Author: Christa Avampato

The short of it: Writer. Health, education, and art advocate. Theater and film producer. Visual artist. Product geek. Proud alumnae of the University of Pennsylvania (BA) and the Darden School of Business at the University of Virginia (MBA). Inspired by ancient wisdom & modern tech. Proliferator of goodness. Opener of doors. Friend to animals. Fan of creative work in all its wondrous forms. I use my business skills to create passion projects that build a better world. I’ve been called the happiest New Yorker, and I try hard to live up to that title every day. The long of it: My career has stretched across Capitol Hill, Broadway theatre, education, nonprofit fundraising, health and wellness, and Fortune 500 companies in retail, media, entertainment, technology, and financial services. I’ve been a product developer and product manager, theater manager, strategic consultant, marketer, voice over artist, , teacher, and fundraiser. I use my business and storytelling to support and sustain passion projects that build a better world. In every experience, I’ve used my sense of and respect for elegant design to develop meaningful products, services, programs, and events. While building a business career, I also built a strong portfolio as a journalist, novelist, freelance writer, interviewer, presenter, and public speaker. My writing has appeared in The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, PBS.org, Boston.com, Royal Media Partners publications, and The Motley Fool on a wide range of topics including business, technology, science, health, education, culture, and lifestyle. I have also been an invited speaker at SXSW, Teach for America, Avon headquarters, Games for Change, NYU, Columbia University, Hunter College, and the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America. The first book in my young adult book series, Emerson Page and Where the Light Enters, was acquired by a publisher and launched in November 2017. I’m currently working on the second book in the series. A recovering multi-tasker, I’m equally at home in front of my Mac, on my yoga mat, walking my rescue dog, Phineas, traveling with a purpose, or practicing the high-art of people watching. I also cut up small bits of paper and put them back together as a collage artist. My company: I’m bringing together all of my business and creative career paths as the Founder of Double or Nothing Media: • I craft products, programs, and projects that make a difference; • I build the business plans that make what I craft financially sustainable; • I tell the stories that matter about the people, places, and products that inspire me. Follow my adventures on Twitter at https://twitter.com/christanyc and Instagram at https://instagram.com/christarosenyc.
nature, New York City

Leap: Nature’s Lessons Via Hurricane Sandy

Christa Avampato
View of Lower Manhattan as Sandy moves in

“Being inexhaustible, life and nature are a constant stimulus for a creative mind.” ~ Hans Hofmann, German-American abstract expressionist painter

A partially collapsed crane in midtown, a building in Chelsea that lost its facade to the wicked wind, and a flooded Battery Park City. All bridges, tunnels, schools, city parks, and most businesses closed. Public transit completely halted. The city that never sleeps was brought to stillness by a powerful gal named Sandy.

Phin and I spent the day hunkered down. He snoozed for most of it and I got a lot of solid work done. I put together and sent my personal e-newsletter as well as the one for Compass Yoga. I prepped for an interview I have next week for a dream contract role with an innovative and inspiring education-based nonprofit, and applied for some additional contract work. I worked on plans to raise money for my nonprofit clients as well as Compass Yoga. I wrote, read, talked to friends, cooked good food, and got in a home yoga practice. By all accounts it was a good, good day in my little abode.

In all my activity, the roaring winds outside never let me forget that I am just a small piece of a greater pie, that there are forces beyond my control and prediction that can and will impact me in significant ways. The best we can do is roll with nature, respect her strength and heed her warnings. There are things in this world for which we can only prepare, and cannot fight.

Nature keeps us on our toes. It checks our egos. And it lets us know that we are all in this wild experience together, for better or worse, so we might as well give our best and take care of one another.

happiness, sunshine, travel, work, worry

Leap: If You Want to Find Meaning in Your Work, Find the Sun

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

I spent the weekend in Buffalo with two of my best girlfriends, Kelly and Alex. Kelly is getting married next Fall to a wonderful man and Alex and I are in the wedding. Alex and I made it to our flights home just in time as Hurricane Sandy approaches the Eastern seaboard.

On my Delta flight, I had the most delightful flight attendant. As we broke through the clouds, I commented that it had been at least a week since I’d seen sunny skies.

“That’s the greatest thing about my job,” said the attendant. “It’s always a sunny day at the office for at least part of the time.”

How many of us can say that? And how many of us would like to say that?

This year, following happiness and joy has been a good strategy for me. I don’t always know what lies around the bend with my newly designed career. Heck, sometimes I barely know what lies in wait for me in my morning inbox. I don’t worry though because I just keep following goodness, sunshine in some form or other, and so far it’s always been a good day in my (home) office.

faith, future, love

Leap: Destination – Love

Christa Avampato

“Love leads us into mystery where no one can say what comes next, or how, or why.” ~ Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg

It’s amazing what love will get you to reconsider. Somehow it helps us to open up to new possibilities in a way that we likely wouldn’t otherwise.

It gives us courage and strength, confidence and the unexplainable knowledge that everything is going work out just fine. And it does this with no answers, no plan, no map, and no proof.

