Liz Strauss at Successful Blog

Thinking, writing, business ideas … You're only a stranger once.

What owns you?

Filed Under Business Life, Comments, Guest Writer, Motivation/Inspiration, Successful Blog, Survival Kit | 2 Comments

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I’ve done more travel lately over the past few weeks than I normally do and the concept of ‘things as tether’ has floated across my consciousness more than once as a result. Earlier in this series, I wrote a blog about envy as it relates to acquisition/status and how it keeps us from being independent.  This week’s installment is a variation on that theme.

Lugging your possessions through lobbies, airport terminals and along sidewalks gives you ample time to contemplate the usefulness and true value of what you are carrying. Two Georges help me illustrate my point: If you’ve ever watched George Carlin’s comedy routine on “Stuff,” or watched George Clooney in the film, Up in the Air and his ‘backpack analogy,’ then you’ll understand where I’m coming from with this post.

On a very personal note, I filed for divorce about two and a half years ago and have spent the time since literally giving away most of my stuff. A five bedroom house. Gone. Most of the stuff that furnished it. Gone. Thousands of dollars of blankets, decor, candlesticks, …stuff. Gone. Donated to Goodwill.

Clearing my life of extraneous clutter and stuff helped, but this post is also about why we accumulate things in the first place and how that compulsion to do so keeps us from our independence. I am not a monk and I’m not suggesting that you become one; rather, I would encourage you to take a look around your house. Take a quick inventory of the things you purchased either for status or because it was something that society said that you needed to own in order to ‘qualify’ for the role you wish to represent.

What things do you really LOVE? What things express your individuality or add joy to your life? What things reflect your true values? How many of them are duplicates? When I was lugging things hither and yon this past month and a half, I carried with me the essential, yes, but also things that made my travel a joy.

“Simplify. Simplify.” – Henry David Thoreau

When we take a moment to cull our possessions to the essential, authentic items that combine elements of utility and beauty, you will find that you need fewer of them. You will be packing lighter, so to speak, and anyway, you can’t take nothin’ with you but your soul (to paraphrase John Lennon). When you have fewer dust catchers, you have more time to devote to other things: your studies, your vocation, a hobby…other people. You’ll have more time to evolve into the person you would like to become, perhaps.

One of the best books about the exchange of energy for stuff I’ve read is Your Money or Your Life. For me, it distilled my focus into realizing what truly was important to me and gave me a guideline to achieve my goals. (NOTE: I do not benefit financially from this link. It’s simply a recommendation).

Stuff is wonderful; stuff is beautiful and having the right stuff when you need it is priceless. Understanding our relationship to Stuff is essential to claiming our independence, however. What owns whom? What has been your experience?

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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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Will you live in fear or in faith?

Filed Under Connecting Dots, Guest Writer, Inside-Out Thinking, Motivation/Inspiration, Outside the Box, Successful Blog, Survival Kit, The Big Idea, leadership | 5 Comments

Faith isn’t faith if you know the outcome. We’ve discussed in previous posts the importance faith has when living an independent life. Whether expressed as comfort with flux; or taking a managed risk, entrepreneurs have to take a leap of faith in order to reach their goals. And, in a brief reference to even last week’s post, it’s a leap that we must each ultimately make alone.

Many times, my point of reference is the movies. When I think of ‘leaps of faith,’ one of my most vivid examples I can think of is Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. In order to save his father’s life, Indy must recover the Holy Grail by deciphering riddles – clues to avoiding the deadly devices designed to prevent seekers from finding the Grail.

After successfully clearing two devices, Indy finds himself facing a chasm, across which their appears to be no bridge for him to safely cross. Reading from his father’s notes, Indy says to himself, “Last is the breath of God: Only a leap from the lion’s head, shall he prove his worth.” He then steps into nothingness and is rewarded by stepping onto an invisible, narrow span which allows him to cross.

Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Action. Action begets opportunity. Opportunity begins with taking a step.

Key to independence is taking that first step. The staircase is there; but even if we COULD see each step leading to the doorway at its zenith, we can physically only take one step at a time. Our job is to take the step immediately before us. Our responsibility is to step.

Keep your dreams alive. Understand to achieve anything requires faith and belief in yourself, vision, hard work, determination, and dedication. Remember all things are possible for those who believe.-Gail Devers

This is the hardest part. Another blogger called this time between steps “The Middle.” I truly wish that I could remember which one wrote it for proper attribution. However, it’s true: The Middle is where we are tested.

While we are taking our steps toward our goals, The Middle is the part where our friends and family may doubt our sanity. Leads may not pan out. Financing may dry up. We may even begin to doubt ourselves and our ability to reach our goal. When we are feeling unsure, we must revisit our plans, focus on what it is we hope to achieve and examine our motivations. Once you have had a chance to take this time to review, and all your instincts affirm your actions, press forward.

When you have come to the edge of all light that you know and are about to drop off into the darkness of the unknown, Faith is knowing one of two things will happen: There will be something solid to stand on or you will be taught to fly.-Patrick Overton

This is what it all comes down to, doesn’t it? Do you trust yourself? Everyone who lives life on his or her own terms has come to this crossroads. Is it fair? Absolutely. We are each the product of our choices and convictions. Making choices like this one is the price of admission to a full and rewarding life.

