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January/February 2009
Waipapa Marae – Kawhia, New Zealand January 2009.
 I
was in Mauritius when I heard the news of David’s death. I’d
just sat down to breakfast when the voice on my Blackberry asked
whether it was the right thing to do to send flowers to New Zealand.
I couldn’t be there for the farewell on the Marae or for the
service at the Salvation Army that followed so it was important
to me that there would be an occasion to close a time of sadness
one year later.
Dafanie and Nigel, very old friends of David and recently our
friends, drove us to Kawhia, home of David’s ancestral Marae
on the west coast of the North Island. David’s mother, Betty,
sister, Barbara, niece, Sheryl and her family met us outside the
Marae and primed us for Powhiri – the official Maori welcome
to visitors onto ancestral land.
 This
Marae is small and not the only Marae that sits at the edge of Kawhia
Harbour. The history of the area is rich in Maori lore and holds
a very special place in the heart of the Tainui tribe as the sacred
landing site of one of the 7 waka (large canoes) that brought the
Maori to the shores of New Zealand a few centuries earlier. Today
it is a sleepy holiday hollow that offers fresh fish from the harbour
and the standard Kiwi hokey-pokey ice cream – what more can
one want in life – seriously………… never
mind that there is no bank or cash distributor in town!
David used to come here once a year to resource, run healing retreats
and to be with his family. His photo is now on the wall of the wharenui
(meeting house) next to his ancestors and I sleep on a mattress
on the floor just underneath it.
 But
I am ahead of my story now.First we have to be given permission
to come on to the Marae.
The small welcoming party is waiting for us and the leading woman
calls us on to the Marae in a Maori that comes from an ancestral
soundscape. We file on to the lawn doing our best to respect the
protocol of women followed by men until we come to be seated and
the seating order is reversed: men in front of women. Her husband,
the official dignitary for the ceremony, makes a speech in Maori
accompanied by the appropriate facial expressions and skipping /
hopping movements associated with the formality of the welcome.
It lasts for several minutes and while the words escape us its meaning
is perfectly clear. The couple then sings together in a tone infused
with nostalgia for another time, another place. It is then our turn
to respond. Our spokesperson returns the welcome in French that
is both elegant and perfectly adapted to the formality of the occasion.
I am the only one who can appreciate the beauty of his words and
there are tears of gratitude in my eyes that he should raise so
masterfully to such a foreign situation. He concludes his speech
with a boisterous rendition of La Marseillaise and judging by the
gapping grin on the face of one of the young lads in the welcoming
party, there are followers of international rugby present. An envelope
is then placed by our representative on the ground equidistant between
the two parties. Our financial contribution to the Marae is officially
recognised and we are given right of entry: “you are our family
now; our doors are open to you while you are here”. We are
served lunch and tea in the wharekai (dining room) and for brief
2 days we become a part of David’s ancestral heritage.
 I
discover the gentle sweetness of his mother, the fun and kindness
of his sister and the same quietness of character as David, in his
niece. We share local Kiwi fare: fish ‘n’ chips in newspaper.
I go with the family in a small ferry boat to the head of the harbour
where Betty wanders slowly along the paths of her childhood. I discover
Jurasic rock formations and the proverbial Kiwi bach – a shack
on the beach with a tin roof. I body surf some great waves on Ocean
Beach with Nigel and we forget our plus 55 years. At sunset the
whole party piles into a four wheel drive and we head out again
for the beach at low tide. We dig holes in the sand and wait for
the thermal heat to surge up and warm us. David loved to soak like
this waiting for the tide to come in, so I am told. We are happy.
We share David stories over dinner and I believe that we are all
healing in some private way. Gratitude is replacing sorrow and loss
and life is moving on again. For his family it cannot be the same
without him but for friends………….. well………,
we can just be thankful for the gifts we received; for the time
we spent with him; for the learning; for the laughter.
March 6th 2009.
September - December 2008
Lynne Burney as "Experienced" by Christèle
Chauchereau
During Lynne Burney's workshop at SFCoach in November 2008, Lynne
invited her audience to experiment with David Grove's CLEAN numbers
(emergent knowledge). Read more on Christèle Chauchereau's
blog, "ACCOMPAGNER
LA PERFORMANCE."
