IWD Special:
18 Mar, 9:30 am – 12:30 pm
One & Co, 20 Anson Rd, #11-01, Singapore 079912
Join us to celebrate this International Women’s Day with loving kindness and be inspired by the kindfulness stories in the form of a human library.
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Meet our human library author
Click on the pictures to find out more about their kindfulness stories.
Book Title:
Lotus above the mud
Author:
Sayalay Sujata
Synopsis:
The grind of daily life can seem like a pond full of mud! Working in the corporate world, I was mired in this muck, my self-centred mind clouded by defensiveness and unhappiness.
Through the training as a Buddhist nun, I learnt to see the world through a different lens — obstacles became opportunities for growth and transformation, and the teachings on wisdom and compassion a fertile soil, providing mental stability and opening the heart. Just like the lotus, we can all bloom with grace and ease, finding peace and purpose within the sticky challenges of life.
Profile:
Sayalay Sujata is a Singaporean Buddhist nun who started her career in the banking and finance sector but decided to embark on a spiritual journey after the 1997 Asian financial crisis. Since then, she has had the privilege of studying with great masters from various countries and traditions, which has enriched her spiritual journey immensely. Sayalay also underwent monastic and meditation training in Myanmar for more than a decade, which further deepened her understanding of Buddhism.
Currently, she serves as the spiritual advisor for Nanyang Technological University Buddhist Society and Buddhist Fellowship Youth, where she shares her knowledge and experience with the younger generation. Her passion for serving the community inspired her to pursue a Master's Degree in Counselling at the National Institute of Education. She also volunteers as a counsellor at Kong Meng San's Counselling Social Services and Dot Connection Growth Centre, providing emotional support and guidance to those in need.
Sayalay aspires to help people cultivate their spiritual journey, integrating Buddhist philosophy and practices into the professional counselling framework of self-awareness, self-reflection, and self-change. By doing so, she hopes to help individuals lead a fulfilling and meaningful life.
Book Title:
FIRE: Forsake Ignorance, Reach Enlightenment
Author:
Venerable Thubten Damcho
Synopsis:
Many Singaporean youths aim for FIRE: Financial Independence, Retire Early. Ruby Pan was on track with a good education and career, but she wondered, why was she still so unhappy? Could it be, as she had heard, that happiness is an inside job?
Profile:
Venerable Thubten Damcho is a Buddhist nun residing at Sravasti Abbey, one of the first Tibetan Buddhist training monasteries in the United States. Born and raised in Singapore, she graduated from Princeton University in 2006 and worked as a high school teacher and public policy analyst in the Singapore government before returning to the U.S. to take novice ordination in 2013. She received the full ordination in 2016. She currently serves as assistant to Sravasti Abbey’s founder, author and well-known Buddhist teacher Venerable Thubten Chodron. Her other responsibilities range from translating Chinese texts into English to removing weeds from the Abbey's 300-acre property.
Book Title:
In pursuit of authenticity
Author:
Yap Ching Wi
Synopsis:
How much can the pursuit of authenticity change our life? With honesty, courage and lots of self-care, more than we ever can imagine! This is what I found out - still a work in progress, I managed to shed an elitism mentality and overcome an 8-year depression.
Profile:
Yap Ching Wi is a social worker with Aranya Sangha Dana Fellowship and a facilitator who designed a life story workshop for seniors. She graduated from the London School of Economics and the National University of Singapore. Being a social worker for 30 years, Ching Wi is grateful for the privilege of journeying with people from all walks of life. She has learned that inner strength comes from simple joy.
Book Title:
Growth Re-imagine… explore, learn & practice
Author:
Lee Boon Yong
Synopsis:
A personal growth story through connecting with self and others. While covid has extended her career pause, she has now returned to Singapore to better support her family in the care-giving of her mum who is in the advanced stage of dementia. With her Zentangle art passion, she believes when you do something with your heart and mind, one stroke at a time, anything is possible.
