Month: August 2010

art, celebration, children, legacy, memory

Step 243: Celebrations and Legacy Building

Christa Avampato

“A nation reveals itself by the people it honors, the people it remembers, and the people it celebrates.” ~ President John F. Kennedy

While Dan and I were in Philly over the weekend, we stopped into the U.S. Mint to see where the money’s made. Because it was a Saturday, the manufacturing floor was not operating but we could take a look at the machinery and the self-guided plaques told us about the process.

As we were leaving the Mint, there was a small section dedicated to commemorative coins. Off to the side there was a display of memorabilia that the Mint produced to commemorate Charles M. Schultz, the creator of Peanuts, one of my very favorite set of characters. I went to Schultz’s house in Santa Rosa, California, a number of years ago and was blown away by his creative process and the simplicity of his life. One time a reporter asked him if he could confirm the rumor that Charlie Brown was actually a reflection of his own personality when Schultz was a child. He replied, “Of course he is. And so is every one of the other characters. They’re all me.”

In the Schultz display at the Mint, the JFK quote at the top of this post appears next to a listing of quotes from famous artists who commented on Charles Schulz’s passing and his tremendous influence on American pop culture. In Santa Rosa, a similar display appears, though it spans roughly a 100 foot long, floor-to-ceiling wall.

Charles Schulz was loved during his lifetime, and has remained well-remembered and celebrated long after his passing. I dare say that his memory will continue on for many generations to come. The fact that we continue to celebrate a man who remained so tapped in to his childhood throughout his life gives me great hope that we can do the same, and want to do the same.

That got me thinking about the subject of legacy, the efforts we put into the world now so that we will have a last impacting long after we cross over. The people we hold up as examples of inspiration and admiration says a lot about the people we mean to be, which in turn tells us a lot about the kind of world we wish to live in, which again in turn tells us about our collective values and purpose.

Once we know our purpose, then legacy-building isn’t a chore – it’s a natural process. Charles Schulz woke up every day to turn his attention toward the concerns of the world, and mad those concerns bearable through the stories and experiences of the Peanuts kids. This says to me that we do care about the common human experience. He made us all recognize just how connected we are, and while we all have our own unique quirks, much like the Peanuts gang, we all want to be loved, accepted, and encouraged to practice. We all want to find out way. And that is an act worth celebrating.

dreams, good fortune, journey, travel

Step 242: Philadelphia Stories

Christa Avampato

This weekend, my traveling pal, Dan, and I went to Philadelphia. We stayed with Dan’s friends, Jeremy and Reese, who could not have been more gracious hosts. They also have a bulldog, Dolly – an added bonus. Jeremy took us on a tour of the neighborhood around Penn, my alma mater, and we went through neighborhoods that I haven’t thought about in over a decade. Truthfully, I wouldn’t have recognized them on my own. Philly has come a long way since the 1990’s.

Philly’s an under-appreciated city; it has been for a long time. Great food, art, culture, easily navigable, with a relaxed, casual feel. We had several great meals at local restaurants and gastropubs, went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art, checked out the U.S. Mint and the Magic Garden, a public art installation of found objects. Some of the best education and medical facilities in the country are located in Philly. It takes 90 minutes to get to New York by Amtrak – even faster on the Acela train. Slightly longer to get to D.C. And did I mention that it’s affordable and filled with exceedingly kind people?

So why aren’t people moving to Philly in droves? Simple – business, sadly, has no incentive to move there, limiting economic opportunities. Philadelphia has a ridiculously high gross receipts tax and city wage tax for all business owners based in the city. These fees have been around forever, and different factions have tried over many years to reduce this burden on business owners in the hopes of spurring economic growth. All to no avail. Apparently Mayor Nutter’s administration is considering another fix to these fees. Like President Obama, Mayor Nutter was left with quite a bit to fix in Philadelphia before he could get started on new initiatives. It’s my hope that he will be successful in jump starting more businesses to set up shop in Philly.

