Tag: personal growth

Holiday Invention #1 – Big Walk Day

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My life partner, Kurt, and I are long distance by choice (our podcast on this, Apartners, will be launching in December or January – eek – stay tuned!). One of my favorite things about our relationship of over twelve years is that we have made up a bunch of holidays that we celebrate every year. I’m sure that plenty of couples, and probably especially those with children, have special rituals and traditions that they do regularly. It’s my observation, though, that these are typically associated with traditional holidays or birthdays. On the other hand, many of ours are just made up completely independent of those things and designed in part to be sources of anticipation. I wanted to share a few of ours in case they may be a springboard of inspiration.  This month I am going to highlight one of my favorites:  Big Walk Day.

 

Kurt and I both love to walk. We may be just a bit obsessed with our step goals (ok, by we I really mean me). We also are very fortunate and privileged to be able to travel fairly regularly, and firmly believe that walking around a new place is the best way to enjoy it. Big Walk Day actually was sort of invented by accident. Kurt had an opportunity to teach a course in the summers in Honolulu for a few years, and one day ago we decided to walk from our friend’s condo where we were staying to downtown rather than hopping on the bus. It was a beautiful day and we just kept wandering around, and we realized at some point that we’d probably end up with over 30,000 steps that day. We patted ourselves on the back for this over cocktails and snacks, and we decided then and there that the following year we’d go for 40,000: Big Walk Day was born.

 

This quickly became a much-anticipated holiday that still continues. It happens in the summer, and we’ve done it so far in Hawaii, Memphis, and New Orleans. It involves setting a step goal given our current physical states (one year we took it a bit too far and I got a little sick, likely from dehydration; lesson learned and we no longer try to beat the top time each year and I’ve doubled down on the water). Then, Kurt maps out a general route that should get us back to our starting point about the point we should be reaching that step goal, give or take.  To put a typical goal in perspective, we usually go around 50K steps, which is over 20 miles, and do it over the course of a 12-14 hour day.

 

For any of you thinking this is a big workout, health-focused thing, let me disabuse you of that idea!  Big Walk Day includes a big breakfast out, coffee and treats, lunch, beer, and dinner. Ok, sometimes more beer in between. We always have a plan about when the next stop will be – some of the stretches are longer than others, and we make an unplanned stop if we need a rest.  We take lots of photos (and post a selfie at every 10K steps on social media – shown above is us mid-walk one year). We each plan out topics to talk about, but we also have some really random and often funny conversations prompted by things we see. We are also comfortable with long stretches of silence, just focused on being where we are and keeping moving.

 

I think there are a lot of different reasons why Big Walk Day is one of our favorite days of the year, and several of them tie into themes I’ve written about here in Demand the Shimmer in the past.  First, of course, it is a ritual, and there are so many satisfying elements of rituals in our life (I wrote about Rituals vs. Routines in one of my first Demand the Shimmer blog posts).   

 

Anticipation is such an underappreciated emotion, and it’s so important to always have things (in the day, the next week, the month, the year) that you are really looking forward to.  We don’t celebrate Big Walk Day on the same day each year, but it’s almost always in the summer.  When we do it in a place we’ve done it before, we make sure to include some of our favorite spots (big shout out to Bogart’s Café in Waikiki and their spectacular Mama’s Fried Rice – breakfast of champions!). We also try to add at least one stop we’ve never been to before to be able to look forward to new discoveries that may or may not eventually become favorites. Because Kurt and I live apart, planning when and where we will be together in the course of a year is a regular part of our relationship, and during the course of this we can generally get a sense of when Big Walk Day will be and start to get excited about it.

 

Setting goals as a couple (or as a family, or a pair of friends) is a great connection builder.  Breaking out of the habits of the things you typically do together on a day off helps to see one another through fresh eyes, and accomplishing something moderately challenging together and celebrating the win is pretty exhilarating. There is also something magical about literally falling in sync with other people by matching their pace and sharing repeated movements while experiencing the same sights and sounds.

