action, adventure, change, courage, creativity

This just in: Be grateful for the difficult parts of life

Christa Avampato
Miracles start as difficulties
Miracles start as difficulties

Miracles start as difficulties. If everything in your life was great, you’d never change. You’d never evolve and grow. You’d never have adventures that lead you to become the best version of yourself.

Adversity is difficult and painful. It’s also what helps us find and fulfill our potential. I wish life were easier. I wish we could just evolve without being pushed to do so. But that’s not how life works. It’s not how we work as wonderfully complex and complicated human beings.

Next time life is throwing you challenges, and in my experience that happens every day!, take a deep breath and gives thanks for them. They are leading you along the path that’s meant for you. Choose to rise up, over, through, and beyond them. Choose to let them make you strong, courageous, and wise. Choose to learn from them and not be broken down by them. They’re there for a reason, and in time that reason will come to light.

career, experience, job

This just in: If resumes and experience were leading factors, Barack Obama would have never been President

Christa Avampato
Barack Obama
Barack Obama

I firmly believe that curious, passionate, and determined people can learn anything to do any job. Character is much more important than resume bullets. This idea is rare in the job search and hiring processes, and I think that’s a shame.

A friend of mine who is abundantly talented told me the other day that she was worried that she wasn’t qualified for jobs that really interested her. To bolster her confidence, I said this: if corporate recruiters were in charge of placing the next President the same way that they place people in other jobs, Barack Obama would have never made it onto the short list much less gotten the job. In 2008, if we compared his resume and experience side-by-side with Hilary Clinton and John McCain, he wouldn’t have made it through the phone screen with HR. He made it to the highest office on grit, passion, intellect, and charisma. He rose by lifting all of us and inspiring us during a dark and frightening time. He was a junior senator who hadn’t even served a full term in the U.S. Senate, and that was his first federal office. He made it on character, not by his resume.

Politics aside, if Barack Obama can get into office and figure out how to do the job of President of the United State of America in the midst of the worst recession in our history (to name just one of his many incredible challenges), we can figure out how to do any job. Stop second-guessing your talents and abilities. Don’t take yourself out of the running by not applying to jobs that really interest you. Throw your hat in the ring, explain your passion and commitment to getting the job done, and go for it! It worked for Barack Obama during the highest of stakes. It can work for us, too.

action, communication, community, community service

This just in: Congressman Elijah Cummings protests for peace

Christa Avampato
Congressman Elijah Cummings in Baltimore shaking a State Trooper's hand after the riots
Congressman Elijah Cummings in Baltimore shaking a State Trooper’s hand after the riots

On the day of Freddie Gray’s funeral, Congressman Elijah Cummings led thousands of people in peaceful protests. These peaceful protesters are the people who are generating change by being the change. They’re cleaning up neighborhoods. They’re creating bridges where there are serious gaps. Their strength and courage inspires me. Love drives out hate. Light drives out darkness.

Violence and sensationalism is what sells, but it’s not what generates progress. Elijah Cummings and all the people who joined him are the hope and light of Baltimore. In time, they are the ones who will close the divides in their community. They’re already doing it. They’re the ones who need our support. We need to band together for our own good and the good of our neighbors.

change, time

This just in: All walls can become doors

Christa Avampato
Turn a wall into a door
Turn a wall into a door

In time, we can transform all walls into doors.

This afternoon I got a number of those signs right in a row that reminded me of this idea: several new lucrative writing gigs, positive feedback from my boss at my new job, and confirmation that my decision to let go of my consulting business was absolutely the best choice. Phin is well and happy. I got several happy messages from friends who shared great news after facing tough circumstances.

Walking around on this sunny afternoon I fully appreciated that I live in an amazing neighborhood in an equally amazing city that has so much in store for me. I took a deep breath and smiled. The Universe works in mysterious ways, often from behind the curtain and out of our immediate view. We don’t always understand what’s happening in the moment or why. When we look back, things do make sense if we just have the faith to hang in there through the difficulties.

I’m ready to walk through the door into the next chapter.

creativity, fear, freedom

This just in: Regrets, fear, and aging

Christa Avampato
Go through the door of your fears
Go through the door of your fears

“You only age when your regrets outnumber your fears.” ~John Barrymore

When we talk about aging in our society, and how to fend off its physical effects, the discussion often turns to diet, exercise, healthcare, and beauty products. I’ve found the best way to lessen the impacts of aging has nothing to do with anything physical. It’s about choices. Are we making the decisions that make us happy and help us feel fulfilled? Are we having fun, enjoying our time, and doing what we love? Our choices have just as much impact on our physical, mental, and emotional wellbeing as anything else. So let’s make the choice to leap through fear and go after the lives we really want.

Washington

This just in: What Bob Schieffer taught me about living in D.C.

Christa Avampato
Thank you, Bob Schieffer
Thank you, Bob Schieffer

“The White House Correspondents Dinner is over around midnight. Very late for a town that goes to bed at 9.” ~ Bob Schieffer, Face the Nation

New York City is a town for people who don’t sleep. We go to bed late and get up early with an IV of coffee in between. It’s packed year-round with people 24/7. The beat of the city is matched by the beats of New Yorkers’ hearts and our rapid-fire footsteps. It’s been that way as long as anyone can remember.

