decision-making, determination, future

Step 148: Ignorance as Gift

Christa Avampato

About 3 years ago I moved back to New York City after business school, no job, no place to live, and barely enough money to get by. I had the gift of a very large blind spot that prevented me from seeing that about 6 months later the economy would unravel into the great recession. Ignorance was not only bliss, but almost single-handedly responsible for making my current life possible.

Yesterday, I made my way to Laguardia airport for a much-needed vacation, by way of Astoria, Queens, my landing spot 3 years ago. My friend, Anne, needed a subletter just as I was graduating and I needed a cheap place in a good neighborhood. The Neptune Diner is right down the street from Anne’s and a favorite local spot in Astoria, owned by a Greek family that has been cooking up homemade meals for decades. They make an out-of-this world delicious, cheap lemonata chicken and it made for a fitting meal yesterday to celebrate how far I’ve come in 3 years.

I took a seat at the bar, ordered the chicken, and took a look around, drinking in my ridiculously good fortune. My mom and I came to Neptune when we moved my few arms-full of belongings into Anne’s. My mom was so proud of me, despite my lack of job, money, and a place to call my own. I was scared to death but I didn’t tell her. Despite my many wonderful friends and supportive family, I felt very much alone 3 years ago. I knew in my gut I belonged in New York again; I just didn’t know why. So I trusted myself and kept following my instincts.

Happily, it did all worked out. My gut knew the way. After a lot of networking, I got a job at the end of my first month back. I started this blog, which has provided me with a great abundance of opportunities to meet interesting people and share information that I hope helps others. It has also helped me land paying freelance gigs and opened my eyes to the opportunities in social media. I have a beautiful apartment in my favorite New York City neighborhood. Through diligent savings, I’ve got a nice little emergency fund tucked away and have started paying down my school loans faster than planned. Last week, I completed my yoga teacher certification. And my loving friends and family have only grown more supportive of my life. It’s been a full, happy 3 years.

Now, I find myself at another cross-roads that feels somewhat like that time nearly 3 years ago. For the past year and a half, I have intensely researched entrepreneurship, and mulled over the idea of starting my own business on the side, hoping to eventually make it my full-time gig. I know that transition takes time so I have a good day job that supports my entrepreneurial vision. No matter how much research I do, I know entrepreneurship must be lived to fully understand it. To really embrace it, I will have to put the books aside and jump.

As I looked around the Neptune Diner, I reminded myself that from a place of fear and ignorance, good things transpire as long as we maintain the right attitude. My life serves as proof of that. I know in my gut, again, that this yoga-based business is the right idea, right now. I don’t know how it will all fall together. I just know that it will so long as I keep at it.

Uncategorized

Step 147: Idle Time

Christa Avampato

This month Wired Magazine published a brief conversation between Daniel Pink, author of A Whole New Mind, and Clay Shirky, crowdsourcing guru and author of Here Comes Everybody. The two discuss idle time, and the growing trend to use off-hours time for community good. Americans watch 200 billion hours of TV every year, but with new online social media tools, that number is dropping and people are increasingly taking up hobbies that they know little or nothing about at the outset. These social media tools give us a way to use our spare time to become experts on interesting subjects, even if they have nothing to do with the skills we use to earn our paychecks. Afterall, volunteers built Wikipedia, that vast user-generated online encyclopedia, in their off-hours for no pay, and they continue to maintain it.

When I worked in theatre professionally, I had no interest in spending my free time going to shows. Even with free tickets. I crave variety in my life and working a heavy amount of hours indoors, sitting down, largely in the dark, meant that I needed to be up and moving in my down time as much as possible. I became a serious runner again, I took up yoga, traveled extensively and actively started to participate in community service projects. These activities now comprise a much greater part of my life than theatre, which leads to an interesting question: “Is there any merit at all in just having ‘a job’ that pays the bills and provides time and resources for other interesting activities to enrich our lives?

In this economy, this idea encourages me. A few of my friends currently struggle with this concept – the frustration of having a job that involves a less-than-ideal purpose. Interestingly, these friends stay extremely productive in their off-hours. They have side businesses; they write consistently; they have fascinating hobbies; they raise families.

At the moment, I have a good deal of down time. Work has slowed up a bit due to the impending holiday weekend and the summer season. I finished my yoga teacher training. I could plunk myself down in front of the TV and celebrate all of this down time by letting it remain empty. I earned the relaxation. But Shirky and Pink have me thinking about energizing, invigorating ways to use the time wisely to jump a few fences that I see coming up in the distance. Idle time, while restful, can fill a higher purpose, too.

