embodiedliving

Women Lawyers Thriving in Their Own Firms: Joleen Hughes

Joleen Hughes greeted me with a big smile at the door of the Celtic Swell, a charming Irish pub in West Seattle. When I sat down with her for a lunch of Irish stew and cornbread, I discovered a woman who makes things happen. She loves music. She loves travel. And she loves to make things happen against the odds, in a big way.

Though her father is a lawyer, Joleen started out determined to make her way in the world without going to graduate school. How did she end up co-owner, with her husband, of the Celtic Swell, and owner of the Hughes Media Law Group as well?

Remember, Joleen loves music. A loyal and fervent Beatle’s fan, she began putting on rock concerts from her dorm at the UW, where she was an RA. While there, she met some of the movers and shakers in the Seattle music industry and after graduating from UW with an advertising degree she jumped in with both feet, soon working in the management office of bands like Alice in Chains, Soundgarden, and Pearl Jam (before and after they got big record deals). Soon she was also the booking manager at the premier rock club in Seattle during the "grunge years", RKCNDY, all while representing up to eight bands, for whom she negotiated various music contracts. By age 24, she’d left RKCNDY to teach Concert Production, History of Rock and Roll, and Artist Management at the Art Institute of Seattle.

At the Art Institute, her friend Kevin Davis of Garvey, Shubert and Barer (and Sir Mix-A-Lot’s lawyer), was a guest speaker in her Artist Management Class, and he suggested she become an entertainment lawyer.  While studying for the LSAT, she took a break from music and  worked in the Dean's office at Bastyr University, where she prepared for, applied and was admitted to Seattle University School of Law with a scholarship, before she told her family or friends. (Her dad beamed with pride when he found out.)

Joleen’s love of travel was boosted by a summer studying law in Florence, Italy (why didn’t I think of that?) and then travelling throughout Italy, Austria, Hungary, Czech Republic and England. More about travel later. Back in Seattle, she was offered a legal internship at the start-up company RealNetworks (the company that invented audio/video streaming technology). Her boss and mentor was Kelly Jo MacArthur, who had come from international business law firm Sidley Austin in Chicago (where the Obamas met each other).

As one of the first employees at RealNetworks, after graduating Cum Laude from law school, Joleen's internship turned into an in-house position where she moved up the ranks to Senior Counsel.  While at Real, she had a full client base, often responsible for 60 to 100 deals at a time. She supported Real's consumer products teams in the music, sports, games and media fields as well as marketing and events.

And she loved her work, using her “street smarts” from her music days in negotiating some of Real's most prolific deals  with music companies (major labels, publishers, manufacturers, artists) sports leagues (like NFL, NASCAR, PGA Tour, NBA), media companies (like AOL, BBC, CNN, ABC, NBC/Universal) and technology providers.  She was part of the team that put together the first legal music initiative (MusicNet) and put together the first VOD subscription model in the movie industry, after spending two years helping major movie studios get comfortable with the model.

While at Real, Joleen says her boss “Kelly Jo was an unconditionally supportive mentor who empowered us all, based on her belief that by surrounding yourself with the best, you become the best.” And she found her co-workers at RealNetworks to be, without question, among the best lawyers she has ever worked with.  "My colleagues at Real have the highest integrity, but are also extraordinarily intelligent, talented, funny and supportive."

In 2000 and 2001, Joleen went traveling again, this time repeated visits to Ireland, Scotland and England for several weeks with her best friend, touring the country and falling in love with the people and the creative energy. Two years later in Seattle, on St. Patrick’s Day, Joleen met Gareth Hughes, who had arrived from Armagh in Northern Ireland many years before.  A late night of talking led to their first date at Mt. Rainier, and they have not been apart since!  After marrying a year later at sunset on the beach in Wailea, Maui, they decided to build an Irish Pub. Why? Remember: music, travel, and making things happen against the odds.  "It was Gareth's lifelong dream to own his own pub, and I fully support him in this effort." 

They found their spot close to their home on Alki Beach while walking their Siberian Huskies, Finnegan and Foley, and they proudly opened the Celtic Swell in July 2004. 
With Gareth fully in charge of running the day to day operation of the pub, Joleen left RealNetworks to take a break and to help Gareth with the pub as needed. But, within a few weeks she was not only being recruited at a couple of large law firms in Seattle but for several in-house positions at other Seattle companies.  Additionally, she was also asked to do a legal project for a former executive at Real.  Faced with a dilemma, she decided to take the project, test the odds and open her own solo practice.  A year later, she was introduced to another attorney who had just started a new practice and they merged their firms together.  When they parted ways, Joleen and the associates of the firm became Hughes Media Law Group or "HMLG" (www.hughesmedialawgroup.com). 

