Successful Blog

Fast Food, Fine Restaurants, and Extraordinary Details

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In Every Person and Every Moment

The experience of a fast food restaurant doesn’t take much thinking — stand in line, get your food, and then eat. Sometimes we go through that routine without even noticing how the food tastes.

The experience of a fine restaurant is tuned and timed to whet our appetite. The service, presentation, and atmosphere are choreographed in extraordinary detail so that we savor every bit.

Blue rose in detail

Unfortunately, most life experiences don’t come served up like a visit to a fine restaurant. A sunrise, a gorgeous flower, or a new friend enters our life, and it’s up to us to see the extraordinary.

The world serves up beautiful experiences with incredible people — all through our ordinary moments. What waits in them is deeper, richer, and more valuable than a fast-food glance will ever reveal. Every person and every moment offers a wealth of ways to connect, to belong, to make our lives easier, more meaningful, and more fun.

The extraordinary details of life are the fine food experiences that feed our souls.

Where are the extraordinary details in your life?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!
SOBCon08 is May 2,3,4 in Chicago. Register now!
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Have You Felt the Power of Being Fully Present?

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I've been thinking . . .

about the power of being fully present.

I’ve noticed a power that comes from being present. It’s state of mind. It’s a heartfelt state of fact. If I give myself over to what’s happening, I find myself fully alive and able to enter into the moment.

Problems, difficult conversations, and huge misunderstandings take on smaller proportions when I let them have my full attention. It’s the distractions, the noises I let in, that complicate, that cause friction and pain. When only my mind is listening, I can find myself over analyzing or adding false context to a situation. When it’s just my heart, I can be overly generous or getting confused about what I “should be” feeling. When I’m only part there, I’m only getting part of the available information.

When I’m at the head, heart, and purpose of the moment. I’m complete and connected. I’m not looking for something from another person. I can take in all of the information. The integrity of who I am — like the structure of a building — holds me strong and sturdy. I can give attention. I can give and forgive, and understand.

The power of being fully present is that we have nothing missing.
We don’t need anything when we listen.

Have you felt the power of being fully present?

Liz's Signature

Connecting by Being Connected

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I've been thinking . . .

about connections.

When my head, heart, and purpose are aligned, life is in working order. Words and ideas come easily. Work is a pleasure. People are a wonder and joy.

When I suffer a disconnect from my head, heart, or purpose, I lose track of that smoothness. Colors fade. Tasks get big and boring. Smiles get harder to find. I see with tired eyes. The disconnect disturbs me.

When I look for angels everywhere, they appear in all generosity. When I speak with care and confidence, people respond with the same. When I trust myself, people are trustworthy, and they trust me. When I work hard, people offer help.

I see in other people what I first see in myself.

Community begins inside me.

It’s huge thought.

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Celebrating Friends

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I've been thinking . . .

about the gifts that have been coming my way.

This morning when I turned on my computer, a friend was there waiting for me. He came with a gift. He saw a need, built something to meet it, and asked if I might find it useful. What he offered was beautiful, elegant, and much better than I might do. It was the kindness of a friend reaching out with a head, a heart, and a hand.

Friends have a way of doing like that so well.

kids on swingset

It doesn’t matter how long you’ve known them — a minute, an hour, a lifetime. Somehow friends have a way of knowing who we are and how to be there in just the right way. They make smiles brighter, suns shinier, sad times lighter, and achievements greater. It’s not what they bring or what they offer. The acts and the words they supply simply underscore the value of the friendship they represent.

Friends are the true gifts of a life.

This weekend I’ll be celebrating my friends.

How about you?

Liz's Signature

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Birdsongs, Business, and Life

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I've been thinking . . .

the songs that birds sing.

This morning, very early, I went out into a foggy day to see the sky and feel my feet on the ground. I heard a birdsong. It was a strong and familiar sound that I’ve not heard since who knows when. Immeidately, I was transported to days when I was a child and other ways of thinking.

That bird was doing what that bird does, and doing it well.

I’m glad I heard that particular bird today.

I’ll be thinking about that birdsong all day. What makes the birdsong of a business or a life?

Liz's Signature

Ain't Misbehavin' Anymore, Back to My Frequency

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Remembering What I Forgot

relationships button

I’ve been stuck, watching folks misbehaving. One of those folks has most certainly been me. It seems I forgot some of the fundamental truths I’ve discovered. They got buried under the blankets when I got slammed with that awful flu, and for some reason finding my way back to them was Herculean work.

I forgot that

  • I can’t love someone and keep score of what they’re doing.
  • I can’t be thinking about what they’re actions must say about what they think about me. Truth is they’re not thinking about me at all — I am.
  • I can’t be my best when I’m focused on being let down or angry.

What was I thinking? Unconditional love is unconditional, if I don’t know that . . . My whole life has shown me that I’m always clear and right when I follow that simple frequency.

So, to all of my friends who’ve felt the fallout of a head and heart turned in the wrong direction, I’m sorry. I’ve behaved badly.

I ain’t misbehavin’ anymore. I’m moving forward instead.

Whew! What a relief!

Back to the regularly scheduled changing the world. . . .

What’s your frequency?

–ME “Liz” Strauss
Work with Liz!!

Work with Liz!!
SOBCon08 is May 2,3,4 in Chicago. Register now!