The path­ways through our life…there are many. 

Choices.

What will it be?  Today.  What are you choos­ing?  Do you feel that joy in your heart?

“Joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls.” ~ Mother Teresa

I’d like to intro­duce a very spe­cial friend today.  Megan “Joy­Girl!” Bord! 

I’ve known Megan for about a year, and in that time I’ve wit­nessed her open her heart up to what is right and good in her life.  Through all of this, what Megan has given me is a deeper appre­ci­a­tion for life and love and heart-connections.

What does all of this really mean, though? 

Please join me, as Megan and I sit down for a con­ver­sa­tion on life…

1.  When I think of you, I am drawn to the “Joy­Girl!” moniker.  Explain that to us, how it came about, and what it really means to you. 
First of all, “moniker” is such an awe­some word. (smile)

The nick­name “Joy­Girl!” came about through my friend, Steve. He started call­ing me that from the first day we met. I rather liked it and decided to make it stick.  To me, it’s aspi­ra­tional, descrip­tive of who I am at my core, and bet­ter yet, it’s mem­o­rable! I mean, who walks around call­ing them­selves Joy­Girl?!! It’s FUN!

As for what it means, in my mind joygirls:

• Laugh a lot.
• Draw chalk mes­sages on their friends’ dri­ve­ways as birth­day surprises.
• Fly across the coun­try to spend a long week­end with soul sis­ters they met online.
• Smile eas­ily; com­pli­ment peo­ple; encour­age oth­ers; live from their heart; want the best for the world; feel at peace most of the time… The list goes on.
• Ulti­mately joy­girls just want to have fun (thank you, Cyndi Lauper!).

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Aspi­ra­tional!  Now, there’s an awe­some word!!  And those side­walk chalk creations…Megan…YOU are a chalk Picasso! 

2.  There’s a say­ing “A jour­ney of a thou­sand miles begins with a sin­gle step”.  Would you share one of those steps you would like to take, yet maybe hold back from doing?
I love this ques­tion, but I’m going to answer it back­wards. (smile)

I just recently became involved in help­ing to build what will become Upstate New York’s largest spir­i­tual heal­ing and retreat cen­ter. I’m work­ing with two other incred­i­ble women on it, and we’re feel­ing our way through each step since none of us have done any­thing like this before. The amaz­ing thing is, resources are show­ing up exactly as we need them to!

A year ago, though, I never could have imag­ined myself in this role – I would have pushed it off on some­one more qual­i­fied and moti­vated. That one step idea would have been lost on me, but now I know I can do this!

And my phi­los­o­phy, in gen­eral, is “If it feels good, do it. If it doesn’t, then don’t.” So I mea­sure the steps taken by how good they feel in my heart. My jour­ney, as you can imag­ine, has NOT been a straight lines!

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  The Uni­verse pro­vides!  And I also just think Robert Frost as I read this…“I shall be telling this with a sigh. Some­where ages and ages hence: two roads diverged in a wood, and I — I took the one less trav­eled by, and that has made all the dif­fer­ence.” 

Megan, I think this is such a won­der­ful project for you — build­ing a spir­i­tual heal­ing and retreat cen­ter.  It really just feels so fit­ting for what I feel is the essence of who you are.  You con­nect at such a deep level, and in that your heart shines!

3.  I draw a whole lot of joy from your presence…so the “Joy­girl” name is very fit­ting.  How about those moments, though, when you are not feel­ing all that joy­ful?
Another great ques­tion; thank you, Lance. I come from a legacy of “not always joy­ful.” I was a sullen girl for a sig­nif­i­cant part of my life, and I’m no stranger to dark moods. I still have days when I fall flat.  There are times when all I want to do is stay in bed! The dif­fer­ence now, though, is that those not-so-joyful moments don’t last very long, and they’re not nearly as sticky. I don’t get sucked into them the way I used to.

Now I can let myself have a down day, feel how­ever I’m feel­ing, and then rebound the next day wiser from what­ever it taught me.

What’s more, I’ve learned to embrace the idea that every­thing in life ebbs & flows, and it’s all so very good!

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Megan, I love how you both acknowl­edge these moments AND see them as such a part of you.  Such is life…for all of us.  That you so openly artic­u­late that here…what a true bless­ing.

4.  Tell us one unex­pected thing that has hap­pened to you, from going down this path of start­ing It’s All About Joy?
(note: All About Joy is Megan’s for­mer blog, which she has cur­rently set aside as she works on other projects)
Hon­estly, I never expected to meet such incred­i­ble peo­ple, many of whom have become friends. It’s like a beau­ti­ful extended fam­ily, with tremen­dous sup­port, encour­age­ment and love flow­ing to and from one another constantly.

I feel close­ness with peo­ple who live all over the world; that’s noth­ing I expected when I started writ­ing my lit­tle 500-word posts a few times a week!

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  That close­ness with peo­ple from all over, from all walks of life…such an amaz­ing and won­der­ful thing!  And that all leads me to thoughts I have about our world — and how, when we come from a place of deep con­nec­tion with self, we also find peo­ple that lift us up, help us, guide us, walk with us…all in such amaz­ing and car­ing ways.  Megan, know that you have been all of this and more, to me. 

5.  Deep-down, Megan, what makes you, “you”?  And what does a typ­i­cal day for you involve?
Deep down I have a love for, and curios­ity about, life. I also believe every­thing is pos­si­ble, and that our beliefs are the only things keep­ing us from all that we desire. I’m also a pleasure-seeking indi­vid­ual. Even my addic­tive ten­den­cies hang off of that (avoid pain, seek com­fort). All of those things make me “me.”