 

If Big Walk Day sounds intriguing to you, please make it your holiday too! But if walking isn’t something you are able to or are interested in doing, what type of day-long ritual can you create – with a partner, family, friends, or on your own?  How can you introduce the elements of anticipation, detail planning, and a moderate challenge of some sort?  Is there a time of year you think you get in a rut that this could spark you out of? 

 

Happy Holiday!

 

 

 

Joy Elixir

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Recently I was wandering around a craft store, and being a sucker for colored paper of all kinds, I spotted on one of those little hanging racks on the end of an aisle a smallish pad of thick colored paper, maybe about 3 X 5.  It reminded me at the time of a prescription pad (is that still a thing?).  I wasn’t sure what I’d do with it but I was sure it was supposed to come home with me.

 

Later in the week I heard Gretchen Rubin on her Happier podcast talking about an Audio Apothecary – essentially a playlist to lift your mood.  That word “apothecary” really appealed to me.  Still later, the word “alchemy” popped up in two very different things I was reading.  Finally, when I was feeling a little overwhelmed from some work issues mostly out of my control and journaling to try to work through some stuff, it all kind of came together.  I needed to write a prescription for myself to lift me out of my stuck place  But, prescription sounded a bit too sterile and pharmaceutical, so I thought perhaps I needed an elixir.  Or maybe a spell?  I’m still deciding which I like better. Either way, the plan was to craft my own apothecary to give myself a boost of Demand the Shimmer magic.

 

I grabbed that colored paper pad and wrote myself a spell.  It included things to do, ways to breathe and move, songs to hear, things to consume, things to say.  Since then, I have made one for bravery (something I really needed to tap more into), sleep, energy, transitioning into vacation mode, and transitioning back to home. 

 

I talk a lot about ritual in these blogs, and this overlaps with ritual in some ways, but I think it’s a little different in that these are really quick to do, a bit silly, and have this tongue-in-cheek nod to magic and playfulness.  

 

I often find that my social-scientist brain and my joyful-goofball spirit to get into tussles with one another.  In fact, that was one of the reasons it took me a couple of years to create this blog and then five years to go from first publishing it to finally telling people about it.  A lot of this stuff I come up with when I’m wearing my Demand the Shimmer hat seems at first at odds with what I know about researching and testing happiness interventions as a scientist.  But are they really so disparate?

 

Maybe not. Here’s what I’m thinking:

 

  • I really enjoyed reading Gretchen Rubin’s book Life in Five Senses last year, and have been working on ways of both noticing how I use all my senses each day and trying to purposefully use them more. She discusses several sources of research on these benefits. An older and gorgeously written book about the senses is Diane Ackerman’s A Natural History of the Senses.  My elixirs utilize a multitude of senses.

 

  • Even though I know I the particular combination of things I’m doing/hearing/consuming etc. is just something I made up, (a) the individual things range from harmless/enjoyable to evidence-based efficacious (e.g., breathing exercises), and (b) placebos can have real effects in some cases if you choose to believe they will work.

 

  • There is a growing body of research on the many benefits of play for adults in a variety of disciplines, and several practical books on introducing more play into your life. A favorite of mine is an interactive workbook I received as a gift one year; it’s called Play: Ideas, Exercises, and Little Ways to Add More Fun to Everyday by M.H. Clark.  To me, making up magical spells absolutely fits the bill of playfulness.

 

  • These spells are essentially a checklist; accomplishing an entire checklist is one mechanism for producing feelings of efficacy and accomplishment in many people, me included. It has been pointed out to me that my name is even List if you change one letter!

 

 

Okay, if that all sold you on this – would you like to create your own apothecary?  Or maybe just try one spell/elixir?  Here are some steps to get you started:

 

  • First, think of a state you would like to create. Is it sleep, energy, joy, something else?

 

  • Next, think about ways to use at least 3-4, but ideally all five, of your main senses in a way that typically helps with that state. For example, what sounds would be helpful?  What could you touch or feel or how could you move to make that more available to you?

 

  • Add some element of whimsy.