Coming from Real, Joleen's most important objective in setting up a private practice was to put together a team of talented lawyers with in-house experience and an extra helping of integrity.  "While at Real, I worked with amazing attorneys and it taught me a lot about how to conduct yourself.  We didn't "fight" over work or take credit for other people's work - it was a real collaborative team effort to just concentrate on doing great work for our clients.  It was an amazing place to develop my legal chops.  When I left, I was shocked to learn that colleagues outside of Real had different experiences at law firms."

So, for Joleen the challenge was to create a firm that provided the same level of attention to clients that in-house lawyers provide while helping them manage their legal budgets and keep costs reasonable and predictable.  "I am absolutely inspired by my clients, it doesn't matter if they are just starting out or have established businesses - I am in awe of entrepreneurs and feel a kinship with them.  Lawyers are service providers - and I think it is important to always remember that.  It is what drives me every day."  Unlike many lawyers, Joleen knows what it is like to take her life savings and invest it in her own business and how scary yet exhilarating that can be. 

In other words, Joleen doesn't take the fact that a client is choosing to spend their hard-earned money on legal services lightly.  She insists that both she and her associates think of themselves as "executives" on her clients’ teams. First, it is imperative that they meet with a client (at no charge) to get an understanding about everything in that clients’ business, from “the toilet paper they buy to their biggest deals".  Next, she and her team work closely with their clients to develop an overall legal strategy for the business.  This could be initially helping negotiate a deal, developing a template, setting up a company, conducting an audit of their intellectual property - or for many - becoming their de-facto  "virtual in-house counsel" team.  This approach allows Joleen and her team to form deep and lasting relationships with their clients and help set legal budgets to facilitate their business goals. Her clients at HMLG are located in Seattle, Los Angeles, and the Bay area and include content production studios, music technology , web, and content, and game developers, advertising agencies and platforms, children's product developers, artists, health care platforms, product distributors, and social networking sites.

It is important to note, that starting and running new businesses is not easy, and Joleen has certainly learned a lot over the past few years.  "In starting a restaurant and law practice (both within the same year!), I have certainly encountered a few speed bumps along the way, as anyone must expect when they decide to open their own business.  But it is absolutely worth it.  I have learned an incredible amount, not just from the good experiences, but mostly from the experiences that have tested my character."  Philosophically and practically, Joleen believes that every one of her experiences in life and in running her businesses has made her a better person, and a more compassionate attorney. 

Looking back to her own roots, Joleen recalls that when she was 12 years old, she went camping with her friend's family on May 18, 1980  on the Toutle River near Mount Saint Helens when the mountain blew.  She will never forget the ash, the grey covered “death” floating in the river after the eruption, and the feeling of coming so close to losing her own life.   “I think that experience was a defining moment for me, because it imprinted in the very fiber of my being that that you can never let anything or anybody stop you from achieving your goals with honesty and integrity. You are the creator of your own universe and each day is a gift.”

Joleen’s story not only inspires me to do what I love--it reminds me that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

What is Holistic Law?

Lady of Justice

Betsy Gutting and I just presented a workshop, Giving Voice to a New Vision: Cultivating Passion and Presence in Your Legal Career,  at the annual conference of the International Alliance of Holistic Lawyers (IAHL) in Chicago.  It was an inspiring conference and a great time to be in Chicago (the Blues Festival was there!).  I can dance all night to the blues (and almost did).

As part of the conference, the IAHL presented an award to Steve Keeva (he was a columnist for the ABA Journal for many years) for his book, Transforming Practices: Finding Joy and Satisfaction in the Legal Life.  If you want to read it, you are in luck, because the ABA is going to reissue it later this year.  I cannot recommend the book enough.  It is not only beautifully written--it is also packed with stories and practical information about how to create your own transforming practices in your legal endeavors.

Stu Webb , who developed collaborative law, came as a trainer and presenter. His genuine  presence and stories inspired our confidence in the collaborative approach to both family law and other civil litigation cases.

