Liz Strauss at Successful Blog

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What do the voices in your head say?

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I received a few messages from folks about last week’s blogpost, mentioning the use of both George Bernard Shaw’s quote and my own grandmother’s prompt to “pretend you’re alone,” when faced with making decisions. As a result, I’ve been thinking a lot this week, as I’ve run my errands or while exercising on the treadmill, about the impact quotes and mantras have on us (or, in the instance of this particular blog entry, me).

Anyone who has participated in self-help books or self-improvement exercises has usually been advised to place reminders in various places around their home where they will be seen. Usually in the form of Post-it notes or notecards with quotes, these sayings or goal statements serve as visual cues to stay on track. Faithful readers of this series will note that I traditionally punctuate entries with various quotes as a means of underscoring my content.

I like quotes for a number of reasons: seeing wisdom encapsulated in these written snippets provides a ballast or redirect for me. Quotes also help me when I realize that I share a commonality, in terms of understanding a mutual lesson. It is reassuring when I see that I agree with someone who has achieved a level of success to which I aspire.

As it relates to independence, I also see quotes as an invisible coach of sorts, encouraging me from the page. When I feel as though I am not getting anywhere or, worse, going backwards, seeing/remembering a quote reminds me that all is not lost. That I have the power of choice.

So I thought that today, I’d share a few quotes that provide the framework for my work across strata: as a mother; as a friend; as a businesswoman. A few days ago, on twitter, there was an exchange among three other “tweeps” who were talking about work vs personal lives and personas. My answer was that mine intersect. I work with people I like. My work is woven into the fabric of who I am as a vocation; therefore, the quotes I use are applicable across roles.

Many of my personal favorites originate with Eleanor Roosevelt. There are literally hundreds of her quotes from which to choose, but the ones that drive me:

“It is not fair to ask of others what you are unwilling to do yourself.”

“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do” (emphasis mine).

“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

The naturalist and spiritual seeker in me is drawn to transcendentalists Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. These two men drew strength from nature and endeavored to align themselves not only with their environment, but also with their inner natures.

Here are three Emerson quotes that regularly filter to the top of my consciousness:

“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”

“A hero is no braver than an ordinary man, but he is braver five minutes longer.”

“All I have seen teaches me to trust the Creator for all I have not seen.”

Of these Thoreau quotes listed below, one is literally affixed to my refrigerator in the form of a magnet!

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you’ve imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler.”

“If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.”

“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.”

Other quotes attributed to favorite public figures from whom I draw strength: Pablo Picasso, Maya Angelou, Albert Einstein and Oscar Wilde. Please share some of your favorites in the section below. Have any quotes made a difference in your life? How?

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Molly Cantrell-Kraig is a woman with drive. Possessing an innate sense of purpose and a pragmatic, solution-based approach to empowering people, she fused these two traits in order to establish Women With Drive Foundation. Based upon its founder’s personal history, Women With Drive Foundation is a means through which Cantrell-Kraig may effect change on both a micro and macro level. By providing women with something as essential as personal transportation in order to transition them from poverty to prosperity, she, through Women With Drive Foundation, seeks to empower women to help them help themselves. Through this action, the individual applicant benefits, as does society as a whole. Follow Molly on twitter as @mckra1g or @WWDr1ve (Women With Drive)

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Would You Like to Be a B.A.D. Business Blogger?

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Hello, Hello! I’d Like to Talk to YOU!

BAD Blogger Button

I’m bringing back the BAD Bloggers. For folks who weren’t around then, B.A.D. — Blogger a Day — is an invitation to any blogger who wants to connect via a telephone or skype conversation. I had to give up the old program because a year of writing the follow-ups took over my time and my blog.

Still, the value of the personal conversations is something I’ve been missing. I think I’ve found a found a way to get the high value for everyone with a sleeker investment.

This time around, I’m calling it BAD Business Bloggers, and every day I’ll report back with a simple few words about the person I’ve met and his or her business. It’ll be a warm hello, a chance to introduce you, and a little promotion for what you’re doing.

