PRESS RELEASE: WOBURN, BEDFORDSHIRE – 18 November 2009 – Today at Woburn Sculpture Gallery, Bedfordshire Businesswomen (BBW), a not-for-profit networking organisation for women who live and/or have business interests in the Bedfordshire area, now in its 21^st year, announced their annual business awards for outstanding achievement in various categories. Amongst the six winners for the 2009 awards, which were sponsored by Barclays Bank, was Lynn Serafinn, a Bedford-based community leader, transformation coach, personal development trainer, public speaker, radio host and bestselling author of the book The Garden of the Soul: lessons from four flowers that unearth the Self. Ms Serafinn received the BBW award for “Working within a Community Organisation or Not-for-Profit Organisation” owing to her work as Founder of the Global Wellness Circle, and also as the Chair of Transition Bedford, a new initiative that is part of the worldwide Transition Network addressing climate change and fossil fuel dependency.

In spring 2008, Ms Serafinn noticed that there was a large faction of practitioners in the holistic health and wellbeing industry who felt isolated both professionally and socially, having no way to promote their businesses or to educate the public about the benefits of living a more natural, holistic lifestyle. In response to this, she formed the Global Wellness Circle (GWC) in May 2008, first in Bedford, but within a few months it rapidly expanded to other parts of the UK. GWC is a community of independent holistic practitioners and members of the general public, whose primary aims are to provide the public with information, education, support and access to a range of quality services and products in holistic and natural health, as well as to provide a truly inclusive social environment fostering open-mindedness, light-heartedness, fun and overall positivity, thus creating an atmosphere of holistic wellness. Now with five chapters (Bedford, Cambridge, Northampton, Milton Keynes and Hemel Hempstead, with another proposed in Dunstable for 2010), and having grown to a wider community of nearly 500 people in central UK, GWC is currently in the process of applying to become a CIC (Community Interest Company/Social Enterprise), with the aim of expanding their ability to help the wider community lead happier, healthier and more fulfilling lives.

Being truly passionate about helping people feel greater connection to themselves, to each other and to the Earth, Ms Serafinn had the opportunity to expand the parameters of her community work when, in June 2009, she was asked to serve as Chair of the newly formed Transition Bedford, a volunteer community initiative whose objective is to create a plan for a sustainable Bedford, addressing everything from climate change and energy, to education and community. Transition Bedford is part of the larger Transition Town Network of over 1500 towns, villages and urban neighbourhoods worldwide, which is a grass-roots initiative addressing the shift away from fossil fuel dependency and towards a sustainable environment by taking definitive, community-driven action in response to climate change and the impending impact of peak oil upon our lifestyle.

As Chair of Transition Bedford, Lynn leads awareness-raising events, community meetings and steering group meetings, and represents the initiative in a variety of public settings. Borrowing from her skills as an online promotion expert and personal development trainer, she also created and maintains their blog, coordinates their online social networking, writes articles and media releases, and offers both free and low-cost training to the public.

She says, “The link between the Global Wellness Circle and Transition Bedford is really pretty seamless. GWC in central UK can easily provide a link between the health and wellbeing sector and the Transition Town initiatives in our local regions, by helping society make the transition to a healthier lifestyle in which we relearn many of the human skills, such as herbal medicine, natural remedies, organic farming and food production, that enable us to be well, rather than compelling us to invent new technologies to fight disease.

Ms Serafinn is no newcomer to community work. Originally from the US, she worked in the 1990s with the Interfaith Action Coalition in Phoenix Arizona, helping to coordinate large-scale events that crossed cultural and religious boundaries and brought together thousands of members of the community who would not otherwise have been connected. In 1997, she was one of the founders of a worldwide non-profit organisation called GOKUL, which sponsored and coordinated world lecture tours of some of India’s leading spiritual teachers. In that capacity, she also created and managed their website, and was the anonymous audio transcriber/editor of several books on eastern mysticism published by that organisation.

Lynn is also no stranger to receiving accolades. Coming from a long history in the music industry, she was the recipient of the National Defence Foreign Language Fellowship in the 1980s, which enabled her to study music and philosophy in India, and she co-wrote and produced a number-1 electronic dance club track in the 1994. In 2005, she received the Microsoft UK Innovative Teacher of the Year Award for her creative use of technology in the Further Education sector. In 2007, her coaching company Create-a-Life won the “Best of Bedford Business Awards” for the best Health and Beauty Company, after only 7 months of practice. And most recently, her self-published book The Garden of the Soul: lessons from four flowers that unearth the Self became an Amazon bestseller in both the US and the UK when it was released in April 2009, outselling such prominent authors in the same category as Deepak Chopra, Eckhart Tolle and Neal Donald Walsch. As a result, she is in demand as a speaker and coach on the topic of self-publishing and book marketing, and has also received countless letters from readers, thanking her for the healing her writing has brought them.

