It was a day filled with opportunities to be the change I want to see in the world through many shared smiles.

A woman at the grocery store behind me in the self-help check-out line, troubled she sounded rude when she pointed something out to me, apologizes. I smile, touch her arm and tell her I didn’t think she was rude. I appreciated her direction as I wasn’t paying attention. We wish eachother a ‘good-day’ and we part on a note of laughter. A smile and thanks from the man at the next gaspump. “Your tire looks a bit flat,” I tell him. And it was. And the favour is returned when I leave my sunglasses on the counter and a woman runs after me to hand them back to me. A man with a dog at the park laughs when I warn him as we approach eachother that Ellie, my golden retriever, sometimes like to share her big girl attitude with small dogs. We pass each other with enough distance to preserve the dignity of everyone and he calls back that he appreciates my letting him know — his dog likes to nip at big dog’s ears. That would not have been pretty.

Little things that add up to moments of grace. Moments of sharing smiles and laughter and kindness.

And then, in my email, the link to the TEDxCalgary talks where I shared, “Lessons in Love: How Volunteering Saved My Life” in November. Sending the link and having my sister write back her impressions of my talk, I am reminded — giving is receiving. And in the remembering the excitement and wonder of that day, I receive again the sense of gratitude I felt being part of it.

And the difference of that day ripples out as I share TEDxCalgary, November 18, 2011 — Volunteer… Even Better.

Below is my talk — and this is the link to all of them — do take the time to visit all the speakers — they are all amazing. And, you’ll be inspired watching so many people shine!

All ten speakers:  http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL41E9A5C6E42C501A

Since the beginning of January I’ve  committed one day a week to making a difference in the world by not driving my car for a day and not spending any money on that day. Yesterday was my weekly date with austerity and the pedestrian life-style.

Except… on Monday evenings I go to a dance workshop. Two hours of free-flowing movement through CoreConnexion. I can’t think of a better way to begin the week than to enter the dance and connect into my body and dance myself into aliveness and freedom, joy and balance.

But, the studio where it’s held is too far to walk. It’s too dark to ride my bike and bus service just isn’t part of that equation.

As my Aunts in Paris would say, “What to do? What to do?”

And then I remember one of the lessons I’ve learned through this process of living A Year of Making a Difference. Making a difference begins within me. When I am balanced, whole, centered, the difference I make in the world ripples out from a centre of harmony. When I am taking care of me, I am better able to take care of others.

I decided to go to dance. Other than driving there, I didn’t have to spend money as I pre-paid for the sessions at the beginning of the year.

And in the process, I came home excited, feeling joyful and grateful for having immersed myself in ‘life’, my whole being transformed through dancing it out and moving into that space where I am one with the world around me.

And that was the biggest lesson from the day. It’s important to be flexible. To allow suppleness into my thinking, and my doing. To give myself room to flow around obstacles, rather than making them hard brakes on the road of life that stop me dead in my tracks.

I know. I know. I didn’t do the whole day without driving, but I did learn another valuable lesson. Look at my calendar before I make decisions with my time. Don’t set the day to not drive on a day when I have something that is important for me to do!

Making a difference does begin within me. For my difference to come from a place of wholeness I need to pay attention to my needs, wants, well-being — and my calendar!

And, I’ll move my making a difference through not driving my car to Friday this week!

All is well. I’m flexible! And supple when I flow into Life, dancing my way to Joy. Life is a Dance and I am grateful for the music.

Namaste

I am thinking of the article in the newspaper about bottle-pickers and the conversation I just had with a friend who volunteers as a board member for an agency in the homeless sector as I pull into the laneway leading to my garage. “We need to ensure we have a portfolio of affordable housing that will not be sold, that will always be managed well to ensure those who need it will have a secure source of appropriate and well-maintained housing,” he’d said over coffee. I’d shown him the article on bottle-pickers. The men interviewed have a ‘home’. They were housed through the ‘housing first’ model under the city’s 10 Year Plan to End Homelessness.

And I wonder about the ‘full circle’. There were many men like them in the past who used to live in SROs (Single Room Occupancy) apartments. The difference back then, before the boom, before ‘economic growth’ dictated tearing down vast swaths of low-rent housing to make way for gentrification of inner city neighbourhoods, was that the landlords were ‘for-profit’, the rents were cheap but the accommodation sub-standard. The men in the article have all they need — low rent, support, a roof of their own, and a means to augment their monthly stipends — bottle-picking.

