I sat behind a boy on the train as we rolled by empty lots between Newark airport and New York City that are littered with trash, surrounded by graffiti laden buildings, and completely devoid of life.
“They could build an arena here. Make it better,” he said to his father.
Kids see potential in a way that most adults don’t. They see possibility, hope, and the opportunity for reclamation. They remind me that despair is something we create, something we’re taught, not something that we innately know. We are programmed for wonder, to seize opportunity. The trick is to hang on to that even as the world attempts to change us. If we can stay focused on what’s possible rather than what is, we can create what we seek.
When I joined American Express in the summer of 2008, my first project was to develop a photo gift card that would give customers the opportunity to put a personal photo on a gift card. On Thursday, that product was featured on The Ellen Show with the original template design I worked on. My VP at the time said I had a $200K budget and 7 weeks to launch the product from start to finish or I’d be out of a job. He also said he and my director had no time to help me. This happened the same day Lehman Brothers failed, the bottom fell out of the economy, and the company embarked on its first major round of layoffs as the stock price fell to a record low of $9 / share. Panic was everywhere, and for good reason. I put my fear aside and got to work because I needed that job. The project launched on time and under budget, and the product is still going strong today despite intense criticism from many of my then co-workers.
Some day I’ll write about everything I learned during those dark days of our economy. Here’s the biggest lesson: in every circumstance, we have to rise above fear and criticism to do our best work. We have to look way out onto the fringes and trust our creative gut to pull the trigger, even and especially during difficult times. In the short run, this is a tough path though eventually history rewards us with the knowledge that our intuition is one of our most powerful and valuable possessions. It will always guide us in the right direction if we allow it to have its say.
Do you feel like you’re making a mess by following your heart? That happens. Every day, I have to sift my way through a to-do list that’s always too long and never done, competing sets of priorities, different opportunities that fly across my eyes and get lodged in my mind. Last night I got to 8:00pm after working since 6:00am and I left like the spaghetti that was coiled around my dinner fork as I sat at my computer, still playing catch-up. I had to laugh at myself. Why did my desk seem to get more cluttered, not less, as the day went on?
I sat in the middle of my mess – on my desk and in my mind – and tried to see the beauty. It was there. It always is. Inspirations on scraps of papers in separate piles, contacts scribbled on my whiteboard, reference material tacked on my cork boards, an endless slate of tabs open in my internet browser.
I grabbed Phin’s leash and we took a spin around the chilly block in the dark. Winter’s settling in again and I’m looking forward to it. I always do. A time for hunkering down. The darkness outside always reminds me of the light within. It lets me be alone in my thoughts. It gives me time to play in my favorite place, my imagination. It also hides just enough of the messy work of creativity so that I can’t really be bothered by my ability to only see the very next step and not the whole staircase of my path.
In the dark, I plod on one foot in front of the other, one day at a time. Inch by inch. I build whatever it is I’m building brick by brick, without a set blueprint nor timeline. The thing with creative work is that you can set the stage but you can’t force the action. It comes in bits and pieces and you have to grab them as they arrive. I always find walking helps them rise to the top. We actively move them out of our minds and into being.
I got back home with Phin. He headed for his warm bed. I went back to my desk. The mess was still there – after all I am by choice flying solo with this work so no one else is going to do this for me – but now I could see the order appearing. On its own terms, though getting clearer all the time.
A few weeks ago, I watched an interview with Bryan Cranston of Breaking Bad fame. When he first started out, he met a lot of people who said they were giving their creative dream a shot for a year. If they didn’t have any success in a year, then they would pack up and go home. “That was amazing to me,” he said. “It takes so much longer than a year to realize a dream.”
This is exactly the reason I’m working on a new book, Your Second Step. You’ve taken your first step – you’ve identified your dream and you’ve started working on it – maybe part-time, maybe full-time. Maybe you haven’t seen the success you’d hoped for in the timeline you planned. So should you pack it in? Should you start to work on something else and come back to it later? In other words, should you hedge your bets?
Put aside any disappointment. Go back to the dream itself. Does it still matter to you? If the answer is yes, then don’t hedge and don’t give up. Commit. Double down. Invest more time and more energy, not less. Be Yoda. Don’t try. Do. And keep doing. Don’t back down now. You’re closer to your dream than you think.
“I know you’re busy but can I ask for your advice on….”
I get a lot of inquiries from friends and readers that start this way. They ask if they can ask me for advice about their project. My answer, always: YES, a thousand times yes. I want to help you and promote you and hear your ideas. A business idea, a product idea, a blog idea, a social media project. I am busy; everyone is. I make time to support others. It matters that much.
I do these 5 things every day without fail:
1.) I brush my teeth 2.) I walk Phin 3.) I eat breakfast 4.) I meditate 5.) I write
If we are to make a-go of our art, any art, it has to be as important as anything else we do every day. When I think of all the artists I admire, each one goes after it full-time with their full hearts. Once I saw that glaring similarity between them, I realized I had to do the same thing. I had to give myself as shot at being a full-time writer by choosing to write full-time. There was nothing else to do but that. Eventually we must decide – is this who we are or is this a hobby? Either answer is completely fine. I knew what I wanted mine to be, so I went for it.
