Rhythm - Montalut

❤️ How do your people see you? ❤️

It was a random day in the kitchen, and our daughter borrowed the phone to take pictures.📸 Her growing photo collection shows what she holds dear: her toys, body, face, the floor, Babam, and a lot of Mommy. Now that she’s five, I’m cherishing this overflowing attention and attachment, knowing fully well that it’s not going to last. I’m careful not to encourage nor discourage it, just let it be, and receive it with thanks. 🙏

To be around a child everyday, so curious and daring about the world–it’s really a gift. It’s an act of seeing with energy and innocence, and I thank God all the time for this wonderful little person who calls me Mom.👩‍👧

❤️ On Red Day, take some time to look at how the people who love and cherish you, truly see you. Do you see yourself in the same way? 👀😍

💜 What tools keep you in flow? 💜

Rhythm TechnologyPurple Day

I’ve been figuring out Notion for two months. Right when I feel a breakthrough is coming and I start to get it, the dumping just begins again: task dumping, drafts dumping, table dumping. I have too many databases now, too many pages within pages.🗓📑

So many people swear by Notion as their ultimate productivity tool. I’m possibly stuck in the swearing. 🤣

💜 On Purple Day, it’s good to do a maintenance check on our life tools, the helpers that (supposedly) make our everydays easier, more organized and breathable.🪔 Now if a tool keeps you up late at night so you can figure it out…🤔

🤍 How do the seasons nourish you? 🤍

RhythmWhite Day

Aşure, aka Noah’s pudding, is a sweet porridge made on the 10th day of Muharram, the first month of the Islamic calendar.🗓 Tradition says it’s the first meal Noah and his family made after the ark touched land again, and is believed to bring about peace and abundance. It’s a labor of love for sure, usually made with at least 10 ingredients (equivalent to the 10th day) comprised of various wheats, nuts and fruits. It takes 6 hours to make and is done in large batches for sharing with neighbors and the needy.🫕

This one has bulgur, garbanzos, white beans, baby raisins, apricots, pears, pomegranates, sesame seeds.🍐🍚🍠🫐 It’s the closest I’ve eaten here to the Philippine ginataang halo-halo, a sweet rice dessert made with coconut milk and sweet fruits. I super miss ginataan, so I ended up eating most of this bowl. 🥣

It was interesting that Aşure started popping up everywhere in the past week, from our daughter’s school, to gifts from neighbors, and to Sunday breakfast in restaurants. The feeling reminded me of bibingka and puto bumbong, rice desserts and treats which in my youth were only available on simbang gabi masses leading up to Christmas.🎄 Because they were seasonal, they were extra special, and it was well worth the effort to wake up at 4am to hear mass and then indulge in these treats afterwards.🍮

🤍 On White Day, let’s look at the seasonal dishes across cultures and the rituals behind them. These traditions are rich in time and intention. Keeping them seasonal is not so much about making them scarce, but more so about deeply aligning the intentions behind them with the movement and rhythm of nature.❄️🌸🌞🍂

💙 What makes your city connected? 💙

RhythmBlue Day, Connect

To live in a disconnected city means to be naturally predisposed to feeling disconnected. Your daily commute is unpredictable, your social life is jagged or effortful to maintain, and your inner world is subject to the same disconnect. On the flip side, to live in a connected city gives us a natural feeling of being connected, plugged in, and alive (because we’re connected to ourselves).

I’m thankful to live in İzmir, really a beautiful coastal city known for its public transportation system. The whole stretch if Izmir from end to end–about 300km–is easily navigable via buses and trains.🚉

We rode the İzmir tram today with our 5yo. She loves trains and it was a joy to see her enjoy this simple part of our everyday life here. Asked if the tram station is beautiful, she replied, “Yes, it has grass.” 🌿

Our environment has such a big role in nurturing our habits, mindset, moods. “No man is an island” doesn’t only apply to our innate need to connect to people, but also to our connection to the outer world: our living space, work space, home, neighborhood, city.🛤

💙 On Blue Day, take a look at how connected (or not) your city is, and how this affects you and your everyday life.🚗 What can you do about your living environment to nurture beauty and inner connection?

💚 Where is home? 💚

RhythmGreen Day

If your answer to this is also your answer to where you live right now, then you’re very lucky.

I’m 42 and I’m still seeking my home 🏡. Not a metaphorical home, but my real world physical home where I can truly be myself–the quiet introvert me who loves solitude and the bold and brave me who goes on adventures, the biggest of them being @leadiagrowth, a home of possibility.🌟

💚 On Green Day, imagine your bestest home, where you’re “at home” and truly you. Imagine the physicality of it– what do you see, smell, touch, hear, and taste? Who else is with you?

