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.
education, Junior Achievement

My Year of Hopefulness – Ethics in the News

Christa Avampato

During my second Junior Achievement Ethics class, I realized that students weren’t reading the newspaper regularly. All of the events that we watch and analyze every day at my job didn’t exist in the students’ world. Now more than ever, Ethics is making front page news every day and I wanted to give them a real world view of why Ethics is important and how it’s used and considered outside of the classroom.

As an assignment, I asked each of them to bring in some type of news article, on any subject, that had to do with Ethics. I was very excited to see what they’d bring in. And then we got to class and most students said they forgot and didn’t bring in anything. Right off the bat, we needed to improvise.

I asked them to consider what news stories they’ve heard about that might involve Ethics. Crickets. And then one lone student, Bernard, raised his hand timidly and said, “I think I know one.” Bless Bernard.
The students had just had a snow day, the first one in 5 years in New York City. Bernard was concerned about the idea that some cities are saying they don’t have enough money to plow and salt roads to keep their citizens safe during storms. “Isn’t that an issue of ethics?” he asked. “Isn’t a city supposed to do everything it can to keep people safe? If someone dies in a car accident because the road wasn’t plowed, isn’t that the city’s fault?”

I love Ethics for one simple reason: the problems are messy and complex. Rarely is there a clear answer that everyone agrees on. Our class began to discuss city budgets and trade-offs they make in areas like education, public safety, healthcare, welfare, services for the homeless. We talked about taxes and philanthropy. We talked about city versus state versus federal government and the roles of each, especially in times of economic crisis.

The students left with many more questions than they had answers, as did I. I thought they might be frustrated by the lack of clarity in Ethics. Instead, they wanted to talk more. They are very confident in voicing their opinions and beliefs. While they often disagree with one another, I have yet to see any kind of disrespect of someone else’s opinion, which is more than I can say for most adults I talk to about situations involving Ethics. My high school kids gave me hope that maybe their generation will be much more adept at making sound Ethics decisions than the painful follies being committed today by the generation in charge of our financial institutions.

books, community service, philanthropy, volunteer

NY Business Strategies Examiner: The Idealist.org Handbook to Building a Better World

Christa Avampato

This week I had the pleasure to interview Russ Finkelstein, Associate Director of Action Without Borders / Idealist.org. Russ was the driving force behind a valuable resource just published by the Penguin Group. The Idealist.org Handbook to Building a Better World is a book for anyone who wants to make a positive impact in the world. Whether you have never volunteered before or are a seasoned nonprofit professional, this book is filled with advice and guidance on the world of philanthropy. With info on areas ranging from board service to volunteer groups to in-kind donations, this book is a must-have for anyone interested in getting involved in service.


For the full story, click here.
health, healthcare, home, movie, news, newspapers, social change, television

My Year of Hopefulness – Mr. Ayers and Mr. Lopez

Christa Avampato

I’ve been developing a habit of reading and listening to inspirational stories. I need to keep my courage and strength up in these tough times. We all do. On Sunday, I watched 60 Minutes because President Obama was speaking. I planned to shut off the TV and go through some of my weekly reading that had piled up as soon as President Obama’s interview was complete. Instead, I spent the remainder of the hour glued to the TV, getting to know Mr. Ayers and Mr. Lopez. 


Meet Mr. Lopez, a columnist for the LA Times. A good guy whom you imagine might be your neighbor, a fellow parent at your child’s school, if you’re lucky he’d be your boss or colleague. Now meet Mr. Ayers, a homeless man in LA. He suffers from the disease of paranoid schizophrenia. And he is a brilliantly gifted musician. Cello, violin, and trumpet. Gift enough to be admitted to Julliard. Gifted enough still to keep up with the LA Philharmonic whose members now rehearse with and provide lessons to him when he visits them at the concert hall. 

After his first year at Julliard, Mr. Ayers went home and began showing signs of his illness which was rearing its ugly head inside his wonderfully gifted mind. As a last ditch desperation move, Mr. Ayers followed the advice of psychiatrists and subjected her son to electric shock treatments. It is a barbaric treatment that was at one time, not all that long ago, accepted as a viable tool to manage the disease. Instead, it sent Mr. Ayers into a downward spiral from which he has never returned. 

