I joke that my least-favorite situation is feeling uninspired.
 
“Inspire” from the Latin “in” (into) + “spirae” (breath) has two meanings:
 

1. To fill someone with the urge or ability to do or feel something, especially to do something creative
2. To breathe in, inhale

• All three of my amazing goddaughters, dancing, studying, making jewelry, starting a photography business, sending me Audre Lorde quotes.
• Volunteering with Whatcom Million Trees Project—being in the orbit of other tree-lovers, drafting off the energy of values-driven people who also love being outside.
• A team of non-profit leaders I worked with this week who do the hardest kind of work imaginable and have been though a hellish three years. They somehow managed to stick together and still deliver on their mission. Incredible.
• Watching my daughter tough it out on the high school basketball team, getting back out there after losses and giving it her all. There are some lessons I just can’t teach at home.
• My college son volunteering on Saturdays at an organic farm that grows for a food bank. Makes me super proud and inspires me beyond measure.
• Lots of clients and friends in discernment about big vocational changes, moves, or shifts in focus. It always takes courage to try something new.
• All the folks in Georgia who have been working for decades to make Raphael Warnock’s win a reality. Sadly and predictably, he’s still only one of four Black people in the US Senate. And that there have only been eleven total since 1870.
• My friend and colleague, a cancer survivor, who went on a sea kayaking adventure with her teenagers just a year after multiple treatments and surgeries.
• Taking my first real winter plunge into the 46-degree Puget Sound with my friend and assistant Robin. It’s painful in the moment, and I relive the glory of it all week long.
• Gabor Mate’s new book, The Myth of Normal. #!*! Pity my husband, who is on the receiving end of my constant commentary.
• My friend starting a “Trash Club” to clean along the banks of Whatcom Creek.
• Singing this song over and over again.
• My air fryer, which makes the most delectable mushrooms ever.

 
It’s time for us to get off our screens and out into the body of the world! It’s ready and waiting with so much to offer. Whatever is going on for you—seasonal overwhelm or depression, the violence of over-work, loneliness, sorrow, uncertainty—that is all real. But so is inspiration. I hope you find some this week.

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