dreams, education, goals

Step 5: Your Sentence

Christa Avampato

My friend, Richard, just sent me this clip with Dan Pink’s advice on how to transform our lives in 2010 with two simple questions: “What’s your sentence?” and “Were you better today than you were yesterday?” The people I admire most can sum up their contributions to humanity in one succinct sentence stating a very specific contribution. This is also true of my favorite books, blogs, artists, writers, activists, and cause-based organizations. They all have a singular focus and purpose. Is a succinct reason for being the secret ingredient to every extraordinary life?

It’s amazing that this paradigm of a single sentence describing an extraordinary life holds true no matter what great personality I consider. Thomas Jefferson penned his own epitaph with a single sentence. No copywriter, no editor. “Here was buried Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence, of The Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom, and Father of the University of Virginia.” This is the summation of his life in his terms. These are the things that mattered most to him. Nelson Mandela’s book, Long Walk to Freedom, remains one of the greatest influence on my life. I could only read a few pages of his story at a time because each word is packed with such emotion and power. His unwavering confidence in and passion for his beliefs is overwhelming. Very simply, his sentence is “I am the Father of a free South Africa.”

So maybe that’s it. Maybe we can all get to extraordinary if we can find our sentence and manage our lives in support of it. By the end of 2010, I want to write my one sentence. I’ve written some blog posts about how I want to be remembered when my time has come and gone, what lasting impact I’d like to have on the world. After 364 days of living a life trying to make each day better than the day before, I think I can get it down to one brief sentence. This is the initial sentence that comes to mind, in rough long form:

“Christa was someone who created a global education system that used creativity as the backbone for all learning, gave 1 million children a second chance at a better life, and offered an entire generation the opportunity to be job creators instead of job seekers.”

It needs some polish, but it’s a start.

The image above is not my own. It can be found here.

guest blogger, Muppet

Guest Post on World’s Strongest Librarian

Christa Avampato

I’m thrilled that today I have a guest post on World’s Strongest Librarian. I compared WSL’s author, Josh, to four Muppets. Here is a peek at the intro. Click here to read the full post.

“Some of my fondest childhood memories involve sitting around the TV with my family watching the Muppet Show. That show spurred my interest in theatre, a career I pursued for five and half years right after I graduated from college.

I write about the characters of the Muppet Show, Sesame Street, and all of their spin-offs with great regularity on my blog and have read numerous books, blogs, and websites about these fabulously funny and furry creatures and their creators.”

change, dreams, gifts, nature

Step 4: The Gift of a Fallen Branch

Christa Avampato

“Use the talents you possess – for the woods would be a very silent place if no birds sang except for the best.” ~ Henry Van Dyke

In that tangled tree diagram of life options, I had assumed that my life would unfold a certain way this week. Instead, the option I considered least likely came to be. The trouble, or perhaps the beauty, is that this unlikely branch is entirely under-developed. Beginning today, I get to imagine a future I didn’t think I’d have just yet.

Brian and I talked tonight about the idea of prana, the intelligent undercurrent of energy that makes itself at home beneath of the narrative of our lives. In times of authenticity, that current supports our actions. When we’re acting against our nature, living our lives to a lesser extent than what’s possible, our prana breaks through, making room in the world for our true selves to emerge. Try as we might to suppress it, our prana will not be kept down for long. Eventually, we will have no choice but to live our lives to the fullest. We have to show up in the world and be everything we are capable of being.

I was willing to take the other branch, to remain in a holding pattern that would delay where I really want my life to go. Today the universe took that option away. No more delays allowed. Sometimes not getting what we wish for is the best gift we can receive.

The photo above is not my own. It can be found here.

guest blogger, owning pink

Owning Pink Feature

Christa Avampato

I am thrilled and humbled that Lissa and Joy over at Owning Pink made one of my recent posts the Mojo Monday exercise. The post was inspired by World’s Strongest Librarian. Much thanks to Josh for inspiring my writing. Here is a short intro and a link to the post:

“This Mojo Monday, let’s put pen to paper, fingers to keyboard, heart to mind, and consider what memories made us who we are today, right now, in this moment. Profound or silly, happy or sad, painful or joyful, what are the “when” moments that created and crafted beautiful, gorgeous you and what truths did they reveal?”

Snapshots of When

education, learning, politics, religion

Step 3: Things I Don’t Know

Christa Avampato

Last night I was settling back in to my New York apartment while the wind whistled through my windows. It was so loud at one point that I couldn’t sleep so I flipped on the TV to CNN. Chistiane Amanpour was reporting about Muslim radical extremists in the U.K. Though I watch the news regularly and read several newspapers, there are some topics that still confuse me. The complex network of Muslim radical extremist groups is one of them. I know all the vocabulary though I don’t know how it all hangs together. And this bothers me.

