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October, 2007: A good cup of tea can solve anything! Written and published by: Dr. Toby Silverton & Dr. Bev McLagan
Well we are back from an amazing month in London, our heads brimming with so many memories, ideas, and possibilities that it is hard know where to start or what to write. If you read the last couple of newsletters, and we hope you did, then you know that we headed for England to see if a lifelong dream of living over there still carried the magic it did many, many years ago. Those of you who have been receiving Live the Solution for a while, or personally coach with us, know that we are great believers in change; small change, big change, earth shaking change. At the same time, we know that sometimes change takes your breath away, leaves you weak at the knees, and yet is worth every hair raising minute. We want to share with you some of the inner process of our latest “leap of faith”!
Good question, what were we thinking as we touched down in London? First, get us off this blinking plane! Second, let us survive the wild ride into London and, third, please don’t let one of us step off the curb to cross the street without looking RIGHT first! We had planned this trip with two questions in mind. Question 1: did we still feel the same way about living in England and Question 2: if the answer is yes, then where in England? That was about the extent of our elaborate plan, along with overdosing on art galleries and museums while we had the opportunity! Well at the end of Day 2 we sat in Peter Jones having afternoon tea (of course having tea) looking out over a beautiful view of London’s vast skyline and experiencing a profound sense of contentment and peace. It was only Day 2 and already we knew the answer to question #1 – the magic was still there. If only change was that simple! Knowing this answer immediately determined we hit that overwhelm button – the jet lag didn’t help! On to question 2, so if we were going to move to England, where would we settle? For some reason this question felt very pressing, like we had to find the answer to the beginning of the universe or something! A sleepless night of problem solving led us to the bookstore to stock up, and we mean stock up, on books about counties in England; South, South West, South East, ok clearly we were not heading North. Then we tackled the internet checking out demographics on various cities, who said academia was wasted! Years of learning research taught us there had to be a definitive answer somewhere…right? Wrong. We spent the next day walking around London, often getting lost (well not totally lost, just slightly misplaced), finding our way again, and eventually ending up somewhere – usually a patisserie for coffee – or, bless ‘em, Starbucks, there is something about the familiar when you are feeling a little lost. We walked for miles and miles that day, not knowing where we were heading, but it felt so right. Back to the plan, we had to find THE place. So we headed off for a day to a city south of London. We thought from all we had heard, from our research and from a visit there many years ago that this might be the place. We arrived, hope in hand, open minded – all the prerequisites for navigating big change including finding Starbucks immediately. By mid-day we were both rather quiet, unusual for us, something wasn’t clicking. We were both trying to stay open-minded but when you know, you know, this was not THE place. So we headed back for the train to London, almost with relief. Another sleepless night, but for a different reason. We knew answer #2. Now you would think this would be a great moment of exhilaration, but answer #2 required a real brain adjustment. Were we ready to make it? Back to Peter Jones for tea while rather solemnly drinking in the view. Now we are only at day 5 and we have 3 weeks to go, already the bigger plan is out the window. Jumping ahead a couple of weeks (don’t worry we’ll tell you answer #2, but we digress) we spent a whole day hiking around Highgate Village and Hampstead Heath. If you’ve never been there it’s a suburb of London, one of the original villages now caught up in the whole. Now when we say hiking, we mean it, Highgate is the highest point in London…legs forgive us! Hampstead Heath itself is a massive (over 700 acre) green area with spectacular views. With a general armament of directions from the waiter at the patisserie as well as his cyclists map which he generously donated (yes we stopped for another tea break) we tackled the Heath, only to quickly realize that the myriad of paths, none well marked, lead off in every direction imaginable. Now the Heath also has a reputation, some of you will know it, so we knew we should be rather aware of which direction we were heading in! We were at point A and we knew where on the other side of the map point B was that we were looking for…it was the in between part that was the true test. Life can be so metaphorical at times! Here we stood, not having a clue which path to take. So we took our combined 32 years of advanced education along with our best problem solving skills and set off. Alright, we admit it, we shrugged and said “let’s try this one it has a bench on it!” When we arrived at the top of Parliament Hill, totally winded, the option of retracing our steps seemed a bad one, so we decided on the next most likely path and set off again. Our emotions ranged from calm and optimistic to worried with fleeting moments of being completely lost! The path we wanted was “just over there” but we didn’t know how to get to it. We carried on, but it began to look like we were heading into thick forest, not the safest option. It was at this point that the image of still wandering around the Heath by nightfall crossed our minds, contrary to our nature we decided to turn back. Thank goodness by the time we realized we needed to backtrack we were on flat ground! There is always a silver lining! When we came to the fork in the paths again we deduced, brilliantly, that the other option may be the one! What started out looking like another untrodden path began to have a little more life on it, we carried on, and although it sounds totally contrived, we literally began to see sunlight through the trees and just as suddenly as we had realized we were on the wrong path, we burst into a clearing with a magnificent sight of swimming ponds and swans and life abounding. After a good couple of hour of being lost on the Heath, albeit with wonderful views, we’d found the right path and arrived at Point B. The next morning, whilst drinking tea and nursing extremely sore muscles, it occurred to me that hiking around the Heath had emotionally felt like hiking in the Himalayas. Life can be so cliché, but the inner journey of discovery that had taken place during that day on the Heath had run the gamut from exhilaration and satisfaction to frustration and despair…from being lost to finally feeling found. So what was the answer to Question 2, if in England, where? It was right in front of us each time we stopped for tea – home for us will be London!
When faced with making big changes remember:
Here’s to finding your way out of the woods! Till next month…
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