your passion ...

and a macaroon ... i think about @greenleafcenter and our classwork ALL the time - and when i'm not thinking about class, i feel as if i'm experiencing something related to servant leadership.

creating time ... somewhere in between cubeopolis crunches, various class commitments, keeping up with health month activities, eeking out a meager social life, and the basic eat & sleep stuff, i realize continuing to create time is PRIORITY ONE so that i'm not uncharacteristically blog-quiet and am stayin' on track with recommitting to yhd and reverb10 in 2011 - PRIORITY ONE, i say.

back to your passion ... recently, i had lunch with a friend who is exploring her next step in life, so to speak. (i believe this is a reminder to me, as well, to keep on steppin', by the way.) she mentioned recently hearing and reading quite a bit about perspectives of success and failure. with that said, the rest of this post is an abridged and somewhat edited version of what i shared with my greenleaf class and my continuing on the ideas and thoughts i have about the topic of one's passion, success, and failure. i'm intrigued ... INTRIGUED, i say! i LOVE the transition phase that people experience. i LOVE being around people on that cusp of transition. most of my life, i feel i have had the opportunity to share in those moments with others - friends and loose ties - the AH-HA moments and the NOT-QUITE-READY-RIGHT-NOW moments. whether i seek it out or it finds me, i get to serve as a kind of connector. people react differently to that cusp - some with a kind of trepidation, and others - it's a full frontal attack and balls to the wall.

time to deal with that cusp ... there are many ways to approach one's passion. for my passion, i shared reconnecting with my passion in one word. now i'm exploring amping it up in 2011. through that past months or so, here are just a very few blog posts i've come across with quite varying perspectives and approaches and all if which i have enjoyed reading ...

• joyologist tricia's i don't always know what i'm doing - i just do it
• advanced riskologist tyler's you today vs. you tomorrow and how to write your biography 40 years earlier and are you dreaming or anticipating?
• zen habits's leo's achieving without goals and guest post from study hacks's cal newport on the minimalist's guide to cultivating passion
• study hacks's cal's passion must be actively pursued, not passively waited on
• the middle finger project's ashley's live alive, not just a life: guidelines for rebelling against reality
• castle in the air's nina on the 3 fears - fear of failure, fear of success and fear of abandonment
• the art of non-conformity's chris on what would you do if you knew you would not fail
• the daily love's mastin on want to change? live outside your comfort zone

back to YOUR passion (aka mission, perhaps) ... my friend mentioned that over the past week or so she has felt flooded with stories of what is success and what is failure - AND when she mentioned talk show host, Tavis Smiley, who has written a book Fail Up, i recall seeing his interview with Larry King (part 1, part 2) several thoughts popped into my head while she and i were talking about this over this past Friday's lunch -

• Bolles's what color is your parachute? exercises (so i gave her the workbook) - although for job hunters, I do believe it helps to clarify one's interests, inherent skill sets, and self-awareness.
• 7 Habits and the mission statement builder via Covey - i thought of this because i took it back in the early '90s and revisited it in 2010; i realize that many elements of 7 Habits have been part of my fabric.
  
• Sher's refuse to choose book, which uses the term scanner - a person with many interests, who wants to pursue all of them.
• dream zapper (or energy vampires) - I thought of this because of the idea of NOT zapping other people's dreams and NOT zapping one's OWN dreams; I came across this while reading TMF's blog posts about dream zappers (over here) and shared related thoughts on my blog over here with the magic 8-ball technique and over here as related to a post about tyler's advanced riskology post
• TED and TED talks - I am going to see what is on TED that would speak to my friend
• Kent Keith's book anyway, the paradoxical commandments, which i came across because my brother sent me ken miller's retake the paradoxical commandments of government over here
  
• Po Bronson's book what should i do with my life?, a collection of essays about people seeking and being
• ann lamott's book bird by bird, which is not just for writing but for discovering one's self (in my opinion)
• legacy, a book that is for writing one's personal history
• the movie UP (on web, imdb), because I had just watched it and balled my eyes out (sweet movie)
  

(YES! this is what happens when i get several thoughts!)

Interestingly, a book that my friend thought about during our lunch and has since lent me to read is patti smith's book just kids, which happened to be on the "to read" list on my springpad!

society on success, failure, accomplishments, lessons learned ... my conversation with my friend has made me think about the accepted (or perhaps imposed) societal burden that defines success and that defines failure - and how does one's mission and message transcend those labels? i believe one's mission can exist EVEN IF others believe that it will likely fail (in the conventional sense) - and it seems like this is part of the emotional and psychological barrier where the messenger and the listener can choose to overcome - where a shared understanding can be reached.

my task for the day ...
share this with lunch buddy