decision-making, Second Step

Beautiful: To Find Our Purpose, We Have to Live the Questions

Christa Avampato

“And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.” – Rilke

Questions without clear answers can paralyze us. I’ve wrestled cloudy questions to the ground many times over in an attempt to get answers I thought I needed before I could make a move. I gave up that practice 15 months ago when I left my corporate job to carve a new path of my own design. Now, I have to live the questions, answers or not.

How I made my home in New York City
I didn’t know if I should act on my idea to leave New York behind and move to California so I tried out California for 2 months without giving up my place in New York. I couldn’t just toss the question around in my mind and wait for an answer. I had to try California, I had to live the question, to find my answer. And the answer was New York.

How I started my own company
I didn’t know if I could make a living independent of a company that someone else designed. Like the California question, I kicked the tires on entrepreneurship as long as I could. To find out if it suits me, I needed to give it a go, live it. I’m still trying it; still living it. The answer is becoming clearer, but I’ve got some room to go yet. That’s how I started Chasing Down the Muse.

How I decided to follow my dream of being a writer
I don’t know if I can make a living as a writer. I’ve made part of my living as a writer for a while, but I don’t know if I can fully support myself with my tightly honed abilities to turn a phrase and meet a tight deadline. That question isn’t going to answer itself. There’s no way to know until I try. So I’m rolling the dice, taking a seat at the table, and living that question every day. The cloud cover will eventually break and I’ll have my answer. All I can do now is play it as it lies. Read about my writing by clicking here.

What questions are you living?

education, film, teaching, television

Beautiful: Finally a Reality Show that Celebrates Real Heroes – Teachers

Christa Avampato

_MG_0785bOn Friday night, I caught the airing of Teach, the new documentary by Davis Guggenheim. It gave me chills, in a very good way. As someone who was saved, literally, by my education, I know that it is a gift that can turn a life around, that can take someone in an entirely new direction beyond their wildest dreams.

Bravo to CBS for putting such an incredible piece of filmmaking on prime time TV. Kate O’Hare of Zap2it.com did a wonderful write up of the show:

“The actions of teachers unions – whether protecting bad teachers, protesting against politicians (or marching for them), and promoting education “reforms” that often seem more about social issues than the three Rs — often capture the interest of the media, overshadowing the day-to-day work of teachers trying to do the best job they can.

In 2010, filmmaker Davis Guggenheim directed and co-wrote“Waiting for Superman,” a documentary that took a frank look at the failures of the American educational system as it showed parents trying to get their children in charter schools.

Much of the media attention for the film focused on a segment that showed how teachers unions fiercely protect political alliances and policies and teachers’ job security, often at the expense of needed financial overhauls.

In a two-hour special called “Teach,”airing Friday, Sept. 6, on CBS, Guggenheim puts the focus back on exceptional teachers, following four public-school instructors through the 2012-2013 school year.

The special also kicks off an 18-month campaign by production company Participant Media, in partnership with Teach.org, to urge students and recent graduates to go into teaching.

“I believe teachers are heroes and have the ability to make an incredible impact in the long-term future of our kids,” says Guggenheim in a statement. “The airing of ‘Teach’ on CBS is another milestone in Participant’s long-term commitment to raise the visibility of the teaching profession and support efforts to recruit the next generation of great educators.”

•The teachers profiled are: Matt Johnson, a fourth-grade teacher at McGlone Elementary School in Denver; Shelby Harris, who teaches seventh- and eighth-grade math at Kuna Middle School in Kuna, Idaho; 10th-grade AP world-history teacher Joel Laguna at Garfield High in Los Angeles; and Lindsay Chinn, a ninth-grade algebra teacher at MLK Early College, Denver.

•All the educators featured strive for excellence, using conventional and unconventional methods.
Follow Zap2it on Twitter and Zap2it on Facebook for the latest news and buzz”
creativity, friendship, technology

Beautiful: Gone Exploring…

Christa Avampato

3d98c6f1b73dc380bc780cd74bbbf7ae I’m off to DC this weekend to celebrate the upcoming wedding of one of my dearest friends with a bridal shower and bachelorette party. It will be nice to get away from my screens and spend the vast majority of my time connecting in real-time in real-life. I hope this weekend holds the same for all of you. Get out there and enjoy some fresh air. Fall is almost here.

love, music

Beautiful: Love for Everybody

Christa Avampato

My niece, Aubree, has her own jam. Every day on the way to school, she asks my sister, Weez, to turn on the song “Everybody” by Ingrid Michaelson. Aubree’s only 3 and she already knows the secret to a happy life:

“Everybody, everybody wants to love. Everybody, everybody wants to be loved…Everybody heals with love. Just let the love, love, love begin.” And she also really likes the “oh, oh, oh…oh, oh, oh” part. Happy Friday – here’s to love!

courage, experience, gratitude, story, strengths

Beautiful: I’m Glad I Lost Everything – 4 Years After My Apartment Building Fire

Christa Avampato
Use the fire of your living

“What matters most is how you walk through the fire.” – Charles Bukowski

4 years ago today, my apartment building caught fire and I lost almost everything I owned. I got out of the building just in time. A few moments later and I might not be here writing this post to you today. On that day if someone told me I’d be grateful for that fire, I probably would have punched them in the nose. Now I know better.

