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I’ve had some rough days the last month - where I get home from my internship and unlock my door and just lay flat in bed, being weighed down by heavy thoughts and feelings that float around in my head as it rests on the pillow.
The last month was my first month of graduate school. “It’s just the work load,” I’d repeat to myself each day after taking off my backpack and intern clothes. “I just have a lot on my plate so I’m stressed. Tomorrow will be better.”
Read MoreTwo years ago, after attending a talk by Bryan Stevenson, the Founder of Equal Justice Initiative,
(EJI), I raised my hand to become a penpal to one of their clients, a prisoner who had been tried and incarcerated as a youth. Part of EJI’s mission is to defend clients they believe were punished too harshly when they were sentenced as children under laws designed for adults.
About three weeks later I received my assignment to write with someone I’ll refer to as DL. DL is living a life sentence in a prison in South Dakota. He’s been there for 18 years, more than half of his
life.
Read MoreLast week I watched a long-awaited matchup between two of the world’s most promising young female players in the US Open: Coco Gauff (a 15-year-old fans adore) and Naomi Osaka (the 21-year-old defending 2018 champion).
Last year, Osaka played Serena Williams in a very controversial final match. Serena - who is currently only two majors away from holding the record for most ever held - was given a warning by the umpire that was a pretty iffy. She struggled to mentally tough it out and ended up losing her confidence and her game spiraled very emotionally. Osaka ended up winning the tournament, but not without tears holding as the crowd booed, believing Serena should have won and the umpire was not fair. An awful way to win your first major tournament at the age of 20.
There are many ways to save a life.
Let us not think little of the way we greet our doorman
Of the smiles we give out on the sidewalks
Of the dinners we make for our friends.
Not everyone stops to say hello
And some people go entire days unnoticed
Coming home to empty houses
With walls full of photographs of people who don't phone.
Make the time.
The other week, I found myself saying “I am so terrified about the gap between what is in my head and what is true in reality.”
I just wrapped up my masters dissertation that focused on some research that has exploded in the last couple of years about how women’s mental health can really suffer due to sanitation concerns in developing countries. Even if they have access to a toilet that, by standards set by the WHO, are considered “improved” and therefore report as great progress towards achieving the global goals, women won’t use them if they don’t feel safe doing so. This doesn’t show up in the metrics.
Read MoreJorgen's piece reminded me of a thought that’s been brewing since a couple of weeks ago.
I helped run a two week outdoor education program through Tinkergarten. To get to the location you had to drive to the way back of a park, which required going over about 12 speed bumps. The first time I pulled in I thought to myself “Wow, this is annoying and I will have to leave earlier tomorrow to get through this and into the woods on time.” (Mind you my 6 month baby was going with me and the drive was usually her nap time so I reeeeally had to mind the speed bumps).
The second time I went down speed bump lane I knew what was coming and knew there was no avoiding so I just took a deep breath and got on with it.
And then, around day three, half way through the course I realized I wasn’t thinking about the speed bumps at all. I was looking around at the gorgeous scenery. I waved to a few dog walkers. I couldn’t believe how peaceful the morning was.
By the end of week 1, I couldn’t wait to drive in and I smiled at every speed bump. The road in runs along a beautiful stream. There are bridges. Loads of dogs and happy walkers. It’s so so green. And the sounds are so soothing.
Read MoreThis summer I went on a family holiday to Croatia. It's a beautiful country with great nature and we planned for a whole lot of activities to do outdoor. One of those activities was rock climbing and it had a great lesson about change in it.
My son Merlijn is 14 years old and back home you can find him twice a week in an indoor climbing venue where he gets trained on different ascends with varying degrees of difficulty. He's been doing it for almost two years now and it was one of the reasons why we wanted to go climbing in Croatia so that he could have the experience of climbing in nature as well. I don't climb at all, but during our summer holiday I made an effort to follow in my sons footsteps (as did my 6 year old daughter and my wife). We went out with a guide and climbed a few routes that we're all easy to do. But then at the end of our time she took us to one that would challenge Merlijn, as she could see it was all too easy for him (for those of you who do climb rocks this was a route with difficulty 5b).