 

  • I have found I like to end it with saying something out loud – it sort of acts as an affirmation. Yes, people make fun of those, but check out Jon Acuff’s book Soundtracks for a hot take on affirmations. The speaking out loud also seems to make it more like a Hogwarts-esque spell.  No wand though. Yet.

 

 

Joy

New ritual: ITL

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Do you ever just have the feeling that there are things weighing on you, but you can’t quite pinpoint what they are? It’s like this little niggling poke now and then, but when you turn where the poke seemed to come from, the source doesn’t quite come into focus.  It’s not major anxiety, it’s just something underneath the current that keeps you from really fully being present where you are and feeling as energetic as you could.

 

After a slew of social events, a weekend was on the horizon with no plans. Not a one.  And I decided rather than to just catch up on errands or cleaning, or even try to do some extra reading or organizing projects – things that for me are soothing and self-caring – I would design a specific retreat day that would allow me to try to uncover all of the things in my life that were lurking in the shadows.  I realized that bringing these things into the light, and more importantly planning an action step around each of them, would make them far less scary. Consequently, I’d be less likely to be looking over my shoulder when I’m trying to fully live the life in front of me.

 

Here’s what I did.  This was a stay-at-home retreat (although different in focus and scope than my regular QTR retreat I’ve described before; you can find a link to my guide for Quarterly At-Home Retreats here if you are interested in that process). The most important thing with any stay-at-home retreat is to have the day to yourself without interruptions. I know that’s easier said than done for some.  I’d suggest at a minimum you do this somewhere you can be uninterrupted except for an emergency, and you keep any notifications off. 

 

Because you are going to need your bravery today to face uncomfortable tasks, conversations, changes, etc., arm yourself with intense comfort.  Plan ahead by thinking of what really brings you comfort using all your senses and gather whatever you think will be soothing.  I was in the coziest of clothes, not one thing itchy or tight.  I had warm lighting, delicious drinks and food all day (but nothing requiring any fuss or distraction), and classical music in the background. 

 

Although I normally don’t combine work retreats and nonwork retreats into one – I hold fast to my strong boundaries between these realms – in this case I decided I needed to examine aspects of my whole life to understand fully where my blindspots were.  I created a OneNote project for this; I am as a rule more of a paper journal person, but the speed at which I could type out insights appealed to me for this, before I lost the glimpse of whatever started coming up.  I started with a freewrite just to get the juices flowing.  Then, I wrote down various categories of home and life and asked myself “what am I pretending isn’t a problem here?”  It was kind of like coaxing a cat out from under the bed; I just kept looking deeper until I saw it there looking back at me. 

 

I can’t pretend that I didn’t at all have an “ugh” feeling looking at this list when I finally herded all these cats, but it was accompanied by a feeling of pride and bravery for taking my head out of the sand.  It also felt like a really good start, and starting is almost always the hardest part. Once that first stage was completed, I did celebrate that accomplishment, but the process couldn’t end there. What I needed was the most concrete, doable action step I could come up with for each challenge. My rules were: (a) I had to be able to do it in the next 48 hours (and preferably some of them immediately doable), (b) the step would take no longer than 15 minutes to accomplish, and (c) it would be something I knew how to do and had the power to do without any additional resources.  I also planned out some fun little rewards for achieving each of these first steps and for planning the next several steps once the first ones were completed.

 

When looking back at the details of this day to write this blog, I’m happy to say that I discovered almost all of these issues have been completely resolved or have lost their power to rattle me.  Doing this one time of course hasn’t prevented me from burying things that I’m not sure how to approach and then letting inadvertently giving them the power to morph into monsters.  My head still goes into the sand sometimes, and I recognize it when that niggling starts again, or when I feel myself more distracted or lower energy than normal.  But now I know what to do, and you do too. ITL: Into the light.

