Lasting Connections

A couple of weeks ago, I got a message from Julie Hanson, a longtime Winning Ways subscriber, from Glasgow, Scotland, whom I first met when she attended a Making a Living Without a Job seminar there.

Julie said she was headed to Las Vegas and wondered if we might connect. A few days later, we located each other under the Chihuly ceiling at Bellagio.

A lively lunch followed and I learned that she’s one of the leading authorities on seasonal yoga, which I knew nothing about. She gave me a copy of her beautifully done, self-published book 5 Seasons.

She said coming to my seminar had first opened her mind to the possibility of creating products to go along with her yoga teaching. I loved hearing about the evolution of her business.

Then she whipped out her iPad and we discovered our mutual passion for Apple technology.  That reminded her of a delightful story about going to her local Apple store for her weekly one-on-one training session.

When the fellow who was working with her asked what she wanted to focus on in their session, she said she needed to design her book cover. “You’re kidding, aren’t you?” he asked. “Did they put you up to this?”

She assured him that she that the book cover  truly was her project of the week. He then told her that in his other life, he designs book covers for which he is paid large sums of money. She was the lucky recipient of his talent that day.

I loved that story and loved knowing that the Glasgow Apple store was as jolly as my local one on The Strip.

Then our talk turned to Julie’s visit. I gave her Las Vegas travel tips. When she mentioned she was going to go to Sedona later in the week, I gave her some more.

In many ways, it was an ordinary encounter with a kindred spirit. Even though they’re ordinary, those encounters never fail to make my heart sing.

Of course, I’m not alone in realizing how important connecting with creative, self-actualizing people is for anyone wanting to succeed in their own business.

Even though I don’t know them personally, I follow a number of joyfully jobless folks on Twitter who are good friends. They all run fairly young businesses and do quite different things, but are each other’s biggest fans.

If one of them is launching a new product or running a program, the others all Tweet about it to their own lists. They’re wildly supportive of one another and although they live in very different parts of the US and Canada, it’s obvious that these relationships matter.

They originally met at the massive SXSW conference in Austin, Texas and have continued to stay in touch and cheer each other on. There’s no doubt in my mind that their individual journeys—and thriving businesses—have benefited enormously from that shared experience.

Your business will benefit, too, from sharing time and space with others who are bringing their own ideas to life. That’s precisely the kind of opportunity we’re busily creating with the upcoming Joyfully Jobless Jamboree, also in Austin, TX, on October 15 & 16.

We’re going to make it easy for the folks who attend to get to know each other, to explore ways they can collaborate and leave with new connections that will be valuable alliances. Some of those will undoubtedly be lasting connections.

If you’re really quick, you could save $150 on the Jamboree registration. But that’s not the best reason to attend.

To paraphrase our friends in real estate, it’s connection, connection, connection.

Inspired By

Last week, my six-year-old granddaughter Zoe came for five days. It was my great pleasure to take her to see Mystere, her first Cirque du Soleil show. For the next three days, the music from the show played whenever we were in the car and Zoe recalled (perfectly) what scene each song accompanied.

The rest of her visit was filled with lots of art projects. This is obviously a girl who gets up in the morning asking herself, “What can I make today?”

On Saturday morning she begged for a return visit to Michael’s for more supplies. I relented because I’m that kind of grandmother. She surprised me by selecting a white mask and a bag of feathers.

As soon as we got home Zoe sat down with my 20 Years Under the Sun book, a history of Cirque’s first two decades. After studying the pictures, she set up her studio on my dining room table and began painting and decorating the mask.

While she worked I was puttering in the kitchen so she gave me updates on her progress. She said, “I want this kind of like Cirque, but it’s going to have me in it too.”

“That’s called inspired by,” I said. “Your mask is inspired by Cirque du Soleil, but it’s not a copy.” I explained a little bit more about what “inspired by” means.

That got me thinking about all the times I’ve been “inspired by” myself. Paradoxically, part of the creative process comes from being an enthusiastic spectator.

And we needn’t limit our spectating only to activities or enterprises that are like our own.

I have no desire to create theatrical experiences, but Cirque du Soleil inspires me. I’m fascinated by their commitment to finding the perfect balance between business and creativity.

Entrepreneurs and other creative types are constantly seeking inspiration, of course. This causes them to pay attention and be on the alert at all times because experience has shown them that inspiration can arrive at any time.

