After a fruitful and enjoyable month long stay at The Hub in Amsterdam last winter, I decided to try and make it a practice to get out of London and go live and work in a new city each December/January. I left a freezing cold London two days ago to travel to Lisbon for a five week sojourn at Coworking Lisboa.

I came to Lisbon a few years ago for a long weekend when I lived in Spain and fell in love with the light, the people and the custard tarts (there is one on my desk as I write). I have wanted to come back ever since and as work is quiet during December and the beginning of January, it seemed like the perfect time to visit again.

Getting out of London and living and working in different countries is a core part of my vision for my work and life and I would heartily recommend that everyone gives it a go. All you need is a laptop, internet connection and a place to work.

Here are some thoughts on the benefits of taking your computer and going working abroad:

1. It gives you the physical and head space to work on a big project.

My project that I tackled in Amsterdam was researching material around mindfulness at work. This year I am writing my new book The Business Yogi: How the Science of Yoga Can Help You Be More Productive, Happy and Healthy at Work, which takes ideas around the practice and philosophy of yoga and applies them to modern business and the workplace. I actually had allocated time in August this year (another quiet period) to write the book but for whatever reason, I couldn't summon the creative juices then. I sat down yesterday to write and the words just flowed. Getting your of your normal routine can do wonders for your creativity!

2. You are working but not really available.

When you are away you can't have meetings, the request for random coffees stop, and your email inbox slows to a trickle. Without all these interruptions and calls on your time, you can get an enormous amount of work done.

3. You can work more according to your energy patterns and feelings instead of pre-planning your time.

Being a bit of a productivity geek, in London I tend to plan and prioritise my time quite strictly. When I am away I tend to kill the to-do list and instead work on what I feel like working on that hour or day.

4. You can foster new collaborations and opportunities.

Being in a coworking space means that I have access to a whole new set of people and businesses and already opportunities for collaborations are emerging here in Lisbon.

5. It's good personal development stuff.

Seth Godin says "seek out habits that help you overcome fear or inertia". Going to live and work in a new country, even if only for a short time, is scary stuff. You leave the comfort of your family, your friends and your language for somewhere new. Yes, it's scary and you have to really put yourself out there and try to make friends. Sunday afternoons are always the worst as everyone seems to be with others except for you. But what doesn't kill you makes you stronger and a little bit of loneliness now and again makes you grateful for what you have back home. You also find yourself really looking forward to going to work on Monday morning!

6. You can see how other cultures work and play.

I find this a fascinating part of working in another country. In the Netherlands, people tend to start work early at 8 or 9am but down tools bang on 5pm as they head home. Here in Lisbon we start later around 10 or 11am but work through until 6 or 7pm. Lunch at The Hub was taken communally round the kitchen table. Lunch here in Lisbon is an hour and a half affair at a local cafe or restaurant. I have already been taken to task for eating lunch at my desk - very unusual here! The Dutch spend time with family and friends with an early dinner and early bed. Lisbon workers head home to get changed and then might have dinner around 10 or 11pm before hitting the bars until 2am. And that's on a school night!

Fancy giving this working abroad thing a go? Here are some top tips for making it an easier and enjoyable experience:

• Book yourself a desk at a coworking space. I know first hand how lonely it can be working from home so find a space where you can go to work everyday and meet new people. Pedro Santos, one of the members here at Coworking Lisboa, has developed a new platform called All Desk where you can search for a spare desk in cities around the world.
• Get involved in the space. If there are lunches or social occasions, go along. Offer to run a workshop or talk for the space members. If there is a space mailing list, introduce yourself and say what kind of people you would like to meet.
• Use AirBnB.com to find a room for your stay. Don't stay in a soulless hotel, stay with a local so you get a real feel for how the locals live. I am staying in this gorgeous place in the Barrio Alto, one of the coolest places in Lisbon. Use AirBnB to also rent out your home while you are gone to cover your costs.
• Don't make it all about work. Make the most of your stay in a new place. Spend evenings trying out local cuisine and entertainment and use the weekends to go exploring. Bunk off the odd afternoon to go for a trip out of town. Build some non-work time in as well (we are off to the Algarve for five days between Christmas and New Year).
• If you can, invite your partner along for part of your trip. I am lucky that Alex also works for himself and he was able to join me in Amsterdam and now Lisbon for part of my trip.
• Make the most of Skype. Unlike in London, here I am logged in to Skype all the time. When I see a friend online, I jump on for a chat. Keeping in contact with others back home can stop you getting lonely.