In addition to her community work in central UK, Lynn extends her influence to people all over the world via her weekly Internet radio show “Lynn Serafinn’s Garden of the Soul”. She says her core belief is that every human being is the hero of his or her own life, and that all facets of her work are aimed at helping others unlock their natural-born hero.

Transition Bedford, whose official launch event is being planned for mid-2010, will be working closely together with groups like Zero Carbon Castle, Sustainable Oakley, Goldington Golden Gardens, the Global Wellness Circle, Mile End Allotments and many others, as well as with Bedford College through their Education for Sustainable Development programme. The long-term goal will be to develop educational programmes, skills training and community projects that will not only raise public awareness, but will also help the town make the transition towards a more vibrant and self-reliant community in such areas of food and energy production, natural health, economy and environment.

“Our approach to climate change is not all doom and gloom, believe me,” says Ms Serafinn. “The real purpose of Transition Bedford is to help people feel uplifted and connected, and to allow them to see how essential a factor they are in the revitalisation of their town, and the world in general.”

Transition Bedford invite any and all members of the greater Bedford community, whether individuals, groups or businesses, to contact Lynn Serafinn at lynn [at] lynnserafinn [dot] com and get involved. You can also visit their blog at www.transitionbedford.org

###

ARTICLE REFERENCES

Bedfordshire Businesswomen website: http://www.beds-businesswomen.org/

TRANSITION BEDFORD CONTACT INFO:
Contact: Lynn Serafinn
Email: lynn [at] lynnserafinn [dot] com
Web: http://www.transitionbedford.org
Forum: http://groups.google.com/group/transition-bedford
Tel: 44+ (0)845 880 25 28

TRANSITION TOWN NETWORK:
Web: http://www.transitionnetwork.org

LYNN SERAFINN CONTACT INFO (AUTHOR, SPEAKER, TRAINING):
Email:lynn [at] lynnserafinn [dot] com
Web: http://www.lynnserafinn.com

LYNN SERAFINN COACHING AND TRAINING ENQUIRIES:
Email: info [at] create-a-life [dot] co [dot] uk
Web: http://www.create-a-life.co.uk

–        END –

Author’s note: I originally wrote this article on 13 October 2008, but in light of the recent outbreak of “swine flu”, I thought it might be especially relevant. I also feel it can help us reflect upon what true “strength,” “wealth” and “wellness” are, as well as what we consider to be “lucky” and “unlucky” in life.

I am a workaholic. I don’t seem to stop. Ever. It isn’t funny. I even have made up a name for my workaholic “gremlin”. His name is Bonzo. Bonzo has a very loud voice. My intuition speaks more softly. When Bonzo shouts so loudly that I cannot hear the voice of my intuition (or I hear it but choose not to listen), the inevitable outcome is that I make myself ill.

A week ago Friday I was co-leading a very large event in London… a community day for about 70 life coaches from various parts of Europe. I had been working on it for 6 months with a team of 3 other great coaches. That day, the weather turned really cold and I knew that I was catching a chill but I kept going. The day was a great success, but it was an enormous amount of work, both over the past months and on the day itself. In the back of my mind, I could hear my body saying, Slow down. Create some space for yourself.

On Saturday, the day AFTER the event, I presented at a wellness fair here in Bedford. It was a freezing cold day and they had the doors open all day during the event. I shivered all afternoon. I kept hearing my body screaming, “Slow down, woman!”

On Sunday, the day AFTER that, I walked half an hour in the pouring rain to meet up with a new business contact, and then later I had my daughter over my house for the night because she needed to talk and get some loving care. We were chatting until well after midnight.

In my head, all I could hear was, Lynn, you keep saying you want to slow down. So, why are not stopping?

SO…

The day after THAT, which was last Monday, I woke up (surprise, surprise!) to find that I had come down with the flu. High fever, chills, aches, sore throat and really swollen glands. I felt like death warmed over. I couldn’t even get out of bed. At first I contemplated whether or not I had the energy to coach my clients (I had a full roster every day this week). Then, I realised that this was absolute insanity. I started calling my clients to cancel. All I had the energy to do was sleep. Because I live alone, and work for myself, my mind kept resisting the “down time” because I am used to taking care of myself and couldn’t see how I was going to pay the bills, do the shopping, etc.