When I lived in the inner city, I had Greg. He came and picked up the bottles I left out on my back porch every week. He sometimes brought me ‘gifts’. A barbeque arrived on my back porch one day. I didn’t ask its pedigree. I think he may have found it in a laneway, placed there by its previous owner who didn’t want to take it to the dump. It was not in fine shape. But Greg’s enthusiasm over its possibilities was engaging. I paid him $30 and later had it hauled away to the dump. Greg did me a service every week, cleaning up my bottles. It was an easy way to repay his work.

I live slightly outside the ‘inner city’ line now. Not in the suburbs. But not downtown either. Bottle pickers are not as common out here.

I thought.

And then, I drove up to the garage and couldn’t get in because there was a rust riddled pick-up truck, motor running with a distinctive, putt-putt-miss-a-spark- putt-putt sound, parked in front of the door. Two men were digging through the blue bin, tossing any bottles they found into the back of their empty-bottle-laden truck.

I pushed the opener for the garage door. One of the men, hearing the sound, withdrew his head from within the blue bin. He looked around, saw me. Gave me a sheepish grin and a wave.

I smiled. Rolled down my window. “Do you come every week for the bottles?” I asked.

He looked worried. One of the comments in the newspaper article this morning was that removing items from bins is an infraction of city bylaws.

“It’s okay if you do. If you like I could just leave the bottles in a bag beside the bin. Would that help?”

He smiled. A gapped-tooth grin like so many grins I used to see at the shelter where I worked.  “That would be great!” He paused. Glanced back at his partner who was still sorting through the blue bin. “Got any more bottles inside?” and he motioned to the interior of the garage.

“No. I put them all in the bin this morning.”

Mission accomplished, the other man came out with one more bottle. Threw it into the back of the truck. The two men climbed into the cab of the truck, the driver’s door giving a big groan as the man used two hands to force it open. Another sheepish grin, wave and they drove off to the next bin and I drove into the garage.

Sure, giving your bottles to pickers is frowned upon by some. One writer wrote in a neighbourhood newsletter that it’s not good to “feed the bears’.  He upset me with his derogatory take on the human beings engaged in bottle-picking. I figure it’s a good way to help someone make a difference in their life by supporting them through whatever circumstance they’re encountering. If the extra income from cashing in my empty bottles helps them, why not let it? ‘Cause I’m not doing it. Why shouldn’t he?

I’m hoping I’m not the only one.

You know, not the only one to feel like blocking people when the traffic merges with relatively orderly precision into one lane and one driver decides to bypass everyone, scoot right up to the front and squeeze in all of ten cars ahead of everyone else who’s been waiting patiently, or not so patiently, in line…

It happened to me yesterday. I was on my way downtown to meet a girlfriend for dinner and suddenly my route was blocked with a big sign saying — oh no you don’t. You’re not going the way you planned. And yes, you probably will be late but hey! It’s Calgary. We get to construct whenever we want to.

Okay, so the sign wasn’t quite that explicit but the road I wanted to take was closed. And so, I waited my turn and merged into the left lane. And then, the guy behind goes whipping by, all the way to the front where the construction sign stood blocking the lane. It was pretty obvious other drivers weren’t too impressed either because no one was letting him in and by the time I got the 10 or so car lengths to the front, there he still was, trying to nudge his way in.

I took a breath.

I didn’t really want to let him in.

I sighed.

Seriously Louise? One whole car length is going to make such a huge difference?

I took another breath.

Bless him. Forgive me.

I let him in. And the car behind him.

I was raised Catholic you know. Penance is good for the soul.

And the difference is…

Not letting him would have played on my psyche. The chatter of ‘you shoulda, coulda, why didn’t you?’ would have been incessant. And, the story I would have created to justify not letting him in would have interfered with my evening with my girlfriend because I would have made it all about his bad behaviour rather than my lack of compassion, patience, giving way etc.

In the end, I was only 2 or 3 minutes late meeting my girlfriend and I never did get around to telling the story. Instead, we spent an evening talking about heart matters, about our lives, our children, what we’ve learned from relationships and their aftermath, what we’ve experienced in living true to ourselves.

It was a great evening with a wonderful woman and I felt better for letting someone in. It may not have made much of a difference in their life, but it sure makes a difference in mine.

Namaste.

