Today I achieved my 3-month goal of walk/trotting up the hill to the Highpoint Watertower, the highest point in Seattle (sea level+520 feet), without feeling out of breath at the top, thanks to the encouragement of my walking buddies and the promise of a coffee break at the top.
This convinces me that improvement is possible; I just have to put in the time and enjoy the process.
What's next?
hosted by the World Peace Through Law Section of the Washington State Bar Association, and featuring Attorney Tamara Blagojević calling us from her office in Belgrade, Serbia. I had been greatly cheered to have gotten the speaker's powerpoint a week before the event (most speakers have been slower despite the timeline sent them in the First Contact letter). The night before, we chatted by email to nail down the time (Belgrade is on CET which is UTC+1, Seattle is on PST which is UTC+8. I had figured that there must be a UTC 0 so we were 10 hours apart, but all the calculators said only 9 hours, as was confirmed by the times on our email. Oh well! The worst that could happen is that she'd call in early.
Speakers never call in at call-in time (30 minutes before the show) so I was not worried. After at T-20 I emailed a reminder. The speaker got onto the On24 site and asked why the voice was not working. This is not especially unusual; we are so used to Zoom and other sites integrating voice and internet that it sounds strange to run the audio channel by phone. I provided the USA number and oooops the caller's plan didn't extend to the USA. There was no backup number to Serbia (something I should have checked!) but Hungary's not that far away, and she was able to call in that way. However she was concerned about charged since it was a borrowed phone; using my strongest Cheerful Voice I assured her we'd cover the costs but she was worried (...and so was I; it wasn't now clear whether she'd called Hungary or the USA, and what the charges would be....). I suggested Google Voice, but that didn't work; sounds like it wasn't available in her area??? Finally she said she had an app and would try it, and hung up.
Did I mention it was T Minus 1?
A sigh can be just a deep breath. At T=0 I did something I'd never done before: I waited to start the show. After all, starting at 11:00 and 59 seconds is still starting at 11:00 - sort of. But once it got to T+1, I knew I had to start. "Welcome, everyone", I announced in my best radio voice ... "...to today's webinar...." and so on through the program introduction, 60 seconds of explaining how viewers could manipulate the screen controls, and 60 seconds of speaker introduction. I spoke S-L-O-W-L-Y you can be sure! And halfway through, the Speaker popped on the line. "Can you hear me?"
"Yes Attorney, we're glad the technical issues have been solved, supporting your call from halfway around the planet from many of our listeners. What a wonderful world we are in..." and the show went on, pretty much without a hitch from there.
It was really helpful to have practice and coaching on remaining calm. This made all the difference between what could have been an unpleasant experience and one that was merely a challenge.
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This evening I had agreed to Toastmaster our Club 832 (West Seattle) Toastmasters meeting, but I had not had much success recruiting speakers and other roleholders. My excuse is being distracted by the holidays and so forth, but maybe I'm just low on gas as the days grow dark. Luckily Karen powered ahead and helped recruit, and we did have one speaker, so onward we go. I liked the theme "Gratitude" as it seemed both seasonal (close to Thanksgiving) and helpful, in this difficult year of 2020, but for my opening address I couldn't feel inspired - my ideas just seemed treacly.
I consulted Google, and got a bunch of quotes on gratitude and - ahha! - hit upon the idea of using the quotes themselves to construct a speech. With minor changes (removing unnecessary gender references, and using the more personal "we" instead of "you", I got:
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Our theme today is Gratitude.
As others have written:
Gratitude is the ability to experience life as a gift,
It is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others.
We must find time to stop and thank the people who make a difference in our lives.
When we arise in the morning, give thanks for the food and for the joy of living.
When eating fruit, remember the one who planted the tree.
If we see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in ourselves.
[SING ALONG]Got no checkbooks, got no banks, still I’d like to express my thanks. I got the sun in the morning and the moon at night.[/SING]
'Enough' is a feast.
We are wise not to grieve for the things we do not have, but to rejoice for the things that we do have; how much of what we have now was once something we only hoped for!
It’s a funny thing about life, once we begin to take note of the things we are grateful for, we begin to lose sight of the things that we lack.
The heart that gives thanks is a happy one, for we cannot feel thankful and unhappy at the same time.
Piglet noticed that even though he had a Very Small Heart, it could hold a rather large amount of Gratitude.
Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes,
And because all things have contributed to our advancement, we should include all things in our gratitude.
True forgiveness is when we can say to someone, 'Thank you for the experience.'"
If, like Groot, we can say only one thing, and the only thing we can say is "thank you", that is enough.
What separates recognizing our privilege from feeling an entitlement is gratitude.
When it comes to life, the critical thing is whether we take things for granted or take them with gratitude.
Reflect upon our present blessings, of which we all have plenty; not on our past misfortunes, of which we all have some.
The soul that gives thanks can find comfort in everything; the soul that complains can find comfort in nothing.
We can only be said to be alive in those moments when our hearts are conscious of our treasures.
When I started counting my blessings, my whole life turned around.
Thanking others can make their day, even change their life;
All that is necessary is our willingness to put it into words.
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Thank you Cicero, Buddha, Tecumseh, Irving Berlin, Epictetus, JFK, Epicurus, Germany Kent, Douglas Wood, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Oprah, Meister Eckhart, Henry Ward Beecher, Brené Brown, G.K. Chesterton, Hannah Whitall Smith, Thornton Wilder, A. A. Milne, Margaret Cousins and the great Willie Nelson for these wise words
And thank you all, dear readers, for your continuing gift of companionship, encouragement and support
In this best of times and worst of times
2020.
Thank you.
--rewinn
