The flip side
Just loved Tribes by Seth Godin. One of my favorite passages:
It’s four a.m. and I can’t sleep. So I’m sitting in the lobby of a hotel in Jamaica, checking my email.
A couple walks by, obviously on their way to bed, having pushed the idea of vacation a little too hard. The woman looks over to me, and, in a harsh whisper a little quieter than a yell, says to her friend, “Isn’t that sad? That guy comes here on vacation and he’s stuck checking his email. He can’t even enjoy his two weeks off.”
I think the real question — the one they probably wouldn’t want to answer — was, “Isn’t it sad that we have a job where we spend two weeks avoiding the stuff we have to do fifty weeks a year?”
It took me a long time to figure out why I was so happy to be checking my email in the middle of the night. It had to do with passion. Other than sleeping, there was nothing I’d rather have been doing in that moment — because I’m lucky enough to have a job where I get to make change happen.
Amen, Seth. Amen.
Here’s Stacy London …
A year after a terrific interview with stylist Stacy London for Game Plan last spring, I checked in for some more wisdom this week from the co-host of TLC’s What Not To Wear. The makeover show begins its seventh season tonight and while I’m looking forward to that, it was a golden opportunity to get some style thoughts from London that reflect our economic times.
As interviews go, this one was on my list of faves. London expresses with enthusiasm and frankness and is up for anything. Stay tuned for a future column with an artistic and global bent, but in the meantime here’s Stacy London on Style and the Economy.
Rethinking legacy
I don’t know which part of me — the writer or the life coach — derived more joy from my conversation with social worker Sandy Meyers and teacher Sherman Taishoff about the late Beatrice Taishoff’s ethical will. We conversed around a table at Jewish Home Lifecare in the Bronx and the result was a Game Plan column called Of Ethical Wills and Legacy. At this time in our nation, it feels particularly poignant to think about leaving behind a document that expresses our values.
Journalism
So many wonderful things I could say about Steve Lopez’s book, The Soloist, but I am still processing it for a variety of reasons. Read it in a day, just couldn’t stop turning the pages.
Here’s a favorite passage, but it requires some set-up. Lopez is a Los Angeles Times columnist who has written about and befriended Nathanial, a homeless man who is a gifted musician. He writes:
Among my many new pen pals is Stella March, the mother of a son with schizophrenia, who is roughly Nathaniel’s age … March writes me encouraging notes about Nathaniel and my efforts on his behalf, but seldom offers specific advice, although she is the one who has taught me Nathaniel is not a mentally ill musician, as I’ve been referring to him, but a musician with mental illness. It’s a subtle but significant difference, recognizing the person before the condition.
Vision board makeover
I began a whole new vision board this weekend and I’m so excited about it. What had begun as sort of a collage had grown into a visually stimulating, but unfocused array of images. I took that one down, saved a few of its key pieces, and created a new one using one of those French-style note boards with satin ribbons. It contains a few specific groupings to cover different areas of my life.
One of the satisfying things about dismantling the old one was seeing how many of those things I had already manifested in my life.
Working it …
Young energy
I must confess that I didn’t know what to expect, maturity-wise, from 20-year-old singer Alex Young when we met for an interview earlier this week. But for the most part, I felt like I was talking to someone ageless. Young has taken on the cause of conflict-free diamonds and her debut CD called Amazing is being released next month. She can count me in her corner.
Check out our conversation at An Up-and-Coming Artist with a Cause.
And, by the way, she has opened up a can of worms for this writer, who was never particularly drawn to diamonds before. Young’s were gorgeous, but in a down-to-earth way. Understated glamour. Oh baby.
An expanse
Love when the weekend lies in front of me and only part of it is planned. That means possibility with a capital ‘P’ for the rest.
Yes.
Design and life
I meet an awful lot of kindred spirits through my role as a columnist and this week’s Game Plan certainly reflects that. It’s a conversation with designer Stephen Saint-Onge, whose latest gig (to add to TLC, ESPN, The View, Oprah …) is with Better Homes and Gardens. It’s all in Improve Your Home, Improve Your Life?
Leading to a kicker
New York Times columnist David Brooks gives an interesting analysis of research on the traits of CEOs in his column today called In Praise of Dullness. The last paragraph is a zinger at the Obama administration that seemingly comes out of nowhere. Startling for me as a reader (part of the plan, I suppose), quizzical for me as a writer (why not make that point higher in the piece?). The comments section alone is worth the read.
Coming clean, publicly
A sad, refreshing, brave account of The New York Times economics reporter Edmund L. Andrews’ spiral into debt via magical thinking in My Personal Credit Crisis.