Raw Ritings
A James Nave presents "Raw Ritings,"
a creative writing workshop in Paris, December 12, 2008.
Click here
for more details.
July/August 2008
DREAM TEAM: LKB School of Team Coaching Promo 6 2008
My team partner, Corinne Devery, and I completed our 6th team coaching
school early July. As you know from reading other parts of this
website the school runs over 4 months and trains coaches and consultants
to work with company teams. What also happens as a by product of
the course is that participants build up a lot of team spirit out
of the considerable diversity and limited motivation they arrive
with (coaches are coaches because they love to work WITH teams in
companies not IN them!)
Corinne and I salute them as living examples of what happens when
willingness and intelligence meets talent and curiosity! Click
here to view their faces
Well done Team!
News from Down Under
Let me mention again that my sister is an artist in Christchurch
- New
Zealand and this is her latest exhibition.
May/June 2008
June– 2 Conferences for LKB
CLEAN Conference in London
June was about work and more work but mostly about two conferences.
The first CLEAN Conference took place in London
June 21st & 22nd. I shared a 90 minute work shop with
Jennifer de Gandt on David Grove’s latest experimental field
before he died: Emergent Knowledge. Our task was to look at the
moment when a client's "story" deconstructs creating the
"space" for new information and learning to emerge. Jennifer
focused on the theories supporting our observations from work in
the field and I described a practical in-company application for
a team.
Post workshop comments were:
- “Lynne is a great speaker with concrete examples and
sharing of experiences.”
“Didn’t expect to hear so well an experience relating
to my work in business.”
“Superb, feeling empowered.”
“Originality.”
“Various, intelligent, pleasing.”
“Infectious enthusiasm buoyed presentations.”
“A useful session.”
“Exciting insight hits brainstorm.”
“Feel inspired to learn more and will re-look at rest
of presentations, to potentially change which sessions next.”
European Coaching Conference in Geneva, Switzerland
The following week I ran another 90 minute workshop on the same
theme at the European Coaching Conference in Geneva. Some post workshop
comments were:
“…………..At some stage I would be interested
to hear more of the work that you do. – I am sorry, I did
not have a chance to hear more of your stories on David (in particular
the stories “a la Castaneda”). Hope, that one day I
will hear more…”
“………….It was a real pleasure to help
you deliver this fantastic workshop and thus help the whole community
to do a step forward………….”
“……………….Yes, I say that
unreservedly despite your nationality! I thoroughly enjoyed your
session and am just about to order Metaphors in Mind. (I read the
reviews on Amazon and it sounds great). Thanks………….”
“……….Great presentation and such a positive
presence. It was delightful to meet you.”
« Ta présence, ton calme, ta joie et ton partage furent
un grand cadeau. Merci à David et à sa messagère
pour m’avoir donné les 6 étapes qu’il
faut laisser à notre conscience pour qu’elle trouve
notre vrai question/réponse. »
May - Japan - 10 days in the land of the rising sun.
I LOVED every inch of the Japan that I saw in just 10 days: from
Osaka to Kyoto to Nara to Toba to Mount Koya to Hiroshima to Tokyo.
Well almost………. I wasn’t so keen on Karioke
or Pechenko (deafening, mindless and addictive gaming parlours)
or the ice cold porn of some of the mangas (Japanese comic book)
but the rest was a visual feast: The cherry blossom was still in
bloom along the Philosophers Way in Kyoto. Geishas flitted along
the narrow alley ways of the Gion district like so many tiny tropical
birds and butterflies. Tokyo truly was an amazing city of neon lights,
skyscrapers and hotel rooms that you can rent by the hour. The Golden
Pavilion do merit pages of poetic expression and the Zen gardens
of Roanji do incite dreams of eternity while remaining aware of
the futility of the exercise. The peace monument in Hiroshima does
require us to remember the destruction that man is capable of when
he plays with magnificently dangerous toys.
But what I remember most is the exquisite communal bathing habits
of the Japanese. The Onsen. A place where women gather to cleanse
and bathe collectively - silent sensual Zen located somewhere close
to paradise.
I loved the way food was served - never eaten so healthily and
so consistently in my life. I was seriously impressed by the orderly,
non aggressive behaviour of ALL the Japanese people including the
millions crossing the road in Tokyo!
