SHIFT HAPPENS!

Hi Friend

Here I am looking at the same blank Evernote screen I've looked at for almost 10 years. I just start writing you and in a little while (or sometimes a long while) this page will be filled up. I started a new notebook - SHIFTED Weekly - to keep these letters to you organized. I'm super grateful you are spending your time reading it. I hope my words provoke an unthought thought.

This week the new website launched with great fanfare. Well, I sent an email, shot a video and posted on social media. I guess that's actually normal stuff. I've gotten lots of great feedback. It is pretty amazing because people have said about it EXACTLY what I told the designer I wanted the response to be. She did an excellent job. I'm satisfied.

I've also gotten a few suggestions, which I'm grateful for. Most of them have been about the navigation bar. I chose to use non-standard words - from a professional speakers point of view - and when others in my business go there, they're aghast at the friction I've created. They want me to succeed, so they all suggest the same thing - Do what everyone else does. I'm trying.

I'm working on my own mindshift. As I've mentioned before, I'm allergic to normalcy. It's something I hold sacred as part of my identity. One of my greatest fears is being just like everyone else. From my peers, it sounds like it hinders me in the marketplace, yet from my clients it is what makes me appealing. Both are true.

"PLAY THE GAME"

Last year a speaker friend of mine said that phrase to me. Monica and I talked about it this week. It's this fine line of staying true to ourselves, understanding what others are looking for and doing both genuinely. It creates a healthy tension. At the extremes it's people pleasing or anti-social behaviors. The "game" exists in both our personal and professional lives.

Are you good at the game? Which way do you tend to lean? Are you conscious of playing it?

I really have three hopes for this letter. The first I mentioned earlier - that you would think a thought you haven't thought before. It's like a new star being born. Once it happens, your universe is never the same. I read books with the anticipation I'll experience that sensation.

My second hope is that that thought will cause you to act in a new way. Life is one big experiment. We're all practicing it while performing it, simultaneously. Wouldn't it be something if every week we experienced something we hadn't the previous? Eleanor Roosevelt suggested doing something that scares us once a day. I'm saying, heck if once a week we did something that was just a first for us, THAT would make life surprisingly interesting. Even if the thing doesn't turn out well.

My third desire for you is that you too would start taking time to reflect on the week you just lived. The process of considering some of the details from the week and letting a lesson emerge from them, is transformational. I've learned so much from myself, simply by taking this weekly time to reflect on what transpired. Big insights are hidden in small moments.

Building the website generated a new vocabulary for me. I spent way too much time working on words to find an accurate articulation of what I'm doing and how I'm serving humanity. From it came the realization that what I do and am passionate about, is challenging people to think just a bit different: SHIFTing perspectives to see from a new vantage point. That's the reason this letter's name changed.

Everyday the gift of life invites us to grow, love and experience it. We can get stuck in thinking patterns that cause us to miss the beauty. I'm hopeful my words will provoke you to look anew. Shift happens - we may as well be intentional about it!

I would love for you to share a shift with me that you're attempting or incorporating into your life this week.