The image above can be found here.

entrepreneurship, New York City, technology

Step 146: The Inspiring Story of Start-up My City Way

Christa Avampato

As a blogger I am constantly introduced to new, interesting people who are bringing their ideas to life. My friend, Erica Heinz, over at Yogoer.com recently introduced me to her friend, Sonpreet Bhatia, Co-Founder of My City Way. My City Way creates mobile phone apps that roll up 50+ hyper-local apps into a city-specific guide. Tailored for use by local residents and visitors alike, My City Way is a tour guide in your pocket.

From our first email, Sonpreet impressed me with her passion and ability to see beyond what’s already out there in the world. The mobile landscape is highly competitive with a constant stream of new competitors. Just when we think we’ve got our head wrapped around its potential, some entrepreneur mixes it up again with a new innovation. My City Way did just that in a big, useful way.

In February, Bhatia and Co-founders Puneet Mehta and Archana Patchirajan took home the prestigious Popular Choice and Investors’ Choice Awards at the NYC BigApps Competition for the company’s first app, NYCWay. Since then, the trio has launched a similar app in a host of other cities including San Francisco, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Washington DC, Boston, and London. My City Way has also been busy working away on new features to delight its customers including a reservation service, discounts and deals on local merchants, up-to-the-minute public transit info, wi-fi locations, even apartment and job listings.

My City Way’s founders were focused on using technology to create something that would help local businesses manage through this difficult recession. They wanted to put something in the hands of tech savvy consumers that would direct consumer spending to local businesses, particularly those that don’t have lavish marketing budgets. Whether you believe in karma or the idea that there is nothing more powerful than an idea whose time has come, their ingenuity and drive paid off. With the success and rapid growth of My City Way, all three founders left their lucrative jobs on Wall Street earlier this year to focus on this startup. They never looked back and that keeps me looking forward, too.

My City Way is available for iPhone, iPad, and Android phones. For more info, check them out at http://www.mycityway.com

community, hunger, nonprofit

Step 145: MercyCorp’s Action Center to End World Hunger

Christa Avampato

“If you can’t feed a hundred people, then just feed one.” ~ Mother Theresa

My company sponsors MercyCorp’s Action Center to End World Hunger, a small interactive museum in Manhattan’s Financial District that helps individuals contribute to the cause to end hunger by giving whatever time they can – a minute, an hour, a day, a lifetime. The center makes it easy to get involved, recognizing and celebrating the power of many small collective actions by a community. Hunger, sadly, lives in every community around the world so we can take action locally and globally.

On a lunch break last week, I walked across the street to the center. One of the staff members greeted me, showed me the 8 minute promo video featuring Tina Fey, and took me around to the different interactive stations that begin to outline the complexity of hunger issues. I was overwhelmed by all of the small ways we can help, and how easy the center makes it participate in a solution.

I picked up a postcard that promotes the website tenthingsyoucando.com, an easy-to-navigate site that segments by category immediate actions we can take to end hunger. From eating locally grown food in season to taking up utilities companies’ offers to switch part of our energy bill to renewable energy sources to adopting an orangutan, our existing interests can be tweaked to work towards the fight against hunger.

For more information and to learn about ways to get involved, visit the center’s website: http://www.actioncenter.org.

business, education, entrepreneurship, social change, social entrepreneurship

Step 144: Sparkseed Supports Social Innovators at American Universities

Christa Avampato

A few months ago, I featured Jerri Chou from All Day Buffet and Teju Ravilochan from the Unreasonable Institute. Jerri and Teju’s optimism in action inspired me to continue seeking out social entrepreneurs who believe that the greatest positive impact on society can be made when we create opportunities for people to use their personal passions to do well and do good at the same time.

I virtually met Mike Del Ponte as a result of my interviews with Jerri and Teju. He emailed me to educate me about his initiative, Sparkseed, which invests in American college students who aspire to be tomorrow’s social entrepreneurs. They have ideas to change the world, and Sparkseed helps them get there by providing a unique blend of services including pro-bono consulting, mentoring, and seed money.

I meet a lot of social entrepreneurs with inspiring stories. Mike’s ability to combine his business savvy with his passion for and personal experience with social entrepreneurship is a rare gift. “When I was at Yale I launched a social venture and soon found that I had to teach myself everything: how to form the corporation, how to recruit and manage a team, how to pitch to investors, etc…I had to reinvent the wheel and wasted a lot of time…I noticed that almost all student innovators run into the same problem…Sparkseed was established to give young social entrepreneurs everything they need to fulfill their potential as change agents.”