As John McShane pointed out at the conference,  we are at a tipping point.  If you have ever run a marathon, you have experienced the last 6 miles.  Hard.  You know you can make it and at the same time, it is the toughest part of the race.  What am I talking about?  Holistic Law.  You can use other names like Therapeutic Jurisprudence, but bottom line is that lawyers and their clients are whole people.  Made of flesh and blood.  All looking for meaning and happiness in our lives.  (If you aren't, please go read another blog!)  And, there has been a strong movement afoot to support an approach to  legal practice that reflects our wholeness as well as the roots of the law as a healing profession in the community. 

Cutting Edge Law (a free online publication) gives a comprehensive history of the movement as well as podcast interviews with key people in the movement. One of our own, Stella Rabaut is featured in one of those interviews. Here is the Cutting Edge description of the movement.

In November, 1999, in Marathon Key, Florida, the International Alliance of Holistic Lawyers held a conference that catalyzed a budding movement. In June, 2001, a group of legal professionals met in Las Vegas, Nevada and created the Renaissance Lawyer Society. In May, 2002, about fifty lawyers gathered for the annual collaborative law conference.

Those early gatherings inspired a Movement in the Law. Those who attended that 1999 IAHL conference have gone on to write, speak, train, inspire and develop new approaches to law, new ideas and new models. Holistic Law, Humanizing Legal Education, Therapeutic Jurisprudence, Spiritual Revitalization of the Legal Profession, Drug and Problem-solving courts, Law as a Healing Profession, Collaborative Law and their cousin Restorative Justice have grown to impact the mainstream. The new approaches call lawyers to apply new skills and challenge law schools to offer a new approach to legal education. CuttingEdgeLaw.com supports the growth of this movement.

The Movement is filled with exciting, creative and dynamic individuals in all branches of law. They are Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and humanitarians (and others) who are integrating their spiritual and personal values into law. They are men and women. They are gay and straight. They represent a diverse group that crosses national, cultural and racial identities. They offer a dynamic combination of intellect and heart. They come together and sometimes they sit alone. We share a common passion to transform the way law is practiced, to be the peacemakers, problem-solvers, and healers of the world.

Interested in the movement?  Join IAHL and make a donation. Subscribe to Cutting Edge Law.  Buy Steve Keeva's book.  Connect with your own values, desires and humanity.  Become a leader.  We only have 6 miles left!

Women Lawyers Thriving in Their Own Firms: Tahmina Watson

 
Tahmina Watson (on left) and Jane Faulkner

I first met Tahmina Watson through King County Washington Women Lawyers (KCWWL).  Her email signature caught my eye because it said Pinky's Shoe Bags, a product that Tahmina had designed for sale because of her own love for shoes. My curiosity was peaked.

When I finally met her in person, she not only had gorgeous shoes, but her inner beauty matched her outer looks.  As I discovered through her leadership on KCWWL (she is president-elect) and my interview with her, Tahmina is someone who brings her own integrity, sparkle, brilliance, determination and big heart to everything she does. 

She just opened her own immigration practice, Watson Immigration Law, in Seattle this January (2009).   This is the story of her journey and her inspiration.

Tahmina dreamt of becoming a barrister from the time she was 5 or 6 years of age. Though she was born in London, her family was from Bangladesh.  Her father was a barrister and her mother- her true inspiration, was a housewife.  When she was young, her grandmother sent her a jute bag that she filled with books for her trips to the prestigious British Courts with her father (an immigration lawyer).  Dressed in robes and white wigs, the barristers held a magical appeal for Tahmina.  When she was 8 years old, her family moved back to Bangladesh because of her father's wish to be of help to the country. She made her way through the schools there, eventually mastering Bengali as they moved from the capitol of Dhaka to a smaller town, Bagerhat. She recalls with fondness the cultural practices that were so strong there—singing, dancing, performing and the traditional music.

Ten years later, Tahmina moved back to London where she eventually attended Brunel University.  Even though her Muslim family had been quite liberal, Tahmina blossomed in the college setting.

She graduated with an undergraduate law degree from a program that had required her to spend a year of her education working in the field of law.  She worked at a small High Street firm in general practice including immigration and family law and at the London Regional Transport Authority, but was still not clear what area of the law she liked best.

A year later, she had graduated from the Inns of Court School of Law. She was then faced with finding an apprenticeship (known as 'pupillage') to become a barrister--quite a competitive process, there were a thousand applications for every one position!  

