Last week I wrote about our birthday surprise for Pam.  We had hidden rocks along the trail for her to find, each rock with either the name of a hike we have completed together, or a characteristic of hers.  Back at the car, we presented her with a jar to hold her treasures, and hopefully to add more.

This was supposed to be a one-hike thing.  We fully planned for it to be finished last week.  But like other important things in life, this one wouldn’t let go.

For some backstory, Pam loves keeping track of things.  She has a book where she journals about every book she has read.  She has a yearly calendar she uses to document her walks, her hikes, bike rides, yoga and whatever else she is doing.  She’s done it for years.  She says she’ll do anything for a sticker!  She also creates books for each grandchild, documenting their first years of life.  She may be a historian, or a journalist, or perhaps she just knows that by taking note of these life-moments, she is forced to slow down and feel the gratitude she has for them.

It was our knowledge of this habit of Pam’s that inspired the idea of the jar containing the rocks with the names of our hikes on them.  It seemed perfect, and especially perfect for Pam.

This week, the week after celebrating Pam, part of our hike took us along a creek bed.  In 2013, we had a devastating flood in this part of Alberta. Rivers and creeks flowed over their banks, trees were uprooted and carried along by floodwaters, and rocks and stones tumbled along in the water until finally the water ebbed, leaving wider river valleys than normal, bordered on each side by rocky shores.  The landscape was changed forever.  The riverbed we walked on was one of those carved out by that flood.  As we walked, we each, not saying anything to the others, had our heads down, searching.  Searching for the perfect rock to mark this hike. 

Something about Pam’s jar of stones, struck a chord in each of us.  We all love these days together.  We feel grateful to have them, we do not take them for granted, and it seemed we all now felt the need to have some physical marker of the places we travel together.  We are each now creating our own jar of hiking stones.  On this latest hike, Lynne found one that was heart shaped.  Mine was more like a flower, reminding me of the little wildflowers we saw along our route.

This new little tradition is powerful.  Amazing really.  A little river stone all on its own doesn’t have much value.  There are literally millions of them along the waterways in our province.  We’ve trampled over many of them.  Little, gray, non-descript stones.  Except now they aren’t non-descript, nor are they plain old rocks.  They have become symbols of this part of our lives.

I’ve kept a photo book for each year of hiking, so this week I was able to use these books to write the names of the hikes I’ve completed on stones I’ve bought.  From now on, each week, I’ll pick up one stone along the way, and when I get home, I’ll write the name of the hike, perhaps draw a little picture of something that caught my eye along the way, and add it to the jar.

I have no idea what size of jar I’ll need.  My hiking stones already number quite a few.  They will take up a lot of room.  I don’t want a jar that will be filled to the brim right now.  I want space at the top to add more.  I hope to need a lot of space but one never knows.

Right now, what I do know is that this little awakening I’ve had, makes me want to not miss any chances to gather a stone on one of our Tuesday hikes.  Really, it’s not the stone I need.  Or maybe it is.  The stone is my physical reminder of my memory of the hike.  The stone causes me to pause, to notice as I add it to the jar, how rich my life is because of these women I hike with and because of the beauty we witness along the way.  It also causes me to pause during the very hike, to think about how lucky I am.  I can’t just act as if it’s part of the routine, just something I do.  It causes me to be deeply grateful for my ability to continue doing this activity, and to not take for granted that my body will allow this forever.  I have no idea when I’ll place that last stone in my jar, or even when I place the ‘last one for a while’.  This visual representation of life, this metaphor, increases the gratitude I already possessed in a large quantity. 

I’m going to bring this idea into other areas of my life.  I don’t know exactly how, and we certainly don’t need jars and jars of stones decorating each room of our home, but there are so many things I want to take note of, to feel gratitude for, and to appreciate.

On Friday, Andy was here for a Gramma Day.  He knows nothing of my jar of stones yet, although once I purchase the jar, I’ll surely show him and explain it to he and Ben.  He was playing in our backyard and came into the kitchen see me.  He had a little rock in his hand.  ‘Gramma, I found this for you. You can keep it forever.’

On any other day I might have taken the rock, thanked him, admired it aloud, put it on the counter, and then later in the evening tossed it outside again.  But not this day.  On this day I asked where he thought I should keep it.  He suggested I could have a treasure chest to keep all the ‘beautiful things I find for you’.

Good idea, Andy.  I’ll do just that.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘What am I collecting?’

Postscript:  I usually take the summer months of July and August away from this blog.  This year I am starting early.  The next few weekends I have dates with two lovely little grandjoys.  We’ll be collecting rocks and bugs, and making memories and I suspect I won’t have much time for writing. It’s possible this is my ‘last post for a while’.  Stay tuned.  I will be back.  My blog jar isn’t quite full.
​
Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to choose what to collect.
 

This past Tuesday, we added a one-day twist to our regular hike.  Pam celebrates her birthday this week and, it being a special one, we wanted to mark it with the attention she deserves.  Over the years we’ve developed a little tradition for birthdays.  It started years ago when it was only Brenda and I hiking.  I baked a little treat, and packed it, and a candle and matches into my pack.  Once we had climbed up Sarrail Ridge, and had our lunch on the edge of the spectacular Rawson Lake, I lit the candle (momentarily) and sang the Happy Birthday Song to Brenda.

A tradition was born.

As we added Lynne and Pam to our group, our tradition evolved.  How couldn’t it, with Lynne’s creativity and Pam’s zest for adventure?  So, this week we knew it would not be enough to simply have a dessert, wear a crown and be the recipient of the Birthday Song.  We secretly decided to get some small (ish) river rocks, and paint each with a quality that Pam possesses.  We were each to come up with a list of her qualities, which we did with ease.  Brenda then threw out the idea that we could also put the names of some of the hikes we’ve done on stones and add them.

It was brilliant!  Pam loves keeping track of things she does, and we knew this would be absolutely perfect for her. 

