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By KimberlyWickham, October 1, 2009 11:25 am

“What if there is no glass ceiling? Now there’s a provocative question!” As Lynne Healy asks in her article below – so what if we are making it all up? What if – if what we see is what we get? Stop and consider… just for a moment… what if we really did focus on and pour our energy into what we do want instead of continually lamenting what we do not have. Here is yet another brilliant example of how we might just be able to change our collective experience of an important issue. Thank you, Lynne Healy of the UK!

Reality or Belief?
What if there is no glass ceiling? Now there’s a provocative question!
I was recently listening to a radio discussion about the glass ceiling and the lack of women on company boards in the UK. Both women were very passionate about changing this reality – one is providing a mentoring scheme which, among other things, teaches women how to ‘work’ the male dominated approach so that they aren’t so marginalized. The other was much more militant and wants government to legislate to force companies to appoint women to their boards.

What hits me every time I read or hear about this glass ceiling is how much time and energy women put into resisting it and fighting the injustice of it. My instant thought is always ‘what could we be achieving if we gave the same amount of energy to what we actually want to create?’

Another question came to me this time, ‘what if the glass ceiling is nothing more than a very powerful belief that womankind is collectively holding?’ When we believe in something enough it influences how we experience life, the choices we make and what we believe we can and can’t achieve. This then reinforces the belief – and so the cycle continues. By believing a glass ceiling is there we ‘know’ the likelihood is we’ll be held back by our male colleagues and bosses and will be denied the opportunity to achieve all that we want to. In effect we’ve very neatly given our power away.

What if the women who have achieved great things in the business world actually broke through the belief rather than a glass ceiling? I cannot adequately convey to you in words the phenomenal change that occurs in you when you choose to change a profound belief you’ve been holding. You only really ‘get’ it when you experience it. It’s like a veil is lifted and you can see more clearly – a weight lifts that you didn’t know was there. What once seemed an insurmountable problem becomes manageable, you see potential you missed before, it’s easy to speak your truth and be heard, and you have so much more energy to create what you want. Anything is possible.

Imagine what the world would be like if women ‘knew’ that the only reality is that we can be / have / achieve our highest potential in everything we do? Women are holding the power to transform business, and with it the world – we have a unique energy that isn’t fully liberated yet because for too long we’ve become sidetracked by fighting injustice. When enough of us liberate this energy it will sweep through consciousness and impact everybody.

The changes we want will then fall into place naturally and graciously. If, right now, it’s a challenge too far to let go of the reality of a glass ceiling try pretending it’s not there for a while – and allow yourself to imagine what that would mean for women, businesses and the world. Pour your energy into thinking about what you do want – but be careful – don’t confine it to the framework that currently exists. How would the world look, what would you be doing, what would fulfill you and help you achieve all of your potential? What would you be creating that would help our world grow and flourish and be a vibrant place for everyone on it?

By Lynne Healy

http://www.lynnehealy.co.uk/ and http://www.vibrantmotherhood.com/

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By KimberlyWickham, September 28, 2009 4:34 pm

Angels, Horses and Other Worldly Lessons

Part three of the series: Through magical inter-dimensional travel, Tina and her friends discover even more quantum secrets of the universe!

Now available at www.kimberlywickham.com

Tina and her friends return in the third book of the series, to adventure and discover even more quantum secrets of the universe and metaphysical gems. Their friends from an ‘other world’, along with a few surprising characters, play a big part in showing the inter-dimensional travelers the art of patience, acceptance, tolerance, mindfulness and manifestation.

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By KimberlyWickham, September 27, 2009 4:48 pm

Every child is gifted and talented – right? Well… not really. Certainly almost every parent considers their child to be exceptionally bright but where does one draw the line? I think that is so subjective I never felt comfortable with being the one to make that determination!

Several years ago, when my son (now 25) was in kindergarten, I started a G&T program at his school, volunteering my time to run the program and teach the drama portion of the program. Using those loaded words “Gifted and Talented” invited so much in-fighting amongst teachers, administrators and parents we had to change the name to something less controversial. Changing the name seemed to satisfy a lot of the bickering so we continued work on the program quite happily until it came time for deciding who was actually eligible to participate. What a quagmire!

A few years later I became a full time teacher at that same school and the official G&T program launched. The in-fighting with the same groups started all over again but this time the administration was ready with a fully sanctioned state program. It got off to a shaky start as the burden of deciding which child was eligible fell on the shoulders of the classroom teachers. You can just imagine how that went over! Parents petitioned teachers, teachers begged relief from administration, administration turned to me to sort it all out… argh… Somehow, with the help of the classroom teachers, it was determined which of the very select group would actually be allowed to participate. It was a combination of several things (I wish I could remember all of the details of that, but I can’t!) from test scores to classroom work, but out of the whole lot selected (2^nd -6^th grade, 5 from each grade) I would have to say only one student was truly ‘gifted’.

Someday I will go into how that program ran, activities we enjoyed and other interesting details, but for now let it suffice for me to ask the question… what makes one ‘gifted and talented’? Do we look at the child who plays a piano concerto at 5 years old or do we focus more on the child who stares into space, finishes his ½ hour work in 5 minutes and then secretly finishes other children’s work? Is it the child who is unruly and the parent explains that he is ‘bored in school’? Is it the Asperger’s Syndrome kid or the one who spends all the free time in the corner reading far beyond his or her grade level?

Even with all the data available for these programs now, all the state guidelines, and all the specialty private programs, deciding who qualifies is still a matter for discussion and subjective determination!

I found these two links extremely interesting. These are comments from two parents with ‘gifted’ children about their experiences in public schools:

http://hormonecoloreddays.blogspot.com/2007/09/giving-up-on-public-education.html

http://desertspor.blogspot.com/2008/02/gifted-academy.html

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By KimberlyWickham, September 27, 2009 7:51 am

So where have you been?
Well, so much for my regular blog postings! All good intentions. Yes? Things have been very busy and you can say I have been taking that ‘collapsed wave potential’ (as seen illustrated in the chair illustration above) and forced it all into a new ‘particle reality’! Just a little quantum reality talk for you all…

In between several trips to New York seeing to the care of someone close to me who has suffered a traumatic brain injury, I have been working. I have created a lot of work for my website
www.kimberlywickham.com and set up another gallery at www.yessy.com/kimberlywickham . The Yessy site is strictly for Artwork but my main site covers my books, artwork and lots of other stuff! This has been a challenging time. Dealing with such a serious issue while trying to get my work out there and available to the world has required a new level of concentration I had not previously known I possessed. Adversity always allows you the opportunity to demonstrate (at least to yourself) exactly what you are made of!

These days I continue to add new work to my site and offer Giclee prints, cards, T-shirts with some of the images from my books along with lots of other images. For you story lovers, you’ll be happy to know, book #3 is out, and I’m also in the process of outlining the 4th book in my children’s series – so perhaps we will see it available late next year… unless I get too busy painting to write it!

Stay tuned…