HARNESSING THE BRAIN

The human brain has 100 billion neurons, each neuron connected to 10 thousand other neurons. Sitting on your shoulders is the most complicated object in the known universe.
Michio Kaku

I have been interested in how the brain works since the 1990s. Here’s the list of workshops, seminars and reading material, both paper and electronic kinds, which register my enthusiasm in the workings of the brain:

1. Attended Edward De Bono’s workshop on Lateral Thinking. Yes, the man himself.
2. Read and attended Goleman’s seminar on Emotional Intelligence
3. Attended a 2-day workshop on NLP
4. Read and practised Roger von Oech’s A Whack on the Side of the Head (How you can be more creative). I came across this book and his cards in 1995 and I was really attracted to it. Especially the cards. I practised what was on the cards, and they are still with me today!
5. Read up on SCAMPER and facilitated a few workshops on this useful tool
6. Attended a 3-day workshop on Emergenetics – the Science of behavioural and thinking preferences. It's a course which i signed up to be a certified trainer and user of the tool. This will be extremely useful for showing people how individuals and teams can function more productively and cohesively. Part of the course taught about the corpus callosum, the narrow bundle of neural fibres which connect the left and right hemispheres of the brain. This bundle of nerves can be stimulated to enable increased firings of the neurons. The desired outcome is of course to increase human productivity and vitality throughout the day.
7. I also learnt more about synaptic pruning through personal study. As we learn new things, many synaptic connections are made. New skills, new environments, constant exposure to learning and thinking increases the firing of the synapses. However, synaptic pruning takes place when there is no incremental firing. In other words, what is not used is pruned. This occurs between early childhood and the onset of puberty in humans and many mammals. This presents a strong case for early exposure to a myriad of experiences.

You might have seen this graphic. With the cumulative knowledge of the workings of the brain, brain gym and its health benefits, child development and the obvious advantages of playing with clay, I recently combined them and through the encouragement of a former client-turned-friend, Faith Tan, the business owner of Bluetree Education Centre, a workshop for mommies and their babies was born.
The feedback was generally positive and mommies shared that they had a few takeaways for the day!
More on the workshop in the next post!
As we gear up for August, where many orders are coming in for our heritage kuehs,

work on the website is still being finalised. But yes, it will appear. Soon.

2016 Will be Our Best Year Yet!

Hi everyone! Wow! it has been 3 years since we last posted! Just when anyone thought we had gone into hibernation. No!!! We have been working hard to make this whole meaningful venture sustainable, starting with one. One life.
To sum up: Well, it's worth it. There are so many words, so little time. But we will start off 2016 with the reason for our existence. Two testimonials which we believe more than account for our 3 years of blog absence.

The first testimonial comes from Madam Asmah, the Employment Support Specialist from SPD

"...Joycelin has been working with The Creative Clay Company since 2012.
Joycelin used to be a timid person with low self-confidence. Ever since she joined The Creative Clay Company starting off as an apprentice, Joycelin has gained an eye for detail in her work. Besides gaining financial independence, Joycelin’s physical dexterity has also greatly improved. Joycelin is more confident and independent now. She is also very proud with her work and has better self esteem compared to when she started.

The Creative Clay Company, with their strong belief in PWDs, has helped Joycelin improve her life and life values. The Creative Clay Company has been very supportive and never fails to give encouragement on her work. This is an achievement that not a lot of organizations have achieved."

Thank you Madam Asmah for your encouragement.

And a heartfelt word from Joycelin herself:

"My Journey with The Creative Clay Co. has been a life-changing experience for me. I've learnt as an apprentice in clay arts that i have to be teachable and an open heart to learn and to have mature trust toward my mentor. Even if you've been corrected or scolded by your mentor, it is ok because it's just makes me stronger. Because the leader who corrected me is the person who truly believe in me even if i fail a thousand times or have some form of learning disabilities. I also do my best to be happy because Joyful people create joyful art :)

In Clay Art I need to be Accurate, Consistent and Fast; and I will achieve this when I practice and put my heart and soul to it. I also have to be open to feedback by my teacher and coach, Mr Leonard, as well as my customers.

As I get to know and learn from The Creative Clay Co. (Mr. Leonard), I also got to know him in person. Through this professional and caring mentor-apprentice relationship, the fear of male-mentors just slowly went away and healing began to take place. Now I am healed by God’s grace of anti-social and fears of man-mentor.

Clays heals and break barriers. Clay arts is a universal language that only the artist can understand yet when it’s shared around it’s a masterpiece to be inspired. :)"

Hopefully these testimonials have enabled us to be accountable for our 3 years of online blog absence.