Undaunted, Tahmina found pro bono work including a position at the Disability Law Service, stemming from her passion for disability issues gained when she had helping disabled children just after college.

Tahmina took a very challenging client and her case to an agency hearing to win her disabled child some accommodations. Tahmina’s confidence was buoyed not only by her ability to calm the client mother but also because she convinced the agency to give the client’s child some help. 

Because of her outstanding work, Tahmina was recommended to another job with the Independent Panel of Special Education Association (IPSEA), where she drafted documents to help parents of disabled children get assessments and proposed solutions for their children.  She found the work to be very rewarding and shortly after this, she was given an apprenticeship position with Bridewell Chambers, in London.

Tahmina worked very hard during this time, shadowing and assisting a barrister supervisor ('pupil master') for six months, then handling her own cases during the second six months, including an occasional felony. (Yes, she wore a white wig and a robe.) 

During her second six-month period of apprenticeship, Tahmina decided to move to the US.  She came to visit a relative in the Seattle area after completing law school and met Tom Watson, her husband, on a blind date.  They managed a long distance relationship as Tahmina completed her pupilage in London, commuting to Seattle regularly. 

She then moved to Seattle in July 2005 and started another series of pro bono jobs as she studied for the New York Bar Exam (the only one that she could take without a US law degree and that had reciprocity with Washington).   Through a chance meeting on a plane with a woman board member of the NW Women’s Law Center (now Legal Voice), Tahmina got a internship there.  She felt great support as she learned about legal issues such as Title 9 and reproductive rights that were not issues in England.  She also clerked for Judge Ricardo Martinez where she found the federal system to be more like the English courts.

Starting in July 2006, Tahmina began working for her immigration lawyer who had just started her own firm. She did not intend to become an immigration lawyer at that time, but to her surprise, she discovered that she was really well suited to the practice and she formed a partnership.  (Her father, also an immigration barrister was quite proud of her choice.) 

Tahmina is multi-lingual, has her own immigration experience and enjoys the complexity of the law and the personal nature of the factual aspects of each case. She loves the way in which immigration cases are like a puzzle, where it is important to fit in every factual, procedural, and statutory piece.  As you can tell from her history, she also has a natural capacity to stand for those who are in disempowered positions.

This January (2009), Tahmina left her partnership and started her own immigration practice.  She never envisioned herself as a solo practitioner and was nervous at the thought, but she liked the freedom of being her own boss and had faith that things would come together.  With the encouragement of her husband, she took the plunge and her first week in her new practice, she had 15 calls.  She is making a profit now and has hired a paralegal.

Her advice to others?  If you had told her she was going to have her own firm a year ago, Tahmina would have said you were crazy.  She is so glad now that she took the risk.  She has learned that where there is a will and the desire, there is a way. And, if you ask, support will be there for you.  If fear of failure is all that is holding you back, “Go for it,” says Tahmina with a sparkle in her eyes.

In addition to the KCWWL, Tahmina is active with WWL, the Asian Bar Association and the South Asian Bar Association.  In Tahmina’s ongoing dedication to giving back, she is an active volunteer for CHAYA, a nonprofit organization serving South Asian women in times of crisis and need, and to raise awareness of domestic violence issues.

Clean Up Your Environment the Easy Way

Because I love the physics of energy, I have been working with the phenomenon of the  "field" in my coaching practice.  Most of us think of the space between us as empty.  In fact it is filled with energetic activity that we cannot see, but that we can feel.

Have you been in a breathtakingly beautiful place, where the air seems so clear and pure that it is almost like a crystal?  Did you "feel" energized and inspired?  And, have you ever been around people who you thought were unsafe and felt as if there was a "slimy" feel in the air?  Or experienced a "heavy" feel in a funeral home or a place where there is a lot of grief?

Our environments have powerful effects on our bodies and minds.  I find that feeling gratitude is a potent transformer of our space.  Heartmath offers a 5-10 minute meditation that can dissipate the negative emotional density cloud that surrounds our earth.

To help transform the mental and emotional density cloud that surrounds the earth, do the following:

1. Imagine radiating love and care from the heart into the density and seeing it dissipate, the way the sun dissipates clouds.

   (You can imagine that your heart is like the sun streaming gold light into the density cloud. For some people, this adds more texture to the experience, but it’s not necessary for effectiveness. It’s the feeling of genuine care that counts.)

