And so we begin…
2024 was quite a year of intensity for me, a year of exploration, a year of dipping my feet into different experiences, a year of expansion and contraction, of ebbs and flows…
A lot of doubts came up for me over my role in the ecosystem after I left my job — at which level can I be most effective & most relevant, questions that I am still exploring…
At the same time, this year has allowed me to connect and learn new ways of being & doing, lessons old & new, being a part of new communities while strengthening old ones…
Amidst all these, finding the time and space to retreat and recharge in Mother Nature, to let these experiences sink in…
What a year of testing my own boundaries and continuously navigating a precarious balance…
In no particular order, the highlights of my year include:
- Adventures in the Forest
The opportunity to go behind-the-scenes of Tropical Rainforest Conservation & Research Centre’s (TRCRC) work in Malaysia was such a treat, exploring the value of a forest. TRCRC collects the recalcitrant seeds of our Tropical Forest Giants, the Dipterocarp, to germinate in nurseries for the restoration of degraded and fragmented forests. What seemed like a fairly degraded secondary forest revealed its value when we saw the footages of camera traps and footprints of various animals that still call the forest home, the only home that they have known. It was so much fun hanging out with the team while seeing their work at the nursery, setting up camera traps, trekking through the forest in the river by the moonlight, and much more. Most of all, just being grateful that so close to home, there is still this level of biodiversity and richness in our forest…
A few months later, thanks to an insistent primatologist friend, off we went to Danum Valley, home to a 130-million-year-old ancient rainforest in Sabah. I got the opportunity to be up close and personal with the Dipterocarps and was in absolute awe of these Forest Giants. This, plus other opportunities to be in the forest throughout the year, always brings up this question for me:
Are we quiet enough to listen? To be with the forest at her pace…
2. By the Great River
In 2024, I was also very fortunate to be able to explore the Kinabatangan River, the second longest river in Malaysia, twice. As much as I love being in the forest, I also really enjoy seeing the landscape, and the ecosystem along the Kinabatangan River is such a vibrant one, home to the Proboscis Monkeys, the Orang Utans, the Borneo Elephants, the Rhinoceros Hornbills and countless others. As we glide across the river, the landscape changes. The heavily logged secondary forest in the colonial days made way for palm oil plantations. In some parts of the river bank, there is so little riparian zone left, one wonders how do the elephants traverse these landscapes when they need to. What’s evident is the work is here…
3. In the Garden
My mom’s garden has provided me with many moments of joy and peace this year. She first got this house and garden in April 2023 and since then, we have grown many leguminous plants to restore the soil and we got our first harvest of peanuts in February! Since then, it has grown into a fairly wild and lush looking garden (perhaps too much) due to fast-growing species like the Mexican sunflower (grown as mulch) but my mom wouldn’t let me chop-and-drop any branches with flower buds on them so in its overly grown state, I lavished under its shade while my mom and I worked with this tiny plot of land and enjoyed the light drizzle in between…
4. Communities of Care & Courage
This year would've ended quite differently without being part of communities that gave me the courage to step forward. At Nexus, I found a community of change-makers that are always navigating the hard decisions and showing up with vulnerabilities while facing the unknowns. Being in their company, the decision became clear that it is time to go home, no more buts and what ifs, the time has come...
My journey with Wild Asia has been wild. I met Reza, the founder, about a year ago, and since then I’ve visited their sites in Sabah, Perak and Southern Thailand. For the last decade or so, Wild Asia has been supporting smallholder palm oil farmers in Malaysia and Thailand to get sustainably certified and now going beyond that to start regenerating the land. Reza’s vision on regenerative palm oil and the regional team’s dedication to the work on the ground is phenomenal but like any growing and ambitious social enterprise, they are strapped on resources and time. I knew I do not have all the components to Wild Asia’s issues on my own so it has been such a pleasure to bring together a Global Advisory Board comprising of professionals from finance, supply chain, organisational development, strategy and communications background, together with Reza, to support Wild Asia in this stage of their growth trajectory and lay the foundations (albeit how small or how slow) for the transformation of monoculture into biodiverse landscapes!
5. The Many Offerings of Taiwan
This year, I received two unexpected offerings from Taiwan, the first with my mom to visit TzuChi, a Buddhist association that she has been part of for many years. It was my first time in Taiwan and being immersed in Buddhism in my rusty Chinese was incredible. Understanding the meaning behind words like 慈悲, which means to know and understand one’s sorrow is being compassionate, landed differently in my body. Visiting TzuChi’s recycling centers, hospitals, universities, TV station, farms, and temples, every single volunteer we met welcomed us with much love and generosity, I was deeply moved by this experience and movement of Buddhism through active service for the society and the environment.
Another unexpected offering was going back to Taiwan in December for the Social Presencing Theatre (SPT) workshop. It’s been a year since I attended the Regenerative Landscapes Asia Pacific gathering using the Theory-U process. SPT is a method under the Theory U using movement (tuning into our body and heart, not just our head) to heighten our awareness practice towards facilitating systems change. The different practices we experienced alternate between stillness and movement, between individual(s) and groups, paying close attention to when does the next move want to begin, especially when you are stuck, as the embodied stuckness cannot be sustained, naturally it will evolve into something else — what new insights does this offer? Putting these elements together in a live stakeholder mapping where we looked into a particular issue and having different people embody different roles and going from where the social system may be stuck to sensing collectively the emerging future possibilities.
6. Places of Discomfort
This workshop also introduced the concept of Ma 間 in Japanese that refers to the pause in between time, space and interval where we may begin to notice the subtle shifts of what wants to emerge. I’ve been on a Theory U journey myself in 2024, the letting go and letting come puts me in many places where I am deeply uncomfortable, taking on multiple roles with either a tight deadline, steep learning curve, needing to hold space for divergent views or sometimes, all at once. This left me feeling like I’m going from one deadline to another, neither the time, space and interval to sense the emergence. At the SPT workshop, we did an exercise called the Field Dance, where sitting in a semi-circle, each of us took turns walking up to the edge of the semi-circle and crossing the threshold of letting go and walking up to the middle of the semi-circle to let come what movement wants to emerge to be shared and held by the group. I was quite nervous at first — of being seen and letting go of what’s “performative” and it’s a reflection of my year thinking that I constantly need to show up with answers while being in the “spotlight” but when I reached the middle, it felt very much like a container rather than a spotlight. So perhaps all I need to do is to continue showing up with curiosity, compassion and care…
It’s been an incredible year of flexing and flowing in many directions and I am glad for the clarity to move back to Malaysia next year and hopefully begin the dream of finding land and building a self-sufficient living that regenerates land at the same time, while joining a family office focused on climate, agriculture and food. My intention is to be kind to myself and give myself the time, space and interval for what wants to emerge including a deeper sense of creativity and flow, of rootedness, playfulness and balance.
And with that, I leave you with the magical sounds of the forest for a peaceful 2025 for all beings, especially to those who needs it the most…