This is my last post until the New Year, and so from Lisbon, I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

[image with thanks to ChrisYunker via CC]

Readers of this blog will know that I am an avid consumer of books. In my ebook, From Apps to Zen: 26+ Ideas for Building a Business with Balance, the letter 'K' stands for Knowledge and my goal to read a (non-fiction) book a week (which I have managed this year!).

Being a minimalist, I tend not to buy and collect books but prefer to borrow them from the library or friends or pick them up second-hand in charity shops (the Oxfam bookshop in Bloomsbury is excellent). But there are a few key books that I have bought and that I return to again and again, and I wanted to share a few key ways that these books have shifted my perspectives on work and life.

So if you are looking for a little inspiration or a new direction for 2012, get some of these onto your Christmas wish list!

1. Your Brain at Work: Strategies for Overcoming Distraction, Regaining Focus, and Working Smarter All Day Long, David Rock

I first saw David Rock being interviewed at the Wisdom 2.0 conference in February this year. He was speaking about mindfulness and our brains and how we can work with our brain rather than against it to be more effective and productive. I bought this book from Amazon before the interview was even finished (so much for paying attention in the present moment!). Using the characters of a self-employed consultant and a corporate executive, he follows their working day showing on one hand the difficulties of the modern workplace, and on the other how much easier things are when we work with our brain. A fascinating book that will illuminate your working habits in a new way.

Perspective Shift: Our pre-frontal cortex (the thinking brain) doesn't cope well with doing more than one task at a time. To get stuff done, single task don't multitask.

2. Full Catastrophe Living: How to Cope with Stress, Pain and Illness Using Mindfulness Meditation, Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn

An expert in the area of stress and meditation, Dr. Kabat-Zinn runs the Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center. Written over 20 years ago, this book is a practical handbook for anyone who wants to delve deep into the science and practice of mindfulness and how it can be used to deal with stress in our everyday lives. I read this book a year ago during my month in Amsterdam researching mindfulness at work and its key messages have influenced my work today.

Perspective Shift: You only have moments to live. Every moment is a new beginning. We can choose to ruminate in the past or dream about the future, or, choose to live intentionally here in the present, from moment to moment.

3. Making Ideas Happen: Overcoming the Obstacles Between Vision and Reality, Scott Belsky

Scott Belsky is CEO of Behance, one of the most innovative and creative companies in the world. Though his work and his blog, the 99%, he has observed that Edison's statement that genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration is true. Making Ideas Happen is a guidebook to ensuring your creative ideas happen through getting organized, collaborating and leading effectively.

Perspective Shift: Not all projects are created equal. Create an 'energy line' of your current projects in order of the energy they should receive. Use this when prioritising your work.

4. How To Be Free, Tom Hodgkinson

A funny book with a serious message, How To Be Free asks how can we be free of the absurdities of modern life with its focus on working to buy more stuff and to get a bigger house. While I don't aspire to some of the rural bliss that Tom advocates, being too much of a city girl, reading this book was a key driver in my current minimalist lifestyle.

Perspective Shift: Stop working to buy more stuff you don't need to impress people you don't like.

5. Happiness at Work: Be Resilient, Motivated, and Successful - No Matter What, Dr Srikumar S. Rao

Based on his popular courses at top business schools, Dr. Rao poses the question of how we can be happier at work and delivers 35 digestible nuggets of wisdom of how we can get there. A chance find while 'wasting' some time in a bookstore, this book has been a solid companion to me this year.

Perspective Shift: Positive thinking is bad for you. If we stop labelling things that happen to us as 'good' or 'bad' we can start to see that life is just series of moments ebbing and flowing, and that everything, happiness and sadness, passes.

6. Conscious Business: How to Build Value Through Values, Fred Kofman

I came across the work of Fred Kofman and particularly the ideas in this book again in my month in Amsterdam. One of the owners of The Hub also ran a company called Realize! and there was a downloadable summary of this book on their website. A conscious business is one that operates with integrity and creates value for all of its stakeholders, employees and customers. In these interesting times when the Occupy movement are asking for an alternative to capitalism, conscious business with its emphasis on responsibility and authenticity could be the way forward. I wish every business leader would read this book.

