Inspired and humbled by the legendary annual reports of Berkshire Hathaway founder, Warren Buffet, I decided to expand my exploration into a full-blown 2011 Annual Report and give it a theme—”Serve, aspire, transcend.”

As you read the Annual Report, I’ll bring you deeper into my life and what I call my “business engines.” I’ll also share something that’s more personal than ever before. Not so much because I want to, but because to omit it would leave a gaping hole in the context around many of my recent business and life decisions. It’ll also provide answers to questions I’ve been asked, yet have never answered publicly.

So, get yourself a latte and some dark chocolate, this craft is taking flight…

Click here to download and read

And if you find it compelling, I’d be grateful if you’d share it around.

P.S. – The report is formatted as a PDF document, and designed to read easily on an iPad or a computer. It’s very visual, so the file a little bigger than a regular document (around 4MB). It’s also 35 pages long, so if you’d like to print it, just remember to check the box when you print to shrink it to fit the page size you are printing on.

I recently swung through NYC’s largest, hippest candy store with my wife and a small gaggle of 10 year old girls. It was wonderous (I started vibrating just from the sugar in the air, lol).

Then we hit one section where we saw the display in the image you’re looking at.

Which made me wonder…

Why is it illegal to advertise cigarettes to kids in the U.S., but in a setting built for kids, it’s okay to sell a product that creates a clear positive association with smoking for kids?

Curious, what do YOU think?

Is this okay?

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You do not learn your own true tolerance for risk and your real appetite for courage until you put them to test.

I put mine to test on April 15th. It turns out I had highly underestimated myself on both fronts.

I had an easy job in a Fortune 500 company. Not only an easy one, but a lucrative one amounting to a nice 6-figure income, which I earned while working from home – often in my favorite yoga clothes and usually in between yoga poses and frequent tea breaks! A job with health benefits and stock options, bonuses and perks, paid travel expenses and tech gadgets; even if things were in worse shape in the recent years, relatively speaking, I had it “good”, as others never missed an opportunity to remind me.

So trust me when I tell you that even after I had lost my ridiculous desire to rise to the top as a next generation company leader, I had no real intention of giving it all up anytime soon.

Someone asked me recently how I was able to detach so easily from the corporate politics, the gossip and the stress of it all and my simple answer is that you just do when you are no longer vesting your future in your company. The day that you give up your aspirations to build that future there and start treating your career just as a job is the day that you free yourself from all the “noise” that goes on anywhere outside your main responsibility.

I did the job; I earned the paycheck. That was my story. There is no point denying it; during my last year at my job, I was there only for my beloved sweet paycheck.

Lest there be any misunderstanding, my work ethic has always been high and my performance at the time of my resignation was one of the best. So I do not advocate becoming one of those many “bums” in the organization who get a paycheck week after week and create no value and make no contribution. Please do not resort to that path; it is the path of cynics and quitters.

Do the job that you are asked to do and do it well or else stop doing it altogether by leaving.

In my case, I did my job and I did it well but oh was I never challenged.

No matter how many times I changed positions and moved around, after initial learning curve was gone, I was bored out of my mind. A job that would take someone else hours often took me minutes.

With a restless mind, a starving heart for knowledge and a desperate desire to do something meaningful with my life, I had way too much energy and room to grow, to explore, to learn, to dream and to build a plan for those dreams. That is why I turned a corner in the corporate world. That is how my blog came about over two years ago. That is how I seriously pursued world travel, photography, yoga, writing, reading, blogging, health habits, cycling, and explorations in social media and the blogosphere community.

Ah but why give up such a sweet deal if life was so good and if I seemed to have it all?

My parents and my in-laws have been wondering this question the most. Worry not, I shall explain (as I nearly pulled my hair explaining to them a dozen times but a different story there.)

