Manila Bulletin - Behind the Scenes: Monica Eleazar Manzano

For this Friday's instalment of my Behind the Scenes column, I interviewed Monica Eleazar Manzano. I've known Monica for at least half a decade, when she was in the PR industry. Then she became a mom. Motherhood inspired her to create a career that made her available for her family. So she's now an entrepreneur, selling all-natural skincare products for babies and moms, and one of the partners and teachers in Beyond Yoga.

Monica on the AntiGravity Yoga sling.

Doing this interview meant a whole lot of catching up. I learned that Monica has since become a believer and practitioner of the yoga philosophy and of Kabbalah. She talked about crystals and Ayurvedic practices to cleanse the body and spirit.

As a Born-Again Christian, I do not share Monica's beliefs, but as a writer, my personal beliefs aren't important. My job is to tell her story and that means opening my mind to hers so that I can tell her story in the best possible way. Many times when we read a news piece, we see the author's thoughts. The tone can be disapproving, disdainful, preachy. This is called editorializing. This is something writers should avoid. Our responsibility is to relay the facts to the reader and not color it with our opinion.

Since it's my column, I actually can inject my opinion there. But the column is called "behind the scenes" for a reason. I'd rather let Monica shine!