Leap: bound, vault, caper

It's February 29th. I finished work around 11:00 this morning, made a fantastic turkey/apple/purple onion/spicy mustard sandwich, and signed the lease of my new apartment {which is in a totally amazing neighborhood, btw}.

And then I came to a crossroads in my mind. First I thought:

1. Today is extra. Is it even a real day, does it count? Why I don't I just snuggle down in my pjs with a redbox movie and lounge the afternoon away? Where can I get some cookie dough?

And then I thought:

2. Hang on. Take this extra day as a chance to DO SOMETHING. Seize the moment, don't delay! Leap forward, bound toward your goals, start that thing you haven't started (for me, this book I've been meaning to read, that I totally want to read, but I haven't really had the brainpower to do the heavy reading yet). Caper around this new town (I'm in Raleigh) and have an adventure! You don't have to do anything, but whatever you do, make it something that you did.

So, hope you are having a great day.

Happy Leap Year.

Healthiest Airport (so far, by far)

Having spent a good chunk of the last two months loitering in various airports, I consider myself qualified to bestow this honor upon the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport.
Instead of a choice between a chicken salad sandwich that was made the day before or a hamburger at Wendy's, this airport was scattered by kiosks stocked with a plethora of healthy choices, like greek yogurt, indivual-sized bags of carrots, sugar snap peas, and celery, hard boiled eggs, fresh fruit, organic granola...I was a happy camper. And I felt great after eating a healthy lunch during my layover. Thank you, Minnesota.

Grad School in Springfield, MO

The most delicious fish tacos I've ever had in my life. Period.

If you find yourself in Springfield, head downtown to Grad School,

a chill place with great food.

We sat at the counter and watched our new friends cook up dinner.

I love places like this; I feel like I'm cool, just because I know about it. But I act like it aint no big thing, I'm just chillin with my buds and eatin scrumptious food. I dunno.

Bomb dot com

My job totally rocks.
Not only am I finished around 3:00 in the afternoon, when we're back at the office, we take the time to do research online, like watching cool videos and sharing stories about people changing the world with cool ideas. (ps. You totally have to check out THE COLOR RUN!! It's like the color festival, but during a 5k...someone shared this with me and I cannot wait to do it!)
Today, we spent a while watching OKGO! music videos, including two of my all time favorites. These are classic, one-shot videos of brilliance. In fact, their creativity couldn't be contained in just one video; they had to make a second video for the same song. I love these {enjoy}:

p.s. love the broken pianos and television sets in the backgrounds (you can tell they had to run through this multiple times to get it right and in a good shot)

The Ozarks

As the rising sun threw strands of golden light through the trees, I drove an hour up into the Ozark mountains this morning to a little town called Shell Knob.
I performed the show for 70 kids at Shell Knob Elementary.
What a blessing of a morning! The hilly country side held white farm houses with green shutters nestled next to creeks and tall trees. The road was a roller coaster, winding up then down, left then right. It was as if someone had scrunched the ground together, the way a rug sometimes gets pushed all toward the middle when someone runs across it with a forceful step--all that ground was bunched up into hills and valleys, making the road feel like a bunched-up hem of lace at the end of the earth's skirt.
We passed through Aurora, where the store fronts on Main Street brought images of old Western film scenes to mind, particularly the old bank on one corner.
We crossed cool bridges built over full, lazy rivers.
Love small towns. I'm a small town girl, myself.
Glad my circumstances took me to Shell Knob, Missouri; it's not many who find their way down that little country road.

All we really want is love's confusing joy

A fabulous work trip to Los Angeles (I hadn't been since last July). Top ten from the week:

10. The sunshine! I ran in the afternoons in the park behind the hotel in perfect, breezy Spring weather. The locals were a bit bundled up, but this Utah girl felt great in a Tshirt.

9. I totally rocked it at work. This was my first training tour, and by Friday I was doing solo shows without any trainers on stage. It feels great to be excelling at my job.