2. Close with a few minutes of seeing the planet in a coherent state, experiencing peace, harmony and heart-based connection. (It can be helpful to add this to the end of any technique.)

Women Lawyers Thriving in Their Own Firms: Pam Cowan

Pam’s office feels like another world—one infused with the serene and beautiful Asian art she loves. Warm and full of life, Pam walked me down the hall introducing me to various paintings and photographs. Each came with a story about the artist—former clients, friends or people who have taken a stand for their beliefs through their art. Pam is like that—filled with stories about her family, her travels, and her choice of “right livelihood” through her immigration practice, Buddhism, and art. When I left, I felt as though she had woven a fascinating tapestry from the strands of her life and work.

I met with Pam to discover how she had come to start her own immigration law practice 25 years ago. Known today as Cowan, Miller & Lederman, her firm is considered one of the premier immigration law firms in the Pacific Northwest. Her partners are Steve Miller (her husband) and Kevin Lederman.

Why does Pam love immigration law? The strong relationships she forms with her clients, the international contact, and the “right livelihood” aspect. Pam helps people come to the United States—people who have a deep desire to change their own lives, reconnect families, and contribute to the U.S. economy.

How did Pam land here? After graduating from college at Stanford, Pam and Steve went to Asia as volunteers. They taught English in Taiwan and Indonesia then meandered around Asia, finally ending up in  Katmandu, Nepal, where Pam found her love—Tibetan Buddhism. She considered becoming a Buddhist nun, yet a Tibetan lama told her that she would go back to the United States and that she would have three children. (Yes, both true.)

While in Katmandu, Pam, in a wave of emotion, wrote to Harvard and UW law schools where she had been accepted for admission and withdrew her applications, convinced the legal profession was not for her. Returning to Seattle (where she had grown up), she considered getting a Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies but was daunted by the language requirements. A Master's in psychology? That required a year of statistics. The default? Law school, of course. The week before law school was to start she met with Dean Hunt, who remembered her missive from Asia vividly. He told her that if she paid the $50 admission fee, he would take a gamble and admit her as an “interesting” addition to the class.
Pam never looked back. Graduating at the top of her class in 1977, she went from a federal clerkship back to Asia (with a two month old son), where she and Steve were the first couple allowed to “split” a Fulbright fellowship - they taught criminal law at the University of Indonesia in Jakarta. They then stayed for a second year, while Pam worked for a private law firm  in Indonesia, before she returned to Seattle as Perkins Coie’s fifth woman associate.

When Pam had her second son, she knew she wanted to spend more time with her children. She designed a part-time policy which Perkins Coie agreed to try out. When she returned after a nine-month leave however, she worked on an immigration matter that she enjoyed more than her large corporate law cases. It felt exhilarating, she said, to meet with individual people and get them a benefit that was truly meaningful - a chance in many cases for them to raise their families in a true democracy and a chance for the United States to benefit from their significant skills.

That was the moment she took the plunge. She knew that immigration law stimulated and satisfied her as a lawyer and a person. She felt it was a practice that she could excel at on her own "terms" - a boutique area of law where she could be the "best" in the city without the traditional backing of a large law firm.  She started her practice above "Magic Mouse Toys" at First and Yesler, with a partner, a typewriter and a telephone. From the beginning, she decided that she would work three days a week, and she has kept that commitment to this day. Her initial partner left shortly after they started, and Pam was officially the owner of her own practice.

Several months after opening her doors, she had her third child, a daughter, and because of her commitment to a three-day workweek, she was able to balance care for her children and for her new practice.

Because most of the large firms did not have immigration lawyers, they were glad to send Pam business in these early days. She hired another lawyer to be there the two days she was not, and finally she hired a second paralegal. And Pam’s firm kept growing, first moving to the Seafirst Building on Fourth Avenue and eventually to her current space at 1000 Second Avenue.  Pam now has 17 people at the firm, including five lawyers. She honors others’ work choices the same way that she honors her own, and many of her employees work on a part time basis as they raise their families.  Few employees leave - her first paralegal has now been with the firm almost twenty years!  Her mother, now 85, still does some of Pam’s bookkeeping.