First, what was brewing on the inside: Ever since the October 2010 Blogworld in Las Vegas, I had become unbearably anxious to focus exclusively on my passions – blogging being the main one but far from the only one. I wanted to create services and products around helping people build smart habits. I wanted to start a podcast – or several. I wanted to build a public speaking platform for my message. I wanted to write and write for hours on end, uninterrupted and undisturbed. I wanted to start my own business and do things my way.

Most of all, I wanted to own all my minutes and choose what to do with every single one of them.

And you know what? I came to believe that when your mind is preoccupied with stress-induced responsibilities and work that you neither like nor find satisfying, you simply cannot give your all and your very best shot to anything else in life.

When a critical component such as mindfulness is absent, you will struggle reaching your true potential. And your dreams and aspirations deserve nothing less than your true potential.

Yet, I loved my paycheck and it was terrifying to walk away from it all without having set my backup plans fully in motion. But sometimes destiny throws you an embrace – or a slap. Either way, it seems to work out just fine.

One day, through a quick turn of events, I was put in a difficult position at work and was asked to make a hard decision. My options did not look good. Integrity showed up and made it a very easy choice; I decided to walk away from it all. In one quick minute, I was done, I was finished, I had had enough and no force of nature – or parental and brotherly advice – was going to stop me from quitting right then and there.

I resigned on April 15^th. No turning back. Not once. Not for a split second.

So I recounted the last leg of my corporate journey – it’s full of drama and it makes for a good story but in real perspective, I was in that world for nearly 12 years and I would be remiss if I did not share with you my honest thoughts especially if you are thinking of making these huge and scary transitions in your life.

First, please set aside what everyone else in your life thinks you should do – deep in your heart, you always – always – know the right decision. No one needs to reaffirm it for you.

Then answer these 8 questions if you are on the fence and have doubts about what to do. They can help uncover the best course and the right timing for you.

What is your …

1. … real and uncensored reason for needing a change? Why do you want to leave your current situation? Being miserable is a good answer but not nearly enough reason. Do you have a compelling desire to do something on your own? Is there another industry that is calling your name? Can you articulate on all the exact reasons you are unhappy and take an educated guess as to where you may find some semblance of happiness? You must come clear on your reasons before even staring your exit strategy.
   
2. … internal state of unrest? Do you even have an internal state of unrest and turmoil? Are you losing sleep and peace of mind day in and day out? Can you accurately attribute this feeling to your work and are you sure it is based on real issues, not transitory ones, or based on circumstances that are outside of your control?  Try to measure your internal sense of urgency.
   
3. … financial comfort zone? What are your current financial obligations and responsibilities? Do you have a lot of savings and little debt? Are you in the habit of spending money on a lot of stuff? Most of all, if need be, can you easily shift your current comfort zone and are you willing to make the life changes that require this shift?  Be really clear about what you are willing to forgo and realistic how that may impact your current state of happiness.
   
4. … tolerance for the unknown? If you do not have a solid plan, you will face a certain level of unknown on the road. Are you comfortable with not knowing what may happen for the foreseeable future? Can you hone into a mindset that will push through and thrive, no matter how unpredictable the road may be? Or do you need more information and certainty before taking the leap?  It takes knowing yourself to correctly answer these questions.
   
5. … appetite for risk? Do you need a position in another organization or are you made for entrepreneurship? Can you feel empowered by the idea of working by yourself for days and weeks if need be? Are you a starter or a follower? Do you enjoy creating your own new process, products, and services? Do you enjoy taking ideas from inception to reality? Entrepreneurship may or may not be right for you. You need to figure this out for yourself.
6. … self-discipline on working for yourself? Do you like being in charge of your own days? Can you muster enough discipline and structure to do the work that needs to be done, to delegate when need be, and to make room for creativity as needed? Can you decide what is a distraction and what is real work and how to distribute your limited time amongst them? Think about how you have worked in the past and when you were most productive – was it on self-driven projects or were you a part of a group project?
7. … depth of patience around cash flow and income? If you were to earn enough to cover two meals a month for 6 months, would you be ok? If your first product sold 7 copies instead of 700, would you despair? If your first book did not fly, would you lose heart? How deep is your patience and how tightly do you define success with income? Knowing your relationship and attachment to money and owning up to the reality of it is the key here.
8. … truth? Yes, I mean your truth? What matters the most to you in your work – and your life? Is it the money? Is it the excitement from a position of authority and power in a firm or corporation? Is it the comfort and the security provided by an established entity? Is it the feeling of contribution to a bigger cause and mission? Is it the sense of belonging to a community? Or is it a compelling desire to do something entirely your own, regardless of the cost and the results? It takes knowing yourself to know your truth and it comes down to you and only you to discover this before you pave the right path for you.