I loved the temples, the tatamis and the kimonos. Of course I
don't know how Japan feels from the "inside" but from
the outside looking in it was a glimpse of the sensual Divine.
March/April
2008
The Writing Salon at La Bouvetière with James Navé
March 25th, 26th & 27th 2008
It happened again!
 Kate,
Kris, Catherine, Jennifer, Adrian and Lynne met again for three
days out in the Normandy country side to write “from the imaginative
storm” and to “wade through the swamp of our psychology”.
We explored the tension of the space between the Storm and the Form
where the creative thrill and sheer joy of feeling words tumble
out of my mouth in a wild array of colours, sounds and forms met
the task maker, the one who takes each word, each line and starts
to transform the parts into a coherent whole that someone else might
be able to read and understand. We used music as a prepping device
this year and there was a magical moment when James, on words and
Jean-Louis on sax jammed together making poetry jazz. We prepped
our bodies to Coltrane and practised performance poetry by reading
TS Elliot’s “The Hollow Men”.
 It
was three days of reframing for me personally. I discovered terms
like “the word trade” for describing the job of a poet
who crafts the spoken word. And “communicating on behalf of
the space between” which means opening oneself up to whatever
arises in the creative space – the storming space, then being
willing to receive whatever shows up as an offering and finally
being willing to work at applying one’s skill as a communicator
to that gift which can, then, be given to others. When one does
that one becomes a translator of the space between.
 One
of our exercises consisted of making up a crazy line of disparate
words, putting them in a hat and two people had to come “on
stage” and improvise a dialogue using the line one of them
had pulled out of the hat. Adrian pulled out my line which was “and
in that space that skipped between your legs, what music emerged?”
The following hilarious dialogue is what Adrian and Kris improvised.
You have to hear Kris’s American accent and Adrian’s
Irish accent as you read this. It has all the delicious flavours
of Pinter and Beckett.
OUR FIRST DATE
A: And in that space that skipped between your
legs, what music emerged?
K: That was a little bit intimate.
A: There’s music in my question.
K: Ah, I see. Music. I don’t know if that
helps. Could you tell me a little bit more about what kind of, you
know, question this is?
A: It’s talking about space, the space that
may exist, using the length. It's just a way of showing what’s
inbetween.
K: Yea I’ve never really thought of music
that way.
A: Maybe when we dance, we move our legs, we dance
to the music. Do you like dancing?
K: I do.
A: What type of dancing?
K: You know, regular dancing.
A: On your own.
K: Alone or with someone, that happens too.
A: Yea, and with music, yea
K: With music generally, yea. I’ll bet you
want to know what kind of music, right?
A: Absolutely! Absolutely!
K: I thought you would want to know that. I do
like folk music. Jazz.
A: Jazz
K: Jazz, in order to dance to. Pop music. How about
you?
A: I like all types of music. I love. Depends on
the mood I’m in. Whatever.
K: It does depend on the mood doesn’t it?
A: Absolutely.
K: And, uh, what kind of mood are you in?
A: I’m in a happy mood, a happy go luck mood.
We have to get to understand the space between our legs and what
sort of music emerges from it. I’m not sure if we’re
getting any nearer to understanding it. I don’t think I’m
understanding quite what was meant by it.
K: Interesting the concept. I’m not so sure
how close we can get to the concept though.
A: Maybe I read it wrong. Perhaps there’s
some nuance that we’ve missed. “And in that space that
slipped,” Space that slipped?
K: Sound a bit Freudian to me.
A: “Between your legs.”
K: Ummm
A: “What music emerged?”
K: Don’t you think that’s a little
suggestive?
A: I never remember.
K: Who would ask a question like that? Wow. Do
you usually ask questions like that on first dates?
A: Not normally.
K: That’s what I thought.
A: But I needed something to start the conversation.
You know when you’re trying to start a discussion you have
to think of something of different.
K: If you live with your parents it could get old.
The music was interesting.
A: I wanted to find out if you had a sense of humour.
K: A duality, you are quite original.
A: Well that’s what’s emerging from
this.
K: I’m sorry but
A: Maybe I like dancing on music. I like dancing
on record, seeing what happens.
K: Well, we can try that.
A: See what comes out of that and see what emerges.
You what to try that?
