Month: September 2010

art, determination, museum, music

Step 263: Hahn-Bin and the Art of Darkness

Christa Avampato

“After my very deep depression, I feel really lucky to have had experience with something so dark and sad. It helps me paint the brightest colors.” ~ Hahn-Bin, violinist

My friend, Sara, invited me to Hahn-Bin’s violin concert on Sunday night at the Rubin Museum. After a productive day (a.k.a. a Sunday that was too busy for my liking), I joined Sara at the concert that turned out to be part performance art, part theatre, part visual design – all orchestrated by a 22-year old virtuoso musician with a very strong sense of himself and his vision. He is stunning, in appearance and in his musicality.

Already blown away by his nearly 2-hour performance, Hahn-Bin gave a very personal talk-back in which he talked about his fascination with world religion, his belief in the highly personal nature of art interpretation, and his struggles with and triumphs over depression. Watching him play with such ease and grace, I was confused by his depression. With a packed house and such a highly individual, refreshing voice in the highly stuffy world of classical music, what is he depressed about? And then I considered how difficult it must be to fight against the traditional music scene, filled with conservatories that are filled with professors who tell you what art and music mean. He must have had many moments of extreme self-doubt, of worry and concern for his future. He placed all his chips on his music – to fail at this would be mean failure in the highest degree.

Hahn-Bin’s story now is a triumphant one – someone who went for his art along his own path because it was the only thing he wanted to do. With his life and his art, he is teaching us an incredible lesson. To create his life, he just followed his interests. And along any path, even one we choose with all our heart, there will be highs and lows. There will be successes and failures and moments of extreme discomfort. Just because we’re going in the right direction doesn’t mean we’re immune to pain.

The right path isn’t the one filled with sunshine and roses; it’s the one where we feel most alive, where we can experience the great depth and breadth of the human experience. It makes us strong without hardening our hearts. It gives us courage and teaches us grace. And if we can make a go of the life we truly want to live, then we also have the opportunity to inspire others to do the same.

Photo above of Hahn-Bin by Morgan Freeman.

choices, decision-making, priorities

Step 262: More Life Editing – My First Lesson from Phineas

Christa Avampato

In January I wrote a post about my wipe board, the blank, erasable canvas that I use to keep track of the projects in my life. In the last two weeks, I’ve noticed that my wipe board, and by association my life, has become too full. I laughed when I caught myself squeezing project descriptions into unreadable script in the corners of the wipe board. I have been doing the exact same thing with my life. It’s easy to sign up, say yes, and create content in our lives. Deciding not to join, saying no, and editing the content are much tougher actions to take.

Now building time into my schedule to bond with and take care of Phin, it’s time for another round of editing. Phin showed up in my life to make me realize what’s really important and needs tending, and also what needs to go. It’s a message Brian has been giving me for months and I’m just now really hearing him – our creativity organizes around the constructs we give it, not the ones created by the outside world.

So I’m taking my time back into my own hands today. I’ve still got some more choices to make, but here’s what’s going so far:

1.) Free writing. Other than my own personal writing like this blog, I’m not writing anything for free – there has to be some kind of payment in the form of some currency I really care about. I have some writing work I want to get to like my yoga / personal finance book. Writing for free when that writing does nothing for me personally just isn’t an option anymore.

2.) Writing about topics I don’t care about. I’ve done some of these assignments recently for all the wrong reasons. Being rewarded financially is important to me, and it’s equally important for me to be rewarded financially for writing about topics that are important to me and that I want to promote.

3.) Work projects and colleagues that suck the life out of me. I have some of these at the moment, and I’ve recently become more vocal at work about the projects I want and the ones I don’t want. In middle management at a large company, it’s easy to just take what I’m given and tow the company line. I can do this, but it makes me miserable. And here’s the real upside about speaking up at work – it’s created a really open relationship with my Director and VP, it’s driving change in the direction that I want it to go, and I’m getting more of the work I want. Leadership from every chair is really important and possible.

