2014 Goals: March Update

So the blogging has fell by the wayside lately... I've also been in Minneapolis for the last two weeks which means I've been able to reflect and share life with people in person. So good.

This week marked the beginning of spring, and it still feels like -14 outside. This week I've fallen on the ice (seems to be a requirement of winter), put my winter jackets and boots away, cut my hair, started spring cleaning...eventually mother nature is going to get the drift, right?

A few really awesome things happened that I didn't even know I wanted to do/experience, but I did.

• Playing backgammon in a bar...without a table...on St. Patrick's Day. Surrounded by Irish music, all the green, and drunken patrons. I lost.
• Dinner in the home of the former US Ambassador to Morocco. Beautiful home, I'll probably never own even a fraction of the house it was... decorated with artwork and things from around the world. We learned all about the wonderful country I'm about to explore. Met some really powerful and incredible people and got to connect with them as people over dinner. Global journalists, charter school pioneers, former ambassador and his incredible wife. So grateful for Sam and Sylvia Kaplan for hosting, and for the generous donors who made the experience possible.

Adventures for 2014

• Trying new forms of moving and exercising

Snow shoeing did not happen, and now the snow has gone away. BUT, I finally bought a Groupon for fitness classes. In the next few months I will try Kettleball and Qoya classes, and get back into Yoga!

• Cooking for one (beyond pasta and eggs)
  
  Still mostly traveling, but the toaster oven has made a few good combinations and I have a few new recipes to try from a potluck at work.

• Practicing self-care
• Drinking more water, still!
• Lots of coffee dates and catching up with friends

• Mixing different friend groups/life circles
• Met up with friends from HS and College in Duluth with Finnegans
• Going to Morocco with former Ecolab employee who is now in the nonprofit sector
• Inviting friends from college and nonprofit worlds to Global Shapers
• Using paid time off
• Took St. Patrick's Day off to volunteer with Finnegans!
• Month of vacation is coming up quickly! Pittsburgh April 4-7 and
• Morocco April 22-May 5.

• Enjoying performance arts
• Peter Pan by Out on a Limb Dance Company 
• Open Mic for local comedy at NE Palace and MN Saloon
• Achieving airline status 

25% of the way there - Morocco is going to get me close to Diamond Status. Delta has been oddly expensive as of late, so I've been doing some travel on other airlines. 

The travel snob in me has now ruled out United for future flights, but I'm appreciating Southwest as my #2 go-to.

• Activating human drives
• Creative Expression is one of the drives - and there was a great point about being present in your spaces (home, work, etc) I think I've done a particularly good job of this. Unfortunately for everyone else, that means I appear very messy but organized in my own way.
• Keeping plants alive
• Work plant - alive and well!
• Home plant - died... sorta. It's gone regardless. RIP.

• Listening to music instead of watching TV

Spotify playlists and Perspective: A Project for the People have been on repeat at home. Good stuff.

• Thinking critically for fun
• Done mostly via coffee dates, delightful conversations
• MH 370 is getting some brain time too. Fascinating.

• Living values through time allocation

Better. Quality time with friends, volunteering, being outside whenever it's sunny and not -14.

It's a Small World After All

I've been fascinated by the inter-connectivity of people for a long time. Growing up in a town of 300 people, everyone is connected (usually by family) to one another. The concept of 6 degrees of separation always confused me, in rural Minnesota, no one is further than 2 it seems. I love the deep sense of community and connection that I grew up around. But I felt a little trapped, and decided to explore the world, and move to Minneapolis for school. Despite only being 90 miles from home, my freshman dorm building would have twice the population of my hometown. It was an exciting adventure, "the cities."

Now, I'm very well aware that Minneapolis is relatively small on the scale of large cities, but at 1000 times the size of my hometown, it was huge to me...at first. Over the years, I've learned that when you're looking for connection (especially with technological advances) the world is much smaller than it seems - no matter how many people live within a particular area. The once giant Minneapolis now feels like home, my city...not everyone knows my name, but I can run into people unexpectedly and make connections all the same. I'm pretty sure that's why I love it so much. I have a fabulous city with delightful coffee shops, theaters, public transit, breweries, parks, and lakes -- and still find the community and relationships I appreciated so much in rural Minnesota.

Fun "small world" connections as of late:

• Nobel Peace Prize Forum - I was on the welcoming committee with Vision, a freshman in college who moved here from Tanzania last August. She's a part of Students for Racial Justice and knows my dear friend Ari who I originally met through STLF. I also saw Allie, who I met a few years prior at Monday Night Dinners hosted by my friends Eric and Tim and have seen periodically over the years.
• Global Shapers hosted a "Meet the Shapers" happy hour last week, and it shouldn't have been any surprise that our circles overlapped with one another - but within 5 minutes of chatting learned that in addition to our mutual connections through Shapers, one attendee works with my first Minneapolis friend Kari... and another played volleyball on the team my mentor Jean coached.

