[Legacy Journal] Having The Idea Is The Easy Part

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Note From Dolly

ISSN 1943-8133
Volume 2010-01, Issue 2
January 26, 2010

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Hello to our newest readers - and welcome! There's more on our blog and in the LJ Archive - please visit and feel free to add your comments. We'd love to hear from you!

Greetings!

Here at Creating Legacy, an exciting new decade is underway. Our time during year-end 2009 and this month so far has been spent in some considerable planning and infrastructure building – some solid foundation building for where we’re going next. That will usher in some important business changes we’ll be unveiling soon to better serve you and inspire more legacy level living and creative work. Very exciting! How about you?

One thing we can announce now is that we’ll be delivering the 7 Steps to Creating Your Legacy program again beginning on March 10 and running for 8 Wednesdays. We worked with our first set of participants to get feedback on the program and were pleased to learn they found it helpful and worthwhile. Their feedback also gave us the opportunity to make some changes to better support your experience, since it is a very comprehensive course with lots of supporting materials. As our beta group, they’ll be invited back at no charge, so you’ll have the opportunity to interact with them and learn from their experience as well!

Our first program has spawned some amazing new projects, and we look forward to showcasing some of them to give you examples of what’s possible. So mark your calendar and plan to join us! Make this the year that you take action on your dreams and great ideas. More information about the program and registration will be coming.

And read on for additional tips to moving your personal legacy ideas forward. Whoever you are and wherever you are, you can get started now to create something amazing and “make a difference now that lasts for generations.” We hope you will and are eager to help you help make a better planet Earth in a way that brings you great joy and fulfillment. Isn’t it time?

Cheers,

Dolly

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“We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean,
but the ocean would be less because of that missing drop."

~ Mother Teresa

"A cake's no good if you don’t mix the batter and bake it.
And love's just a bubble if you don’t take the trouble to make it.
So if you’re free to go with me, I’ll take you quicker than 1,2,3.
Lets gooooo. Times a wasting."

~ June Carter Cash

“If we can choose our future, and I believe we can, then we should do so mindfully, attentively, deliberately and hopefully. Now.”

~ Chip Ward

Having The Idea Is The Easy Part

Last issue we featured a Legacy Story about Dan West, an Ohio farmer with a good idea. How many times have you had a good idea? Maybe you have them all the time. Maybe you stop yourself from having them, or doing anything with them because you think “Who am I to think I could do that?”

Who are you to think you can’t!? I like Marianne Williamson’s reasoning: “You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do.”

Kids get this. They haven’t had the disabling fear, the sense of scarcity, or the experience of “not enough” that precedes thinking they can’t do something. They figure they can do anything, then they become teenagers who are invincible and college students who are idealists! Until the adults in their lives advise them to be “sensible,” to grow up and get a good job. Maybe that’s you? Someone who gave up passion for sensibility? And maybe you even picked a job or a career course that you actually found interesting and challenging … until it wasn’t anymore. When did you lose your own sense of possibility in life?

Well, we’re here to help you get that back … and do something great with it!

Our farmer Dan, probably lost the sense he was invincible, but not his idealism. Having seen real scarcity in the form of circumstances experienced by people in war torn Europe, it seems he kept the perspective that he had ‘enough’ to give some away. And therefore he had something to work and be generous with – and build on.

As a result, he took action on his idea. That is the main difference between people who build legacy projects and those who don't: they act on their ideas. They do something.

A great saying we like that sums this all up is: “having the idea is the easy part.” Then you’ve got to take action. That doesn’t have to be a big, jumping off the cliff feeling sort of action. It need only be a step, and it’s helpful if you take the next right step. The best approach there is to not guess what it might be.

Oh, and just because the idea part is easy, it’s not that what comes next has to be “hard”! The action steps that come next may be work, but they are good work. They are good because they are based on those authentic ideas that are yours. The ones that stir your interests and fuel your passion for being and doing something in the world. You may be amazed at what you can build from there.

Thus, the next step after the idea might be to do some research, meet someone new or talk to someone you know who has some information you might need, and maybe visit a project that is similar to your idea or the way you envision it playing out to see how things really work there. Then you can start to fashion a reasonable plan, with all the risk you may fear anticipated and calculated right in so you can address them as you take next steps.

The more you know, the easier it is to put in place the right actions to build on your idea. If you’re one of those people who stops yourself from even entertaining a big idea, taking such actions can and will generate even more of them for your further exploration. Then you’ll be on your way to cultivating your inner-entrepreneur since entrepreneurs naturally have lots of ideas (and are often in love with them all – but that is another story!) But even for such ‘idea-people’, taking the next right steps in gathering information and making a plan are necessary ingredients.

So start with the easy part – entertain your ideas. Then share them with us. We can help you take the next right actions and cultivate them from there.