Clear about her priorities and what was important to her, Pam took five trips of around three-months each with her family, taking the children out of school in their younger days to travel to Fiji, New Zealand and Australia; Turkey, Egypt and Israel; Tanzania and Kenya; France and Italy; and to the national parks in the western United States. Pam continues to make travel a very HIGH priority and takes significant time off (sometimes with grown children) to explore Asia and South America.  Still engaged in her Buddhist practice, she recently took a month-long pilgrimage back to the Tibetan Buddhist Center she had visited in 1973.  Since she continues to work three days a week, she now watches her granddaughter one day a week which balances work with the very best aspects of family life!

Pam is humble about how well her livelihood suits her personality. She enjoys the complexity of immigration law, the people, the high stakes for the immigrants and their families, and the management side of running a small business. She works with large companies to help them fashion immigration strategy and meets interesting people from all over the world. Pam’s smile and easy presence reflects a livelihood that integrate her mind, heart and spirit.

Start by Assuming the Best--- Jones Day Associate Teaches Us

The ABA recently reported about a Jones Day associate assigned to work with a demanding, "ornery" senior partner.  Without knowing it, she applied one of the NLP (neurolinguistc programning) presuppositions that I have found to be most helpful in relationships. Here it is--Assume that everyone is doing the best they can with the resources they believe they have available to them at the time.

In her words, she decided to look at his motivation, realizing that he was nearing retirement and facing pressure to train young lawyers. "Once I understood his motivation, I decided to take responsibility for changing the dynamic," she said. "I demonstrated interest and enthusiasm whenever we'd interact, and eventually he became my mentor." 

When we take things personally, it almost always leads us into a no-win situation.  This associate did the following things that turned the situation around:
1. She did not take the senior partner's behavior personally;
2. She became curious about his motivation and assumed the best;
3. She took responsibility for what she wanted in the relationship and modeled that, with success.

Just who was mentoring whom??

Remembering Our Song

This is a reprint of the feature article from my May newsletter.

Trance Music

A friend is someone who knows your song and sings it to you when you have forgotten it. —Alan Cohen

 

Have you noticed the contrasting images that surfaced in the media this last month? On the one hand, Susan Boyle captured the hearts of the world by opening her mouth and sharing her beautiful voice with all of us—even after we judged and laughed at her. On the other hand, we’ve been swamped with photos of people wearing masks over their mouths to protect against the outbreak of swine flu. These photos are metaphors for the way that fear “masks” our voice and self-expression.

I first watched Susan Boyle with curiosity. As she talked backstage before the show, she seemed an odd mix of childlike openness and old-fashioned British countryside. But as she walked out on stage and began talking, my whole body began to constrict. The judges and the audience members rolled their eyes, sneered and laughed—at her age, her clothing, her hip-shaking responses to their questions. I felt pure dread in my stomach when I heard her say she wanted to be like Elaine Page, the first lady of British musical theater. I found that I projected my own fear of failure and rejection outward in anger toward the judges and audience (I love defending the underdog).

Then when Susan began to sing in her deep, resonant voice, a sense of awe and wonder rose from a deep place inside of me—a place even deeper than the fear place. I felt so genuinely moved in that moment. My fears transformed to an almost ecstatic delight. My heart stirred and my body felt the vibration of her song. I was resonating with Susan, hanging on each note. She could have been Godzilla and it would not have mattered. In sharing her song, she looked and felt beautiful to me.

And I was not the only one. The audience was moved to tears. The judges could not stop talking about their own surprise and thrill. The feeling in the room was one of truth and love, not fear. Susan Boyle’s song had the power to move us all past our fears and judgments to the place where our own dreams live.

We all have a dream, whether we are aware of it or not. We were each born with a “heart’s desire,” and it is up to us to express that desire while we are here. This is our legacy to ourselves and the world.

How do we connect to that legacy?

First by connecting to our own unique song.

Ancient traditions, and some contemporary ones, teach that each living being has their own song. Through the vibration of these songs, there is a way to communicate beyond words, to respond to the resonance of the essence of that being.

In his book Wisdom of the Heart, Alan Cohen describes this phenomenon in an African tribe. Before birth, a child’s song is discovered by the women in the community. It is sung to the child at birth, and at all life and death passages. When a person commits a crime, the village gathers in a circle and sings that person’s song. “The tribe recognizes that the correction for antisocial behavior is not punishment; it is love and the remembrance of identity. When you recognize your own song, you have no desire or need to do anything that would hurt another.”