4.) Friendships that are not a two-way street. I have a few friendships in my life that are not giving me as much as I’m putting into them and have been putting into them for many years. And then in contrast I have so many that are wonderful, fulfilling, balanced experiences. Going forward, I’m focusing on the latter.

5.) Private clients for Compass Yoga who can be serviced by other yoga teachers. Originally, I thought I would take on any private clients who were willing to work with me. Now, I see that I’m looking for people with very specific needs – whether it’s confidence, or having a specific ailment that they are trying to heal – physical or mental. I’m also tremendously interested in providing yoga to people who want to enhance their creativity through concentrated focus on calming their minds. There are plenty of wonderful yoga teachers who can teach anyone with $100 / hour to spend on private yoga. I’m not the right teacher for those students. My yoga is about helping people who can’t find the physical and mental help they need elsewhere. And that distinction is important, and feel right and good to me.

Are you doing some editing in your life, too? I’d love to hear about the choices you’re making.

animals, dogs, family

Step 261: Meet Phineas, My New Dog

Christa Avampato

Finally, after months (maybe even years) of deliberating, I rescued a dog from the Humane Society. Meet Phineas (Phin for short), a black and tan 10-pound dachshund, part wire hair, part smooth coat, part mini, part standard size. About a year ago, we lost our dachshund, Sebastian, and it was a heartbreaking event for my entire family. We really loved that little guy and this is the first year of my life that I’ve ever spent without a dog to love. Now that the grieving has passed and I can now almost mention Sebastian’s name without crying, it’s time for a new chapter in my life with canines. And just as I decided I was ready, Phineas appeared through the help of New York Dachshund Rescue and the Westchester Shore Humane Society in Harrison, NY.

I woke up this morning as if it were Christmas, eager to meet Phineas and see if he was a match. I knew in just a few minutes that this guy was the one for me – now if only dating were so easy (and I suppose it is with the right guy!) My newly retired mom, a great dog lover, met me at the Humane Society and agreed to watch him this weekend while I’m out-of-town. She fell in love with him on sight – another good sign! I’ve started reading Cesar Milan’s book, Cesar’s Way, and have plowed through many of Temple Grandin’s books in an effort to understand how dogs think and how to give them the very best lives possible by giving them what they need, not what we need. It’s going to be quite an adventure with Phineas and I’m looking forward to it!

A lot more to come as I travel down this new path. As I learn about Phineas, dogs, and myself in the process, I’ll record the journey here. Happy trails and tails!

Above is a photo of Phin and I, about 10 minutes after meeting. It’s our first photo together.

celebration, change, family, work

Step 260: My Mom Retired Today

Christa Avampato

When I was a teenager, I distinctly remember watching the news with my mom one night and there was a segment on retirement and social security. It was quickly becoming apparent to our nation that my generation would likely never collect social security despite all we would pay into it for many years. My mom said something like, “it must be nice to retire.” I replied with something like, “you’ll find out someday.” And then I have a snapshot in my mind of my mom hanging her head and saying, “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to retire.” And it wasn’t for lack of wanting to but lack of means.

That all changed today. Just about now, my mom is packing up the last items of her office, clicking the door shut one last time, and bidding adieu to the life of full-time work. Today she will retire from over 50 years as part of the American workforce – an incredible accomplishment by any standard.

So what’s next for my mom? We’re aren’t 100% sure yet. She’s moving to Florida next week to be close to my sister and her family. She is eager to spend more time with my darling nieces and it’s time for her to spend more time in the sunshine, resting, relaxing, and reflecting. She’ll do that for a bit and then decide what’s next.

Maybe she’ll continue with her own small business, get a part-time job doing something she loves, or spend a lot of time volunteering in her new community. Maybe she’ll take up writing or painting or some other art. Maybe she’ll learn to be a clown and join the circus. My mom is full of surprises. It’s one of the many things I love about her.

