Hospitality / Soulful Living

Today I’m thinking about all the investments I’ve made in other people. The events and parties and dinners and fundraising receptions I’ve hosted at my house at my expense. And three years of Sunday@Six gatherings. One of the things I love about true hospitality and generosity is it delivers a kind of immediate satisfaction. There […]
Innocence and Loss

We try to protect our children – some of us. Thinking some realities are too harsh to introduce to our children. Wait we think. Let’s wait. Wait. Until they are older. They don’t need to know this yet. We call that period before they know that everything that matters is fragile and subject to loss, […]
Good Planning

Your Favorite Pair of Jeans
Handle Your Elephants

This past month I’ve been working like mad to pull together reports and proposals for clients. I have a small team and we’re all buzzing. There’s building a business and then there’s doing the business. I love all of it. especially my purpose now – to support leaders in the arena – People hire me […]
Joy

What brings me joy? Seeing people flourish. Watching people use their gifts. No, not celebrities. Not in fancy productions. Just up close watching people grow into their skins, fill out a role, find direction and purpose. I LOVE encouraging and supporting that quest. My brother used to make fun of me. “You’re all ‘be all […]
TALK. TALK. TALK.

Lot of folks over the last couple of weeks talking about talking. Yep. Talking about talking.
Serve

No matter how hard we try we can never completely heal our own hurt without service. We cannot fill our emptiness or alleviate pain without acts of service. Through service to others we find meaning in suffering. We stop the torment of “why”. We see our common humanity. This is the ultimate salve for our […]
Starting Places

Five years ago, Judge Ed Emmett rang me up as I was juggling two phones trying to get information about which of our centers were flooded and which were dry. As then CEO of BakerRipley I was thinking past the immediate emergency of drastic flooding and stranded people, trying to inventory what assets we had […]
Builders

Here’s an observation – I’ve noticed that those full time “calling out” probably never built anything. Not an institution or a city or a building or a business … I’m not as patient as I once was. Sometimes listening to critics makes me want to say “get back to me after you’ve tried to build […]
If There’s a Hole In Your Bucket

service will fill it Just a reminder that service to others never fails to help us. Almost any sort of misery is lessened if I’m turned toward helping. Here’s my unpopular opinion. We are often told there’s some line that exists between caring for ourselves and caring for others and that taking care of ourselves […]