But then, the most amazing thing happened. My clients, family and friends starting calling me, asking how they could help.

On Monday, one client (who sells Aloe Vera products) posted me a tube of Aloe Vera jelly for my throat and some bee propollus and Echinacea for my immune system.

On Tuesday, after receiving the parcel of Aloe Vera, another client (a homeopath) brought me some homeopathic medicine and took a deposit to the bank for me so my bills would get paid on time.

Later that day, another client (a Reiki practitioner) went shopping for me and brought me back loads of soup and juices which I spent several days guzzling down with great delight.

On Wednesday, my son-in-law went and got me some medicine for a massive headache I had had since Monday.

On Thursday, still another friend/client (a cranio-sacral therapist) came over to my house armed with apples, juices, macaroons (yummy) and toothpaste (I was completely out).

And as each person came with supplies, they also stayed for a chat and I felt better and better just for their presence. When I went to bed on Thursday night, I was astonished that in less than 4 days I felt about 80% recovered, whereas the previous flu I had had about a year before developed into lingering chest infection and cough that lasted 6 weeks.

I slept soundly, and when I woke up on Friday morning my flu was 95% gone (personally, I really do credit the Aloe Vera with curing my swollen glands).

I felt so good when I woke up Friday that I went into London to attend a course called “Awakened Wisdom” with one of my favourite mentors, Patrick Ryan. The course uplifted me that final 5% I needed to feel completely well again, and by Saturday morning I was 100% recovered. On Sunday, the last day of the course, I stood up in front of the class and made some very powerful commitments about becoming “visible” as a spiritual teacher through my writing and my work. Today, as I write this, I have to tell you that some of these commitments have already started to unfold. But beyond that, I not only feel completely restored in body, but the experiences of the past week have also healed my mind and heart as well.

A year ago, none of this would have happened. Why?

Two reasons:

The first reason is because a year ago, I didn’t know any of these people who came to help me (apart from my son-in-law of course). All of the local people who came to help me are people I met over the past 6 months through the Global Wellness Circle (GWC), which is an educationally focussed community project group dedicated to promoting a natural and holistic approach to health and well-being at all levels of mind, body and spirit. Sounds like a great organisation, yes? Well the best thing about GWC (for me) is that I myself started it in April (2008). I started GWC in response to the isolation I kept hearing so many other holistic therapists expressing, and which I also shared. I wanted to create a supportive community that would not only help us just grow our businesses, but also help us thrive as human beings with a common value base. It is extremely gratifying to find that this “Wellness Circle” provided me with a circle of people who helped me feel well when I was ill and overworked. I can only assume that this kind of behaviour is going on amongst other members of the Circle. It makes me more and more convinced that “Communities create wellness” (which is the motto of GWC).

But the other reason why none of this would have happened a year ago is because I myself am a very different person from who I was back then. A year ago I was in a state of mind where I felt I needed to support everyone else, but I would rarely (if ever) allow others to help me. I used to think this was because I didn’t want to “burden” others, but I now know this was simply a rationalisation. In truth, I believe the real reason why many of us do not ask for help is that it makes us feel vulnerable. We want people to see us as “strong” people, so we tend to hide what we judge as our own weaknesses. But actually, it is only we who judge ourselves to be weak. The truth is, it takes more strength and courage to show our vulnerability in public than to be stoic and alone. Quite opposite to how I used to think, I have learned that being vulnerable and asking for help is actually the bravest and most empowered thing we can do.

And here’s the surprise bonus—when we ask others for help, we actually empower them too. We allow them to give us their love, strength and wisdom. Just imagine if we lived in a world where nobody needed anyone else. We might falsely imagine such a place would be a world full of powerful people, but actually it would be a world full of lonely people who had no purpose to fulfil.

Allowing my vulnerability to guide me when I had the flu was a fantastic voyage of discovery, surprise and gratitude. So now, I am continuing to allow all the nurturing that exists around me to enter into my life… and I am really enjoying the ride.

This time of year, a lot of people get the flu. If you are one of the “lucky” ones, use the time to slow down and surrender to the process your body is craving. Then, dive deeply into the resources you have around you and ask for help from those around you. Always remember that we are actually giving a great gift when we allow others to show their love for us.

Anyway, that’s why getting the flu was the highlight of my week, and how much it made me aware of what real “health” (and wealth) in life is.

Lynn Serafinn
13 Oct 2008