After watching Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, my sister Margaret posted a photo of her latest creation with this explanation: “This is what happens when I watch Marilyn Monroe get married in the movies: a little hat made of pleated satin with a voluptuous, hand-made chiffon rose and a wisp of tulle.”

That, of course, is the lovely thing about inspiration. It begets more inspiration.

But only if we’re paying attention. Or as Mary Pipher says, “Inspiration is very polite. She knocks softly and goes elsewhere if we don’t answer.”

The 90-Day Stretch

Yesterday I realized that we were entering the 90-Day Stretch leading up to the Joyfully Jobless Jamboree. Since the 90 day time frame is one of the best power tools I’ve discovered for creating focus and making regular new discoveries, I  know where my attention will be in the coming weeks.

If you want to accomplish more, make your business diverse and fascinating, and enrich your life enormously, I urge you to make 90-Day Projects a regular activity.

Imagine how rich your life could become if you took up the practice of finding new things to explore four times a year. In forty years’ time, that would add up to 160 new discoveries.

The simplicity of this plan is that you do each thing as fully as possible—one thing at a time. It’s a way to grow and stretch yourself by focusing on a single new activity.

Been wanting to try contra dancing? For three months, become the world’s most enthusiastic contra dancer. If at the end of 90 days, you’ve had your fill, move on to salsa. If you’re really hooked on contra dancing at the end of three months, find a way to work it into your life on a permanent basis.

* Begin with the end in mind. To get started, take a look at your lifetime goals list. (You don’t have a lifetime goals list? Make writing one your first 90–Day Project.) What item catches your fancy?

Pick one that suits you and give some thought to your intention in pursuing it. Do you want to enhance your creativity? Acquire a skill that will be useful in your business?

Meet some new and interesting people? Travel?

* Give it a theme. A friend who had been procrastinating about getting her writing career launched called her project Anne Learns How To Market Her Writing. This led her to read several books on the subject and take a couple of adult ed classes.

Before the 90 days were over, she’d sent out five query letters and gotten a writing assignment. Having a theme, kept her on track.

A theme helps add focus and raises awareness so you notice what supports that theme—and eliminate things that do not.

* Immerse, don’t dabble. While you’re in the midst of a project, be fully there. Immersion is popular with language schools and it works for other things, too. Make what Barbara Sher calls a “temporary permanent commitment.”

No, you don’t have to stick with this for the rest of your life, but be totally committed for all 90 days. There will be times when you’re bored or lose interest. That’s just part of the learning process. Keep at it anyway.

* Include the unpredictable. If you’ve always wanted to learn Swahili, do it. You don’t have to have a reason or application for using what you’ve acquired. Personal growth is the top priority here and learning for its own sake is commendable.

* Go for variety. For nine months of the year, Todd builds twig furniture in his home workshop. When summer rolls around, he hits the road, selling his wares at Arts and Crafts festivals around the country. It’s a huge contrast to the solitary time that makes up most of his year.

“Getting out and talking to people, explaining how I work and so forth can be exhilarating and exhausting. But it always fires me up for my creative time.”

At its best, the 90–Day Project generates synergy partly because it provides a contrast.

* Get involved in a parallel universe. Anyone who takes up a new learning activity quickly discovers that there’s a whole group of people already engaged in that pursuit. Part of the fun of being a neophyte is meeting more advanced aficionados.

This is also a great way to make progress on your goals. Want to lead a tour to the Mayan ruins someday? Create a 90–Day Project to research Mayan history.

Then create another to learn all about organizing and promoting a tour. Then create another to market your  Mayan Exploration.

Not only is this a logical way to move ahead, making smaller projects out of a bigger project can eliminate a great deal of anxiety and fear. After all, you are just researching, learning and experimenting.  There’s nothing too scary about that.

There are other bonuses to the 90–Day Project as well. You’ll become more disciplined, committed and, best of all, more interesting.  So go feed your Renaissance soul with a new adventure. Then in three months do it again.

Preparing to Win

My grandchildren and their parents arrived yesterday afternoon so it’s a wonderfully chaotic time around World Headquarters. (Translation: no time to write a new post.)

So I’m rerunning a post from a few months ago that you may have missed…or are willing to revisit.

Author Robert G. Allen wrote, “The will to prepare to win is more important than the will to win. Preparing usually means doing those kinds of things that failures don’t like to do.

“ It means studying and learning. It means reading books, going to seminars. It means not being afraid to corner experts and ask foolish questions.”

As a person who has traveled across the country to attend a seminar and even further to conduct one, I can’t imagine why everyone hasn’t discovered the joy of participating in events that have the power to change our lives for the better.