I'm sitting here
Looking at the blue painting that hangs over my bed
It’s a brown-haired girl floating on the ocean’s surface
You said you bought it because she reminded you of me
And I asked if I could take it for my room
Because I needed decor for the walls
And I didn’t really tell you how much I love it
Or really ever thanked you for it
Read MoreThe past six months or so, I’ve been working with a client on the preparation for an immersive session with their global leadership team. They would like to change some behaviors of their team to become more adaptive to change. In their traditionally risk-averse environment, one of the key things they want to work on is dealing with failure. Up until now, failure is not an option in this organization. There is a fear of failure that is almost coded in their DNA. So the question arises: how do you change this attitude and create a culture that accepts failure as an opportunity to grow?
Read MoreA few weeks ago, my sisters and I spontaneously decided to hop on the NYC ferry to Rockaway Beach. It was our very first time on the ferry (some real New Yorkers we are!). After the beach and some very authentic New York deli sandwiches for dinner, we were a little sleepy. So we were a bit disgruntled when we got back to the ferry as the line to board wrapped around multiple blocks.
Read MoreJuly was a month of self-discovery and new experiences.
It was the first summer my kids were away while I stayed behind in NYC. I made a conscious decision to not feel anxious or sad. Instead, I was to focus on myself and spend July working on becoming…
…a better dancer.
Read MoreI sweep the dust away from the drain and continue to sift through his things. So many things. Pieces of track and mini cars and houses to the Lionel train collection. A “for sale by owner” sign with his number still written across the front. A toilet paper roll hung from the ceiling, probably to blow his nose from saw dust or leaf clippings or the smell of house paint. So many extension cords I wonder how far he ever intended to go.
Staring into this shed, I see my childhood in a million pieces.
Read MoreI remind myself that if this post can create a change for just one person, then it’s a good post and a good day.
One person, not hundreds or thousands or millions.
Read MoreStillness is something I’ve always aimed for, but a practice I find immensely difficult. It’s the same flaw that so often gets me into trouble with the bees.
Read MoreI think we seem to take ourselves – us 7 billion humans now, and the ones in our lineage -- and what we have accomplished so far -- for granted.
I don’t think we think highly of ourselves… as we had a human community scale “we esteem” issue. We would never have required Nike to tell us “Just Do It” if we lived in the space of knowing we can do it.
But maybe worse…
…I think we just take ourselves for granted not recognizing what an amazing species we are.
Read MoreOver the last few months, I’ve had the most interesting experience. It started when I had a colleague that I hadn’t talked to in a couple of years reach out and reconnect.
He had been a senior guy at a big technology firm, and he’d created a series of masterful marketing initiatives that propelled him from manager to VP within the course of 18 months. But he was unhappy. He ignored that empty feeling he had and began to simply work harder and longer to try and duplicate the innovation that had powered his meteoric rise. Within six months, he became convinced that it was internal politics that was stopping him, and he started picking fights with his leadership team. Ultimately, he began taking calls from recruiters, and ultimately took a slightly lower level job at a competitor.
Read MoreI never know what I come for, I just know I must come.
The forest is a painting of patchy yellows and browns, peeking with red, and yet quickly fading with the time of seasons. The messy array of oak, maple and tulip tree leaves on my path is a most beautiful canvas that I brush intuitively with my feet. I often find ourselves in conversation here - the limbs, the bark, the fleeing birds, the silence, and me.
Read MoreOpening my shades first thing in the morning to the sun beaming through my New York windows.
When you smile at a stranger in NYC and they automatically smile back.. always find it funny how contagious happiness actually is.
Read MoreI had a great anti-pet peeve happen today! It was Monday (never a good start in my opinion) and it promised to be a long day with an aggressively overpacked schedule. It was sure to end in missed meetings or a missed flight or at the very least — total, frazzled exhaustion. As I looked at my calendar before bed last night, I chastised myself a bit — “What happened to saying 'no' Lisa?! It’s not possible to do all that in a day!”
Read MoreIt’s a saying most people have probably heard - “correlation does not equal causation.” Just because two things are associated with one another does not imply that one necessarily causes the other. For example, it is well known that how healthy a country is and its GDP are highly correlated - it’s much harder to prove if one necessarily drives the other.
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