I have a personal interest in seeing Philadelphia rise up to get all that it deserves. It is a city that has had a difficult, important history. In many ways, I came of age there as a Penn student. I had some of the very best, worst, happiest, saddest, proudest, and most disappointing moments of my life there. I learned how to love and care deeply about people and community. I discovered that one person really can make an enormous difference in the world. I learned how to fail, fall, and get up again, growing stronger every time.

When I graduated my friend, Derek, gave me a photo frame with a quote inside it. “Years from now, you’ll remember and you’ll come back and hang a plaque. This is where Christa began being what she can. ~ Stephen Sondheim, Merrily We Roll Along” I didn’t know how fitting that was until the trip back this weekend. I haven’t yet hung a plaque on any wall there, but I really did begin a journey of possibility there.

Philly and I have a history intertwined. I didn’t recognize the campus as I toured through the neighborhood on Saturday. Through the eyes of my 22-year old self, I wouldn’t recognize the me of today either. Philly and I have both grown and changed in dramatic ways, mostly for the better. And I’d like to believe that for Philly and for my own life, the very best of our days have yet to be seen.

choices, decision-making

Step 241: Big Choices

Christa Avampato

The through lines of our lives can be drawn between our tipping points, those moments and decisions that are so influential that they end up shaping our path forward in a dramatic way. I’ve had a few of those moments: my choices to try to create a career in theatre and then to leave touring theatre companies, moving to Florida and then DC, enrolling at Darden for business school, and then moving to New York City post-graduation without a set job.

Now I feel poised on the very edge of another turning point, with a window of opportunity that holds a lot of promise. That window won’t remain open forever. I have a limited amount of time to crawl through. If I choose to let it close, then I am certain that another window will open, but the opportunity will not be the same. Unlike my previous tipping points, this one makes me a little more nervous. I have more to lose now. Finally I’ve gotten to a comfortable point in my life, and I’m thinking of shaking it all up for the shake of a far-reaching dream.

My decision is eminent. In the next few weeks I will have to make some tough and interesting choices. My gut is conflicted, which rarely happens and which indicates to me that this decision is multi-layered with greater complications than my previous tipping points. I promise to disclose all of the details once I’ve made a choice. Until then, I’ll be turning the options over and over, looking for more information, hoping that my gut once again can show me the way.

While I’m thinking about this tipping point, I’d love to hear how you’ve made these types of choices and what the outcome was.

art, New York City, nostalgia, theatre

Step 240: Spiderman the Musical and Nostalgia for the Theatre

Christa Avampato

Yesterday I was in midtown to get a pie as a gift for my hosts this weekend. My pal, Dan, and I are heading to Philly for a weekend – our third long weekend of travel together. (The other two were to Portland, Maine and Nashville.) We’re staying with Dan’s friends and I’m bringing a pie from The Little Pie Company as a gift for them. I went to college in Philly and haven’t been back in a number of years. Dan has never been. I’m excited to see what we find – Philly holds a mix of emotions and experiences for me, some of the very best and very worst of my life.

As I headed back to the subway from The Little Pie Company, I walked by the theatre where Spiderman the Musical will open on November 14th. The stagehands were outside the stage door having lunch. I asked them if they were working on Spiderman, they said yes, and asked if I’d like a tour of the theatre. I gladly accepted.

It’s been a while since I’ve stood on a Broadway stage. It used to make me so nervous. I’d do whatever I could to avoid standing on the stage – I have had a life-long struggle with stage fright. Or at least I used to. Today standing on the Spiderman stage didn’t make me nervous at all. It kind of felt like going back to my hometown after being away for a long time. Some things were different and all in all it felt very familiar.