Keep in mind that all these ideas occurred less than 24 hours before the hike was to start, and that we had no river rocks and no real plan for how to turn this into a surprise.  Luckily, I have great faith, that once a first step is taken, once there is a will to achieve a goal, somehow the universe gets on board to help make the stars align.  This was the case here too.
Brenda suggested maybe we put the little finished rocks in small cloth bags and hang them in trees on the way out so Pam might find them on the way back.  At first, we thought this might be tough, as we are all always together as we hike.  We wondered how we’d get the rocks assembled and how we’d hide them.  I had little bags in my workshop materials, and when Lynne, Brenda and I met earlier in the morning than Pam knew, we put a mixture of painted rocks, along with some little heart rocks I had, into each of nine bags and stuffed them into the outer pouches of our backpacks.  We had a rough plan but decided however it played out would be great.

Great it was!

As we hiked out, the path was wide, allowing us to walk in pairs.  We kept Pam at the front, and whoever was with her tried to keep the conversation lively.  Brenda later told us she went through almost every single perennial in her garden as they wandered along!  I divulged, that on the way back, when I was trying to linger behind to pick up a bag, but Pam was waiting and watching, I stepped up beside Pam and started walking and talking about estrogen!  That got her attention, allowing Lynne and Brenda to do the sneaky work.

We managed to hang all the bags on the way out without getting caught.  We lunched by the waterfall and after some picture taking and a rest, and Brenda brought out the dessert, attempted to light the candle with the breeze blowing it out as fast as it was lit. Lynne produced the crown, and we celebrated Pam.  As far as Pam was concerned, the festivities had been a complete success, she felt special, and the celebration was complete.

We headed back.

When you know what you’re looking for, it’s almost impossible not to find it.  Lynne, Brenda and I could see the first little burlap sac hanging in the tree from quite a good distance.  When we realized that Pam, who had no idea she should be looking for anything, had not seen it and was about to walk past, Brenda jumped in a pointed it out.  We all feigned curiosity, urging Pam to be the brave one and look inside. 

Pam was delighted.  She loved the little painted rocks.  But she had absolutely no idea they were meant for her.  None.  She assumed, someone had put them there for a special scavenger hunt or some other occasion.  We all ‘wondered’ if this bag had been left behind.  Pam thought we should leave it, and the rest of us were in a panic trying to think of how to not spoil the surprise.  We wanted her to figure it out for herself.  Brenda whispered that we needed to figure it out because we were NOT going to hike the entire way out again to pick up that bag!

Someone suggested we bring it along and hang it on the bridge, close to the beginning of the hike.  That would be an obvious place for someone to find it.  On we went with the first bag.  Bag after bag, we approached, us thinking how obvious they looked, but Pam, not having a clue there were more bags, did not see them until one of us ‘noticed’ them.  Pam opened and looked, amazed at what she saw, but never, ever thinking these were for her.   By the second bag, she was certain they were part of someone’s adventure, and she insisted on rehanging them, including the first one we’d convinced her to take.  That left us with the task of quietly removing the re-hung bags without her seeing, stuffing them back in our packs and lugging them out of the forest again.  The amazing thing was we were having so much fun, they didn’t feel heavy.

We passed more people on the trail that day than we have in any hike we’ve ever done.  Three of us worried that some of those hikers would surely see the hanging bags and either move them or take them, just as we’d taken the first one.  But even though they were obvious, and hung in plain sight, no one noticed them.  Not one person.  Why would they have?  They didn’t know they should be looking for them. 

Life is like that.  When we are looking for something, for some evidence, perhaps for some identified trait in a person, we find it with ease.  In fact, we are so good at finding what we are looking for, we often overlook other traits they might have, good or bad.  When we don’t know, or haven’t been tasked with noticing anything in particular, it’s almost impossible for us to see things, even when they are in plain view.  This is why a bird watcher, going on a hike, might come home talking about all the incredible different birdsongs he’s heard.  Meanwhile, a botanist, or even a gardening enthusiast, might come home from the same hike telling not of birdsong, but of the incredible beauty found on the hillsides.  We find what we are looking for.

When we go through life looking to criticize, there is no shortage of things we will find.  When we look for things to worry about, we find them.  When we look for ways to control, we find them.  When we fine tune our lens to focus in on an undesirable (to us) habit of someone we live or work with, we can find it in a heartbeat.  But when we travel along, looking for things to be grateful for, our buckets fill with that too.  When we look for it, we find inspiration, good will, kindness, effort, skill, thoughtfulness and generosity, even in the most unlikely people and places.

As we pondered why Pam didn’t notice the bags, or figure out that the rocks described her, it was because she not only had no idea what she was looking for, she had no idea she was even supposed to be looking.  She was travelling along looking for what she usually noticed; beautiful trees, incredible views, delicate flowers and good conversation.  She found all of those things.

We too will find what we are looking for.  Let’s take a brief minute this week to make sure we seek things that nourish our souls and fill our buckets with all the right stuff.  The other things are easy to find, but much heavier to carry.
​
Happy, happy birthday, Pam.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘What am I seeking?’

Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to choose what to seek.
 
 

Our son, Greg, spends time, as do I, thinking about life.  Not just the regular stuff like what the week looks like, what we’ll do on the weekend, or how’s our money situation, but bigger questions too.

He thinks about how he wants to show up in each relationship he has.  He thinks about how his actions today will, or won’t, lead him to a goal he has set. 

I’m lucky to benefit from his intentionality.  It means that about once every month, he texts or calls to invite me out for a coffee and visit, just the two of us.  Of course, we connect in between times too, at family gatherings, when we go out for dinner, and through calls and texts during the week. But these coffee dates are intentional and very special.

This is where we can talk about the stuff there’s never time for in the hustle and bustle of regular family time.  This past Saturday we had one of our coffee meet-ups.  We got chatting about something one or the other of us had done and Greg said, ‘That sounds like one of those Type 2 ‘funs’’.  This is not a new concept to me.  We’ve talked about the different kinds of fun before, but it had slipped my mind.

In the context of fun, Type 1 fun is the kind of fun that is enjoyable during the activity itself.  It doesn’t require much effort or pushing oneself.  Type 2 fun, on the other hand, is fun that may be difficult or even unpleasant at the time but is rewarding or enjoyable when you look back on it. 