 

 

 

 

Savor Watching

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It’s pretty typical to have someone ask you what you’re binge-watching, but you never hear people ask about savor-watching.  I am a savor-watcher.  I think in part it might stem from my love of a ritual. I used to love looking forward to Mad Men on Sunday nights – and for y’all who are my age-ish, who can forget Must-See Thursdays on NBC?  I still remember counting down ‘til Saturday night and the Love Boat as a kid (I realllllly wanted to be Julie McCoy when I grew up). 

 

Watching a bunch of episodes in a row of a show doesn’t really appeal to me. In fact, these days I find I can’t even watch a whole episode of a show at a time – I’ll often spread the one episode out over a couple times in the week, or even across weeks.  That way I can spend time with Midge Maisel and Jonathan Van Ness and Mr. Kim and Emily Cooper for a much longer stretch of my life than I would have otherwise.  In between, I can anticipate.

 

I think anticipation is one of the most underrated emotions, but more on that coming soon about that with my ode to the long distance relationship. Stay tuned!

 

Back to savor-watching. I think it’s part of an obsession I’ve been having with the idea of savoring as a key component of a joyful life.  Research in the field of positive psychology has seen an uptick in scientific interest in the effects of efforts to increase people’s savoring in various aspects of their lives.

 

Proponents of positive psychology recognize that while it is really important to help people cope with negative experiences and states, that is just one side of the coin. It is also vital help people who are doing just fine go from fine to thriving and flourishing.  This is definitely on brand with Demand the Shimmer. One of the researchers lighting the path toward more scientific work on savoring is Dr. Fred Bryant from Loyola University in Chicago.  He and his colleagues recognized that just as people can learn to proactively cope with negative stuff, they should also be able to proactively increase their joy in reaction to positive stuff.  Savoring is the practice of doing just that, and it can involve the whole process of anticipating something awesome, mindfully experiencing the moment of awesomeness, and actively practicing reminiscing about the awesomeness. 

 

Some other savoring practices I’ve been trying to put into place this summer include:

 

  • Taking the last meal of a vacation or the last leg of a road trip to review the whole thing event-by-event with whomever I am with to relive all the fun memories again. Typically, different people will have had different little memories stick, so sharing expands everyone’s experience.  And, If I do a daytrip alone, I’ll actually talk the details out loud or write them down so I can relive them before the memories fade.

 

  • If I see something beautiful or funny or interesting, like most of us I am quick to snap a photo, but I try to stop and really look carefully and savor the moment rather than count on a pic I may never return to.

 

  • This one might sound a bit weird, but when I have a feeling of joy or happiness come over me, I try to stop and say (out loud, even if I’m alone) “I am so happy.” Noting happiness and sitting with it for a few extra beats helps to expand it.

 

  • Keeping a one-line-a-day journal where the one line or phrase is the most fun moment of the day. Even a crappy day often has at least a moment of humor, connection, or beauty.

 

Although savor-watching and some of these other savoring practices come pretty naturally to me, I really struggle with the type of savoring people typically think of first – eating slowly and savoring food.  I am and have always been a fast eater, as much as I try to slow down.  In fact, I’m writing this at a coffee shop and I just got to the last bite of a delicious pan au chocolate before realizing I had finished it mindlessly.  I am going to double down the efforts on this; I know it will be worth it.

 

What will you try to savor?

 

 

Cheers,

Lisa

 

 

 

 

This Time

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This Time

August 5, 2023

 

“The treasures that are hidden inside you are hoping you’ll say yes.” – Elizabeth Gilbert, Big Magic

 

I launched this website, this blog, my products, on my 50th birthday – August 5, 2018.  I had the idea hidden inside me for some time, and finally pledged they’d see the light of day when I turned 50.  The morning of my birthday, it went out into the world – not with a bang, but with an almost incomprehensible whisper.  I had the courage to get it out there, but not to share it, especially not with people who knew me (save for my partner, who supports me fully in everything).  What if they thought it was dumb?  Unprofessional?  Silly?  Self-indulgent?  Unsubstantiated musings from a social scientist who was supposed to always and only put forth the products of empirical evidence?