Whatever you end up doing, be true to yourself. The rest will fall into place.

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Farnoosh Brock left a 12-year career at a Fortune 500 in IT and engineering for her pursuits in writing, public speaking, coaching, podcasting, blogging and social media. She talks about smart habits for rich living with focus on smart communications, smart travel, smart living and smart entrepreneurship. She can be found at Prolific Living.

It was a clean break, which means the bone was completely separated and there was a risk that the pieces would heal out of position if I continued to walk on it. So I was put into an air-cast, then spent the next month on crutches, followed by a second month walking on the foot in the air-cast.

When I was finally allowed back in shoes, every step still caused intense pain. I was sure something was wrong, so I called the doctor. Everything’s fine he said, the bone is healed. He then shared how my month on crutches, while necessary, also wreaked a bit of havoc. The muscle becomes seriously atrophied and the connective tissue becomes constricted.

“I know it hurts,” he said, “but you’ve got to keep walking through it.” That was the only way for the muscle to rebuild and the connective tissue to become unstuck and re-pattern itself back into something more functional.

So, I walked, still convinced something was wrong. It shouldn’t hurt this much, I thought. But it did. And I kept walking.

Over time, I started to notice something. Actually, I started to notice what I wasn’t noticing. The pain. It was, in fact, starting to ease. The doc was right. Over a period of months, my foot began to get better. In fact, it was this very lack of continued “forced” movement into pain after a shoulder reconstruction years earlier (don’t ask, I was a gymnast as a kid, ack!) that is very likely why my should never re-patterned or returned to normal function.

But, here’s the bigger issue…

I’m very body-aware. I’ve studied, practiced and taught various forms of movement for my entire life. But I still wasn’t equipped to determine whether the pain that followed my time on crutches was good pain (to be leaned into and worked through) or bad pain (a signal to stop doing what I was doing). I’d never been on crutches before or experienced the level of atrophy, constriction and loss of function that it led to. This was new territory for me and I couldn’t draw upon my normal database for answers.

Sometimes we can figure these things out through introspection, learning and intuition. But other times, we need to turn to others to help us know whether what we’re feeling is good pain or bad pain. Either because we’re too close to the pain, emotionally and physically to be able to make an intelligent decision. Or because we simply don’t have the knowledge needed to intelligently translate the signals.

And that’s not just about our bodies, it’s also about our businesses and lives. Self-awareness, observation and intuition can cover you in most situations. But sometimes, they’re still not enough.

One of the strongest moves we can make in business and in life is to own the need to occasionally surrender and be open to receiving guidance.

So, I’m curious, have you guys ever had a similar experience? With your body, your business or life?

And, if so, how do know whether the pain is good or bad?

And who do you turn to if you’re having trouble figuring it out?

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You know the thinking behind the much touted elevator speech. You’re supposed to figure out how to sum up your business in an intriguing way so it can be said between the 4^th and 7^th floor just in case someone asks you what you do. Trust me, you’ll never be asked what you do in an elevator; you’ll be lucky if someone even returns your guarded nod.

Of course elevator pitches are meant for networking events and other chance encounters with people who, gasp, might want to hire you to do whatever it is you do. The theory is it has to be brief or you’ll lose their interest; it has to be pithy so they will remember you.