Type 1 fun is immediate, and, let’s face it, it’s fun.  Type 2 fun is delayed, but more fulfilling.

Luckily, we don’t have to choose one over the other.  Both kinds of fun are good, and important to have in our lives.  It’s great to have fun eating ice cream, going to a party, getting together for book club, going to a movie, or playing baseball.  But if this was all our lives were made up of, they’d eventually feel a bit hollow. Not to mention that if you happen to be an introvert by nature, Type 1 fun is eventually exhausting.

It’s the Type 2 fun that leaves us with the best memories.

When I first learned about Type 1 and 2 fun, I jumped right into judge-mode, judging myself.  I immediately accused myself of not having much Type 1 fun.  Really, I’m a delayed gratification girl.  As I judged myself, I assumed other people were having more Type 1 fun than me, and to make matters worse, that it meant that they were somehow more fun than me.  I pondered my life, and the things I do that I enjoy.  I hike, I dance, I play with little Ben and Andy.  We go camping, on holidays, and host family for dinners.  I spend time with friends. I can’t think of one time when I’ve done one of these things where I haven’t had a great time.  Sometimes when we hike, we laugh hilariously.  Same with dance.  And with the boys, it’s basically fun camp.   So, I do have Type 1 fun, yet I know Type 1 fun, as a standalone is not what I seek.

For me to really be really having fun, I need something more. I’m not sure if there is a title for it so for now, I’m labeling it Type 3 fun.  This, according to me, is the kind of fun where it’s Type 1 in the moment, but when it is done with consistency, and with a focus on relationships, it creates the satisfaction of Type 2 fun.   Doing activities with people with whom I have secure, safe relationships allows me to have Type 1 fun.  Then by doing those activities with consistency I create the Type 2 satisfaction I crave.  Normally Type 2 fun comes when we overcome obstacles or challenge ourselves.  My activities don’t exactly fall into this category.  Mine are created from the challenge of prioritizing them, and from doing them with the people I love to be with.   They require intentionality, consistency, and a focus on the relationships involved, something that looks easy when Greg does it, but in fact, is a challenging skill to master.  The payoff is that it’s deeply satisfying and incredibly fulfilling.  It’s my kind of fun, Type 3 fun.

Greg’s an ultra busy guy.  His work weeks are incredibly demanding and long, and often requires that he be out of town, sometimes for weeks on end.  I suspect there are some Saturday mornings when, instead of meeting up with me, he might just like to have some Type 1 fun.  However, at the end of each of our visits together, we always acknowledge how much we have enjoyed catching up together. 

I get together bi-monthly with a group of women to knit.  We donate our finished products to organizations who need them. This morning Greg took time to join our little group of knitters to teach us how to crochet.  You read that right.  I taught both of our kids how to knit and crochet when they were little.  As they grew, Kaitlyn preferred knitting, and Greg, crocheting.  He stopped doing it for many years but in the past few years has taken it up as a way to relieve stress.  His creations are spectacular. 

As we worked on our little sample piece this morning, Angie, one of our group members and a doctor, said with some exasperation, ‘Gall bladder surgery is easier than this!’  So, I’m guessing today might not fully fall into Type 1 fun, although if you’d been a passer by on the street you might have heard some laughter.  However, the feeling in the room as we challenged ourselves to something new, will have us looking back on this as Type 2 fun.  I also think, that as we crocheted and talked, we strengthened relationships with one another.

That for me is the magic.  The Type 3 fun.  I’d choose it every time.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘What type of fun fills me?’
​
Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to practice fun.
 

Jim and I have just returned from an incredible trip to the Netherlands.  We also spent a bit of time in Belgium and France, but most of our days were enjoyed soaking in the sounds, sights and smells of the gorgeous Netherlandic country.

This trip was in honour of our 45th wedding anniversary.  We had hummed and hawed about where we would go, but the lure of the possibility of seeing fields filled with tulips was more than we could resist.  I’ve seen pictures of them for years and wondered if they were real.  It was hard to imagine those long rows of colour being something we could see in real life.  But real they were.

Tulip season is a short one.  These beautiful symbols of spring only each last about two weeks.  If the different types are spaced out in terms of when they are planted, the entire season can stretch to about 5 weeks.  We knew we were taking a chance on seeing them.  Luckily, we had many other sights on our list to see, so if we had missed the flowers, our trip would still have been incredible. Thankfully, luck was on our side.

We landed in Amsterdam at about eight o’clock in the morning after an overnight flight.  We’d planned to spend the day exploring the nearby town of Haarlem and had booked a little canal tour for mid afternoon when we knew we’d be running out steam.  We had saved our big tulip day for the following day when we hoped to be rested and fully able to enjoy both the bike tour we’d booked and our visit to Keukenhof, the most beautiful spring garden in the world.  But I didn’t know if I could wait, so on our way to Haarlem, I asked Jim if he thought we could take a drive through the countryside to see if we could just get a sneak peak of the fields of tulips.  Some like the ones in the pictures. We did a very brief search online and discovered that the region of Lisse was famous for tulips and we headed off in that general direction.  We were not disappointed.  We’d only driven for about twenty minutes when some brilliant colours caught our eye.  With a few twists and turns onto country roads we found ourselves alongside fields of the most brilliant colours of tulips.  Red, orange, yellow, pink and purple stripes filled field after field. 

The beauty of it stopped us in our tracks.  Such a simple little flower.  Such an incredible sight.

The entire next day we were engulfed in tulips.  We toured the countryside by bike in the morning where we were treated to more incredible stripes of beauty.  Afterward we walked and walked and walked through the world famous Keukenhof Gardens where over 7 million bulbs had been planted and were in their full glory.  It’s very hard to put into words just how gently beautiful this was.

Tulips don’t have to do much on their own to blossom.  At Keukenhof gardens, a team of forty gardeners use the knowledge gained over hundreds of years to plant the bulbs at just the right time in the fall.  They plant them in perfect sandy soil, in wide open spaces where the sun can warm them and begin the process of growth. With a little help from Mother Nature, the following spring, they bloom. 