So there it sat, in the shadows. I would write blogs when inspired and post them.  I updated the look of the website and added a few features to make it easier to navigate for the zero people who were navigating it. Occasionally I would drum up the courage to share with an online group where I didn’t know anyone well.  I finally shared with my childhood best friend and one other professional friend who I was mentoring.  My partner shared with a few people he encountered whom he thought it would benefit.  It was always well-received, but I still couldn’t get past those pesky what ifs. 

A lot has happened in my life in the last five years. My beloved Mama who was part of my everyday life passed away in her 90s.  I hit menopause; or rather, it hit me.  Daily. With buckets of fire.  Oh, yeah – there was a pandemic.  On the wonderful side, I have had opportunities to go back many times to places where younger me lived and learned and grew – the Boston suburbs and New Orleans. Seeing these places now through my more creased eyes, or through my readers if looking close up, has helped me realize both how far I’ve come in some ways and how fundamentally me I remain in others. 

I spent a little time today thinking about how women my age are saying more and more often that they no longer have any fucks to give.  When I first heard that expression years ago, I thought it was hilarious, but lately when I’m supposed to feel that way, I’ve found myself feeling sort of cringy with that notion though I wasn’t sure why. It’s not the profanity – that part I still find hilarious.  I think it’s because it just seems so angry, which is just not my general nature.  It implies a clause that precedes it that is filled with frustration…like “that’s the last straw, I no longer have any fucks to give…” or “I am done with all you people, I no longer have any fucks to give…”. I want to keep caring; I kind of want to care more.  But I want to care differently.  Not about those what ifs. I don’t want to care about the imagined judgments of people who don’t have my best interests at heart.  But I do want people to see the everyday joys that they are likely walking right past.  I want people to be even just a little happier, to have a tiny bit more fun despite the big and small frustrations in the world. To craft their days to maximize the good, for themselves and for others. 

And so that takes me back around to Demand the Shimmer.  So here I am again.  Five years later. This time, it’s on.

Demanding the Shimmer During a Pandemic: Frivolous or Vital?

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I write this in August of 2020, while we are well into the COVID-19 global pandemic.  I started writing it in April while many parts of the world were on stay-at-home orders for all but essential workers (and I fear we may go back to that).  So many people have been touched directly by the virus.  Many others still are living in fear of the physical and economic survival of themselves and their loved ones. 

 

The Demand the Shimmer philosophy calls for people not to settle for “meh” and to make small tweaks in their daily activities to turn day-to-day life into something to celebrate.  Admittedly, as I crafted this road map for daily living over the years, the inconvenient ideas of “social distancing” and “sheltering in place” – and of course the much scarier ideas of widespread death and lasting economic turmoil – never crossed my mind.  Yes, I was aware that each of us are in different places in our lives and facing different demons; this means that Demand the Shimmer would manifest differently for everyone.  I still believed that anyone could find the approach useful in their quest for day-to-day happiness.  But, given the sheer enormity of what’s happening now, is this all just sort of frivolous?

 

I had planned to write a new blog in March (now I can’t even remember about what); when fear of the pandemic was all growing exponentially by the day, my first thought was to just stop.  Maybe just stop the whole thing – this whole philosophy or brand or whatever you want to call it – before it even really gets off the ground.  It’s just a fluffy little thing; meaningless in the face of what is really needed right now.  Right?

 

But as the weeks passed, I started to change my tune.  The mundane of day-to-day living is all many of us really have right now.  It’s the tiny things in your day – the bits of beauty and joy and fun that you find and choose to appreciate – that’s what will get us through this strange time.  And sharing our ideas of how to do that is a gift we can all give each other right now.

 

And then it was Memorial Day, and the world shifted again.  We seem to be at a new crossroads in the fight for social justice and against systemic racism.  Any of you who have been educating yourselves further will understand that true change will require people to become really uncomfortable. I believe that.  Platitudes about “good vibes only” that we see in memes and t-shirts may inadvertently serve to minimize the important work that needs to be done.  I’m now spending many of my daily walks this summer struggling with whether Demand the Shimmer smacks of toxic positivity.

