My muddy list

I was so absorbed with family stuff* over Christmas and New Year that I hardly gave myself any thinking time to consider my personal goals for the coming year. I’ve given it some thought this morning and cobbled together a list.

Steve’s List:

  1. Work hard and be nice to people (two things but inseparable)
  2. Do my tax return
  3. Trust my instincts
  4. Accept criticism gracefully
  5. Read a little every day
  6. Walk the dog
  7. Daydream often; procrastinate less
  8. Make more 3-minute phone calls
  9. Convert the garage into a workspace
  10. Share (especially via Instagram)
  11. Eat more fruit bananas
  12. Collaborate with others to bring @hardlynormal over to the UK
  13. Make people laugh
  14. Make my family proud
  15. Post here more regularly, as I promised I would
  16. Keep Friday evenings special – i.e. film night with @gicela
  17. Build more bridges
  18. Understand what my daughters need from me (besides extra pocket money)
  19. Be there for my dad as he starts his fight against prostate cancer
  20. Help charities get to where they need to get to quicker
  21. Work hard and be nice to people

The Field
Fetch
Moors

* It has been a fortnight of mud and rainbows; of roast turkey and cider. Most of all, mud. In the few months since we’ve become dog owners - pinch me; how did this happen - I’ve grown to cherish our daily walks in the waterlogged fields down the lane that runs behind our little house. When the girls are off school this is something we do together as a family. We slop and squelch about on the Moors, where the grazing marsh is criss-crossed by an interconnecting network of ditches (known locally as rhynes) which in mid-winter drain the floodwater from the fields.

Whatever your goals and dreams, and wherever you may be on that journey, I hope that some of them come true in 2012.

Update: Soon after I hit ‘publish’, I stumbled upon Taking 18 Minutes Day Towards A Year-Long Focus, which Beth also posted today. It really resonated with me, as I have also decided to focus on a handful of themes this year. I didn’t include them in My List; they merit posts of their own, so watch this space.

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Solitude

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Target moments

I couldn’t help notice this exchange earlier this afternoon between Tony Wang (who manages the Twitter office in London) and Jamie Oliver. Must feel good to see people connect and discover common ground in the work that you do.

I bet charity:water is listening, too; they are very good at that sort of thing.

I was reminded of this next tweet I ‘collected’ last year. Just small talk; but most relationships start with small talk.

As Anne is fond of saying: it’s about creating target moments, far more than about target audiences.

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Stourhead in Autumn

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Are you part of the charity industrial complex?

This is Seth Godin at his disruptive best – speaking at last year’s NextGen:Charity conference on the topic of “Embracing Risk & Failure in Philanthropy”.

Most charities are part of the charity industrial complex, he says.

Ouch.

This is not an opportunity for you to put some “cool internet toppings on your factory-based charity mindset.” The internet is a connection machine, and charity:water, Kiva, Kickstarter… they are getting into the connection business.

Clever ways to interrupt people are fine, but it’s not the future. This is “not about pouring money on top of your traditional system.” This is about your desire to make connections.

Do you care enough to put it out there and have it not work? The changes that we’re looking for are impossible to imagine… until they work.

Listen to Seth for sixteen minutes. It is worth every second.

#ngc11 will take place in NYC on 17th and 18th November.

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