Mr. Lopez and Mr. Ayers met three years ago. Mr. Ayers was playing his cello in a park as Mr. Lopez roamed the streets trying to come up with a story for his looming deadline. What struck Mr. Lopez in addition to Mr. Ayers’s virtuosity, was that he wasn’t playing in the park for money. He was just playing his cello for himself. Mr. Lopez would learn that Mr. Ayers played to forget, to chase away the frightening effects of his schizophrenia. He needed to, wanted to drown out his deepest, darkest concerns. Thus began a 3 year friendship that continues and flourishes so much that it caught the attention of Universal Pictures and has been turned into a movie, The Soloist, featuring Jamie Foxx and Robert Downey, Jr. The movie will open in theatres on April 24, 2009.  

My father was a clinical psychologist so I know a bit about diseases like paranoid schizophrenia. I can tell you that it is a heartbreaking disease to see and experience up close, and it is even harder to see the strain the disease places on families and loved ones of the person who has the disease. To hear the story of Mr. Ayers, to hear his incredible musical gifts mixed with his equally incredible demons, we have to believe that in all people, regardless of circumstances, there is good and not-so-good. 

It was a reminder to me that too often we cast aside the mentally ill in this country as if they have nothing to offer society. They are hidden away, forgotten, ignored. Their basic needs like healthcare and shelter too often go unfulfilled. In our society, they have very few vehicles to raise their voice, to come together, to stand up, and to be counted. Let’s hope that The Soloist is not just another feel good story at the box office but that it actually raises awareness that inspires action. On the movie’s website, there are links to help you get involved in the efforts to end homelessness and help those with mental illnesses.   

To read the 5-part series written by Mr. Lopez about Mr. Ayers, click here.

The above photo depicts Mr. Nathaniel Ayers playing the violin. I found the image at: https://christaavampato.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/1865563850_9f4c68c464.jpg?w=300
economy, Fast Company, future

My Year of Hopefulness – Embracing the Future is Our Only Choice

Christa Avampato

In Robert Safian’s letter to the editor in Fast Company this month, he closed with a very poignant, short paragraph that was hopeful and also a mark of tough love delivered in an empathic way. We have been spending the past 18 months with a “whoa is me” attitude. The economy is awful. We’re afraid. We’re in a death spiral downward. What are we going to do???


It’s okay to hide under the bed for some amount of time after the dark days arrive. No matter how scared or uncertain or confused we are, we have to eventually come back into the light. We have to start living again, even if the kind of life we live going forward is dramatically different than the way we lived before. 

Robert’s assessment is very clear and strong:
“These are dark days, no question. And unpredictable events, from natural disasters to fiscal meltdown to 9/11, can often make things look darker. But the unexpected can also be our friend, our ally, as long as we maintain hope and embrace our uncertain future. After all, we have no choice.”

He’s right. We don’t have the option to stay hidden away, hoping and praying for better days. We are going to have work hard, very hard, for them. And better days doesn’t mean the days we used to have. All we can do is embrace what we’ve got to look forward to, whatever that is.   
Africa, economy, entrepreneurship, investing, Kiva.org, money, philanthropy, social entrepreneurship

My Year of Hopefulness – Kiva.org

Christa Avampato

I’ve given up on opening my 401K statements. The news is just too depressing. Given our current economic state, I’ve been searching of where to put my investment money. Where will it do the most good, for me and for the companies I choose to invest in. When I look at the Dow 30, I don’t have a lot of faith in many of those institutions to reinvent themselves. Some of them have remarkable potential. Most of them have to accept that they have a very tough realization to come to terms with – in the words of Darwin, “Change or die.”


The investments that are intriguing to me these days are in entrepreneurs, particularly those in developing nations such as Rwanda. I just placed my first investment in an entrepreneur in Ghana through Kiva.org. I lent $25 to a woman named Agnes Cobbina for a 7-month term. She owns a hair salon and she wanted to borrow $375 to expand her business. With 14 other lenders, I completed Anges’s loan goal. What was remarkable is that I clicked on several different entrepreneurs and by the time I got to the “lend to” page, their goal was already completed. In the 10 seconds that it took me to read a bit about them, someone else had stepped in to help! One loan is made every 14 seconds through Kiva.org. 

Some people might think of this as a charitable donation rather than a loan. Nothing could be further from the truth. 99% of those who receive loans through organizations like Kiva.org pay them back in full. How many U.S. investments can say that these days? And not only am I confident that I will receive my money back; I know that I helped someone help themselves through this loan. I am empowering Agnes, providing her with a dignified way to grow her business and support her family. 