8. The kids. They are awesome! (Don't tell anyone, but initially I was a bit apprehensive about being surrounded by hundreds of small children everyday. That uneasiness has melted away.) I'm gaining some huge insights by watching the way they respond to my shows, the way they interact with me, how they look at me as a hero. They are eager to learn from you and want to do exactly what you're doing. **New understanding about the scripture instructing us to be as little children.

7. One day on a playground during recess, I heard some boys speaking Korean so I walked over and talked to them. Turns out they're exchange students, headed back to Korea in a few weeks. During the show, I gave them a shout out in Korean. It was awesome.

6. I met a nice guy on the flight to California who works in film. During the first half of the flight, we slept together; I used his shoulder as a pillow and he stretched his long legs out into the space on my side of the seats. After we woke up and introduced ourselves, we had a great conversation about how everything happens for a reason. We exchanged info and are keeping in touch. Very handsome, kind guy. From Michigan. He recommended Cha Cha Chicken.

5. Cha Cha Chicken is a Carribean outdoor restaurant near Santa Monica Pier. I tried the enchiladas, they were delicious. I loved the people. A table of guys helped me choose my order from the menu, another group of people chatted with me until CB arrived (More on that in just a moment.).

4. The ocean! I got to walk along the boardwalk in Long Beach, in the rain (with my boss...so that was a little strange, but still, I love the ocean and will take any opportunity to spend time near it). And then later, after eating at Cha Cha Chicken, I got to see Santa Monica Pier at night time, which is one of my favorite things ever. It's so sparkly and pretty!

3. Seeing an old flame. I asked CB to meet me at Cha Cha Chicken so we could catch up. We talked like we always do: dramatically, romantically, way too personally, enjoying our chemistry but not committing to anything. I like basking in his affectionate deductions about my personality, I'm a sucker for attention.

2. He kissed me. After all these years.

1. The following evening he took me on an Old Hollywood classic date. It was enchanting. We ate at Muso and Franks, and walked around Grauman's Theatre (surprisingly, we were nearly the only people there). He told me stories about Julia Roberts, Tom Cruise, Dean Martin. He was a gentleman in the oldest sense of the word: truly aware of me, concerned about my welfare, and he made me feel like a lady.

p.s. Can you say Cha Cha Chicken five times fast without getting the urge to dance?

Sunday Snowstorm

Home in Utah for the weekend, I woke this morning to a winter wonderland.
I spent the afternoon with my mom and sister. Mom made hamburger meat pie, which after some serious discussion, we determined none of us had eaten since I was living at home and in high school, years and years ago.
We watched a movie about true love and Mama told me about her fiance and my sister gave me good, long sister-hugs.
A lovely afternoon at home, it was.

This is from the last time all four kids were at Mom's house.

Never Give Up

What am I currently doing for a living? Performing a character-building show that teaches kids how to be champions at school and in life.
In the show, we tell the kids that if they Never Give Up and Encourage Others, they can accomplish amazing things!
The kid in this video is a total champion. I love this:

If you keep practicing, your best will get better and better and you can move on to bigger things.

Confidence

This is one of our trainers at work, Tim,

reenacting his crushing blow to a clay

flower pot with a hammer.

{Applicable Emperor's New Groove quote:

"And I'll smash it with a hammer!!!!"}

Tim started the morning by having us sit at the table, close and cozy. He explained that we had been hired because we had some characteristics that were perfect for the job.

Then he placed the clay pot on the table.

I was fully anticipating some handfuls of soil and fertilizer with a chummy analogy about the training process adding to what we were already bringing to the table, me+company=plant/flower growing, etc.

Instead, he pulled a hammer out of nowhere

and clobbered the pot.

Remember, he just told me that the pot represented me.

He expounded upon what we understood through the surprising but brilliant object lesson:

sometimes, when you learn something new, you might feel like no one wants what you have to offer and you're never going to get it right. You might feel like you're getting shot down

and that no one understand you.

