Browsing Category Desire

The Microphone

Picture this with me: You’re escorted from a posh waiting room down a few nondescript halls to a curtain. Behind it is a dark stage holding only a microphone on a stand in the circle of light cast by spotlights.

Peeking through the curtain— your eyes fighting against the spotlight— you catch a faint glimpse of faces in the crowd. Light reflecting off of someone’s glasses. Small movements here and there.

You pause to listen and hear the gentle murmur and rustle of this audience waiting in anticipation.

How many many people are there? I’m not sure. 400? 5,000? 28,000? The number matters less than their intent, which is to hear what you have to teach them. To learn what you have to say.

They’ve come to hear a short program, only a few sentences in length.

The stagehand escorting you tells you you’re on in 1 minute as the host steps up to the microphone. You hear her begin your introduction.

And now it’s your turn.

You walk bravely and confidently to the mic to say your piece. To speak your truth.

You only have a few sentences. Maybe even just one.

What do you want to say? What do you want these people to hear? They’ve come to hear from you. What is the deep and most real truth you need to share? What do you want them to know, believe, do, hope for, change, fix?

You take a deep breath…

… and begin.

Share your brief words in the comments.

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Cancer, Amputation, and How to Keep Going When Difficulties Arise

The last two weeks have been hard. Hard is an understatement, actually. They’ve been grueling. I’ve felt beyond capacity and pretty empty.

They have been the hardest weeks of the past few years of my life.

A few months ago, my ever-present seven year old red heeler mix companion and side-kick, Lina, started limping.

We rescued Lina from a shelter 6 years ago. I wasn’t sure that I was ready for a dog, but Stacia knew this was the one. She couldn’t have been more right.

Lina has been with us through thick and thin. She’s road tripped across most of the US multiple times, moved houses three times, and always helps us remember to stay in the moment, to get outside, and (of course) to play more.

The limp wouldn’t go away, so we took her to the vet. That appointment turned into a series of appointments and eventually a biopsy. That biopsy came back with worse news than we could have expected— cancer. And further lab work proved it to be a highly aggressive cancer— hemangiosarcoma.

A week and a half ago, we had our first meeting with an animal oncologist. One thing lead to another and we found ourselves faced with hard and expensive choices: radiation, amputation, and/or chemo.

The vet encouraged us to amputate her leg — where the mass had grown in order to slow the spread. The good news was that the cancer currently had only gathered in her leg. The bad news was that this kind of cancer will haunt her for the rest of her life.

There was no good decision and yet we had to make a choice.

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Meaning of passion

The Meaning of Passion: the GoldieBlox Story

Are you familiar with the toy Goldieblox yet? It’s a toy intended for girls that combines stories with building things. The goal is to helps young girls develop skills in engineering and physics.

It was funded nearly twice over on kickstarter a while back and has continued to grow and expand.

The kickstarter video continues to stick with me.

These are the first lines: “Hi. My name is Debbie. I’m an engeneer from Stanford and I was always bothered by how few women there were in my program, so I decided to do something about it.”

She goes on to tell of how as a child she never really played with toys that encouraged building things. Building toys were “boy toys”, so no one thought to get them for her.

Then she talks about putting all of her resources and savings into creating Goldieblox…

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