MP Live! Join the conversation!

Last Updated on Wednesday, 28 July 2010 10:38 Written by MP Concierge Tuesday, 27 July 2010 05:52

You’ve been asking for it….we delivered…

On July 7th, 2010 we brought the MarketPlace conversation to YOU!

In our inaugural teleconference, Kevin A. Johnson, Marquese Martin-Hayes & Aaron Towns (co-founders of The MarketPlace) and other MP voices teamed up on a LIVE call on this month’s topic of PERSONAL FOUNDATIONS….
…
We talked about our ideas around what a personal foundation is—what it means to us and our lives, as well as the idea of personal responsibility and how we can leverage our foundations-no matter what state they are in right now—for a powerful way of life. We even had a special guest show up on the call towards the end, that brought tremendous insight to the exchange.

Download it to your MP3 player.  Take a listen. Then join the conversation by leaving your comments on this post.

[powerpress]

25

Last Updated on Monday, 26 April 2010 03:48 Written by tlomax Sunday, 14 March 2010 08:18

Today I went to a memorial service for a man I only knew for 25 minutes. Looking back, I realize those 25 minutes mixed with this very moment, will never leave me and has become a defining moment in my life.

Fear is the illusive elixir of life. It allows you to live, and at times can feel like the cure, but one never truly lives while under its influence.  It will romance you for however long you remain in its arms. Never realizing there is another choice, another way, another life and that is love.

In the back seat of an s u v I witnessed John Ganser & his wife Sue, for 25 minutes on our way to the airport. Sue, Raquel, and I were heading to Colombia that early morning. It’s amazing how heavy an impression love will leave on you when you are blessed to be a witness of it in action.  As the vehicle sped to our destination I witnessed two people free, friends, and in love. They fed off of the gift of acceptance and the gift of freedom to be the individuals they are and yet had chosen to merge and become husband & wife, mother & father, and friends to those they shared themselves with. To see this great dynamic of love, laughter, friendship, and care made me once again catch a glimpse of what I don’t get to see too often in its rare form.

Now standing in this memorial service packed and rimmed with people who knew John Ganser (for more than minutes) I realize how life just happens . . . that nothing can be predicted. Who would have known, a man I only knew for 25 minutes on a cold day in December would teach me so much. How that moment would teach me.

I stand here witnessing a room full of people who just by their presence alone testify about the life they are happy John Ganser lived.

To see his wife & children and feel all the love people have for him in this church I realize I have lived in fear of the very thing I desire the most. . . that we all desire . . . love.

Fear will never lead us to love, because its job is to isolate us from it.  I have spent the past 15 years on a tight rope. Sometimes teetering to the left side of fear and then to the right side of love, with every thread of my being trying to get balanced. The wave of emotions attached with every teeter to the left or right made me believe, to be neutral . . . to witness, yet not indulge in either fear or love would keep me safe. But you see even being neutral was just a disguised zone of fear.

My eyes are welling up as I look around the church, as I listen to the priest pray.  How can one escape the feeling to cry when the presence of love is what you realize you have been missing, that special union that even words, at times don’t do justice? This is what I have been missing. I feel selfish to steal this moment and reflect on my own life . . . to realize that, though the physical presence of a man is gone . . . here in this church, everyone who knew John Ganser, where ever they go he will live, because of their love for him and not fear.

His life’s transition came to him quickly. One cold morning in December he was dropping Sue, Raquel, & I off at the airport, to embark on our Colombian adventure. Then with only one warning and no time to react he was gone by the end of February due to liver cancer. There were no signs, he was 50.

I was offered a front row seat in the church, no longer an observer on the sidelines . . . front and center, witnessing the stories of love and friendship: Putting the pieces of a man together I spent all of 25 minutes with. A man who I could see loved his wife, his best friend and she loved him just the same. Witnessing the play and laughter of two people: I love laughter, it is essential.  Catching a glimpse of what I deserve in my own life, but have allowed fear to detain me from it.

Never discount the moments. Everything means something, if we let it and it can mean nothing just the same. Though it is raining and the clouds have taken over the sky, love lives in this place and there is only light shining across a sea of bodies dressed in black clothing.

I won’t allow fear to consume another year of my life. I won’t allow it to be the locked door to my beating heart. The world can withstand my love. The true question is can I? I have found my answer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . and it is this.

I am not here to control the hearts of others or their actions. I am here to unleash the blessings of my God given purpose. The purpose we all carry and that is to live in the awareness of the majesty, simply powerful . . . . love. It is not for me to worry what others will do with it. It is simply my mission to give it.  To reflect the light I am and if I should go blind I hope it is to block the vision of fear, second guessing, doubt, past disappointments, and hesitation.  To love requires everything, but hesitation. I mean really what aspect of love makes a heart hesitant anyway?

I can assure you in the end of it all and without sounding too cliché. It is better to have loved, than to have never have loved at all.

It’s amazing what you can learn in 25 minutes.