A seed that I found in the spice forest when I visited Munnar, India earlier this year.
“The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
“I don’t try to guess someone’s ceiling.” ~ Marcus Samuelsson, Yes, Chef
It’s easy to look at something, project our own experiences and opinions, and pass judgement on how it will unfold. We look at students and employees that way. We think we have the ability to determine someone else’s potential, that we can somehow determine how far they can go and what they can do. There’s a danger in that. The human brain is a wondrous piece of machinery, but it is a horrible fortune-teller.
Take a look at an acorn or any kind of seed the next time you’re out walking in the woods, planting in the garden, or strolling through the park. The seed is a humble looking entity and yet there are worlds buried inside it just waiting for a bit of Earth, a sprinkle of rain, and a few rays of sunshine to cast their gaze in its direction.
We are seeds, too. We cannot look at others, we can’t even look at ourselves, and know exactly what we are capable of being. Get some wilder dreams. Aspire to something beyond your own comprehension. Imagine that you have no boundaries, that there are no limits. Chase down that vision, confident in the knowledge that you have everything you need within you right now to bring it to life. If the acorn can do it, so can we.
“Be content with what you have; rejoice in the way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, the whole world belongs to you.” ~ Lao Tzu
We are programmed to think that what we have right now is not enough. We need things that are bigger, better, faster, shinier, newer. It keeps us striving.
I love striving. I love setting a goal and exceeding it. As I get older, I’m also learning to enjoy where I am right now. I see how much further I have to go. I see the mountain before me and I’m excited to scale it. But I don’t want to miss the glorious views along the way. I want to take it all in and be grateful, content in this moment that I am exactly where I’m supposed to be.
“Each detail in a city should reflect that human beings are sacred.” ~ Enrique Penalosa
If I say “city”, what’s the first word that comes to your mind?
Skyscrapers? Concrete? Traffic? Crowded? Busy?
What if the answers were more like “Parks”, “Community”, “Opportunity”, or dare I suggest “Ease”?
Why is this second set of answers so funny? Why can’t we have cities that are beacons of a peaceful, productive, and harmonious way of life? I’m not convinced of the impossibility of this wish. I think in a city we can have the very best of the natural world and the human made world. I believe that the two can co-exist.
How?
It is up to us to make it so. We have to choose it and choose leaders who believe in it. City life is becoming the American way of life, the global way of life. Over 50% of the world’s people live in cities and to make this trend tenable, we must transform city living into healthy, happy, and sustainable living for all people who choose it. The answer is in the details – the green space, housing, transportation, etc. – and those details should honor our creativity, ingenuity, and generosity.
After watching the speeches of the Democratic National Convention, I am fired up even more than I was in 2008. Last night after President Obama’s speech, I opened my wallet, which I do only after intense consideration, to make the largest political contribution I’ve ever made. Then I opened my calendar, which I guard even more closely than my wallet, to give my time and talent to move us forward as a volunteer for the campaign. I can’t spend these next two months before the election just observing and commenting. I am making the time to act.
No matter what your political persuasions, the Democratic National Convention did exactly what it was supposed to do – it motivated people to do something. To talk about the issues, to stand up for what they believe in, to start creating the lives they want to live rather than listing the myriad of reasons of why their lives are less than they want them to be.
Now is the time – take a stand and do something about it. What kind of country do you want to live in and what are you doing to create it?
I am so honored and excited to share the news that Manduka, a sustainable yoga products company, made me their yogi of the week. My yoga story is posted on their website and Facebook page header. I shared my yoga story of healing with Manduka to inspire others and to explain how that healing story provided the impetus for the start of Compass Yoga, the nonprofit I founded to bring the therapeutic benefits of yoga to more people in more places, regardless of their financial and socioeconomic circumstances.
Here is the text of my yoga story as it appears on the Manduka site:
Meet Christa.
Christa used to manage Broadway shows for a living. That’s how she found yoga.
A musician working on one of the shows also happened to teach Iyengar yoga, and could sense the stress and pressure that Christa was under. He ended up offering her private instruction for close to 6 months – all he asked in return was that she ‘pay it forward’ to someone else in need.
Christa took that request and ran with it. She has opened a non-profit organization called Compass Yoga, teaching free yoga classes in New York City to people who don’t otherwise have the opportunity, or the funds, to begin a yoga practice.
This past spring, Christa went on her first trip to India. It was an experience that broke her down and built her back up completely new, and more powerful. She now refers to her life in two eras: her life before India, and now her life after India. She returned home with a new-found gratitude for all of the opportunities she has available to her, and feels more determined in her purpose to spread the benefits of yoga and meditation to more people.
Yoga has truly been therapeutic for Christa. It has helped her to work through her father’s passing, and to let go of the guilt she still carried from their rocky relationship. Yoga taught her that we don’t have to wait for healing, it is within us and available to us all the time. We have all the answers and all the knowledge we need; we just need to tap into it.
My friend Blair sent this to me and said “thought of you………. you ARE fire!” How right she is.
3 years ago today, I scrambled down 3 flights of stairs through blinding black smoke after a fire in my apartment building burned through 3 floors and was on its way into my kitchen. I was one person when I ran from the wreckage and another person when I emerged on the street. In an instant, my life and perspective was forever changed. I didn’t know that at the time but with the gift of 3 years of hindsight, I see how critical that fire was on my path.