I do know that she won’t take retirement lying down. She loves to be busy and active, and now she has the opportunity to really get to her life to-do list now that her employer’s to-do list is done. My mom is a firm believer in the idea that when a door closes a window opens. I can’t wait to see how everything unfolds for her. Happy retirement, Mom – no one is more deserving of it than you!

sleep, stress

Step 259: A Moment, or More, of Rest

Christa Avampato

“Sometimes the most urgent thing you can possibly do is take a complete rest.” ~ Ashleigh Brilliant

I have spun myself out. Stress seems to be everywhere. Yesterday, no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t calm down until I got home and collapsed in a heap on my yoga mat. I sank down into the floor, feeling the comfort of the solid ground beneath me. I could have continued to ignore my own advice and run, run, run to combat stress. I thought about it, and then thought better of it. I didn’t need to run, I needed to rest.

Resting, contrary to logic, is hard work. Our minds race, our hearts race, and our feet follow along furiously trying to keep up. It’s a cycle. I used to beat myself up for over-scheduling my life. Now, I just de-schedule it. It’s another form of editing, an under-appreciated, subconsciously coveted, and courageous talent. It causes anxiety, guilt, and a bit of regret. But sometimes, a little regret is necessary. We aren’t perfect. We make mistakes. We burn ourselves out. We wear ourselves down.

Energy is cyclical, and when we’re done, we’re done. Take a load off. You deserve it.

Illustration above by Jim Davis. Garfield had the right idea.

health, healthcare, hope, hospital, New York City, teaching, yoga

Step 258: Teaching Yoga at New York Methodist Hospital

Christa Avampato

Yoga provides an incredible well-being practice for everyone. There are no physical or mental limitations that prohibit a yoga practice of some variety. If someone can breath, they can do yoga. I began my journey toward becoming a yoga teacher focusing on my classmates at the Darden School at the University of Virginia. They had stress and I knew how to relieve stress through yoga since I had been on a journey of self-study and yoga for close to a decade. A classic case of filling a need in the market.

In May, I made my teaching path “official” and received my 200-hour certification through Sonic Yoga and started Compass Yoga. During my teacher-training process, I turned my attention toward making yoga accessible to people who had few opportunities to experience it, namely people with serious physical and mental health ailments. Almost 4 months to the day after completing my training at Sonic, I will begin offering classes in the pediatric unit at New York Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn to patients, caregivers, and the hospital staff. This is exactly the type of yoga work I set out to do and it feels like such an incredible gift to do the work I know I was meant to do.

I begin on Saturday, September 25th with a trial run at New York Methodist. I will be sure to update this blog as I get further along the path, though wanted to share this wonderful news, for which I am infinitely grateful, as it happens. Where there’s a will there is most certainly always a way. Namaste.

personality, psychology, relationships, women, work

Step 257: 10 Scientific Findings About the Differences Between the Male and Female Brains

Christa Avampato

“Men and women have to stop blaming one another for their differences, and there really are differences.” ~ Barbara Annis

I went to a talk today with authors Barbara Annis and John Gray, leading authorities on how to get the sexes to understand one another and work together. Barbara Annis has just published the book Leadership and the Sexes, and John Gray is the author of the New York Times Bestseller Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.

They uncovered some surprising research currently being conducted about the male and female brains, and then used that research to formulate strategies for men and women to use together to create better work environments. Here are the top 10 points of interest that I took away from their presentation:

1.) Under stress, women remember more details and men remember fewer details. In general, women have better memories than men. When he tells you he really doesn’t remember, he’s telling the truth!

2.) Women can speak and listen simultaneously because the capability to listen is housed in multiple areas of their brains. The male brain is better equipped to focus solely on speaking or listening because all of their listening ability is housed in one area of their brains. So the pause between his listening and speaking is legit – give him the time to process.

3.) Women are more susceptible to stress and the average woman at work experiences 2X the amount of stress that men do. To compensate women have more endurance to continue to function under stress, however this increased stress and desire to continue to perform under stress causes many health problems in women. Ladies, get to yoga class, take a walk, meditate. You need to cut your stress levels!

