Nina has something to say

You allowed me to grow faster than I ever thought possible. You beautifully led me to transformation and growth. You have guided me to the depths of my soul, getting glimpses into all the parts that make me whole; the parts I hadn’t allowed myself to experience, to be, to live fully. Today, I can see all of them clearly and proudly carry them with me, out there in the open. You’ve been rough and unkind to many, and I am learning to still love you despite the moments I resent you. 

Lately, I’ve often been asked how to deal with the uncertainty we’re currently faced with. As entrepreneurs, uncertainty is our daily bread. However, today we’re being served an unprecedent amount in our lifetime’s experience.

I don’t have the answer that’s best for you so I usually ask: What decisions can you make that influence the status quo? What can you learn about what you don’t have control over to help you mitigate the uncertainty when possible? Word of caution: beware of rabbit holes...

I’ve seen companies who’ve had to make difficult compromises so they could survive in the short-term in order to hopefully thrive in the long run. Sometimes, you have to take a detour so you can remain on your bigger picture track.

We can't know for how long lockdowns will last, if we'll have futher waves or what the long-term consequences of this pandemic are going to be on the economy, our society, our communities and our people.

What you can do, is to consider taking a short-term detour in order to predict a better outcome for your business. Such a detour could possibly lead to unexpected innovations, re-purposing of your products and services or surprising encounters.

I realised recently that as the founder of Align the Dots, I had two roles but only took the one I like best to heart. I mostly sat in the role of Nina the Consultant, the one who gets things done and fixes things. I had not put much thought or effort into the role of Nina the CEO. 

Nina the CEO’s job is to make sure the brand is out there, people know about Align the Dots, what I do, how I do it and why I’m great at it. Because Nina the Consultant doesn’t like to be in the spotlight, that job wasn’t done very consistently.

I choose to step out of my comfort zone and into the shoes of Nina the CEO to learn new things and new ways of doing things because I know it’s what’s best for Align the Dots.

I was asked to dress in a way that made me feel like a Goddess. So I did, and I felt damn good! Walking down the subway like a Queen. A conversation ensued where I realised I more often operate from my masculine than from my feminine and I am trying to understand why. 

I want to mention that I’m not talking about gender in this context, I am talking about the feminine and masculine poles and the spectrum from which we all operate from, regardless of which gender we identify as.

I asked myself, what beliefs do I have that lead me to favour the masculine more often than the feminine? 

I am grateful for where my career is taking me and somewhere within me I believe being direct, my sense of power and influence, my strength, relentlessness and drive help me move forward. Those are traits I associate with my masculine. Only the last couple of years have I acknowledged that my feminine contributes to being great at my job too.

There are some traits I associate with the feminine that I don’t identify with but I noticed there are many I do identify with, and that I want to embody more: kind, beautiful, independent, loving, trustworthy, honoring herself, listener, caring, sexy, vulnerable, decisive, dependable, gracious, in the knowing.

All these beliefs come from an influential social construct I grew up with and believe in. I can only recognise my bias when I dare to question what is true to me, and what is a truth I simply take for granted. (Sidenote: I’m currently reading Glennon Doyle’s Untamed which is very inspiring and powerful in this reflection.)

I want to be be aware of which pole I operate from and I want to balance my feminine and my masculine. Knowing that I lean towards the masculine, how do I shift to consciously operate more from my feminine? I pay attention.

When I make a decision, do I operate from my masculine or my feminine? Which one feels the best at that time?

When I pick my clothes and my hairdo for the day, do I feel my feminine? I’m the kind of person who wants to look fabulous rolling out of bed without any effort so I don’t spend more than 15 minutes on my make-up, my hairdo and my clothes. I just want to be myself, so when you strip me of all that exterior you still see me for who I am, in my feminine.

When I walk into a room or a conversation, what energy do I want to exude?

What led me to Align the Dots? It started with Tembomentum. And yes, I thought it was a brilliant brand name. Until a dear friend of mine did a wonderful and very tactful job at letting me see how it wasn't. 

