Blog
Never had planned on starting my own company but did it twice, each time with a business partner. The first partnership came about when I was looking to exit a job and thought, 'why not, do this for a couple of months until I decided what's next.' Seven years later we parted ways. The second time was another leap of faith and 'why not' attitude. In hindsight, there's a lot more than faith needed to ensure successful partnerships.
Ten years ago, a homeless beggar on the subway opened my eyes to a new perspective. Words are powerful yet people are lazy with words. We use them without thinking. Spending a lot of time in developing countries raised my awareness about how I use words -- sometimes that consciousness sticks, othertimes not. But this subway experience was an eye-opener.
People have the attention span of a gnat and get confused easily so your brand messaging must hit it out of the park, and quickly. Be true to you, but with detachment -- everything isn't interesting or of value to everyone. Read, reread, cut, and cut again, then run it by objective others -- not your loved ones!
I write because I don't know how to not write. It's where I find peace, answers, inspiration. It's always amazing the reaction people have when I say I'm a writer -- what is the mystique or stigma that surrounds it? Sometimes it's as though they're in awe, other times, it's more like, 'oh you poor thing, that means a life of struggle, drugs, alcohol, early death...' As the young kids say, WTF is up with that?!
Earth Day is forever etched into my being. The first Earth Day, April 22, 1970, was celebrated half a block from where I grew up in downtown Manhattan. It’s also the day my parents serendipitously opened their new company, Earth Shoes, those odd looking shoes with the heel lower than the toe. The shoe was immediately adopted by the flower children and went on to make shoe business history.
Hugging the president of a country doesn't feel like a normal hug, but it was one great hug! To see a friend in Haiti transition from being a huge musician to the president of this complicated, complex, and beautiful country was an experience. Needless to say, all means of contact are cut off when someone becomes a president so a chance visit a New York club was a happy reunion.
A brief interlude as a groupie from a free $592 third row seat reminded me to just let go... Growing up in a family of huggers, to this day, I hug everyone. If you read my Haiti post, you'll see I hugged the country's president, and with this experience I got to hug one of my favorite dancers from Dancing with the Stars. But this story is about so much more!