For example, if you’re an accountant something like “I help non-profits track their profits and losses” might get someone to pay attention more than if you simply said “I’m an accountant.” Or, using myself as an example, I might say “I help people turn their dreams into words,” instead of simply saying “I’m a writing coach and ghostwriter.”

There’s certainly nothing wrong with getting crystal clear on what you have to offer and the elevator pitch might help you with that.

That clarity is a must if you’re to be successful. Mark Silver of Heart of Business does an excellent job helping people identify what it is they are actually doing. I tell writers Every writing project needs a purpose statement.

Being able to boil that purpose down to a few words is a worthy exercise for itself. But frankly, expecting to use it in elevators, on the subway, over the phone, at a networking event or in any face-to-face or most virtual communications with other people is bound to lead to disappointment, particularly if you expect it to reliably lead to more business.

What really leads to new business is your connection with people. Communication is, by definition, between two people – one listens while the other talks then, ideally, the process is reversed. To attract a client you’ve got to convince them you can solve their problem which means you have to listen to them closely enough to understand what their problem actually is. It’s about them, and how you can be of service, if indeed you can.

Sure, you need clients, but when you come from that needy place, you’ll end up with no clients or those who need you to work for free or darn close to it.

When, however, you listen deeply, even in an elevator, when you’re more interested in helping  than in getting, a couple of things happen.

First, people love to be listened to. Think about it. You know when someone really hears what you say. You also know if they are metaphorically biting their fingernails planning how they will talk when it’s their turn. Notice which you prefer – and know you’re not alone.

Next, because you’ve listened, and maybe even asked a question or two so you understand their problem more thoroughly, you’re actually in a position to know if you can help and how. Often that  means you’ll be suggesting a resource or another person who can do what needs to be done, with no apparent benefit to you. Sometimes the help you offer may actually be the service you provide and if your response convinces the person you’re talking with you can solve their problem they are likely to hire you.

Either way, both of you are better off. You’ve left the person you’re chatting with in a better place than they were before you met and you know you’ve come from the heart. If it’s a gig you land it’s likely to go well because you came from a helping, supportive, listening place; if it’s not, you’ll know that the world a better place just because you’re in it and responding.

I suggest instead of an elevator pitch you start with ‘hello.’ Then listen and see where the conversation naturally goes.

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Anne Wayman is a writing coach, ghostwriter and blogger at AboutFreelanceWriting.com and WhenGrandmotherSpeaks.com

It was early. 7:30am.

The only people in the waiting area were me and, sitting across, a mom in her forties and her son, a wiry kid with glasses who looked to be about 11.

He was still in his pajamas, squished into the chair playing his Nintendo as his mom filled out her forms.

I guessed she had nobody else to watch him that early, so she dragged him down to play video games while she went in for her scan.

The tech came out, called my name and theirs. We all got up and followed him inside.

Walking down the hall, the kid asked how long it would be.

About an hour and a half, came the answer.

Well, that’s better than 2, said the mom.

The tech handed me a gown to change into and I entered my room.

Minutes later, I stepped out wrapped in hospital blue.

The boy was in the room next to mine.

Changing.

His mom whispered to the tech.

“You don’t ask him anything about what’s on the forms, right?”

The tech looked at her. Confused. “Excuse me?”

Even more quietly…

“I don’t want him to know what he has.”

But what about an entrepreneur? Or a banker, doctor, lawyer or accountant? What about the business affairs or account managers in a creative agency, are they creatives? How about a tradesperson, like a plumber, carpenter, electrician or roofer?

Do these folks self-identify as creatives?

Should they?

Does it depend on who they are and how they do their work?

I’m fascinated by how we label ourselves and others when it comes to creativity, and what impact that labeling has on the work we’re willing to do and risks we’re willing to take.

Would love your thoughts on this:

1. What do you do?

2. Do you self-identify as an entrepreneur?

3. Do you self-identify as a creative?

4. Are there certain roles or jobs that are just plain non-creative?

5. Or is it more about the individual and what they bring to these roles and jobs?

Feel free to copy and past the above and share your insights and answers in the comments…

She’d be pulling out any moment now.