Profile:
A banking professional with more than 25 years of experience across multiple geographies at global banks. She is passionate about developing talents, creating sustainable business growth and delivering value.
She is an Zentangle Art artist and a Certified Zentangle®️ Art Teacher. She enjoys sharing this relax mindful art form with the wider communities to promote active aging, art and wellness.
Book Title:
Happiness as a woman
Author:
Michelle Lee
Synopsis:
How does one continue to be happy, whether as a working mum or stay home mum, and rejoice with the opportunity to volunteer.
Profile:
Michelle graduated from NUS and was working in the manufacturing industry for 18 years before leaving her general management position to dedicate her time as a full time mother to her 3 sons when the family moved overseas due to her husband’s job postings. Moving around 4 different countries in 12 years meant frequent changes and adaptation to new environments. With these, came the opportunity to interact with people of different nationalities including volunteering with different societies and clubs here and overseas.
Together with her husband, Michelle have also been active in the Singapore Buddhist community, starting with Buddhist Graduate Fellowship (subsequently, Buddhist Fellowship) and now as the Exco member of Firefly Mission.
Book Title:
Om and Nom
Author:
Sheriel
Synopsis:
Weird things happen in life, but somehow they make sense in retrospect. When dreaming of adventure is also about loving the mundane.
Profile:
Sheriel dreams of having a good life - one with adventure, love and purpose. But even with those guidelines, she is constantly wondering what that means at each stage of her life. Looking back, she has hiked in a few countries (favourite being the Everest Base Camp hike in Nepal), lived and worked in Myanmar and most recently incorporated a non-profit working on food security. She currently works as a Business Consultant in the Finance Industry. The road ahead is a blank canvas she doesn’t want to over plan. She hopes for the courage to just live it.
Book Title:
Going against and going beyond
Author:
Koh Kai Xin
Synopsis:
Life seems to always turn out the opposite as planned for Kai xin. This is a journey of how Kai xin learnt to drop her fixation on achieving goals, identity, and views, and arrive at peace with the unconventional decisions she made in life: Not pursuing a degree, dedicating her life to the triple gem, and moving out while being single.
Profile:
Started a communications agency at age 19, without a degree, Kai xin has trained thousands of business executives from fortune 100 companies and won multiple awards. She is also the co-founder of Handful of Leaves, an online Buddhist Publication, featuring practical Buddhist learnings to navigate the complexities of life. She regularly retreats to the forest monasteries in Thailand for self-practice. Her life mission is to go against her own defilements in order to go beyond suffering.
Heartwarming Dialogue
with Anthea Ong
Profile:
Anthea Ong served as a Nominated Member of Parliament from 2018–2020 in the 13th Parliament of Singapore. As a self-described “fulltime human being, part-time everything else”, she is a mental health advocate, social entrepreneur and impact investor, life and leadership coach, strategy consultant, yoga and wellness instructor and author, amongst many other roles. She is never seen without headgear to match her multiple hats.
She enjoys bringing disparate groups of people together, especially where this highlights our common humanity amidst our differences. As such, she divides her time, energy and love across many different communities and has founded or co-founded several initiatives in her main focus areas of migrant rights, mental health, environmentalism and social impact, including SG Mental Health Matters, WorkWell Leaders, A Good Space Co-operative, Hush TeaBar and Welcome In My Backyard. She also served and serves on several boards and committees in these fields, including Unifem (now UN Women), Society for WINGS, Daughters of Tomorrow, Social Service Institute, National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre and the Tripartite Oversight Committee for Workplace Safety & Health. Prior to devoting herself to civil society and social impact work full-time, she spent over 25 years in the corporate world as a C-suite leader. Her new mantra, as a former banker and reformed business leader, is “why start a business when you can start a movement, or two?”