I started thinking about all of the things that I know just a little about, and how much it bothers me to have holes in my knowledge. I don’t like the phrase “I know enough just to be dangerous.” I’d much prefer to know enough so as not be dangerous but be able to speak intelligently on a topic.

In this new year, there are a few topics that I’d really like to dig into and understand in depth. Here are a few of them:

1.) WHAT – I know little to nothing about Islam and its many factions. I’d like to take a small step toward piecing together the popular vocabulary that surrounds this religion. It’s influence is growing in leaps and bounds, dominating our news waves. I should understand it more clearly if I’m to have a greater understanding of our own foreign policy.

HOW – My friend, Amy, is very well-versed in the topic so I’m going to ask her to give me a little crash course during one of our catch-ups. I’ll also ask her for some primer books, blogs, and news services that would be a good reference for me.

2.) WHAT – I’ve been practicing yoga for a decade though have not read some of the sacred texts that serve as its base. I also don’t know the Sanskrit names for all of the asanas (poses).

HOW – At the end of February I am going to begin a very intense yoga teacher training program to master this material. Every other weekend, I’ll be practicing 9 hours on Saturday and 9 hours on Sunday, for 14 weeks. In addition, the program also requires meeting 3 times per week after work, independent reading and writing assignments, and class attendance at the studio once per week. It is a rigorous program that will require a great deal of focus, though my passion for the art and science of yoga will make the rigor a welcome circumstance.

3.) WHAT – The news stories I love most are those that showcase the Power of One. I’d love to read more of these stories in 2010 to understand the psychology of this personality type, and there are a few people that particularly intrigue me. There are several sources that catalog the journeys of these kind of people. Two I particularly like are NBC’s Making a Difference segment and Dafna Michaelson’s 50 in 52 Journey.

HOW – I’ve ordered a few books that share the stories of Geoffrey Canada, the Founder of Harlem Children’s Zone, and William Kamkwamba, the 14 year old in Malawi who built a windmill for his family armed only with a local library book. These are incredible stories of people who saw a need in their communities and set to work to meet that need with little or no resources except their own ingenuity and passion. Could anything be more inspiring?

career, creativity, Fast Company, IDEO, work

Step 2: Working with Friends

Christa Avampato

Today I had lunch with Trevin and Blair, two of my friends whom I worked with a number of years ago. During our lunch, I was reminded of how good it feels to work with friends, to be such an integral part of their lives. I’ve heard some people say that it’s best to keep our personal and professional lives separate. I disagree. I’d always prefer to work with friends – it makes work feel like play.

Last year I wrote a blog post that referenced an article in Fast Company about David Kelley, the Founder of IDEO. He left a mediocre management job at an engineering firm to get his MBA at Stanford. Though he had job offers after graduation, he declined them to start his own company with his friends. That company became IDEO. In the article he describes that his one strong inclination for employment was to work with friends. Had he not taken the leap and followed his instinct, he probably would be toiling away in a grey cubicle doing less-than-inspiring work. Instead, he founded a company that is arguably the finest product design firm in the world. And he has fun everyday. Bet well-played, David.

What if we could all follow our gut with David Kelley’s creative confidence? What if we could turn down opportunities, as great as they seem, because they just don’t jive with how we’d like to live our lives? Perhaps there’s an IDEO for each of us, or at the very least a bit more happiness to be had in our careers. In 2010, I’d like to get back to a career of working with friends.

The photo above is not my own. It appears courtesy of IDEO.

choices, dreams

Step 1: If

Christa Avampato

“If”: proof that glorious things can come in very small packages. Think of all the wonder wrapped up in this tiny, two-letter word. Imagination takes flight, dreams come to be, and chances of a lifetime are taken by its mere utterance. On his blog, Chris Brogan asked his readers to consider the three words of 2010 that they would use to shape their 2010 plans. “If” is my selection because of the great possibility it invokes.

“If” describes the abilities that make us successful in the truest sense of the word, in terms of the deepest and dearest meaning it has. What abilities allow us to live a life of great virtue? What abilities will make every possibility an option for us? “If” is the gateway to the answers.

