That brilliant idea guy, Kirk M, over at Just Thinkin’ has a brilliant idea. Go on over and read about it. Click this title to find the information.
I know I spent hours thinking about what my first post might say and cropping the photo.
Without further conversation, here are my first words to the blogosphere.
Gosh, they still seem appropriate.
What did you first say when you got here?
–ME “Liz” Strauss
Every year in publishing, the push for sales conference was brutal. My birthday was for most of my coworkers a “drop dead date.”
The focus, the hours, the living, breathing attention of an entire company were all centered on a week of product release. If we missed it, an entire year of sales was blown . . . gone . . . forever. The competition was mighty. Our customers were children. The product had to be exemplary.
We were pulled thin like copper wire — dead tired, not pleasant, and out of creativity. I didn’t realize the impact of such a relentless environment until we went to sales conference.
Our plane left through the beautiful skies of Austin, Texas, taking through time to Durango, Colorado. We didn’t interact much on the plane. I worked on my presentation and contemplated Shakespeare’s Sonnet 29, thinking it wasn’t really about love.
It’s not like we’d had been working in a sweatshop. It’s not as if we were in a city devoid of beauty. Yet, with one step onto the tarmac — the Durango airport is atop a tiny mountain plateau. The world changed. I was surrounded by the luxury of space and beauty. It was a gift to be inside breathtaking mountain scenery.
The the view, the space, the sense of creation! How could I care about words on a page when THIS is waiting?
My energy, my creativity, my personality showed signs of returning to the living.
So now I know, when I’m “with what I most enjoy content least,” the sky, the lake, a chance to lay back and look up into the leaves of a tree are what I need.
The world is majestic. How can we live here and ignore it? We only have to look a few seconds and we’re wired to be moved by it. It’s our home. It changes us to stop to recognize it. We’re filled up with what we need.
Be awe-inspired. Then show another person how to be.
We can change the world, just like that.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
some days, some times of the year, what you planned just isn’t working. The kids are one place, and you’re in another one.
Any actor, any writer, any artist who performs for an audience, will tell you the same thing. Parents know it. Managers know it. The folks who care for animals know it too.
Ask any marketer. I bet you’ll hear that customers don’t behave according to plan.
When I used to work in an office, I called certain times of the year “karma-skew,” because they were predictably off. Those were by no means the only ones when it seemed that most folks in the building were, well, . . . a little bit . . . um . . . zany. I only wish. What we really were was bored and cranky.
Since the time that the world began, humans have had our explanations for this phenomena . . . the planets are misaligned. . . . The sun is breaking out in spots.
Any first grade teacher knows it happens before a rainstorm, or when the sky clears, or when there’s going to be a vacation day, or when it’s the first day back, or a special event, or hundred million other everyday catastrophes and celebrations.
Who cares why? It just does. A time comes when we need to change things up.
When it does . . . you set the plan aside, and you say, “I have an idea!”
Actually, I have lots of them. I have ideas about having ideas, about making friends, about being jazzed and productive — all things that are fun!
So let’s put the heavy thinking aside. Here’s a great place to start.
What’dya think? Good idea? Are you ready to come along?
The conversations within the dots…
Blogs started as personal logs. Today they are catalysts for engagement.
The Cluetrain Manifesto said it best…
When you think of the Internet… think of a table for two
Ron was the catalyst for my thinking this week. His 7 tips to not be invisible was a strong reminder that whether in the virtual or real world, too often we forget to participate, preferring to be Lurkers are those people that read blog posts, message boards and other online community sites but do not participate. His call to action was
If you are investing time to read, why don’t you invest a few moments more to add to the discussion and create some visibility for yourself? It gets easier the more you do it and people appreciate the participation.
Does it make a difference?
Sure it does. You’re invited to visit Citimama’s Project Life Change. I’m sure she felt wonderful to know her readers support her in her decision. Comments like You have me totally inspired! and I know how difficult that decision can be shows me this. She connected with her readers with her words, they reciprocated with their hearts.
Mingle, or stay single
Amanda’s post about the lost art of mingling? equally applies in the virtual world as it does in the real world. Successful bloggers have a secret and it’s not Digg. They mingle… usually through blog comments. That is the biggest travesty about RSS feeds, the convenience it affords us means we consume content rapidly, never stopping at blogs and letting them know something we read moved or inspired us.