K: Why not I’m pretty well game for anything
at this stage.
A: Do you have a vinyl record we could stand on?
K: No, I don’t. I don’t. No. Then we
could . . .
A: Then we could. Let’s pretend there’s
a record there, we’ll dance on it and see what emerges from
between our legs. Try it. Imagine there’s a record.
K: I’m imagining.
A: What sort of sound emerged do you think.
K: Well you know. It kind of took the wind out
of my sails to put it simple. I’m sorry, I just not use to
this kind of conversation on a first date.
A: Really.
K: Yea.
A: What kind of people do you date?
K: Normal. Regular people. Usually quite boring,
you know, I must admit there’s a difference.
A: But I thought if you liked dancing,
K: I do, I do.
A: you’d like dancing on the record.
K: With no music, no record, no
A: Making a cracking noise when you dance on it.
That’s music any sort of nice music, isn’t it?
K: What do you do?
A: What do I do?
K: Yea. Do you have a profession, a job?
A: I’m just someone who does odd jobs. Odd
Job Man.
K: Odd job man. Yes. I don’t know why I’m
not so surprised. What sort of odd jobs do you do?
A: Anything anyone wants done, I can do it for
them.
K: Do you do gardening.
A: Huh?
K: Gardening?
A: Oh very good.
K: I need a gardener actually.
A: Yea.
K: Huh.
A: Yea.
A: My Company is called Bodget and Bodget.
K: You’re joking?
A: No but it’s a good name. That’s
what I do.
K: Uh, huh. You hungry? Are we sure of something
to eat?
A: I don’t think we are getting too far in
my line of conversation.
K: I think it’s a little bit too soon. I
have to warm up a little.
A: At least you’re warming up.
K: Oh sure, sure.
A: You’re happy.
K: Yes I’m having quite a time.
A: So, we’ll have something to eat. What
would you like to eat?
K: How about some tea and cookies.
A: Tea?
K: Tea and cookies would be nice.
A: And what do you think I should have?
K: I hadn’t thought of what I should think
of what you should have. Now that you mentioned it, how about tea
and cookies?
A: It’s not the sort of thing an odd job
man should be seen drinking.
K: Oh no, really.
A: Not really.
K: What do you odd job men drink anyway?
A: Oh, I think it has to be beer or something like
that.
K: Oh Okay, you’d rather go to a pub or something?
A: Fish and Chips?
K: Oh Okay.
A: You like fish and chips?
K: Sure fish and chips. But it’s four o’clock
in the afternoon, I’m not really hungry.
A: That’s a problem too; I have to work flexi
hours. So I have to eat when I can.
K: You know, why don’t we meet on a Sunday
afternoon? You can come and see my garden.
A: Yea, maybe I can do something on the garden.
Maybe you can bring you fish and chips if you’re hungry.
K: Why don’t we cool it? And you can give
me a call later.
A: Yes that’s a good idea. I’ll call
you later.
K: It’s been nice meeting you.
A: Nice meeting you too. I’ll call you soon.
K: Goodbye.
Transcript by James Navé
EGG Meeting – Avignon April 11th & 12th 2008.
 EGG
is a group of European professional coaches who meet twice a year
in a different country to Explore and Grow together. We have been
meeting like this since October 2001. We have met in Paris, London,
Vienna, Geneva, Barcelona, Gien – France, Munich, Athens,
Oxford, Derbyshire - UK, Bonn, Avignon – France. In April
we were in Avignon. We create an agenda when we start the meeting
and this is the opportunity to share new techniques and ideas with
everyone. It is also the time to discuss difficult subjects in safety.
This is what a day at an EGG meeting looked like this Spring:
Saturday 12th
I begin the day by teaching the group “Trigunasana”
- a relatively simple yoga posture that symbolises the interweaving
and meeting of three energies: tamas, rajas, satvas in Indian cosmology
but also resembles the strands of a DNA model that make up all life
forms.
Ursula follows this with taking us through a trance like experience
of Mathias Varga Von Kibed’s TETRALEMMA model. It is a way
of moving clients from dilemma to choice by creating 5 postulates
: This one / that one / both / neither / all and none. We explored
the movements from one mental space to another in silence by choosing
to work on a personal decision each one of us was currently faced
with.
