To kick start the issue, I would encourage you to take our quiz titled, More Than Just Good Looks.  I’m sure you’ll be able to pick a number of our celebrated women, and then there will be others you’ll learn about.  Either way, all these women have contributed to our world, one way or another.

If you are conscious of the money you spend, the waste you produce and the environment, you’ll love the site, Love Food Hate Waste.

Michelle profiles the book, How Jane Won: 55 Successful Women Share How They Grew from Ordinary Girls to Extraordinary Women, and Cheryl shares with us an insight that tooks some years to realise.  Apart from our meditation, Empowering Yourself, we have a couple of give aways within our Just For You feature.

This month’s Modern Goddess and inspiring woman is Jennifer Lee.  Jennifer rediscovered her childhood passion and has successfully carved out a career and business doing the things she loves.

May your month be filled with laughter, happiness and empowering action!

Nicole x

As a certified coach, artist, author and yogini she is doing wonders in her local community as well as over the Internet.

As a kid, Jennifer was always painting or drawing but once she hit high school she started comparing herself with others, and gave into the belief that she was not talented enough. Like all other good young adults, she focused on doing well in school so she could get into a good college and have a good career.

However, after 10 years in corporate America working for companies such as Gap, Accenture, Sony and Universal, Jennifer she left her successful career in change management consulting to pursue her passions and living in alignment with her values.

Jennifer incorporates creative elements like visualization, movement, collage and book arts, to help women tap into their greatest potential and live their most authentic, full life. She is the creator of the Right-Brain Business Plan, a tool to help you creatively envision your business.

These days, Jennifer spends her days coaching individual clients, practicing yoga on and off the mat, facilitating workshops, leading the Oakland Ladies Who Launch chapter and doing creative projects. In short, she’s living her life authentically and feels like she’s making a positive impact in people’s lives.

When Jennifer’s not working, she loves to spend time hanging out with her husband, Brian and their adorable dog, Emmett. She enjoys Ashtanga yoga, reading, knitting, book binding, arts and crafts, painting, hiking, nature, eating great food and connecting with friends.

As we do with all our modern goddesses, we asked Jennifer a few questions.

Nicole: What inspires you?

Jennifer: I’m inspired by so many things! The beauty that surrounds me in every day life. Touching stories of people taking risks to live their dreams. I’m inspired by art, creativity and people expressing themselves fully in all aspects of their lives. I’m inspired by seeing connections and discovering new and interesting way to integrate different concepts or ideas.

Nicole: Which women have inspired you?

Jennifer: Anyone who is going after her dreams and living her most authentic life inspires me. It takes courage, passion and determination to make your visions real in the world, so I love seeing women creating positive change in their lives and the lives of others. I’m inspired by my dear friend Brighid O’Shaughnessy who developed a non-profit based on her passions around theater and mental health. I’m always learning from her willingness to speak the hard truth with love and her talent for mobilizing people to take action.

Fictional females even inspire me – like Paikea in “The Whale Rider” and Juliette Binoche’s character in “Chocolat” who both embodied the power of intuitive and feminine leadership.

Some of my other muses include: Martha Stewart, Oprah, Madonna, Frida Kahlo, tranquilista Kimberly Wilson, the amazing clients I work with and the world of creative bloggers who bare their art and soul everyday.

Nicole: What are your future plans for your business, and for yourself?

Jennifer: I’m envisioning abundance, ease and organic growth. I want to continue supporting women to awaken their inner muses and live their dreams. My vision includes getting my first book published, continuing my 1:1 coaching and leading workshops, and offering more ways to help “musepreneurs” authentically grow their creative businesses. I also want to contribute to the emerging field of Expressive Arts Coaching through supporting other coaches, developing community and sharing resources.

In my personal life, I’m intending more spaciousness to enjoy the things I love. Some fun goodies I already have in the works include taking intuitive painting classes, enjoying a yoga retreat and vacationing in Mexico with my hubby. Yay!

Thanks again, Nicole, for this wonderful opportunity to connect with you and your marvelous readers!!

Nicole: You’re welcome Jennifer.

To relate the meditation back to this issue’s theme, our meditation focuses on empowering yourself to live your dreams.