A sought-after speaker on human-centred leadership, mental health and social entrepreneurship, Anthea has also published numerous commentaries and contributed to anthologies such as My Life, My Story by the National Library Board and the recently-published Social Context, Policies, and Changes in Singapore edited by Dr Intan Azura Mokhtar and Dr Yaacob Ibrahim. Her wood-cover memoir, 50 Shades of Love, was shortlisted for the Best Illustrated Non-Fiction Title in the 2019 Singapore Book Awards. A podcast series, Shades of Love, followed in 2021. Foreworded by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, her latest book 'The NMP Scheme: Are Unelected Voices Still Necessary in Parliament?' was launched on 9 Sep 2022 in Parliament by former Prime Minister, ESM Goh Chok Tong.
Anthea finds wisdom through her intrepid travels that have taken her to all seven continents and over 80 countries including Antarctica, Mt Everest Base Camp, The Amazon, Machu Picchu, Sinai desert, Iran, Tibet, Siberia and more. A passionate scholar of self and student of life, she believes that the farther out she explores, the deeper in she travels as she continues to be amazed by each new chapter in her journey of becoming.
Book Title:
Who Me?
Author:
Tracey Woon
Synopsis:
On my quest to prepare myself for the next phase of life at 45, I decided to engage with a life coach to help me figure what i need to get to what next. I learnt one of the most important lessons of my life. That profound effect has continued to transform and shape my journey to this day.
Profile:
Tracey retired in August 2020 from an illustrious banking career spanning nearly 40 years. As her giveback to the industry she benefited from, Tracey sits on various regulatory bodies and engages actively in the corporate world. Her greatest motivations and joy though is mentoring the young and sharing her life and work experience. Most importantly she works at maintaining a healthy body, spirit and mind by practicing self care and love, keeping fit, doing inner work and meditation, amongst other things. Tracey is married with 3 grown children.
Book Title:
60% Mother, 40% Woman. 100% Human
Author:
Sher-Li Torrey
Synopsis:
“I’ve always felt the weight of being a woman. In my life decision, the responsibilities of being a woman at home and at work often tripped me up. I have, however learned to find power in my roles. A woman’s strength is often found in her ability to embrace being human – and it has been my journey to discover that. Embracing my vulnerabilities but also discovering my voice (all female) to try to make this world more empathetic and kind towards the female gender.”
Profile:
Founder of Mums@Work (Singapore) (Since 2010)
Co-Founder of Career Navigators Singapore (Since 2016)
LinkedIn Top Voices in Gender Equity (2022)
Sher-li Torrey is the founder & director of Mums@Work (Singapore), which was started in 2010. Trained in various personality profiling tools, she has more than 20 years of corporate experience. Formerly heading the postgraduate team at the Office of Career Services at the Singapore Management University (SMU), she has held various roles in different industries.
In 2010, following the birth of her daughter, Sher-li started Mums@Work (Singapore) – a social enterprise that supports women. A point of information source for women looking at flexible work arrangements and/ or starting their own business, Mums@Work is a career portal that supports more than 50,000 women. In 2016, she started a subsidiary of M@W, Career Navigators – with a focus on bringing women back into the workforce in full-time roles. Through this subsidiary, partnerships with more than 150 MNCs have been established.
In 2021, Sher-li launched “Singapore:40-over-40. Inspiring Women”- an annual initiative to highlight 40 women in Singapore, over the age of 40, who have started a business, restarted a career, changed career paths or created a social giveback project. Designed to champion against ageism and gender bias, this project was launched in March 2021 and will be run bi-annually.
As founder of Singapore’s first flexible work career portal, Sher-li has spoken to various organisations and local media on Diversity & Inclusion topics, as well as HR-related issues. She is a frequent speaker and article contributor to press and TV on topics related to new work environment, employment trends and diversity hiring. As a trained career coach, Sher-li continues to support the different Singapore universities and polytechnics in career-related projects for their fresh graduates. A mother of 2 school-going children, Sher-li strongly advocates a work environment that thrives in allowing employees to have better work-family integration.