What would have happened, I wondered, if the tulip bulbs had the ability to think and feel like we do.  Might they have said, ‘I don’t think I should fully bloom. Someone might not approve.’ Or perhaps they would have thought, ‘I was taught to not show off.  I’ll just stay quietly in the ground.’  Or maybe, ‘I’m not quite ready to bloom yet, so I’ll work hard and maybe I’ll bloom next year.’ Or they might have remembered being told, ‘Who do you think you are?  You’re not better than any of the other flowers.  Stay small.’ Or even, ‘Be satisfied in your little winter cocoon.  You don’t need anything more than what you’ve always had.’

Imagine. 

Imagine the beauty we would have missed.  Imagine the joy not brought to the thousands of people who came to witness them.  Imagine how different our world would be if tulips talked to themselves like we do. 

​We humans are lucky.  We don’t only have one short blooming season each year.  We have so many opportunities to bloom.  We can bloom in small and big ways.  We can bloom all on our own or alongside others.  We bloom when we are brave enough to show up exactly as ourselves.  We bloom when we stop playing small, and step into our greatness, whatever that means for us.  We bloom when we are kind, when we smile, when we rock an outfit, when we put our creations on view for others to see, when we share our talents, when we deep-down laugh, when we sit quietly with a friend.  We bloom when we push aside the voices in our head that tell us we are not enough.

This weekend is Mother’s Day.  Typically, it’s the time of year when the first flowers and tree blossoms appear.  I challenge you too, to fully appear.  To bloom.  Just like those magnificent tulips who I can almost hear whispering to one another, ‘Bloom, baby, bloom’.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘How am I blooming?’
​
Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to bloom.

Fifteen years ago, I tasked the leadership students in my school with choosing a global project to work on.  We had built good leadership muscles in our school and in our community, but our participation in global citizenship was not as strong as I wanted.  I still shake my head in wonder to think that we chose to build a school in Africa, and I shake it even more to think about just how fast the project came about and how much it has grown.  At the time we had one goal:  raise enough money to add two classrooms to the government operated elementary school in Ewaso Ngiro, Kenya.

Our entire school community rallied around this huge undertaking.  The students were so proud of what they accomplished and what they learned in the process, namely that they have the agency to affect and even make change in our world.

Just a couple of months after the official opening of the classrooms, Jim, I and four others were on a plane headed to Kenya to meet the community we had come to know and love.  Besides us, we took the trip with Randy who was a parent at our school, member of our new board for our project, and father of three children, two of Randy and Bonnie’s teenage children, Hannah and Ryan, both of whom I taught, and Rick who had introduced us to our now long-time partner David (Kamishima).

For a girl who never imagined she get the chance to step foot in Africa, this was indeed a huge step.  I was worried, afraid even.  The culture on the Massai Mara and in rural Kenya is as different from Canadian culture as one can imagine.  One night as we slept in tents, protected by guards with large guns, we listened to what sounded like a stampede thundering past the back wall of the tent.  We lay still, eyes open wide.  In the morning, on a walkabout to see the sunrise, we discovered that what we had heard had indeed been a stampede, a stampede of zebras being chased by a lion! 
This had not been one of my fears pre-trip,  or I may likely have not boarded the plane, but I certainly did have other worries.  I was afraid I’d be overwhelmed by the need we would see.  Not only the need for education, but the need for food, for health care, for drinkable water, for safety, and for protection of the young women to name only a few.  I’m a doer, and I knew I would never be able to do enough.  Not only that, I knew it was not my place to go there to do.  So ahead of time I put on my coaching hat and imagined some structures I could put in place for myself, and for the rest of our group, so we could manage our fears and have some agency over ourselves in terms of our management of emotions.

The two things we put in place to do were these:

Each night, all of us who had been together during the day, including our Kenyan friends, stood in a circle and told one another what our favourite part of the day had been.  This caused us to not only notice what we were experiencing, but it helped us focus on the wonderful things during the day.  We would experience something and then wonder if it would be the most wonderful thing we might mention that evening.  It’s not a bad practice.  I think it may be commonly called gratitude.

The other thing we did was to remind ourselves to ‘be a witness’.  We did not have to judge.  We did not have to solve.  We did not have to change.  We did not have to know.  We did not have to fix, or judge or even comment on.  We simply needed to witness, to see.  This was a gift to us.  When things were difficult for us to see or experience, we would remind each other:  Be a witness. 

This idea of ‘be a witness’ has been something I and  others from our little group, have continued to use in everyday life.  Only a couple of months ago, I had a wonderful catch-up conversation with Randy, who I hadn’t seen in a while.  We recalled this, and commented on how valuable this practice has become in our lives. 

We live in a world where doing is valued, and where we tend to have an aversion to all things uncomfortable.  When we notice someone crying, our first instinct is often to pass them a tissue, or perhaps to tell them not to cry, that everything will be alright.  Sometimes we even jump in to assure them that it isn’t as bad as it seems.  Or that we have been through the same, or even worse.  While well intentioned, none of these validate what the person is experiencing.  In fact, we say and do these things to make ourselves feel better, and we have little understanding of the impact on the recipient. 

When we stop ourselves from these well-meaning gestures, we take the first step in becoming a witness.  For to witness, not only means to see, it can also mean to give evidence or proof.  When we give witness to someone’s situation or emotion, we show proof that the thing is true.  When we give witness, we see, we hear, and we believe. 

How do we do this, how do we give witness to someone?  We do it by quietly standing with them.   We do it when they are celebrating and when they are mourning.  We do it when they are confused and when they are elated.  We do it by acknowledging whatever they are experiencing without trying to minimize, diminish, brush over, or compare.  We stand together with them and we see, we hear, we believe.

Just over a week ago I received an unthinkable call to let me know that Randy’s wife, Bonnie, our friend, had passed away unexpectedly and suddenly.  Jim and I were in complete disbelief.  We were shocked into silence.  Then tears.  Then more disbelief.  We simply could not believe this news.  It took hours for it to begin to sink in.  It has shaken our world.  During the evening of that same day I said to Jim, ‘We need to go to see Randy tomorrow morning.’  And so,  without a phone call to give notice, without a casserole in my hand, without any prepared words, we went.  Randy met us outside their beautiful home, and we held one another.  We stood with him, and his family and bore witness.  We hugged again and Randy whispered in my ear, ‘This is what I need.  Presence’.  And then he looked at me and said the words he and I have practiced living:

Be a witness.