As for what a typ­i­cal day involves, I start each day giv­ing thanks. I bow down to the Uni­verse for all the glo­ri­ous­ness in my life, and then I inter­nal­ize the notion that “I Am God.” Once I can feel that in my cells, I fire up the lap­top and get crack­ing: email­ing, writ­ing, read­ing, cre­at­ing, con­nect­ing, loving…

I run three to six miles just about every day, too, which is made eas­ier by a dream job I recently man­i­fested as a per­sonal assis­tant to a great guy who’s done well for him­self. So through­out the day, I field requests from him, his clients, etc. and help him man­age his busi­ness and per­sonal lives, all from the com­forts of my home — some­times in my work­out clothes, some­times in my paja­mas. Such joy and flex­i­bil­ity!
 

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Life is glo­ri­ous!  Start­ing your day that way…and I have an even bet­ter under­stand­ing why that “Joy­Girl!” moniker is so fit­ting!

6.  What are you “let­ting go” of today, to move toward the deeper voice in your heart?
For starters, I let go of my blog. I kept get­ting the prompt that it was time to take a break, so I did. Doing so meant fac­ing the fear­ful “what ifs?”, espe­cially since my blog shaped how peo­ple came to know me in our com­mu­nity. When the fear – those “what ifs” – arose, I had clar­ity: I wasn’t blog­ging because it soothed my heart any­more as much as I blogged to feed some part of my iden­tity. That’s when I knew it had to go.

I also started let­ting go of other per­sonal goals that were cen­tered around strength­en­ing “Megan Bord,” the brand. Things like pub­lish­ing a book, being “well known” for some­thing (any­thing!), accom­plish­ments, val­i­da­tion, etc. It’s less about me these days – or at least, the “me” that I’ve always known. There’s a big­ger sense of com­mu­nity – of one­ness – that I’m align­ing myself with. I don’t quite know what that means yet, but it’s okay!

In this let­ting go, I feel clearer and free. And that, along with being here today, feels good.

Thank you for shar­ing your space with me, Lance, and for demon­strat­ing love in every­thing you do.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Megan, this is all beau­ti­fully okay…as you align more deeply with what your heart speaks.  As I read what you’ve writ­ten here, I KNOW that you are trav­el­ing on your own path…and a path that is such a right place for you to be.

7.  What does LOVE mean to you?
In my eyes, love is the ulti­mate wis­dom, and it’s an energy that can be felt in the body: as warmth, as pul­sa­tion, as heal­ing, as assured­ness, as the orig­i­nal source of joy. Love is all-knowing, and it con­nects every­one and every­thing on this planet.

Love is the uni­ver­sal currency:

With­out it, we are poor.

But if we have love and noth­ing else, we have every­thing we need.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  This is truly YOU.  And I really believe this, just by the way you “care”.  I’ve felt that in every con­ver­sa­tion we’ve had.  I always believe that what I’m say­ing to you…it mat­ters.  And in that, I feel deep love.  You ARE cur­rency for the world!

Clos­ing Thoughts:  Megan, you embody what is right in our world…embracing all of life…and wrap­ping it in love.  And in doing that, I feel this deeper con­nec­tion with you, and even more — a deeper sense of how amaz­ing and beau­ti­ful our world is when we embrace that oneness…the col­lec­tive heart…the whole of human­ity. 

Megan, it is such an honor to call you friend, to have you here in this space, and to know that your beauty goes deep and wide.
 

“We shall not cease from explo­ration. And the end of all our explor­ing will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” ~ T. S. Eliot

Explo­ration.  What does that word bring up for you? 

Today I’m sit­ting down to talk with some­one who has lived very much a life of explo­ration.  Please wel­come Sandy Salle here to this space.  Sandy, along with her sister-in-law Mered­ith Hill, oper­ate Hills of Africa Travel.  Sandy, who cur­rently lives in the United States, is a native of Zim­babwe.  Her many years in Africa have given her a deep love of the coun­try, the cul­ture, and the explo­ration of a very remote and untamed part of our world. 

Please read along as Sandy shares about her expe­ri­ence with this great part in our world…Africa.  And in that, feel her deep sense of love for this place, and for an explo­ration not only of another part of our world but also an explo­ration into self…

1. What is it about Africa that really touches your soul?
It’s pure energy.

Every­thing from the smell of the first rains to the melt­ing sun­sets, the bright col­ors to the strong aro­mas, and the mag­netic wildlife to the gen­uine peo­ple, Africa is a place where you leave with a new out­look on life and on yourself.

To me, there is no other place on earth where you can sit for hours on end in com­plete silence as you watch the story of nature unfold before you. And the peo­ple are so gen­uine in their hos­pi­tal­ity and joy that you can­not help but feel trans­formed by their energy.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Sandy, what a won­der­ful view of Africa!  And truly, what a mag­nif­i­cent expe­ri­ence to life.  Being able to expe­ri­ence the beauty of our world — both our nat­ural world and from the inhab­i­tants of that said world…in such grace…beautiful!

2. You have started your own com­pany, Hills of Africa. Tell us about the inspi­ra­tion behind that. And how long you have been doing this?
I was work­ing in NYC and had just had my first child when we took a trip to North Car­olina in March of 2002 to visit my brother and his wife. With the inten­tion of mak­ing a move, we put an offer on a house. Whilst talk­ing about life, my sister-in-law told me of her plans to start a travel com­pany. I didn’t think any­thing of it.