Getting yourself to a seminar may, in fact, be more important than what happens in the seminar.

When you are willing to spend your time and money to expose yourself to new ideas, new techniques for doing things, and new people who can add their enthusiasm to your dreams, you’re also sending a strong message to your subconscious mind about your own worth.

Conversely, not investing this way also sends a strong message. As Sondra Ray says, “When you say, ‘I don’t have enough money to go to that self-improvement seminar or buy that book, it’s almost like saying, ‘I am not a good investment.’ The best way to make money is to invest in yourself.”

What would you like to be better at? Speaking German? Creative marketing? Managing your time? Boosting your emotional intelligence?

You can accelerate your progress at anything by putting yourself in a roomful of people who are on a similar quest.

Best of all, an investment in yourself is the one thing that no one can ever take from you. No matter what is happening in the economy or where interest rates are headed, the investment you make in your personal growth—and continue to make— never stops paying dividends.

“In times of change,” said Eric Hoffer, “learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.”

With all the resources—the books, the seminars, the insights of  others—available, it makes no sense to skip the critical preparation stage.

Because, in the the final analysis, winning isn’t about what you have or even what you do. Winning is about becoming the person you were meant to become no matter how long and difficult that journey may be.

Take advantage of every  resource you can find. You never know what might happen if you do.

You could be sitting in a roomful of strangers and suddenly meet yourself.

°°°°°°°°°°°°

If you only attend one more event this year, I urge you to make it the Joyfully Jobless Jamboree. Filled with ideas, inspiration and opportunities to connect with others who are building their own exciting enterprises, this is going to be two of the most memorable days we can deliver.

Visit the Jamboree website and see what’s coming on October 15 & 16 in Austin, TX and make plans to join us now.

Less Can Be More

When I started my first business, The Successful Woman, in 1974, I had never heard of a book with a similar title, The Total Woman. That changed quickly when Marabel Morgan’s book became a tremendous success.

In case you missed the commotion, The Total Woman sold more than ten million copies and was the best-selling nonfiction book of 1974. As the Wikipedia listing recounts, the book taught that, “A Total Woman caters to her man’s special quirks, whether it be in salads, sex or sports, and is perhaps best remembered for instructing wives to greet their husbands at the front door wearing sexy outfits, or draped in transparent saran wrap, with nothing (but herself) underneath.”

“It’s only when a woman surrenders her life to her husband, reveres and worships him and is willing to serve him, that she becomes really beautiful to him,” Morgan wrote.

Needless to say, that bore no resemblance to my plan to create personal growth seminars via The Successful Woman. Although fans of The Total Woman were not likely to be my customers, who was?

Obviously, men were not my target audience, but I knew that not every woman was either. What did my ideal customer look like?

At the beginning, I thought they would be those we often refer to as career women, but that began to change as I met the creative females who came to my seminars and subscribed to my newsletter.

After a couple of years, it became clear to me that I wanted to work with women who, like me, were starting their own businesses and weren’t necessarily interested in the conventional notion of what that meant.

At about the same time, the homebased business movement was quietly springing up all over the place. While not focused exclusively on this group, I felt a real connection with the things that were happening on the home business front and began looking for ways to let them know what I had to offer.

While experience and evolution often changes our definition of an ideal customer, it’s both wise and necessary to spend time figuring out who you want to serve.

One way of doing that is to identify what Mark J. Penn calls (in his book of the same name) Microtrends. Thanks to the Internet, it’s easier than ever to track down these folks who may have specialized interests that are being overlooked by big companies.

In fact, you may be part of a micro trend yourself and are aware of what’s missing for them.

Here are a few of the small trends Penn identifies.

Working Retired

Sun-Haters

Pet Parents

Old New Dads

Young Knitters

Vegan Children

New Luddities

Social Geeks

Home-schooled

International Home Buyers

Can you see the dozens of possibilities in these growing groups—whether you know much about them or not? All these micro trends are ripe for products and services designed for small niche markets.

If you haven’t already done so (or you haven’t done so lately), spend time writing a profile of your ideal customer. What do they love? What problems do they share?

It makes it so much easier to get connected when you’ve figured that out. It’s also the shortest route to building your own natural monopoly.

As Seth Godin points out, “Many of us have realized that big doesn’t equal successful. Maybe you need to be a lot pickier about what you do and for whom you do it.”

Go for less. Get more.

