Writing: A Journey of Stops & Starts

The journey of writing my book has been fraught with stops and starts. I never considered myself a writer, but after writing 496 pages, I owned that I had a message to share.  I then had a strong intuitive hit that the book, which I’d originally envisioned would share the learning garnered from exploring other people’s choices, needed to be expanded to incorporate the wisdom and process I’d extracted from creating many personal maps. 

How might I do that when I created each of my maps with the rawness of a private journal I never imagined sharing? [Read more…]

Choosing to Not Play Small

I was heartbroken when I learned that my friend Jane’s 90-year old mom was in hospice. I’d had the pleasure of spending a few days with Ruth at her home in Florida a few years back and I was touched by her zest for life, her humor and her overall kindness. Jane shared with her community that she’d be honoring her mom’s request to slow down and would be taking a sacred sabbatical. There would be no weekly emails or offerings. Instead she’d focus on her own rest and rejuvenation. [Read more…]

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What is a Map?

A map is a visual representation of a choice you made, a choice you are making, or a choice you will make. Mapping is different than journaling, where you allow your words, thoughts and feelings to flow onto a page to understand them more clearly. As you map, the words captured are more concise, more nugget-focused.

“Mapping” expresses how you visually capture your thoughts. You can use different media to create your map, whether that be in your favorite journal, typing bullet points on a Word document, creating branches in mind-mapping software, capturing your nuggets on index cards or affixing sticky notes to your kitchen wall. Regardless of the form it takes, what’s distinguishing about a map is that it allows you to present each choice visually so that you can view it from a new perspective.

[Read more…]

Choosing to Make an Anonymous Donation

My business partner, Eric, and his wife Amy, consciously seek out opportunities to help others by making an anonymous donation each year. They envision creating a book for their grandchildren that chronicles the stories of their random acts of kindness, hoping their book will be a family legacy allowing future generations to be bitten by the giving bug.

After Eric learned that a single mom, who the family knew distantly, had to spend her scrupulously amassed Christmas savings to replace a totaled car, he and Amy filled an envelope with money. On Christmas morning, a trusted friend knocked on the woman’s door, handed her the stuffed envelope, wished her a Merry Christmas and walked away. [Read more…]

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