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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!
Confessions of a judge-aholic.
The poet Rumi once wrote: "Out beyond right and wrong, there is a field. I'll meet you there." How I'd love to visit! I only wish he'd left directions. Hint: The kids in the video below found it. Me, I'm a judge-aholic.** I grew up with self-judgmentalism. A...
Celebrate Valentine’s Day with a fiercer love
I've been learning about a new face of love reading Valerie Kaur's See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love. Her writing is glorious. Who else could have successfully braided memoir with a manifesto? Memoir calls for personal vulnerability....
Let’s sing a new revolution
In Estonia, people sing. An Estonian woman I heard speak in an online singing class talked about Laulupidu, Estonia's choral song festival. Begun in 1869, it now draws 100,000 participants, including 30,000 singers. Wikimedia commons. Estonian Song Celebration. Photo...
If you need more time
Even though last week I wrote about seeding a new beginning, I've had trouble starting up again. The air feels fresher, yet still weighted. It's been hard to feel clever, creative, or wise. Time to surrender to what is. NOT YET I'm not quite ready to start up again....
Seeding a new beginning
"Stories are like seeds. It pays to know what you want to harvest from your garden so you can plant the right seeds." Mary Alive Arthur, story activist. Inauguration Day felt like the true start of the new year. With so much commentary–I'll let others address the...
Why not let life be complex?
This US Presidential Inauguration Day, a group of riders on white horses wearing white coats will ride into Washington, D.C. to assume power. At the same time, a group of black-coated riders on black horses will ride away. Peace will be restored and the world will be...
To tame a raging bull
It is rare that I consider aborting a blog I have almost completed. But how to keep writing, let alone think, when an army of rioters is storming the US Capitol? I saw photos of ninja-like warriors climbing over Capitol walls, upended offices, broken glass, and...
Let’s celebrate 24 new hours
When you rise tomorrow it will be a new year. Or perhaps, where you are, it already is. For many, the turn of the year to 2021 will be a relief. To the robins, squirrels, salmon, oak trees, granite and gray wolves, it’s business as usual. Life continues on. And while...
Your presence is a light
A friend shared a quote this week. It moved me so much I tracked it down, to Kent Nerburn in his book, Make Me an Instrument of Your Peace." It seemed a fitting way to celebrate this season of light. "We are not saints, we are not heroes. Our lives are...
Light up a bleak midwinter
"In the bleak midwinter" could be my theme song these days. I'm tired. The weather is glum. I've had enough election news. The phrase is the name of a favorite carol written by the English poet Christina Rossetti in the 1800s and set to music by Gustav Holst. In the...
When is dementia not a tragedy? (Hint: most of the time)
Earlier this year, I wrote about saying "yes/and" to dementia with a very cool approach that includes improv theatre. But last month, it wasn't cool at all to learn that a favorite cousin has just been diagnosed with Alzheimer's. That hit me hard. I was shocked and...
How loss can make us grateful
Thanksgiving was different this year. My husband and I ate alone for the first time in thirty-plus years. Of course, being the Martha Stewart look-alike that I am, I treated it like any other Thanksgiving. I meticulously cleaned the house, decorated with the requisite...
Feeling safe
A lot of people aren’t feeling safe these days. Three million people in the US keep open-carry weapons with them at all times. Self-proclaimed-militias stalk US State houses. The global home security industry is expected to reach $78.9 billion by 2025. Between...
Stay calm–and vigilant
Last Saturday, as elections results were finally announced. I celebrated. Relaxed. Cried. Then I looked up and knew, "It ain't over yet." I thought back to my time competing my horse at cross-country events. I'd gallop my horse across fields, charge through water,...
Time for trust
We hoped it would be over. It's not over. Maybe over was just a fantasy. The same forces that existed before the elections, some dating back hundreds of years, continue. My friend John Perkins once gave me a wake-up phrase that I treasure. John, an African-American...
As we move through countdown
Are you on countdown this week? I keep ticking away days as if life is being divided into BE (before elections) and AE. I know this is historically myopic. The crow, the hawk, and the falcon are not counting down. They will keep flying regardless. As their kin have...
What if the animals were our partners?
If you need a break from election-mania, here's something different. (I voted Saturday!) I watched the video below about a scientist, Nan Hauser, who was saved by a humpback whale. Her story is not unique. If you search the Internet, as I did, you can find loads of...
What’s in your emergency joy kit?
The poet David Whyte has offered a series of soul-nourishing talks during the pandemic. After the most recent, he offered a question we could use as part of our practices: "What do you like to do where the doing itself, no matter how awkwardly done, is its own...
This revolution will require love
Is it OK to rage when we're committed to practicing love? How do we love someone whose words and actions have lead to deaths and needless suffering for millions? And when their credo of selfishness taints and threatens to destroy this county? If love is a tender,...
Is your head stuck in the sand? (Hint: neither is the ostrich’s)
How much news can one take? My working answer is simple: it depends. My friend Dan used to work as a crime reporter. Armed with his journalistic lens of objectivity, he saw horrible stuff, yet he was able to distill it into readable print. He likes keeping up with the...
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