The Financial Times recently awarded Sparkseed with its prestigious Best Social Investment Strategy award. To date, Sparkseed has funded over 50 social enterprise projects from a wide variety of fields:

Elecar Inc.: Founded by Brown University student Andrew Antar, Elecar is working to provide the missing piece to the electric car puzzle. By developing residential charging station and an online payment system, Elecar is laying a cost-effective framework to facilitate the mass adoption of electric cars.

MaloTraders: Founded by Temple University student Mohamed Ali Niang, MaloTraders specializing in the processing, storing, and marketing of rice for small-scale farmers in Mali. By making local production more competitive on the international market, MaloTrade is working to alleviate poverty.

Paper Feet: Founded by University of Michigan student Jimmy Tomczak, Paper Feet makes the world’s thinnest and most flexible flip-flop out of recycled billboard vinyl. Every year, 10,000 tons of billboard vinyl ends up in landfills. Paper Feet is addressing this problem by rolling out a line of hip products all made from up-cycled waste.

Get involved and be inspired! Learn more about Sparkseed and its incredible stable of social entrepreneurs by visiting the organization’s website, joining the Facebook page, and following on Twitter.

change, yoga

Step 143: The Last Class

Christa Avampato

“Often when you think you’re at the end of something, you’re at the beginning of something else. I’ve felt that many times. My hope for all of us is that ‘the miles we go before we sleep’ will be filled with all the feelings that come from deep caring – delight, sadness, joy, wisdom – and that in all the endings of our life, we will be able to see the new beginnings.” ~ Fred Rogers

My birthday falls under Pisces, the final sign of the zodiac. Pisces enjoy endings, resolutions, and projects completed. Today marked the final day of our 200 hour teaching training at Sonic Yoga, a happy-sad day as my friend, Vivian, called it so eloquently and accurately. We look forward to the time that will now be open again on our calendars, and at the same time have tears in our eyes that exactly the way we have all been together for the last 3 months will never be again.

As a closing ritual, we all lit candles, and one by one, stared into each others eyes with the silent gesture of Namaste, “the light that is in me honors the light that is in you.” We so rarely have these moments with others in our daily lives. We don’t acknowledge one another in that profound way nearly enough, and in our world today we so desperately need that mutual honor, respect, and support.

I found all of those things in abundance in Sonic’s teacher training. 23 women gathered together for 3 months, with incredible teachers, to pay tribute to one another’s light. We laughed, cried, worked, and played together. It is a rare and precious gift to join a community so filled with joy, one that recognizes the beauty baked in to each of its souls in a unique and stunning way.

I tried hard to think of a way to say thank you enough, to the students and to our teachers. For someone who nearly always knows exactly what to say and when to say it, I found that the silent gaze into the eyes of each person conveyed more authentic gratitude and love than any phrase I could have uttered. The best way to honor the gift of this training is to pay it forward with wild abandon.

future

Step 142: Here Comes the Future

Christa Avampato

“Objects in the rear view mirror may be closer than they appear.” ~ every car sold in America

I make lists for everything, and my favorite lists are those that describe things I want to accomplish. I like to see how they change and grow; I like to reflect on which items I accomplished and which I tossed away and why. When I make these lists, I think that the check-mark next to each is an elusive, distant thing. Sometimes I think my future exists out there somewhere in the ether. I think I’ll see it coming way off in the distance so I can ready myself. So I can prepare. It never works that way. The future resides just over there, only a moment away, never as far away as I imagine. And always more beautiful.

writer, writing

Step 141: Reasons for Writing

Christa Avampato

“You must trust and believe in people, or life becomes impossible.” ~ Anton Chekhov

I recently landed a freelance writing gig that caused my mind to reel in a very different direction. I will tell you the groovy circumstances of how it happened when the post goes live next week. For now, I’ll share how the conversation I had with the company’s founder started to change my outlook on my writing.

I spend a good deal of time writing about creativity, hope, and personal growth. Sometimes I struggle to sum it all up. I write about my life in New York, ‘Christa in New York’. When I put that down in writing, it sounds awkward to me. Too cliché, too flat.