I know and understand all of the reasons I stopped managing Broadway shows. I’ve never considered going back. That was a chapter of my life that I’m so glad I had, and I’m so glad I left when I did. It was still the best business training I’ve ever had, and I was so fortunate to have that experience. But for just a split second, I imagined what it might be like to go back. I could feel the exhilaration of starting something new and unique, helping bring a new vision to delighted audiences. Maybe there’s a way to weave it back into my life, not in the same way as I did all those years ago, but in some new form that better fits my life and outlook today. I’ll mull that over and let you know what I find. I find it ironic that I would have this experience just as I’m heading to Philly, where I first considered a career in professional theatre, and on the same day that I received an invitation in the mail for a New York City theatre event sponsored by my Philly alma mater. Universe, what are you trying to tell me?

For the record, Spiderman is going to be a crazy, wild production. It will be unlike anything we’ve ever seen. That’s all I’m saying so as to protect the artistic integrity and the magic of life on the Great White Way. Grab some tickets before they’re gone!

clarity, communication, courage, feelings

Step 239: The Ease of Stepping Out and Up

Christa Avampato

“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” ~ Henry David Thoreau, American Author

There was some little snap inside me this week. I’m not sure what it is – could be that the heat has just gotten to me. (After this blistering summer heat, I truly can’t wait for sweater weather!) It might have to do with some shifting tides at work – all good and different. Brian would probably say that finally, finally, finally I am trusting my gut enough to let it have its own voice. Or he might say that the prana really loves me and therefore uses me every chance it gets. Whatever the reason, this week, for the first time in a long time, I was unmistakably me. My friend, Col, also realized this trend and wrote about it on her blog this week.

I have what some people have termed as a bold personality. Though for the past few months I’ve tempered that, particularly in public forums. My friend, Blair, gave me the nickname “Scrappy” (yes, as is “Scrappy Doo”) some years ago. Lately, I’ve lost a bit of that spiciness. This week it came shining through on several important occasions.

On Wednesday morning I had a meeting about a new initiative that I’m particularly passionate about. A lot of people gathered around a table to offer up feeble, same-old same-old opinions. So rather than tuning out and going to my happy place as I often do in meetings with people who have fancy titles and not much to support them, I spoke up. There were some arched eyebrows around the table, a few sheepish looks, and while I certainly remained professional and courteous, I pointed out that doing what we’ve always done just isn’t working and we should do x, y, and z instead. And then I produced the data to back up my opinions. I think a few people left the room at the end of the meeting saying, “and who was that woman and what part of the company does she work in?” in a positive way. I do like to encourage curiosity and push people’s boundaries.

The funny side to my boldness is that I’m also a pleaser. I do like people to like me. I like to be helpful, to strangers and friends alike. And I’m good at sharing, listening, and empathizing. I paid attention in kindergarten and got a good foundation of social skills. But pleasers have a rather dangerous lot in life – as pleasers, it’s easy to lose ourselves.

There’s a balance between boldness and pleasing, to be sure, and in the past I have often veered too far to one side of the spectrum or the other. This week, I got that balance right, dead on. While I did want some new audiences to like me, I also made it a point, without even trying, to also have some tough conversations with those parties, not for the sake of being tough but for the sake of really helping them and making our interaction a valuable use of their time. It was easier than I thought it would be, certainly easier than it’s been before. I cared less about being liked by them, and more about helping them think more clearly and contribute in a more meaningful way.

Brian told me that adolescence actually lasts into our early 30’s. Now at the start of my mid-30’s it’s no surprise to him that I’m beginning to rise up in every area of my life – personally and professionally. I do feel that after so much work of laying the foundations of my life, I’m now building castles in the air – exactly the opposite of the order that Thoreau discusses in his quote above. After this week I’m now wondering whether a good foundation naturally supports and builds a castle on its own simply because that’s what a foundation is meant to do. And by comparison, if we spend so much time working on who we are at our very core, all of a sudden do we step into the light just because that’s where we’re now ready to be?

art, choices, decision-making, impact

Step 238: Virtuous Feedback Loops and Doing What We Do Well (and Love)

Christa Avampato

“In the last analysis, the individual person is responsible for living his own life and for “finding himself.” If he persists in shifting his responsibility to somebody else, he fails to find out the meaning of his own existence.” ~ Thomas Merton, Trappist monk, poet, and author

My Uncle Tom sent me this quote just as I was online researching virtuous feedback loops, an operations term that describes a system that is built to educate itself by doing the very act it was created to perform. (There really is no end to my nerd-dom.) With virtuous feedback loops, a system constantly learns and improves. It’s a technical paradigm that at its core supports the old adage of “practice makes perfect”, at least “practice makes better.”

