Mending Lives

Jane Houng: [00:00:00] Hi, I'm Jane Hong, and this is Mending Lives, where I'm talking with people from a patchwork of places. Some have had their lives ripped apart by loss, some are in the business of repairing others brokenness, but we're all seeking to make this world more beautiful.

My guest today is Vanessa Chan. You may remember the name because she interviewed me in the first episode of Mending Lives. Vanessa is based in Hong Kong, like me, and has worked in business consulting and international high tech for over 20 years. But after a painful divorce and some issues around her personal identity, she devoted time and effort to improve her physical and mental health.

This included training as a yoga and meditation teacher. Well, I can vouch that her yoga classes are really good because I went myself when I was trying to get my own [00:01:00] life in order. Since then, she has set up what she calls Meditation Hikes and Meditation Walks in Hong Kong as well as Singapore and recorded meditations on her website called Finding Ananda.

She also enjoys mentoring young executives, running and swimming. I caught up with her in her home studio to have a chat.

Jane Houng: Hi, Vanessa. How are you this afternoon?

Vanessa Chan: I'm great. How are you, Jane?

Jane Houng: Pretty good, considering. Let's get on with the podcast because I'd love to know more about your career. Uh, but of course we're focusing on mending lives [00:02:00] here. So, before we move on to your contribution in that respect, please tell us more about what personal qualities it takes to be a business leader and how your creative spirit has helped you achieve what you have?

Vanessa Chan: Well, first, I think there are many different types of leaders. The world needs diversity of leaders, um, for, for the world to, to function and operate well. Um, and I like to think of it as, you know, throughout my career, I pick up bits and pieces of those leaders who have inspired me. It's not just one particular one, but I feel like the collection of leaders. I've worked with I've learned something from each of them and have developed my own leadership style I think if you ask people who have worked with me and for me, they would describe me as someone who is visionary, who is inspirational, and most [00:03:00] importantly, uh, persistent.

I'm a very, very persistent, very resilient, um, kind of leader. I don't get Um, , discourage, , very, , easily. In my career. I've done a lot of long and difficult projects that I imagine many people would give up, but I don't, and not only I personally don't, I very often can rally up the team, um, and continue the effort for a really long period of time. And I think that's what makes me unique as a leader.

Jane Houng: So you have resilience. You have patience. You have some charisma, which keeps people wanting to work with you. And where's the vision? Give me an example of where you've been.

Vanessa Chan: I'm in tech and when you build partnerships, it's a bit like, um, putting a marriage together. It's very, very complicated. That's the products. That's the commercial side. Um, that's the structure of the [00:04:00] entity. Uh, the structure of the leadership team.

There's a lot to fight about if you want to. Um, and two very, usually two different companies, very different cultures. Um, even though you come together because your vision is aligned, but it doesn't mean that you totally agree with each other. Um, so a lot of times, someone has to take the extra mile.

In order to put the picture together and a lot of times I play that role many times and I like to think that I'm quite good at it and it's all because I like to listen. I like to listen to what actually in people's hearts and try to think how to close the deal that way. Um, yeah, someone, someone needs to fill the gap.

There will be no partnership, um, or any commercial discussion where naturally two parties just come together and put a [00:05:00] perfect picture that will inspire, you know, usually maybe a hundred people might get involved. Um, That just doesn't happen naturally. And someone needs to really have the imagination and have the heart and patience to talk to enough stakeholders on both sides and, um, and put the picture together.

I'm not afraid of prototyping. So the first picture I put together might not be right. It might be actually very, very wrong, but someone needs to put it out there and let people debate and disagree and agree. Um, and I think because I am an artist at heart, since I was very little, um, I'm very comfortable with that process.

Jane Houng: Okay. So you listen to people, you like to think that once people have peeled off all the layers, our hearts want the same kind of thing, we want peace, we want a marriage of true minds, right? Yes. What happens when you meet people who have some mental health issues? Because I believe it's quite [00:06:00] common in the workplace now.

Vanessa Chan: Back then, like 10 years ago when I was less educated on the topic, I just thought people were a little stressed, a little anxious, um, they like alcohol maybe a little bit too much, you know, maybe temper, bad temper now more educated on the topic. I realized they actually have, um, mental health, challenges

and they're, they're very common in the sense that, you know, , There's a degree, right, like it's not everyone is on the same page, even if they're struggling with similar symptoms. I think it's compassion, Jane. I think it's all about making them feeling comfortable, um, to share their struggle. Because the more they hide the deeper the disease gets and the longer and the more, uh, more challenging it would be for them to recover.

Jane Houng: And when you say them and we, I mean, are you thinking about women in particular? And [00:07:00] if so, is there anything that women, uh, face or struggle with more than men?

Vanessa Chan: I think, I think we all struggle, men and women. Um. And I think, if anything, actually women find it a little bit easier to share, at least with our girlfriends. , because I think we are used to having that kind of very vulnerable relationship with our, you know, girlfriends, for sure, or mom or aunts, right? I think we tend to have those relationships. Unfortunately, for men, I find that, um, those relationships can be rare and precious , and not as, um, strong, right?

And so, even though you might have one or two guy friends who you share a little bit more, but you may still be feeling like you should not share so much with them because of You know, a lot of reasons, like maybe it's too much for them. [00:08:00] Maybe it'll scare them off.

Jane Houng: Receive, yeah, I mean, uh, uh, vulnerabilities right?

Vanessa Chan: Or, trusting the other side who can take care.

Jane Houng: And about emotion, about feelings, that kind of thing. I think it's a, it's a bit of a generalization, but it's fair to say that women are more used to doing this with their girlfriends, yeah, than men do over their drinks at the bar or whatever. Um look, let's talk about technology a little bit longer, because I'd like to know what you think, um, technology can give to people seeking well being.

Vanessa Chan: Mm. I think we have made a lot of progress. Um, it's, just like everything in life, like it's a bit, You know, like contradictive in some way, because I think technology has created a lot of mental health issues if I can be fair. Um, But it can also be a [00:09:00] solution, ironically, right? So, there are all these meditation apps out there now.

Jane Houng: That jumped to my mind immediately when you said that, yeah. And we're going to talk about your meditation apps very soon. Because, yeah, people can access those for free, right?

Vanessa Chan: Yeah, for free. Um, you can go to YouTube and watch a lot of wonderful teachers, , teaching mindfulness. Um, talking about how do you achieve well being. I think the science is very clear now. Um, luckily, we've done a lot of research on neuroscience and the mental health in the past 10 years, the science and well being in general, I think the science is very clear. But unfortunately, the behavior or the will and the, you know, you have to want it to to actually leverage this turn the knowledge into a reality, into actual health. Um, that gap is still very, very big in our society.

Jane Houng: And [00:10:00] maybe there's, there's some self control there, isn't there? Because you rather than tune into your, I don't know, the latest score in the racing or the NBA or something, You think, well I'm just going to listen to a meditation or some, do some yoga rather than those other temptations, which are diversions.

Vanessa Chan: Yeah, and even that, right, I think we're beginning to understand more how do we build habits. Right, there's the book called Atomic Habit. There are quite a few books that talk about how do you build healthy habits.

Um, And you know, there are a few tricks, like for example, you start with very small dosages, you don't make the initial steps so big, because especially for meditation, it's all about small dosage, but consistently for about two months, that's how you get the results, and when you see the results, of course, you'll be more motivated to stick with your new habit, but The challenge is to help people stick [00:11:00] with this new habit for two months.

We tend to be overambitious in the beginning. I'm going to do half an hour of meditation, right? Start with five minutes, and five minutes for two weeks, three weeks, and then you can add another five minutes.

Jane Houng: How long have you been meditating for?

Vanessa Chan: Well, I've started doing yoga in 2000. So, of course, every yoga class has some kind of meditation and panayama, like breathing exercise. But meditation more seriously, I would say maybe six, seven years, , it's also partially inspired by the yoga teacher training that both you and I took and in the yoga teacher training, you know, it the main focus is still yoga as a whole the all the eight means. And meditation is just one of them. After that class, I became very curious about meditation and I got deeper into that branch of yoga.

Jane Houng: And what is your daily practice now, if you don't mind me asking?

Vanessa Chan: Well, I wake up at 5, 5. [00:12:00] 30. Um, I do, you know, about 20 minutes meditation and then I go work out for one hour, one hour and a half. So I have to start really early in order to show up at work at 9, 9:30.

Jane Houng: Well, I can share, I have, I do something fairly similar. Um, and it's developed into a healthy habit that I, that I miss if I don't do. Um, so when my mind was particularly in turmoil, let's say, um, just sitting quietly and breathing was of great assistance to me. And now here we are six years later. Yeah, I tend to wake up early and I often listen to a podcast or some recording on the internet and follow it's usually a breathing exercise just in and out. It's very very basic and followed by some yoga.

Vanessa Chan: I don't do the same workout every day. So sometimes it's weight training. Sometimes [00:13:00] it's running. I run quite a bit. One or two days it would be yoga usually hot yoga for me.

Jane Houng: Hot yoga. Yes. And do you vary the exercise component?

Vanessa Chan: Yeah, I, I do. Um, and I think you, , you should in order to stay healthy and, um, if you want to be strong, because each form of exercise has its purpose in your health program.

Jane Houng: What about running?

Vanessa Chan: Um, running is something I've been doing for a really long time. Maybe like 20, 20 plus years.

Jane Houng: So you were swimming this morning?

Vanessa Chan: I was at 6:30 Jane. It was nice and toasty not.

Jane Houng: Did you have a wetsuit?

Vanessa Chan: Um, I had half of wetsuit. I have a vest. Um, and it was 10 degrees Celsius. The pool was, um, nice in the sense that there was finally a lot of space at the Kowloon Park pool.

Jane Houng: Ah, I wonder why. Because it was 9 degrees [00:14:00] today, which is really cold for Hong Kong right. Yeah. So yeah, variety of exercise. I do the same. I mean, yeah, I do my meditation. Um, I do a little yoga or stretching and then I do some physical exercise and sometimes it's boot camp on Lantau Island.

Vanessa Chan: Yin and yang, right?

Jane Houng: Yes. And sometimes it's a slow walk. Another time, um, it's swimming. I go in the sea. Yeah. So, let's think about all this in the context of, Mending lives because going back to the difficulties we faced and we revealed in our first show. Um, I really am a firm believer in a healthy body, healthy mind. What about you?

Vanessa Chan: Yes, I think the, um, brain, body, heart connections are real, right?

Um, we cannot make good decisions. We cannot be good leaders. We cannot be good mothers. Friends without a healthy body, because everything in your body [00:15:00] helps you make decisions, helps you see clearly, , and I think even like nutrition is a key part of, you know, your overall, well being, and the science behind all this is very clear now.

I don't think you can say we don't know enough to know how to live healthily. Now, you know, we are entering that phase in human history where we have so much science and knowledge about our brain, our body, now it's about putting it to work and how do we help people to develop healthy habits?

How do we help people to want this? Um, and that's very much, um, in my heart . For example, all these like meditative hikes, um, all these meditation sessions I do at work. I just want people to have a glimpse of what it's like when you reach that point of peace and balance. And I want them to have it, even if it's just one second, three seconds of [00:16:00] it.

Jane Houng: Yeah. It's a feeling to me. If you feel good, right. You've eaten well. Your body is working well. Your mind is clear. It's not cluttered, confused. It's a feeling and, I found it very helpful to aspire to that as much as I can from day to day.

But tell us more about your meditation hikes. Come on, the first one you did was in Hong Kong.

Vanessa Chan: Yeah, so, um, I've been leading community hikes for a number of years. Some are very challenging, , some are easier. , and I have decided that, , I would like to really bring the trail to people who have never experienced it before or who are intimidated by them.
Um, I'm also a female trail runner and I used to get scared to be on the trail on my own, but not anymore. , and I want to help more people to overcome this fear.

Jane Houng: What's the fear in hong Kong?

Vanessa Chan: I think like [00:17:00] one is like, you know, the trail always feels so far away, Jane. But in reality, I mean, we're so spoiled in Hong Kong.

They're really just, maybe 30 minutes, 45 minutes, an hour from your house. You're in the country parks. Yeah, you can go to many trials within one hour in Hong Kong. That's just the fact, right? So it's a mental blockage, I feel like. And the second is you don't have the confidence to go up, like, or, or know the route, right?

Um, what if I get stuck? What if I get lost? You know, there's like lots of fear, but you can start with some very simple, um, route and it's very well marked in Hong Kong. Very well organized. Um, you can do the shorter ones. I mean, there are lots of ways to overcome this initial fear and, and I feel like when we have a group going, then people would be more inclined to try.

Jane Houng: Exactly because you're doing all the planning, right? So how many people usually sign up?

Vanessa Chan: It has been [00:18:00] so wonderful to see the growth, of the membership. Um, so in the beginning, I'm talking about like maybe four or five people.

Now all our meditative hikes have always oversubscribed. Last time, I think I let like 24, 25 people. That's the maximum. That's the maximum I can. I'm comfortable.

Jane Houng: You can handle.

Vanessa Chan: Yeah. Yeah.

Jane Houng: You and your dogs or dog. Tell me about the dogs. I've looked at the photos and I will see dogs around.

Vanessa Chan: Yes so they are rescue dogs. There are four of them. They're called Lantau fishlers. They have been such an inspiration not just for me. I think for many people who who saw them in, in Lantau because they rescued us. They were extremely abused. Um, one pair was, , a breeding pair. So before we adopted them, they actually have never, ever lived outside of a cage before. And Momo, um, the oldest one, , he has a very special relationship with [00:19:00] me. Um, he was so scared when we went to the center. And, , and I fell in love with him and he fell in love with me. He really trusted me from day one. And I was really touched because he after all the trauma he has gone through, he put his head on my, you know, on my lap and I was like, Oh, you know, like he, , he was showing that he was willing to let go of that fear, at least when it comes to me. Now, when it comes to other people, it took many, many years and he actually ran away, you know, a couple of times, um, the maximum. The longest was eight days.

Jane Houng: You must have been beside yourself with worry.

Vanessa Chan: I was in China on a business trip and I flew back by the way. I, I ran and so did many other runners. Um, we ran everywhere to look for him. And, and in those eight days, I really had this belief, like just no reason. I don't even know why I believe that he will come back.

Jane Houng: So when when he joins your meditation hikes, [00:20:00] that's just because he loves being with you or is he, does he have some therapeutic advantage to, to enjoy the hike?

Vanessa Chan: You know, I, I really hesitated the first time because like I said, I mean, he would run away when he's scared. I was so scared of leaving Momo in the middle with all these strangers, and he was fine. He was so at peace, so he has come a long way. .

Jane Houng: So meditation at the end is, are there any meditative practices throughout the hike? What do you do exactly?

Vanessa Chan: I'm really into prototyping. Um, I'm a creative person, So in the beginning it was just like a hike, , a meditation on the hilltop. And then eventually I wanted you know, the participants to try different types of meditation so that they could find one that they resonate with after the hike and continue with the practice at home. That's the idea. So now what I do is we do about 45 minutes of social hike so people can talk. And then we, we hit the first, [00:21:00] um, grassland and we do metta meditation, which is love and kindness to open up their hearts.

And then I asked them to hike to the top uh, the plateau silently after the love and kindness meditation, it's about another 45 minutes. And then once we got to the hilltop, then we do mindfulness, breathing, and visualization, intention setting and then. Um, after the meditation, they would have a few minutes to journal, reflecting on the experience, um, for new year meditation, I would ask them to write down three words that they could use throughout the year to bring back the serenity they were feeling at the hilltop. And many people love that exercise.

Jane Houng: Love on the mountaintop . Yes. How can you ever stop? Oh. So what kind of people at, um, are attracted to, to coming? I mean, I'm, I'm sure after listening to this, some people would like to [00:22:00] sign up and of course I'm going to put the details on the show notes. So, um, yeah. Well, what's your sort of average kind of person?

Vanessa Chan: Well, what I really like about, um, being on the trail is in nature we are all equal and you really do attract all kinds of people. um, People you may not have a chance to meet with if you didn't join this kind of community hikes.

So there could be students, there could be, , business people, um, that could be tourists, , apparently our name has made it to the tourist um, discussion board for Hong Kong., some, some experienced meditators, some brand new meditators. I've even done it in Singapore.

Jane Houng: Yeah, that, now that's your most recent.

Vanessa Chan: Yes. Yes.

Jane Houng: Venture. Yeah. Tell me about that. Was it, was it similar or, or were there differences?

Vanessa Chan: Well, trail, hike, these kind of words for Singapore would be a little bit of a stretch. Limited. Yes, a little bit. [00:23:00] So, um, I call it meditative walk. So we do it at Fort Canning. It's a beautiful park.

Jane Houng: Beautiful.

Vanessa Chan: Yeah. Lots of greens. I think being nature is key. That's what makes the experience unique. And when you do these sort of things, you don't know if people will show up, , it's not a big group yet. We had five, six people, um, each time.

I ran two sessions in Singapore. When you do it in a park, you can do it at night under the moon and stars. And that gave the practice a completely different vibe.

Jane Houng: What a lovely idea. And I suppose through word of mouth. Numbers will grow. Are you planning to go back and do it again?

Vanessa Chan: Yeah, I do go to Singapore regularly because I work in tech and our headquarters and a lot of our business is done in Singapore so that's where I got the idea from is that I want to have the ability to bring this to all the communities that I have interaction with It's my way of saying thank you to [00:24:00] Singapore for everything thing. Um, you know, all the opportunities that I've had in the industry, a lot of them are in Singapore.

Jane Houng: I sense you're a giver, Vanessa, and you've maybe reached a certain stage in your life where, where doing that brings you satisfaction. Is that, is that fair to say?

Vanessa Chan: Yeah, you know, um, if I look back to my life, the, a big turning point was, um, you know, my divorce. It made me realize that I wasn't living the way. I wanted to live and then I was searching right if I wasn't living the life I wanted to live then What should I be doing? And then eventually I found, um, the yoga teacher training. Yoga training put a structure around how I should look at my life. And one particular concept that was very helpful to me professionally was that we are all just conduits on this planet. You know, We are given certain gifts, like [00:25:00] talents, like skills, like assets. We are just here to distribute those resources to the world, to contribute.

They're not actually yours, they're just being distributed through your body. And once I contemplated on that concept and understood it more, it was no longer about just a promotion, uh, all about me. It was about other people. Then I thought about how can I leverage all the experiences in the past and all the skills I have to contribute to a project, contribute to the culture and do beyond my roles and inspire young people.

Jane Houng: And maybe the difficulties because in our first podcast you shared about your unusual family situation because your mother was adopted and then about your divorce and how painful that was and how ill actually, you know, you, , you mentioned the world that you sort of stumbled or you broke down or you know, it was quite a, it was a [00:26:00] very significant time in your life.

So, um, maybe people who are interested in meditation and yoga and these kinds of therapeutic practices are people who are also , in a challenging journey. They're searching. And they're searching for something more.

Vanessa Chan: Think a lot of times the society look at these phases in our life quite negatively. And I think because I have benefited hugely from that period of my life, I look at it very differently. I think we should. thank the universe for giving us those opportunities. Those are opportunities to be reborn.

Jane Houng: Through suffering, through pain.

Vanessa Chan: Through pain. Yes. without the pain, without someone putting so much pain on you that you can't stand it and you have to get out.

You wouldn't want to change, right? Why would you, right? [00:27:00] And how wonderful it is to make decisions again when you're wiser, when you have thought through it more, and it's a wonderful opportunity.

Jane Houng: And tell me, how do you feel when you know that you've really helped someone? Maybe it's not because you've talked at great length. Maybe you can see how they respond to your meditation, without breaching confidentiality, of course.

Vanessa Chan: On a day to day basis, you might not realize how much difference you're making on someone.

But if I, for example, look at, um, some of, , the people, younger people who have worked with me and, um, have known me for a long time, they would come to me and say, , I made this decision differently, I look at this differently, I did this differently because of something you said five years ago, ten years ago.

And you're like, Oh my God, right? Like you have made such an impact on someone and [00:28:00] sometimes you don't even know.

Jane Houng: So you feel, how do you feel?

Vanessa Chan: I feel grateful that I have an opportunity to contribute because only when you are so blessed that you're able to give, right? That you have extra. And that's a good feeling.

Jane Houng: There's this concept of being a wounded healer. I think of that sometimes. You know, maybe if you've been through a very difficult time and you've found a way out and then, I mean, we all um, have difficulties in our lives some more extreme than others let's say, but um, I can see as you're describing, I mean you're almost tearing up, but I don't know maybe you're thinking, yeah, that one person came up to you and said, Thank you so much, it really helped.

Vanessa Chan: Absolutely. And even like during the last Hong Kong meditative hike, there was a Russian kid, he's only nine years old, and his mom, whatsapped me the night before and asked me if it's okay for, for her to bring him. On the hike, and I said, well, if he could sit quietly for 20 minutes, then yes, and she's like, [00:29:00] yeah, yeah, no problem. And of course, he didn't exactly sit quietly for 20 minutes for all the meditations, but towards the end, , we were all journaling and he was also journaling. And of course, a nine year old kid is not going to write journal the way, you know, we do as adults. He was drawing and writing some vocabularies and then drawing, but he was really focusing on his journal for like a good, , five, 10 minutes. And I was really touched at that moment because I was like, it's very possible that this kid's life would never be the same after this.

Jane Houng: Maybe it's the first time he's reflected.

Vanessa Chan: Yeah. Right. . And, and the beginning of an inner journey, right? If you start at nine, wow, like, can you imagine? Yeah.

Jane Houng: To end this podcast on a healthy note, upbeat and optimistic. I think we're in agreement, you and me, , that a healthy body leads to a healthy mind, which leads to a healthy [00:30:00] perspective and outlook. And, , this is a very good way to overcome challenges in life.

Vanessa Chan: Yes, that's correct. , if you make the best decisions in life, you have to bring all parts, your all body parts with you, right? So that includes your brain, your heart, your gut everything

Jane Houng: In light of that, let's go and have some dinner right now.

Vanessa Chan: Sounds good. Bye. Bye.

Jane Houng: Thanks again for listening to Mending Lives with me, Jane Houng. It was produced by Brian Hou. You can find relevant links to this show in the comments section. I would not, could not, be doing this without many people's support and encouragement. So until next time, [00:31:00] goodbye.