I’m more grateful than ever for that experience. Through that healing process, I found out what I’m made of, and I found out what so many other people are made of, too. I emerged from the other side of that grief a far better person than I was before. It was difficult, and many times it was awful and painful. A big part of me wanted to give up on remaking my life. A small part of me refused to give in. I listened to that small voice. I fed it, and eventually it grew loud enough to drown out the doubt. And if knowledge is power then I’m more powerful now than I ever dreamed I could be.

It doesn’t matter what challenges we face. What matters is how bravely we face them. It doesn’t matter how much nor how little we have, but how much we do with anything we have.

action, decision-making, friendship, time

Beautiful: Wait or Act? How to Decide.

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“I like things to happen. And if they don’t happen, I like to make them happen.” – Winston Churchill

The most striking outcome of my time in California is my decreased tolerance for waiting unnecessarily. Some times, we need patience. We need to take a beat, a breath, a moment. A gathering storm needs to pass. We need to deal with a new emergency. But patience can be used like a crutch. We wait because it seems less scary than action. 

So how can we tell if it’s time to wait or time to act? Remove ourselves from the decision. Imagine that a friend is asking for your advice on the exact situation you’re in. This friend is strong, capable, ambitious, and talented. She will succeed or learn trying. Should she act? Should she wait? That’s your answer. 

Almost always I find my answer is to act. Try this experiment. Let me know how it goes. 

adventure, animals, creativity, dogs, travel

Beautiful: Roll The Dice of Life Like a Dog

Christa Avampato

When I get out Phineas’s travel carrier, he never knows where we’re going. Sometimes, we get on a plane. Sometimes, we head for a car or the subway. We’ll go over to Brooklyn and visit two of our favorite friends, Amanda and Jordan. Sometimes, we’re going to the vet.

No matter. Without fail, Phin enthusiastically jumps around at the site of his carrier because he knows we’re going somewhere to do something out of the ordinary. He doesn’t need to know where he’s going; he’s just prepared to enjoy the ride. We, and by we I mean me, should live more like Phin.

Thanks to my friend, Alex, for this beautiful photo – and the reminder to enjoy every adventure.

holiday, vacation

Beautiful: Happy Labor Day, Sans Labor

Christa Avampato

“Every person needs to take one day away. A day in which one consciously separates the past from the future. A day in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for.” ~ Maya Angelou, Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now

I hope today is this kind of day away for all of you. It is for me. Happy Labor Day, sans labor.

From Pinterest
career, learning, time

Beautiful: Jack of All Trades, Master of One

Christa Avampato
From Pinterest

“Be a jack of all trades, master of one. Be a specialist and a generalist.” ~ Calvin Soh, SXSW V2V

This piece of insight from SXSW V2V may have been the most helpful in terms of my own personal career. For a long time I’ve wrestled with a way to reconcile my vast number of interests with the desire to choose an expertise. During the recession and in its aftermath, I’ve seen specialists struggle to make ends meet. Personally, I’ve felt the stress of being pulled in many different directions by my passions and eagerness to learn new skills and information. Calvin helped me see that both are possible in the world that we live in. Being a generalist and a specialist isn’t weird; it’s necessary.

The secret is self-control and self-monitoring. The key question I have to ask when tackling something new is: how much knowledge do I need to connect the dots and make this new information useful? My former boss Bob G. used to say, “I want to know enough to be dangerous.” In other words, know enough to be articulate and ask the best questions of the experts. I don’t need a PhD in every subject that interests me. I just need to go as far as the fun of learning takes me. That is enough.

choices, creativity, decision-making, journey, time

Beautiful: Give Life to Your Madness

Christa Avampato

80a9859ef75df428fb6ac4cff03310d8Wrapping up a week in madness, I’ve reflected a lot on the ideas of creativity, transformation, and acceptance. Remaking ourselves and our lives takes courage. Some people may not understand what you’re doing or why or how. They might put us down in every way possible, and we might start to do the same to our own mad dreams. Don’t take your cue from them. Their words and actions, as much as they may hurt, have nothing to do with you. It is just an expression of them wrestling with their own demons and lost dreams that they didn’t follow. And the reasons for their choices don’t matter. They chose. Now you choose: Go down that road even though you know how it ends, and it doesn’t end well, or go in a new direction.

New directions can be frightening. We are leaving behind our history, our patterns, our expectations, and the impressions of others. Of course it’s mad to chart a new course. The old worn one is so much easier to travel. Be mad. I know it sounds so easy to say “let go”. No one tells us how painful that process can be. There’s a grieving, a mourning period. But on the other side of that grief, is light.

And here’s something else no one tells us: once we strike out on a new road, we don’t travel alone. Up ahead, just around the bend, there is someone new waiting, lots of someones waiting. They took off before we did in the same pursuit of something new and exciting, something that they feel passionately about. They are our new examples of how to be. We are both teacher and student, always. We learn and then we turn around and teach others through our example. That’s how it’s always been.

Yes, we’re here to take life by the horns, madness included, but we’re also here to give even more back. We’re here to be generous with our experience so that others may be encouraged and inspired to invest in their own mad dreams. That’s progress.