So tell me, do you want to be a B.A.D. Business Blogger!

If so email me at lizsun2 at gmail [dot] com and put BAD Blogger in the subject line.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!
Check out Models and Masterminds too

Kirk M and Kent Newsome Are B.A.D. Bloggers!

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Hello, Hello! I’d Like You to Meet . . .

BAD Blogger Button

It’s a fine way to spend a Sunday visiting some B. A. D. Bloggers I know. Without hesitation, these are folks who are worth getting to know. I can say that because I did.

Have you met Kirk M?

I got a B.A.D. Blogger email from Kirk M.
He said, “If you’re still doing this, I would like to offer myself as a victim…er…I mean interviewee if you would be willing to risk your mental health by talking to me.” You should have seen me smile. The prospect was lovely. This fella who came around my blog with always a thoughtful remark, wanted to spend time talking to me.

It was a gracious man, Kirk M., who took a phone call from me. We talked about submarines, wheelchairs, dreams, blogging, the sort of people we are, the sort of people we meet, how our minds ramble from subject to subject. I told stories. He told some. We talked about claustrophobia, fear of heights, and that crack between the floor and the door in an elevator. It was a fun and relaxing conversation.

Kirk was in the room he once described in a comment.

Currently my back room is located in a corner of our library (we live in an old house so we set it up in an old fashioned way), with a rocker to my right with a forest of plants behind it in the window. Behind me is a old table made out of rock maple and a grandfather clock on the other side ticking away ready to tell me I need to get started for work (and more plants).

He was the guy I knew who typed those words. Authentic Kirk.

Kirk original email had also said, “Just think…then I could put a ‘I survived a call from Liz Strauss’ thingy in my sidebar!” He did. At least, I think he did.

Oh and, do you know Kent Newsome?

I met Kent for the first time when he suggested we might meet virtually. So on went out head phones and up went the conversation level. From his first words, I started thinking about and calling forward my memories of Texas just from hearing his voice. It was lovely.

I had recently discovered Kent’s blog. He had recently emptied his feeds and asked his readers to recommend new ones. Somehow my blog got in the mix. Somehow we ended up on a voice call.

Kent and I spent time discussing what made a great blog post. It was a conversation about conversation and blogging — how to leave the blog post open and unfinished, the way conversation happens. That led into writing and interacting with people. We talked about how long we’d been blogging. That led into a glance at our philosophies of life and our histories . . . isn’t that always the case?

We compared notes on everything from the web to songwriting to lawyering.

Kent told me a bit about his background in law. He’s songwriting lawyer who blogs — well not all at once, but it’s fun to say. Kent wove all three into the coversation about his blog and his blogging. He’s an integrated guy. He brings his skills out when he needs them.

Kent said he started blogging to see whether a guy who didn’t live in the Bay area or work in the tech industry could make his way into the conversation.

The answer is a resounding “yes.”

Kirk and Kent, you are B.A.D. Bloggers!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Want to be a B.A.D. Blogger see the. . . a B.A.D. Blogger? page in the sidebar.

Alex Shalman and Steve Roesler Are B.A.D. Bloggers!

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Hello, Hello! I’d Like You to Meet . . .

BAD Blogger Button

It’s a fine way to spend a Sunday visiting some B. A. D. Bloggers I know. Without hesitation, these are folks who are worth getting to know. I can say that because I did.

Have you met Steve Roesler?

Steve Roesler knows Ann Michael and Valeria Maltoni. It took a while to find out. He called me. I called him. Then called me, and I him again. But in the end I know he knows them because we finally made a voice connect, and he outright told me. We talked about who knew who and how we knew each other. We even talked about how much we like them, and about how we met.

Then we moved on to other topics.

Steve and I had a delightful discussion about blogging and conversation. We wound through ways to invite readers to participate in what we have to say when we write — how to leave more room for them. It’s always fun to consider with an intelligent blogger how we present ideas on our blogs and the people who come to read them.