The company founder I spoke to helped me articulate my writing purpose when he asked me to write about how to stay positive in a big company job with big company challenges. While the post focuses on career, the ideas it explains have broader applications within our lives. This blog really focuses on positive thinking – how to find it, get it, and keep it. Sure, I get discouraged from time to time. In some posts, you will see glimpses of that. Mostly, I write to celebrate and commemorate moments – this act makes the bad times bearable and the good times even more joyful.

Negativity exists in a lot of places, on a lot of faces, and within a lot blogs. Those blogs have their place and their followings, just not here on this site. I believe in full expression and experience, and I also believe that hard times, shortcomings, and failures offer us valuable opportunities to stop, listen, look, and examine our lives. They give us the gifts of faith, trust, and belief that together we can make everything better. I write to connect with people who hold this idea in their hearts and then take it out into the world, bravely and boldly.

books, love

Step 140: Meet Tre Miller-Rodriguez

Christa Avampato

I met Tre Miller-Rodriguez about a year ago as a result of my Examiner.com column. At the time Tre worked as a Senior Account Manager for Harrison & Shriftman. She set me up with several start-ups to feature in my column about entrepreneurship. Once Tre left Harrison & Shriftman we stayed in touch and then I discovered her inspiring lifestory outside of her career.

A little over a year ago, Tre, 34 years old, lost her husband, Alberto, to a sudden heart attack. I have trouble getting over a break-up with a boyfriend. I can’t imagine how I would get through losing the love of my life at such a young age. Tre’s strength bowls me over. She left Harrison & Shriftman to travel to Cuba, Alberto’s family home, and finish her book, The White Elephant in the Room: Diary of a 30-Something Widow. She recently launched her blog, of the same title as her book.

Her writing packs a punch, and her heroic journey reveals just how much might this woman has in her heart. Her first page of the book put a knife in my heart. She placed me right into the center of the situation with Alberto, and my mind raced with questions. I found myself saying out loud “no, no, no! This can’t happen!” I wanted to stop, rewind, get Alberto to a medical center, and save him. Tre recounts her loss with awe-inspiring grace and dignity. Your jaw will drop, as mine did, before you turn to page two.

Want to know how to rise above tragedy and live an extraordinary life? Get to know Tre.

The photo above depicts Tre and Alberto on their fairytale wedding day. Tre’s blog can be found at: http://whiteelephantintheroom.tumblr.com/

books, community, neighbors

Step 139: Good Neighbors

Christa Avampato

“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me ‘Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping’.” ~ Fred Rogers, The World According to Mister Rogers: Important Things to Remember

I feel sick watching the news about the unending oil spill in the Gulf. As someone who has worried about our water supply since age 5, this story breaks my heart. Bill Maher got it right when we so poetically stated, “Every a**hole who ever chanted ‘drill baby drill’ should have to report to the Gulf coast today for cleanup duty.” I agree.

Whenever these sad moments hit me, I go to my book shelf and pull from a small collection of books that I refer to again and again for inspiration. The World According to Mister Rogers is one of those books. For Christmas in 2003, my mom bought me this book about Mister Rogers. The inscription on the inside of the book reads, “This book is dedicated, in Fred Roger’s memory, to anyone who has loved you into being.” My mom added, “and continues to love you every day for everything you do, for caring so much about all of us. I feel so lucky to have you as my daughter.” Moms always have a way of making us feel better, no matter how bleak the world may seem.

Last week, my yoga teacher Stacey read us the quote at the top of this post. I had forgotten it and when I went searching through the book tonight, I found it on p. 187. It made me feel better about the Gulf. And about Haiti and Afghanistan and the South Bronx. Blight and tragedy play out all over the globe every day, making it too easy to get lost in the sadness. Look for the helpers – they dwell in every neighborhood, sometimes acting behind the scenes and sometimes taking their rightful place at center stage. Find them, wherever they live, and celebrate them.

Mister Rogers taught me about community and the priceless value of a helpful neighbor. I grew up in a tiny, rural town on an apple orchard. We struggled financially; a lot of people in my town did. But we had really kind, generous neighbors, and we tried to return the favor every day. We tried to take care of each other as best we could. In my cushy Manhattan apartment tonight, I may have left behind the circumstances of my childhood, but I never lost the lessons of good neighbors.

P.S. – Trish Scott, a very talented writer, animal behavior expert, and extremely loyal reader of my blog wrote a post several years ago about how Mister Rogers raised $20M in 6 minutes. She put this link into the comments section but it’s so powerful, I had to include it on the main page of this post. Happy reading!