“If-” is the title of one of my favorite poems by Rudyard Kipling, and one of my favorite lines of the poem asks us to “start again at your beginnings”. Today begins a new decade, and so it’s only natural for us to look back and remember where we began the last one. A few days after January 1, 2000, I took off for my first theatre tour. Previously, I had been working in a tiny theatre box office, and I needed to break out of it. The contract for the tour was only for four months and the pay was less than I made at the box office. I didn’t care; I needed the adventure.

And so began a decade that would lead me to travel around the globe, fulfill my dream of managing Broadway shows, and then send me back to school to take on the complex world of hard-nosed business. I became a published writer, and through that writing found my truest voice. I found yoga as a balm for my old soul, fell in love countless times, and learned to trust my own instincts above all others. In the decade that began with the year 2000, I discovered how I could make a meaningful contribution to humanity that would live on long after I am gone.

At the end of the decade, I was getting a bit too comfortable. I had gotten set in my new ways and lost sight of the adventure that called to me so clearly at the start of 2000. I too often trusted the opinions and instincts of others. And so, the world decided that a cleansing was necessary, a cleansing that would make it impossible for me to rest on my laurels by taking away the laurels altogether. In Kipling’s audacious terms, I was forced to start again at my beginnings.
Today, in this hour, at this moment, I am choosing to begin again using a map of “If, then” statements. It is a long and winding road, filled with imagination and dreams, a tortuous tangle of stunning possibility and hope. Cheers to the beginning of a very good year, and a very good decade!

dreams, hope, inspiration, nature, writing

My Year of Hopefulness – Castles in the Air

Christa Avampato

“Do not worry if you have built your castles in the air. They are where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

This is my 365th day of actively seeking out and writing about hope. This was my one New Year’s Resolution for 2009: to feel more hopeful and record what I found here on this blog to help others feel more hopeful, too.

On this day last year, I had no idea that my life would look as it does today, in any respect. I can say with great confidence that this has been a year filled with more change than any other year I have had. Part of me wonders if that is actually my doing: did I precipitate all of this change or did the change just happen to me? I suspect it’s a mix of the two. I can also say with great confidence that today I feel exponentially more hopeful than I did one year ago. And I hope that these 365 blog posts have made others a little more hopeful, too. If so, then I achieved what I set out to do in my writing in 2009.

There are so many reflections I have on this year of writing about hope, so many things I’ve learned about myself, about others, about my community, and about the world as a whole. However, one revelation stands far above the others: when I actively, passionately search for something, I will inevitably find it because I will not give up until my task is done. And the truly remarkable thing is that yes, if I span the globe I can find millions of pieces of hope “out there”, though the pieces of hope that mean the most to me are with me all the time. I carry them inside of me.

Now what will I do next? I’ve got overflowing buckets of hope; how can they be put to the best use? My pal, Laura, asked me this question about two months ago while we were at dinner. Without missing a beat, I told her that for the next year I’d do one thing every day that used all that hope to build an extraordinary life. The answer just sprang from my mouth, no thought required. It was a wish my heart made.

So here we go: beginning tomorrow, I will write a post every day in 2010 that will describe the one thing I did that day that put me one tiny step (or one great leap) closer to living an extraordinary life. The wheels of change are well greased from the events of 2009, so I expect more big changes in 2010. My friend, Kelly, has had a mantra all year of “begin again in 2010.” She’s a wise woman, someone who is both a friend and a mentor, and I’m taking her advice.

The final thought I have as I close out this year relates to nature, a topic from which I’ve drawn a lot of hopeful examples. It’s a butterfly analogy, though not the stereotypical one of beautiful re-birth. When a tiny caterpillar wraps itself up in a cocoon, it purposely constructs the cocoon to be very tight so that the butterfly has to struggle to emerge. It has to wiggle and turn and twist, completing exhausting itself inside the too-tight casing. There are oils on the inside of the cocoon and when the butterfly struggles the oils are distributed over its wings. It will not be able to free itself until the oils are distributed evenly over its wings. Those oils build a layer over the butterfly’s wings that keep the wings from breaking apart when it flies. Without the oil coating on its wings, the butterfly would break apart the moment it tried to fly.

I think about my own struggles, and the struggles of the world, through the lens of the butterfly. The twisting and turning is a painful process. It wears me out, and yet that struggle is so necessary to my development and success. I would never be able to fly without the distribution of its lessons throughout my life. I have struggled long enough and my struggles have done an excellent job of building up the foundation of my life. So let the flight begin toward my castles in the air.

adventure, family, holiday, travel

My Year of Hopefulness – Journeys We Don’t Plan

Christa Avampato

I recently saw the movie, Up!, an animated feature about Mr. Fredrickson, a grumpy old man remarkably similar in appearance and demeanor to Mr. Cunningham from Happy Days. All their lives, he and his wife dreamed of an adventure to South America, and she passed away before they had the chance to go. Wanting to fulfill the dream to honor her, he uses the asset of being a balloon salesman to sail south of the border, house in tow. That’s the adventure he planned.

