Brother Blue

On Sunday afternoon, the few remaining Cleveland found ourselves sitting at meals and in hotel lobbies recalling the moments that touched us.  Here is my top 8 in no particular order.

1) Lee Nagel quoted me.
Lee Nagel keynoted the first conference I ever attended in youth ministry.  I can still remember watching him on stage.  I learned a lesson from him at the conference that informs the way I do ministry to this day.  Not only did I get to introduce him, but he quoted things I had said earlier in the conference.  Humbling.

2) Have my parents and peers meet each other.
There are so many people who have helped me to grow and change because of the work we are blessed to do.  Many of them were in Cleveland.  It was a blessing for my parents to meet these people and these people to me my parents.

3) Watching Steve Angisano at dance practice
There is no who takes dance practice more seriously.  “Make your sparkle fingers pop!”  All of this is rooted in wanting to put on the very best show for the people we love.  As much as people love the show we put on Saturday, it can’t hold a candle to rehearsal.  In less than 2 hours we put the show together.  It is so much fun watching these people I love put there heart in the ridiculousness that we have written for them.  It took one e-mail that read, “find ugly Christmas sweeter” to start smack to talk on who could find the ugliest.  It is a great moment of community and support.
What we all need
Why I am going to hell

4) Building relationships with the sound, lights, and stage crew
The crew from DWP love this event.  As house manager said, “We do jobs all year, but we love being here.”  There are dedicated to provide a quality event.  They did some many things that no body could see.  They always did it with a smile.

5) Hearing conference participants share the moments of the weekend that touched then.
It felt like I was running small group all week.  People I have never met walked up to me to tell me what they had learned, how they were challenged, or the moon walking bear that they had just found.  It was amazing to know such growth was going on, and the at they need to make sure I knew about it.

6) Being aware enough to savor the opportunity of a lifetime to host this conference
The third time I ever juggled in public it was on the steps of the US Capital in front of 8000.  I was just worried about doing my thing.  Two hours later the drum of the “Checkered Cabs” walked off stage and looked at saying, “I just played my heart out on the Capital Steps and my parent saw it.”  I realized I had missed the chance to savor the moment.  I didn’t miss the moment at NCCYM.  It is very likely I will never have the chance to fill that role again at this conference.  I drank in and savored every moment.  I was never in a rush.  I brought none of the worries of what was going on back stage or the planning that still needed to be done for later parts of the conference.  When I was on stage I simply soaked up the blessing that was that time on stage.

7) Seeing Joia Farmer thrive on stage
There are no words to describe how much I love Joia Farmer.  It was so amazing to stand in the wings listening to the other musicians go on and on about how amazing she is.  Having people like Kate Cutty turn to Bobby Fischer say, “You can’t leave until you hear Joia.”

8) Getting to say this to people I admire
Welcome. Thank you. I love you!

I have no horse in this race. I will be voting Libertarian in November.

With that being said, I have been dismayed at the number of times that participating as a community organizers has been dismissed at not being significant service.

Personally, I think the less government there is and the more community activism there is, it is better for all.

Community organizing can be loosely defined as [via wiki]:

a process by which people are brought together to act in common self-interest or to help others. While organizing describes any activity involving people interacting with one another in a formal manner, much community organizing is in the pursuit of a common agenda. Many groups seek populist goals and the ideal of participatory democracy. Community organizers create social movements by building a base of concerned people, mobilizing these community members to act, and developing leadership from and relationships among the people involved.

Community organizers act as area-wide coordinators of all the programs of different agencies so as best to meet community needs for health and welfare services. They also facilitate self-help programs initiated by local common-interest groups, for example, by training local leaders to analyze and solve the problems of a community. Community organizers work actively, as do other types of social workers, in community councils of social agencies and in community-action groups. At times the role of community organizers overlaps that of the social planners.

Here is a list of a few of my favorite community organizers:

• Dorothy Day
• Sr. Helen Prejean CSJ
• The Founding Founding Fathers
• Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
• Fr. Gregory Boyle SJ
• Susan B. Anthony
• Martin Luther King Jr.
• Fr. Jack Davis
• Jerry Gobel
• Catholic Relief Services

“The people I distrust most are those who want to improve our lives but have only one course of action.”
Frank Herbert

I am not a big fan of my own birthday. I usually let it pass without much fan fare. With the advent of social networking we now know when everyone’s birthday is. I received many awesome birthday wishes. Thanks to all.
If you want to do something form my birthday (which I wouldn’t expect) please consider this e-mail I sent to the APeX mailing list this evening.