I had a meeting yesterday with a group that is moving a project out from under the umbrella of the host agency into a not-for-profit of its own. They’ve asked me to sit as chair of this new agency and I am excited. Its mission aligns with my belief that ending homelessness is only possible if we ensure those experiencing it are supported with wrap-around services that compassionately support their transition from system dependency to self-efficacy.

And, I am honoured to be asked to step into this pivotal role at such an exciting and defining moment in time for this fledgling agency. I am honoured that my experience and reputation has awarded me this opportunity.

To make a difference in the world it’s imperative that I turn up and be part of the process, not just sit on the sidelines and make commentary, (or engage in the 3Cs). It’s important that I actively support those at the frontlines to ensure they continue to have the resources and the emotional and spiritual support they need to know — it’s not them against the world, it’s all of us in this together.

It’s important to be engaged in changing the world.

It does not serve me to not serve the world. It does not serve me to let self-doubt keep me from being of service, nor does it create more of what I want in my life to play small in a big world. It doesn’t serve any of us to do that.

We all have a light to shine. We all have gifts to share. Finding the courage to let our light illuminate the path for others to see encourages others to let their light shine. And when we all shine, the world is a brighter, and better place.

We are all born to shine. It is in each of us, not just one or two or three. Shining is our birthright. Our gift. Our responsibility.

When we let our inner critic hold us back from living in the brightness of our brilliance, we are keeping our worth from being seen in the world. We lose and the world loses with us.

The question is:  What are you doing to let your light shine today? How bright is your brilliance showing?

For today, try stepping out from beneath the shadow of self-doubt to let your light shine freely.

Ask yourself —

Where does the world need my brilliance today?

What’s in it for me not to shine?

And then, let your heart guide you to being the brightest light you can be as you shine in the brilliance of your authenticity and Love.

Namaste

The world is filled with opportunities for making a difference — and as I journey deeper into this year and the subject matter of ‘making a difference’, I am realizing just how important it is to actually be that change/difference.

In Choices, a personal development program I coach in, one of the tools we teach trainees is called The 3 C’s. Do not Criticize. Condemn. or Complain.

It’s easy to gossip. It’s easy, in our Instant messaging, hot-wired world where bits and bytes of data reign down from the Ethernet in a never-ending stream of information to get our fill of gossip. Gossip is easy. We have newspaper columns dedicated to gossip. We have gossip magazine’s, television shows, radio talk shows all of which focus on getting to the lowdown on who’s who, who’s doing what, to whom and when and where and how much it cost and how little it took to bring someone down. Everyday we consume gossip packaged as news. Gossip is big business.

But it’s not my business. Yet, I catch myself indulging and wonder why is it so much easier to gossip than to stay true to living by the 3’s?  Do not Criticize. Condemn. or Complain.

Gossip is insidious. We package it up in ‘well it’s just my opinion but…. she said, he should have, she didn’t he did… but don’t tell anyone okay? I know I shouldn’t be repeating this but…’ commentary and slide down the slippery slope of saying about others what we hope no one ever says about us.

How we do one thing is how we do all things.

When I indulge in gossip, I am doing what I don’t want done to me.

There is a difference between critical analysis of what’s happening in our world and gossip. Gossip is always personal. Gossip is always about making someone else look small by making me look big.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s vital that we talk about what is happening in our world. It’s important to be discerning, to be critical of processes and policies that undermine our social fabric, that keep people in their places, that keep people from achieving their dreams, from rising out of poverty, from throwing off the yoke of dictatorship, or anything that would prevent them from being free.

It is not important that we gossip. About the people making up our headlines or standing in the sidelines of our lives. It’s not important that we talk about the girlfriend who just got married, again, or divorced, again, or a facelift, again, or a new diamond, again, or whatever else we find to criticize, condemn or complain about their lives.

So, here’s my commitment to making a difference in February. I will not gossip. I will not participate in feeding the grist that churns the chafe of all the things I see wrong in other people’s lives, or that I perceive they are doing that I’d like to criticize, condemn or complain about them for.

I hereby declare: February — A Gossip Free Month.

Care to join me? Care to watch your language and your thoughts? Care to be part of making a world of difference by not criticizing, condemning or complaining about your friends, family and neighbours?

This could be fun. To create a movement of letting go of the 3 C’s of negativity and embracing the 3 C’s of positively affecting our world, of being human with  all our creative force alive to the power we possess to Celebrate. Cooperate. and Create a world of difference in our own backyards!