2024W41: It All Begins With The Conversations We Have With Ourselves

Airplane coffee!

All year I’ve been seeing, hearing, and experiencing this refrain in my head: Everything starts with the conversations we have with ourselves.

These conversations determine how we feel…

… what we do….

… which conversations we engage in with other people. And which we don’t…. (Grammar! I know. But you get my point.)

… the quality of our days.

And when I say “the conversations we have with ourselves,” I don’t mean the little motivational quotes we frame and hang in our office. Or the personal pep talks we write with Sharpies and stick via Post-It notes to our bathroom mirror. Not the oversimplified concept of “self talk".

I mean the rich dialogue each of us has with ourselves. Or that we could be having with ourselves, if we don’t currently cultivate that inner dialogue.

Do we have an inner dialogue? Sometimes, inside, we still have an inner monologue. One side of us dominates the conversation unnecessarily. The part that is the harshest self-critic? The eternal pessimist? Or the part that is ever the optimist, even as all the data at hand paints a very different picture of reality? What is possible if we have an inner dialogue that invites multiple points of view, and different ideas, from our own selves? (Is this where healthy self-regulation comes from?)

Maybe we write in our journal regularly, and feel free to express our innermost thoughts with ourselves. We can write literally anything down, and seeing the words, and acknowledging that they came from our truest selves, feels both terrifying and freeing. And informative!

Maybe we balance our inner dialogue with a healthy number of conversations with other people, about the same topics. So that we can find a baseline for values and our moral compass.

2024W35: I Turned 50!

I’m writing this update now a week late. If I’d posted on time, last Monday, I would still have been 49. But the past few weeks have been hectic, as I added a few shenanigans and hijinks to celebrate my 50th birthday. It’s been a perfect time for reflection and renewal and I am grateful for the most amazing family, friends, and professional relationships.

I’ll spend the next two weeks very much in preparation mode: for a new virtual workshop that I’ve facilitated many times in person but never virtually; for a busy travel and work period over the next two months; and for 2025 planning. Yep, it’s already that time. I’m trying to do less of the big annual stuff and more of the 12-week year vibe, but that will take some mental shifting in small doses over a long period of time.

But the Hononichi Techo line for 2025 is out and I am trying to decide if I will extend the now-2-month personal challenge to hand letter a piece every morning, not just through the end of 2024, but through 2025. And then I need to decide if I want 6 months in a book or 12 months in a book, and whether I will stick with the smaller A6 size or try the larger A5. Did I mention some of the new illustrated covers are delightful? So many decisions!

This is my profile pic for all my social media accounts for the next 10 years.

2024W32: Writing a Keynote Speech

I mentioned last week that I’ve been in a program to learn how to build a keynote speaking part of my business. I finish the program in November, but I got an invitation to keynote next week, at the Keller Williams Young Professionals Advance event!

I’ve had two coaches weigh in on my talk-in-progress, and my third and final coaching call in preparation for this talk is tomorrow. So far, I’ve had some useful take-aways:

1. I’ve been public speaking at workshops for so long that my natural style is to speak at the strategic and tactical levels. It’s taking a lot of focus to stay broad and big-picture.

2. Stories bring a significant amount of value to keynotes. I’ve pressured myself to populate my talk with specific (and true, obviously) stories that are profound and meaningful, but you can also tell compelling stories about culture and society and ideas themselves.

3. I’ve never had to be so purposeful about humor. I think I’m pretty good at finding humor in the moment, rather spontaneously. But maybe only 5% of a keynote is spontaneous. You have to know you are hitting all your points in a specific time frame, so there isn’t a lot of riffing to be done. This is also strange and new and terrifying!

What is life, if not embracing the strange and new and terrifying?

I’m including a picture from the Pop Cats Austin show last weekend. I was so lucky my friend Lisa Teichner invited me! We had a great time.

2024W31: Exploring Different Aspects of My Voice

I’m finishing my third month of a seven month structured program to build part of my business that will offer keynote speaking. This is very different for me than workshop speaking, and it is requiring big stretches and great leaps of faith. 😅 My workshop approach and voice are pretty refined after 20+ years! Everything about workshops feels natural to me, from how I prepare to what I say, not to mention the heavy emphasis on strategy and tactics, with the ultimate goal of action.