When our “masks” of fear show up, often in the form of judgments, projections, or (as Amanda noted on Britain’s Got Talent) cynicism, our true song cannot be heard.

Susan Boyle’s song demonstrated freedom from fear, freedom from masks. By just being who she was, she took us beyond our masks, our judgments and labels and biases, to our deepest feelings and essences. To where we felt a universal connection to humanity. 

So how do we let go of our masks on our own terms?

Name them as you discover them. Don’t shove them back into the cave, but sit with them at the campfire and discover their story. Accept them and see them for their true size, not as a looming shadow in the dark.

Feel the feelings that come up. Notice especially the uncomfortable sensations in your body. Tune in. Inside each of us, there is a whole world of priceless information just waiting to be recognized, heard and felt. By acknowledging your feelings, you give them permission to soften. Until you acknowledge them, they will scream and crash to get your attention.

As the masks begin to fall away, notice what wants to come through you. What gives you the deepest pleasure, stops time, brings you alive? What are your gifts, talents and treasures? Spend some time remembering and also inviting forgotten passions back into your life. Literally write down your dreams, so your unconscious can assist you in the process of reclaiming your song.

This is your path to conscious awakening. Our treasures are in our gifts and our songs, not in our possessions, acquisitions, or external recognition. And the paradox is that when you value your own song, it will magnetize others to do the same. Your song will actually radiate energy out from you, in the same way that your heroes—whether the Dalai Lama, Barack Obama, Michelle Obama or Susan Boyle—radiate fields of energy that magnetize you.

As J.K. Rowling, quoting Plutarch, said in her commencement address at Harvard last year, "What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality. We do not need magic to transform our world. We carry all the power we need inside ourselves.”

Life does not need to be hard. That is the old tape. We are not here to suffer, to resist, to strive, to survive. We are here to thrive, to sing our songs, to play from our passion, to taste the fruit of knowing. The only “sin” is our cynicism. We can sing our own songs and those of our friends, family and community. And the world will applaud.

References

Alan Cohen, Wisdom of the Heart, (Carlsbad, CA: Hay House, 2002)

J.K. Rowling, 2008 commencement speech at Harvard, http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/2008/6/5/entire-text-of-j-k-rowling-harvard-commencement-speech-now-online, accessed May 3, 2009

What Would You Do if You Knew You Could Not Fail?

Week 1 Possibilities

This past Saturday, Betsy Gutting and I co-lead a CLE for women lawyers on Cultivating Your Vision: Awakening Passion and Presence in Your Work and Llife.  One of the exercises was asking the participants to reflect on what they would do in their work/lives if they knew they could not fail?  It is such a juicy question because it really invites you to play with the possibilities. How would you answer the question if there were really NO limits?  Is the answer a surprise? 

I find that this is a great exercise to do while you are on a walk. Once the ideas are popping, try making a vision board to see what surfaces from your unconscious.  Directions for making one can be found on Christine Kane's blog.

First Lady Knows What is First

Michelle Obama

The ABA picked up an Associated press story about an interview with the First Lady.
Michelle Obama talked about her decision to leave a large law firm when she was an associate.
She said that just before leaving, both  her father and a young friend died and she asked herself, If she were suddenly to die, what did she want to be remembered for?  She knew then that practicing corporate law in a large firm was not her legacy.  For a full report of her interview, see the Chicago Sun Times.

Her remarks are wonderful reminders that the "path" that is our legacy is not linear, not rational and not predictable.  It is connected to our feelings, values, what we care about and what makes our heart sing.

As Michelle so eloquently describes her own process:  So I left my job at the firm and started to then think about what I wanted my life to become. And when I thought about the things that I cared about, the things that I was passionate about, service was always somewhere in there. I thought about the things that I did for enjoyment. They were always mentoring, working with other young people, trying to help them get to where I had -- I was to help them think about their lives differently. So I knew that service was always going to be a part of that passion. So my goal was to figure out how I could not do that in my spare time, but how I could make my work service.

So I started doing a bunch of crazy things: working in city government, and that's when -- after city government I left to start this wonderful organization in Chicago, Public Allies, which many of you know of, because it's one of the first model AmeriCorps national service programs.

I struggle with this choice everyday.   It takes courage and commitment to choose my passion and what I care about deeply over what I perceive as "security"--money and possessions.  Especially in this time of media driven fear about our financial and economic security.  Stories like Michelle Obama's help me remember what is important.  What do you want to be remembered for?