​We both understood.

We wished witnessing was not needed in that moment, but nothing, absolutely nothing else, could possibly have stood in its stead.  When we witness, we protect the recipient of the witnessing.  We protect them from having to explain, defend, pretend, deflect. We offer protection in our willingness to accept and stand with them.

This weekend many of us will gather with family and friends.  I know there will be opportunities to practice witnessing.  It is such a simple practice. It is not easy, especially at first, but it is without doubt the most valuable gift anyone can either give or receive.

I’m taking a couple of weeks away from my writing.  Jim and I are going to take a trip to celebrate our 45th wedding anniversary.  This milestone too, needs us to bear witness.

Meanwhile, my challenge for you is to ‘Be a witness’.

Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to be a witness.

Our family has been partying all week.  Birthday partying that is!  Our most senior member, Jim, celebrated his seventieth birthday first, then two days later, our most junior member, Andy, celebrated his fourth birthday.  Within the week we’ve had five different celebrations.  There could have been six, but Andy had some serious ideas about that.

For Jim’s birthday, we had our ‘big family’, dinner on Saturday evening.  This is the same ‘big family’ that gathers together for Christmas and other major events.  Not that many really, just twelve in all.  It was such a wonderful evening, complete with Jim’s favourite foods and a rousing game of Birthday BINGO.  Everyone is old enough to play this on their own now, and listening to little Andy as he finds each picture, enthusiastically says, ‘YES!  I HAVE that one!’, and then eventually as he shouts out BINGO, is well worth the price of admission. 

On Monday, Jim’s actual birthday, we had both boys for the day due to a day off school for Ben.  Before they arrived, I wanted to give Jim a special birthday gift. I had invited many of Jim’s family and friends (the ones I had contacts for) to put birthday wishes and pictures on a digital card that Jim would be able to open and see.  I could have just sent it to Jim’s phone where he could have viewed it, but I hoped we could sit together and take in each message.  I had already read them and was overwhelmed at all the love and good wishes sent to him.  I wanted him to have the same experience.  I used my phone to project the card onto the television, and we sat together.  He had no idea this had been in the works, and as we sat together, reading message after message, no distractions were needed.  All our focus was on the gift of love before him. 

The doorbell rang before we were half-way through, and I suggested we ‘close the card’ until after our day with the boys was over.  We could have continued trying to read, but we’d have had our attention split between the card and the boys, so we chose to wait.

Much later that evening we had the chance to re-open the card and read it in its entirety.  There were messages from long ago friends, messages of love from his brothers, and there was the Birthday Song, sung by his 95 year-old mom.   We were both so grateful for this quiet moment together.  I don’t know the word to describe our feeling.  Perhaps overwhelmed, perhaps humbled, perhaps moved.  Perhaps there is a better word.  Our feelings leaked out of our eyes.  We know we are so lucky for our life, our health, our friends, and our family.  As we sat together afterward, our bodies were still, but our hearts were so, so full.  

On Andy’s actual birthday, he went to his day home.  There are four little ones there altogether, and their caregiver does special things when ever one of the children has a birthday.  Andy knew this and was excited.  However, when he got there and his caregiver told the other kids it was his birthday, he told her with seriousness, “But don’t sing the Happy Birthday song for me.  My family will take care of that.” And so, they did not sing.

​Later that evening we stopped by Andy and Ben’s house for some birthday cake and to take him his present.  Kaitlyn had made a Panda cake, we lit the candles, and with his Grammie and Grampy joining us via Facetime from the east cost, we all sang the Happy Birthday song.  If I could bottle the joy on Andy’s face as we sang, we could all be millionaires.  He simply beamed with delight as we sang.  As we sang, we couldn’t help but watch him with such love.  I can guarantee our minds were not wandering.  They were right there in that moment.  When the song ended and the candles blown out, Andy turned to his mom and said, ‘Now that’s what I call a great birthday’.

I will never, ever sing or receive the birthday song the same again.  I now understand this song, like Jim’s card, is a love song.  It is so simple a child can sing it, it takes but a few moments to complete, but when done with love, it is such a treasure, such a gift of love.

Although this was not my birthday week, I feel as though I have received a valuable gift.  I sat in two homes, ours, and Andy’s, with two people I love, and found myself fully absorbed in the moment.  I experienced complete gratitude.  I did not need a journal, I did not need a workshop, I did not need any reminders.  My mind was not hurrying on to the next thing.  I simply fully embraced and deeply experienced the moment I was in.  I’m going to do this more often.  I’m going to be where I am.  Fully. 

I wish for you a moment this upcoming week where you too, can be fully where you are.  Those precious moments can appear in the most common places.  Notice them.  Breathe them in.  These are the riches of our lives.

This week, instead of an inquiry, I have a challenge for you.  The challenge?  ‘Notice a moment, stop, breathe it in, feel it.’
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Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to notice the moments.
 

This past week, little Andy, who is three, asked me to put sixteen minutes on the timer for him.  He loves to have a timer set for him whenever we’re going to be heading out or if he has a nap coming up.  I always ask how long he’d like on the timer.  He used to say three minutes, ‘because I am three’, but more recently his favourite number is sixteen.  Either way, I set the timer for ten minutes.  It seems to work.

Andy’s little.  He’s just starting to figure out time.  He’s sorting out yesterday and tomorrow, and the tomorrow after tomorrow.  He asks how long it will take to get to a certain place, and his brain is starting to appreciate what a ten-minute drive feels like, or a half hour drive.  When you are young, a half-hour can feel like infinity.  It’s not unusual for us to hear a voice from the back of the car telling us that ‘This is taking FOREVER!’.  I remember that feeling as a child.