Moments later, the SUV about to turn the corner some 50 feet up the road saw the same thing, and decided he had dibs. Zooming back and signaling as if he’d been there the whole time, he got out and gave me the “that’s my damn spot” wave around. I could’ve stayed and argued. But life’s too short and wherever I ended up parking, I needed the exercise.

So I moved along. And found a new spot even closer to my destination. A block or so later, I strode into Starbucks for my afternoon writing session. The corner table in the sun, the one that’s so hard to get awaited. Hearing the door open behind me, I walked toward my chosen spot, which also just happened to be the last available seat in the joint.

As I opened my pack, I glanced up to see the person who’d come in seconds behind me. It was him. Mr. That’s My Spot. Without a chair in sight.

Some days you’re pigeon, others you’re the statue.

And some days it’s the choices and actions that seem totally unrelated that land you in either spot.

Ahhh, the sweet taste of comeupins.

Update – Yep, I know I chose an “alternative” spelling of comeuppance, just liked it better and the Urban Dictionary says that’s just fine by them. Breath in, breath out, it’ll be okay. Freedom of choice FTW!

And it generated a lot of conversation. A lot.

The point of that post was to say I’m no different than any other person who hunkers down and “does the work.” We are all capable of getting more done than the average bear when we truly commit to making things happen.

The  word “Pro,” for those who got it, was actually an allusion to Steven Pressfield’s The War of Art, where he speaks about the difference between Pros and Amateurs in the creative world.

As some of you pointed out in the comments, though creating a habit of “doing the work,” though, isn’t quite the entire equation (thanks for keeping me honest).

There’s a pretty mission critical element I left out…

Knowing which work to do.

It’s one thing to sit down and quite another to sit down and know which is the small slice of the work that will yield the majority of the benefit.

So I thought it might be helpful to share the approach of one of the most productive creators I know, ProductiveFlourishing.com’s Charlie Gilkey. Charlie, for those who don’t know him, is a productivity genius who works largely with creative professionals. And he’s become my go-to person when I’m having trouble figuring out which way is up.

So, here’s how our conversation unfolded…

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JF: What do you find to be the biggest obstacles for creatives/entrepreneurs in turning actions and outcomes.

CG: Before I answer that question, I wanted to say thanks for the interview. I appreciate the conversation and I hope it helps some of our peeps start building some momentum rather than spinning those creative wheels.

If I had to say what the top three challenges are, I’d say they’re

1. trying to do too much at once,
2. trying to get results too quickly, and
3. not quite having enough of a strategy under what they’re doing. Let’s handle each in turn.

Time and time again, what separates successful entrepreneurs and creative professionals from the struggling ones is that the former ship and get stuff done. One of the best ways to ship and get stuff done is to focus on a few key projects and activities and landing them. The very same hypercreativity that drives small businesses is the hypercreativity that can stifle them if it’s left unchecked.

Trying to get results too quickly fits in here because many creative people can’t tell themselves “Not Now.” There’s a fundamental difference between seeing that not doing something now doesn’t mean you won’t ever get to do it, but that’s hard to understand when you’re first starting out. Every idea has to get developed right now, which means few ideas get developed into fruition.

And here’s where strategy fits in. Knowing which few ideas to work with now, which to do next, and what to do after that helps glue all of this together. This is especially true in a creative small business because a large part of the challenge is balancing all the activities so that there’s enough money coming in the door to support the creative projects and operations you’re working on.

JF: It’s important to work hard. But most people I know have a ton of potential places to focus energy and attention and enough work to keep 5 of them busy, so how do you determine how to allocate your work energies? How do you know what needs loving and what needs shelving?

CG: I love that you brought up energy and attention, as it completes the time, energy, and attention triad that I think we all need to consider more than just time management or energy management. It’s a bit more complex and nuanced than what you could put on a timesheet, but it more accurately represents the life of the creative professional.