Keynotes however? They exist on a different plane from workshops, and focus on the big picture. I’ve spoken in that big picture, visionary way for a few minutes at a time, usually during the facilitated sections of workshops, while responding to something that’s come up organically in conversation. It’s a big change to fill 45 minutes this way, all planned, totally uninterrupted. No questions the audience answers out loud, no verbal interaction.

I’m glad I have a few coaches to help guide me. It’s truly humbling to write a fairly complete outline of a talk and be encouraged to start over, haha. Not so much on content, but on style — I’m still processing everything through a very technical lens, and I guess I need to loosen up. Imagine!

2024W28: Mermaids And Other Summer Fun

A couple months ago, probably on one of those sick days in May, when I took six naps a day and found myself occasionally awake, I fell deep into mermaid brain. The blues, purples, and silvers. The smooth textures of the insides of shells, and the rough textures of coral reefs. The enchantment of a deep sea world humans would never know. Now it’s July and I have a whole mermaid (snail mail) campaign nearly ready to go. This goes along with my 365 Notes project for the year. TBH the full mermaid suite is a lot of work and a lot of time, so I will need to figure out a smaller and more sustainable mini-ensemble. And all of these will go out before end of August, which to me is an official end to mermaid season LOL.

While I am glad to be off the road for a few weeks, getting things done around the house and home office, I’m just as busy. I have so much content to finish writing and producing, more admin and marketing work to support the workshops and courses I’m developing and delivering, and of course recharging the creative battery that gets it all done.

Also I am determined to binge watch The Bear, Season 3, before I accidentally read spoilers and get angry at the world for it, haha.

I’ve had two big revelations recently.

1. I have heard all year several things I have said (in some cases, ten or more years ago) that are now being published in popular books or otherwise said to me. In some cases it’s clear that I said a thing, someone heard it and internalized it so much that authorship got fuzzy, and now it’s coming back to me as someone else’s thought. In other cases, it’s not clear whether my saying something was original authorship, but it’s still annoying that an idea I developed years ago is now enjoying popularity being uttered by others who don’t even seem to have business models, lifestyles, and products that align with whatever their wise words are. All this to say: I keep thinking I need to wait till my thoughts are fully baked, but I don’t. Neither do you. So I plan to start sharing more wild and random thoughts here, even if I haven’t had “enough time” to process them fully.

2. I am at a point in my career where I might kick back and phone it in, but I don’t. I’m wired to keep pushing. And also, the people I work with and for are important enough to me to always do my best and try to be my best. But I am realizing that a lot of people at similar stages of their career do phone it in more often than not. It makes my work stand out even more, not just because of the quality, but also because of the effort, care, and purpose.

Anyone else feeling these things? And / or have you had any big revelations recently? Drop some thoughts in the comments if you wish, and let’s dissect them together.

2024W22: When Illness Strikes

I missed two weeks of posting — lots to catch you up on — but in the spirit of giving you “right now” info, I am about 10 days out from a bad bug. I tested negative for covid, but I came back from my last trip with something that did not want to let me go!

I’m so much better, with just a lingering runny nose and cough. This whole week is about getting back on track with life, starting with this blog.

Irritating things about being sick!

1. Living life one day out —figuring out from moment to moment what meeting I can or can’t handle; keeping the throat lozenges handy to stave off coughing fits; deciding a day ahead whether or not I’m still contagious and thus can’t attend a variety of Memorial Day events.

2. Thinking I’m getting better, only to have the virus retreat and level up into something to draw out the illness a few days longer.

3. My Apple Watch, insisting I “can do this! Just a brisk, 26-minute walk and” I can close my move ring! NO, I AM SICK SO LEAVE ME ALONE.

Sweet moments despite being sick:

1. Finally moving at the same speed all day as my elderly canine BFF. Taking lots of naps together, so his FOMO was at an all-time low.

2. My family cooking for me and making sure I was eating and resting.

3. Gratitude for the many more days I am well. Chronic illness is not a thing I want to trifle with.

I’ll catch you next week! Stay well, my friends.

