I love this woman’s approach to consulting! Pamela Slim writes the Escape from Cubicle Nation blog (introduced here.)

This is what caught my eye in her post yesterday:
Your goal as a consultant is to work your way out of a job.

Her questions following this statement are excellent examples of real service. They focus on causes, not symptoms. Now that’s where we’ll find sustainability!

This morning at Toastmasters, two things stood out to me:
1. A reminder of important planning and preparation are.
2. How much I’ve taken these things for granted with our Toastmasters group.

In the Inc magazine article I read yesterday, the concept that resourcefulness is more important than resources was attributed to Tony Robbins.

Was that blatant this morning! Several people made a bunch of excuses explaining why they didn’t know what to do about this, or that they weren’t prepared for that, and so on. There are tons of resources available before the meeting, from people with decades of experience, to assigned mentors, to manuals provided by Toastmasters International to help us with our jobs. (Resources don’t do much good when they aren’t used.) There really wasn’t any reason for someone to not be ready. I thought it was interesting, considering how seldom this happens in our meetings, that it came up for three different people this morning.

That said, it is a totally volunteer program meant to be a training ground for developing public speaking a leadership skills. That we are, normally, very prepared group–OR can ad lib practically seamlessly when not prepared–made this morning’s glitch’s stand out uncharacteristically.

Being one who runs meetings, workshops, and I’ll throw working with clients in this same bag, it was such a great reminder of the importance of preparation!! Being “on the ball” does wonders for people’s impression of whether I’m competent or not.

Obviously, life happens, we’re human, and we make mistakes. This is where the resourcefulness comes in. How can I fulfill my duty with as little interruption to the group as possible? With focus on the purpose of the activity (and not on my own personal issues), I’ll likely be able to come up with some solution that will enable the momentum of the activity to keep going.

Dessert at the Chinese restaurant is usually my favorite part of the meal. Just as many kids in the inner city have no idea where spinach comes from, as a kid, I had no idea where fortune cookies came from. They were so wise, getting the right fortunes to the right people, they must have come from some magical cookie factory where humans feared to tread.

My faith wavered when winning lottery numbers began showing up on the back of the little message papers. (Little did I know that the lottery traces all the way back to the Han Dynasty between 205 and 187 B.C.)

Nowadays, I still crack open the cookie with a little thrill of anticipation, wondering what words will guide my destiny–for the next 5 minutes until we leave the restaurant, in any case.

Not long after dedicating my life to Project Simplify, I received this one (Since when do they put smiley faces on them?) :

I brought this one home and stored it in some incredibly secure place, a place where one would naturally think to store fortune cookie fortunes from long forgotten Chinese restaurant dinners. So secure that I forgot all about it until I happened to run across it this morning. So here it is for the duration. At least I know where to look for it =)

The theme of the week is “space”. Last night at class (Zen and the Art of Comedy Improv), our teacher asked us what we see when we look up at the sky at night. “Lights” “Stars” “Satellites” “Constellations” were some of the answers.

“What about space?” he responded. “Everything is suspended in space. Space is the canvas without which we wouldn’t exist.” How we move within this space is up to us–our imagination, our creativity, our ability to be in the Now.

Then tonight at the Gather the Women meditation circle led by Patt Lind-Kyle, we were led through an exercise calling attention to the space around and between each of us. “Try this throughout the day,” she invited us. “When talking with another person, experience the space between you rather than focus on them as an object. See how you remain more centered. You’ll feel your heart more than your head.”

When I got home I looked up in the sky. We have one of those clear nights where you can actually see the blaze of the Milky Way brushed across the darkness. Incomprehensible to consider how much space is actually between each of those lights dotting the seemingly 2-D canvas.

Looking up, I remembered asking a few weeks ago (somewhat ironically), “Where is God in Cyberspace?” When the other person immediately dismissed the notion that this was even a possibility, the thought popped in my head that God is in the relationships between all the people making sincere connections through the web. That’s where the unity forms, where the gratitude glows, where magic happens–in the space in between.

Once upstairs, that glow-y, open feeling sank as my eyes focused on the explosion of papers on desk, chair, floor–areas that had been totally clear at noon today. It only took 15 minutes to reclaim the surfaces, but in those 15 minutes, my attention reverted back to the focused, head-based mode that had been blissfully forgotten at the meditation circle.

Music doesn’t make sense without space between notes. Thoughts don’t make sense without space between words.

There is a connection between space and the quality of our experience that is worth exploring.

