The importance of having fun with Carmen Alfonso Rico
Make Space for Growth Podcast
You can feel the energy in the voice or the video. It is contagious. A breath of fresh air in a world that is almost afraid of joy. That is how I felt coming out of recording the new season of the podcast with Carmen Alfonso Rico. It is not every day that you meet someone who is unapologetic about having fun and enjoying what she is doing. Kicking off with politics Carmen wanted to be the US Secretary of State when she was a little girl. Note she was not a US national or living in the US, but that did not seem to stop her. Serendipity determined she would start her career in...
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Listening to Yourself with Samreen Ghani
Make Space for Growth Podcast
Before the summer break, I reconnected with old colleague Samreen Ghani to talk about her journey and her role as President of Moonbug Studios. It had been a long time since our M&A times together! And we end up finding ourselves in a similar life reflection on "how you measure your life"! The Early Days Samreen did not follow the expected path. Her earliest memory from childhood was spelling the word "doctor", which was exciting for her parents as she grew up. In Pakistan, her expected paths would have been doctor, engineer, lawyer or banker if she wanted to define herself...
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Believing in Serendipity with Rita Vilas-Boas
Make Space for Growth Podcast
Rita Vilas Boas first connected with me on Linkedin. After a lot of online engagement, we finally met in person last year to find out we shared . When she was a little girl, Rita wanted to dismantle things and figure out how things worked, but deep down, she wanted to be part of Fame, and dance on a Taxi roof in the streets of New York. Can you picture it? Different lives Rita studied biotechnology but soon found out about marketing, where she started her career. She threw herself into it and got a job at Loreal. For 20 years, she was a marketer in multinationals and large family...
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Finding your happiness with Sabine Tejerina
Make Space for Growth Podcast
When she was a little girl, Sabine wanted to be a businesswoman. In the middle of the pandemic, faced with economic distress in parts of the world and her day job helping large companies restructure and prepare for the economic downfall of Covid, she went on a life change. She became an entrepreneur and has since then been living the rollercoaster of start-up life. "It's not always the big decisions that impact your life", Clay Christensen Share ownership as a goal The idea for Upstreet started with a focus on rewarding customers for loyalty through company shares. Research shows that...
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A life dedicated to purpose with Daniela Barone Soares
Make Space for Growth Podcast
It is unusual to find someone who wanted to be something as a child that they are today. Daniela started volunteering at age 12 and she always knew her life would be dedicated to making the problems of the world better. These experiences increased her resolve to do something about it, even if she did not know how. A glide path "When you look back, it all seems to make sense" Daniela However, it was not so rational at the time. As Daniela was working in Private Equity, she realized her skillset was truly invaluable in the social sector and realized she could start making a difference in this...
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A life dedicated to purpose with Daniela Barone Soares
Make Space for Growth Podcast
It is unusual to find someone who wanted to be something as a child that they are today. Daniela started volunteering at age 12 and she always knew her life would be dedicated to making the problems of the world better. These experiences increased her resolve to do something about it, even if she did not know how. A glide path "When you look back, it all seems to make sense" Daniela However, it was not so rational at the time. As Daniela was working in Private Equity, she realized her skillset was truly invaluable in the social sector and realized she could start making a difference in this...
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Never waste a good crisis with Inês Santos Silva
Make Space for Growth Podcast
With a love for learning since early age, I have a feeling Inês will be learning for many years to come. She is passionate about innovation, and is not scared about solving a challenge. You just have to look at her resume to see this. I lost count of the number of roles and ventures in her profile. A fast-starter Ines assessed start-ups needed support way before it was cool to talk about accelerator programs. So she designed one. And expanded it to multiple cities. She determined there was a need for social ventures long before social impact was a concept. So she dedicated her efforts...
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Never waste a good crisis with Ines Santos Silva
Make Space for Growth Podcast
With a love for learning since early age, I have a feeling Inês will be learning for many years to come. She is passionate about innovation, and is not scared about solving a challenge. You just have to look at her resume to see this. I lost count of the number of roles and ventures in her profile. A fast-starter Ines assessed start-ups needed support way before it was cool to talk about accelerator programs. So she designed one. And expanded it to multiple cities. She determined there was a need for social ventures long before social impact was a concept. So she dedicated her efforts...
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Creating Space - Launching Season 3
Make Space for Growth Podcast
Today, I am bringing you the launch of Season 3 - Creating Space. In order to tell you more about the upcoming season, I feel I need to go back in time and explain my concept of word of the year. Because Space is my word of the year. For the last 3 years, I have been defining myself a word of the year. Why a word of the year? I already have goals, values, and even a vision board. I found a word goes beyond and through all that. A word gives me a true north. Believe In 2020, my word of the year was . And that belief helped me hold it together - do you remember the year of Covid? I acted...
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A Journey back through the Season
Make Space for Growth Podcast
For the Season Finale, I went around the world and down into my memory to pick the highlights of this season. What I learnt, what I discovered, what I was impressed about. There is no bittersweet taste in getting to the end of a season. In fact, it is exciting to look back and remember all the amazing women that crossed my path. After the hard to forget year of 2020, my goal was to bring to light in 2021, the stories of what are now almost 2 years of this pandemic, but more importantly, how each of us is looking to lift ourselves up, look forward and face life stronger and together. As for...
info_outlineI have long wanted to interview Francesca Geens. She was one of the first women I reached out to during the first season. However, there was a lot going on in the Happy Self Journal world and it was not until I exchanged emails with Francesca about her newest journal edition for 3-6 years old, that we used the opportunity to schedule a date. It was hard to stop our chat, even after we stopped recording! What she is doing for gratitude and children is just the type of thing I love!