Sit comfortably with a straight back and your eyes closed. (Pause) Take a deep breath in through your nose and out through your mouth. (Pause)

As you count down from 5 to 1, you find yourself letting go (Pause), letting go of all thoughts (Pause) and releasing any tension in your body. (Pause)

5. Ensure that your face is soft (Pause), ensure your eyes are soft (Pause) and your jaw is relaxed. (Longer Pause)

4. Let go of any tension in your neck, your shoulders (Pause), your arms and fingers. (Pause)

Good! You’re doing well! (Pause)

3. Take a deep breath in, (Short Pause) count to 3 (Short Pause) and release your breath imagining yourself calm, relaxed and totally at ease. (Pause)

2. Let all your thoughts float away like a white fluffy cloud on a clear blue day. (Long Pause)

Excellent! (Short Pause)

1. All noise and movements allow you to slip deeper and deeper into a state of wellbeing. (Pause) Feel the tension of you lower back, hips and legs become soft and relaxed. (Long Pause)

In your mind’s eye you find yourself sitting by an open window… (Pause)

When you look out this open window, you see the most beautiful, lush, green grass with bright coloured flowers sprinkled throughout.  Take the time to look around and drink in the amazing energy of this glorious place. (Long Pause)  Feel the energy seep into your heart (Pause), seep into your mind (Pause), seep into your soul. (Pause)

As you are taking in this energy you begin to realise that your Inner Goddess is nearby (Pause) she has the most infectious smile, that you cannot help but smile with her.  Her love for you is truly blissful, you feel it to your core. (Pause)

As you connect with her, she encourage you to walk with her through the field. (Pause)  While walking pick some of the flowers that you walk past, knowing that these will be displayed in a vase to remind you of your time together. (Pause)

Your inner goddess asks “what is it that you really wish to do, but there is a barrier stopping you?”  You sit down in the grass to connect with your heart and find your answer. (Pause) When you’re ready you share your answer with your Inner Goddess. (Long Pause)

Your inner goddess asks “what can you do to overcome those barriers?” and without thinking you immediately tell her the actions you can take to empower yourself to live you dreams. (Pause)  Upon finishing you feel your energy buzzing, your heart smiling and butterflies dancing in your belly. (Pause)  This is all good, your inner goddess tells you.

Your walk is nearly over and you have bright, illuminous flowers in your hand.  Say goodbye to your inner goddess (Pause) and make your way back to your window. (Pause)  Once you’re back at your window, watch the sunset (Pause) and know that the obstacles have become actions, and those actions will move you forward in achieving your dreams.  Sit with those actions and recognise how each one is a stepping stone and an achievable goal. (Pause)

When you’re ready, put your hands together in prayer position, (Pause) place them at your heart chakra (Pause) and say “I am empowered to live my dreams” and take the time to thank your inner goddess for visiting. (Pause)

Take 3 deep breathes and with each breath your awareness returns to the here and now. (Pause) Wiggle your toes and fingers (Pause) and when you’re ready, open your eyes. (Pause)

Take a few moments to remember your obstacles and actions to overcome them, write them down if you wish.

Blessings to you!

The Love Food Hate Waste campaign aims to raise awareness of the need to reduce food waste.

Their website is jam packed with recipes, tips on how to save time and money as well as how to work out portion sizes.  All practical everyday things that can do to waste less food, and ultimately benefit our purses and the environment.

Being organised is about planning, diary management and a practising techniques that work for you. Here are some techniques that will help you organise yourself and achieve what you want to achieve within your day.

* Learn to say ‘No’ - I know this is a tough one, and I am constantly practicing this myself. When you stop doing the things others want you to do, and do things that impact your timeline, you’ll be amazed at how good you feel achieving the things you want to achieve.

* Avoid Butterfly Behaviour - This means flitting from one task to the next, to the next and then the next. You don’t actually get anything completed and you often finish where you started. Focus on one task at a time and only allow for the telephone and people to distract you.

* Just Do It - Stop procrastinating… just start the task, even if you don’t know where to begin. Break it down and start on something small, the sooner you start the sooner momentum will kick in and you’ll get the task completed in no time.

* Multi-Task on Small Things - Don’t try to do two major tasks at once, instead focus on the small things such as reading a report while waiting for an appointment, exercise while watching your favourite show or the news, think about your to-do-list or writing a letter while in the shower, buy or borrow books on tape and listen to them while travelling or going for a daily walk.

* Schedule Blocks of Time - Identify your low energy times and allocate those times to easier tasks that do not need so much thinking such as responding to emails, and utilise your more higher energy times to more challenging tasks. Then set yourself times each day for specific tasks, such as emails and only check and respond during those times. Alternatively, schedule quieter days or times of the year to do general office duties or marketing.

It’s never to late to get organised, or review how you manage your day.

