More of my notes from TEDxStanford, the one where I arrived in a police car. I’m sharing some of what I wrote in my program during the event. It might be a quote from the speaker, or it might be a thought I had at the time.
My key take away from Dr. Sanjiv Sam Gambhir is simply this: Continue reading “What love does.”
In May I attended TEDxStanford. I arrived in a police car. I had parked on campus and got lost on my way to the event. I was there pretty early and there weren’t many people around, so I was relieved to find a campus police officer. I asked him if he knew where the TEDx event was. “Sure,” he said, “I can give you a ride if you want.”
How nice!
“You’ll have to sit in the back, though.”
A few years ago I was on a first date with a guy I’d met at a wedding. We were in Mill Valley, sitting in the shade in the plaza after a long hike. There was a pause in the conversation and then he asked me: “So. . . how many kids do you want?”
Big question for a first date! I asked why he had asked me that.
“Because I’ve watched you all afternoon and you smile at every kid you see.”
It’s true. And it’s on purpose. Continue reading “Smile at children.”
I was stuck. Faced with a nagging problem that wouldn’t let me go, I went round and round asking myself: What should I do? Maybe you’ve been there, too. If you have, then you know how utterly exhausting it is to get sucked in to that endless loop of a question.
I spoke to a few close friends, I journalled, I read Hafiz and looked to some of my favorite blogs and other sources of inspiration. And finally, I realized that part of my problem was Continue reading “Ask useful questions.”
My dad is a great storyteller, and when I was little he often read to me. He also told me stories about growing up on a farm, and going to school in a one-room school house in Illinois. He told me about being a Peace Corps volunteer, and traveling around the world. From 1968 to 1972, his assignment took him to Tunisia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Continue reading “We are all time travelers.”
Last week I was in Hawaii, and while I spent a fair bit of time sitting by the ocean and reading, I also swam, hiked, and played with yoga. It felt fantastic, and I kept coming back to this idea:
The body wants to move.
It was such a pleasure to be out in fresh air and sunlight. I loved feeling the sand between my toes, and floating in the ocean. I felt more attuned to the fact that even when laying on Continue reading “Keep moving.”
Thank you Ruth Bernhard, for this and all your work.
Kim Nicol 