Without participation, there is no conversation
If you want to change the world today…
Haydn asked that question on his blog wondering whether he should write a book. I selfishly implored him to blog instead so rather than wait a year or more for his wonderful insight, I could engage him in his thinking everyday perhaps taking him on different paths as he would me.
Winning with dots
Every week, I’m thrilled to post here. Liz gave me a bigger soapbox and best way to describe what I do is a quote by Zig Ziglar I found thanks to the winning attitude.
The greatest good we can do for others is not just to share our riches with them, but to reveal theirs.
All of a sudden, I’m feeling kinda warm all over. Secretly, I think Liz figured this out long before I did.
May the dots be with you!
This morning I woke early as I often do. My mind was working on a problem. I found my way to a news story, called Heroes, by David Armano.
The problem that woke me up so early fell away from my mind. My eyes got wide. My heart got open. I looked out the window at the thinnest crescent moon for the longest time. It blurred as I tried to find the word for what I was feeling at a cellular level.
The word was hope. I was proud to be human.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
Click the title “Heroes” to read David Armano’s eyewitness account of a horrible train wreck and two young heroes.
This morning I was greeted by an email from a dear friend, Joanna Young. I am often encouraged by her words as I start my day. This email said, “it felt like the thing I needed to write. You know how that can be.”
Yeah. I do. We know I do.
I knew before I opened it that what Joanna wrote would move me. Anyone who reads her blog would know that. So, without another word of my own, I share it now with you.
I don’t know if you’ve ever had the feeling that something is calling to you, blinking at you, trying to get your attention. “You need to do this”, it says. “You need to write this”, it tells you.
Liz’s change the world series is one of those quietly persistent flashes of light. It blinks at me: here I am, still waiting, patiently.
Sometimes it asks me, quietly: what are you waiting for?
Because the words, the idea, the possibility of writing something that’s about realizing the power of our own words to help change the world — well, that’s right up my street. It’s what I believe. Truly, deeply: that the words we use can help shape our reality, create the kind of world that we want to live in.
So what is it, the question goes, what is it, then, that you are waiting for?
And sometimes when I see another post go up, another beautiful button with a picture of this world we hold so dear, the simplicity of the message, the persistent reminder of those words, change the world! and the gentle, quiet reminder at the end: we can change the world, just like that! Sometimes when I see that button I get a jolt of anxiety that someone other than me will write the words I’m trying to find, that I’ll be too late, will have lost, or wasted the opportunity.
And so, the question persists, quietly: what is it, then, that you are waiting for?
And there are those times when I read other people’s words here , so simple, so powerful, such a compelling reminder, that yes, our words can and do make a difference that I’m jumping up and down in front of my computer, muttering yes, yes, yes! to my startled, sleepy, cat.
Words like the recent contribution from Jon Swanson, words that took my breath away with their power and simplicity, the conviction of this simple message:
Here’s the point. To talk about deciding to change the world ignores the fact that we already are. Our existence, our interactions, our writing, our time, our love, our hate –all of these things are shaping the world in small ways. The question is not whether you are ready to change your world. The question is whether you like the way you are already changing it. And whether you are willing to be part of helping other people change the world. too.
Our choices, our actions, our words, our decisions to write, or not to write: they all count. They’re all part of this bigger picture, one post at a time.
I know this. And yet: what is that you are waiting for?
And I realized. It’s not the words. It’s not the skill with the words, playing with phrases, finding just the right pattern and rhythm. Because I can do that. It’s not hard for me.
But writing this, answering this question, this quiet persistent question is hard. It’s hard because alongside the quiet, persistent question runs another line of insistent chatter. Who do you think you are, writing for a readership like that? Who do you think you are, offering up your paltry words to someone who knows so much, has written so much? Who do you think you are, offering up such small words to such a big task: change the world!
And so I realized. It wasn’t the words I was waiting for. It was the courage.
The courage to say: this is the best I can do. These are my words “they’re all I’ve got. I can’t think of anything smarter, wittier, cleverer, more appropriate to say. I’m sorry” It’s not enough.
And then I wondered: perhaps if this is how I feel, well maybe there are other people out there who feel the same. Perhaps if I venture up these words, however inadequate to the task, who knows, somewhere, some day, perhaps these words will resonate. Connect. Help to make a difference.
Help us to answer this gentle, persistent question.
What is that you’re waiting for?
—Joanna Young.
_______
Thanks, Joanna, for being a light, being a voice, and being there to help us see what to do.
We can change the world — just like that.
–ME “Liz” Strauss