2024W19: A Different Kind of Presentation

I spent the weekend in New Jersey for my dear friend Brenda’s memorial. Luckily, I was able to also catch up with other friends, including Kyle of Vacuuming the Lawn and general Princeton community fame. (She took the pic of me above, among shockingly bright azaleas.)

I don’t think I was purposely avoiding finishing the short talk I had been asked to give at the memorial, but I’d never written anything like this before. And even though I’d had about 3 months to work on it, all I had was an outline. Most of which I ended up scratching.

The morning of the memorial, I felt clear that:

• The point of the talk was not to say every single thing I wanted to say about this person. In fact, five minutes or less was probably a good time benchmark, so I had to be very focused.

• The fact I’d known this person for less time than anyone else in the room shouldn’t matter. My best addition would be to highlight was was special about her from my unique POV.

• One way to honor an entire life is to summarize her contribution to the world, through me.

I went with a structure based on “three lessons about friendship in the second half of life,” and it came out quick! I read it through once and made very few modifications, which is unusual for me. (How I write and how I talk can be so different.) In practice, it clocked in between 5-6 minutes depending on how quickly I could abate tears and get back on track.

I got to meet family and other friends Brenda had told me about over the years, and bonded with them over our mutual loss.

2024W17: Changing My Daily Routine

At the end of February, I came home from a trip and sprained my shoulder lugging my suitcase off the baggage carousel at the airport. It’s most likely because I haven’t really exercised since last fall… long story why, but obviously the result is not-very-intentional movement and decreased strength and being close to finishing another decade. Here we are.

Last week I started exercising again and remembered that three short workouts a week is a good rhythm for me; that Sunday-Tuesday-Thursday is better than Monday-Wednesday-Friday because I only have to schedule later meeting start times on two business days a week; and I need to take at least one long walk each week to stay in touch with subtle shifts of season and my changing neighborhood.

I’m also changing up my morning routine as a whole. I have written three pages every morning for about a year now, but in 2024 I’ve noticed I have no time or mental space to draw. So I’m skipping morning pages for now and instead drawing in my sketchbook each morning a series of little vignettes that document my thoughts and ideas. It allows me to listen to a podcast or watch a video while I am drawing — for some reason, I can’t do those things while writing.

Surprisingly (or not?) I experienced inspiration from the video I watched while drawing my morning, and developed it out throughout the day and actually published a finished product on Instagram. Unfortunately, I also procrastinated on replying to emails, so I seek balance of course.

AND I have decided to write and develop content for three hours each day that I work from home. I have ambitious plans for content development this year and I need more discipline around this. Also, I’m customizing a workshop for an event four weeks away. Typical me writes and edits until the day before an event, and then I try to cram in all the practice the night before and morning of. If I can get three hours a day in, I should complete the writing and practice well within two weeks. Which sounds amazing to me.

Wish me luck! These seem like they should be small changes, but they feel enormous. I wish you all a great week. <3

Inspiration and completion on the same day. Imagine that.

2024W14: Welcome Q2!

Q1 is over! No fooling there. I do a pretty good job of examining all of my ingrained habits, to make sure they still work for me. At the end of each quarter I feel a surge of unnameable anxiety… and I am asking myself this time if that’s for any good reason at all.

This is where I landed: Yes, a small amount of extra awareness is super helpful at the end of Q1. Not overwhelming anxiety, not a shame spiral, not self-flagellation. Just a bump of awareness, followed by commitment to insight. I started the year with enormous ambitions, specific projects and goals, and a one-year focus. This is a perfect time for me to take stock of my progress so far, and make some adjustments.

Celebrate

• This Friday, I’ll publish my 8th and final episode of season 1 of my new podcast, Instructor Notes.

• I’m on track to launch my YouTube channel before summer, which I think is the missing piece of my business’ social media landscape.

• I hosted gatherings at my house five times in Q1 and it was such a blessing to have more frequent contact with some of my friends and family.

• I have written morning pages every. single. day this year.

• Two unexpected opportunities have presented themselves to me, and I’m in the process of evaluating where and how they may fit. I hope they fit!

Needs Attention

• My social media use has fallen off. I think I have figured out how I want to use LinkedIn and Facebook though, so it won’t be too tough to try these modified approaches for the next quarter and see how they work. Weekly blogging was going well until it wasn’t, and I hope to find my footing in the next 3 months.