When we went on hol­i­day together a few months later, she asked me if I would like to join her in her com­pany. I eagerly said yes, not even think­ing that I didn’t have any expe­ri­ence in the travel indus­try, but know­ing that I had lots of expe­ri­ence trav­el­ing around Africa from hav­ing lived in Zim­babwe and trav­el­ing around Africa with my parents. So my part­ner is my sister-in-law, my maiden name is Hill—hence the cre­ation of Hills of Africa Travel. We have been in busi­ness since May 2002.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  What I find so great about this is how you have really found some­thing that is deeply mean­ing­ful to you.  And in that, you are cre­at­ing amaz­ing expe­ri­ences for all of the trav­el­ers that come your way!  What a trip this must be!!  And, from our phone con­ver­sa­tions about this and the trips you plan — I have to say — this just sounds like an expe­ri­ence of a life­time!

3.  Tell us about one African adven­ture you have been on and what made it so mean­ing­ful for you.
I trav­eled to Zam­bia to do sev­eral site inspec­tions and ended the trip with spe­cial, one-on-one time with my dad, whom I hadn’t seen in two years. My dad is cur­rently liv­ing and work­ing in Zambia. I took him to the mag­i­cal Zam­bezi Val­ley, stay­ing in two of my favorite camps, Chi­awa Camp and Old Mon­doro on the Lower Zam­bezi River. It was very emo­tional for me (I am a crier!) as my fam­ily means the world to me. One day we were plan­ning to leave on a game drive and went back to our tents to get ready, when my dad came run­ning (or limp­ing as he has a bad knee) out to tell me that there was a fam­ily of ele­phants in front of his tent. So, instead of going on our game drive, we opted instead to walk and visit with the elephants. They even­tu­ally made their way across the river. 

That after­noon we went for a canoe ride and took a detour as we saw a buf­falo in the reeds. Our guide told us that we might have to come back and head into the main chan­nel as he wasn’t sure our route would get us through. On the way back into camp, we saw our fam­ily of ele­phants start­ing to swim back across the river. 

The funny thing is that if we hadn’t taken this detour to see the buf­falo, we wouldn’t have been in our canoes right next to this fam­ily of ele­phants. This fam­ily of ele­phants swim­ming together was the most amaz­ing sight and really meant so much to me. They all had their trunks up in the air try­ing to fig­ure out where our scent was com­ing from. We man­aged to get so close to them; it was one of the most mean­ing­ful expe­ri­ences I have ever had in the bush. It was as if the ele­phants were speak­ing to me.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Wow!  Sandy, this story you’ve shared here really touches upon the beauty of the moment, and of let­ting that expe­ri­ence — within that moment — become a part of our being.  I sense that very much as I read this, and I also sense the true love you have for this place that you have called home. 

4.  Tell us a lit­tle about the Soul Safari trip you have com­ing up in 2011 (which just sounds like an amaz­ing trip, by the way).
Thank you! It is a truly amaz­ing expe­ri­ence. We hosted a Soul Safari in 2009, which was a great success.

The best way to explain the Soul Safari trip is to first, imag­ine your life with­out fear or uncer­tainty and with the abil­ity to con­trol your own des­tiny. A life where you have the con­trol to erad­i­cate both sub­lim­i­nal and obvi­ous fears, and as a result, you receive clar­ity on your life’s purpose.

We all have past-life fears that block and stall us in our lives, and many times, we are unaware of these fears.

This clar­ity of life is some­thing that the Soul Safari Trans­for­ma­tion with Ainslie MacLeod, a psy­chic and fea­tured author on Oprah’s Soul Series, will help you to achieve. Dur­ing the Soul Safari Trans­for­ma­tion, you’ll dis­cover the sim­ple, step-by-step sys­tem for under­stand­ing your soul’s pur­pose, while you uncover a sense of ful­fill­ment and joy you have never known—all in just 9 days while you enjoy a Zim­babwe safari tour, a Vic­to­ria Falls tour, a Hwange National Park safari, and a Zam­bezi River cruise.

Some of the high­lights that will be expe­ri­enced on the Soul Safari 2011 include 9 days of Trans­for­ma­tion lessons and guid­ance by Ainslie MacLeod, all activ­i­ties of a leisure trip to Zim­babwe, an exter­nal ener­getic boost of nature, and an inter­nal ener­getic boost of game viewing.

In these coach­ing talks and Trans­for­ma­tion lessons with Ainslie, you’ll learn how to iden­tify past life fears and find a moti­va­tion that will result in totally erad­i­cat­ing them. You’ll receive power in absolute clar­ity, you’ll have the abil­ity to embrace your authen­tic self and finally love who you are, you’ll dis­cover a free­dom you’ve never had before, and you’ll dis­cover what you were put here to do.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Sandy, this trip sounds so deeply mov­ing and con­nect­ing at a soul level.  What an expe­ri­ence this has to be — out away from the hus­tle and bus­tle of our daily lives…completely focused on that deeper con­nec­tion to self!  And doing all of this, while sur­rounded by the beau­ti­ful nat­ural ele­ments of the African countryside…so, so good.…

5. Are there any com­mon con­nec­tions between the types of trav­el­ers you have on your dif­fer­ent safaris?
I would say that our clients, no mat­ter the coun­tries they plan on vis­it­ing and no mat­ter the activ­i­ties they choose to take part in, have a curios­ity about life. They always want to learn more and expe­ri­ence new adven­tures, cul­tures, foods, sights, sounds, scents, and cus­toms. They come to Africa to gain per­spec­tive on the world and on them­selves. They leave Africa with a new energy and a new zest for life.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Our world is such an amaz­ing place!  That you have shared your deep love for one cor­ner of that…so awe­some! 

