Body at work and the international debut in Barcelona

It was incredibly challenging to make up my mind to sit down and start writing this tiny piece of memoir about our very first international body at work trip… an unforgettable trip to Barcelona. I’m just guessing the reasons. We had a wonderful time (well, not so much the weather), we did two lively and rich bodywork sessions with 40+ CEOs from all around the word, we had thought-provoking conversations, and much-much laughter day and night. Well, as if my piece of writing would never be as good as the trip itself… so what’s the point of jotting this all down? Anyhow, in the end… on this beautiful day I resisted the temptation to keep silent and here you are – reading.

 

The Barcelona challenge accepted

So there is this unique initiative by an association called CEO Collaborative Forum. The team has the aim to connect CEOs from all around the globe to provide them a platform to learn, grow, inspire and get inspired with each other and by each other. Their Fall Community Meeting took place in Barcelona on 23-25 October and they were looking for a team who could provide the participants safe space for self-reflection, building trust and team cohesion. Talking about trust, we need to highlight Zoltán Bruckner at this very point. Zoltán is a Team and Executive Coach colleague of Ági Holló, and he was the one who knew what bodywork is capable of in corporate settings. So we were introduced to CEO CF by him, and after two rounds of negotiations, we were chosen to be the team to facilitate these sessions for their talented and well-established members.

 

Bodywork and teamwork rulez

Our delegation to Barcelona included Ági Holló, our co-founder, HR Professional Team Coach and much more. Another member was Péter Halász, HR Business Partner, Bodywork Facilitator, Mentor4men and also much more. Although we had known Peti for a long time for his expertise in organizational development, facilitating executive retreats and male circles as well as for his hilarious sense of humour, we had not got the chance to work with him. Well, Barcelona seemed just the perfect place to see how we could collaborate. And finally it was me, the author of this present account.

 

 

And… action!

The event took place in the Hilton Diagonal Mar Barcelona. It was an inspiring venue indeed although we had to reorganize our sessions a little bit due to certain specifications of the location. The actual program started on Thursday morning and we were the ones to kick off the day with an ice-breaking and trust-building bodywork session. It was great to work with 40+ super-talented and super-elegant businessmen getting immersed in the moment with physical exercises and improvisational situations. We were searching for fresh new perspectives in the space, moments of cooperation, and moments of intimacy and trust. After this session, the hard work begun for them, and we had a little bit of a break at last. For the afternoon, we invited our participants to join us in a more in-depth self-discovery session. And our topic was… Control. Well, we didn’t need to explain anybody why control is a thing for executives. (And also for facilitators like us.) So in this longer bodywork session, participants had the chance to reflect verbally on their own relation to control and they set intentions what they wanted to use this time for. In the exact bodywork part of the session, they experienced and experimented with different sates of leadership and compliance as well as allowance and resistance. We were happy to see that our participants left the room with valuable insights, reflections and feelings shared with their fellows in a final verbal circle.

 

Move ahead and keep walking

We gained lots of feedback on our sessions that we are processing right now… They are mostly related to business development as our participants are experts of this field. For me, though, the most striking and motivating experience was to see a huge-huge amount of passion, wisdom and inspiration at one place: 40+ outstanding CEOs with a “can-do” worldview… I cannot imagine a more inspiring setting for a business starter team like us. The great thing is that now we are having follow-up calls with a couple of CEOs giving us further tips how we can reach out to our would-be clients more effectively.

 

All in all, I am just grateful for all these experiences and inspirations, for the support of Zoltán, for our newly formed trio with Peti and Ági, for the open-minded participants and the space in which all this could come into being. Yes, I still see my words are clumsier than my feelings inside.

On our last night in Barcelona, I bumped into a ring in a local handcraft shop and I fell in love with it immediately. After a little bit of hesitation (I am not a shopping fan and impulse buyer at all) I decided to buy it… and here I have it now. It’s become a symbol of my mission with body at work: love, connection and the capability to call values into life. So I’ll give it a try to express my gratefulness for all this in a more bodywork mode: