Rotary Club of Santa Monica

"2001/2002 - A Rotary Odyssey"

Rota-Monica

SHE MAY ADVISE YOU

TO REARRANGE YOUR OFFICE

             Three years ago Angi Ma Wong set up shop as a consultant.  She now lists among her clientele Bank of America, Universal Studios, AT&T, Ford Motor Company, Merrill Lynch, and 65 real estate developers.  What does she tell her clients?  Mostly how to arrange their furniture.  But occasionally how to change the landscape or even shift a building.  She’ll be our speaker this Friday.

             Ma Wong practices a 3,500 year-old Chinese system called feng shui (pronounced fung shway).  The words mean wind and water in Chinese.  The system is based on the idea that rooms, landscapes, and buildings have hidden zones of energy that can change shapes, size, or color to heighten chances of prosperity and success.  Some real estate people bring feng shui consultants to inspect property before they invest.

            Ma Wong speaks widely on feng shui and has written five books on it.  She is president-elect of the Palos Verdes Sunset Rotary Club for 2002-3.  She is a graduate of the University of Southern California.

OUR FIREWALKER AND SKYDIVER

(One of a series on new members)

             How many of our club members have walked barefoot over hot coals?  Only Christopher Lawson, as far as we’ve heard. 

            In 1998 he flew to San Francisco to learn how.  He paid $695 to join a four-day seminar that culminated with this feat.  The seminar, called “Unleash the Power Within,” taught mental exercises to build personal confidence and energy.  The mentor was Tony Robbins, known as a stimulating writer and speaker.  Chris read a Robbins book, and signed up for the course.  He found himself in an audience of about two thousand.

             “We went from the lecture hall to where the coals were sizzling,” Chris recalls.  “It was up to each of us to walk across if and when we chose.  I thought for about five minutes.  Then something clicked, and I knew I could do it.  I kept my head up and walked across with an even stride.  I think everyone did it eventually.”

             For Chris, the challenge was part of his drive to discipline himself.  As a schoolboy, and then as a student at Babson College and University of Colorado, near his family in Denver, he usually held part-time jobs to make sure he didn’t become lax.  He was quick with numbers and intended to go into some kind of financial work.  After graduation, while he pondered his future, he worked in Denver for seven years, first in real estate and then for a bank.  To broaden himself he plunged into civic efforts, joining the Optimist Club, donating blood, bicycling in a benefit race, delivering for Meals on Wheels, playing volleyball in a March of Dimes tourney, pounding nails and sawing on Habitat for Humanity houses.  And he did a skydive as part of his self-improvement campaign.

             In 1996 he looked around for a big organization where he could keep working up.  He wound up at Invesco, an international firm with thousands of employees.  “I liked their comprehensive training program,” he recalls.  “They offered a lot of opportunities.  People working there seemed pleasant and happy.”

             He started at Invesco on the phone, answering inquiries.  By 2000 he was a 45 minute speaker at a national convention of financial planners in Palm Springs.  Invesco offered him a move up, to build business in Los Angeles, and he accepted.  But he began to yearn for his own business, talking about financial strategies for investors’ clubs, adult groups at colleges, and other money-minded audiences.  He felt confident.  So he left Invesco last September and spent three months arranging speaking engagements, to begin at the start of 2002.  Today he has ten bookings, with more in prospect.  Our new roster lists him as “professional speaker.”  Lecturing to audiences must seem easy after walking on hot coals.

LOOK WHAT’S COMING AT FRIDAY MEETINGS 

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