4.) When men feel stressed, they slow down and do less. This helps them process information during stressful times. Women actually speed up under stress and do more. This is detrimental to women’s well-being. Ladies, take a tip from the guys – in times of stress, take a step back, breath, and relax.

5.) Under stress, men seek space to sort out the situation independently. Women seek understanding and turn to others when stressed. In connection, stress among men drops when they disconnect from others. Women’s stress level increases when they are disconnected from other people. In times of stress, give people what they need to feel better.

6.) Men prefer to be left alone at work, and find well-being in the workplace from more responsibility and opportunity. Women have a desire to feel connected to their employers and co-workers. The #1 reason women leave corporations is not for work-life balance but because they don’t feel valued by their employer. Corporate America, listening is and under-rated skill and you need to encourage it among your teams.

7.) Single men take more risks than married men, and fail more as a result. However, I believe in the axioms, “nothing ventured, nothing gained” and “fortune rewards the bold.” There’s nothing wrong with calculated risk.

8.) Testosterone does not increase aggressive behavior, but lowers reaction time. Under stress, men are likely to make quicker decisions as a result. Guys, take more time with decisions when possible. You’ll be happier in the long-run.

9.) Because of lower testosterone levels, women tend to weigh consequences of actions more often than men do. Guys, consequences matter – take a bit more time with your choices.

10.) To create a better working environment, men and women have to stop blaming one another for their differences and seek to really understand one another.

These differences have their benefits and should be celebrated! We’ll all be happier and healthier as a result – we have so much to learn from one another.

adventure, choices, determination, government, journey, politics, risk

Step 256: What We Can Learn from Rahm Emanuel

Christa Avampato

“If you run before the wind, you can’t take off. You’ve got to turn into it. Face it. The thing you push against is the thing that lifts you up.” ~ Delta commercial

Rahm Emanuel has a reputation for being a tough administrator who gets the job done. He runs a tight ship as an ambitious First Mate. I’m sure somewhere in the history books, long after the Obama administration has left the White House, there will be some chapter somewhere that recalls Emanuel’s role as the White House Chief of Staff. More than likely, the average American will not remember him nor his critical role in making the Obama administration run. Even now, do we know how much policy he has influenced with a heavy hand? At best, we know that he is a trusted adviser to our President, though we don’t know his advice.

Last week Mayor Daley announced that he will not seek re-election, and rumors begin to circulate that Emanuel may exit the White House to return to his beloved city of Chicago to become the star of his own life and career, as opposed to someone’s manager who looks on from the shadows of the wings. I thought about that image when I met with Brian last week. Brian has been a supportive and unrelenting advocate for me and my career. He thinks I have spent enough time in a supporting role and that it’s time for me to step out on my own in some way. He voices that message on a regular basis.

I tell him I need some more time to save money, to grow my experience base. Brian’s all for pragmatism, though he’s more in favor of setting the stage for how we’d like our creativity to organize itself. In other words, if we tell our creativity we’re just not ready and we need a plan B then our creativity will believe us and get going on a brilliant plan B. Our creativity, in large part, does what we tell it to do.

The trouble is that I’m an excellent supporting character. I’m really good at juggling priorities and managing around challenging personalities. I’ve made a successful career out of improving situations that very much-needed improving, and until I decide to work from a clean slate, I will continue to be part of the clean-up crew. We get the circumstances we ask for, or at least the ones that we’re willing to tolerate.

We all deserve the opportunity to be the stars of our own lives, to test our own ideas, and to make our own independent contributions to the world. As much as Rahm Emanuel may respect his boss and believe in the Obama agenda, he doesn’t call the shots. At the end of the day, they’re called for him to execute against. That’s the gig that comes with being a Chief of Staff and not the Chief. Of course he’s considering the possibility of becoming the mayor of his hometown. And with that inspiration, we should all think about what stage it is that we’d like to star on – we all deserve a little piece of the spotlight in our own lives. Turn into the wind, and see what lifts you up. For Emanuel, it’s the city of Chicago. What is it for you?