I usually refer to this moment as the ‘put up or shut up’ moment. We are called to live out our values. Again, faith is not faith if it’s based on the known, no matter how much we may wish for guarantees. In order to achieve independence, we must step out in faith. When I’m feeling small and more than a little crazy, I am encouraged by the words of a pioneer in her field:

Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained.-Marie Curie

It is worth it. You are worth it. Decide. And then take that step.

——-
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)

Buy the Insider’s Guide to Online Conversation.

How do you harness fear?

Filed Under Connecting Dots, Guest Writer, Idea Bank, Inside-Out Thinking, Motivation/Inspiration, Outside the Box, Strategy, Successful Blog, Survival Kit, The Big Idea, leadership | 8 Comments

Alone. That’s a state of being we must learn to identify, accept – even embrace if we are to move forward as individuals. If you’ve been reading my previous blog entries in this series, my comprehension and interpretation of paradox is a common thread that runs through most of them. In order to be a strong partner; one must be able to function alone.

In order to contribute unselfishly and totally to a team or an effort, one must do the work to identify one’s strengths apart from the group. There’s only one way to fully and thoroughly develop one’s autonomy – to be brought to the point where one is separated from all other illusions of community.

That said, none of us is ever really separate. Life really is like Obi Wan says: we are a collective Force. Alter one, affect the whole. However, each of us has the capacity to opt out of the stream of The Whole and to do some individual work in order to become a stronger component of it.

This matter of altering the plane under which one operates is optional. Lots of people elect to operate within the confines of security; the Known. Theirs is an existence that recalls to me the world of The Matrix. A churning pool of folks who eat noodles and pay their taxes. …Which is good, fine and “normal.”

But within this collective are those for whom this level of existence isn’t enough. But how does one break free? How does one become ‘independent?’

These are the sorts of theoretical mental calisthenics that keep me awake at night (and fuel coffee shop discussions – perhaps the two are related <g>).

“Although to be driven back upon oneself is an uneasy affair at best, rather like trying to cross a border with borrowed credentials, it seems to me now the one condition necessary to the beginnings of real self-respect.”-Joan Didion

One must go within to change what is without. Much as a seed has all the genetic wisdom contained within itself to become the mighty tree, you have within yourself everything you need to reach your goals. To reach your goals is hard work. Messy work. Usually painful work. But in order to live the authentic life, it is mandatory work.

We learn about ourselves in number of ways. Our first clue is our surroundings and our friends. We draw unto ourselves that which we believe we deserve; that which reflects who we perceive ourselves to be. Our friends are also an indications of our self esteem – in what relation do we place ourselves with our friends? Are we the ringleader? The learner? Until we can recognize not only where we’ve placed ourselves but our intent in so doing, we’re kinda just floating along, cosmically-wise.

Until we can live with ourselves, AS ourselves, we do not have the foundations of self-respect.

…A man goes far to find out what he is–
Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.
Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire.
My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,
Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?
A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.
The mind enters itself, and God the mind,
And one is One, free in the tearing wind.”
-excerpt from the poem In a Dark Time, Theodore Roethke

Here we return to paradox: death of the self begets freedom through itself and God (which can be interpreted by some as Source). But if you’ll notice, the author is able to recognize fear in this process. He notices and discards/rejects it in order to articulate his freedom.

If you’ve ever worked with metal, you know that heat purifies. It burns away dross and leaves the essential elements. Heat, in our lives can be literal, but most of the time, it’s figurative. I heard the quote, “if you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen” from early childhood. By way of comparison, in this particular instance of Roethke’s poem, fear is ‘the heat.’

When it comes to the purifying nature of fear, I don’t know of a better example of a linear, step-by-step explanation of how fear can be harnessed and overcome than the following excerpt from Frank Herbert’s 1965 speculative fiction book, Dune:

“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.” - Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear

So you’ve gone through the fire. You’ve faced your yourself and your fears. Now you can, with a clear-eyed perspective, take responsibility for your life and move forward. What’s neat is how your perspective has shifted. If you’ve been paying attention throughout your journey, you’ll note that your path has incorporated all of the elements you wanted to avoid in your life, but, like the elements of the seed, were necessary to your growth.

“…but Oz never did give nothing to the Tin Man That he didn’t, didn’t already have.” – America

By striking out on your path alone (but still in concert with others), you have developed your individuality. You are stronger than you were before your journey. Just like Dorothy (whose courage was manifested as a lion; bravery as a tin man and heart as a scarecrow), you have within you the keys to your own freedom. The power is within you, and has been all along.

——-
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 Foundation)

Buy the Insider’s Guide to Online Conversation.

How to fly without wings

Filed Under Connecting Dots, Guest Writer, Inside-Out Thinking, Strategy, Successful Blog, Survival Kit, Tips, leadership | 8 Comments

“Look before you leap,” says conventional wisdom, But if you have an iota of entrepreneurial essence to your soul, part of you inherently rejects this “wisdom.” Entrepreneurs, by and large, operate outside conventions. These are they who see what doesn’t exist, march to different drummers and chart their own courses.