Gratitude
Yes, this will be yet another article talking A LOT about gratitude and the importance it has in our lives. I have shared a lot before about my gratitude practice and how I started it 3 years ago. It has certainly helped my perspective and reminds me of all the small things that can exist, even on a bad day.
As to Francesca, her trigger was all the stories she was hearing in the press about children being depressed. She became very interested in the science of happiness and how simple habits can have a meaningful impact on our wellbeing. In 2017, she started working on the concept and launched the Happy Self Journal in 2018. Her passion project is now her full-time business and she is selling in more than 150 countries.
"Just a few minutes of reflection a day give children the space to think about their emotions, be grateful for the positives in their lives and develop a positive attitude"
The Science of Gratitude
If we practice gratitude, scientists are able to measure the impact on our happiness after 1 week, 1 month, 3 months or even 6 months. It actually reinforces the positive pathways in our system. It is such a simple thing with such a great impact. More importantly, Francesca is taking gratitude to another level, she is taking is to children.
With a journal, the kids get a structure to have a safe, normal space to share things that are usually not easy to talk about. Francesca is also getting a lot of feedback that the kids are sleeping better and communicating better. As an added benefit, the parents are also feeling better, as many of them are doing the journals with the children and end up reflecting on their own 3 things for the day or on the quote that Francesca adds to every page. Ours today was:
"Your world is as big as you make it"
Georgia Douglas Johnson
I have started Little Girl C on the Happy Self Junior Journal 3 years ago, and whilst we don't always keep up every day, the first year has definitely changed our family a fair amount. That is how we found out about bullying, that is how we can get her to express some of the anxiety when she struggles, or how we get her to have a moment of reflection and wind down before going to bed. It works for us. And now, Baby S is a fan as well and is almost through his first journal. He told me he would keep it until he was 100 years old today.
Ramping up through the pandemic
"This has been a crazy year!"
Right? I am certain we all agree with Francesca on this. In the beginning, they did not even know if they could continue shipping, or if their warehouses would stay open, topped with the chaos in the postal system. At the same time, at the start of the first lockdown, anxiety levels were very high and the uncertainty was really stressing kids, so the orders were also dramatically increasing.
In 2020, the team launched a lot of new products. Whilst they had products planned for the year, the combination of having nowhere else to go and the immense need that they observed, made them accelerate some of their plans. They launched a teen edition, a continuation edition and did the work to the newest My First Journal (officially launched this week).
One thing that had not been planned at all was to apply to Innovate Finance UK, which allowed them to distribute thousands of journals to children on free school meals, children that were least likely to get hold of their journal. This was one of the highs of the pandemic, which allowed them to do good with their business in an extra way. For Francesca and her team, to get the funding and deliver the journals on a very tight timeline was a reason for great pride.
Are people more grateful now?
Before the pandemic, a lot of parents assumed they did not need such a tool. Their life was fine, their kids were happy. Why would they need a tool to work on their happiness?
However, once the pandemic hit us, there was no escaping. The background or financial situation did not matter. Everyone got hit in some way. The pandemic reminded us that life has ups and downs (and will continue to do so) and that there are tools we can use to deal with it in a better way. The pandemic was such a huge event that it made people sit back and realize the magnitude of the problem. And find ways to address it.
Chickens for Lockdown
I know - chickens! I have been wondering about the chickens on Francesca's Instagram story. The chickens were meant to be an Easter Project, but as lockdown started, the family anticipated it, as suddenly everyone wanted chickens and wanted to be self-sufficient. So they got 3 chickens that really created a different routine and small joys and it was a perfect distraction for them.
At the same time, the family tried to slow down, have lots of walks and taken one day at a time, enjoying the small things. Francesca tried to practise what she preaches and gratitude played a part. The family keeps their gratitude journals, they share their top 3 things at dinner, they have a gratitude jar (which I am yet to get), try to get themselves outdoors and get enough daylight.
It is about the micro-moments and how they end up really add up. Big changes don't always work, small micro changes do (have you heard me say this before). Sometimes we try and over-engineer too much and simple things may sort it out.
"It's ok to sit and do nothing"
The gratitude jar
If you are not into a daily gratitude practice but want to try some of its benefits, maybe the gratitude jar is for you. All you need is a glass jar, pen and paper. So after a great day, write down a memory of that day and go round the table for everyone to do it. The best of it? To open it at the end of the year to remember what the year has brought you. This is next on my list.
Looking forward
When we can go to concerts, restaurants and parties, will we still be worried about being grateful? Hopefully, yes. Many of us found an increased ability to connect to us, to our children, to our families. Together with Francesca, I hope we can find some lasting change in this and can take as positive from this situation.
In her business, Francesca also sees new opportunities and new markets. The company is only 2 years old and has already gone through so much growth. But the last year it has certainly gotten the confidence to really speak up about their product and what they have to offer. I can't wait to see what else they will bring!
Before we go…
- 2020 Advice: Go back to the simple things and find ways to switch off (and get more chickens, or something silly that gives you joy)
- 2020 Lesson: Step back and realise what you can go through staying positive
- 2020 Challenge: Wi-fi (they are very rural and have no mobile reception!)
- Book for 2021: Mindset, Carol Dweck
- Word for 2021: Growth
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