Weekend Excursions

It’s been ages since I’ve done a roundup of articles and resources that have been gathering in my files. Obviously, it’s time for a Weekend Excursion so you can explore them on your own.

There’s no real rhyme or reason or theme to this list of treasures except that they all delighted me in different ways.

Green and Growing

If you’re a subscriber to Winning Ways newsletter, you will recall that I recently did an issue exploring what gardeners have to teach entrepreneurs. Last week, I learned about an extraordinary English gardening writer named Beveley Nichols who chronicled his evolution as an amateur gardener.

After reading his book Merry Hall, I wanted more and came across a collection of his wit and wisdom called Rhapsody in Green. When I read the following passage, I realized he could just as well have been advising someone growing a business:

Gradually my impatient desire for immediate results, which is the besetting sin of all beginners, died down. I began to take a joy in the work for its own sake. Until you actually own a garden, you cannot know this joy.

Before and After

The other day, I received an e-mail from Connie Hozvicka sharing her excitement about taking the big step. Connie is a dynamic artist and her blog at Dirty Footprints Studio is always a visual feast.

However, her post I Want You to Hear Me took my breath away. Go read it for yourself and you’ll see why.

Expose Yourself

It’s no secret that I’m a raving fan of Seth Godin who constantly astonishes me with his regular blog writings. This one, called Expose Yourself, illustrates the importance of choosing your influences carefully.

Follow Your Fascination

I’ve been working on the next issue of Winning Ways and am writing about collectors and collecting. Everyone I’ve known who is a serious collector has a story to tell about how their passion for collecting perfume bottles or old coins or Disney memorabilia began with a mild interest and grew stronger as they explored farther.

So that was on my mind when I came across this short piece called  Innovation Begins with Fascination. Don’t miss the exercise at the end.

Loving a Writer

Steven  Pressfield has this advice for spouses, partners, and other caring folks who may be perplexed by their writer/entrepreneur/musician lovers. If you are feeling misunderstood, you may want to print out Loving a Writer to share with your beloved.

Just in Case

I’ve been raving everywhere about Sandy Dempsey’s amusing video about her adventures with Flat Barbara. You may have been within earshot.

However, if by some fluke this has passed you by, pay a visit now and see how Flat Barbara is learning about the Joyfully Jobless life. (Scroll down to see the video.)

Getting Connected for Free

It was a big occasion when Zoe lost her first tooth, one worthy of a Skype call to Grandma Vegas. I oohed and aahed as she preened and smiled. It was far more memorable than if she’d simply sent a picture.

Keeping connected to faraway family members is only one of the ways I use Skype. Nearly every day is a little brighter thanks to that bit of technology.

Yesterday I needed a small change on my Web site, so I Skyped Lisa Tarrant, my Web Wizard, who lives in Massachusetts. In the past, I’d have told her what I wanted and then checked my site when the call was finished. With Skype, I could see the changes as she made them.

I tune into teleclasses, consult with clients, and have regular conference calls with Alice Barry and Sandy Dempsey to plan the Joyfully Jobless Jamboree from my desktop.

Last week, Alice and I were trying to solve a Jamboree problem via e-mail and not getting very far. Alice suggested a call, we talked face to face and had the solution in no time.

On Saturday, I began my morning with a long overdue chat with my friend Georgia who recently moved to Sweden. Seeing her sitting at her kitchen table at her new home made the conversation more special.

Have something new I want to show my sister Margaret in California? Show and Tell is just a Skype call away.

Then there was the recent evening that Sandy Dempsey sent me an e-mail with a link to a video she had just spent three hours creating about the adventures of Flat Barbara. I could see she was still online, so I promptly Skyped her to congratulate her on the project.

(If you’ve watched the video, you know that Flat Barbara enjoys Skype too.)

Although my sister Nancy, who lives in Rome, had urged me to use Skype for several years, I was not paying attention. I remained unmoved when Maureen Thomson reported that she’d used Skype to keep her business in Colorado running smoothly while she was enjoying a home exchange in Spain.

Without any investigation (a bad way to make decisions), I assumed it would be difficult or would involve buying equipment. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

What finally motivated me to check it out for myself was a Webinar that Oprah did with Eckhart Tolle. The two of them sat on a bare stage discussing ideas in his book  A New Earth while readers called in to ask questions or make comments via Skype.

There was a discussion group at a bookstore in Los Angeles, a woman from Connecticut, a couple from Amsterdam. It was obvious that the visual component added a dimension to the communication that isn’t present with voice-only.