Perspective Shift: The power of Unconditional Responsibility. You have the power to become the main character in your life and choose how you respond to external factors.

7. The 4-Hour Work Week: Escape the 9-5, Live Anywhere and Join the New Rich, Tim Ferriss

I have written many times on this blog about Tim's book and how it shifted my perspective from a structured career path until retirement to design my business to suit my lifestyle. It was instrumental in my move in Spain in 2008 and my current part time location independent lifestyle (I will be writing my final blog post of the year from sunny Lisbon next week!). You can take parts of this book with a pinch of salt but Tim's new perspective on work is worth a read.

Perspective Shift: Parkinson's Law: work expands to fill the time available. Set yourself crazy deadlines to work faster and better.

8. ReWork: Change the Way You Work Forever, Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson

I love this book so much I dedicated the letter 'R' in From Apps to Zen to it. If you are looking to change your perspective on the workplace, then this book is for you. In fact, buy one for every member of your team. With ideas such as Meetings are Toxic, Long Lists Don't Get Done, and Planning is Guessing, ReWork will debunk some of the persistent myths about what it takes to make a successful business.

Perspective Shift: Good Enough is Fine: find a judo solution one that delivers maximum efficiency with minimum effort.

9. Do More Great Work: Stop the Busywork Start the Work That Matters, Michael Bungay Stanier

A little gem, the book inspires us to stop the ‘busywork’ and start the work that matters. With 15 practical exercises or ‘maps’ Michael takes your through step by step how to identify, start and sustain your Great Work. This book was my holiday reading this year in Vietnam and it allowed me to get a fresh perspective on my work and provides daily reminders about how important my Great Work is and how to focus on it.

Perspective Shift: Tap into the power of Role Models – when you are trying to identify what your Great Work is, think about your top 5 role models in your work and life. What are their common or distinct characteristics? What do they tell you about your Great Work?

I hope one or more of these books has captured your imagination so ask Santa if she will bring one : )

Merry Christmas!

On Wednesday I gave a talk on Social Influence to leaders in the arts and cultural sector as part of a leadership initiative by Sync Leadership. It was a lively and interesting discussion where we looked at everything from why we want to influence others to tricks and tips for effective influencing.

Start With Why

Simon Sinek is the author of Start With Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone To Take Action which says that to make change we should start with Why we are doing something before moving onto the How and the What.

Start with why you want to influence others online and the strategy and tactics for achieving your goal will become clearer. Do you want to create change? Do you want to show different ways of being, working or thinking? Do you want to raise your profile to get more work? Do you want to challenge the status quo?

Have Something To Say

Gandhi famously once said: "don't talk unless you can improve the silence". We are all aware that the social web is creating far too much noise in our lives with constant status updates and tweets. I try to make it a practice not to add to the noise just for the sake of being seen but only share content or ideas when I think they are of value.

Social media is just an amplifier. You need to have something to say in the first place.

Know Me, Like Me, Trust Me

To influence others they must get to know you first, then like what you do, and then start to trust you and become an advocate for your work.

The first step is being found. Sounds simple but if no-one is listening, you are not influencing. A good trick is to Google your name/company/brand on a different computer to yours and see what results come up (your computer will have cookies remembering what sites you have visited). Are you happy with the results? Where are you mentioned on the social web? Make the most out of your LinkedIn and Twitter profiles and optimise them with the keywords you want to rank for.

Get active on social media and post regular but great content. Engage in conversations - don't make it a one way street. Listening first and asking questions is a good way of influencing others. Use Twitter searches and hashtags to follow conversations around a topic you want to influence.

Make your content shareable with sharing buttons on your blog. Actively ask others to tweet and share your content. If you don't have a blog, guest post on other blogs and drive traffic back to your website. Make it easy for people to follow you by putting links to your social media on your website, your business cards and your email signature.

We can influence by being an authority or expert in an area, by sharing our ideas on a topic as well as curating the best content from others. Having an opinion on the social web is crucial. In the early days of tweeting and blogging, I was reluctant to say anything that went against the status quo or that challenged others' opinions. But now I am more comfortable in my skin and happy to say what I really think.

Telling stories and being human is another key way of getting others to know and trust you. Each of us has a unique journey that has led us to where we are today and sharing our lessons and vulnerabilities is a powerful way of connecting with others.

What's your story?