In that way, love is faith of the highest order.

courage

Leap: The Teachings of Compassion and Courage

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“Without courage, compassion falters. Without compassion, courage has no direction.” ~ Eric Greitens

Compassion requires that we step out of our lives and take the viewpoint of another. We need to remove our filters, our blinders, and try those of another on for size.

That viewpoint has been years in the making. For sure there were times of discomfort and times of joy. There were great disappointments and equal triumphs. Each experience had some impact on the way this person sees the world. Somewhere along the line they went through something that changed them.

This is not easy work. To have great compassion requires great courage. It’s frightening to put away our own convictions, our own truths. With true compassion, we will be asked to question our own beliefs, especially those that form the bedrock of our lives. If we have the courage to pursue compassion, we will find ourselves in the midst of a profoundly considered life.

adventure, choices, creativity, determination, passion, time

Leap: Passion Projects

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“Those who wish to sing, always find a song.” ~ Swedish proverb

If you truly have a passion to do something, you will make it happen. Its allure, its promise, will be undeniable. You will have to set aside everything else in favor of getting it done.

That’s how it goes with projects of the heart. Because it is actually a part of you, you cannot shake it. You will stare down every fear, leap over every obstacle, and shut down every nay-saying thought to bring it to life. You don’t have a choice in the matter. It is just what you must do.

dreams, fear, finance, financing, money

Leap: The Most Important Purpose of Money

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“The importance of money flows from it being a link between the present and the future.” ~ John Maynard Keynes, British economist

Money – what we earn, what we save, what we spend, and what we give away – is always a bridge between what we have now and what we will have in the future. It’s just energy. It ebbs and flows.

This perspective helped me to think of money as a much less terrifying force. I used to be petrified of it. Afraid I’d never have enough. Afraid that my pursuit of it, no matter how noble my path, might consume me if I didn’t remain on constant watch.

Now I see it for what it is – fuel that gets me from where I am now to where I want to be next. In this way it’s become a very selfless entity – something that shows up when I need it, allows me to use it to the best of my ability, and then happily changes hands without even so much as a glance back at me over its shoulder.

It feels good to no longer see it as a foe, but rather as an ally.

creativity, time

Leap: There Will Never Be a Better Time to Do What You’re Meant to Do

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“Too often man handles life as he does the bad weather. He whiles away the time as he waits for it to stop.” ~ Alfred Polgar, Austrian journalist

I’ll get to it when I have more time, when life is less hectic, when I have more money, when the weather gets better.

How many times have you said something like that when contemplating your next step?

I used to say it all the time. Then one day I just got so sick of hearing myself say it that I stopped making excuses and really got down to business to create a life. On occasion, I catch myself slipping back in to my old “maybe someday” habit. The truth of it is that today is someday, and it’s just as good a someday as any other day will ever be.

Here’s my only motto these days – less waiting, more doing.

adventure, creativity, journey, time

Leap: Take Your Unique Journey

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“What each must seek in his life never was on land or sea. It is something out of his own unique potentiality for experience, something that never has been and never could have been experienced by anyone else.” ~ Joseph Campbell

Don’t wonder if your idea is original. Don’t wonder if what you have to say has never been said before. You are unique. The road you take has never been traveled in exactly the same way with exactly the same intention. You are an individual – a beautiful, shining example of the potential that we all have to do something magical and profound.

All that matters is that you bring your whole heart to whatever it is you do. Show up with authenticity and integrity. Don’t play a role. Just be you. You are enough and rare and amazing, just as you are right now. Your unique journey is waiting for you to get moving. Go!

adventure, creativity, dreams, opportunity, time

Leap: Get Started Right Where You Are

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“The lure of the distant and the difficult is deceptive. The great opportunity is where you are.” ~ John Burroughs, American naturalist and essayist

So often we think we have to make monumental changes in our lives to have an adventure, to stoke the fire of opportunity. We believe that we have to endure impossible scenarios to have a real adventure. In our pursuit of the new, we sometimes miss all of the possibility that lies at our feet every day, along the same roads we regularly travel, with the people who are intricately woven into the fabric of our lives.

Everything, and I mean everything, can be renewed. And not all of it has to come via challenge. Very often, adventure is laid at our feet and all it requires is a simple “Yes, deal me in.”

Open your eyes, ears, and mind, right where you are, right now. Somewhere in the course of your day, I am certain you will encounter the chance to do something amazing. You’ve spent all this time creating dreams. Go live them – you have everything you need to begin.

time

Leap: Everything Is Uncertain Except Now

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“Embrace relational uncertainty. It’s called romance. Embrace spiritual uncertainty. It’s called mystery. Embrace occupational uncertainty. It’s called destiny. Embrace emotional uncertainty. It’s called joy. Embrace intellectual uncertainty. It’s called revelation.” ~ Mark Batterson

There is nothing wrong with wanting answers. There is nothing wrong with wanting safety, security, and stability. It’s just not possible to have any of these things in any other moment except now.

This is all we get, ever. There are no other guarantees. We have now, no more and no less. So make the most of it.