It combined Tembo, elephant in Swahili, and momentum. I want my clients to gain the qualities of the elephant: gain wisdom, develop inner strength, be confident and patient, and play, and momentum, which is critical to growth. 

Having to explain all this defeats the purpose of a good brand name, not to mention how difficult it'd be to remember and possibly even to pronounce. Tembomentum was out.

In came the dots. What do you do with dots? You identify them, then you connect them and finally, you get to align them. And thus was born Align the Dots.

I assumed that when I’d offer my coaching services for free, people would jump on the occasion to have a coaching session at no cost. My intention was to give them the experience of being coached by me and create a sales opportunity.

I failed to realise how biased I was by my assumptions: 1) everyone is interested in being coached and 2) my offer is free. 

I kind of knew that not everyone is interested in being coached but as many founders, I assumed that what I’m doing is awesome and everybody wants a slice of my cake. I got reminded that it’s not true.

My offer was not free for them, I was asking for their attention and their time. A whole 75 minutes of it! Crazy, isn’t it? I didn’t see it then, I definitely saw it when I only got a 3% response rate to my messages on LinkedIn.

I had to change tactic in order to get people’s attention. 

My assumptions had gotten me into this mess, how could they serve me moving forward? I asked myself what other assumptions I was relying on and realised there were quite a few. So I decided to challenge them by asking for help from the very people who’d ignored me so far.

I am now asking for an interview where I ask questions about what is preventing their company to scale easier by looking at how core values, vision and purpose impact their growth capacity because that’s the core of the consulting and coaching services I offer. 

The purpose of this interview is to challenge my assumptions about the services I offer, hear the perspective of entrepreneurs in my target market, as well as know what vocabulary they use to describe their values, vision, purpose and company culture.

In exchange for their valuable time, I offer a coaching session. And suddenly the free service I offer has value. The response rate increased to about 20%. That’s how I’ve learned a lot from the very people I aim to serve and how many “feet in the door” I’ve gotten.

I don’t like to be put in a box because I find it very limiting. “I am more than that box you put me in!” I hear myself say. However, that’s how most people think and it does help us make sense of things sometimes.

I really struggle to answer the question: “What type of coach are you?” I started with a long story I won’t bore you with here.

I realised that whatever I said, it always ended with “Oh ok, you’re a business coach!” or leadership coach, or life coach. And I couldn’t identify with just one of them. And I kept hearing this voice saying “I am more than just one of your boxes!”

I acknowledged that I needed to create my own box to help potential clients and partners understand who I am. And if they put me in a box of their choosing, well, then at least I’ve tried.

I started with: “I’m an entrepreneur coach!”. It didn’t help, the questions kept coming. I’m now testing I coach entrepreneurs to connect their personal development with their company’s ambitions so they can grow together. So far it’s been received well and led to fewer follow-up questions. Am I on the right track?

How did I choose to become a coach? How did I move from Kenya to Sweden and start yet another company? The full story is a long one I’d love to share with you over a cup of coffee if we ever meet. The short version of it all is that I listened to my inner voice.

I trusted it to move to East Africa ten years ago even though I didn’t know why or what I’d do there. I trusted it to take the jobs that were good for me and quit the ones that weren’t. I trusted it when I moved back to Europe and chose Sweden, a country I have a passport from but that I don’t really understand.

I left Kenya 11 weeks ago, stayed "in transit" with my dad and sister in France until today, when I'm arriving at the destination I picked to learn more about another dimension of who I am, Sweden.

I am full of excitement, joy, curiosity, fear and love. I get to start anew in a city I don't know, a country I've never lived in, a culture I've only gotten glimpses of and a career I'm recreating.

Am I really starting anew though? No. I have lived 35 years filled with wonderful, painful and joyful experiences.

I find it is easier to be on the move, think about what’s next, plan and organise for upcoming projects than to be still. 

I’m currently in my childhood home in France, in “transit” between Kenya and Sweden, and I am trying to be still, just enjoying spending time with my family, reconnecting with old friends and nurturing those valuable relationships. 

