Come One Come All!!!!

Grow is growing!

I'm doing more workshops now and this one is open to the public!

Here's the description:

Ever wonder whether you are truly reaching your full potential? Or whether you are fully engaging your abilities?

Come to this lively, interactive seminar filled with insight about the hidden talents no one ever told you about. Presented by career coach, speaker and blogger, Katie Rice, this eye-opening workshop will have you rethinking your own potential!

Click here for tickets:

http://growcareercoaching.eventbrite.com

Create Yourself: Will Gray

“Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” 

― George Bernard Shaw

Last year, when my friend, Rebecca, recommended I go with her to a screening of Will Gray's documentary, "Broke," I thought little of it.  But Rebecca always has good recommendations when it comes to musical events, so I figured I might as well check it out. (After all, she was the catalyst behind my Enriquez Iglesias experience.) And this documentary was about breaking into the music industry, so I suspected that I'd probably enjoy it.

But "enjoy it" was an understatement. The experience blew me away.

The film screening was held in an intimate setting, a row house in Washington, DC. Upon entering, Will welcomed all of us in what I now know to be his typical warm, affectionate way. I was even a little taken aback by his humility and graciousness, being that he'd made a film, was a phenomenal singer and a gifted song writer.

And let's just say he was quite easy on the eyes.

(Shoot, was that out loud?)

Anyway, what really blew me away was Will's voice.  And I'm not just talking about his speaking voice or singing voice, which was, I have to say, amazing. (He and his fellow performer, Reva Williams, treated us to a few stunning performances following the film screening.) I'm referring instead to what Will had to say.  He had managed to find his Voice with a capital "V," that inner awareness that so few people seem to achieve in their lifetime.  He knew what he wanted: to perform, to create, to tell a story; and he new what he wanted to say: that the music industry was changing in some not-so-beneficial ways and how it that affects the artform of performing and songwriting.

The fact that Will had made his music career- by age 30- something profoundly personal and unique was truly inspirational.  What's more, Will had made his life his own in a world of imitators and skeptics, a world I'd become somewhat familiar with from my time in professional acting. Like a breath of fresh air he was genuine and kind. He hadn't succumbed to all of the phoniness of the music business, from the rejections, from the hardships of trying to express his art despite the throngs of people trying to break into showbiz mainly to be famous.  He hadn't been hardened by the fact that being the right look or sound can easily trump talent.

What I saw that night was someone who had chosen to transcend that often troublesome world by having faith: faith not only in God but in himself and others as well.  He appreciated the collaborative approach to music, writing and filmmaking. He spoke of the miraculous results stemming from working as a team and how he relished that collective creative process.

It became increasingly apparent as the evening progressed that Will was living in a truly multifaceted way, using his whole person. He had tapped not only into his songwriting ability and singing talent but also his entrepreneurial streak, his sharp intellect, his poetic gift for visual, oral and musical storytelling, and his penchant for finding meaning in life and sharing it with others. He demonstrated all of these extensions of himself in his beautiful music, his insightful documentary and the visual way in which he had presented the entire evening.

Listening to the story and songs of a musician who had gone for "broke" (thus the documentary's title) provided a visceral experience for all of us gathered there.  We shared an unexpected creative intimacy in a normally distant, reserved and sometimes unimaginative city. I suppose we Washingtonians just needed a bit of a renegade to shake things up!

So, from a person who has been fortunate enough to experience your talents, here is a belated thank you, Will.  Thank you for touching my life in such a wonderful way. You eloquently embody what it means to "create yourself."

Meet The Mother of Invention:

Ms. Necessity.

(Charmed, I'm sure.)

She often shows up when times are tight and we're experiencing more deprivations than we care to.

You may have heard that here in Washington, DC we are facing some pretty serious economic deprivations.  While the rest of the country has been reeling from the recession for quite some time, The District has been relatively sheltered from it, mainly due to the fact that our largest employer here is the Federal Government. Furthermore, thousands of government contractors call Washington their home as well, thereby providing a substantial portion of gainful employment.

But that government gravy train is slowing down substantially with the furloughs, deep budget cuts and other effects of the sequestration. I myself am certainly not looking forward to watching our nation's capital struggle.  The impact will not only affect my business, but the whole economy in this area. It will mean even less for those who make very little already and we'll see more individuals living below poverty.

Mother Invention, Please Step Forward 
(Because we need you!)

In the absence of indigence, however, some deprivation can have a beneficial effect.  For instance, think about some time when you had to cut back financially and thought there was no way you could survive without x,y or z.  But then you did indeed survive by coming up with a different means of getting what you needed, without the money you thought was "required." You discovered a personal inventiveness that you didn't know (or had forgotten) existed.