I’m thrilled to be able to participate with Kiva.org. But I want to do more. I’d be willing to take part of my investment money and provide it directly to an entrepreneur in a country like Rwanda for a return. What an amazing thing it would be to combine the idea of Sharebuilder with that of a Kiva.org. Could this be a new paradigm for global investment?  
Africa, entrepreneurship, Fast Company, government

My Year of Hopefulness – Happiness is Forward

Christa Avampato

This month Fast Company ran an incredible article about Rwanda and the economic revolution that is happening in that country 15 years after the genocide that robbed it of 1 million people (1/8 of the entire population) in 100 days. 


President Paul Kagame has set audacious goals for Rwanda: increase GDP by 7X, move half of Rwanda’s subsistence farmers into paying jobs, quadruple individual income, and make Rwanda a tech center for Africa. All by 2020. In 11 years, he believes he can transform his country and he is dedicated heart and soul to the effort. His charisma and ambition is so powerful, you’ll want to ask where you can sign up after reading the article. 


The connection I felt to Rwanda after reading the article is very much a testament to Jeff Chu’s talent as a journalist. He captured small details as well as the big picture so that a reader can imagine lumbering down the roads of Rwanda with President Kagame, Jeff Chu, and Marcus Bleasdale, the talented photographer who captured iconic images of Rwandan life for the article. The one small detail that has played over and over in my head since reading the article is a short phrase that Jeff Chu saw painted onto the back of a truck. “Happiness is forward.”

Despite the vast separation, geographically and historically, between Rwanda and the U.S. there are universal themes that bind us together. I imagine that in 1994, hope was a scarcity in Rwanda. After the genocide, many Rwandan must have doubted that their country would ever heal, forgive, and flourish. And somehow they were able to keep moving forward. Our nation’s hope has waned considerably in the last 18 months, and though for different reasons, that sense of hopelessness and helplessness is the same. After all, the loss of hope is the same for everyone who experiences it, regardless of the cause. 

Rwanda’s story is a poignant one of resilience and strength. Their ability to move forward and not only hope for better days but work hard for them, day in and day out, is remarkable. We have much to learn from them that is particularly relevant given our country’s current crisis. We must all believe, remember, and recite to ourselves and to one another “Happiness is forward.” This sentiment in Rwanda is moving from an ideal to reality. 

The photo above was taken by Marcus Bleasdale for Fast Company. 
books, entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship

My Year of Hopefulness – The Blue Sweater

Christa Avampato

Inspiration is one of the main reasons I read. To my delight, Jacqueline Novogratz, the CEO of Acumen Fund, a nonprofit venture capital fund dedicated to eradicating poverty through strategic entrepreneurial investments in the developing world, wrote a book from her heart that is uplifting for anyone who ever had a dream and went after it. The Blue Sweater is a story of encouragement, faith, and determination for people who want to live a purposeful, fulfilling life. In other words, this book is for everyone. And you must read it. 


Jacqueline takes us on a journey from her life as a young college graduate working for Chase Manhattan into Africa where she worked in microfinance back to the US where she attended Stanford Business School and then through her career post-MBA up through her founding of Acumen Fund. Articulate, powerful, and deeply moving, Jacqueline’s prose are so fluid it’s as if a friend sat me down to tell me her life story. Every page took me further and further down the road of adventure. I couldn’t put it down and read it from beginning to end in one weekend. 

With a vivid writing style, Jacqueline introduces each character so clearly that you feel they’re in the room with you and you feel compelled to help them in the way that you’d help a friend or family member. I wanted so much to see each character succeed. As their pride welled, so did mine. As they smiled and grew more confident, so did I. And when things didn’t go well for the characters, I felt their heartbreak, too. I wanted them to keep going and I wanted to go with them. 

Perhaps the most incredible feature of the book is Jacqueline’s humility and her ability to try and try again she made some positive progress in everything she ever attempted. Too often we are reading the stories of people and companies who are too afraid to admit mistakes or failure, who don’t want to take risks or step out of their comfort zones. It was refreshing to hear the twists and turns that Jacqueline’s career in social enterprise has taken. She owns every success and every failure with grace and dignity. And the many entrepreneurs she has helped throughout her career are all better off for her tenacity and ambition.  

Warning: there is a high probability that this book will motivate you to make a difference today. Be ready.   
art, career, entrepreneurship, social entrepreneurship, Spring

My Year of Hopefulness – Spring arrives

Christa Avampato

Spring arrived yesterday with a last little flurry of snow. I was just finishing up my Friday morning shift at God’s Love We Deliver when I looked out the window to see flakes swirling in a mad rush to wave one last good-bye to the long, cold winter. And it was Winter’s nod to us to remind us that “I’ll be back”. I laughed as I thought about that dialogue between Spring and Winter. Nature’s changing of the guard. 