Sit comfortably with a straight back and your eyes closed. (Pause) Take a deep breath in through your nose and out through your mouth. (Pause)

As you count down from 5 to 1, you find yourself letting go (Pause), letting go of all thoughts (Pause) and releasing any tension in your body. (Pause)

5. Ensure that your face is soft (Pause), ensure your eyes are soft (Pause) and your jaw is relaxed. (Longer Pause)

4. Let go of any tension in your neck, your shoulders (Pause), your arms and fingers. (Pause)

Good! You’re doing well! (Pause)

3. Take a deep breath in, (Short Pause) count to 3 (Short Pause) and release your breath imagining yourself calm, relaxed and totally at ease. (Pause)

2. Let all your thoughts float away like a white fluffy cloud on a clear blue day. (Long Pause)

Excellent! (Short Pause)

1. All noise and movements allow you to slip deeper and deeper into a state of wellbeing. (Pause) Feel the tension of you lower back, hips and legs become soft and relaxed. (Long Pause)

In your mind’s eye you find yourself in a place of beauty… (Pause)

This place is so radiant, beautiful, and loving.  Take the time to look around and drink in the amazing energy of this place of beauty. (Long Pause)  Feel the energy seep into your heart (Pause), seep into your mind (Pause), seep into your soul. (Pause)

As you are taking in this energy you begin to realise that you have the most stunning pair of angel wings on your back (Pause) and when you realise this, you stretch them out and see that they are large enough to wrap yourself and someone else in the wings. (Pause)

Without thinking, you know that these angel wings are to be used to wrap people in a loving and healing embrace. (Pause)  Upon knowing this, you see family and friends who could benefit from such a generous, heart-felt embrace. (Pause)

You slowly walk up to the first person, quietly saying to yourself “I love you, please accept my loving and healing embrace” and then you wrap your angel wings around them. Embrace them as long as you feel you need to.  (Pause)  You continue to embrace all that need your beautiful energy. (Long Pause)

Once you have wrapped your beautiful angel wings around everyone, visualise Mother Earth and say to yourself “I love you, please accept my loving and healing embrace.” (Pause)  Then wrap your wings around yourself and say “I love you, please accept my loving and healing embrace.”  Sit with the energy for as long as you need. (Pause)

When you’re ready, put your hands together in prayer position, (Pause) place them at your heart chakra (Pause) and say to yourself out loud or quietly, “Thank you for my beautiful wings.” (Pause)

Take 3 deep breathes and with each breath your awareness returns to the here and now. (Pause) Wiggle your toes and fingers (Pause) and when you’re ready, open your eyes. (Pause)

Take a few moments to remember your messages, write them down if you wish.

Blessings to you!

The nice thing about his book is that it’s written in simple language and organised into five, seven-day plans, with each plan concentrating on a specific life concern - how to attract money into your life; how to attract ideal relationships; how to attract your best health; how to attract your dream job and how to attract everything needed for a successful business.  Each chapter has a side note that delves deeper into the philosophies of the Law of Attraction.

This book is a great gift if you wish to introduce family and friends to a different way of being or even for yourself to learn a new way of attracting the life you wish to live.

To learn more about the author and other books in the series, visit www.boldthought.com.

Cheryl has us thinking about the different ways we can give, Michelle profiles gifts of giving, Jennifer promotes shopping locally, and Anne suggests five ways of looking after yourself, because we so often are busy looking after everyone else.  To continue with the ‘giving’ theme, we shine the spotlight on a challenge… a 29 day giving challenge.  I highly recommend you join and have some fun giving.

Our Inspiring Women is Eve Chan, a young woman living her life with passion and intent.  We also have a great easy read on living your life with intention, and our fable in the Spiritual Health section demonstrates how we so often live life without any clear direction.

With so much going on around the world, we offer you a Healing Meditation and Colleen explains how important it is to live in the present moment; to enjoy the present moment.

From all of us at the Modern Goddess Magazine, we wish you a wonderful and safe holiday period.

Blessings to you and your family.
Nicole x

The reason she is our “Inspiring Woman” for this issue is because she turned her life upside down and made a career shift from finance/insurance to organic/environment/natural medicine.

Her career now is in alignment to her beliefs and purpose, which is to serve humanity and to make planet earth a better place to live. 

Towards the end of her career in the financial industry, Eve felt that the current system had no justice.  She began to question why a small amount of people were entitled to more resources they can possibly use, while millions or billions of people are starving, with no access to the right medical treatments, spending their entire life working to pay off their debts etc.  The final straw was after watching Michael More’s documentary Sicko, which is about the US insurance sector.

