Hi, I was contemplating direction, focus and purpose as I walked the beach last week, and I have a question for you..

What lights your fire?

It is rare that a film can do justice to a good book. There are exceptions of course, Tolkien's the 'Lord of the Rings' trilogy springs to mind. Last weekend SBS screened the movie version of the book 'Like Water For Chocolate' by Laura Esquivel. While the film could not contain all the exquisite detail of the book, I was glad to be reminded of its compelling story.

It relates the 'romantic, poignant tale, touched by moments of magic, graphic earthiness and bittersweet wit'. The story is centred around the dysfunctional De La Garza family in Mexico . It tells of unrequited passionate love, anguish, despair and wry humour.

In a particular scene, Tita, the main character is being drawn out of a voluntary non-speaking isolation by a doctor who would woo her. He offers the analogy that each of us has a matchbox within us and it takes an outside influence to set the matches alight and with it, our soul's passion.

”My grandmother has a very interesting theory,” he tells Tita.” She says that each of us is born with a box of matches inside us but we can't strike them all by ourselves; we need oxygen and a candle to help. In this case, the oxygen for example, could come from the breath of the person you love; the candle could be any kind of food, music, caress, word or sound that engenders the explosion that lights one of the matches. For a moment we are dazzled by an intense emotion. A pleasant warmth grows within us, fading slowly as time goes by, until a new explosion comes along to revive it. Each person has to discover what will set off those explosions in order to live, since the combustion that occurs when one of them is ignited is what nourishes the soul. That fire, in short, is its food. If one doesn't find out in time what will set off these explosions, the box of matches dampens and not a single match will be lit.....” He added, 'There are many ways to dry out a box of matches, but you can be sure, there is a cure".

You may be aware from previous newsletters that one of my 'matches' is exploring work life balance issues. In the process of working with a client, she discovered writing kids stories gave her great pleasure. It seemed an impossible ask, given her huge daily workload, yet she persisted. Any spare time was devoted to putting pen to paper (well, typing on her computer really) and finding dormant stories from her imaginative mind. It gave her a sense of satisfaction and peace that she didn't get from her career. As she put it, “Writing keeps me sane in an insane industry”. She didn't quit her day job: it provided financial security and other benefits she was unwilling to do without. But that didn't matter to her, as long as she could tap away on her lap-top and perhaps even get her stories published one day. The outcome wasn't important to her, the journey was giving her so much anyway. She had found a 'match' and was striking it for all she was worth!