He explained that we were hired because we have what they want, but now they're molding us to be exactly what the company produces. Using what we have is super important, but it may feel like we're falling short. And when someone points out how they want you to change the work you're doing--especially when it's work that you're putting your heart and personal effort into--

that can be disheartening. 

So, what are we taking home from this?

1. I have a cool boss

2. Yeah, it sucks when someone corrects you,

 but we get that it's to help us succeed.

3. YOU are still the important, essential aspect in this equation,

and it is up to YOU to remember that.

Can you give me a personal example, Jess?

Yes, yes I can.

I was feeling all self-doubty and down on myself.

Because I let some of the comments at work make me

second-guess my capacity to do this job.

I lost confidence, and felt like I couldn't please anyone.

I felt like I was under a microscope all day at the office,

 and I couldn't wait to get back to my hotel room

 just so I could take a break from being scutinized.

Then, one night, I told myself, "Jess, to hell with them. You know they're just trying to help. But either way, whether they like your work or not, you are the one doing the job you were hired to do. So you are the one who gets to decide how you're going to do it."

The next day, I tried to put my heart back into my work and do my best.

But I got a few corrections from Tim and I faltered again.

So I said, "Tim, I feel like I'm failing a test everytime we work through this. I know I can do this. But I'm afraid to try because everything I do initiates four people's opinions and feedback. I know the feedback is meant to be productive, and it would be except that I shut down when I think I'm failing, and I'm interpreting the feedback as 'Hey, you're not doing that right.' I'm not asking you to change what you're doing. I'm just telling you what I'm thinking, because I'm going to stop thinking that, right now. And I need you to know, that I'm just going to do this the way I would do it."

He said, "Oh yeah. It's not a test at all. And you're doing great..." He basically told me what I knew: that I was right on course. Him telling me this did not give me my confidence.

Me telling him that I knew I could do it gave me my confidence.

I had the best day at work following that conversation,

 because I finally clicked into that magical place where you believe in yourself

and you allow yourself to do work without trying to please everyone.

Ironically, everyone is so happy

 because you're doing better work.

It's hard to remember that YOU know what YOU are doing.

Getting better, trying new things, being brave

these things sometimes make us feel like

someone is beating the crap out of us with a hammer.

Yeah, growing and becoming more than we are hurts.

But we can't forget that WE are still the essence of this experience.

Because of who we are right now, becoming better is a possibility. It doesn't mean that who we are isn't good. It means that who we are is so amazing that we're ready to become more.

And brilliantly, the way life works, everything we've become and experienced up until today has been preparing us for the things we're attempting now.

If you feel like you aren't cutting it,

remember that doubting yourself will halt your ability

to be yourself

and use the very talents and special skills that got you to this challenge in the first place.

You can do anything

if you believe that you can do anything.

Another day in the office

A good portion of my work this week involved

balloon art.

This is a crown that represents Brain Fireworks.

When you love learning and you work hard to

accomplish your goals, you'll have those "aHa!" moments

when everything clicks inside your brain.

Those are called brain fireworks.

Or, as Demetri said in the last assembly I performed at,

"Your mind explodes with learning!"

You have to make a really awesome crown for one lucky winner

each time you do a show.

So taking the time to practice is important.

And fun...

This is Nedina.

She stands in as the prize winner when we practice.

She's very chic and awesome.

Attack of the balloons.

Awesome scary face, no?

Andrew, my partner in crime and co-beingtrainedforthisnewjob-friend,

is afraid of balloons popping.

So we make him blow up all the balloons.

And then we stick them to the ceiling

and to everything else.

My job is so totally super cool

for a TON of reasons,

including the BALLOONS!

Other fun things I'm getting paid to do:

1. Practice making laser beam sound effects

2. Talk in funny voices, dialects, or just sing everything you say all day

3. Practice yoyo tricks anytime, anyplace

4. Color, with crayons

5. Talk into a microphone, and practice microphone techniques for enhancing sound effects

6. Travel around the beautiful cities in the Seattle area

7. Visit with kids and make them feel like heroes

8. Do research for the show...like watching Sponge Bob Square Pants, over and over again.