6.  I love that we are talk­ing about Africa – and I can’t help but draw sim­i­lar­i­ties the idea of “jun­gle” that touches both you and I. Could you take a minute to describe what the term “Jun­gle of Life” might mean to you.
Being out in the bush—which isn’t a jun­gle, but draws on some similarities—is all about being clos­est to nature and expe­ri­enc­ing com­plete peace and spir­i­tual awak­en­ing. There is no one else around you, just the ani­mals and the sights and the sounds of nature. You can hear the birds singing and the wind rus­tle the grass, and smell the bold aroma of the earth. You couldn’t be closer to your true self than in the bush / plains, as this is where you really get to know yourself. You are able to con­tem­plate life and think about your future and what you really want out of life. 

Our every­day life is so tan­gled with what we have to get accom­plished, how we should work, and our every­day respon­si­bil­i­ties. Being in the bush, or the Jun­gle of Life, is about find­ing your true self again, dream­ing big, liv­ing big, and remem­ber­ing that we are all here for a big­ger purpose.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Find­ing that space of becom­ing closer to our true self…that’s what I really draw from what you have shared.  Life can seem like a “jun­gle” some­times. (or…like being out in the bush…)  When we begin that jour­ney of work­ing our way through it all (the “jun­gle”, the “bush”…life…)…really work­ing our way through it — very much this takes us toward that place of our “true self”.  Sandy, that’s what I love about all that you have shared, both here and through our con­ver­sa­tions.  I feel even more con­nected to self, just from hav­ing your words inter­sect with mine…

7. What do you love most about the work that you do?
Noth­ing is more reward­ing to me than shar­ing the beauty and mag­netic power of Africa with our clients. If I can make someone’s dream vaca­tion come true, I feel as though my dream has come true.

We also find it highly reward­ing to send clients on a life-changing jour­ney to Africa and to hear about their expe­ri­ence with the ani­mals and the peo­ple. It’s also amaz­ing to see the peo­ple of Africa get to know trav­el­ers and see how the African peo­ples’ lives are changed for­ever by hav­ing been given the chance of get­ting to know trav­el­ers and learn­ing about their fam­i­lies, their his­to­ries, and their cultures.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  What I find so neat is how every­thing you offer can be cus­tomized and designed for the expe­ri­ence each trav­eler desires.  What a gift you give to all those who work with you!

Clos­ing Thoughts:  Sandy, the gift you give this world speaks loudly to the pas­sion you have for this remote and wild part of our world.  As in the words of T.S. Elliot, you have not ceased from explo­ration, and in help­ing oth­ers to explore more deeply them­selves.  And in that…we just get to know “us” so much more deeply.  Keep shar­ing this pas­sion you have with the world!

---

You can keep up with Sandy, and Hills of Africa Travel by fol­low­ing them on Twit­ter and Face­book.  For more infor­ma­tion about an African adven­ture, visit their web­site.   Just vis­it­ing their web­site is an expe­ri­ence into Africa!

“I can think of no more stir­ring sym­bol of man’s human­ity to man than a fire engine.” ~ Kurt Von­negut

Ear­lier this year, I had the oppor­tu­nity to have lunch and get to know another Mil­wau­kee blog­ger, Nate St. Pierre.  What Nate has cre­ated, though, is much more than a blog.  He has really cre­ated a move­ment, based around his web­site, It Starts With Us. 

What is so unique about what Nate is doing, is how It Starts With Us (ISWU) has really become a place to bring peo­ple together — from all walks of life and every cor­ner of the globe.  Brought together around the sim­ple idea of doing good in our world.  And that’s not to say there aren’t a whole lot of oppor­tu­ni­ties to do that right in our own neigh­bor­hoods — as I’m sure there are.  This is really about small, easy acts of good (mis­sions) that can be done -  with a com­mon con­nec­tion to peo­ple from all over the world! 

Please join me as I ask Nate some ques­tions about what has brought him to this place he’s at today.

1.  Tell us a lit­tle bit about who “you” are (fam­ily, career, any spe­cial life expe­ri­ences you’d like to share, etc.)
I laughed when I saw the word “career” in the ques­tion. I don’t think I’ve ever had a career as most peo­ple would define it. I started out as a jan­i­tor at age 14, then dur­ing high school and col­lege I worked as a civil­ian hire for the Air Force. I went to col­lege on aca­d­e­mic schol­ar­ship to study mol­e­c­u­lar genet­ics and organic chem­istry, then dropped out of school to go work at a fish can­nery in Alaska. When I came back from there, I did some free­lance tech­ni­cal writ­ing and desk­top pub­lish­ing. Dur­ing the dot-com bub­ble I taught myself basic web design and built a topic-specific search engine direc­tory, which I ran for a while and then sold. From there I moved into land title insur­ance for a lit­tle bit, and then I became a web devel­oper for a big com­pany. After doing that for a while, I became the web team leader and ran that show for a cou­ple of years, until I decided to quit and focus on ItStartsWith.Us full-time. Instead of hav­ing a solid career to back me up, I feel that I have a vari­ety of dif­fer­ent expe­ri­ences to draw from, each of which has allowed me to develop a dif­fer­ent skill set and per­spec­tive on life. I can’t say that I’ll run ItStartsWith.Us for­ever, but I can tell you that it’s the first job I’ve ever truly loved.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  The expe­ri­ence at the fish can­nery in Alaska has to have some pretty inter­est­ing mem­o­ries!  And…I think you have really hit upon an impor­tant thing:  Our life is not just about our career, it’s really about our life expe­ri­ences and the peo­ple we’ve met along the way.  Keep on really liv­ing life, my friend!