Kris did a demonstration on how to work with a client using Bryon
Katie’s 4 step approach to conflict resolution. It is a way
to change your version of the “story” providing you
are willing to admit that it is only YOUR version of the story.
Kris “worked” Kay through the 4 basic questions: “is
that true?” / “Can be absolutely know that that is true?”
/ “when you think that what happens to you?” / “who
would you be without that thought?” plus added a little of
her own intuitive music.
John presented the 4 Agreements of the Toltecs: “Be impeccable
with your word” / “Don’t take anything personally”
/ “Don’t make assumptions” / “Always do
your best” and we practiced applying them to a recent situation
that we hadn’t managed well. We worked in pairs.
Anne proposed we use an EGG honoured exercise: Talking in Rounds
to explore the subject of death and dying. This meant two groups
of 6 with each person speaking for 2 minutes on the subject before
handing on the “monologue” to the next person. We did
three rounds each with 2 minutes of silence between each round.
Not everyone was up for this exercise! And that was OK too.
Corinne closed the meeting by inviting us to select a “wisdom
card”. Mine was “I see my parents as tiny children who
need love”. On the other side was written: “I have compassion
for my parents’ childhoods. I now know that I chose them because
they were perfect for what I had to learn. I forgive them and set
them free and I set myself free.”
We all went off to visit the Palais des Papes and followed that
up with a wine tasting event inside the papal confines!!
The two days was a gastronomic feast of nouvelle cuisine and great
wines and after the meeting several people expressed their enthusiasm
with some “cute” lines about our good time together.
Avignon
 Cafe
life warming sun
Miracles for everyone
Wine and cheese in papal splendour
Arty restaurants - quite a bender!
Baby small with soft blue eyes
Egg has hatched - there's a surprise!
Revealed to us to touch our heart
Even unto death us part
Life is in the time we take
Peace at every turn
Warmth and strength, companionship
Ah - we have so much to learn.
-Jackie
Writing from the Imaginative Storm
Blue sky, yellow daffodils, green lizard.
Spider webs blowing in the wind,
reaching ever upwards,
where sun shines through the crystal air
reflecting on the beauty of the wood.
The honeysuckle smells, the lizard sleeps,
The artist sighs "Ah! C'est merveilleux!"
-John
Two limericks
There once was an EGGfest in France
Where everyone wanted the chance
To hold Tini's Charlie
For he's such a darling:
He must be the best babe in France!
Kay's programme was varied and fine
She'd arranged lovely places to dine.
We were keen to embrace
Gerrit's Open Space,
Good food and the Pope's stock of wine.
-Alison
January/February 2008
Two Beaches and a Tangi 
December and January were mostly about Christmas and New Year of
course, but I guess what really marked both months were three journeys:
two to beaches and the departure of David Grove which I write amply
about in my Heartlines of February. In fact even my monthly epistle
started with a memory of a beach from a long time ago in New Zealand.
I guess you could say that my life has been marked by beaches, or
shorelines at least. When I watch the moods of water on a shoreline
I sense a longing for home whelming up in me. It has taken me many
years to realise, perhaps, that the nostalgia is the soul’s
longing to find rest. So while the old wrenching didn’t accompany
me to the shore this last December, I did experience the familiar
joy of finding myself once again looking out to sea and dreaming………
of what it would be hard to say, but dreaming nevertheless.
I like the beach in winter: desolate, barren, windswept,
scruffy,
forgotten………..
At least that’s how they are in New Zealand but of course
Deauville, just 200 kilometres away from Paris, isn’t quite
that forgotten. In fact Deauville simply changes its colourful summer
stripes for fur coats and fussy wee dogs. The race horses that canter
the waters edge are the same as those that dazzle summer visitors
with their grace and elegance. I love it all the same. I love the
crisp air and the quiet fading hiss of tiny waves left unmolested
by raucous holiday makers. The romance of beach huts separated
by low fences each named after a famous film star and the Normandy
styled mansions that line the road along the beach, is somewhat
marred by the clogged sky hanging over Le Havre away in the distance.
Industrial pollution is for all seasons but I wish I could ignore
it, now, on this perfect morning in December on a winter beach.