• My drawing has also tapered off. Hand lettering still OK. I’m super excited to be a patron of Drawn Together; and the two illustrators who lead it have been very helpful getting my brain and inspiration back on track.

• Decluttering has just stalled out completely. Maybe it wasn’t the best season.

Regrouping

1. I was overly eager to do all the things in the first three months of the year. I’ve been more realistic in spreading out the major projects through the remaining 9 months of the year.

2. There seem to be many lessons for me this year in trusting myself completely.

3. While I love annual planning, I wonder if I will benefit from less of a “new year, new me” approach and more of an ongoing evolution / revolution that recalibrates every quarter. It would make January of each year feel less like a grand adventure and more like “I planned this and soon it will be here.”

How about you? How was your Q1?

2024W9: A Last-Minute Week 9 Post

I wrote something and decided not to publish it. I’ve written this instead.

Some years ago, a KW associate started a great Facebook group for all KW associates to share their notes, which was perfect for those of us who suffer from FR FOMO. I was getting into sketch noting and shared my notes there, and I loved being able to read other people’s notes from the sessions I could not attend. It was a very active group! But during the pandemic, things in the FB group got messy and late last year it was mainly full of spam.

My first Week 9 post was a call to use that FB group, and link to it. But I’ve changed my mind, and changed the post. Because in retrospect, other ways of sharing notes have popped up in the past 5 years. And they seem to be meeting people’s needs better. We can get so caught up in forcing something that might organically have met its end.

So my lesson this week is: sometimes things we build have their season, and it’s OK to let them go when they are past their usefulness. File this one under my annual mantra “Bless and Release.”

KWFR24 Las Vegas Restaurant Recs from Trusted Locals

Did you know I went to high school in Las Vegas? And my parents lived there from that decade all the way until 2020. So I have contacts there. I know people… 🤨🥸🙃

And those people know local restaurants, both on and off the beaten path (the strip). If you’re also heading to Vegas for the KWFR24, here are links to restaurants less likely to be frequented by the other 10,000 convention-goers. Please note I have not personally eaten at any of these places, but people I know and trust have recommended them. Be sure to check the restaurant sites for info on reservations, to confirm address, etc.

Lamaii (Thai)

4480 Spring Mountain Road, Suite 700
Las Vegas NV 89102

Main St. Provisions (New American w seafood + steak)

1214 S. Main Street
Las Vegas NV 89104

Cleaver (Steak + seafood)

3900 Paradise Road, Ste. D1
Las Vegas NV 89169

Weera Thai (… Thai)

7337 Rainbow Blvd. Ste. 101
Las Vegas NV 89139

Sparrow + Wolf (New American)

4480 Spring Mountain Rd Ste 100
Las Vegas NV 89102

Al Solito Posto (Italian)

420 S Rampart Blvd
Las Vegas NV 89145

Elia Authentic Greek Taverna (Greek)

8615 W Sahara Ave
Las Vegas NV 89117

Graze Kitchen (Vegan comfort food)

7355 S Buffalo Dr Ste 2
Las Vegas NV 89113

Tarantino’s Vegan (… Vegan)

7960 S Rainbow Blvd Ste 8000G
Las Vegas NV 89139

2024W2: My Word Of The Year 🎉

New Year’s Day is my favorite holiday. I feel so refreshed! I’ve done all the New Year things in years past (and occasionally still do some of them): resolutions, goals, habits, themes, etc.

One New Year practice that found me is a word of the year. And I’m literal about that — a word has found me each year, for maybe the past ten or so years. It starts to surface as a lesson learned across many areas of my life, usually starting in the fall of the prior year.

My 2024 word is TRY. Please don’t let this trigger your inner Yoda about how “there is no try, only do”. Even Yoda knows I am a do-er, so this connotation to the word does not bring a lesson I need, thanks tho LOL.

When I repeat that mantra “TRY” I’m fully embracing the playful, experimental nature of the word. As in:

• Give it a try.

• Just try.

• Let’s try it and see what happens.

