Category: Self-Cultivation

Phase 2 of The LEAP Journey focuses on growing your Real Self in different ways.

The curse of intelligence: How we limit ourselves by being human knowers instead of human beings

Chantal BreytenbachAuthenticity / Experiential Learning / Future Self / LEAP / LEAP Thinker / Meaning / Purpose / Real Self / Self-Cultivation / Self-Discovery / Self-InnovationLeave a comment

You might think that your life would be easier and infinitely more fulfilling if your IQ were higher. Don’t smarter people have it easier, because they always have the answers? And don’t they get the best career opportunities and make more money than anyone else? In our most recent blog post, Chantal explores some of the downsides of being highly intelligent or a high achiever to illustrate how the LEAP Journey might help those individuals who have become stuck, because they have too many options, or because they are afraid of failing or making a mistake. […]

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Why understanding human nature is important in a coaching /learning relationship

Chantal BreytenbachCoaching / Experiential Learning / LEAP Thinker / Self-CultivationLeave a comment

When you work with people, things can get a bit messy and complicated. People are unpredictable and no one person is exactly like another person. So, when you are designing learning experiences to help individuals grow and reach their most important goals in life, it’s important to be cognisant of the differences between people as well as the traits we all share as human beings – i.e. the things that make us uniquely human.

In this blog post, Chantal describes her experience whilst attending a coaching workshop on building confidence, and the lessons she was reminded of again on how best to facilitate participants’ learning whilst being mindful of differences in personality, culture and even in the way that people interpret and process information. […]

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Why it’s sometimes bad advice to be yourself

Chantal BreytenbachAuthenticity / Future Self / LEAP / Real Self / Self-Cultivation / Self-Discovery / Self-InnovationLeave a comment

So, you’re interviewing for a new job. Or you are going on a date with someone for the first time. Naturally, you feel a bit nervous, so you ask your friend for some advice and they dispense that old adage: “You’ll be fine. Just be yourself.” In her TED Talk The Art of Being Yourself, Caroline McHugh contemplates the ridiculousness of this little piece of advice. People will tell you to “just be yourself” as if that is the easiest thing in the world and as if it is a completely novel idea that you haven’t considered. However, as most of us know, if it were simple to “just be ourselves”, most of us would just do it and reap the benefits.

In this blog post, Chantal discusses the situations in which it is bad advice to “just be yourself” and the steps you need to follow to allow your real self” to work for you. […]

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What makes our LEAP unlike any other? Part 5: We develop LEAP Thinkers not Leap Takers

Hannelize JacobsExperiential Learning / Future Self / LEAP / LEAP Thinker / Mindset / Purpose / Self-Cultivation / Self-Discovery / Self-InnovationLeave a comment

Because people can quickly understand the power of leaping to a better future, transformational programs have latched on to the idea and quickly accelerated it to the top of the hype curve. This has created many problems for both experts and for the methodology itself. The hype machine has led many transformational programs to claim that simply taking leaps is the hammer to every nail.

In this article, Hannelize warns against this practice and explains what a program that will bring lasting results should look like. On The LEAP Journey, we travel beyond mindfulness and use tools to develop meaningful cognitive transformation. This requires that our clients become LEAP Thinkers and not mere ‘leap takers’. We believe that you can only leap meaningfully if you align your life and career with who you truly are. This requires deep self-work that changes the way you think and feel. LEAP Thinkers balance their conscious and intuitive thinking and follow a disciplined approach to decision-making. To guide our clients accordingly we use a LEAP Thinker Journey Map, which Hannelize also shares with you. […]

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An invitation to all Hummingbirds

Chantal Breytenbach100-Year Life / Future Self / Meaning / Purpose / Real Self / Self-Cultivation / Self-Discovery / Self-InnovationLeave a comment

I recently stumbled on a talk by Elizabeth Gilbert – the author of Eat Pray Love – on a curiosity-driven life. In this talk entitled “The Flight of the Hummingbird: The Curiosity-Driven Life”, Gilbert speaks out against passion. That’s right – it’s not a typo – she was advocating for steering clear of passion. And I got excited, because this incessant search for passion, and the frustration that some of us have with not finding it, is one of the reasons why we created The LEAP Journey… […]

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What makes our LEAP unlike any other? Part 3: We call for the “removal of blinkers”

Hannelize JacobsExperiential Learning / LEAP / Mindset / Self-Cultivation / Self-Discovery / Self-InnovationLeave a comment

Your perspective is the way you see the world. It comes from your personal point of view and is shaped by your life experiences, your values, your current state of mind, the assumptions you bring into a situation, and a whole lot of other things. Throughout our lives, we are exposed to perspectives and realities beyond our own. How to open up and learn from and integrate these perspectives, i.e. how to “remove your blinkers”, has become a distinguishing factor of The LEAP Journey. […]

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How to turn a limestone quarry into a lush garden

Chantal BreytenbachFuture Self / Mindset / Purpose / Self-CultivationLeave a comment

Earlier this year, I took a trip with my family to Vancouver Island, British Columbia and we paid a visit to The Butchart Gardens. As stated on their website: “The Butchart Gardens is a must-see oasis over 100 years in the making”. And what a privilege it was to take in the beauty of this place that stands as a testament to what is possible when one has a grand vision. The story of The Butchart Gardens has some hidden life lessons for us as we embark on The LEAP Journey and it is also one of the most interesting family business success stories rarely told… […]

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The secret behind greatness

Chantal BreytenbachExperiential Learning / Future Self / Mindset / Purpose / Self-Cultivation / Self-InnovationLeave a comment

Our modern-day society tends to overemphasise talent at the expense of other factors that lead to success and they perpetuate the myth that excellence or greatness is mystical. Consequently, some of us assume that we are not meant for greatness and that we will never excel. Here’s why reaching excellence or greatness is both easier and harder than just having talent. […]

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Why you shouldn’t try to find your passion but rather aim to develop your interests

Chantal BreytenbachFuture Self / LEAP / Meaning / Mindset / Purpose / Self-Cultivation / Self-DiscoveryLeave a comment

When it comes to choosing a career or making a career transition, many career experts and graduation commencement speakers offer the advice that you should “find your passion”. Most people today find themselves stuck in lives and careers not of their own making. Sometimes out of desperation and perhaps also with some hope for something better, they absorb messages proclaimed by books like The 4-Hour Work Week. They believe that if they could only discover their passion and find the right formula for living and working, they could live happy and productive lives, and pursue meaningful jobs that ignite a fire in their bellies. However, once they start down that path, they soon discover that the Utopia that was promised is not within their reach… […]

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How to incorporate the three C’s of Resilience into your life

Chantal BreytenbachFuture Self / Mindset / Self-CultivationLeave a comment

Resilience is mental toughness. It is the ability to adapt, recover from, or bounce back from setbacks, failures and disappointments. We have all heard tales of bravery and resilience from people who were able to overcome difficult circumstances or events and turn their lives around for the better. What is their secret? Is it something we can all learn? […]

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