I can only do what feels right during these difficult times of transition and collective consciousness raising (Emma Thompson)

Emma Thompson is a person of integrity. 

I have admired her talent for a long time, now I have a new reason to admire her, having read this article in The Guardian on the train to London yesterday.

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage (Anaïs Nin)

Photo by Banter Snaps on Unsplash

I found this succinct response to an article on why girls excel over boys at school but not after they leave school, and wanted to share.

Counseling girls to be more confident, avoid overworking and economize efforts won’t be enough to help women catch up to men in the work force. Insistence that employers pay equal wages and combat sexual harassment will do far more.

One voice, one hope, one real decision (Queen)

Photo by Arthur Osipyan on Unsplash

Examples of leadership are close by every day.

As I wondered past the Churchill statue at Westminster yesterday (on our way to the Abbey to light a candle for recently departed friends and family), I wondered what the great man would make of the current situation here.

Sadly, at the moment, in the UK, examples of political leadership are either in short supply or of poor quality.

Self-interest and political expediency rule the roost.

I am reminded of a simple quote that was a favourite of my mentor, Colin Prentice:

Where there is no vision, the people perish (Proverbs 29:18)

The simplest solution

Photo by Brayden Law on Unsplash

The two pillars of a future-proof education: # 1 Teach kids how to lead; # 2 Help them learn to solve interesting problems.

Seth Godin

Only the beginning, only just the start (Chicago)

Photo by Donnie Rosie on Unsplash

It's February and time to look forward to some new beginnings in New Zealand, while being in the present in Vienna.

A life-time is not what's between,
The moments of birth and death.
A life-time is one moment,
Between my two little breaths.

The present, the here, the now,
That's all the life I get,
I live each moment in full,
In kindness, in peace, without regret.

-  Chade Meng, One Moment

Over the hills the good times are sitting under grey clouds (Jack Bruce/ Pete Brown)

Photo by Rye Jessen on Unsplash

Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life, as by the obstacles which one has overcome while trying to succeed (Booker T. Washington)