He didn’t count on one of his neighbors being on the deck of his house when it took off. He didn’t think that he’d ever meet a rare bird named Kevin who would need his help so desperately or his greatest idol who would turn out to lack integrity. This was the part of the adventure he never imagined. Along the way, he lets goes of old heartaches and material possessions, makes new friends, and discovers how much courage his old soul can muster. These are the parts of the adventure that make his trip unforgettable.

My Christmas trip was a bit like Mr. Fredrickson’s. I had planned to stay home to study and write for the week between Christmas and the New Year; I hadn’t planned on going to Alabama at all. The opportunity presented itself, and I took it. On the banks of the Tennessee River in a small town named Tuscumbia, I learned how the term “Southern hospitality” came to be.

My brother-in-law’s family welcomed me with open arms, literally. His mom, Trish, had an extra chair at the table, an extra room where I could sleep and study, and extra gifts under the tree just for me. She taught me to make chicken and dressing, proved that any food can be whipped into a delicious casserole, and exhibited all of the love and graciousness that you’d expect from a woman whose greatest joy is her family. I learned about their complex family history, and was included in their family photos. In truth, an outsider looking in might never know that I was a guest who’d never spent a Christmas with that family. They took every opportunity to make me one of them.

Having grown up in small town, I appreciate the warm, cozy feeling of having memories in every nook and cranny. Kyle, my brother-in-law, showed me where he went to high school, where all his childhood friends lived and hung out as teenagers, and where his dad’s artwork (and therefore his spirit) still exists even though he’s no longer with us. I saw their old family photos and then understood the resemblance my niece, Lorelei, has to that side of the family. So much of their history and culture exists in their food and the memories of togetherness that their meals invoke, and I got to be a part of it. It was easy to see why Tuscumbia is a special kind of place.

On the long drive back to Florida, I thought of Kyle’s family a lot: how lucky I feel to have met them all and how much I appreciated being able to spend a holiday with them. I’ve always found that the experiences I love most in my life are the ones I don’t plan for – the job that came my way quite by accident, the friend I never planned to meet, the spur-of-the-moment trip that I never imagined I’d take. My trip to Alabama showed me how much joy we can find in the unexpected and unplanned, and I’d like to figure out how to make that kind of joy and the circumstances that create it a little more common in my life in 2010.

art, career, dreams, writing, yoga

My Year of Hopefulness – The Center

Christa Avampato

“The artists’ role is to do what’s honest for them. So if you’re in New York and everyone is looking at the floor, you can look up. It’s not your role to follow the others. It’s your role to go to your center and then reflect that, not just to be a mirror to what’s happening.” ~ James Hubbell

Here is a tricky balance to keep: how can we be mindful of what’s happening around us and also learn to follow our own hearts? It’s easy to get swept up in the moment, in the emotions and circumstances of others. In its best form, we know this as empathy. In its worst form, we know this as distraction. How can we see the whole picture, and also our own role in it? How can we see both the forest and the trees? The role of the artist, in any medium, demands this balance, and that balance is our Center.

Our Center is an elusive thing. We clearly know when we have moved away from our Center: it’s apparent in our lack of energy, enthusiasm, and joy. Finding and holding the Center, particularly in our daily adventures in chaos, is a tough thing because it sometimes requires that we disappoint others to be true to ourselves. It requires that we believe in ourselves and in our own abilities more than we believe in anything else. It asks us to take our future into our own hands.

There are three ways to know if we’ve found our Center:
1.) It makes time pass by so quickly and effortlessly that we barely notice how long we’ve been there.

2.) The activities we perform at our Center give us energy and we never grow tired of them.

3.) Our Center is the summation of the very best gifts we have to offer to the world.

For me, my Center is found in writing and yoga. I’ve been writing daily for three and a half years, and intermittently as far back into my childhood as I can remember. I’ve had a steady yoga practice for 10 years. Time has flown! These activities give me boundless energy and let me show my most joyful face to the world.

And so, I am taking James Hubbell’s: in 2010, I will go to my Center and reflect what is there. By the time 2010 is singing its swan song, I’ll find a way to make writing and yoga the Center of my life. I’ll find a way to earn my living through them. The ‘fierce urgency of now’ is calling me far too clearly to spend my life any other way.