"When no one wants to lend you money, you become resourceful."

-Cheryl Krueger

Founder, Cheryl's Cookies

from an interview with Cake & Whiskey Magazine   

Yes, tight times and a meager budget can indeed be extremely difficult, but as long as we can still put food on the table and have a roof over our heads, it doesn't have to be devastating. It can make us create solutions and force us to rethink our needs and invent alternative plans; a great way of developing that creative brain "muscle!" 

And, as I bet you've also experienced, often times those alternative plans become the key to new relationships, resources and directions. Realizing that maybe we can get by with less and use our cleverness to compensate for cash is one of the most empowering feelings. We move away from being a victim of our circumstances to being a benefactor of our circumstances.

"The quickest way to give yourself a pay raise is to spend less money."

-The Minimalists, 

Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus

Most importantly we move away from the fear of less, the fear of complete depletion if we earn fewer dollars or give up something.  Money can be disabling that way, because once you can afford to have some luxury you get used to it.  You enjoy it, it seems to make your life easier and more comfortable.  But then you start to think you can't even live without that extra benefit , even though it didn't always exist. You've forgotten the fact that you used to do just fine!

After all, the natural tension between priorities and resources will always exist, and more money means more decisions about where funds should or shouldn't go.  Given that it's all relative, when IS enough really enough?

Now, Ms. Necessity, It's Your Turn

So here's my pie-in-the-sky hope for Washington: once all of these highly educated, highly skilled, highly inventive people out there begin making less money than they've become accustomed, they'll be forced to innovate and see some unique opportunities.  Perhaps they'll become entrepreneurial and supplement their diminishing income with a latent interest-turned-side business. Or, for those used to making a hefty paycheck, once they take away the big salary from their list of "must-haves" they may give themselves permission to do something that uses more of their talents.

"... what we do with our money plays a far more important role

 than how much money we make."

from "Don't Indulge, Be Happy"

by Elizabeth Dunn and Michael Norton

I'll leave you with an example of the relativity of money and a common mentality around here: 

A friend recently heard two private law firm partners discussing salaries. One was lamenting to another that she could not imagine what it would be like to live on $100K a year versus the $500K + annual salaries that she and most of her fellow partners at the firm earn. "How do people get by?" she asked her colleague, shaking her head in bewilderment.

Washington, you've got a long way to go, but hopefully you'll get there sooner than later.

Make It Your Own

If there's one thing I learned from my 12 years of professional acting it's this:

Don't go into professional acting.

I'm kidding! 

(kind of...)

And the second most important thing I learned is this:

Whatever you do, make it your own. 

I thought of the latter when I watched a video of these two young men playing the Lennon/McCartney song, "Let it Be":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-5XOCMpUwA

Enjoy!
-Katie

Jeff Haden: What Does YOUR Success Look Like?

Inc. columnist, Jeff Haden, suggests we adopt a more individualized definition of success. This involves honestly assessing our happiness and recognizing that there are always personal and professional tradeoffs.

Oh, and there's a picture of a Golden Retriever.

What more could you ask for?

Enjoy,
Katie

http://www.linkedin.com/today/post/article/20130314115932-20017018-the-best-definition-of-success-is-the-one-you-never-use?goback=%2Eptf_*1_*1_*1_*1_recentPosts_*1&trk=who_to_follow-b

What if you knew...

You had patience to spare?

Insights to offer?

What if you knew you you were enough to make a difference?

And were capable of creating really useful solutions? 

What would today look like?

The Thief

In the Oscar nominated film, Les Miserables, the amazing Hugh Jackman as Jean Valjean laments his cruel and unjust 20 year imprisonment, incurred merely for "stealing a mouthful of bread."

Given that testament, it's a good thing that my dog, Cloey Margaret, doesn't live in 19th century France.  She has stolen enough bread to warrant une guillotine sentence.

It's hard to admit that our lovely Golden (ahem) Angel has literally and figuratively taken the cake one too many times. What was just a once-in-a-while occurrence is now rampant. She's now officially a full blown thief, no doubt about it.

Yes, I'm talking about YOU!

From a loaf of bread to a carton of yogurt to turkey to fruit to butter (as well as the common butter substitute, Smart Balance) Cloey will scarf it down with aplomb. While we try our best to clear the counters as much as possible, life distractions inevitably happen, luring us away from the kitchen midway through making a ham sandwich or, say, Thanksgiving Dinner.  You better believe that The Thief is hanging around, paying close attention to any interruptions.

Besides snatching the unsuspecting muffin from the counter, she also chews toys- seasonal items in particular.  This past Christmas-and I'm not making this up- she plucked Baby Jesus out of the Little People manger scene.  (Fortunately I then plucked it out of her mouth.) Then she moved on to Santa and his hapless reindeer, followed by a futile attempt to gnaw off part of the Easter Bunny, who just happened to be hanging out with the Christmas gang.