Speaking of the life of the creative professional, something we all have to accept is that we’ll never actually finish the list. If we’re in the right environments, they’re not the ones where someone hands us a list of things to do, we do them, and then go home. We tend to have those types of lists that, once one thing gets completed, it spurs three or four more ToDos. Truth be told, we have ToDo hydras rather than ToDo lists.

One of the best frameworks I have for deciding what to do is to look at your activities in terms of Cashflow, Opportunity, and Visibility. When you start thinking about the ends of the different things you might do, it becomes much clearer. For instance, if you need to make your payroll numbers, it’s probably time to reorient your activities so that you focus solely on cashflow generating activities. If you’ve got a bit of margin and know you need to make some key moves in your business so it grows, it’s time to look at new opportunities or new places to get some visibility.

The challenge is that these priorities might shift every few days. A successful visibility campaign might quickly create a new opportunity-making project one day only to become a closing cashflow operation the next. We creatives have the ability to change the world that way, which means we need to be especially agile in the way we process what needs to get done.

JF: Do you use any specific tools or methodologies?

CG: I’ve read and implemented so many different methodologies that it’s hard to point to any single one of them as the one I use. I think most of the well-known frameworks – GTD, 7 Habits, Lean Six Sigma, Pomedoro, etc. – have some key insights, but, when it comes to productivity systems, no one size fits all. We each have to build our own system, although it does help to have someone guide you through the process.

I use OmniFocus to help capture a lot of tasks, but I don’t actually use it as my productivity dashboard. I use good ol’ pen and paper for that. Sometimes I’ll use the planners I’ve designed, but, mostly, I separate a piece of notebook paper into the main categories represented on those aids and work from that. The separation ensures I’m not fiddling with a todo list on the computer when I need to be writing on the computer.

I also use a lot of microsystems such as TextExpander and 1Password. I’ll not go into too much detail here, but the microsystems fit into the workflow and help speed up a few steps. They save me time indirectly because I’m not always trying to find information or open other applications so I can stay on task.

JF: When you find yourself heading off the productivity rails, what do you do to get back on track?

CG: As counter-intuitive as it sounds, I stop doing a bunch of stuff and get out of my office. I’ll walk around the block, exercise, talk to Angela (my wife and ops manager), take a shower, or play guitar for 10 – 15 minutes. It’s so easy to spend a few hours wheel-spinning or stuck on the Loop, and the best thing (for me) is just to unplug and get some perspective on what needs to be done.

A simple trick, though, is to ask yourself what you really need to do before you check out for a bit so that you let your unconscious mind start working through things. When we too heavily focus our conscious mind on current activities, there’s not enough bandwidth and time for the other parts of our minds to do any of the work, and there’s a lot of processing power that happens in other parts of the brain. Disengaging a bit opens up more capacity, and leaving with that open question has a tendency to anchor that processing power onto something useful.

The more challenging bit is knowing when you are off the productivity rails. A lot of us get stuck doing things without thinking about what we are doing, and this is especially problematic when you don’t have a clear plan for what you should be doing. The simplest way (for me) to not get off track is to visualize and plan out what the track should be every day. The 10/15 Split helps with that.

JF: What are your feelings about what’s become known as the 80/20 rule?

CG: The insight to the rule is that there are a relatively few things that make a big difference to the results we actually get. That part is sound.

The other part of the rule that’s sound is that our work often becomes bloated with non-critical elements if we haven’t evaluated our workflow in a while. When I work with clients on workflow/productivity issues and get into the details, we often find that they’re using tools and processes that over-complicate what they need to do.

I have two concerns about some expressions of the 80/20 rule, though. My major concern is that many people end up cutting the soul and heart out of their work. There comes a point in which a pure efficiency analysis of our activities can lead us to taking out the joy in our workflow. For instance, responding to blog comments may not fall into that core 20%, but it might be something worth doing just because you enjoy it.