I thought about how we build systems into our lives that function as virtuous feedback loops. Certainly music, sports, the arts, and cooking are examples of these loops – we improve these skills just by practicing them, learning something from each new shot we take at it. Except when we hit a wall. Improvement ceases, we get stuck, and then grow to hate the activity altogether.

I was a saxophone player when I was in school, and I was truly mediocre. I would practice and practice and practice and really never make any great strides. I finally got so frustrated with the lack of progress that I decided to be a jazz fan and turn my artistic energy toward writing, design, and business (which, yes, is most certainly an art). It was a wise choice on my part. I’ve turned out to be a much more productive and happier writer, designer, and business woman than I ever would have been a jazz artist.

We have only so much energy and years to while away on this planet. Thomas Merton implores us to take a look at our lives from our own perspective, not anyone else’s. Take stock of what really matters, what we love to do, and where we can be useful, and action against that. Build virtuous feedback loops in our lives that do what they’re meant to do – help us get better at something we’re meant to do. I wasn’t meant to be a saxophone player. And as disappointed as I was to realize that at the time, I’m glad I didn’t spend years trying to hack away as a mediocre musician.

That move took some serious serious self-analysis and more than a little humility. I had to let go of what I loved but couldn’t improve so that I could find a new happiness and passion. I had to quit to succeed. Sometimes that happens, and it’s okay.

So if you find yourself stuck in a rut, working at something that just isn’t improving and that you’re actually growing to dislike as a result, then maybe it’s time to find a new passion, one that you can improve upon as you practice. Just make sure that if you do get a new dream, you’re the one making the choice. This is your time after all, and you only get one chance to be you.

goals, marketing, New York City, priorities, work, youth

Step 237: Do You Want to “Arrive”?

Christa Avampato

I always know that something is afoot in the universe when the subject of a conversation I have with a friend is echoed in a conversation I have at work the very next day. Last night I had dinner with my friend, Courtney, and we talked a lot about “arriving”, both in a professional and work sense. I met Courtney through my yoga teacher training and as new teachers we’re both trying to find our way through the complicated maze of the wellness industry. She and I are both contemplating full-time career moves as well.

We talked about relationships and living in New York City, a city whose residents strive to arrive in every aspect of our lives and yet are also always reaching for that next rung up. After all, most of us moved here to prove we could make it here, and therefore make it anywhere. (Thank you, Frank, for writing that succinct, poetic line to describe our complicated, collective goal.) Because we live in this delicate balance of thriving and striving, it’s hard to know when we’ve actually made it.

I work full-time as a product developer for a premium financial institution. Like many luxury brands, our brand halo has always had the understanding that once you carry our brand in your portfolio, you’ve made it big time. It’s a sentiment that’s served us well except for one tiny, recent glitch: many young people (young Gen X, Gen Y, and Millennials) don’t feel like they’ve made it yet and therefore don’t have a sense of belonging with our brand as they do with many others. It’s a tough nut for us to crack since we’ve spent over 100 years touting ourselves as aspirational and a recent market study showed that young people today are choosing to grow up later in life than previous generations. The real risk for us is that if we don’t grow loyalty among the youth segment now, we actually won’t be relevant to them once they do feel like they’ve made it.

I’m a cusp Gen X / Gen Y so I understand this mentality. In truth, I’m not sure that I’ll ever feel like I’ve arrived and a large part of me doesn’t want to feel that way. I live in New York City because I actually love striving, pushing my limits, and the feeling I get from growing, intellectually, spiritually, emotionally, and professionally, every day. Honestly, if you’re not interested in growth and change, I would recommend living someplace else. New York City is just too difficult a place to make your home unless you love to push yourself every day. I love New York City – I’m probably a lifer – but it is not for everyone and I understand why people choose to move. There’s no shame in that at all; it’s just a matter of priorities.