art, change, museum, New York City

Step 255: Matisse’s Unfinished Works

Christa Avampato

I went to MoMA today to see the special Matisse exhibition. It covers the period between 1913 and 1917 when Matisse began to find his groove that became his hallmark – the voluptuous figures, bold colors, and intentionally unfinished quality of seemingly simplistic forms. It is a collection of work gathered from all over the world, from a variety of public and private collections, that is a rare treat that showcases an artist as he gains confidence in his own voice. So often art exhibitions show an artist’s work that made him or her famous, that fully expresses a specific point of view. MoMA’s Matisse exhibit however shows an artist in the process of becoming.

My friends, Allan, Sara, Andrew, and I all commented on how much of Matisse’s work in the exhibit remains intentionally unfinished. He made very few comments on the work while he was alive, leaving the interpretation to his audience. On the audio tour, curators from MoMA and the Art Institute of Chicago commented on the work, largely guessing at what Matisse meant to say with each piece as he re-worked each canvas several times with different color schemes, adding new characters, and then taking them away, changing background colors and landscapes. Matisse never seemed to be satisfied or finished with a work. Rather, he just moved on.

Matisse’s work got me thinking about how we all work the different canvases of our lives. We move on from jobs, relationships, cities where we live, leaving each with some mark that we were there and yet giving them the freedom to evolve long after we’ve gone, all remaining open to interpretation of what our presence meant and what might have happened if we had stayed on longer. Maybe Matisse in his early career had it right not just about art, but about life – we are all in the process of becoming, no work (or life) is ever quite finished, and it all deserves celebration and reflection.

Matisse: Radical Invention, 1913 – 1917 is on exhibit at MoMA until October 11, 2010.

The photo above depicts Henri Matisse painting Bathers by a River, May 13, 1913. Photograph by Alvin Langdon Coburn. Courtesy of George Eastman House, International Museum of Photography and Film, Rochester

community, free, justice, New York City, religion

Step 254: A Vigil for 9/11 and Religious Freedom

Christa Avampato

“Sunlight is the best disinfectant.” ~ U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis

Last night I went with my friend, Sara, to a vigil for religious freedom and to commemorate the anniversary of 9/11. I had never seen the sky lights that are lit up to pay homage to the Towers, 2 giant beams that shoot up from the base of where the buildings once stood clear into the sky for as far as the eye can see. Hundreds of people gathered just one block away at Park and Church, holding candles, listening to speeches by religious leaders, and talking with friends. Just around the corner stood the site that will become the Islamic Community Center.

To be honest, the speeches weren’t moving, sometimes inaudible, and the traffic continued to run along Church Street throughout the vigil. What was moving was to hear the message, from the speakers and attendees beside us, that no neighborhood in this country should ever be off-limits to anyone. It sounds like such a simple idea and yet it has caused such controversy in New York and around the country. The argument “how could THOSE people be so insensitive?” has circulated around the Islamic Community Center in newspapers, TV broadcasts, and on the streets on U.S. cities. My response is THOSE people didn’t have anything to do with 9/11. Muslim lives were lost when those Towers fell, too; Muslims the world over are mourning today and everyday just like non-Muslims. If anything that ground on Vesey Street, and anywhere else in this world for that matter, belongs to the global community. We all have a right to be wherever it is we want to be.

What toppled those Towers so tragically 9 years ago today was not Islam or people living in Middle Eastern countries. It wasn’t hatred for Americans, nor was it anger in our foreign policies. What destroyed those Towers and continues to threaten world security is intolerance. By protesting the Islamic Community Center at 51 Park Place, intolerance grows and strengthens. Intolerance, the very idea that has caused our nation and particularly New York City, so much heartache is exactly what the protesters to the Islamic Community Center are propagating. It’s akin to poisoning ourselves with the very thing that others used to harm us.

It was encouraging to be among the group gathered for the vigil last night, sharing candle light and a common belief in true freedom for all people everywhere. I hope that the light we created there goes at least part of the way toward rooting out intolerance and burying it once and for all.