On the other hand, my friends closer to the right-hand side of the continuum of life frequently mention how quickly time goes.  ‘Where did March go?’, I heard this week.  It was the same with January and February, and before that it was ‘Where did 2024 go?’  Time is flying faster than we can believe and faster than we want.  We have no more ability to make it slow down than Andy and Ben do to make it speed up.

I wondered why time, such a precious commodity, is experienced so differently in different situations and at different ages, and so I did a little digging.  It turns out there are two main reasons this happens.  One of them is something I had wondered about.  This theory is based on numbers, and I suspect that’s why my brain went there.

This theory is officially called The Proportional Theory of Time, or Log Time.  Simply put, as we age, a year becomes a smaller fraction of our entire lives up to that point. A year for a 5-year-old is one fifth (or 20%) of their life so far, but a year to a 50-year-old is one fiftieth of their life (or 2% of it) so it seems to pass ten times faster.  Most adults would agree with this.

The second theory, which is not in contradiction to the first, (thank heavens because if I had to choose between it and numbers….)  but rather is a second contributing factor to the differences in the ways we feel time as we age, is information processing.   The brain encodes novel experiences much more richly than it does everyday, ordinary experiences. It’s as though novelty is stored as high definition, but for experiences that we’ve had several times, the brain is already familiar with them, so it doesn’t bother expending much energy storing them. Unless there’s something different about them, the brain just encodes a faint trace.

This explains why you can easily recall the details of any new experience, but forget what you had for lunch two days ago (or sometimes even today).

As children, everything is new, so all experiences are richly encoded in the brain. With so much information and data being processed, children have the sense that time passes very slowly. This explains why we sometimes have memories of going from point A to point B as a child, and recalling the distance to be so long, yet when we travel the same route as an adult, we can be shocked to discover how close it really was.

For adults, with much less data processing happening in the brain, we have the sense of time moving quickly.  In terms of car trips, I notice that the trip to any new place always seems to take longer than the same trip home.  I guess this is because on the way the scenery is new, and I really have to pay attention. In other words, my brain is busy.  But on the way home, the route looks somewhat familiar, and my brain doesn’t have to work nearly as hard.   Throw in a bad snowstorm on the way home and the trip feels so much longer. 

In general, the more information our minds process, the slower times passes. Time speeds up with increasing age because most of us have fewer new experiences, allowing our brains to relax. We can stop time speeding up by bringing new experiences into our lives and by living mindfully.

Most of us can think of a time when we’ve wished time would slow down, or perhaps we wish we simply had more time; more time with loved ones, more time on a holiday, more time to do what fills us up.  As our parents age, and as our grandchildren, children and even we, age, we say we want more time.  However, I don’t think what we want is more minutes.  I think what we want is more precious time.  We really don’t want more time to watch television, or even to work.  We don’t want those mundane familiar days that pass so quickly.  We really do want more moments when we feel alive, when we experience something new, when we fully connect, when we deeply understand one another, when we laugh until we cry, when we witness beauty, and when we hold a hand in ours, instead of taking it for granted, we memorize the feel of it.

This weekend Jim will celebrate his 70th birthday.  Time is flying by.  I invited his mom to send a video of herself singing, as Andy calls it, ‘the Happy Birthday song’.  Usually each year, she calls and when Jim  picks up the phone she sings it to him.  But this year, I hoped she could manage a video.  She is 95.  Time is flying by.  Jim hasn’t seen the little video yet, which I understand took many tries, and help from her dear friend Jane.  I know that when Jim sees it, time will slow, and slow more, as he cherishes this sweet moment.  He will not forget it.  It will become a memory, making it feel as though it takes up more time than it actually did.  May we all create such moments.  Time is flying by. 

My inquiry for you this week is, 'How am I using this time?'

Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to slow down time.

This past Tuesday as we started up the trail, snow began to gently fall.  Despite the fact that we’re ready for some warmer days, it was absolutely beautiful.  Pam commented that this could be our last hike in falling snow this season.  She went on to remind us that we never know when it will be the last, the last of anything.  Somehow it made the day even more special.  It allowed us to enjoy the snow, rather than wish it away.  We’re often in such a hurry to rush the seasons along, we forget to breathe in the beauty of each of them as they unfold.  Sometimes we do the same with the rest of life too.

Just after lunch today we packed up our little grandjoys, their clothes, bikes, helmets, boots and toys,  and took them back home after a full day here yesterday, followed by a sleepover.  There is never enough time for them to do all the things they love to do when they are here.  Ben has suggested more than once that maybe they should plan to stay for a week, or even two, to solve this problem.  The truth is, I doubt the problem would be solved.  The ideas keep flowing and Jim and I just do our best to try to figure out a good balance between planning events away from home and having activities here to enjoy too. 

Yesterday, after a wonderful visit to see Shirley and her new calf, Bella, we planned to spend the afternoon at home.  Andy usually has a sleep, and I’d bought a new Lego set for Ben to work on.  This is one of his favourite things to do, and he was thrilled to work well into the evening to complete a police car, an ATV, and a getaway car, complete with jewels.  He doesn’t need help with it, but he does love someone to sit with him.  Whenever he finishes a Lego set, he loves to play with it.  He has a great imagination, and he sets up scenarios for whatever vehicles he’s made. Last night was no exception.  Even as I was getting him ready for bed, he gave me a long and detailed description of what we could do with these vehicles.  His plan was to set up a car chase, where the bad guys robbed a bank, and the police had to chase them down.  There could be an old house where the bad guys holed up, and a rock shooter might come in handy too.

I remembered that we had some light foam boards that we might use to make a police station and bank, and asked if that was something he was interested in.  I needn’t have wondered.  His mind was whirling when he went to bed, and this morning when he came in to wake me at 5:57am, he was ready to go!