When I think about the youth dilemma facing my company, I think we’ve got one clear choice: Do you want to be a brand that rewards people once they feel like they’ve arrived at some idealized financial state or do you want to help people strive, accomplish, and push their boundaries no matter where they are on the “arrival spectrum”. That’s a very different kind of brand attitude that requires a new overarching brand strategy and quite a shake-up at my company. It’s a question worth pondering and acting upon – living in a state of limbo and identity crisis doesn’t help anyone, and in actuality it’s a sure-fire way to become irrelevant. Eventually, you’ve got to say “this is who I am” and be with the people who support that.

choices, decision-making, literature, mentor, writer, writing

Step 236: Mentor: A Memoir

Christa Avampato

I went to The Half King (one of the last great New York literary bars) last night to hear the author Tom Grimes talk about his new book Mentor: A Memoir. The book discusses Grime’s relationship with Frank Conroy, his mentor and friend whom he met at the Iowa Writer’s Workshop when Grimes was a graduate student at Iowa. Grimes explained how the book came about from a magazine assignment gone wrong. An editor had asked him to write a piece on Conroy’s work and instead the piece morphed into an exploration of Grime’s mentor relationship with Conroy. While not what the magazine editor asked for, the editor encouraged him to keep going and 8 months later Grimes had a book he never intended to write.

Exceedingly gracious and humble, Grimes also read a passage from the book from his early writing career when he waited tables at a small restaurant in Key West, Florida. He had a several second encounter with Conroy when Conroy spoke on a panel about writing in Key West. Conroy brushed him aside as just another would-be writer wanting admission into Iowa. Because of his rude behavior, Grimes wrote him off until Conroy called him to offer admission and a scholarship to Iowa after Conroy read his application and sample manuscript.

Throughout the talk, Grimes offered advice and encouragement to the audience about publishing, the craft of writing, the struggles that every writer faces in finding their own voice. The advice that sticks with me the most is his most simple and straight-forward: don’t let other people talk you into giving up; only give up when you think you should. It’s good advice for anyone who’s doing something they’re passionate about – their art, a business idea, an education, a community project, even a relationship.

There will also be naysayers, and sometimes those naysayers will be people close to us who care about us and our future. They will tell us how to spend our time, what skills to work on, where to live, go to school, and whom to be with. Ultimately, the only opinion about our lives that really matters is ours because we’re the ones we have to wake up with everyday, no matter what. If you can’t live with yourself and your choices, then it really doesn’t matter if anyone else can. You only get one crack at being you – make sure it’s done on your terms.

The Half King has a great slate of events that happen every Monday night. Check out the schedule and sign up for their email at http://www.thehalfking.com/

growth, happiness, history, nostalgia, work

Step 235: Insights from a Little Trip Through My Archives

Christa Avampato

This weekend I needed to put together a portfolio of sorts. I started digging through my archived files relating to different projects I’ve worked on since graduating from business school 3 years ago. A few ideas hit me as I sorted through the many documents I have saved, and all of the personalities that had a hand in crafting them:

1.) The breadth of work that came my way once I entered the innovation field still knocks me out and makes me feel incredibly lucky. From re-designing a toy store floor to developing a cost-neutral social media system to track credit card fraud practice, the ride has been anything but boring.

2.) I have had the great good fortune to work alongside some incredible talent. I owe them a big thank you for everything I’ve learned from them.

3.) How some less-than-talented people climb the ladder, particularly in competitive cultures during a massive recession, still astounds me. My friend, Wayne, always says that a chapter in his corporate autobiography will be entitled “Cruella De Ville and Other Crazies I’ve Survived”. I’ve also seen a lot of wonderful people let go during a time when companies should have been thanking their lucky stars to have such incredible talent among their ranks.