2.  What led to the cre­ation of the It Starts With Us web­site?
I was attend­ing a week-long lead­er­ship train­ing course for my job in Novem­ber of 2008, and one of the ses­sions focused on com­plet­ing self-assessment exer­cises. “What are your skills, tal­ents and inter­ests, what do you enjoy doing, etc.” — that kind of thing. After writ­ing all that down, the idea was that you should try to do some­thing in your life that would speak to those qual­i­ties. With that in mind, the instruc­tions were to write for 20 min­utes based on the ques­tion pre­sented on the next page. When I turned to the page, I saw that it was blank, except for the phrase, “Next year, I will … ” at the top. I scrib­bled furi­ously for 20 min­utes, and when I was done, I looked back to see what I had writ­ten. Today I don’t remem­ber any­thing about that page except what I wrote for the first line: “Next year, I will change the world.”

I thought about what that meant for a few months, and real­ized that I could never do very much on my own. But I thought that if I could build a sys­tem that would enable peo­ple to par­tic­i­pate quickly and eas­ily, feel like part of a team, have fun, not pay a dime, and actu­ally see the life-changing results of their work, then they would engage with the project. And with so many peo­ple engag­ing, we lit­er­ally could change the world.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Nate, what you have cre­ated with the It Starts With Us move­ment is incred­i­bly soul-touching.  You ARE chang­ing the world — in some amaz­ing ways!

3.  Nate, when I think about your site, I think about how I can per­son­ally make a dif­fer­ence in the world – and how your site helps facil­i­tate a way to do that.  Am I close to what you see your mis­sion as?
Indeed. The vision of ItStartsWith.Us is to change the world. The mis­sion — the way we do that — is to make a pos­i­tive impact in the lives of the peo­ple around us … in just 15 min­utes a week. Any­one and every­one can give 15 min­utes a week towards help­ing out their neigh­bor, lov­ing their fam­ily, work­ing on their atti­tude, or join­ing us in one of  our shared mis­sions, like writ­ing a let­ter to a sick child or drop­ping a Love Bomb on some­one in need. When I assign the weekly mis­sions, I try to make them small enough to be attain­able, but big enough to make a mea­sur­able dif­fer­ence in some­one else’s life, and also your own.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  What’s so great about this is the min­i­mal time com­mit­ment that is really nec­es­sary to be a part of this.  Any­one can do it!!  And — the whole col­lec­tive of this is so powerful!

4.  Tell us about the weekly mis­sions, and how they have impacted you per­son­ally.
I like to think of the weekly mis­sions as a gen­tle reminder to keep our eyes open to the good we can do in this world as we walk through life. There’s no pres­sure to do them or not — nobody’s keep­ing score. It’s very easy to delete the email or unsub­scribe from the list alto­gether. We’ve been run­ning mis­sions for right around a year now, and I’ve done every sin­gle one I’ve assigned. And you know what? It was hard for me. It made me stretch a lit­tle bit. I’m a huge intro­vert, and I’m not the friend­liest per­son (my fam­ily and friends can attest to that). But doing these mis­sions each week has opened my eyes to so many things I can do bet­ter in this life. I’ve found so many ways to make a dif­fer­ence for oth­ers, even if it’s just as sim­ple as a friendly smile, a quick chat on the street, or a small offer of help. And the sur­pris­ing thing is, as much as the peo­ple I serve appre­ci­ate the lit­tle things I do, I’m the one who gets the biggest ben­e­fit. My out­look on life is bet­ter. My atti­tude is more pos­i­tive. My days are more joy­ful. It’s really been amaz­ing, and it seems the old adage is true — when you serve oth­ers, you really do get back more than you give.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  I’ve been a mem­ber since our lunch meet­ing back in late win­ter of this year.  While I haven’t done every mis­sion, I have done most of them.  And that’s the thing.  Some weeks we get busy, can’t get to every email that comes in, etc, etc.  And that’s what works here.  I do this when I can.  And it’s a win-win when I do.  Some­one ben­e­fits from what­ever “kind­ness” is being put out there this week.  That’s not nearly it, though — I come away from all of this a bet­ter per­son, and am touched by each one of these mis­sions that I par­tic­i­pate in! 

5. Tell us one unex­pected thing that has hap­pened to you in the last year.
I think the most unex­pected thing is what I men­tioned just above — that I was changed as a result of this project. I began it because I believed in the idea and thought I could bring a lot of peo­ple together for the com­mon good, but I was totally amazed by the way it trans­formed me right from the beginning.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  I love this!!  When we trans­form our­selves in amaz­ing ways, what a great place to be!