I’m usually pretty good at trying new things, too! But this year there are really big things for me to try. These 2024 things feel more consequential than trying a new dish at a familiar restaurant, or trying a new pen, or renting a different car than usual when I travel. Those are all low risk ways to try.

My 2024 TRY is about strategizing, collaborating, expanding horizons and possibilities. Big stuff. Real stakes. But I am ready and I am excited!

Have you capitalized on the energy of New Year’s, with plans or resolutions or a focus or a word???

Unwanted Filter.

How was your Christmas? Ours was very low-key and laid back. No one told me that once a 12-year-old turns 13, sleep is more important than presents. And the teen woke up kind of cranky! At noon! It was like we had our own personal Grinch.

I’d started reading the Anna Kendrick memoir, Scrappy Little Nobody, on Christmas Eve. And despite carrying it around the house with me the next day, I had no desire to read it. That’s not like me — memoirs are my reading equivalent of a bag of Kettle brand salt and cracked black pepper chips: guilty pleasure, consumed in record time. She’s not a bad writer. There are some funny moments. Maybe my reading tastes are changing, and fun and frivolous tales of young privilege are simply not enjoyable to me anymore. 

But more likely, the past 6 weeks I've felt like I’m living the same life with a filter over it. A filter I'd never choose BTW, that never seems flattering on anyone else's Instagram pics, either — and I’m still living my life with this unwanted filter laid over it, and I keep messing with the RGB settings to try to get things to feel just right. Anna Kendrick’s book may have delighted me on Nov 7, but today, it is not reading right. So I’ll get back to Dark Money, which hits a little close to home and should be on all our required reading lists anyway.

Gratitude From My Sick Bed

What started as a 3-day cold has given way to bronchitis, and perhaps a mocking hint of conjunctivitis yet to be... Each day, I test myself to see if I can taste more, or better, than the day before. A wave of symptoms seems to subside and a new one takes its place. And yet, I can't help but feel immensely grateful...

• It could be worse! But it isn't. I am grateful.
• This illness hit me during a 10-day stretch between work travel. The number of people affected is minimized. I am grateful.
• I haven't exercised in over a week, and I can tell my overall muscle tone is softer. But my deep inner abs? Strong as ever, and sore, thanks to two nights of coughing through the night! Who knew? I am grateful.
• I have successfully worked from bed for 3 days now, which means short trips to the kitchen, a few times a day, to stock up on snacks and water and throat lozenges. I work in short spurts, and read or surf FB and IG too much in between. Every day, I've been able to take a short nap when I feel tired. I am grateful.
• I am able to work from home. So many aren't. I am grateful.
• My family is picking up the slack. Laundry and dishes are getting done without me. Even the dog took a few shifts snuggling, catching up on last weekend's episodes of Girls and The Walking Dead with me. I am grateful.
• If I talk for more than a few minutes at a time, I devolve into a coughing fit. It has made me a better editor of my speech -- only saying what is absolutely necessary, nothing more. I am grateful.

Hope you've successfully avoided the cooties! I thought when March began that I didn't need to be as diligent about my Vitamin C AND I WAS WRONG! How humbling to be wrong. Lessons in humility are good. I am grateful.

On Goal Setting: Results vs. Process

I had a daily writing goal in 2015, and I hit it! I wrote 365 days last year. But this is my first post in three months, so clearly I had no blogging goal, haha. Maybe I need one! (Note to self…)

Late last year, I had a couple of epiphanies about goals. The first is that I’d become a one-year goal setting and goal achieving ninja. I’d successfully set and hit one-year goals for several years. BUT I was achieving a succession of one-year goals without any long-term plan. My friend Colette suggested a book called Five: Where Will You Be Five Years From Today? I completed all the exercises over three morning writing sessions and walked away with a concrete vision of what I want to see in five years. Big wake up call: my son will be in his final year of secondary school in five years. Better be sure I’m raising the man I want to see in 2021!