I lived in artistic limbo for a long time. I made a lot of excuses. Now, it was time to commit, one way or the other. I’d been a writer on the side for 6 years, diligently plugging away every day, doing everything possible to improve the skills I had and build the new skills I needed. That incubation period was vital; it paved the way to today.
I still work on my skills every day. I hope I wake up every morning a better writer than I was the day before. That’s my only professional goal, and I’ll keep right on working for that as long as I have words.
Sometimes, we lose our footing on our path because we doubt our gut. We make a choice that at the time seems like the sensible, acceptable way to go. Then we get down the road and realize this was the wrong choice. Our gut was right. We should have followed our instincts. Doubling back seems difficult, if not impossible, so we just keep going in the wrong direction, hoping that we can somehow turn it into the right direction or be happy with it as is even if it’s not what we want. This is the sad definition of settling, but it’s not the only definition. We can choose to settle for what we want.
When I worked with my therapist, Brian, we spent a lot of time on this concept. For much of my life I had settled, but I didn’t realize that at the time. I had gotten so used to settling that it felt like what I wanted. Certainly I pushed myself very hard and I had incredibly high expectations of myself and others (I still do), but there was a part of me that was very concerned with the appearance of success and the guilt of not taking an opportunity that many others would love to have, even if it was one I didn’t want. “I should be happy with this,” I would say. “Many other people would be so I should be, too.”
Brian helped me break that awful habit. We are here on our own paths. We know what we want, what brings us joy, more than anyone else does. And that includes your best friends, your partner, your parents, even your strongest and most inspiring mentors. They don’t know what you want. They only know what will help them not worry about you. And that’s a lovely wonderful thing, but it is no way to live a life. Thank them for the advice and do what you know to be the right thing for you right now. Ask for their support, but don’t live by their rules.
You have to decide how to spend your time. You have to choose how to build your life. It’s one of the best things about being an adult – getting to carve and live your own masterpiece. Let people share in that, but don’t let anyone dictate it to you. Don’t be afraid to give yourself everything you’ve ever wanted in life.
In yoga, the concept of a life path is known as dharma. It’s our direction, our anchor, our reason for being and doing.
Here are a few things I know about dharma: 1.) You are the only person who knows what it is 2.) More often than not, it chooses you. Either you follow it or fight it, but that choice is up to you. 3.) It never fails you in the long-run, but in the short-run it can be bumpy, difficult, and uncomfortable. The good news is that you learn to love the discomfort because you know that finding your dharma is worth the ride. 4.) If you don’t follow your path, you feel a lack of fulfillment and purpose that is tough to find any other way. 5.) The way is always open, though the path is not always immediately apparent.
Here’s how these 5 principles came alive for me:
Theater, culture, and writing I left professional theater a number of years ago because the path that I was on in the industry wasn’t my path. I was working on the business side even though my path is to be a writer. I have known this for a long time, for many years. It took a long time for me to get the courage to follow the writer’s path. It also took me a long time to learn the craft well enough to trust myself to earn a living from it. And now I’ve written my first play about specific societal issues that are near and dear to my heart and am beginning to submit it to different theater companies for their consideration. My love for theater and culture finally merged with my path of being a writer. I’m also writing a book and writing for a number of publications and organizations rooted in good causes. I spend my day crafting words about things that matter to me, my very favorite activity.
Business and writing
Some people thought I was crazy to leave my job in the business side of theater without knowing what I wanted to do next. Some thought I was crazy when I left my comfy corporate job many years later to pursue a creative path that was not yet clear to me. I knew I wasn’t crazy; I knew I wanted to be happy and I had to take a new road to find out what makes me happy.
Technology and writing
My business experience in several different industries, including technology, has been an enormous asset to so many areas of my life, and I know it will continue to be. I love business and technology, and I especially love to explore the way in which they push cultural change. To be happy, I had to bring the pieces of my life together in a creative way – that was the path. It took a long time to learn that, and when I finally understood that I found that the way was open. I had to choose it, but it was there waiting for me.
Some people think of Spring as a time of renewal. For me, my renewal happens in October. When this pumpkin-, apple-, and chilly weather-filled month rolls around, I breathe a little more fully, dream a little more freely, reflect a little more gratefully. Here’s to October, and all that magic it brings.
A pic I snapped during one of the tech session at Advertising Week
Day 3 at Advertising Week blew my mind. Literally. Technology is taking us right to the brink, in a good way. The brink is where you want to be. The brink is where we push the boundaries of possible, where our wildest dreams become the realities that we seamlessly integrate into our daily lives. The brink is where it’s at. It’s where I want to spend all of my time.
In one particular session, I began to see my future come together, how all the pieces of experience I’ve collected throughout my life gel. I may have even heard a “schumpf” as the picture of my future as a writer in the fields of technology, culture, and business became so much clearer. The steps to the end game aren’t all laid out in a perfect sequence. There are holes that I don’t quite know how to navigate, but I do know where I’m going and why. And I do know the very next step I need to take. That’s enough to keep going.
I also know this: I needed every job I’ve had, every person I’ve ever met, and every place I’ve traveled to make sense of it all. Some were delightful and some were awful. They were all necessary. It is a satisfying thing to look back on our days and see the logic in the madness, the order in the chaos. It makes the day-to-day so much more manageable.
Christa Avampato 