6.  If you had to pick one thing as your great­est achieve­ment, what would it be (and why)?
With this project, or with life? Hmm. I’ll pick the “with this project” option, because it’s eas­ier. With this project I’m most proud of the fact that we’ve been able to make such a dif­fer­ence for so many peo­ple. We started out with 18 mem­bers a year ago, and today we have over 2,000 mem­bers in dozens of coun­tries. In just one year we’ve been able to get to the point where we’re now pump­ing hun­dreds of hours of com­mu­nity ser­vice into the world each week in an orga­nized, directed and effec­tive way. And we’ve been able to do it with no fund­ing — just a desire to make a dif­fer­ence. I wish I could share all the notes, calls and emails I receive on a weekly basis about what the team has done — we truly do touch hearts and change lives. It’s incred­i­ble to be a part of that.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Hun­dreds of hours.…fifteen min­utes at a time!!  How cool is that!!

7. Any­thing new you have com­ing up?
Dude, I always have some­thing new com­ing up.  Right now I’m work­ing with a cou­ple of peo­ple on two spin-off sites: Love Bomb and Love Drop. The Love Bomb sub­group is already very active, so we’re going to turn that into a stand­alone project to bet­ter focus the efforts of those mem­bers. Love Drop will be a true 501©3 char­i­ta­ble orga­ni­za­tion cen­tered around the micro-giving con­cept, where inter­ested peo­ple join the group and donate either $1.00 or $5.00 a month, and at the end of each month we ask our mem­bers if they know of any­one who could use some finan­cial help, and then we’ll direct vir­tu­ally all of that money to the cho­sen recip­i­ent. I try to keep the main ItStartsWith.Us team away from any mon­e­tary giv­ing, so this will give inter­ested par­ties the oppor­tu­nity to give back financially.

The biggest thing I’m work­ing on right now, how­ever, is the busi­ness offer­ing of the project. Last month I quit my job to focus on ISWU full-time (putting 30 hours a week into the project on top of my full-time job for the last year was get­ting a bit rough). I’m now work­ing with large orga­ni­za­tions and busi­nesses to uti­lize the ISWU model to mobi­lize their mem­bers to give back in a fun, free and effec­tive way. I’ve custom-built all the tools nec­es­sary for busi­nesses to adopt this model and have the same kind of suc­cess that we’re hav­ing, and I’m doing per­sonal con­sult­ing to help them imple­ment the sys­tem and make a real impact with it. Even bet­ter, when these orga­ni­za­tions con­tract with me to adopt the ISWU plat­form, they also become part of the lead­er­ship net­work I’ve formed, and part of our quar­terly ini­tia­tives … which will be huge mis­sions con­sist­ing of peo­ple from dif­fer­ent com­pa­nies and groups all over the world, where we all work together to do some­thing for one per­son, one fam­ily, or one orga­ni­za­tion … all at the same time. Imag­ine all of us com­ing together to grant a wish for a child in the Make-a-Wish Foun­da­tion, which is one of the places I’m going be look­ing to part­ner with. The world has never seen the kind of things we’re going to be able to accom­plish this year. It’s going to make a huge dif­fer­ence — and be a lot of fun at the same time.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  I’ve been a part of the Love Bomb group for sev­eral weeks.  What a mov­ing expe­ri­ence, to be able to offer some words of encour­age­ment and love to one per­son who has a lot they are deal­ing with.  And — how awe­some that you are able to focus on ISWU full-time!  The whole idea of tak­ing this into busi­ness, too, makes so much sense:  what a great way to unite a com­mon group of peo­ple around a com­mon cause!

8.  Deep down, what makes you uniquely “you”?
Had to end with a tough one, didn’t you? Hmm. Okay, how about this? I’m a business-minded ide­al­ist. Mean­ing, I have the val­ues, pas­sion, ded­i­ca­tion and drive of some­one who wants to change the world, but I’m doing it in such a way that it makes sense to those with the money and power to help make it hap­pen. I talk to exec­u­tives about how adopt­ing the ISWU plat­form will help with employee engage­ment, recruit­ment and reten­tion, and about how the real-world results they get with their group will be worth much more in pos­i­tive brand-building than what they’re cur­rently spend­ing from their adver­tis­ing and PR bud­gets. I show them how being a part of this net­work affects their bot­tom line and is actu­ally prof­itable for them, and then when they join, I fly out to their head­quar­ters and show them how to run their own group that touches hearts and changes lives. Yep. Just like what we’re doing now. And since I give them all the tools and all the exper­tise they need for a very rea­son­able price, ISWU becomes a self-sustainable busi­ness … in the busi­ness of chang­ing the world.

So that’s how I feel I’m unique — I’m some­one who believes that absolutely every­one is in a posi­tion to do amaz­ing things for the com­mon good. Pas­sion­ate indi­vid­u­als, small com­pa­nies, global brands, non-profits, edu­ca­tional orga­ni­za­tions, celebri­ties, reg­u­lar folk … as long as we work together in an orga­nized, effec­tive and sus­tain­able way, we’ll be able to do things that have never been done before. It is cer­tainly pos­si­ble. In fact, it’s even eas­ier than you think. And I’m excited about get­ting it done.

Lance’s Com­men­tary: Hey, I can’t make all of these easy!!  You are cre­at­ing some­thing that is very spe­cial and mean­ing­ful for every­one involved.  That, cou­pled with the new direc­tions you have planned — and you are indeed chang­ing the world…in very life-connecting ways!

