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“It”
“The more serious we are about being true to a vision, the more we realize it is our life work.” – Peter Block Hello again, it has been a minute since I wrote my last blog. I started graduate school in August 2018, and homework has sapped my extra time as well as much of my free range creativity. Even so, the scholarly effort I extend toward that goal does not work quite the same muscles as this blog. I have missed it. This quote from Block, it caught my attention. It is from his well-known Flawless Consulting, an assigned text for class. Honestly, my first thought in reading the…
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What’s Your Dream?
There is a dream that many people seek. It involves a combination of houses…cars…vacations…expensive hobbies…even more expensive vices and a lucrative occupation to support it all. Sometimes it’s called the American Dream. The founding principle of this dream is fulfillment of our basic needs. This instinct, combined with the evolution of consumerism over the last century, results in the idea that things will make us happy. And if some is good, then more is better, right? The dream is so ubiquitous, at some point, we adopted it as our own. But is it? When we unknowingly move towards someone else’s expectations for our life, we may begin at a sprinter’s pace. But, sooner or later the degree…
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A Year in a Word
HAPPY NEW YEAR! Whether you were Snapchatting at midnight from Times Square or at home stacking zzz’s, 2016 came to a close this weekend. Without question, this past year was one for the books–heartbreaking, unpredictable, and miraculous at turns. Trying to describe the year in just a few words is difficult. Fortunately or wistfully, the calendar has turned for all of us. Instead of looking backwards, we turn our attention to the future. While there is no way to fully anticipate what this next year will bring to our doorsteps, we can make a decision right now about how we will respond each day that it arrives. As always, we can choose…
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Different for a Reason
In a niche of a larger industry, Joe built a tribe. He stepped out of the safety of the familiar, a tried and true model of converting asset donations to a nonprofit’s bottom line, and grew a company based on his passion for innovation. He doesn’t sell a product although he has one. Instead, Joe sells an idea about how to do things differently. As an adolescent, Morgan witnessed first hand the impacts of mental illness. She developed a tremendous capacity for empathy and justice. After working in a substance abuse treatment center and at a school for children with behavior disorders, she pursued nursing and became an acute care RN. Morgan…
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Different Is Good
In a presidential election year, a year when we have been bombarded with racially-charged national tragedies, the word diversity has gotten a lot of air time. It is established in our lexicon. The meaning shifts however when we set aside political agendas to consider the merits of diversity on a personal level. Diversity of thought. In this context, diversity simply means different. Existing in a state of unlikeness or of being different from something or someone can trigger all kinds of responses. Fear or curiosity. Attraction or repulsion. But before we can truly encounter and engage the nature of someone’s otherness, we are obliged to concede on one essential point…the possibility…that we don’t know everything. A…