I was sold. What I didn’t know, however, was that I was also about to save $500 a year since calls to other Skype users are free, no matter where they are in the world.

For the nominal fee of $29.50/year I added unlimited calling throughout the US and Canada to non-Skype users (i.e. landlines and cellphones). There was no longer any need for long distance service with my landline so I cancelled it.

Last year, Soul Acrobats founder Alvin Tam wrote about getting rid of his expensive voicemail—his costly cellphone—and replacing it with Skype. He discovered, as do many users, that not only was he saving money, he was motivated to call his family in Canada more frequently.

Yes, there are times when I hear a call come in and on my way to answer wonder if my hair is combed or if I’m properly dressed. Much of the time, however, calls are arranged in advance so I’m ready and waiting.

If you’ve been resisting using Skype for personal and business communication, I urge you to take a look. Not only is it a wonderful way to add a personal touch, if you’re planning to run a global World Headquarters, it is essential mobility support.

And if that’s not enough, let me remind you again—it’s free.

Trust Your Resistance

It appears that career counselors have it all wrong. Instead of asking people what they most want to do, they should explore what they are most avoiding.

There’s plenty of evidence that what we ignore is often our most cherished dream. Our Resistance is a maddeningly accurate indicator of what would serve us best.

I watched a vivid reminder of this unfold when  The Today Show invited viewers to submit their ideas for a feature they did called Live For Today. The television program challenged their audience to tell them  the one thing they wanted to do before they die.

The response was huge. Obviously, this invitation awakened numerous dreams that had been put to sleep.

That wasn’t the most amazing thing about this project. What’s astonishing was how doable the submissions were. People weren’t asking to acquire their own islands; the ideas were more along the lines of “be an extra in a movie.”

Many viewers reported that they’d had their dream for years. So why have they avoided doing something about it?

In The War of Art , Steven Pressfield profoundly blows open the insidious ways in which Resistance keeps us stuck in place. When I learned that the author was doing an Internet radio interview, I tuned in.

Midway through the program I called in and asked him if there was such a thing as good Resistance. He laughed and said, “When the Resistance is really strong, you better fasten your seatbelt, because something  big is trying to get your attention.”

Entrepreneurship is a surefire awakener of this phenomenon. I suspect that nobody starts a business without having to confront their own Resistance. But it doesn’t stop there. At every step of the way, our Resistance comes out to meet us.

The closer we are to getting what we want, the stronger our Resistance becomes. I see proof of this with every seminar I do. There are always folks who wait until the very last minute to enroll.

I used to think that these were people who were mildly curious, but had no intention of actually doing anything. Now I think these malingerers may be the most likely to succeed—and they’re scared to death to find that out.

While we can’t eliminate Resistance, we can use it as a power tool to move us closer to our dreams. It takes some courage and maturity to do that, but every great achiever has already learned how to pay attention to their Resistance, acknowledge the truth it tries to obscure and then move past it.

Consider what Vincent Van Gogh had to say about it: “If you hear a voice within you saying, ‘You are not a painter,’ then by all means paint…and that voice will be silenced.”

What have you been avoiding? What adventure have you let Resistance abort? What if instead of seeing Resistance as a red light or a stop sign, we started treating it like what it really is: a signal to proceed?

You don’t even have to deny it’s there. In fact, you have to notice it and call it by name.

“Aha,” you might say, “there you are again, but you’ll not be having your way with me this time. I assume you’re here to alert me to something wonderful and I will continue on.”

What if you began to trust your Resistance? At the very least, your confidence would grow because with every defeat of Resistance we get stronger. Viewed from this angle, Resistance seems more benevolent than we may have thought—and far more useful.

So go ahead—be contrary. Listen to your Resistance and then do the opposite. If it tells you not to bother, be contrary and bother. If it tells you that scrubbing the toilet is more important than writing your next chapter, let the toilet go unscrubbed.

Challenge it. Laugh at it. And, most of all, trust what it’s telling you.

A Friend to Entrepreneurs

After I read La Bella Lingua, I decided to make the Italian Renaissance one of my summer projects. I began by rereading (as I do every summer) Michael Gelb’s How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci. 

I promptly tracked down a number of books at my nearby library, including the amusing Uppity Women of the Renaissance by VIcki Leon, plus the DVD of the glorious PBS series The Medicis: Godfathers of the Renaissance.

Those aren’t the only library books living with me at the moment. I’m working on the next issue of Winning Ways newsletter which has a theme of Collecting for Fun and Profit. My exploration of the library catalog turned up a long list of resources. 