Guest Blogger: Clare Myatt-- The Path to Mastery

Clare Myatt is insatiably curious about what makes us inspired, empowered and satisfied in life. She is a dear friend who I met in somatic coach training. She also has a degree in law! Clare now lives in Britain with her husband.  Partnering with her clients to reveal their dreams and aspirations, Clare uses a compassionate yet practical approach to help shift insight into action through collaborative design of embodiment practices. She works with executives in need of the soft "EQ" skills, singles and couples to enhance their relationship skills, somatic students for supervision and anyone invested in self-development and possibility. Clare has degrees in law and psychology, is licensed as a Marriage and Family Therapist in California, certified as a Master Somatic Coach and member of the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy.

Ever have those days when, having tried to get a smidge too much done before leaving the house, the consequence is the strong possibility of being either right on time or a couple of minutes late for an appointment?  Well, I had one of those days last week.  And with it came a great lesson, made up of a series of minor irritations that at the time did not feel like a great lesson in the making.

The first irritation came in the shape of traffic light controlled roadworks letting through three or four cars at a time; the second a tractor which had three miles to traverse at a snail’s pace on a road where no overtaking was possible; the third a learner driver under instruction.  Of them all, the third, a young, tentative learner driver was probably my greatest teacher.  As he kangaroo’d along, attempting to master that difficult balance of clutch and accelerator control, I remembered to take a very deep breath, let go the outcome of potential lateness, and pay attention to the here and now.  The beautiful pink spring blossoms of the trees and hedgerows, the dainty bluebells appearing here and there along the verges, the white billowy clouds scudding across a bright blue sky.  Oh, what a beautiful day I had been missing amidst my hurry and intolerance.

Several deep breaths later, I began to pay attention to the trials and tribulations of the learner driver ahead and cast my mind back to those intense times, all those years ago, when every single minute behind the wheel of a car took intense concentration and focus.  What a difference several decades has made.  No longer do I have to focus on synchronizing the clutch and accelerator, pay much more than cursory attention to traffic, checking mirrors, indicating, pulling out to overtake, indicating and pulling over again.

Such is the path to mastery.  What a great reminder.  Whenever I take on a new practice - lately it’s been walking with a balanced gait after knee surgery - I am reminded of how clumsy we feel with something new and how it’s only practice that embeds habits and routines into the body.  I’m using a new phrase these days, one I picked up from a conversation with a retired psychiatrist who in turn heard it from his tennis coach.  “Practice makes permanent.”  I’ve always heard “practice makes perfect” but this new rendition makes much more sense to me.  As I sit and watch people walk, interact, eat, drink coffee – whatever they do – there’s a certain way in which who they are shows up in all they do.  In other words, whatever they’ve been practicing has become permanent in their structure.

 So the new question for myself and for my clients is this – what are you practicing?  If practice makes permanent, then be careful what you practice! 

 

Failure and Imagination: Bookends for Success

Flickr

Many of us will be attending graduation ceremonies this spring.  I love to listen to inspiring commencement speeches and found this one by JK Rowling (Part 1) from 2008 at Harvard.  She focuses on failure and imagination, her own formula for success at finally writing the novels that she dreamed of doing when she graduated from college.

One of the best lines in her speech, is "There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction." (This is my gift to my mom for Mother's Day!) So you have a choice when you feel like you have "failed."  You can blame, regret, and go to a place of shame, or you can look "failure" in the eye and thank it.  "You will never truly know yourself or the strength of your relationships until both have been tested by adversity.  Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won and it has been worth more than any qualification I have won." (Part 2)   Facing your own fear of failure or feeling that you have failed will lead you into the lion's den, where you will discover your courage, imagination and deepest values.

 Rowling goes to the heart of the matter when she tells us that imagination is not only the source of all invention, but that it enables us to empathize with others whose experiences we have never shared.
Quoting Plutarch, she offers, "What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.  We do not need magic to transform our world.  We carry all the power we need inside ourselves...  We have the power to imagine better."  (Part 3)

She urges all of us to move from "failure" through imagination into compassion for others, and to use our voices for others, especially those who have no voice, who are powerless, and who have less than we have.  So when you feel as if you have failed, look inside yourself for your owl, your broomstick and your wand. Then pull them out and pass your gifts on.