Blog

SHOES

"And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you

because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places.

Those who don't believe in magic will never find it.”

Roald Dahl

Happy New Year my friends! Here we are in another January, hopeful and committed to making this year better than ever!

My mother always told me, “If you smile real big, no one will notice your shoes”. While that is somewhat true, there are exceptions. Like for instance, when a candidate I had recruited for a prestigious hospice CEO job went for the interview. I asked the search committee chairwoman how the interview went she replied, “her shoes were scuffed”. That candidate did not make the cut, clearly her smile did not detract from her shoes.

I’ve shopped for shoes from New York City to San Diego and all parts in between. I love beautiful shoes, likely because they were not within my budget growing up. But, when I started my consulting business, ...

“I believe that what we become depends on what our fathers teach us at odd moments when they aren't trying to teach us. We are formed by little scraps of wisdom.”
― Umberto Eco

FATHERS AND FREEDOM

Sunday is Father’s Day, a day we acknowledge dads and their contribution to our lives. Sunday is also Juneteenth Independence Day or Emancipation Day.  It marks the day in 1865 when the last enslaved African Americans in Galveston, Texas got word of the end of the Civil War, and the end of slavery.  This occurred more than 2 ½ years after President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, which had become official on January 1, 1863.

Juneteenth has been celebrated as an African American holiday. It is now it’s a federal holiday and one that all human beings should be proud to celebrate. This isn’t about politics; it’s about acknowledging the freedom from 1 human being owning another human being. We own cars and houses and pets and things…we don’t own people. Let’s celebrate t...

We the People…

"Don't judge people for the choices they make when you don't know the options they had to choose from"

Each July 4th I think of our founding fathers who risked their lives to create a new country pledging their honor to claim their independence from England. Declaring freedoms that no other nation enjoyed at the time: freedom of religion, speech, the press, assembly, and petition.

The 56 courageous and dedicated men who signed the Declaration of Independence in 1776 knew they were committing treason when the ink was dry on their signature. And still, they accepted that risk to ensure “…certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”.

In the 244 years since that monumental day, many of ‘We the People’ are still searching for complete freedom. People who are of a different race, gender and/or ethnicity than those 56 white men want the same freedoms.  We expect freedom of speech, even if it is interpreted as “fake” from...