Meet Isabel Lamers

We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Isabel Lamers a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Isabel, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?

I believe that resilience is a skill we can build over time. I learned a big chunk of that in rock climbing. I remember once being in a route, lead climbing, and feeling that I was too weak to continue. My hands were sliding off the holds and my feet started shaking. But if I fell right there, I would have swung over to the other side and smacked the rock uncontrollably. It was too dangerous. And yet I couldn’t get to the next bolt, I couldn’t get a move in. I started panicking, I even became hysterical, crying and yelling at my belay partner about my life threatening situation. Then, when I almost couldn’t hold on any further, my body had found a position that locked me in between the rocks, not a real crack but I found two protruding rocks to kind of jam myself in and when my hands and legs gave in, I let go – and nothing happened. I just remained put where I was. I was okay. I could rest, and I continued on after to finish the route.
I think the more we challenge ourselves, the more we learn how capable we are, the more confidence we build and the more resilience we develop, because we have been through things, we have experienced intense and challenging situations and emotions, and we survived.

Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?

I am currently producing my very own first film called FILIPINO KARATE KID. It’s a female-led martial arts proof of concept that uses martial arts as a metaphor for exploring mixed race identity and belonging. As a mixed-race third culture kid I never felt like there was a space where I truly belonged: I never seemed German enough to assimilate, I didn’t appear Filipino enough to be seen as Filipina. This story goes deep to my core. The longing to belong and the rejection from your countrymen is woven into the story of our half-Filipina protagonist trying to join a local martial arts gym only to have to prove herself as ‘good enough’. For her, it’s a subconscious way to showing that she is ‘Filipina enough’ and she trains extra hard to fit in.
I want to make this film because I think many people have faced prejudice based on their looks and it still seems to be a form of judgement people rely on to make their decisions about others. I sometimes have to end up justifying my ethnicity to other people, just because they “don’t see it”. I want to give representation to the mixed-race experience and to demonstrate the silent loneliness of being excluded from your own people. I also want to create action that is not misogynistic and women-driven, roles where women are actual three-dimensional strong characters not just accessories for the plot. I also want to highlight Filipino martial arts, a martial art that has been appropriated into many action movies but never been credited for. This is a true underdog story and I really hope that making this movie will change a few people’s perspectives, maybe open someone’s eyes and make someone else feel seen and understood. That would be the best thing that could happen!

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

Mindset: Affirmations and mindset are key. I have a phrase in my head “I can do this.” that I have had since childhood, and I believe that it has subconsciously guided me through many hard times. I also strongly believe that using affirmations to replace old thinking patterns of myself are super effective. We won’t be able to catch negative thinking patterns all the time but they literally affect the way we feel and behave, and take decisions and actions all the time. It’s so powerful. For instance I used to be really shy, and didn’t know how to approach people. Then I started telling myself “I can handle rejection” Of course there was more involved. I also learned how to manage emotions, but yes, I started saying that before reaching out to people, and now I don’t even hesitate when I walk over to strangers and introduce myself. I mean what are they going to do ?

Emotion management: This is SO key, and I’m still working on this one hard. At some point I realised that I was suppressing all kinds of emotions. And it affected my decisions, actions, etc. I did a lot of work, inner child work in particular, but I also learned to face my feelings. (I used the affirmation “Let yourself feel. It’s ok.”) If something came up, I would take time out (going to the bathroom is ideal because that’s the only place where people respect ‘you time’) and I would feel into the emotion, and try to dive deep. This was hard at first, I faced a lot of coping and avoidance mechanisms but over time I also could appreciate the freedom of not being driven by a fear to feel. It’s insanely liberating to know that whatever happens if you’re okay to feel what you’re feeling you will be able to get through it.

Playfulness: Only as an adult did I realise that I had this quality, and that it had brought me through so many hard times. I can make a playful challenge out of a boring task, or take a rejection as a starter pistol to proof that I can do it after all. I can also laugh about hardship sometimes and I tend to try to see the lighter side, of what is good, of what is actually going well. Or make fun of how a bad situation could actually be even worse and how I can be grateful that it’s not. I see the fun in a lot of things and I try to cultivate a joy for life on a daily basis. I mean, think about it! Isn’t it really amazing and unique for us to be here right now on this planet?

Alright, so before we go we want to ask you to take a moment to reflect and share what you think you would do if you somehow knew you only had a decade of life left?

There are so many tropes in filmmaking and I’m right now stumbling through them all. The Kickstarter campaign I launched had a great start but is stalling now that I have exhausted my network. It also seems like these times with wars and crisis going on in many countries, people are hesitant or not able to donate – which I fully understand.
I am now trying to get creative to try to see how we can meet our funding goal. Because with Kickstarter, it’s all or nothing. That means if you don’t reach the funding goal, you won’t get any of the donations! This is why I’m now actively looking for Executive Producers, sponsors and any interested collaborators who are interested to join on board with our project to support third culture kids, female-led action and Filipino martial arts.

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