All morning, he and Jim planned, cut, glued and assembled the buildings.  As each one was complete, he had another idea for a building he could add to the mix.  It was all I could do to keep the paint colours coming, keep the brushes cleaned off, and pitch in with painting and imagining.  The kitchen looked like a bomb had gone off, and the living room wasn’t much better, as Andy had taken refuge there, choosing one game after the next for he and I to play.  Eventually all the construction was complete, and we were filled in on the second phase of the project – the action video!  Good grief! Gramma, you make up the story, I’ll drive the vehicles, and Grampa can organize the video and sound.  We negotiated a few role switches and soon were busy ‘filming’ in the backyard.  The completed eight-minute action video will never win any award, and we might even prefer it never see the light of day, but Ben was thrilled with it, just thrilled.

Jim and I didn’t have to have a discussion to know the two of us were exhausted, and perhaps even questioning our decision making. 

And yet, just as Pam mentioned the possibility of our Tuesday hike being the last one in falling snow, we know too, that these days with little boys have the uncanny ability to fly past us so quickly that before we know it, the last one has happened.  Before we know it, little boys turn into bigger boys, boys with friends to play with, school assignments to complete, part-time jobs to go to, and exciting adventures to have.  Before we know it, the little hands that we treasure holding no longer reach for ours, the adventures to the farm no longer seem so exciting, the bike rides and camping trips and overnight sleepovers no longer hold their magic.  Before we know it, we no longer seem like great playmates with good ideas.  Before long, many ‘lasts’ have come and gone, all without our ever knowing they would be the last.

I think of this often.  How many lasts have we experienced without ever realizing either the significance of it, or more often, even that it was the last.  Firsts are easy to identify.  We know the first time we flew on a plane, the first job we had, the first time we were recognized for some skill, the first love we felt, the first home we bought, the first family dinner we hosted, the first time we held a newborn baby.  It’s so much more difficult to identify a last until it’s only a speck in our rearview mirror.  

I’m learning to live more and more in the moment, appreciating walks in the snow, and exhausting bank robberies and car chases.  Life’s moments pass by with speeds I could never once have imagined.  I know I’ll experience many lasts without recognizing them at the time. This is simply the way of life.  I hope I’m wise enough to be present during them, so that in looking back they are moments to be cherished.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘What is the last thing I did today?’
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Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how create moments that last.
 

Calgary used to be unique in its changeable spring weather, but I understand that over the years the rest of the country has wanted in on the action, and now too enjoys False Spring #1, then more winter, then False Spring #2, and then perhaps real spring.  No matter how many times it happens, we are still drawn to spring, be it false or not.  There is something about the warmth of the sun after the cold days of winter that gives us hope. 
On one of our local news stations, they offer a ‘Picture of the Day’, sent in by a viewer.  This week, someone sent in a picture of a crocus, peeking out from behind a warm rock close to the south side of a home.  Such hope from such a small little flower. 

I love all our seasons (well, perhaps not Second Winter so much) but Spring holds a special place in my heart.  Spring signifies new life, new hope.  Spring holds untold possibilities.  In Spring it is as if there is unseen life starting to move around under the soil, sometimes just underneath the leaves on the lawn, just waiting for the right time to reveal itself.

Growing up on a farm, spring was an important season for us.  Dad, along with every other Canadian farmer, worried about the soil.  Was it too wet, not wet enough?  Was it warm enough to plant or did it still hold some frost?  We all knew it would be all hands on deck once Dad determined the conditions to be good enough for planting.  I can think of many spring days, after school, when our fingers would be cold from dropping those little seeds into the soil.  We all understood this had to happen, cold fingers or not, if we were to have a good harvest to take to the market.

It's miraculous really.  A tiny seed placed or dropped in a trench, covered with heavy soil, eventually becomes a living plant.  Some grow to produce things we can eat, some grow and give us shade, some provide nutrients for animals, some bless our hearts with beauty.  All begin from tiny seeds, seeds that can’t help themselves.  If they are given the slightest bit of encouragement, they can’t resist becoming what they were meant to be.  Even the asparagus seed can’t help itself.  It’s buried a metre below the surface and takes three years to appear and bear fruit, and yet it does.

I think Spring speaks so clearly to me because of the seeds I see inside each of us.  We don’t always know who planted them, but they are there.  Often, they are deeply buried beneath that heavy soil.  Life has a way of doing that.  And yet once given the nudge, the little bit of encouragement, or sometimes just time, the seeds begin to grow.  Sometimes they surprise us, like volunteer flowers in our flower beds.  We don’t even remember them… until we do, and then those dreams and yearnings begin to take form.  A bit of light thrown on the picture helps us see next steps.  We begin to become enthused, watering our own long-kept ideas and dreams.

On the farm we learned we could not all be the planters all the time.  So many steps went into the process it’s surprising it happened at all.  Seed catalogues were poured over in the winter months. Which seeds did we want to plant?  Our dad was wonderful at encouraging us to try new ideas.  We tried planting corn for popcorn, we tried watermelons, we grew broccoli before it was a vegetable recognized by most, we tried every manner of vegetable and berries, often having signs up at the market so people would know the names of these new vegetables.  When I think of it now, this was a wonderful gift to us. Those attempts were not to be feared, no one felt like a failure if they didn’t work.  We simply learned that these were not meant to be, not on our farm, not with our soil.  Not every seed will grow.

In Canada, over the last two months, some Canadian seeds have begun to grow.  I suspect most Canadians are like me, they have always loved being, and been so proud to be Canadian, and could never imagine not having our county be a sovereign nation.  We had seeds of love for our country inside us, but often, like we do with many treasures in our lives, we took Canada for granted.  The comments from south of the border have nudged those seeds inside us.  We have heeded that nudge and are doing exactly what we know how to do.  We are standing up and being Canadian.  All of the Canadian qualities and characteristics that were preserved so perfectly inside those buried seeds, are now are pushing away the soil, and with the warm spring rays of sun, are beginning to bloom in all their glory. 

While this is an incredibly important seed to water, it isn’t the only one.  On the farm, we also learned that if we placed all our attention on one part of the garden, the rest would suffer.  So, while we are watering our Canada seeds, we need also to remember there are other little seeds to nurture.  Each one of us makes up a tiny piece of our country, and we too, each have personal hopes and dreams and longings, and they too need to be watered and cared for.  Imagine how wonderful our country could be if every single one of us was flourishing, if we each doing exactly what we were meant to do, and if every one of us was in full bloom.