🧡 What do you pay attention to? 🧡

RhythmOrange Day

It’s almost a year since we moved to Turkey. Realized it today when I saw these ₺7 lira tomatoes. These days, they sell for ₺30 lira per kilo 🤯

“Time flies” is something we say a lot, especially when around kids who just “grow so fast”.🏃‍♀️ I look at my pics and notice the little big things that change everyday. For the most part, they make me smile.🙃

🧡 On Orange Day, look at the pics on your phone and try to find the patterns of what you pay attention to. What do they say about you?

❤️ Do you like what you see in the mirror? ❤️

RhythmRed Day

There’s a Macedonian lady who cuts my hair here in Turkey.✂️ Koray’s family has been going to her for over 40 years, and I now swear by her magic hands too.

❤️ On Red Day, go look at yourself in the mirror. Are you smiling? Do you like what you see? 🪞

💜 Is money small or big? 💜

RhythmPurple Day

Here’s how the world’s first coin looked, made in Lydia over 2,600 years ago.🪙

We named our project @leadiagrowth after Lydia as a homage to this coin, a tool that has enabled growth and innovation through the ages.📈

💰 When you look at money, what do you see? Is your money small or big? What big things are you doing with it?

🤍 What do you see from the top?🤍

RhythmWhite Day

Did you know that there are Nine Cities of Troy?🏛 For 3,000 years from the Bronze Age to the Roman period, settlement over settlement was built on top of each other, and one of them was Homer’s Troy, the legendary city of Priam and home to the mythical Trojan Horse.🎠 When you visit the ruins in modern day Çanakkale, Turkey, you get to see it from the top. And you get not just a bird’s eye view but one that cuts through the layers underneath.👀

🤍 On White Day, when you step back and look at the big picture of your life, put on Xray goggles and look through the layers of time that brought you to where you are today.⏳️

💚 What do you find endlessly fascinating?💚

RhythmGreen Day

My exact words about Turkey 🇹🇷 when we just moved here. It was my third visit, and I felt I was still seeing things for the first time. The richness of the land, culture, seasons, history and life on the streets–endlessly fascinating. The blues of the sea and sky, the changing leaves, the rich food and weekly markets–endlessly fascinating. And the animals! Dogs, cats, and the everyday sightings of storks, flamingos, pelicans–endlessly fascinating! 🦩

When our daughter rode the Istanbul metro for the first time, she loved it so much, she asked to ride it again the next day and “pretend it was her first time”.🚉

This ability to find everyday things endlessly fascinating is a gift 🎁.

💚 On Green Day, make a list of what’s endlessly fascinating for you, and keep that list handy.

🧡 Do you let yourself say Maybe?🧡

RhythmOrange Day

The other day our daughter cried buckets because I didn’t keep my promise to pick her up from school.

“If you can’t keep your promise, just say maybe.”

💔

The next day I made sure to be there for her pick up. One of her favorite things to do is ride the bus, so we did the bus for mommy-daughter time.

I learned an important lesson that day: it’s okay to say maybe.😌

We’re told to let our yes mean a Yes and our no, a No. I say let’s add maybe to that list.

🧡 On Orange Day, let your maybe be a Maybe.

💛 Summer heat is a gift? 💛

RhythmYellow Day

“Çok sicak” is the new “Hello” these days, with summer going strong, even hitting 53°C 🔥. So thankful we found a summer school for the little one, to keep her mind off the heat and still have outdoor playtime in the shade.

🌦 Life in four seasons takes getting used to, especially on days of extreme weather like today. The passing of time is more felt too, as opposed to the endless summers of the tropics. There’s a hurriedness in the background, like an everyday ticktocking.⏰️ It’s both a constraint, something that limits what can be done “while the sun is out”, and also a movement, something that pushes you forward, even when you’re not ready.

It’s definitely an interesting feeling, perhaps a great recipe for creating: you get excited with all the changes in nature–so many new things happening all around, if you pay attention!🌤 And you also get the pressure of deadlines–if you wait around, the moment will pass and you miss out.🌬

I’m thankful to experience this for the first time in the Mediterranean, where the culture prioritizes balance and taking one’s time.

💛 On Yellow Day mornings when the house is quiet and the birds 🐦 sing their songs, let’s remember to just take it all in and roll with the moment, especially when things get extreme. There’s a gift somewhere there, that’s allowing us to push and create.