These were the strangers I met and had mutual connections with. Amazing. And wonderful. In addition, in the last couple weeks I have run into friends three times at events we independently attended. And the previously foreign St. Paul Skyway now is full of hellos and smiles shared with acquaintances. Small. World. 

there is just one moon
and one golden sun
and a smile means friendship to everyone
though the mountains divide
and the oceans are wide

it's a small world after all

-Disney's "It's a Small World After All"

Time and Norms

Forewarning - this is a bit more train of thought/need to process out loud but I live by myself so writing is how I do that. Time is a funny thing. It seems like winter has gone on FOREVER... and at the same time, I don't know how it's already March. Norms are the same way. Some changes seem second nature immediately, and others take much longer to become a new default.

Time first - I've been out of college longer than I was in it. Graduation seemed like this giant milestone that I worked towards forever, and yet more time has passed in seemingly less time.

However, in the last 5 years I have:

• had 3 more addresses
• changed careers and companies
• traveled to Sierra Leone
• joined and left 3 committees/boards and joined 3 more
• paid off my student loans
• made a list of 24 things to do before 25 and finished 18 of them
• learned more life lessons and random facts than will ever fit in this post

And norms. I started thinking about this as I was out to dinner with a dear friend who asked, "How's life? Still drinking strictly coffee and Diet Coke?" to which I honestly replied, "Not really!" ... granted most days I do manage a cup of coffee in the morning, I do many things I didn't 5 years ago.

• I own (and wear) scarves and cardigans instead of tshirts every day
• I drink tea and water (this is new in the last 2 months)
• I prefer dresses/skirts to pants
• I own boots that are not snow boots
• I wear my hair down and straight instead of pony tail
• I live alone
• I fly, live in a hotel, and drive a rented car 17-18 weeks a year
• I went from driving 18,000 miles a year to 7,000 (thank you MetroTransit)

Some things never change

• I have a hard time justifying buying lunch and eating out in general (thank you mom and dad)
• I'm the most organized and messy person I know (note: messy, not dirty)
• I'm still a much more pleasant person with a cup of morning coffee
• Hand written cards are still my thing
• I'm a night owl, and not a morning person
• I am textbook oldest child
• I love traveling, and feel claustrophobic if I stay in Minnesota longer than 3-4 months
• I don't like light beer

Rereading this - it seems like less of an epiphany. But it was an a-ha if nothing else... and helped me track progress. As a child you mark time passing with birthdays... and then school years... and eventually graduations. Theoretically a majority of adults mark time passing by their children's birthdays... but I have no children, and want to acknowledge growth that continues to happen.

My Life According to BuzzFeed and Identity

I've always enjoyed self-assessments, or tools and resources that give us a common language to raise understanding of ourselves and others. In college/STLF we used them to better work in teams and understand our differences, valuing the individual contributions of our team/core members. StrengthsFinder, Myers Briggs, True Colors, Love Languages, Leadership Compass...etc. They all (for the most part) have legitimate research and psychology base.

BuzzFeed has recently come out with a whole collection of quizzes lately that give you insight to your personality. The questions are seemingly unrelated, but the outcomes seem to be directionally correct. This is puzzling to me. In any case, according to BuzzFeed I: 

• should have been a Writer.
• would be Norway if I was a European country.
• ideally live in Wisconsin.
• am most similar to Hilary Clinton Amy Poehler of all her roles/characters.
• my major should have been Environmental Scientist.
• am Rachel of all the Friends characters.
• am Robin Scherbatzky on How I Met Your Mother.
• should have a drink with Jennifer Lawrence.
• am Mr. Feeny of Boy Meets World characters (description below).

"It’s the little things in life that you appreciate. You’re extremely important to some people, and what you have to say really resonates with them. Do good. People won’t forget you."

I wish I would have saved all the results descriptions - not that you ever fit perfectly in the descriptions, but each one had something that resonated. Except the Rachel one...that was only about hair. Weird. They all were a little random, but fun to read, and mostly accurate.

It's important to be self aware and have an identity. While I would very much like to drink with Jennifer Lawrence and I've long said Robin Scherbatzky is my TV Show equivalent, I had to think more about identity lately as I was featured on our Global Shapers Minneapolis Hub blog. The previous posts had 3 identity statements as a title, and I followed the trend.

After struggling to figure out my "thing" earlier, I came up with the following:

• Leadership Nerd - I read leadership books for fun, STLF was my first chosen community (outside those given to me at birth and proximity), and I've always been a proud nerd.
• Community Lover - While I've learned to love living alone, I thrive in community - both in groups, but best as a partner. I regularly look for ways to contribute to community and love people in my life.
• Life Adventurer - We live in a great big world, and I look forward to exploring it. Each day. Whether it's a new coffee shop, taking a really long walk, or traveling across the world... I find ways to break up routine. I cringe when things feel comfortable and status quo.

It's not a perfect definition yet, and will probably change in the near future. But hooray for self awareness and intentional reflection on where I'm at and where I'm going.