Here's to 2016! Fom the founder, leonard:
"2016 will be challenging, on the training front. However, i remember that in al things that there must be trials in order to have testimonies. So we courageously press on to give you the best quality handmade clay craft which are unique to us!"

MORE STORE OPENING SPECIALS!!!

Hi Everyone! We are promoting our 100% uniquely handmade clay products over this period of two weeks! Hurry down to our store at http://thecreativeclayco.storenvy.com/
For now, we give you an offer which we JUST rolled out!
A picture tells a thousand words and so we'll let the pictures tell you!
Just email us your interest at tcclay@gmail.com

HURRY WHILE STOCKS LAST!

Have you visited our Store Yet?

Thecreativeclayco's online shop took the founder two years plus to envision. After spending seven years playing with air-dry clay and teaching it to children, young people and adults, we have decided to showcase it in an online store. http://thecreativeclayco.storenvy.com/

We want this to be part of our grander vision of providing opportunities to the less privileged - specifically people with disabilities. Managing double bottomline? Thriple bottomline? It's really challenging. When we mean challenging, we mean more than the usual challenges: Besides the 4Ps, we have the social mission - the HR policies, and the need to rise up to the marketplace competition - stiff competition in the face of rising inflation and weak growth, to do well AND to do good.

And we don't want people to buy from us out of sympathy; and I believe our PWD staff don't want that either. We want every customer to buy from us because there's a need to be filled, a demand to be met, and a product that can attract. In other words, we want people to appreciate the 100% hand-made products as a thing to be appreciated.

What's the road ahead? We don't know. But we will do our best to make it a good company that stands out from the crowd, not just in Singapore but also in Asia and the rest of the world.

We are focusing on Scalability, Sustainability and Sociability. We will also try to provide integration of the PWDs with the rest of the company staff and to make ourselves a truly barrier-free organisation.

In the recent Social Enterprise conference, these words, said by someone, still rings in my ears: What separates one human being to another is OPPORTUNITIES.

We want mre opportunities and we will work very hard to create opportunities for ourselves and for our less privileged staff.

Will you give us and yourself an opportunity to make their lives better?

Buy from us.

Make this Christmas a more meaningful one for yourself by patronising us, a social enterprise that provide opportunities for ourselves and the people with disabilities. We know that this term PWD is actually not very accurate.

It should PWO - People With Opportunities.

Have a joyful and meaningful Christmas.

Up Close and Personal - Joycelin

Joycelin joined Peak Paradigm and Thecreativeclayco as a clay craft apprentice. Her Cerebral Palsy caused her to be unable to walk. But boy, her hands can surely do clay handiwork!

She will be packing, later producing handicraft for sale. She is seen here receiving her first day gift - a set of clay tools. We appreciate her joyful and can-do spirit!

We asked Joycelin to tell us her story:

Joycelin Toh’s Story


Engaging with art and craft has been my burning passion since childhood, especially clay art. Clay art making and painting gives me great joy and contentment. I’ve made many pieces to give to friends and others during birthdays or other seasons. My friends love it and say it’s beautiful.

I have participated in art competitions and some of my art work has been displayed around Singapore. In one competition when I was with the Spastic Children’s Association School, we entered a team competition to decorate a big starfish and we won first Prize.


I went to two Special Schools – Asia Women’s Welfare Association School (AWWA) and Spastic’s Children Association School (SCAS). In my two special schools teachers taught me how to do art and craft and enjoy doing arts from then on I fell in love with art.

Besides art, I have also participated in other competitions like swimming and horse-riding. All these competitions helped me to gain more confidence, courage, joy and boldness in life.

I graduated from Spastic Children’s Association School in 2010 and joined Society for the Physically Disabled (SPD) in July 2010 to take up the IT Apprenticeship Programme. Later on I went onto the Techwerkz Programme, learning data entry skills.


I joined Peak Paradigm in December 2012 through the help of my Job Placement Officers. I want to do my best and bless others in my clay art as I sell to them to our customers.

A Fresh Start to THECREATIVECLAYCO!

Today marks the start of our new social enterprise blog, THECREATIVECLAYCO.blogspot.com! We employ people with disabilities as clay craft artists, administrative and other positions with the aim of empowering them and giving them opportunities. All of us need opportunities and that's why we see fit to start a social enterprise.

We need your support! Our online retail store will be opened very soon and we hope that you will like our 100% handmade clay handicraft and buy them for use and enjoyment.

We will be making more announcements very soon.

Thank you!

www.jumpingclay.blogspot will be changed!

Hi everyone! www.jumpinclay.blogpot.com will be changed to www.thecreativeclayco.blogspot.com from 2/12/12!

We look forward to an new and exciting journey with the new social enterprise which we have recently started. We are a social enterprise who employs people with disabilities to give them gainful employment. That's our mission. And we need your support! Thanks!