KCSpeaks

The other day I was busy in the kitchen preparing a dish for Christmas Eve diner. I was making stuffing I usually make for Thanksgiving Day. At special request, I was asked to make the stuffing and happily obliged even though I considered the food Thanksgiving food and not Christmas food. This year things were different for Thanksgiving this year and I didn’t have the opportunity to cook the normal dinner. There was nothing wrong with making the stuffing for Christmas. It tasted just as delicious. My holiday feasts were different, a little topsy-turvy compared to years past. They were not bad, just different. In reflection, this is how the entire 2020 was, different and a little topsy-turvy. My reflection brought me back to thinking about how the spirit of #Vision2020 can be kept alive when so much has gone topsy-turvy or has just gone away. I am certainly not alone in my thoughts. I am one of many who has questioned absolutely everything.   At the close of 2019, the world everyo...

We are in the last quarter of #Vision2020 and it has been an unbelievable year of events for the history books.   I hope everyone is to finish out this year strong on the way to the vision everyone has hoped for. Some of you may have let the idea of #Vision2020 go already and are thinking maybe 2021 will be better. It is hard to discuss goal achievement without discussing personal accountability. In our minds, accountability may be this thing you associate with work or school, but the truth is accountability is in all aspects of our life. Having someone else to hold you accountable can be great and can move you along, especially at the beginning, but ultimately having your own sense of accountability is the thing that keeps you honest in all aspects of your life, especially when you are trying to achieve a goal. If your #Vision2020 included saving money for something specific, if you choose not to save as you had planned, ultimately you will not achieve the goal. If your vision...

  Our road of #Vision2020 has been paved by brave warriors before us. Without those inspiring people that have come before us, so many of the world’s technologies, accomplishments, and mankind’s growth would not have been possible. This is why this month I want to reflect on a visionary life well lived of Supreme Court Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg.   I could never do her story justice, so I will not be telling her story. Rather my reflection is more about what a life well lived means for those of us looking to have the vision we have in our minds. We all know Justice Ginsburg was a lawyer and a judge. Yet she was not born a lawyer or a judge. Justice Ginsburg was a woman who attended law school at a time when female lawyers were rare. Based on her experiences in education and employment, she saw the need to champion human rights for not just women, but for all. In today’s world, we would not bat an eyelash at a woman achieving all Justice Ginsburg did. This is because she ...

Up until now, we have talked about having vision in your personal life or helping others find their own vision. Ultimately, it is hard to talk about vision without talking about people who you know that have vision. Those people you would call “visionaries.” In the pandemic world, with so much social unrest, looking through the clouds to see the sun can be a challenge. One way is to figure out who you know that is has vision.  It would be hard for me to talk about identifying vision without mentioning some historical figures that come to mind. For example, the United States founding fathers believed in a new type of government different from the way European countries were ruled. Thinking about people like, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, you can see vision in the birth of the country. It is hard to talk about this year, without mentioning the Black Lives Matter movement. Before our current efforts, leaders in the 1960’s, such as Martin Luther King Jr, had ...

Welcome to July! The midway marker in the year. If this year was a year like any other, I would be commenting on traditional summer fun and relaxing past times. It would be a great time to reflect back on all that we have done so far, and to look forward at how to finish the year strong. Unfortunately this year is not like other years. The year 2020 is very different than its predecessor.   The year 2020 has brought lessons to everyone. I think the biggest lesson is to slow down and focus. The Covid-19 global pandemic and increased focus on social justice is calling all of us to look more closely at our day to day and how we as people interact in the day to day. We now have the saying “the new normal.” This year has been stressful because of so many things. Health, income, employment, family, friends, society, politics, and so many other reasons.     As a result of all this everything happening in the world stuff, every person has had to change something....

The year 2020 may not be the year everyone envisioned, but it is not without hope and the ability to achieve your personal #Vision2020. My hope for all my readers is everyone is healthy and safe in the spaces you live and must be every day   This year we have defined, clarified, and documented our vision. The next step is to give it life in the world and share your vision.   Why does sharing your vision give it life? Sharing your vision means someone besides yourself will get to learn about you in a way that could be scary. Now your vision will be alive as you speak it into existence. This could be a stressful and scary part of the journey, but is just as necessary as the other areas already covered this year.   Why is sharing so scary?   Sharing leaves a person open to see a piece of you. Sharing opens you up to criticism and the scary possibility of shaming from others. Nevertheless, we must put aside those fears and share.   Sharing ou...

Beyond our work as workforce development professionals, we have been challenged personally and professionally. We have been asked to stretch and to reinvent ourselves to keep ourselves, our family, and our community healthy.   I am challenged each day in ways I never thought I would be before. Some things, like a simple trip to the store, are different.   Personal and professional relationships are different. How we speak, what we plan, and what we do. There is not a person in the world that could say the year 2020 is going as planned. Pandemic was not on my vision board.   This does not mean our #Vision2020 is dead. Instead, we must make it a point to go forward and keep the vision alive.   We have defined our vision. We have clarified our vision. The next step is to document our vision. Documentation of a vision for what we want to achieve can be done in so many ways. By journaling, paper vision board, online vision board, or other way, documenting the v...

It has only been three months and already the vision for the year has changed. The start of this year was so hopeful for making this an amazing start to a new decade. Unfortunately the Covid-19 pandemic has challenged us in so many ways. Yet we must remember this does not mean we give up on our goals completely. Instead, this is the time to clarify exactly what it is we want.   After you define your vision, you need to clarify. This is the process of looking at the specifics and focusing on what is really important in life. You may not be able to achieve everything you want, but you may instead be able to clarify what is most important and how you want to achieve it.   A pandemic puts everything into perspective, our values come into play, and we start prioritizing what is truly important. What are the themes of your vision? What do the pictures? What are the most important parts? Ultimately you vision will play into your values and will represent what your belief...

Vision seems like such an easy concept. The idea of picturing stuff in your mind and then working to make it happen. In reality it is more specific. Vision is not just a picture. Vision is pictorial definition of your goal. Vision is what you goal will look like once complete.   In vision’s simplest way to define, an example is having a new car. My goal is to buy a new car. I can see myself driving a new car. I can see myself enjoying that new car smell. Easy, but my vision is not specific enough. Do I want a car, truck, or SUV?    What color do I want my car to be? What will the inside look like? Once I start to put those pieces into place, I have my vision for my car.   This how we define vision.   The same vision example is true about planning a vacation, going back to school, getting a new job, or making any other change.   Defining a vision is picturing a goal. In the land of workforce development or any of the social services, this is ...

Happy New Year! A new and exciting year is here, but not only a new year, a start of a new decade. This is the year for you. This is the year to reach new heights. This is the year to accomplish what you have been putting off. This is the year to revitalize and change, do new things, take initiative, organize, get a better job, get a career, get whatever it is you what. Except in order to do this, you need to know what you want. In honor of figuring out what you want, I am putting this year’s word into action. You will need vision. Welcome to #Vision2020. The one word for 202 is vision. Why do you need vision? Why is it so important? Without vision, you cannot set goals. It is hard to know what you need to do without knowing what you want to achieve. Vision is the first step. How do you see yourself? What is the life you want to have? How will that particular goal help you achieve the life you have envisioned? Sometimes it is hard to know exactly what you want. Some...