One of the most amusing is a heavy (and heavily illustrated)  book called In Flagrante Collecto (caught in the act of collecting) by Marilynn Gelman Karp. Then there’s Collectomania by Miriam Plans. Who knows where this is going to lead?

It’s no accident that I live less than five minutes away from a library. When I was moving to Las Vegas, I got a city map and plotted out the locations of things I wanted easy access to. Libraries were high on the list.

In a talk I gave at a library in Minneapolis, I told the audience, “Libraries are an entrepreneur’s best friend.” I wasn’t just flattering my hosts, however.

A great library system is a basic requirement for me. In a normal week, I make several visits to the library and consider having a personal relationship with the librarians to be fundamental.

Some people go shopping when they need a lift; I go to the library. If I’m stumped, don’t know what to do next, I can count on a visit to get me moving again.

The library exists to connect us with information and ideas all stored in one space for our convenience. While the Internet is a fabulous tool, one I would hate to give up, I can go deeper into a subject at the library—and I trust the accuracy of the information more.

When I see parents bringing their small children to get their first library card, I am delighted. This is an important rite of passage and the sooner the library becomes a familiar friend, the more apt it is to remain a lifetime relationship.

I also love the sense of not knowing for sure what I’ll find when I go there. Richard Wiseman tells a story about going to the library to do research for a paper he was writing when he was a schoolboy and being directed to the wrong shelf where the books on magic happened to be housed. That started him on his way to becoming a boy magician.

A fellow library lover told me about the morning she arrived at the library as it opened. She planned to spend some time doing genealogical research. “The next thing I knew,” she recalls, “they were announcing that the library was closing. I hadn’t eaten or gone to the bathroom all day.”

Can you imagine what a thrill it was for a lifelong library lover when a woman came to my seminar in Washington DC saying she was there because she worked at the Library of Congress and had come across Making a Living Without a Job  on their shelves?

“There is an unspeakable pleasure attending the life of a voluntary student,” said Oliver Goldsmith. That’s also true for the curious entrepreneur.

Whether you’re a regular library patron or not, plan a creative excursion to your library soon and browse until you discover a treasure. Or visit the reference department and see what ideas you get looking through directories of grants or Gale’s Encyclopedia of Associations. 

Then do it again and again. And anytime you find yourself thinking, “But I don’t know how to do that,” take yourself to the library and start digging.

 

Artists of Everyday Life

One morning my granddaughter Zoe was getting ready for kindergarten when her mother walked into her room. “Does this go together?” Zoe asked.

“You’re an artist,” Jennie reminded her. “You can wear whatever you want.”

The next morning, Zoe confidently put on her fanciest dress and her flowered rain boots. When she walked into the kitchen, her father took one look and said, “Lose the boots.”

Zoe looked him straight in the eye and said, “Dad, I’m an artist. I can wear whatever I want.”

It delights me, of course, that Zoe is encouraged to think creatively and to think of herself as an artist. There’s evidence that she’s taking it quite seriously.

A few months ago I was planning a visit to Zoe and her family when I got a Skype call from her. We talked about some of the things we were going to do when I got there.

“Saturday is Jacob’s birthday,” she said in her most matter-of-fact voice. (Jacob is the doll I gave Zoe for her second birthday. Jacob is a girl.)

“Oh, dear,” I said. “I don’t have time to get her a present.” 

”Improvise,” Zoe suggested. “Just use what you have.”

Great advice, don’t you think, for solving a problem? But being an artist of the ordinary has even greater rewards.

Some of the happiest people around are those who have been raised to make their life an on-going art project. And, happily, I’m not alone in thinking that.

I recently finished reading Peter Buffett’s Life is What You Make It. Of course, I was curious to know what it was like to grow up with one of the world’s wealthiest men as a father. 

My favorite story in the book answered that question nicely. Peter writes about coming home to tell his family that he’s decided to follow his passion and become a musician. Here’s what happened next.

“As was his custom,” Buffett writes, “my father listened carefully, without judging, without offering explicit advice. Then one day, almost in passing as he headed out the door, he said to me, ‘You know, Pete, you and I really do the same thing. Music is your canvas. Berkshire’s my canvas and I get to paint a little every day.’

“That was all he said—and it was plenty.”

I don’t know if the Buffett men ever heard what M.C. Richards said, but they certainly personify it.  “All the arts we practice are apprenticeship,” says Richards. “The big art is our life.”

Seems to me that Zoe’s already figured that out. What’s your canvas?