It was the turning point. It was a new birthday. It gave me the courage to eventually make the Leap into a life of my own design.
When I quit my corporate job 2 months ago to craft my own career through Chasing Down the Muse, I really quit being afraid. In that instant, I became the person that fire made me become. Heat is a tool of transformation, and in a very visceral way, that fire was a spiritual kiln for my soul. It left an indelible mark on me and I am grateful for it.
In the past 2 months, many people have asked me how they could do the same thing. Here’s my 1 simple piece of advice to everyone who wants to take a Leap of any kind: dig down, way down deep to your core, and ask yourself what happens if everything falls away tomorrow. Is where you are where you hoped to be once this game was all over. If tomorrow the book of your life has the two words “The End”, has it been a ride you’re happy with?
I faced this very grim possibility 3 years ago and my answer was a resounding “No”. I knew something had to change; I knew a lot of somethings had to change and that it would take time. I had to get going. I needed to create a new direction.
I thought I was scrambling down 3 flights of stairs but what I was really doing was crawling through the window of possibility toward my very best self. In that moment, my Leap was set in motion. To quote Sondheim, “that’s where I began being what I can.”
“Art is not what you see, but what you make others see.” ~ Edgar Degas
I believe in the deep healing of art. I didn’t always believe that. I knew it was healing for me but for a long time I thought my work in the arts was frivolous, self-indulgent, and a waste of time. How time changes and teaches us!
In the 8 years since I left professional theatre management, I have not missed it. The impossibly long hours, the stress and pressure, the constant hustle. Even when you have a job in that business, you’re always looking for work because a gig is gone in the blink of an eye. But I miss it now, in a very deep and passionate way.
More and more, I have thought about trying my hand at it again now that I have a bit more business experience under my belt and a few more lines of time around my eyes. This time I won’t be creating the environment for art for my own sake, but for the sake of others.
“He who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are closed.” ~ Albert Einstein
I spend time with my nieces, Lorelei and Aubree, because I love them. I also spend time with them because I am incredibly selfish. They are a constant reminder to me that life is filled with the exciting, the unexpected, and the unprecedented. There are millions of surprises just waiting for us. The world wants to astound us, to make us wonder and wander. It wants us to be free and open to its magic, to follow its lead into the miraculous and previously unimagined. My nieces remind me of all of that whenever they see something I have seen a million times before and regard it with amazement.
Show up with a full heart, open eyes, and perked up ears. You won’t be disappointed. You’ll be inspired.
“Life offers its wisdom generously. Everything teaches. Not everyone learns.” ~ Rachel Naomi Remen
No matter what’s happening to us, we have the opportunity to learn. Good times teach us gratitude and generosity. Tough times teach us about perseverance and dedication. Confusing times teach us about our priorities. Moments of clarity teach us that life doesn’t have to be as difficult as we make it.
Around every corner, there is a chance to meet wisdom, to take her into our lives, and make her feel at home. Just let it happen.
I am by nature an efficiency hound. I hate wasting time, I love to be productive, and I feel an outsized sense of pride as I check off items on my to-do list. Yoga and meditation have taught me a subtle truth about efficiency that I didn’t know for a long time: sometimes what looks inefficient in the short-term is the most efficient thing to do in the name of long-term productivity.
At the suggestion of Anne Lamott, one of my favorite writers, I started reading God’s Hotel: A Doctor, A Hospital, and a Pilgrimage to the Heart of Medicine. The book chronicles the 20+ year career of Dr. Victoria Sweet at Laguna Honda Hospital in San Francisco, the last almshouse in the country. Low-tech and human-paced the work of Laguna Honda is a far cry from any hospital I’ve ever been to or read about. Early on in the book, Dr. Sweet gives samples of surface inefficiencies that proved to be tremendously helpful when viewed with the gift of time.
There was a nurse who dedicated a good chunk of her work time to hand-knitting blankets for each patient. Efficiency consultants were aghast and put a stop to it. However, those blankets were tangible symbols of how personally vested the entire staff at the hospital was to all patients. It let the patients, many of whom were so ill that no other hospital would admit them, and their family members know how much care and attention was being paid to their health.
Another example of inefficiency was the process of giving Christmas gifts. Collected and wrapped every year, the nursing staff would dole out the gifts randomly and then a day of festive trading between the patients would ensue. It made for a lively atmosphere with plenty of interaction throughout the entire hospital community. Again, the efficiency consultants saw all of this festivity as a terrible waste.
Rather than collect random gifts and wrap them up without any indication of what was inside, the nurses were instructed to ask each patient what they wanted, including size and color, and then that is exactly the gift they would receive. Though the gifts were still lovely, the loss of the trading process deflated the celebration. Christmas at Laguna Honda lost its sparkle when it lost the activity of swapping. And with the loss of celebration, they lost some of the spirit of deep, true healing.
These examples made me think about the efficiency of my own life – my to-do list, the structure of my days, and my constant pursuit of more productivity in less time. These things have their purpose and they’ve served me well but perhaps there’s a bit more wiggle room than I typically allow.
Maybe it’s okay to spend part of my afternoon at a museum today rather than spending that time on business development. Going to the museum probably won’t yield a client contract, but what it may give me in terms of inspiration may be just what the doctor would order and exactly what I need to be at my best tomorrow.
Christa Avampato 