I have not been blogging a lot over the last three months for two reasons. Side note: I was flattered by the number of people who asked why I wasn’t writting.]
Reason 1 for not blogging: For more than a month I have been sick. I have been crippled by flu like symptoms twice. I have had glands in my throat swell three times. I had to reschedule flights because my doctor worried about my eardrums. I have had little to no energy that walking through my parents house required me to lay down on the floor somewhere in the middle to build my strength to continue the long journey to the kitchen. People who spent as little as 90 minutes with we were also crippled. (Though strangely others who spent more time with me didn’t get sick. Maybe they were trying to poison me and were immune.)
Good News! I think it has passed. Sunday night my throat was starting to hurt again for the fourth time. At about 3am I decided I was done being sick. I told my throat it was no longer allowed to swell. Some how it has work.
Reason 2 for not blogging: I have been writing and creating none stop since the beginning of October. New talks and workshops. Postcards and t-shirts. One and one half new books. Audio CDs. Lots of articles. It has been awesome working on all these projects, but it left little creative energy to blog.
Over the next six weeks I am going to share all these projects. Here is the first one:
I am not normally a toot your own horn type of guy. I am proud of the work I do, but normally do NOT make big deal about it. I couldn’t be happier with how these turned out. I proudly present 4 guided imagery CDs. I have worked really hard on these, studying a number of disciplines to get these right. Each one has a very specific goal. They will relax your body and your mind.
Check them out at Surefire Stress Busters: Guided Imagery CD’s

Heart Breaking Yesterday I gained a lot of attention as I was standing in a Home Depot parking lots with two crow bars and a rubber mallet. I was trying to bang the back end of my recently rear ended car into enough shape so I could get my suitcase out of the back. The back end was so crumpled I couldn’t get anything out.
I had a number of interesting conversations over the hour I banged and pried. At one point I was relaying the story of what happened to two men who had parked next to me. I was sharing that while I had gone back to a friend’s house (a block from the accident) to retrieve a writing utensil, the man who rear-ended me drove away. The first question the two men asked was, “Was he colored?”
Tried to keep a straight face as my heart ached.
Heart Warming The two quietest times at an airport are Saturday night and Sunday morning. Sunday morning flights are often more than half empty. I approached security at 5 am this morning to find more than a hundred people in line. Every gate was full. My flight was packed.
The reason? Hundreds and hundreds of soldiers on their way home. Baltimore is one the two first two stops the Army uses on the way home from the Middle East. Most of them got state side last night and were treated to lobster and stake. Today they are on their way home (weather permitting) to see loved ones.
Lots of holiday tears are going to be shed.

“The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated”
Mark Twain
Last night I was scolded by a friend for not blogging is so long. It is not that I have been writing or creating. I have just been creating other stuff. Lots of exciting details to come in the next few days about all the new projects (CDs, books, web-site, other places I am writing).

I was asked to write an article (which turned into a 3 part article) for an eNewsletter that is not my own.
Received a few nice e-mails from around the world thanking me for my words.
Then I found this. (You have to scroll down below the fold.)
We live in a brave new world.

I spent the weekend with like minded people.
I attend over twenty hours of classes in three days.
I learned a great deal.
Through out the weekend my mind was flooded with opportunities and possibilities.
In the front cover of my notebook I had two lists. One was todo/new ideas, the other articles and blogs to write. Both lists ended with more than 20 tasks on them.
Then the drive home happened.
It took about 9 hours to drive 350 miles home (because of little things I like to call CT and NYC).
Somewhere in Connecticut I could feel my dreams deflating. The sense of lightness of opportunity and hope was just gone. It wasn’t as quick as a balloon popping, but it also wasn’t a slow deflating. In less than 90 it was gone.
And it left me feeling empty. Kind of like a crash after a sugar rush. The low was a low as the high was high.
On Monday I was able to re-stoke the flame and get some work done on these new ideas.
Tuesday was a wash because of dental issues (and my wallowing in my dental issues).
Today, I am almost afraid to get up from my desk and eat breakfast, because I am going to break the momentum of the morning (which has been great filled with a few more new ideas and some good content).
Dreams are great, but they are not enough.
There is still the small voice inside of us that wants to talk us out of chasing dreams. It does not do this because it is mean or takes joy is sucking our’s. It is doing it because it is trying to protect us from the unknown and failure.
The little voice in our head that says, “can’t” and “not worthy” is a coward. It assumes the worst. It assumes you are going to get your hopes up and fail. It assumes that failure is going to be so painful it is going to cause death (or something much worse).
It is just trying to protect us from ourselves. Unfortunately, it is greatly misinformed.
I am not going to die if I fail, but I will suffocate if I don’t chase my dreams.
To do this I must keep stoking the fire of the dream. I must try again (and again). I must get up and dust myself off after setbacks. I must keep reminding myself that failure is not the end of the world (not matter how if feels in the moment). I must keep reminding myself of the past joys of chasing these dreams.
Even if I never reach these dream, by chasing them I will feel whole, alive and real.

The exact wrong food to eat after having dental work as your mouth is slowly un-numbing: Sushi.
You can’t tell where the fish ends and the inside of your cheek begins.