Faces, friends, and reconnecting on a weekend trip
My friend Tabitha and I drove to Chicago last weekend to attend the Lead Like Jesus Facilitators’ Reconnect. Part of the program was devoted to the work we did in Uganda last October, so I was invited to attend even though I’m not yet a fully-trained facilitator. We arrived at the hotel around noon, but weren’t able to check in because our room wasn’t ready yet. So we went to the café next door to have some lunch. As we [...]
Dance of Life? It’s the Hokey-Pokey!
The Hokey-Pokey. That’s what I’ve decided is the dance of my life. I’ve never thought about my life as a dance before, and probably never would have if I hadn’t been asked that question during the Table Topics Speech Contest at the Toastmasters District Convention last weekend. The exact question was this: “Life is a dance that you learn as you go along. What dance represents your life?” When you’re asked a Table Topics question, especially in a contest, you [...]
Insights come from tea and cookies and favorite people
I got some great advice and ideas last week, which I plan to incorporate into my business as well as my personal life. These insights came during conversations with two different friends. I was meeting one of them for coffee. The other I spoke to on the phone as we were rescheduling a planned get-together. We had to reschedule it because my friend, who is almost 80, is moving into a new townhouse. She calls it her “penthouse” and is [...]
A Table Topics question revisits resolutions
“What New Year’s Resolution did you make this year, and how long did you keep it?” I was asked that question last week during Table Topics at a Toastmasters meeting I attended. Table Topics is the time, during every Toastmasters meeting, when we practice thinking on our feet and organizing our thoughts on the fly. The Table Topics Master asks a question, and then calls on someone to answer it. That person then has to spend one to two minutes [...]
Washing of feet much more than a symbol
Wash your feet. That’s probably not something you hear or say very often. We wear shoes and socks much of the time, and most of the walking we do is indoors or on paved roads and parking lots. You probably wash your feet when you take your shower every day, but most likely you don’t think about it even then. You just do it. “Washing of the feet,” however, is something many of us think about during the Easter season [...]
Morning sun brings an enlightening experience
I didn’t ask for a message or a miracle, but that’s what I got. I was sitting on the sofa in my family room, doing my prayer exercise. This is a ritual – part prayer, part journal, part asking God for advice – that grew out of a class I once took. Now it’s something I do every morning. The past few weeks had been extremely busy, with the kind of work that made me feel like I was taking [...]