Clos­ing Com­ments:  Nate, as I read that quote by Kurt Von­negut up above…you ARE the fire engine!  And all these peo­ple sign­ing up to be a part of the team become the water.  Wow!!  From this…WE are all chang­ing the world!  Your cre­ation of It Starts With Us is the cat­a­lyst for bring­ing together peo­ple to col­lec­tively make a big dif­fer­ence in our world, one step at a time!  I am hon­ored to be part of this amaz­ing move­ment! 

---

You can keep up with Nate and the It Starts With Us move­ment by vis­it­ing his web­site, fol­low­ing him on Twit­ter, and sub­scrib­ing to his Face­book page.

“Heal­ing may not be so much about get­ting bet­ter, as about let­ting go of every­thing that isn’t you — all of the expec­ta­tions, all of the beliefs — and becom­ing who you are.” ~ Rachel Naomi Remen

Today I have a very spe­cial guest here (she’s from Wis­con­sin — we could be neigh­bors…), dis­cussing a topic that is all too often shoved under the cov­ers.  Please help me wel­come Mag­gie, who has cre­ated a won­der­ful resource for any­one out there suf­fer­ing from the hor­rors of domes­tic vio­lence, sex­ual abuse, and rape. 

Mag­gie has a per­sonal blog, Okay, Fine, Dammit, that she has had for some time.  About a year ago, after writ­ing a local piece on domes­tic vio­lence, Mag­gie felt the deeper need for cre­at­ing a place where peo­ple could share their own per­sonal sto­ries — and to bring some peace and heal­ing in the process.  From that, she cre­ated the Vio­lence Unsi­lenced website.

Vio­lence Unsi­lenced (VU) is that place where peo­ple can share, in their own words — from their per­sonal expe­ri­ences from domes­tic vio­lence, sex­ual abuse, and rape.  Please note: read­ing the VU site can be emo­tion­ally chal­leng­ing and all the sto­ries are very real. It’s in these sto­ries, though, that the vio­lence, pain, and suf­fer­ing can find some pos­si­bil­ity of heal­ing.  It’s also a place where each of us, through the voices of those who have been there, can more deeply see how heinous these acts are.  And in that, per­haps we can all take a few more steps towards a heal­ing and mean­ing­ful com­pas­sion for all our broth­ers and sis­ters in this world.  

Please read along, as Mag­gie shares a more in depth look at who she is and what she has created.

1.  What led to the cre­ation of the Vio­lence Unsi­lenced web­site?
Back in 2008, I wrote an arti­cle pro­fil­ing seven domes­tic vio­lence sur­vivors for a city mag­a­zine — and the expe­ri­ence changed me. Then one night, right around that same time my arti­cle ran, there was a domes­tic vio­lence death in my com­mu­nity. In a fit of sad­ness, I vented on my per­sonal blog (Okay, Fine, Dammit) — and the response was very intense. There were clearly a lot of peo­ple impacted by abuse. On top of that, I knew how cathar­tic the mag­a­zine expe­ri­ence had been for the sur­vivors I pro­filed, and decided I wanted to keep that momen­tum going. I was well aware by then in the power of the blog­ging com­mu­nity, and I had a lot of con­fi­dence in my fel­low blog­gers. I knew we could do this together. In writ­ing the arti­cle I learned that one in four women will be a vic­tim of abuse in her life­time. I thought about how small each of our blog­ging com­mu­ni­ties can be, and how well we think we know each other. The assump­tions we make, the things we don’t see. I thought, why don’t we show the blo­gos­phere just how pro­lific and encom­pass­ing abuse is?

From the very start, VU was a col­lab­o­ra­tive process. My blog read­ers con­tributed their input, their sto­ries, helped choose the name, and helped spread the word — so much so that on the very first day VU went live, there were sev­eral thou­sand vis­i­tors. That was over a year ago, and I believe it’s still a very col­lec­tive effort.  I’ve said this before, but I hope when peo­ple think of VU, they don’t think of me — they think of the sur­vivors and the sup­port­ers. It’s a good day when I over­hear some­one talk about the “peo­ple over at VU,” rather than the “person.”

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Mag­gie, I find much hope in what you have cre­ated.  And for me, per­son­ally, I really believe it touches upon love and compassion…in the hear­ing of these stories. 

I think about that fig­ure, 1 in 4 women will be the vic­tim of abuse.  And as I think of the women I know in my life, I really hope that it’s way off (although real­ity tells me it’s prob­a­bly not).  Proof of that made it’s appear­ance just yes­ter­day — as I read the words of a blog­ger friend, Jill (who gave per­mis­sion to link to this — thank you, Jill) who just hap­pened to share her own story of sex­ual assault on her site.  Jill — know that I see you as a brave and coura­geous soul.

2.  Mag­gie, I look at what you have cre­ated, and find such great hope in the mes­sage that you are cre­at­ing.  As this has evolved over the last year, what has this whole project meant to you?
Even though I knew there were a lot of peo­ple with these types of sto­ries, I was still shocked by the sheer vol­ume of responses. I’ve had a 4–6 month wait list from day one, and here it is a year later with no signs of slow­ing down. So many sto­ries wait­ing to be told… it’s both ter­ri­bly sad, and incred­i­bly hope­ful. I am bowled over every day, both by the strength of the sur­vivors and the com­pas­sion of the read­ers. I feel blessed that I get to watch this human­ity in action right here on my screen.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Your com­mu­nity is such a sup­port­ive one, and what a gift that is to everyone. 