Steve works with client companies All Places World. The folks he works with become stronger communicators and better team builders. Steve handles All Things Workplace — he specializes in communication training and development and works on improving systems, relationships, and large-scale change. He has deep interest in the global nature of business and business relationships.

Steve’s a people person. It comes through when you talk to him.

Steve likes his family too. He’s worked all over the world, but he’s partial to the woods near Philly where his family is.

. . . And Ann and Valeria are nearby for a blogger meetup whenever he needs one.

Oh and, do you know Alex Shalman?

Alex Shalman says, “. . . a life stems from the realization that the past is gone and the future hasn’t happened yet, the only moment which we possess is the one in which we live.”

Alex is a student, son of a dentist. He’s going to be one himself. He IMs me from the library. Well, that’s where he always says he is. So that must be. Except when I was younger than Alex, I used to put 250 miles on the car going to the . . . um, er . . . library. . . . Of course, he’s past that stage. He’s working gainfully on a career.

Alex likes learning. He reads books on personal development and participates in a mastermind group. He seeks out mentors where he can find them. He’s a membor of the attendees at SOBCon 07.

Alex’s personal goal to be a dentist will make him the fifth generation in his family to choose that profession. His plan is to be an entrepreneur by developing a practice that will be franchised, provide mentoring, dental education, and lead to a career as a speaker and teacher.

Alex’s blog is a result of his exploration into personal development and his continuing interest in it. He has an undergraduate degree and a passion for psychology. He likes restating it in an understandable form.

Yet the coolest thing about Alex is his laugh when he’s relaxed and being himself.

Alex and Steve, you are B.A.D. Bloggers!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Want to be a B.A.D. Blogger see the. . . a B.A.D. Blogger? page in the sidebar.

Hart Singer and Anita Bruzzese Are B.A.D. Bloggers!

Filed Under B.A.D. Blogger, Successful Blog | 6 Comments

Hello, Hello! I’d Like You to Meet . . .

BAD Blogger Button

It’s a fine way to spend a Saturday visiting some B. A. D. Bloggers I know. Without hesitation, these are folks who are worth getting to know. I can say that because I did.

Have you met HART Singer yet?

HART’s mind works in mysterious ways. HART’s been around Successful-Blog longer than I have. He’s the man who said the now famous quote, Half the show is in the comments . . . to Paul Scrivens when Successful Blog had no comment feed. That was over 39,000 comments ago in November of 2005.

HART’s an entertaining storyteller and he’s got some entertaining stories to tell. Believe that. Few are about his work serving businesses as a finance man. HART doesn’t show off. His stories are about times when real-life things happened — the wheel flew off the car and went through the window of the biker bar. . . . or this one about why he was fired.

HARTs also Canadian citizen, who let me in on the secret that all Canadians know everyone, everywhere in the world, and that he is related personally to almost half of them.

When you see HART let him know that you’ve seen the bar stool with his name at Successful-Blog.

Everyone: HART!

Oh and, do you know Anita Bruzzese?

Anita is from Missouri, and she has 45 Things to show you about the things that you do that drive your boss crazy.

You might wonder how a writer living in the “Show Me” state would know anything about what your boss thinks or what you do. I sort of wondered too — until I found out that she’s spent the last decade writing about the workplace for Gannett News Service and USAToday.com, winning awards and such. They say her readership is over 8 million daily. ahem.

Anita is plain fun to talk to. We covered the topics in her book, a few places we’d been, and some things we’d seen, The best part hands down is that she’s a delightful and charming conversationalist, who on that day was as sincerely interested in another person’s new book as much as she was in her own. No kidding.

By the way, if you meet her, her last name is pronounced “Brew-ZEES.”

HART and Anita, you are B.A.D. Bloggers!

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Want to be a B.A.D. Blogger see the. . . a B.A.D. Blogger? page in the sidebar.

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