The Million Dollar Question (with a little spice on the side)

Happy New Year! They're shooting off fireworks here in Asheville on this beautiful, chilly night. I love the first day of the year. It feels like new vistas are opening up and we're all given a fresh chance to start over.

At the beginning of every year when I prepare my vision board playshops, I send out a list of questions to help participants frame their vision. When my own purpose or focus eludes me, I turn to the Million Dollar Question:

If money were no object, if the opinions of friends and family didn't matter and if you were free to do anything in the world you wanted – what would you do? (Another way to ask this is: if you had a million dollars, what would you do?) 

Now, answer the Million Dollar Question and watch yourself fighting the little objections that arise. See if you can push them down and let the truth of what you really want rise to the surface.

Seriously, what's your heart's burning desire? What have you dreamed about doing ever since you were a kid?  What are your five top passions, the pursuits, things or experiences that you enjoy so much you couldn't live without them? 

Creating a vision or sensing our true purpose leads us forward toward something larger than ourselves. It helps us set goals and define how we want to live our lives, the actions we take moment to moment, and the people we take with us.

“If you don't know where you're going, you'll end up someplace else.” –Yogi Berra

Our vision acts as an attractor beam pulling us toward it, while we're simultaneously drawing it to us.  It keeps us on track, rather than wandering aimlessly through our days.

Here are some other questions to explore that might help you define or color your vision – and bring it into reality.

1. Who do I most admire or envy and why? 

2. What are they doing that I'd love to do?

3. How would I most like to be of service? 

4. Who would really appreciate my talents and gifts?

5. Who do I need to be or become to really go after my dream?

6. How will I feel when I'm actually living my purpose?

7. If I could choose any profession or service other than what I'm doing now, what would it be?

Tonight (New Year's Eve), I made collard greens and black-eyed peas, the traditional southern New Year's Day meal to share with friends on New Year's Day for good luck and money. Because let's face it, we all need a little more luck and some extra cha-ching doesn't hurt either. I love sending folks off toward their vision quests on a full stomach – a spicy feast to launch a spicy new year.

Here's wishing everyone out there more joy, more love, more presence, and a more fulfilled life in 2013. And add a little spice while you're at it.

“The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.” – Henry Miller

Seven Questions/Actions to Help You Review 2012:

Summer Berries in my Back Yard, July '12

Leading up to the New Year and our first Lucky '13 Vision Board Playshop on January 20th, here is a list of questions and processes to guide your review of 2012. As we prepare to enter a new calendar year, we're offered the perfect moment to integrate our experiences of the last 365 days, the time it takes for our planet to make one revolution around the sun. This year marker may seem arbitrary, but it does give us a long enough chunk of time to create a vision in the future and achieve the incremental goals that allow us to reach it.

      "The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once." Einstein

Enjoy answering the questions:

1.      Create your Letting Go List. What do you want to leave behind from 2012? It could be an experience, an emotion, an attachment, a relationship, a habit, behavior or addiction, a way of looking at the world. (You might think about burning this on New Year’s Eve or burying it, some kind of letting go ritual.)

2.      What and who in your life do you want to bring into 2013?

3.      Make a list of all your high points, successes and accomplishments.

4.      Review actions you’re learned from. Is there anything you might have done differently?

5.      What people or experiences served to inspire, teach or mentor you in 2012?

6.      Who did you nurture, inspire, teach or mentor this past year?

7.      Who do you need to forgive? Take some time over the next few days to create your own forgiveness process for those people. And, of course, include yourself. You might also think of forgiving G-d or whatever spiritual force you believe in.

Announcing the 1st Playshop of 2013

Just click the flyer to expand. Thirteen lucky visionaries will join me on January 20th.

More info coming soon. In case of inclement weather, the snow backup date will be February 2nd.

Time to do what you love

Coming soon...The Lucky '13 Vision Board Playshop, January 20, 2013. And a second playshop, February 2nd. Stay tuned for more details. Till then, I love this manifesto:

The Chocolate Heart Passion-Powered Playshop

Introducing the last vision board playshop for Winter 2012. This time we're bringing in some Sweet Inspiration with artisanal chocolate from local favorite, French Broad Chocolate Lounge – in honor of Valentine's month. Of course, this playshop, like all others, promises some mysterious and magical processes to unleash personal insights about our individual goals and dreams. We've got a very interesting crowd lined up so please come join us if you're in the Asheville area. And, of course, the chocolate itself will be unveiled in a special love-powered ritual to be revealed on Feb 4th.

Everyone's an artist in this playshop. Guaranteed fun as you create a blueprint for success.

We had a wonderful magic-inspired playshop yesterday in Black Mountain, in a creatively-inviting room with glass doors so we could see the Swannanoa River flowing by us. Here are a few photos below.

New Flyer for 2012 Vision Playshops

Just click on image to blow up flyer for details.