3.   Tell us about these shared sto­ries that you post  — and have they touched you per­son­ally?
To be hon­est, it’s very dif­fi­cult to be reg­u­larly exposed to so much trauma and suf­fer­ing. I admit I have had to learn to limit my time with the project, and to take care of myself emo­tion­ally. But yes, every sin­gle one of them touches me per­son­ally, because these are not just auto-posted—there is a process I go through with each sur­vivor to make sure he/she is absolutely cer­tain he/she wants to be pub­lished, and is accord­ingly sup­ported and aware of the risks. After­ward, I feel very bonded to each sur­vivor. It’s a very per­sonal and hum­bling expe­ri­ence, and it hap­pens twice a week. Ulti­mately, despite the sad con­tent of the posts, it’s always a pos­i­tive thing for me. Speak­ing the truth out loud seems to make these sur­vivors even stronger, and I get to bear wit­ness to that miracle—which makes me a bet­ter per­son, I believe. I can’t even remem­ber my life before VU.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  As sad as it can be to read these sto­ries, I also find much hope in the shar­ing of them.  I very much get a sense that there is a heal­ing in the shar­ing.  I also believe that I, myself, feel an even deeper level of com­pas­sion for the world around me after read­ing a story on VU.  So, as dif­fi­cult as these sto­ries are — the pub­lic shar­ing of them really is so good for everyone.

4. Tell us one unex­pected thing that has hap­pened since cre­at­ing Vio­lence Unsi­lenced.
I didn’t know that it would be so widely and uncon­di­tion­ally sup­ported. I thought it might be a project inside my read­ing cir­cle, but I didn’t expect the wide-reaching, con­sis­tent pro­mo­tion that so many peo­ple (like you, for instance) feel com­pelled to do. I am so grate­ful to you, and to all of them. We are seri­ously doing this together.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Mag­gie, know that I believe that you have cre­ated a won­der­ful gift in VU, and it’s an honor to have you here.

5. Out­side of VU, what’s a typ­i­cal day for Mag­gie look like?
My daugh­ters are 10 and five, so they go off to school now. I have a writ­ing stu­dio I rent to do my work, which is free­lance writing—I write mag­a­zine arti­cles for a liv­ing. My fam­ily and my per­sonal time are the most impor­tant things to me, so I build my sched­ule around that. I do quite a lot of run­ning around, but ulti­mately my favorite thing is to hold very still as often as I pos­si­bly can.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  I’m guess­ing that guy in the pic­ture with you is the guy you call hus­band!  And it sounds like you have a won­der­ful fam­ily life — savor all the moments!  And in that still­ness, much clarity.…

6. Any­thing new you have com­ing up?
I’m speak­ing at BlogHer ’10 in New York City this year, on a panel about uti­liz­ing com­mu­nity for change. I’ll also be speak­ing at the Type A Mom con­fer­ence (Asheville, NC) in Sep­tem­ber.  I really feel deeply that there’s a lot of power out there in the blo­gos­phere to be har­nessed for good, and I’m also very rev­er­ent of writ­ing. I think some­thing is lost in the chaos of the social ladder-climbing, pop­u­lar­ity, and pro­mo­tion in abun­dance in blog­ging today. It’s so dif­fer­ent from the way it was when I first got started, and though there have been very pos­i­tive changes, it can also be very dis­cour­ag­ing. There’s a whole lot of little-known blogs out there where incred­i­bly good writ­ing is going down, and I guess I’d love for peo­ple to widen their viewfind­ers a bit.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  Your mes­sage is such an impor­tant one — so that’s great about you get­ting out there and spread­ing the word.  You will touch many more lives, in amaz­ing ways, and

7.  Deep down, what makes you uniquely “you”? 
This is prob­a­bly a very tough ques­tion for any­one to answer about him/herself. I don’t know what makes me me, but I know what I value most in the peo­ple I care about—integrity and com­pas­sion. I may fall down a lot, but I try to emu­late those traits as much as I can. I also love how dif­fer­ent we all are, and per­son­ally I’m glad we’re not all try­ing to be like each other.

Lance’s Com­men­tary:  I fall down a lot too.  And per­haps that is all part of the jour­ney we are each on.  There will be moments when we are mak­ing great strides, and then oth­ers where we slip and fall.  And in those moments when we fall, the beau­ti­ful part is that we CAN get back up.  And that’s not any more evi­dent than in the VU web­site, and the peo­ple who share so openly their sto­ries.  And in that unsi­lenc­ing of the violence.…they can get back up.  And per­haps we can get back up, too.…touched by com­pas­sion and love.

Clos­ing Com­ments:  Mag­gie, it is an honor to have you here and shar­ing a bit more in-depth look at what Vio­lence Unsi­lenced is all about and what is has come to mean to you.  I know you don’t feel like this is just you out there cre­at­ing this.  I still want you to know, though, that you shine your amaz­ing and beau­ti­ful light into our world…and that does make it a bet­ter place.  You have given sur­vivors of some really bad things a place to safely share and move fur­ther down that path of heal­ing.  What a won­der­ful gift you are! 

Thank you, once again, for being here.

---

You can keep up with Mag­gie by vis­it­ing the Vio­lence Unsi­lenced site or her per­sonal blog, Okay, Fine, Dammit.  Keep up with her on Twit­ter, @maggiedammit .

Note that I have also added a badge to my side­bar in sup­port of what Mag­gie is doing.  If you are inter­ested in join­ing in sup­port of this, you can Take the Pledge right here.