In the coming days, I shall be defining success and I would love some input from all of you. I have defined and re-defined success and this is because I believe success is organic. By this I mean that our goals should change as we grow.
"Creekside," a limited edition print in the Natural Patterns Collection
I am thinking about angles, perceptions and perspectives. To me, it looks like this tulip is talking. What does it look like to you?
Philadelphia- April 2010- Market Street, across from 30th Street Station
In “the Great Reset How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity,” author Richard Florida discusses the importance of local boosterism — the grassroots interest and intensity and commitment — that it takes to re-make a locale, whether it’s a post-industrial place or downtrodden due to the current Great Recession.
In talking about what it takes, Florida notes that what renewal is NOT about is “the sweeping plans and power of federal bureacrats.”
AMEN!
What Florida says is fact. I work with this every day. Let me point you toward some Pennsylvania places: Midtown Harrisburg, Reading, York, Lancaster and a place dear to my heart because of the ladies who refuse to give in to slumlordery and its effects: Port Richmond, a neighborhood in Philly, on which I have and will continue to spend a lot of time due to the grassroots assistance and enthusiasm from citizens.
So, if you’re in a place that needs a little — or a lot– of work, take interest. Even the smallest contributions mean something. Even a little time and a little interest beats nothing.
A few months ago, I had the pleasure of reading Daniel H. Pink’s “Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us” and, just now, thinking in an interdisciplinary kind of way, I started to ponder what Pink says in “Drive” with what Richard Florida says in “the Great Reset: How New Ways of Living and Working Drive Post-Crash Prosperity,” a book that is hot off the presses and worth reading and pondering and discussing in multiple circles, and with Seth Godin’s “Linchpin: Are you Indispensable?” I highly recommend all three titles.
Now either I’ve overdosed on caffeine or I am onto something. I think, though, despite being caffeinated to the limit (hey, it’s Monday) I am beginning to RE-see something many of us known in our gut but forget in our day-to-day lives. It’s the kind of something that allows a person to build the type of character necessary to work at fixes – evolutions and revolutions – that one believes are necessary to succeed as an individual, a community, a regional, a state, a country, a state of being.
I think the message is the title of this post. I’ll weigh in more later, when I have fully processed these evolving, revolving thoughts.