I love being in those moments but I also get impatient. I want to grow Align the Dots, meet new people, date, discover a new city. That’s what I look forward to when I’m in Sweden. And Sweden, with all that excitement and newness, will still be there when I move to Stockholm in August.

I feel like I’m walking on stepping stones across a river and I can’t wait to reach the other side. But if I go too fast or skip some steps, I’ll miss the fish swimming in the river, the birds chirping in the trees, the wind blowing in the grass along the riverbank and I’d miss out.

18 days passed between the day I left my family's home in Kenya's lush countryside and the day my dad picked me up at the train station in France. In those 18 days, I sold most of my belongings that were in my apartment in Nairobi, I sold my car, Suzie, I packed and shipped the items I wanted to send to France, I made travel arrangements from Nairobi to my French hometown and I launched my latest venture, Align the Dots | Coaching & Consulting.

When I really think about it, it's pretty crazy. 18 days and my life did a 180! So I'm trying to reflect on how I made this happen so I can consciously learn from it and share it.

Here are the factors I believe contributed to my ability to do a 180 in 18 days:

I was mentally prepared. I made the decision to leave Kenya in July 2019 and meant to leave around April 2020. I ended up leaving just a month later than anticipated.

I had no doubts about my decisions. That is in my nature, once I make a decision that comes from within, I stick with it for as long as it feels right.

I was present, in the moment, every step of the way. I didn't worry about what had happened the days before nor what would happen too long ahead. I focused on what I had to do now and within the next few days at the most.

I prepared myself as best as I knew how but didn't expect things to go according to plan. Here are a couple of examples:

I had all the paperwork the French government required to enter and move within its borders but there were no clear directives I knew of regarding quarantine so I didn't make any arrangements beyond my arrival on French soil. For all I knew, they would have changed the rules while I was in the air and may have had to quarantine upon my arrival. Thankfully I didn't and instead got to take a physically distant stroll in sunny Paris.

My plan was to rent a car in Paris and drive 600 km to get to my dad’s. The night before I was flying out of Nairobi, I realised I didn’t have my French driving license with me. It wouldn’t have been possible to rent a car with my Kenyan license without an official French translation which was impossible to get at 9 pm on a Friday night. So instead, I spent a night in Paris and took the train the following day.

My new venture is run digitally so why wait? I genuinely couldn’t find any reasonable excuses to not go ahead with it.

I check in with myself all along my journey. I am going through an important transition, relocating to Europe after 10 years in East Africa, and I want to make sure I fully experience this transition and acknowledge any emotion that shows up along the way.

What I am learning throughout this process is that I know I’m going in the direction I’m meant to go and I feel supported and loved by everyone who’s with me on this journey, and thanks to video calls there are many! 

There is nothing like a barefoot walk in a forest to reconnect with the Earth, balance your energies and find peace. For offering me that, Karura Forest, thank you.

Thank you for helping me find answers about life.

Thank you for being the steady force I could always count on.

Thank you for offering me peace and comfort when the world kept spinning around me.

Thank you for listening to my pains, my joys and my ills.

Thank you for being the beauty, calmness and power that you are.

Thank you for enabling me to keep my sanity in this mad and extraordinary city of Nairobi.

All these thank you's are also dedicated to the extraordinary people that I have crossed path with on this beautiful continent. You have all been part of creating who I am today. Thank you. If you feel this might be you, please re-read my words above.

Today, I am leaving my footprints on the African soil that has shaped the last ten years of my life. With joy and melancholy, I am turning a page to start writing on a blank one. With excitement and fear, I am leaping into a world I am learning to love again.

This is not an Adieu, just an Au Revoir.

Have you ever been in a situation when you worked very hard for something and it just wouldn’t happen? Out of frustration, you let it rest. Some time goes by and then something even better comes along out of the blue. It happens to me all the time… Why? I trust the process, and I don’t get particularly attached to the outcome.