By all accounts I am a Winter person. I love my sweaters, jeans, and boots. Walking in the park or down 5th Avenue when it’s snowing is one of my favorite activities. Usually Winter reminds me of rest and healing, a time of contemplation, reflection, and preparation. Not this year. I have wanted Winter to end from the day it started. These past few months I’ve been praying for the end of the cold like never before. 

This morning as I stepped outside I felt a little lighter (though still cold thanks to the 32 degree temperature). There definitely was a shift in the air from Friday morning. I imagined the ice that’s surrounded us for 4 months cracking and shattering under the gentle gaze of the warm sunlight. The very tiny seeds that we planted last fall are beginning to inch upward, reaching for their stage. It’s almost their time. 

Now nearly three months into my writing, researching, and reading daily about hope, I’m ready to do something with all of these ideas I’ve been considering and shaping about my career and my life. It was a far longer process than I thought it would be. My very simple idea to do something in the social entrepreneurship space has been whittled down to something that looks more like a recognizable figure, though not yet fully formed. I consider how every sculptor starts with a mound of clay, slab of marble, or block of ice, knowing that with patience, passion, and hard work a masterpiece will emerge, eventually. 

In one of my college art history classes, I remember reading something about Donatello’s agonizing work style. There are accounts of him in his studio hammering away at the marble to create his next statue and screaming at it “speak, damn you, speak!” Though I’m not really at that level, I understand that desire to work away on the block so that the fully formed piece will step into the light and show itself. 

I think about that image, that metaphor of a sculptor, as I walk in the park, write, and adjust my idea for starting a social enterprise. In the light of Spring it seems to be taking shape more clearly. With every conversation and experience, every book, blog, magazine, and newspaper article I read and write, I get a tiny bit of information of how to shape my idea. And as I gather up all those tiny bits, I begin to see a vision that’s clearer and more reflective of who I am and who I’d like to be.  

comedy, entertainment, humor, writer, writing

My Year of Hopefulness – Empty Your Pockets

Christa Avampato

Last night I was flipping through the channels and landed on PBS which was airing a biography of Carol Burnett – one of my all-time favorite entertainers. I have fond memories of watching the show with my family, and my mother would laugh so hard she could barely breathe. I never knew much about her childhood before this biography. Her story of endurance and love and what her family termed her “pipe dream” is inspiring. 

After Carol Burnett’s biography, PBS aired a shorter biography of Erma Bombeck, one of my mom’s favorite authors. I would read her column in my mom’s magazine’s as a kid and found her so funny, engaging, and honest. I wanted to write that way. The biography ended with Erma’s untimely death from kidney disease and they captured how she viewed life with one of her most famous pieces:

I always had a dream that when I am asked to give an accounting of my life to a high court, it will be like this:  ‘So, empty your pockets. What have you got left of your life?  Any dreams that were unfilled?  Any unused talent that we gave you when you were born that you still have left?  Any unsaid compliments or bits of love that you haven’t spread around?’

And I will answer, “I have nothing to return.  I spent everything you gave me.  I’m as naked as the day I was born.”

Isn’t that how all of us should answer? Why return any bit of energy, any dream or wish or hope? We don’t ever get it back. Once we make our graceful exit to the other side, anything we hoped to start, try, or finish will have to fall to someone else. That’s no way to go out, and frankly it’s not fair to the rest of us for you to be selfish and keep you dreams and talents to yourself. This world needs you; it needs all of us and everything we’ve got. 

care, nature, nurture

My Year of Hopefulness – Peace Lily

Christa Avampato

I’ve killed every plant I’ve ever tried to care for. Even a cactus. I overwater and pay too much attention to them. They actually make me nervous. I obsessively nurture them to the point of killing them. It’s odd really – plants make their own food. They really don’t need me and as I force myself on them, I see them wilt before my eyes. Caring for plants brings out all my insecurities.  


I thought my peace lily, one of the three plants on Earth that my local florist tells me I cannot possibly kill, had kicked the bucket. It was looking sad and pathetic. Limp, yellowing, and with one foot in the chlorophyll grave. I was about to throw it out and decided to give it just a bit more water to see if I could revive it. And I sang to it. Seriously, I belted out a few songs because I heard a long time ago that plants respond to music. Why not give it a shot?

By some miracle, I was able to revive the peace lily and now it is thriving. I only water the plant when the soil is dry. No fertilizer. No special treatment, aside from the singing. I do sing to it every day. And it’s working. This plant taught me that it might not be the amount of care that you pay to something, but the kind of care. Give everything only what it needs.