Never Too Early, Never Too Late To Build On A Great Idea

One of the ways to begin acting on a legacy idea is to examine what others are doing, and possibly fit the project you design in with an existing organization. There are a number of steps to getting there, but our story this issue illustrates how this can happen. The organization to which legacy builders Alison Barnstable and Laurel Redding attached their project also developed from one person attaching his idea to another organization. And both examples illustrate projects started by people with little financial means of their own – this one by a couple of students.

In 2009, Barnstable and Redding were still hard-working students at University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine beginning their third year. They had plenty of work to do and little experience in the world of legacy – but they had dreams, and an idea. They submitted their project idea in the form of a research grant application called “Increasing Agriculture Productivity in Developing Countries.”

The pair felt strongly it was important for the Veterinary profession become more involved with addressing world hunger through a contribution to public health. They recognized that a large portion of the world’s population relies on animals for both food and pursuing a livelihood. For both reasons, they also knew the importance of safeguarding animal health.

So Barnstable and Redding included in their research proposal a plan to work with Heifer International – the organization started by farmer Dan West – devoted to distributing livestock and providing training for people around the world in environmentally sound agricultural practices integrating both farming and ranching. Working through Heifer International sites, their plan is to expose other Vet students to public health and world hunger issues, get them involved in helping to train community animal health workers and establish information networks that allow Veterinarians to use their skills to have a greater impact in the lives of people worldwide.

Barnstable and Redding

Their project proposal was awarded a $100,000 Student Inspiration Award. The award itself is related to another great legacy from 2005: the largest gift the Penn School of Veterinary Medicine ever received from a living donor, in the form of a $10 million grant from Vernon and Shirley Hill. Vernon W. Hill is founder and Retired Chairman of Commerce Bancorp Inc. and his wife Shirley Hill is owner of InterArch, an architecture design firm. Their gift to the school allows it to continue its world-class teaching and research mission, including grants to support the Inspiration Award that has given financial support to the building of these students' great legacy project idea.

This young, caring, conscious and committed pair of Vets-to-be prove that you are never too young to build on a great idea. They started early, and their passion and decision to take action on an idea – by putting together a plan to apply for a research grant – will allow them to pursue a career path filled with good work, they can feel great about and that will make a positive difference in the world.

It is never too late to start. Take action on your great idea. You’ll never know what amazing resources may show up to support you in bringing it to fruition, unless you take a few small steps in that direction.

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Email me about someone you know who is living or building a legacy. We'd love to feature their story. Maybe it's you?!

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This really is an amazing value for a jam-packed coaching session that will change your life for the better, and may well change your whole approach to the rest of the world! No kidding! After January 31, this special goes away. So click here now!

CREATING LEGACY STUDIO CALLS FOR FEBRUARY

Join co-hosts Dolly Garlo and Eliza Crouch for our free twice monthly teleconferences to explore your ideas for creating a personal legacy!

The Creating Legacy Studio sessions are held on the 1st and 3rd Wednesdays of the month at 10a PT / 11a MT / noon CT / 1p ET – call in from wherever you are, and plan to spend the hour with our growing community!

Teleconference number: U.S. 1-218-862-1300 (long distance charges apply)
Conference Code: 534481

More Info Here

THE NEW CREATING LEGACY KIT IS HERE!

We've added new materials and resources to help you consider what your personal legacy might be, and how to pursue it. Access your copy at no charge at the Creating Legacy Network website. Just enter your contact information in the upper right corner and we'll send it out to you directly. You'll also be subscribed to the Legacy Journal and our periodic email updates and offers.

If you've previously accessed a copy, sign up again - you won't receive duplicate emails if you use the same email address as before (and you can handle any duplicates you might get easily by managing your own subscription status).

And if you signed up previously and didn't get all the items in the Kit at that time, we recently discovered a glitch in the delivery system that's now been corrected. Stuff happens to the best of us, and correcting is what's important! So we encourage you to try again - and refer your friends. We'd love to get our resources out to as many people as possible and your help is appreciated!

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Dolly M. Garlo, RN, JD, PCC is the founder and president of Thrive!!^®Inc. and Creating Legacy™. We are devoted to empowering business owners and entrepreneurially minded professionals make their positive impact in the world - with joy and meaning. Our clients are members of Generation "G" (for generosity)!

For 30 + years Dolly has supported clients in many different arenas - healthcare, law and business - with a current focus on for profit and nonprofit business development, career transformation, and helping people develop social enterprises as independent projects and corporate responsibility programs.

Is it time for you to design your work and create an exceptional life so both reflect your personal integrity and values, greatest level of wellness, highest and best contribution, and individual sense of abundance - for which you can feel exceedingly fulfilled and grateful? We believe these are the keys to true, lasting satisfaction and happiness from which you can also "make a positive difference that lasts for generations."

And we look forward to getting to know you.

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The Legacy Journal newsletter is written by Dolly M. Garlo: http://www.CreatingLegacy.com. If you have any questions or comments, please send them to: Dolly@CreatingLegacy.com.