Eve’s actions to live based on her beliefs demonstrates that you CAN have a career based on what you are passionate about.  Her passions are organic foods, natural healing and saving our planet, and Eve has been able to successfully combine all three in her career.

Today she spreads her time working for OrganicHome as Sales and Distribution Manager, Optiumum Health as Marketing and Consultant, as well as an Organiser of the Better Hong Kong movement.

Eve also practices what she preaches… she is an organic vegan because of animal cruelty, world food shortage issue (the grains we use to raise 1 cattle can feed many starving people in the 3rd world), global warming (the number of cattles exist are in positive correlation to the green house gases in our ozone layer) and organic is the only way to protect our God-given physical body at its best condition and the best way for us to sustainably farm on the body of Mother Earth.

In her spare time she also helps with the facebook group, Save the Human.  Save the Human is a campaign to raise public awareness about the alarming facts of green house gases.  Their aim is for people to not only change their lifestyles but also to pro-actively be part of the solution.

As with all our inspiring women, I thought I’d ask her a few questions… 

Nicole: Who inspires you and why?

Eve: My current employer Dr. Alexander Yuan and a good friend, the owner of Life Cafe, Bobsy are the ones who inspired me.

Dr Alexander Yuan’s Better Hong Kong Movement’s political statement is my major source of inspiration.  His illustration of how our society and the world should be, very much resonates with what I have always believed. His vision not only can be applied to a small metropolitan city like Hong Kong but to any city on this planet. I read his political statement and just door knocked at his office and asked him to hire me, it is a great honour to work with someone who has a vision and acts on what he believes.

Bobsy is the owner of  Life Cafe, a beautiful organic vegetarian cafe situated in Soho. He has been supporting the green movement in Hong Kong for the past 20 years and has always been dedicated his work and service.  He promotes vegetarianism as a solution to many world issues in Hong Kong. His vision and his love for mother earth has set an example of ways in which I can help the planet. Mother earth is a conscious living being just as we are and she deserves the same respect and treatment as we do to ourselves. He had initiated the fantastic campaign Save The Human.

Nicole: What women have inspired you and why?

Eve: My mother is my source of inspiration whom has now retired in Melbourne, Australia. She was once a hippie and was a Thailand buddhist nun for three years when she was still on her journey of soul searching. She has given me much freedom and support during my years as a child and adolescent to explore variety of experiences such as travelling to different countries around the world, letting me pursue whatever interests that I may had at that time and treated me like an equal instead of just as her daughter.

My mother has offered me great insight into buddhism and since a young age, I have been fascinated about the buddism values and the concept of reincarnation. Before she retired she was a successful entrepreneur (who didn’t even complete high school) managing 300 people.  Everyone adored and respected her. She is my best friend, my mother, my guide and the light in life and will always be someone I look up to.

Nicole: What are your future plans for yourself and for your causes?

Eve: My purpose will always be serving God and humanity, in whatever way I am called to do so. I am very happy with what I am doing at this stage but will move on shall I have other calling to work on a different project or different part of the world. My options are opened and I will just let my intuition guide me to wherever I shall be.

Save The Human will be launching officially in mid-Jan with a fund-raising launch in Hong Kong and will put together a music video to circulate around the internet!  With Organic Home, we will be expanding our distribution further and will constantly host eco-tour in various of farm sites around Hong Kong to raise general public’s awareness of Hong Kong’s hidden natural assets. BetterHongKong will be recruiting liked minded people to be core members of our ThinkTank to facilitate our 101 projects to make Hong Kong and hopefully the world to be a better place.

Nicole, this is a real honour, thank you for offering me this opportunity.

Nicole: Eve you’re most welcome and I look forward to following your projects with much interest.

Eve highly recommends the documentary Zeigeist Addendum for anyone who would like to know the REAL history of the development of our monetary system - which was designed to serve the elite but not the mass.

She is also organising (for those that live in Hong Kong) an organic brunch and organic German Christmas stollen workshop.  Contact Eve via email on evewaiyu@hotmail.com.

The focus of this issue is ‘making an impact this season’ and you can definitely make an impact by taking part in this wonderful, empowering challenge.

29 Gifts: Challenge is about giving one thing away each day for 29 days.

Why? Because to see the world change, we have to do something to change the world. Plus, the best way to attract abundance into your life is to be in a perpetual state of giving and gratitude. Be an important part of the global giving movement that inspires more generosity on our planet.

You can give away anything… time, money and object.  To learn more about the challenge, watch the video below and join the 29 Gifts: Challenge Community.

Find more videos like this on 29-Day Giving Challenge

I hope you join the challenge… Happy Giving!