 

I started this website and these blogs almost two years ago, and as I write this still hardly anyone knows about it, save a few people I chose to tell (after fighting off the butterflies) and anyone who randomly stumbled on it.  I was ready to bring this into the world on the edge of turning fifty – it was something I wanted to do for years and I set that as my goal.  And then I launched – I pressed the button and birthed demandtheshimmer.com.  And then I paused. And then I just got cold feet about sharing my ideas and products and coaching. 

 

I learned recently that one of the reasons people fear putting their dreams in the world is that they feel they can’t because they lack a degree.  Oddly, my PhD is one of the things that has held me back.  I am supposed to be a serious social scientist, after all.  I am supposed to only tout ideas drawn from rigorous empirical testing.  And in my day job, as a professor and researcher, that’s what I do.  But when I don’t have my scientist hat on, I spend a lot of my time crafting a life from ideas I pick up not only from science, but from self-development books and podcasts and just good ol’ trial and error of my own accord. 

 

I’ve been told throughout my life that I am full of joie de vivre, enthusiasm, and energy in my teaching, mentoring, and social life.  I’ve also been told that I have an amazing knack for work-life balance, time management, and organization.  We all have superpowers, and these happen to be mine; I put them together to form the foundation of Demand the Shimmer.  At first, I held back on sharing these ideas widely because maybe people would think they were dumb, or not serious and scientifically tested enough.  And some people will think that.  But maybe some people – even one person – will catch my spark and will be energized to see their lives differently and lean a little more  in the direction of joy.  Holding back because of my fears of approval may have kept someone from being just a little bit happier, perhaps when they needed it most.  That thought hit me hard. 

 

So what about that toxic positivity hesitation?  Here’s where I landed. I do not want to promote putting your head in the sand and avoiding hard conversations, fighting for what’s right, grieving, being angry at injustices in the world, and the like.  In fact, this post about the privilege of positivity smacked me right in the face when I read it and made me realize that I do these things way too much and need to stop.  Yet, that’s not what Demand the Shimmer is about.  It isn’t about putting on a happy face for the world and avoiding real challenges. It’s about self-care, intentionality, and elevating the ordinary to the extraordinary – for yourself and those around you – in creative ways. 

 

After I post this blog, I am taking steps to share this with my network and beyond.  People can take or leave what they like.  I have so many more ideas for ways to build this going forward.  I am not quitting my day job – I still love it and am proud of my career.  But this is so aligned with my purpose that I have to put it in the world.  Is this bad timing?  No, I think it’s exactly what we need right now.

 

No Worrying Lying Down

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If you are like most humans, you probably find yourself worrying about things in the middle of the night if you can’t sleep (and in particularly nasty cases of this human condition, the worry keeps you from ever getting back to sleep). I had a couple of Big Worries with a capital B.W. going on over the last year regarding the health of loved ones, and this affliction hit harder than normal.

 

I have tried the trick in the past to schedule your worry. As a champion planner and scheduler I was sure this was for me, and sometimes it did work. But, because I’m also a generally happy person in the light of day, the time would come up on my list when I was supposed to be worrying and I just wasn’t in the mood. But if I didn’t do it, I felt like I wasn’t completing my plan. So, this didn’t seem like a great long-term strategy for the middle of the night ruminations.

 

Then one night, as soon as the tickle to worry struck me, I made a new rule for myself right then and there: No worrying lying down. I could worry whenever I wanted, I told myself, but I had to be upright. Have I told you about my bed? It is c-o-m-f-y!!! As much as I wanted to worry, I was not leaving my cozy cocoon. And somehow, making the choice – because I did give myself a choice – to stay laying down rather to get up and worry somehow seemed to signal to my body that this problem must not really be that bad and it calmed me enough to help me rest.

 

More often than not when I wake up things seem a lot brighter, and even though I’m upright, worries just fly in and out with other more pleasant thoughts without sticking in the gears of my brain. In other cases, in the light of day I am better able to turn worry, which is essentially useless, into problem solving and sort out what I have the power to control and what I don’t. Then I can plan to take some action steps in the right direction.