Several years ago when studying Italian to prepare for a year abroad in college, we got to the national pastime of the country I’d be visiting–Italy.

The word that corresponds to “fans” is tifosi. I remember being a little surprised that the word had a connotation of being frenzied, die-hard fans passionately attending to their teams. (I didn’t realize at the time that “fans” in English is short for “fanatics”). Our casual use of the word is fairly benign and used for all kinds of uses off the ball field.

As the Italian version has stuck in my head all these years, I was a little surprised to read Robert Middleton’s ezine over the past year talking about “raving fans” as a good thing. His Sept. 19 ezine article, for example, was entitled, “How being outnumbered will gain you raving fans.”

I mean, if “fans” is short for “fanatics” then “raving fans” sound like they should be foaming at the mouth or something. However, I don’t think that’s what he means :-)

The other day, walking home from a writing session at my preferred cafe of the month (name withheld for small town reasons), I ran into writing coach and friend, Nancy Shanteau. I complained (yes, complained) that even though I brought my own 10 oz mug to the cafe (a typical small would be 12 oz) the barista still managed to make it super milky.

My words were something like, “Where is the consistency! The ambiance of the place is great, the baristas are attentive and nice, now if they only would get consistent in making their espresso drinks, I’d be a raving fan!”

Hmm, so maybe the raving fan does mean a foaming fanatic in this case (Yes, I take my latte’s seriously and since I’m off the double shot kick, I’m super sensitive to too much milk!).

Nancy, being a very good coach, turned my potentially destructive passion about the subject into a positive, creative force by saying, “sounds like a blog post!” Smart woman, she.

Which brings us to the moral of the story. Us service providers want positive, raving fans for our services and business. One of the ways this will occur is by consistently giving top quality service and results to clients! :-)

The theme of the week around here has been stuff, physical stuff. The things on the desk, in the closet, in the trunk of the car, on the kitchen counter, under the kitchen sink. Those things. This week’s newsletter (coming soon!) addresses identifying and clearing out the stuff that has become dead weight.

I’m still riding the afterburn from half a week at Burningman where stuff was and was not at a bare minimum. We carried our own water for drinking, cooking and showering which would imply bare, and we had an air mattress in the tent (luxury for this girl!) We brought just enough clothes for the days there and brought costumes to play it up and have fun. (btw: some photos here)
A winged angel on a cauldron of books.
Photo credit: Mark Einert.
What I see from this gets right to the heart of simplifying, i.e. know what’s important to you, make sure you’ve got all the tools and time to do it in the way you want to.
This tea house was made of found materials and food packaging.
Photo credit: Mark Einert.

Along these lines, Zen Habits blogger Leo Babauta recently wrote about “How much is enough?“. Great question. He puts it in terms of “what makes you happy? comfortable? what helps you thrive?

I like that context–a simple way of figuring out what’s important to you–that which makes your heart expand, your mouth smile, your belly chuckle. Get in touch with that glow of feeling alive. What makes the glow grow…?

The afterburn is what someone who goes to Burningman experiences upon re-entry to “regular” society. Funny, when out on the desert with 45,000+ other costumed, dancing, frolicking people that feels completely normal. I mean, why wouldn’t we have art installations everywhere you turn? Why not have art cars inviting impromptu dance parties cruising the streets? Why not dress up in costumes to suit your mood? Because we have work to do! We have serious things to take care of! You can’t run around like that all the time!

Welllllll, psshhaawww! Now that I’m home, I can feel that my fun quotient and desires to celebrate life have increased quite significantly. Am I going to leave Project Simplify in the dust and go join a roving band of Burners? No! I will, however, bring more levity and joy to my clients. =)

If reading this blog for the first time, you may be wondering what in the world I’m talking about. In a nutshell, I just got back from Burningman, “the cultural phenomenon/event that becomes Nevada’s 6th largest city for one week around Labor Day weekend each year” (from newsletter issue #45). Jill Bauerle of The Union did a great job capturing much of the essence of the event from a virgin burner point of view in her blog entries.

The entire experience has only increased my understanding of why it is important to simplify and be organized. We each have valuable contributions and skills to share with our blood and chosen families, near and far friends & local and global communities. However, sacrificing the individual to the bigger picture denies the validity of the individual’s experience. We each need time to explore the yummy expressions our souls want to sing–the delicate voices so easily snuffed out by stress, crises-management, and fear. This is why we want our lives manageable–for more play, joy, and celebration!