The second concern is that many people don’t have a clear idea of what results they want or need. As an example, many small businesses and creative entrepreneurs focus so much on cashflow because their 80/20 analysis is so heavily biased towards cashflow. At a certain point, they find themselves stuck or burnt-out because they haven’t been building opportunities and visibility, and (they think) their only way forward is to keep doing the same thing they’ve been doing better, longer, and harder. You can only do that so long before things fall apart.

JF: What else should I be asking you?

CG: I think you covered it, Jonathan. I’d like to end with a reframe, though.

When it comes to productivity, many people focus on what they aren’t doing, what they’re not getting done, or what they won’t be able to do. That’s a natural negativity bias that most of us carry with us.

I’d like to encourage you to focus on what they have done. Sure, you might not hit every pitch thrown your way, but at least you’re swinging and hitting a few. So many people have ideas and never actually step up to the plate.

Focus on the hits and homeruns. The more you do that, the more you’ll see what’s working – and then build on your successes. Focusing on the strikes is a great way to underplay your own power.

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Charlie Gilkey shares strategies for thriving in life and business at Productive Flourishing. Follow him on Twitter to get bite-sized slices of mojo and inspiration.

She’s a writer, teacher and intuitive business strategist who blends transformative energy technologies, the magic of story, and grounded spiritual practice with pragmatic entrepreneurial principles. She’s also the author of How To Rule Your World From The Inside Out: The Art Of Inner Leadership.

With gratitude for her voice, enjoy…

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A few weeks ago, Jonathan invited me to write a guest post for his beloved blog. I sit down to write, and am overwhelmed by love.

Love surges in my throat. Pressed back by a wagging Finger of Doubt.

“You want to write about what?” says Finger. He raises one semi-elegant eyebrow.

“Love,” I whisper, looking down at my shoes. “I want to write about love.”

“You realize this is a business blog, right?” Finger adjusts his tie and frowns. “Business. Not love.

“Write about how to make brilliant decisions. Or about intuitive strategies for creative entrepreneurs. Write about productivity and procrastination. Be practical. Be useful.”

I think: Finger of Doubt loves me. He doesn’t want me to blow it. But he doesn’t get it, either.

“Love,” I say, glancing at him out of the corner of my eye. “Everything you’ve suggested? It’s rooted in love.

“Brilliant decisions? Love. Intuitive strategies? Love.

“Productivity, procrastination, presidential gravitas—love, love and love.”

Finger sighs. Shrugs. Wipes a speck of dust off his impeccable sleeve.

Glides off to take care of business.

And I pick up my pen to write.

Here, dear Readers of Jonathan’s wonderful blog, is my love-letter to you.

You are beautiful! So beautiful, I could sit and gaze at you all day and drown in wonder as night falls and Time dissolves.

You are magnificent.

You hold the sky as lightly as a bubble in the palm of your hand.

You, my friend, are the light that shines through the tender green of this leaf and brings eternity into focus.

You are the restless power of the sea, and the yielding boundary of the shore. You are the freedom of wild geese on the far horizon.

You turn your elegant head and the Earth spins on her axis.

You are all that is Necessary, and Sufficient.

You dream the stars from their home in the belly of the Earth.

Your circle of inner selves is the crown that shelters, the lap that cradles.

The bead of sweat on your fingertip nourishes the whole, hungry world.

What will you do, with all this power?

Who will you be, when you see your true reflection?

Come visit the Pool of Remembering with me.

Even a puddle will do. Come, see your true reflection.

Everything conspires to show you your Self.

Everything conspires to make you visible.

Will you rise on the horizon in the Land of Wagging Fingers?

Will you become a Pool of Remembering for them too?

Write the truth of your being on your body. With your naked finger. Write:

I am beautiful!

I am magnificent!

I am you! And you! And you!

Write it! Sing it! Say it!

I am love. We are love.

Our business—O, our business is love.

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Hiro Boga recently launched her digital program, How To Rule Your World From The Inside Out: The Art Of Inner Leadership. You’ll find Hiro online at HiroBoga.com & on Twitter @HiroBoga.