Welcome.

Autumn has arrived here in London. And fittingly this newsletter offers you a full harvest of events and news.

You’ll find here information about two public Leadership Embodiment weekends I am running in London the next few months, plus an announcement about the launch of the Centre for Embodied Wisdom, an initiative I have been working on over the last year and which now goes public!

Finally there’s a quick head’s up about events in the UK around the launch of Wendy Palmer’s new book and her November visit.

LE Fundamentals/Level 1

My next Leadership Embodiment Fundamentals course in East London is on the weekend of November 2-3rd. I love offering this course which introduces the foundations of all our embodiment work: getting to know our own patterns, rediscovering our capacity to be centered and glorious in the face of pressure, taking a stand for what we believe, and finding more compassion for us all in the face of the world’s demands.If you haven’t done this, perhaps now is the time. If you have, you may wish to return to practice on this weekend. Be great to have you there. Details on the link above.

LE Intermediate/Level 2

Already done a Leadership Embodiments Fundamentals course? With me or others? Take the next step and join James Knight and myself on January 18-19th for the LE Intermediate Course. This deepens and expands the work of the Fundamentals, introducing more challenging exercises and complex dynamics. It enables further exploration of your patterns and capacity to be more centered under pressure. I explore in more detail your three centres, and your ability to be inclusive even when challenged by people or circumstances. Use of the bokken (wooden sword) is also a key and popular part of this course, giving you a really powerful way to mobilise and shape your energy around an intention.  Details on the link above.

Launch of the Centre for Embodied Wisdom.

An exciting, big development. Over the last year I have been working with two very valued, impressive colleagues, James Knight and Anouk Brack. We have just launched a major new initiative:- the Centre for Embodied Wisdom. The Centre’s website is now up, we have a valued and growing Facebook page and we are now offering our first courses to the world. The Centre will be offering access to the full range of Leadership Embodiment courses from Fundamentals and Intermediate, to the LE Retreat and Coach Training. You can find details of all this at the site. We will also be offering courses designed specifically for teachers, parents and business. Eventually we will be offering online courses and have already started giving you access to a range of voices connected to embodiment and wisdom. We’re very excited about it, and hope you will be too.

 As the Centre develops you’ll find many voices and perspectives, courses and resources, all building our ability to embody wise, effective and compassionate action in the world.

 Clearcircle will continue to exist as a vehicle for much of my coaching and consultancy work. But the Centre will now be the main vehicle for my embodiment work. If you are interested in this aspect, please go to the Centre’s site and sign up for our emails. Or join our Facebook page, The Body of Wisdom.

Wendy Palmer’s New book launch.

Many of us here are getting excited about the imminent launch of Wendy Palmer’s third book in the Autumn. It’s called Leadership Embodiment: How the Way We Sit and Stand Can Change the Way We Think and Speak.  Wendy has teamed up with neuroscientist Janet Crawford in the writing of the book, and if you are interested in this fascinating and growing science you’ll be as eager as us to get hold of a copy too.

Wendy is visiting the UK as part of the launch and is doing a public Masterclass workshop on November 9th and an evening event at The Canal Museum from 7-9pm on 13th November.

 Coaching places available.

I have space for some one-to-one coaching over the next few months. If you are interested in this, particularly embodiment coaching, please get in touch now by simply emailing me back. I love having the time to work with individuals and offer them tools to live life more positively, compassionately and effectively.

New blog.

Lastly you can read my new blog on the Centre for Embodied Wisdom site on my daughters Karate lessons, power and kindness. Click here on the link.

That’s it for the Autumn. If there are ways of being of service to you or your organisations, don’t hesitate to get in touch.

 Be well everyone.

John Tuite.

By some accounts Carl Jung’s favourite story went something like this.

“A tribe sent seekers out into the desert searching for the Water of Life.  The Water showed itself in the world by bubbling forth from an artesian well. After a long journey the seekers came upon the well and drank from its invigorating waters. They felt life surge through them and were truly satisfied.

They sent for the tribe, which soon arrived. There were many people gathered around the spring, so a wall was built to protect the purity of its crystal water. As the people arrived shops and buildings sprang up. Roads were built. Eventually to organise access and pay for the necessary administrative costs a charge was made for drinking from the vitalising waters. Still the people came.

And then one day the people woke up and the Water of Life had gone.

Water still flowed, but it was not the Water of Life.

People drank, but in time realised their loss.

The people sent seekers out and the cycle began again.”

I find this story immensely rich, layered and resonant. Like the water itself any attempt to pin it down simply fails as it takes itself off to another place.

I am often reminded of it in numerous conversations I have with teachers (and others in vocational or artistic occupations). For many the initial impulse or purpose that sent them into teaching was strong. Like the Water of Life it invigorates and energises. A real and deeply felt connection to the external and inner world can materialise through entry into a such a vocation. Naturally we build around this. We learn the profession’s language and behaviours, we join a school or organisation, we construct a career.

Yet a certain percentage of those who I sit in conversation with are there because unknown to them the Water of Life has shifted. Often some time ago. They are left with the infrastructure of purpose and the necessary arrangements of a life centered on something very important. But the Water has gone. They work hard and for a time ignore the dryness of the experience, the diminishing satisfaction and the growing sense of lost connection.

It is time to seek again.

Human beings are creatures of loss and discovery. Our souls are designed to pulse between the tasks of seeking and the tasks of settling. This is a necessary rhythm, and denying either side of it denies the other. We must go out. We must come back.

When we realise that the Water of Life has shifted this demands we begin the search, the enquiry again. It may not be a physical change that is needed. Indeed a physical change is a powerful way to delay the real confrontation that is needed between the old and the new arrangement. Changing job, exiting a marriage, buying a motorbike at 45 may not be what is required. Sometimes it is a deep internal seeking. It might be a reconnection to the body, enabling us again to recover the natural intelligence of our childhood and follow the perhaps now faint trace lines of our own satisfaction, wherever they may lead. An enquiry into “what the soft animal of the body loves” as Mary puts it. It may be as simple and hard as building into our work-life enough stoppage time for us to experience the satisfaction of a job done well, rather than speed on to the next task ad infinitum. Sometimes we can live at such a density and speed that the Water of Life cannot enter us. It may be to rediscover a spiritual practice or to drop a long-held grievance or sorrow that has distorted the way we touch and are touched by the world around us.

I find this story incredible optimistic because I see two qualities to the Water of Life.

Firstly, its nature is to move and refuse limitation.

Secondly, its nature is to be found and re-found.

If the shifting Water of Life naturally creates the Seeker we can be hopeful, because it is clear that it desires the Seeker as much as the Seeker desires it.