 

Now I’m starting to think of what other kind of rules like that I can make – I know they are arbitrary and maybe somewhat silly, but if I state it with authority to myself I somehow am compelled to do it. Maybe someone who hates rules should make one that says worry as much as you possibly can right now – and then they won’t? One of you rule-breaker types will have to let me know how that goes.

 

Cheers,

Lisa

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Camper: Planning a Camp Day to Leap Forward

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I’ve written before about the benefit of retreats (and you can find a link to my guide for Quarterly At-Home Retreats in the Products section of Demandtheshimmer.com if you are interested). Those retreats are designed to take a day to really reflect on your life as a whole, and all the aspects of it that are meaningful to you, in a way that allows for regular temperature checking on your progress toward your goals. Camp Day is different.

 

Camp Day is perfect to declare when there is something you really have been meaning to tackle – particularly those things that might scare you a little bit. It’s all about moving the needle on one particular thing in your life that will really make a difference. It’s not about just taking a baby step (also an important strategy to get started on something) – it’s about a real leap forward.

 

Camp Day is not something I came up with, but I’ve really embraced it. There are Stats Camps for people in quantitative professions that need to learn new statistical techniques to stay current. There are weekend music camps to really devote time to practice. There are writer’s retreats. Camp Day is like that, but it is designed solely by YOU, and attended only by you, for your own purposes.

 

One key to Camp Day is the planning and the anticipation. First, of course, you have to choose the activity. I declared a Camp Day to get this website off started and to make Demandtheshimmer.com a reality for me and not just the vague fantasy it had been for longer than I care to admit. I had been toying with the idea for a year or two, but there seemed to be too many things I didn’t know or understand about the process of launching a website that were going to continue to keep it from happening unless I committed to a day devoted to nothing but learning how to do this, purchasing the domain, and getting started. I also declared a Camp Day on the day I learned how to use a sewing machine for the first time and ended up sewing a really cool pillow that is still featured in my bedroom many years later.

 

Once you pick a day and choose your camp project, start thinking of all the ancillary things about the day that will make it especially fun and tempting. Like a retreat, you need to be alone and undisturbed for this. Where will you go? Home or somewhere else that you love to be? Home can work, but only if you can really focus on only what you’re doing and not be tempted by the siren song of the laundry pile or Netflix. What will you wear? Something super comfy, or something that makes you feel on top of the world? I picked out a fun new t-shirt with something motivational that I thought of as my camp uniform. What kind of treats will you have throughout the day? These can be special food or drink treats, or fun break activities, or really any small things that make the day feel really special and not just like any other day.

 

I recommend having at least a rough agenda set and approximate times for activities planned out, though you should also anticipate some roadblocks and challenges. If you are working on something hard – and this should be something that challenges you in some way – these things are bound to happen. Flexibility is key.

 

Try to plan your Camp Day a little while out – a week or two at least – so you can really anticipate and look forward to it. Think about what tangible outcomes you’d love to see at the end, as well as how you want to feel when you crawl into bed at the end of Camp Day, pretty spent and exhausted in that really awesome satisfying way.

 

Happy Camping!

 

If you’re never a beginner, how are you ever gonna begin?

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Do any of you remember Jane magazine? It was in circulation from 1997-2007, and I had every issue except the first one. One of the coolest bonuses for subscribers was a mix CD you’d get in the mail every year, and it was the best way back then in the pre-Spotify and Pandora days to learn about some new or off the beaten path music. One year the song   “The Beginner” by Miranda Lee Richards was on there. I recently found this CD – one of the only ones that I still seem to have – and I started playing this on repeat. It’s a super upbeat song, and my favorite line goes:

 

They say I’m a pretender

They say I’m a charlatan

Well, if you’re never a beginner

How’re you ever gonna begin?

