The Artist from Sarasota, Florida
Art Emrich is my friend, philosopher
and guide. Outside of my parents, wife and daughter, he is the person I have
laughed most with, learnt most from, and has advised me on most occasions.
By the way, I don’t say this
lightly. For someone like me – an extroverted alpha male in his forties, working
for one of the world’s largest multinationals, I have been privileged to meet and
socialise with a lot of wise and interesting people – in the innumerable
offsites and workshops I participated in, during my MBA course with a premier business
school in London, on numerous long haul flights, at airport lounges and whilst on
vacation. But Art is different from all of them. Way different!
I met Art for the first time in a
professional context. I was a Manager based out of Pune, India
in a mid-sized IT consulting organisation called Kanbay. Art was the Americas head
of HR and was invited to conduct a course called ‘Consulting with Clients’. It
was a fascinating course – where Art did role plays of various client
personality stereotypes namely: “Expressive”, “Driver”, “Analytical” and “Amiable”.
Through those role plays he taught us how to build a rapport, how to flex your
own style to build intimacy with clients and some excellent techniques to
understand clients through natural dialogue and open ended questions. Art taught
the course with finesse. He had a special kit of props and makeup as he would
disappear for five minutes to re-emerge completely transformed into a different
personality, ready for the next role play. The two days were more like being on
stage with him acting in an intense drama, rather than passive learning in a
classroom. Over the years, I became a certified trainer and must have taught
the course to hundreds of professionals – albeit nowhere nearly as effective
and fun as Art teaching it. It’s probably like the difference between watching
a famous act in an amateur cast versus the original.
As the country head of HR, Art had
worked in his previous life for DuPont and lived in at least fifteen countries
in Asia. Therefore, apart from his extensive
knowledge on consulting, mentoring and coaching frameworks, he has a lot of interesting
personal stories and anecdotes to tell.
One of the many passions I share
with Art, is doing imitations. I grew up as a child winning elocution and drama
competitions. So when I was living and working in upstate New
York, Chicago and Wisconsin – Art and I became famous for
imitating our colleagues and senior leaders of the organisation we worked for.
We did joint mimicry at various offsites and annual events. I have never had so
much fun. We laughed until we cried as we saw our audiences roll on the floor.
Art was the de facto CEO – ‘Chief Entertainment Officer’. And I was fast
becoming his succession plan, as he considered retirement.
Eventually we parted ways. I moved
back to the UK and Art
retired and moved to Sarasota, in sunny Florida. But it was
impossible for Art to retire. He pursued a Doctorate in Hypnosis. We kept in
touch on-and-off on LinkedIn and Facebook until at the back of one of our family
vacations in Disneyland Orlando, we decided to visit Art.
I was meeting Art after nearly a
decade. He was now in his mid sixties but had hardly changed. I asked him how
he had been. He said, “Well, I have had some trouble with my kidneys. So I
put them in a hypnotic trance and talked some sense into them. Eventually they
were cured.” He smiled through his eyes as he ate a deep pan Pizza cooked
in extra virgin olive oil topped with jalapeños. You can
never tell when Art is serious and when he’s being facetious. But I believed
him.
After lunch we went to the bay where
his shiny eighteen foot yacht was waiting to host us. Her name was ‘Work of
Art’ and she was a beauty. Art showed off the auto-navigation equipment he had
recently fitted on as per of her refurbishment. We could see sonar images of little
fish swimming under the boat about four inches in size as we headed out of the
bay. They got incrementally bigger than a foot as Art accelerated into the Gulf of Mexico. Nearer the coast line, we watched huge
pelicans dive straight into the clear light green waters to catch fish. “They
calculate the speed of the dive, the precise speed of the moving fish and are
highly accurate. However, eventually they go blind with the force of water
hitting them on every dive. Then they can’t see the fish. That’s how they die.”
Art informed.
After we sailed for about half an
hour, we saw the green waters of the bay intersect with the azure blue waters
of the gulf. The breeze was now stronger and the waves less gentle. Venturing
out in the open sea, away from the coast guard, as we swayed from side to side,
I suddenly realised how small and lonely our boat was. I exchanged a nervous
glance with my wife as she made sure our four year old daughter’s life jacket was
secure. Art looked at both of us and smiled through his eyes. “We are almost
there.” He said perceptively. A couple of nautical miles from that spot, we
approached a beautiful white sand bar island, no more than a hundred metres in
length and less than fifty metres wide. There was nothing on it except a few
seagulls. Art put the anchor down and we tugged the boat to dock on the sandbar.
The seagulls and pelicans flew off to their nests
well before the Sun set. Apart from the sea waves, it was now very quiet. We
put up the tent, nailed the pegs and were ready with popped soda cans to watch
the glorious sun set.
Invariably, I found myself catching up on all the lost
time with Art. Art told me about the new institute he had founded and his work
as a personal coach. He said he was mentoring a budding Tiger Woods. “He’s a
teenager, half Italian half black and is wining all the Golf tournaments at his
age group at the state and national levels.”
“But…” I interrupted. “As far I remember Art, you never
played Golf?”
“You’re right Sachin. I don’t. My
mentee has another professional coach who corrects his swing. But Golf is
hardly about the eighteen holes. Consistently improving your handicap is all
about what happens in your mind, between those holes. This is where I help a
little.”
It was now pitch dark under a clear Floridian
sky. On a night like this, you realise how little we see even on clear nights
from the terraces of our homes with all the glow of the big cities we live in.
With the fresh breeze in our face and the feel of soft smooth sand, we sat
silent for a while, propped on our elbows looking at the milky way galaxy
above. It was magical!
Very reluctantly, we headed back as
we had not packed to spending the night and had a young child with us. On the
way back, I told Art that as much as I admired his coaching skills, as a
completely rational person I did not really believe in hypnosis. Of course my
exposure to hypnotism was limited to watching a Woody Allen comedy movie ‘Curse
of the Jade Scorpion’ and I was talking to a doctorate on the subject. Art told
me he had combined his coaching techniques with his new found conviction in
hypnosis to work with terminally ill patients. “You are right Sachin. If someone
has a cancer, they need advanced medical treatment. Hypnosis cannot cure them.
However, I work with their belief system to the point where most of them believe
they’ve got something as common as a cold or flu. That belief helps them deal
with the cancer much better.”
Art’s work with the terminally ill
is now so famous in Florida, that some of the
leading cancer research institutes and hospitals in USA are now calling on his help to
formalise the approach as alternative medicine to aid the effectiveness of
radiation and other conventional treatment options. I am amazed at the deep and
profound impact this man continues to make on so many lives in so many
different ways.
A few days ago, I got an email from
Art inviting me and several common friends to a three day workshop on Daytona beach Florida
this summer to learn self-hypnosis. I am still not sure about hypnosis but I
know it will be a lot of fun! So I’m planning to be there.
My daughter is now ten. What is
incredible is that she has forgotten about her Disneyland
vacation but still remembers the evening on the sandbar. Now that is work
of Art.
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