It happened when I was googling coaching courses for months and kept getting lost in the acronyms and one day, a coaching academy called me back and the following day I was enrolled. It happened when I had an assignment to submit that for some reason I didn’t understand and the next morning I got it.

When I moved to Tanzania in 2010, I realised much later that the purpose was to understand who I am. I didn’t truly know until then why I had decided to move.

I am moving to Sweden sometime this year and I don’t know what the outcome of that decision will be. I know, feel and see Sweden is where I need to be for the next phase of my life and all I need to focus on is the next step: leaving Kenya and making my way North.

I often feel like I am in a fog (the comforting and embracing kind) and only my next few steps are crystal clear. The fog lifts the day I can look back and understand how the dots connect. It might take hours, it might take years. The path continues and it might get foggy again. I just keep moving forward and trust the process.

I’ve learned to be comfortable with the fog and found relief in not being attached to the outcome. It gives me the opportunity to not miss out on something even better that might be put on my path.

Some might argue, “Are you kidding? I don’t have time to wait until it falls in my lap!” and you’re absolutely right, it is very unlikely it will.

If something is important to me, I make sure I give myself time to work on it. I think about it some time in advance, pen keywords down, doodle, sketch, make it messy and creative. That’s where my unconscious works, where I connect dots I hadn’t connected before and where my creative juices flow, even if just one drop at a time. And when I feel ready, all the pieces fall nicely into place.

I want to share my hope for what’s coming. And I also want to share my guilt. I am in a very privileged situation during this isolation period. I am with my family whom I get a hug from every day. I have the space to be on my own when I want to. I overlook a grand landscape from my desk. I learn new things every day. I often speak to my closest friends all over the world. 

I am not afraid of losing my job or keeping a company afloat. I don’t have to fire anybody. I am not worried about how I’ll put food on the table. I am not concerned about my landlord kicking me out. Tragedy has not hit anyone in my circles. I am not putting my life at risk.

I am deeply grateful for all the things that are happening to me and for the ones that are not. 

I also feel tremendously hopeful. As many have already shared, this a global wake-up call. The Planet (possibly the Universe) has had enough! So what are we doing to move forward? My belief is that there is a shift in consciousness, values and priorities of enough people to tip the scale towards building a sustainable world supporting the survival of our (any many more) species and of our planet. This shift will not happen for everyone, but for enough of us to make a difference.

Many of us have this wonderful opportunity to spend time with ourselves, get to know ourselves and love ourselves. Take this time to grow and when we’ll roam the globe again, we’ll be ready to start building a world that makes sense.

With love,

In these very challenging times, I believe it is important to look inwards and observe our feelings and emotions for what they are and not shy away from them as it will allow us to find the love, the kindness and the compassion we need to support one another.

I lost my mother at 14 years old. She loved me unconditionally, I know that now. At the time, I didn’t understand her love in the way she expressed it to me. Although it’s been over 20 years since her passing and I know she’s with me from afar, I miss her presence and her motherly love.

I am in isolation with my family in Kenya’s countryside. I am taking this time to learn things I knew nothing about, deepen my knowledge on things I’d scratch the surface of and to ground my emotional, physical and spiritual self by meditating and exercising daily.

This new routine and these activities are shifting my self to a new state that I can’t quite describe yet, it’s a process in the making. Regardless, it has led me to experience strong emotions bubbling up to the surface and instead of running away from them or burying them deeper, I choose to face them and look them in the eye. Why are you here? What do you want from me?

I had such an experience today when I felt a strong pain in my heart because I miss my mother and her love. Why is the pain there? To remind my self that I was loved by my mother and I am loved today by many.

What does the pain want from me? To accept that even though I don’t experience my mother’s love today and I didn’t understand it 20 years ago, it shaped and formed the love I have for my self and for others. It’s not a perfect shape, it has some sharp edges, some soft corners and no straight lines but it’s my love. I accept it. And so, the pain dissolves and love emerges in its stead.