But as we’ve also established through previous posts, there’s a difference between risk and folly. An entrepreneur takes calculated risks and is also comfortable with flux and the unknown. That said, part of any “risky” action is performing due diligence, whether that is researching your chosen industry; reaching out to others in related fields or drafting a business plan.

In so doing, you begin to form a network (some call it your tribe). These are the folks you turn to as mentors, guides and other resources as you move forward toward independence and fulfilling your dream –  launching from the cliff, as it were.

Your network is your wings.

Your wings actually form themselves – triggered by your action.

Once you step out in faith, your network activates in an effort to help you. If you’ve cultivated your network properly, the anchors within will enable you to move upward more easily (see my previous post, “How Anchors Free Us). These people have probably achieved a level of success that enables them to operate from a position of stability and strength. They *want* you to succeed as well.

Choosing and nurturing a strong network is critical to achieving your independence.

Abundance begets abundance. A strong network comprised of secure people will want you to achieve (or even exceed) their levels of achievement because they are not threatened by your success. Rather, they understand that abundance magnifies itself. The Whole is elevated by your success, rather than diminished by it.

Your responsibility is to determine what you can offer, focus on it, develop it and implement your idea through consistent action. Leap.

——-
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 the 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 the 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)

Buy the Insider’s Guide to Online Conversation.

Blue ‘Vette, Pink Flamingos, and Customer Relationships

Filed Under Comments, Design, Inside-Out Thinking, Marketing, Motivation/Inspiration, Productivity, Successful Blog, Survival Kit, Tips, Writing | 2 Comments

How a Car Made a Conversation

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I had the lovely experience of spending two hours with @connieburke in a Chevy Corvette Grand Sport while we were at SxSW. It wasn’t because I’m anything special. Chevy had two ‘vettes, two Camaros, and the Chevy Volt ready for Ride and Drives so that folks could have the experience.

On Sunday when my SOBCon partner, Terry Starbucker walked by the cars, we stopped to say hello and talk to Connie about how ride and drive was going.

All I did was ask.

“Hey, Connie, you know I used to live in Austin. We could take one of these ‘vettes to go see the house we built. I could show you hill country and why folks really love it out by the lake.”

All Connie did was ask.

“I’ll put in for a car on Tuesday. Let’s see if we could make that happen.”

As it turned out, Tuesday it was raining … our GOOD luck because it meant we got the Blue Grand Sport for a couple of hours.

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Connie and I hit the road at around 11:30 a.m. As we started, she was driving. Google maps wasn’t much help getting us to where I wanted to go. We ended up having a conversation with Onstar.

Seemed kind of weird having OnStar in ‘vette, just sayin’ … Good weird though because it got us to the “pink flamingos” at Pots and Plants the Nursery at 360 and Bee Caves Road in Austin.

The flamingos enticed us to pull in and park.

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But I think Connie was most partial to the old Chevy truck.
Or maybe she was just taking pix for my dossier.

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I took the wheel as we left. Going up the on ramp to 360, I slowed for a car to pass. Connie quietly said, “Ya know, you have the acceleration.”

Oh yeah! I was driving the ‘vette.

While we took 360 out to 2222 old route then to 620, I told stories of ’69 ‘vettes — one that my best friend, Nancy, raced in gymkhanas and another that my husband raced in the Grand Nationals.

When we reach the house I once lived in I looked over the fence to see the red oak I planted in the clay caliche soil in the dry Austin heat.

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On the way to Austin’s famous Oasis restaurant on the lake, we told stories about how our kids grew up. We talked business and possibilities.

At lunch we did about 10 minutes trading our favorite Stephen Wright jokes. Who knew that about either of us?

And at the end of lunch, I bought t-shirts for my son and my husband who’ll remember many meals we shared there.

That’s how a car connected Connie to my best friend, my husband, my son, a house we built — all parts of my history — and a hillside full of pink flamingos.

I became a person during that conversation. So did she when she told me some of the same things.

You can bet that I’ll be showing up if she calls. Proof to seal the deal is that I’m not sharing the conversation on the way back into Austin down 6th Street.

It’s not so outlandish that blue ‘vette and some pink flamingos would lead to good business … The car connected us in a mutual experience. Our trip wasn’t about the car it was about the people in it. The car started a conversation that led to a relationship. I can’t imagine how much longer it would have taken to cover the same ground without it.

This wasn’t a free ride without purpose. It was building relationships one person at a time. Back at the convention center, our meeting with Mark Horvath went even better because we knew other just that little bit more.

We’re already ready exploring some ideas together. A natural one is Chevy: Your Mission. Our Drive. People who would like to make a difference in their community (with the help of Chevy vehicles and volunteers) can fill out a short, online application on our Facebook Chevy Missions tab or follow progress on @ChevyMissions

Every business is relationships and relationships are everyone’s business. Companies who reach out fearlessly with trust in their customers are the ones who can win.

You must have a story about how a product connected two people in business. Will you take a minute to share it now?

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Thank you, Connie and Chevy for that … looking forward to how we’ll be helping folks in North Central region with the new initiative.

–ME “Liz” Strauss
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