Many times I’ve caught myself walking in D.C. at night and noticed that the sidewalks were mostly empty. For a New Yorker, this can be a bit unnerving on many levels. I know great things are happening in every corner of this city and those actions and decisions impact the entire world. So where are all the people in D.C. after the sun goes down?

This has been an adjustment, and one I couldn’t understand until this weekend when Bob Schieffer uttered the magic words above on Face the Nation. Unlike New York City, D.C. is not a 24/7 town. At night, especially during the week, people pack it in. They retreat to their private corners to reflect, regroup, and fight another day tomorrow. For all its focus on achievement and a desire to make a difference, D.C.’s rhythm isn’t a million miles per hour every hour of every day. Washingtonians work very hard, and then they go to sleep. For me, this is a novel concept and one I’m looking forward to trying.

After two months, I’m slowly beginning to figure out what makes this city tick. Thanks, Bob Schieffer, for pointing me in the right direction. I think I can take it from here, but if I have more questions, I’m calling you. Who knows this place better than someone who’s faced this nation through this city’s lens every week for a quarter century?

creative, creative process, creativity, fear, feelings, work

This just in: Don’t unpack your bags – a lesson from Saturday Night Live

Christa Avampato
Saturday Night Live - 1980s
Saturday Night Live – 1980s

Yesterday I watched a documentary about Saturday Night Live in the 1980s. The show struggled so much after its first five golden years. It lost a lot of its people, its mission, and its way. And it wasn’t a matter of finding it again. A very small group of people, some original and some new, scrapped the entire format and started over from scratch. Brave, and frightening. Just like life.

Many of the cast members—Billy Crystal, Kevin Nealon, Dana Carvey, Julia Louis-Dreyfus—talked about not unpacking their bags. They all had month-to-month leases and were never really sure if they’d made it. Even when things were going very well, they were always on edge. In so many of those old sketches and outtakes, I could see the nerves, spontaneity, and spark.

It got me thinking that as much as we are creatures of comfort, habit, and routine, maybe we do our best work when we don’t have any of those things. Maybe those nerves that keep us on our edge give us our edge. We shouldn’t be looking for comfort at all. What we need to do our best, most creative work is a manageable dose of anxiety and fear. Our magic is not is doing the work we know we can do, but in biting of more than we can chew, in taking on precisely the projects that are beyond our reach. We should go where we think we’ll fail. We rise when we have something to shoot for that seems impossible.

community, community service, food, health, volunteer, Washington

This just in: I’m a new volunteer at Food & Friends

Christa Avampato
Food & Friends
Food & Friends

Today I went to new volunteer orientation today at Food & Friends​, a local D.C. nonprofit that prepares and delivers healthy meals, groceries, and nutrition counseling to people in D.C., Maryland, and Virginia who have life threatening illnesses. 10,000 volunteers help make their work possible and I’m very excited to join them. I’ll be cooking, delivering meals, and helping at special events.

If you’re looking for a great volunteer opportunity, they always need extra hands and hearts. Individuals, groups, and people of all ages (including kids) can be a part of their work on a very flexible schedule. I love this quote from one of the people who has received meals from them: “This isn’t just about food. It’s about life.”

I hope you’ll join me!

books, child, childhood, children, education

This just in: An education is for the good of the many, and the one

Christa Avampato
Goal: a high-quality education for every child everywhere

I recently read a quote that books (and thereby, learning and education) can’t solve everything. They don’t fill an empty belly, stop violence, or provide much-needed healthcare. And I beg to differ. I’ve felt hungry, afraid in an unstable environment, and sick without healthcare. Books helped me, and continue to help me, take the long view. They help me to believe in a better, brighter tomorrow, and they empower me to build that tomorrow with my own two hands, and my mind, and my heart. Books make me powerful.

In my saddest and darkest hours, my education literally saved me. It helped me to keep looking up, and to keep trying, when it seemed like all of my efforts were in vain. No, maintaining our grit and determination in the face of adversity isn’t easy, and yes, it’s tempting to take a shortcut and go off the tracks and give up. But if we will go just one more day, no matter how difficult or embarrassing or discouraging, the light at the end of the tunnel is there and it is ours as much as it is anyone else’s. It was there for me, and it’s there for every child who can find a way to keep going.

We have within our power, in one generation, to make that happen for every child, everywhere. It will be expensive, though not nearly as expensive as not doing it. Think of how we could change the world if we could educate every child.An education is for the good of the many, and the one. That’s not just an idea, that’s a revolution. That’s a movement.

creativity, happiness

This just in: The joy of continuous improvement

Christa Avampato
Joy
Joy

“Continuous improvement is better than delayed perfection.” ~Mark Twain

Perfection is a shiny object in the distance that’s rarely, if ever, achievable. I chased perfect for most of my life, and eventually its dance wore me out. I gave up on perfect, and have never looked back. Rather than racing around after it, I’ve learned to sit still and breathe. I learned to realize that what I have, right now, is perfect for this moment. I have everything I need right now to be healthy, happy, and whole. Nature’s not perfect so why do we expect to be?

These days I put my effort into steadily improving myself from the inside out rather than trying to be perfect. Every day, I try to be better than I was the day before. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t. And that’s okay.

Life is messy and complicated. It’s full of magic and heartbreak. That’s just its nature. Things get torn down to make room for something new. Over and over again. And we don’t always know why. I’ve found that the real joy is in the bouncing back from hard times and the gratitude we feel and show for the good times. Nothing’s permanent, so let’s enjoy what we’ve got right now.