With love,

Since I stopped working three weeks ago, I’ve gotten to learn how to slow down and what I enjoy about it. For the last ten years, I’ve been running, sometimes sprinting. In January, I hit the brakes and since then, I’ve been walking pretty slowly. I know I’ll get running soon enough so why not enjoy this time where I have the opportunity to take a stroll? It surprised me to realise it’s not as easy as it sounds...

Currently, I don’t have any responsibilities so it doesn’t really make a difference if I do something today or tomorrow. And that’s exactly what I wanted for my transition. Because all of my time is my own now, I actually try to spread out things I want to do so I have something to accomplish every day: make that pie I’ve always wanted to do, read the dusty book that’s been on my shelf for ages, visit the shop I was told has some beautiful glassware, etc.

When your default is to be fast in everything you do, when the environment you live and work in is always on the move, you have to make a very conscious effort to slow down. I am just back from a trip to Zanzibar where I spent five days in Paje with the sole purpose to be a beach bum. When I arrived there, I was taken aback by a worry that crept up: what on earth was I going to do for five days?!

Well, I slowed down. In everything I did, from watching the sunrise, reading a chapter of a book, looking out at the ocean, walking on the beach, eating or having conversations with strangers, I was utterly present and I absorbed my environment with all my senses. There was so much going on around me, I never got bored. And suddenly the five days were over!

What I struggle with though is my urge to plan, organise, schedule and prepare for what’s next. Be in full control. I think about what can I do to prepare the work I’ll do when I move to Sweden, should I start looking for an apartment in Stockholm, can I start setting up meetings with potential clients, etc. Bear in mind, I’m moving to Sweden in July… Obviously, it’s way too early to do any of that but that’s what my brain tells me to do.

So I sit back and get comfortable with the discomfort of not being in full control and knowing everything about what’s next right this moment. I also trust myself to know that when the time is right, I’ll get cracking on all these questions and get it done in no time. 

Slowing down doesn’t mean being lazy or less efficient. It means that you get to be more aware of all the things you do, absorb what’s going on around you and let it sink in. When I start running again in a few months’ time, I intend to keep some space in my day to just slow down and be ok with it. 

For a few months I've been in a transition phase. By listening to my inner voice, I have come to understand I need a change. After 10 years in East Africa, a place I will always call home, I will be moving to Sweden next year. What drove this decision? My cultural identities and love.

A friend of mine recommended a book to me, Designing Your Life (Burnett, Evans), and the first exercise to do is to evaluate where you are in your life. This is where I am:

Work: 100%

Play: 50%

Health: 75%

Love: 25%

I could start sensing why I felt out of balance.

In May this year I spent three weeks in Europe visiting old and new friends. I gave and received more love in those three weeks than my last year in Nairobi. I could confirm that I was out of balance.

Around the same time, I realised that I wasn't strongly exposed to my cultural identities growing up (both my parents are Swedish, my mum grew up in Kenya and I grew up in France) and my strong pull to come to East Africa in 2010 was probably a pull to understand where I'm from, what is African in me. Now I know and it'll forever live in my heart. What I don't know today is what makes me Swedish.

The first thing I did was to resign from my job, even though I'll still work until end of January. Then I told my family and my closest friends who have been very supportive. I booked a trip to Sweden to get a feel for the place (especially when it's not the kindest season so I'm going in November) as I've never been there with the mindset of living there.

Now, I'm slowly building my network in Sweden as I'm starting from scratch. I'm not worried about finding a job though I am taking steps to make it potentially easier.

A friend asked if anything could make me change my mind. After some thought, I realised that it's not impossible but very unlikely as I'm not running away from anything in Kenya and I'm not chasing anything in Europe. My decision comes from my inner voice, the same inner voice that lead me to move to Tanzania in 2010.

I'm grateful that I am sensible enough to hear and listen to my inner voice, that I make decisions that are in tune with my inner voice. I don't believe things can go terribly wrong by listening to my inner voice.

Do you hear your inner voice? What is it telling you?

With love,