Useful Links

Coaches Training Institute – (www.thecoaches.com)

This is the organisation with whom I have learned to coach. It is a vibrant world-wide network and some of the people I have trained with, and been trained by, are among the most impressive people I have had the good fortune to interact with.

Mankind Project – (www.mkp.org.uk)

I’ve belonged to two Men’s Groups; the first ran for 12+ years and I still meet up with two of my fellow men every couple of months, more than 15 years on. Now, I benefit from belonging to a men’s group which meets fortnightly; we’ve all done self-development work with MKP, and value the chance to share a supportive and authentic connection, which allows for the presence of the good, the (so called) bad and the ugly; all emotions and all feelings. 

Women in Power – (www.womeninpowerprogram.com)

A female equivalent, and I see the impact they’ve had on my partner and other women I’ve met who are involved – they rock! 

Boarding School Survivors – (www.boardingschoolsurvivors.co.uk)

I went to boarding school at a young age, and scars from this experience lie deep. My journey from under their malign influence began with work I did with Nick Duffell and Boarding School Survivors. Recommend his books and ‘The Making of Them’ film too.

Poetry – (www.kimrosen.net)

I often share poems that have had an impact on me with friends and coaching clients. I have been influenced by the work of Kim Rosen, whose book, Saved by a Poem, is a wonderful introduction to the power of poetry – poetry learned, spoken, shared – to change lives. I was introduced to her work by my friend John Hillman www.johnhillman.org

Poetry

This is where I post the text, and home-made audio recordings, of poems that inspire me.

Appointed Rounds, by Louis Jenkins

I was introduced to this poem, and others by Louis Jenkins, by Robert Bly on a Men's retreat many years ago. It was the first time I had felt drunk on poetry and by the time Bly came to read this, we were ready for anything. The laughter and joy filled the room. My reading of it, alone and without an audience, is far too sober for such a joyous poem, but there we go. Louis Jenkins is also admired by the actor Mark Rylance; the first two times he won a Tony award in New York, Rylance devoted his entire speech to reciting a Jenkins prose poem (see video links below), to the bafflement of the showbiz audience. I wrote to Jenkins, via his website, to say how joyful I was that Mark had given his poems this space, and he responded quickly and kindly, wondering whether for some of the viewers, it might have been the first poem they ever heard, and how extraordinary that would be.

At first he refused to deliver junk mail because it was stupid, all those deodorant ads, money-making ideas and contests. Then he began to doubt the importance of the other mail he carried. He began to select first class mail randomly for nondelivery. After he had finished his mail route each day he would return home with his handful of letters and put them in the attic. He didn’t open them and never even looked at them again. It was as if he were an agent of Fate, capricious and blind. In the several years before he was caught, friends vanished, marriages failed, business deals fell through. Toward the end he became more and more bold, deleting houses, then whole blocks from his route. He began to feel he’d been born in the wrong era. If only he could have been a Pony Express rider galloping into some prairie town with an empty bag, or the runner from Marathon collapsing in the streets of Athens, gasping, “No news.” 

Firestacks

This website is illustrated with images of Firestacks, works made by my cousin, the artist Julie Brook. As cousins, I have known and lived with her work for many years, and these have always moved me very much. I love the way in which they combine the elements of earth (stone), fire, water and air so completely and I am moved by the way in which the fire holds on as the stacks are engulfed by water; what an image of resilience! 

In May 2016 there was a BBC4 documentary about Land Art called Forest/Field/Sky, presented by Dr James Fox, and Julie was one of the artists he met and watched at work, building a Firestack, more than 20 years after she had first worked in this way. The image above was taken during the making of that film.

The coaching community

Life Coaching has become an overused term; we seem to be everywhere! This is down to two things, one good, one less positive. 

At its best, Coaching is being recognised for the beneficial impact it can have on individuals and organisations. In our frenetic, over-stimulated society, the chance to stop, take stock and be supported by someone skilled in asking the right questions, is proving to be a valuable resource for society as a whole, and more and more industries and employers recognise this.

Less positive is that it is perhaps too easy to call yourself a Coach; there is no minimum qualification or depth of experience, and so coaches are springing up everywhere, and quality will inevitably vary.

Through my training with CTI, and in my practice as a Coach, I have come across some absolutely inspirational coaches and others committed to similar goals. Find out more about some of them here:

Jacqui Sjenitzer 

Joanna Watters  

Nick Kettles

John-Paul Flintoff

Richard Topham

Duncan Muller

Jamie Catto

Dave Rock

Amanda Livermore

Fiona Sturrock

'It is important that awake people, be awake'

I first came across this poem, 'A Ritual to Read to each other', and its poet William Stafford, in 1990, when the American poet Robert Bly read it as part of an evening of poetry on a men’s retreat, and I felt I was hearing words that spoke to my soul’s purpose, words that set out some simple, challenging truths that could guide me if I chose to listen. I do believe that it is, as he says, important that 'awake people be awake'; it’s what I want for myself and for everyone I meet, coach, work and share life with.

“A Ritual To Read To Each Other

If you don’t know the kind of person I am

and I don’t know the kind of person you are

a pattern that others made may prevail in the world

and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.

For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,

a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break

sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood

storming out to play through the broken dyke.

And as elephants parade holding each elephant’s tail,

but if one wanders the circus won’t find the park,

I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty

to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.

And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,

a remote important region in all who talk:

though we could fool each other, we should consider–

lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.

For it is important that awake people be awake,

or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;

the signals we give–yes or no, or maybe–
should be clear:
the darkness around us is deep.”

— William Stafford

There is a crack in everything

Leonard Cohen’s song Anthem speaks so simply of the need to accept our vulnerability, our shadow, our imperfect selves: ‘There is a crack, a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in’.

Silence after music

This performance of an epic Mahler symphony moves me most for its dying moments and the profound silence that follows between orchestra and audience. In that silence we get to hear ourselves. 

Gustav Mahler Symphony No 9.

 1: Andante comodo 2: Im Tempo 3: Rondo-Burleske Allegro 4: Adagio.

August 2010

My musician brother & sister

I have two siblings, both of them musicians, both taking very different paths to express their musical gifts.

My sister Tarisha, is a singer-songwriter, whose songs I love. www.tarisha.co.uk  She also uses music to heal and rejuvenate, in her Singing Medicine workshops http://www.tarisha.co.uk/workshops.html

My brother Tom is a classical conductor. www.tomseligman.com He has also founded a charity called Five Senses Music, on whose Board I am proud to sit, dedicated to the sharing of live music with as wide an audience as possible; their first project in early 2016 was based on Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring www.riteupclose.com