have a coaching theme rather than a niche (mine is relocation). He made the aim of his day a deliverable rather than a certain amount of time spent – so for example you would focus on 1000 words or 1 painting rather than an amount of time spent.
I loved that Chris formed his adventures through making lists and working through them. When he travelled to every country in the world this quest was of course based on a country list. Chris did a question and answer session at the end and I really appreciated that he was grounded and honest in his answers, he wasn’t there to boast or to show how clever or successful he is. He said that his superpower was ‘jet lag’ and when asked if about the life direction of others he helped them to steer their intuition to what they wanted and their values rather than give a one size fits all answer.
Jana Shuberth who organised the event came back on stage with her amazing team and volunteers. I have been working with Jana for a year and a half as she is my coach. They say it is important for coaches to have a coach and I feel fortunate to have found such an amazing one.
Alive in Berlin 2015 is going to be on next year and the year after there is talk of it being held in Barcelona. I had one of my best weekends ever. It really was a gift to myself and I am looking forward to getting to know those in my new tribe better over time.