 I
made another journey to a beach in January: to Mauritius with its
tropical shoreline, lush hotels and more white blubber per square
metre parked around kidney shaped swimming pools than any brochure
ever shows you. Usually I can’t stand feeling like a fat cat
amongst people who make their living exclusively off your tourist
dollars but this time it felt like being on holiday in a beautiful
hotel run but independent and friendly people doing a job like anyone
else any where in the world and if that was pure illusion then I
was sweetly duped. Gazing out over an aqua lagoon from a balconied
room and idly contemplating the sway of tropical palms decorating
a white sandy shoreline was enough to convince me that if this wasn’t
paradise then it wasn’t far from it. I was up early to swim
before breakfast, gorged myself on fresh pineapple and passion fruit,
walked for miles along the coastline on some days and loafed beside
the pool with a good book on others. The island is beautiful and
the people friendly. The food is excellent and the weather wraps
you up in a warm fuzz every day. From this space of luxuriant green,
dazzling birds and vibrant flowers it is easy to believe that all
is well with the world and time is endless and for 10 days I slipped
into this reverie with absolutely no difficulty.
Reality stepped into paradise just before breakfast one morning
to announce the sudden death of David Grove. The sea didn’t
change colour and the palm trees continued to sway but the pineapple
was without flavour that morning and the tea was cold.
 I
wasn’t in New Zealand for the Tangi (Maori funeral practice)
that took place in the middle of January but friends were there,
on the Marae to say farewell to David and, while I may not have
all the facts right, this is what I am keeping in my mind as a part
of the story of his departure.
They told me that David’s body was taken to the Marae in
a casket and it lay on Maori ceremonial ground for 24 hours surrounded
by friends and family. There was a funny part where one of the pall
bearers realised that he had to get his shoes off and get through
a narrow door while still carrying the casket with 5 others also
trying to do the same thing. I could hear David giggling hilariously
inside his casket. David, the one who was always asking people to
go through impossible spaces but who was always there for them on
their personal journeys, was demanding one last piece of contortionism.
There were songs and stories and photos and memories, kids and elders,
tears and laughter. There was order and rank and a whole history
of Maori ancestry that maybe even David wasn’t familiar with
but in a country where the claim to Maori ancestry is now a claim
to spiritual identity, it was fitting that he should be honoured
by his people this way. There was a speech dedicated to acknowledging
David as a great human being, the last lines being:
“……………..And, if greatness
is determined by taking the path never travelled before
With courage and dignity knowing there is a price to pay to yourself
and to your loved ones, then David grove, you were truly a great
man.”
I was told that his brother made music on an enormous Japanese
drum inside the Salvation Army Citadel. I have no doubt that the
sound would have transported David to the edge of this world and
on into the 6 worlds beyond and probably knocked the wee socks off
the protestant community in Tauranga!
And now it is all over and there is just the empty space and the
conversations amongst friends who find meaning in sharing some of
the crazy “Grovian” adventures etched for indelibly
on his memory.
desperately in the blackness. “I can’t find it,”
I sob helplessly.
He tilts it upwards and I am gasping for breath – taking in
great gulps of freezing air and it is not enough.
The night is endless.
He moves the seat up and to the left and my eyes catch the stars.
My hand reaches out and my whole being is bathed in wondrous beauty.
Small “oh-s” escape my lips and a sense of deep gratitude
swells within me and spills over the edges of my eyes.
I am brought back to the starting position, upright, facing forward
and level to the ground. I say repeatedly, “It is so beautiful.”
I say, “I am cold”.
David fetches hot tea and while I am sipping hot tea and gazing,
transfixed, at the table, I can only continue to say, “It
is just so beautiful – Thank you”.
From the reverie I hear David’s drawl (pure Down Under) saying,
“Well y’ look like the Mad Hatter at a tea party, Sheila”.
And I am down.
I am back and I roar great gales of laughter and ask if he has seen
Rabbit and is He keeping track of Time and are we likely to be late.
I climb down and out of the contraption. My legs are shaking –
possibly from the cold.
I write the following lines spontaneously and share them with my
travelling “brothers” and “sisters” at the
party in the evening.
Waiting
Expectant
Waves foreseen and provided
For
You will come
And the earth shall be salted
with the people of hope
And cold shall be expelled
from our hearts
We will be
One in you
Dear, dear Love.
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