We can do this for one another. 

Sometimes we’ll be the planters; we’ll plant the seed of an idea for someone else.  Sometimes we’ll be the tillers, clearing the way so the conditions are ready to accept the seed.  Sometimes we’ll just need to put drops of water on the ideas.  And sometimes we’ll need to weed out those thoughts that tell us and others that we can’t and we shouldn’t.  No matter what our job, it’s never been more important that we nurture the seeds inside ourselves and inside others.
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After all it’s Spring, and all those little seeds are just waiting.  Imagine what it will be like when they all come into bloom.

My inquiry for you this week is, ‘What seeds am I nurturing?’

Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to nurture seeds inside ourselves and others.
 

I’m out of sorts this week.  Not crabby, not sick, just unsettled.  I suspect many Canadians are feeling the same.  Powerless isn’t a feeling I often seek.  Truth be told, I never seek it.  No matter what the situation, I always find some way to stand in at least a small piece of power.  This week though, the whiplash of the news cycle is happening so quickly, it’s difficult not to feel dizzy, and somewhat powerless.  That alone would be plenty to manage, but for many of us, there is the additional challenge of feeling betrayed by a lifelong friend.

No wonder I’m off.

Over the past weeks, I’ve read quite a few articles written by economic experts, and current and former politicians of all stripes.  A common theme seems to be that we do have power.  The big moves, of course, need to be left for those in elected office.  But we have little pebbles we can throw.  We can choose to buy Canadian, choose our holiday destinations differently, and knowing that most of us share that ‘off’ feeling, we can choose kindness.  These are our pebbles.  And pebbles make ripples and ripples change things.

This Tuesday, our hiking group was finally able to get back on the trails after missing the entire month of February.  The weather had been so cold, it was simply too dangerous to consider heading outside for any length of time longer than a few minutes.  We’ve missed those Tuesdays.  We miss the exercise and the incredible beauty we are fortunate to walk in, but we’ve also missed being together.  We miss our talks, we miss catching up on each other’s lives, we miss supporting one another.  Each of us have busy lives and families, and none escape the regular ups and downs of life.  We love that as we walk we can share our joys and sorrows, our win and our losses, our challenges and our accomplishments.  

Sometimes we arrive at a trailhead holding what feels like a boulder but before too many kilometres are underfoot, the boulder shrinks, and shrinks some more, until we are upright again.  We each know how lucky we are.  We do not take our time together for granted.

This past week we were in a quandary about where to hike. There are enough hiking trails within a two- hour drive of our homes to last us a lifetime, even if we never repeated any.  However, at this time of year we need to choose carefully.  Some trailheads are not available to us due to winter road closures, so obviously we weren’t considering those this past week.  However, the ones closer to home had just received some a covering of slushy snow, and that, along with last weeks spring like conditions were no doubt going to be an exercise in dodging ankle deep slush and mud puddles, so we chose to avoid those too.  The ones higher up in the mountains, sit in places of deep snow.  This is avalanche time, so those too are off our list for a while.  We landed on a beautiful little hike near Canmore to fill us with mountains, keep us safe, and keep our feet dry. 

The Grassi Lakes hike is short but spectacular.  At the top are two small lakes, surrounded by mountains.  This alone is beautiful.  However, the real beauty of the lakes is created by the minerals found in the waters.  These paint the waters with emerald green and blues, and even to the naked eye, they look like priceless paintings.  I was surprised the lake had open water.  Despite the warmth of the past week, we’d just come off a week of frigid weather and most lakes are still ice-covered.  But luckily for us, these were not and the colours were in full splendour.  

There were very few hikers there on Tuesday.  And none who were compelled to throw pebbles into the water to see the ripples.  I was glad, since when the water is glass-like the reflection of the mountains is breathtaking.  As we made our way around the lake to the far side a small breeze came up.   The smooth lake was affected, and little ripples began to form.  On this side of the lake there happened to be final bit of winter’s ice along the edge, about two metres in width.  As I watched the ripples come across the lake, I thought to myself that the ripples would be stopped when they reached that ice.  Since I’d also been thinking about the ripples we were trying to make with our ‘buy Canadian’ movement, I felt a bit badly that the ripples would stop.  I’d been taught that when you throw a pebble in a lake, it makes ripples, and they go on and on and on.  We were taught that we never know how far our actions will reach.  But here I was at Grassi Lakes, about to have those old teachings disproven.  Sure enough, the ripples reached the edge of the ice and stopped.  They didn’t bounce back out toward the middle of the lake, they just stopped.

For just a minute.  

As I watched, the ripples that couldn’t move the ice from the edge, must have weaseled their way underneath, and soon little bits of water bubbled up in various spots on top of the ice.  As more ripples came, more tiny bits of water appeared.  The ice was not flooded over, the whole mass of it did not shift, but the ice absolutely felt the effect of those tiny ripples.  Such relief.  Those ripples do make a difference.

There are so many ways to make ripples in our lives.  Most of them cost nothing, take very little time, and can move even the most rigid objects.  I, like most Canadians, am committed to making ripples by my choice in purchases, by standing up for my country, and by wearing my little red maple leaf pin.  But there are so many other ways we can make ripples.  We can remember that this is a difficult time for everyone.  We can ask how a cashier is doing, we can invite a friend for a coffee or a walk, we can make a phone call, say hi to a stranger, sing in the car, offer to help with a project, sit quietly with someone who needs us, and in the case of our hiking group, go on a hike and share our pictures.  We can watch our words when we talk about our American neighbours, after all, it is not the American people who are responsible for the mess.  We might only see the beginnings of the ripples, but I know for sure that sometimes, those tiny little ripples cause changes in even the hardest of objects.
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Elizabeth is a certified professional Leadership Coach, and the owner of Critchley Coaching.  She is the founder and president of the Canadian charity, RDL Building Hope Society.   She works with corporations, non-profits and the public sector, providing leadership coaching.  She creates and facilitates custom workshops for all sizes of groups and has expertise in facilitating Strategic Plans for organizations. Contact Elizabeth to learn how to make ripples.