How she always managed to select the holiday superstars I'll never know.

Anything made of wood is especially fair game. Lincoln Logs are carefully stored in a sealed container; however, she's pretty much cleared out our entire United States puzzle.  While South Dakota didn't phase me too much, I was almost personally offended when she chewed up my home state of Indiana.

But that's just the mischief happening in the house; she's decided that our yard is fair game as well.  She'll chew several nuggets of pine bark mulch if we're not paying attention, not to mention the kid's multi-hued sidewalk chalk and a ball... or two or three.

Obviously we have realized that enough is enough.  After all, not only is her habit an issue of inconvenience for us, we understand it could be dangerous for her.  While she doesn't swallow most of the stuff she chews, what if she accidentally did?  And there's always a chance that she'll get one too many Hershey Kisses when raiding the kid's Halloween bags, or Christmas Stockings, or, coming up right around the corner, Easter Baskets. Therefore we must now acknowledge, much to our dismay, that Cloey Margaret is not quite as perfect as we'd made her out to be in our minds.

However, before reaching this conclusion, I'll admit that I'd gone through every plausible excuse for these chewing fests. For a while there I fancied myself as some sort of animal behavioralist/detective (think The Dog Whisperer meets Ace Ventura: Pet Detective) trying to solve The Baffling Case of the Perpetual Munchies.

My first hunch involved a hunger or nutritional issue.  As in, are we not feeding her enough?  Our veterinarian- who also happens to be a trusted friend and seasoned doctor- said that no, she is getting just the right amount of the right kind of food. Then I thought, well, maybe she's not getting enough exercise and she's just bored. However, sure enough, I noticed that she stole food and chewed up random things even after coming back from long walks or playing in the yard.

Then at one point I postulated that perhaps she chews toys, for example, when we're all having fun and she isn't getting enough attention.  But that theory proved a bust when I discovered that she was chewing a toy car in her mouth while I was petting her. Her bone lay there just a few feet away, untouched, while she surreptitiously crushed the jeep into scrap metal.

Cloey, shown here making some good chewing choices

I kept coming up with more reasons as to why my precious lamb was eating, chewing and scarfing her way through our house with increasing gusto.  Separation anxiety? Dominance issues?  Obsessive Compulsive Disorder? Some disease of the neurological-hormonal-hematological-vascular nature? Her doctor refuted all of my stellar theories, saying that no, she is a Golden Retriever who loves to eat and chew and is tall enough to get what she wants, which is food from the counter. She also pointed out that Cloey's definition of "food source" seems to be broader than ours.  (Picky humans!)

Now, I would be kidding myself if I didn't factor in the sucker piece of all of this thievery business: Cloey knows she has us wrapped around all four of her paws. It's as if she feels she had passed the probationary period of her adoption and now she can eat whatever she wants, whenever she wants, knowing she is here to stay. And that assumption, of course, would be correct; our adorable, furry baby is going nowhere except in her crate: a nice, big, comfy cozy "home." We've concluded this will happen when we're away from the house for a little while or away from the kitchen or whenever we decide that she needs a little break from the chewing action. And who knows, she'll probably like that anyway, having boundaries and restraints and all.

(That's about as "pack leader" as I think I can get.)

The reason I am disclosing the shenanigans of our resident thief is this: sometimes an excuse is just an excuse. We can spend many an hour constructing elaborate excuses about a person or job situation or a beloved pet; however, most of the time we're spending lots of energy masking that big old reality that needs to be accepted.

In this case, we've had to accept that not only do we have a wonderful and loving Golden Retriever who is not as flawless as we'd once thought, but also one that has the oral fixation of a goat.  And if you had a goat, you certainly wouldn't let it roam freely in your home when you are gone now, would you? Time to accept this fact and move on, I'm guessing.

We can all stand to question relationships and job environments or anything that seems to keep us in a rut. The more we deny, ignore or excuse a problem the more destructive it's going to get.  And yet we tend to spend more time rationalizing behavior rather than doing the necessary steps to prevent it.

Conversely, when we modify or abandon a destructive relationship or stand up to the critical issues at hand, we empower ourselves to move forward instead of backward. And sometimes just the acknowledgement alone can be half the battle, followed by some boundary-setting.

So here's my question of the day:

If you took away the notion that something- or someone- isn't as perfect as you'd once imagined, what would change? Could you move forward? 

I'm guessing you could. 

And I'm personally crossing my fingers that we can put a stop to Cloey's shenanigans before Cesar Millan gets our number... and puts us all in la guillotine.