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Your Story Matters: leading and living your creative best
Welcome—so glad you’re here. Do you, like me, want to work more creatively, lead lightly, be productive, and design the life you want to live? Are you curious about how storytelling can help you can engage others and shape meaning? If so, I hope you enjoy these posts and I look forward to hearing from you!
My husband is under house arrest
My husband is not guilty of crimes against the state. The state may be guilty of crimes against him. The news about what is happening or not happening in Washington, D.C. is robbing him of his optimism and faith in the future. I watch him going down as he reads about...
Is it time to create your “Joy List?”
This week, I'm balancing writing an article about coping with life's little losses by remembering all the joys that I'm finding. I'm creating a "Joy List," a go-to, no-thinking-required list of top pleasures, delight-full projects, music that moves, things that make...
Play your way into presence
How does one learn to be more present–in that state of being in the moment, open, receptive, and curious? And how do I move beyond my overstretched I've-got-to-have-life-figured-out brain, and, occasionally, (good luck), stop trying to control the world? I'd like to...
Peeking into the lives of others
I'm fascinated by how others live, not just by the face they show the world. Living in Paris, I'd spend hours people-watching at outdoor cafés. A café creme was the excuse I needed to be able to sit and watch the world pass by. Living in Seattle, I enjoyed...
Freedom’s not just another word
"Freedom's just another word for nothing else to lose." Kris Kristofferson Last week I lost a piece of my heart: our foster dog Jackson. After many bouts of sobbing, I found myself in a peaceful stupor, when the word freedom came to me as if Jackson had sent it....
When the tail stops wagging
Today, as this post is being published, our dog, the irrepressible Jackson, is being put down. Perhaps dementia was triggering his increased aggression–we don't know. Our trainer assures us that this is the right way to go; our old dog will be fine and it's better to...
The power of deep hope
Last year a good friend went through a true dark night of the soul brought on by medical circumstances. The prednisone she was given for an acutely painful condition weakened her bones, leading to a serious fracture of her lumbar spine. Even in rehab, the excruciating...
When you’re feeling climate despair, give nature a face
I'm feeling pretty despairing about climate change these days. The idea that people in high places dispute the science behind what's happening to our environment seems unconscionable. Barbaric. But then a lot of things seem that way to me these days.I recently...
When good enough beats great
When the late William Stafford, one of my favorite poets, was asked how he managed to write one poem (or more) every day, he offered a phrase that endeared him to many:"I lower my standards." Stafford wasn't suggesting that he had low standards for the poems he...
Does it spark joy? If not, create your own.
I fell in love with Marie Kondo, the queen of tidying, when I watched her NETFLIX series during last February's let's-hope-it-never-comes-again blizzard. I am not a convert yet, although I've taken a little ground. What I loved most in the series was hearing her laugh...
To hold as we are held
My Mom was not the perfect Mom. I was far from being the ideal daughter. I constantly challenged her during the late '60s with my drugs, sex, and hitchhiking, marches against the Vietnam War, and grungy clothes, There's a picture of me where I am wearing long hair, no...
How to move your creative potential into practice
We’re all innately creative. Creativity, like love, is a force field that surrounds us and comes through as it's needed. As writer and photographer Jan Phillips in her book Creativity Unzipped writes: “Creativity is … released automatically when we are on the right...
How to Spot Your Inner Critic
Why is it that when we're totally qualified for a job, totally right for a project, or totally entitled to a big dream, we feel the need to throw in the caveat, "Or, maybe not." I'm working with a new client who deserves the job for which he is applying–120%. Yet...
Spring for a Pause
If you want proof of the complexity of the world, come visit my garden, a mélange of good and evil, light and dark, what I want and what I don't, all asking for my care. If you have a garden, you know what I mean. Some say weeds are just plants in the wrong place. In...
Find Your Inner Porpoise
The books written about Purpose or "Finding Your Inner Purpose" on Amazon have it almost right. They just spelled it wrong. Change a few letters and you'll have more fun. Finding a purpose can feel heavy. A porpoise is buoyant. Just to be clear, I think having a deep...
When Paris Burns: Finding the seeds of resilience
Last Monday, as I stumbled past my husband on my way to bed, he looked up from reading on his Ipad and announced, "I have bad news." What now, I wondered. Isn’t constant bad news the new norm? “Notre Dame is burning, and there’s been a lot of damage. The spire has...
Images of imagination
This week, I've been thinking about the power of imagination, especially as we age. Imagination provides a spark for creativity. Creativity feeds the soul. Filmmaker David Lynch says that his best ideas come through daydreams. Others find space in nature. In space and...
How to keep your attention in an age of distraction.
Your attention is precious. Me, I could always use more. I need it to write, finish reading a book, plan a project, and any work that requires sustained concentration. It is so damn easy to lose focus with interruptions, as I wrote last week. We're in the age of...
Attention! Yours is at risk!
You know how it starts... You’re trying to concentrate on the computer, perhaps reading an article, writing a document, thinking through a problem, or searching for a recipe. After five minutes of concentration, a text pops up. You think, Might be a family member or...
When you’re feeling the weight of the world
Another week, another tragedy. I was up before dawn to drive to a conference when tragic news, from the far side of the globe, jolted me awake. If you ever wonder if we're all connected, notice how fast bad news travels. Remember John Donne's poem, written in 1621...
Your blog is an ongoing tonic for the soul, and a reminder of what’s possible.
Stephen SilhaWow! You keep writing the most pertinent, passionate, and clear articles I have the pleasure to read. Bravo!
Doug LipmanAs always, Sally, I am dazzled and inspired by the elegance, eloquence and relevance of your writing…
BIll Veltrop
Meet Sally
She’s an inspiring communicator, an original thinker, she weaves big ideas and practical examples together to help her clients take their next big step forward. She teaches leadership presence by modeling it.
She is visionary and practical, vulnerable and solid, accessible and real. A perpetual learner herself, she’s not afraid to take risks to develop the talents of her clients.
Engaging Presence