 

I think a lot of us struggle to be beginners. It’s embarrassing to not know how to do something, to fumble around, to feel like your questions are dumb and everyone knows things you don’t. Miranda’s words ring true though – how else are you going to begin any kind of new adventure or new project? I’ve recently noticed that there are a lot of different influences in popular culture right now that speak to the wonderful parts of being a beginner.

 

For example, “the beginner’s mind” is a concept from Zen meditation and mindfulness where one sees the world through fresh eyes, without preconceived expectations. In this context, you work to cultivate a beginner’s perspective not only with things you really are just beginning, but also to bring that fresh, non-skeptical outlook to every day things to appreciate them anew.  This short piece explains this nicely.

 

Another take on being a beginner can be found in Carol Dweck’s work on the growth mindset. In fact, those with a fixed mindset are likely to really shun the idea of being a beginner, likely because they would assume if they already can’t do something they’re never going to be able to do it. Years of research has accumulated on the advantages of the growth mindset.  Here is a summary.

 

Finally, we’ve been learning from Brené Brown the power of vulnerability. In her many books and much-viewed Ted Talk we learn how being vulnerable can bring us to new levels of strength and personal development. Vulnerability is one reason we avoid being a beginner – but we are starting to learn that it might actually be one of the very reasons we should seek out opportunities to begin new things.

 

As we go into 2019 and are thinking of new beginnings, let’s also think about ways to dive headfirst into the joy of being beginners. Happy New Year!

 

Cheers,

Lisa

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Milestone Birthdays and The Big Ten

Posted on by demand13bg

Happy birthday to me (a bit belated) – I turned 50 this year! Clearly a milestone birthday, 50 can represent to many things to different people. For some, sadly, it seems like an ending of youth and the death of some essential part of vitality. For others, me included thank goodness, it marks a sense of achievement and the passage to a really exciting time of life.

 

Walking through the archway of 50, it was almost like there was a life concierge standing there saying “here, let me take that baggage from you, Madame” – and the baggage was all the stupid, bullshit worry about really dumb stuff that I’ve been hauling around for decades. Am I skinny enough? Am I still pretty? Am I smart enough to speak up? Do I know what I’m talking about? Does anyone care what I have to say?

 

Who. Cares.

 

OMG, let me tell you, having those bags removed from your shoulders makes you feel like you can fly. Admittedly, those worries aren’t 100% gone – but it’s like the giant suitcases (without wheels!) have now become small clutch bags, or perhaps a cosmetics case.

 

Just like I did on my 39th birthday, on my 49th I spent a lot of time reflecting and thinking about how I wanted to spend my time in my last year of my 40s. I came up with the Big Ten list, articulated in my journal as I sat near the ocean on a trip to Hawaii. The Big Ten list was a list of ten things I wanted to do before my 50th birthday.

 

The rule of the Big Ten is that it cannot be things you think you are “supposed” to do, but don’t really want to. This is no “lose 10 lbs.” or “go to the gym more” list. It has to come from the heart, with a combination of big and small achievements or experiences that you think will bring you joy.

 

Curious? Here’s what I came up with this time:

 

  1. Create signature dishes, in all categories (side dish, main dish, desert, etc.)

 

  1. Hold a plank every morning of the year.

 

  1. Learn to do a pull-up.

 

  1. Become a liquid eyeliner master.

 

  1. Design and sew a dress.

 

  1. Join a group.

 

  1. Learn 5 songs on the drums.

 

  1. Go on a solo trip.

 

  1. Take a one-second video every day

 

  1. Start a side-hustle

 

Did I complete the Big Ten? Not entirely, but I did most of them, and came really close on the others (still striving). I had so much fun with this – I had a Big Ten journal that I tracked progress in, and on my weekly to-dos I always had Big Ten striving activities.

 

Some of my favorites from my Big Ten before I turned 40 included learning to open a champagne bottle without making a terrified face and learning to juggle.

 

I encourage all of you to think about this the year before a milestone birthday; it gives the build up to the birthday a special sense of purpose and excitement. It’s part of the repertoire of the Demand the Shimmer life.

 

Cheers,

Lisa