4.) The amount of personal and professional growth is evident when I view the spectrum of my work as a whole. From the data analysis to the strategic planning to the execution design, I could see my strengths growing and multiplying throughout the paper trail. I winced a little looking at my early work after b-school – it was a good reminder that we all start somewhere and we’re all capable of growth, many times in leaps and bounds!

5.) The projects that I felt the most passion for weren’t always the most successful or the ones that earned my paycheck. The pro-bono work and the projects we couldn’t get funded were the ones that really made me come alive. Funding within large companies is an odd thing – newness and risk are not things that large companies easily take on. And yet, those are the very ideas that have the greatest upside. Playing it safe carries its short-term rewards for sure, but it doesn’t hurt to take a peek over the horizon toward a tomorrow further down the line.

As I look back on my body of work, it’s always the things I did against all odds that brought me the greatest happiness.

career, dreams, education, work

Step 234: Public Education Needs Us to Set Sail

Christa Avampato

“A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.” ~ John A. Shedd

This week I read Paul Tough’s op-ed in the New York Times about innovation in public education. As I begin the journey to transition my career in corporate product development to innovation in public education, I’ve been doing a lot of research on new ideas in the education field. Tough, who wrote the excellent biography Whatever It Takes about Jeffrey Canada and the Harlem Childrens Zone, raises the flag on Congress continually commissioning fact-finding studies rather than putting new ideas into action in schools. This is equivalent to companies testing new product ideas in powerpoint rather than in market.

It’s safe to test in powerpoint, to commission research studies. The trouble is those acts don’t move us forward on our journey. Testing new ideas in the public eye takes guts and conviction. Innovation in any field is not for the faint of heart or the perfectionists. Innovation is for the ones who are willing to let go of today’s safety for the possibility that a brighter, happier tomorrow lies just beyond the shore. It is for the person who is willing to give up the perfectly acceptable for the hopeful promise of the truly extraordinary. Innovation, particularly in an area as critical to our future as public education, is for people who demand the ship pull up its anchor and head straight on toward the horizon. And if that ship refuses to move the innovator will pitch herself overboard and go it alone with the tides. It takes a certain amount of fearlessness mixed with equal amounts of curiosity and humility.

Paul Tough, Geoffrey Canada, and a myriad of others who care deeply about public education today are those innovators who would rather risk it all because the truly risky bet is to just do what we’ve always done; and what we’ve always done in public education is no longer working. We’re seeing the frightening effects in free-falling test scores, soaring drop-out rates, and ever-increasing desperation in the very poorest school districts. Public education needs you, me, and as many others as we can gather. Our government bands together to save the big banks, but not public education. Most government officials don’t understand that simply throwing money at the public education problems doesn’t make them go away. It takes just as much heart as it does money to have an impact in the lives of our children.

Some people ask me why I’d hop off the corporate product development track to pursue a career in public education. I have a plum position with a well-known company working on new technology development, a role that many MBAs would take in a heartbeat. I make good money. Most of the time the hours are perfectly manageable. By all accounts, I have found a safe harbor in the economic storm. I am beyond grateful for the opportunity. I could stay there and do well and move up the ladder. That life would be fine, but for the fact that it is not the least bit reflective of my spirit.

Here’s the rub: I don’t bring my heart to work. I show up to collect a paycheck. Nothing I do is building a better world, directly or indirectly. It’s just making more money for people who already have plenty of money, more money than they could ever possibly need. And I don’t want to wake up at the end of my career and look back at a broken public education system only to say, “I really should have spent my career trying to innovate in schools. That would have really made a difference.” I could sit back and years from now look around at a big pile of money in a bank account, and it would feel completely worthless. I would have wasted my time, and that’s just too tragic for me to bear.

So I’ve started to make my way out to sea, a tiny little row-boat paddling as fast as I can toward the sun. Call me an idealist; I’d welcome that. I’d rather live by my own ideals than by someone else’s. The mother ship is fading into the background and I’m looking for a way to do the work I was built for. Sometimes you’ve just got to set sail, no matter how rough the waters may seem.