The second epiphany is that I’m in a good place overall, both personally and professionally, and it didn’t happen overnight. This has become a bit of an obsession. I traced back healthy eating, for instance. I am not claiming to be the cleanest eater in the world, but I bet I’m doing pretty good compared to the average American. It began in 2002, when I got pregnant. It was the first time in my life I remember questioning what I ate, considering that my personal nutritional choices would also affect the baby growing inside me. I cut out all caffeine during my pregnancy, and began eating organic produce. After my son was born and began eating solid foods, I bought organic for him and conventional for my husband and me, and asked myself one day, “Why would you want only the best for him, but not for yourself?” I am sure we spend far more than most 3-person households on food, and it’s about quality, not quantity. We forgo other luxuries because food quality is a high priority for us.

I’m happy we have healthy eating habits, and each year since 2002, we’ve made some adjustments that at the time didn’t seem major, but as an accumulation of habits, lead to really positive outcomes.

One memorable story I've heard about goal setting was from a teacher who insisted that a 25-pound weight loss goal he’d set in January, and had not happened yet by December 1 of that year, would not have happened had he not written it down. After Thanksgiving, he buckled down, disciplined himself for the following month, worked out like a fiend, and by December 31 he’d hit his goal.

Yay for him, but what I remember most is that the next year that weight came back! To my knowledge, the number on his scale has continued to go up and down over the years, because he has always focused solely on the result goal, and not on a process goal.

So I’ve been looking at goal setting very differently. Instead of focusing on an just an achievement, I’m mostly focusing on behaviors, habits, and rituals that can lead to an outcome I want.

Now that I’ve written that, it seems silly and self-explanatory. But business people can get carried away with end results ("Just bullet point it for me!"), totally ignoring the means. And the means are what lifestyle, and quality of life, are all about.

How are your 2016 goals coming along? Are you more of an end result goal setter, or a process goal setter, or both? 

Expectations

Yesterday, I finished reading the novel, Sand Omnibus, by Hugh Howey. One of his previous novels, Wool Omnibus, was my favorite book last year. But then I read the other two books in that trilogy, which didn't measure up at all IMO, and felt I'd appropriately lowered my expectations around Sand. 

I was still disappointed.

Which got me thinking about expectations. I don't usually read reviews before watching a movie. If the trailer or even the premise look promising, I'll gladly watch without finding out more. I definitely don't read reviews of books before I read the books themselves, although if my reading queue is full, I might scan star ratings at Goodreads and Amazon to prioritize. 

It's probably common practice to read a book you love, and then get your hands on everything else the author has written. But I'm finding that, for me, this can create expectations and invite comparisons to the author's other work that are difficult for me to leave at the front door.

Do you ever experience this? Any advice for me on how to let go of my (perhaps) unreasonable expectations?

[In case you're interested, here is my review of Wool Omnibus, and my review of Sand Omnibus.]

Process vs. Product Goals

It's about that time of year. Not quite Q4, but late enough in the year to think about my progress against my annual goals. The good news is that I'm doing great. I'm on track. But, for the first time in years, my big goal this year was not a product goal, but a process goal.

I didn't do it on purpose. But I'm reading a lot this year that challenges the current business mindset that an annual goal is the sum total of your year's efforts. If I did that, I might have set a goal to write a book this year.

But I've published before, and there was never big romance in that for me anyway. I just wanted to get better at writing. In fact, I want to be great at it. I'd like to be as confident in my writing as I am in my speaking. I'm not tied down to any specific form that my writing will take. So instead of setting a goal to write or publish a book, for instance, my goal was to write every day this year.

Every day.

After a couple of months creating the daily writing habit (about 66 days, and I wasn't even trying), I took a writing class. Having specific feedback from my teacher as well as other students helped me increase the quality of my writing dramatically. I read several books and followed their great writing prompts, found a dedicated writing partner / peer reviewer, and am ironically exploring an opportunity to write for book publication again. Not because I've been focused on getting published again. But because, instead of obsessing over the outcome ("product"), I've focused on the everyday work of writing ("process").

I've written every single day this year, and because much of my writing has been by hand, in a notebook, the best I can do is estimate my word count. In the first eight months of the year, I've written somewhere almost 160,000 words. The rough equivalent of three novels, if you're looking for a benchmark.

Would my year be going differently if I'd set an annual goal of "52 blog posts of 1,000 words each," or "write a book?" Hard to say. And there are probably goals that are clearest as end result goals. But I am completely happy with and excited about my results from focusing this year on process instead of product.