Prompt: Beautifully different. Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different – you’ll find they’re what make you beautiful. (from Karen Walrond)

What a funny prompt this is. I find that I’m accidentally reading several other posts, and finally writing my own much later in the day. I didn’t realize I was doing this until Alex pointed out that she was attempting the opposite. And then I saw what fun the crowdsourcing angle can be. And then I stumbled upon this gem about how we are all tragically undifferent. At least that’s how I read it. But I did agree with one point – your own opinion on what makes you different is skewed and unnecessary.

i actually struggle with this thing all the damn time.

Originality doesn’t exist. Everything I’ve ever said, done, written or thought has already been discussed, executed, written about, contemplated. In a world where it’s cool to be different and hip to be uncool, where the hell does that leave those of us that have been uncool since it was uncool to be uncool? [wait, what? You heard me.]

so where does that leave you? or me? or anyone?

Leave differences. And similarities at the door. We have something in common that we bond over? Awesome. We are different and that makes us bond? Spectacular. You do you and I’ll do me and lets let that be good enough.

let the love in. that’s what’s beautiful here.

so what’s this?

#reverb10 is an annual event and online initiative to reflect on your year and manifest what’s next. The end of the year is an opportunity to reflect on what’s happened, and to send out reverberations for the year ahead. Get in on this.

Prompt: Let Go. What (or whom) did you let go of this year? Why? (from Alice Bradley)

2010 was actually not much of a “letting go” kind of year for me. It was more about settling down and finding adulthood. In October, I was forced to let go of complacency. I was forced to let go of my sense of security. And in 2011 right now, I’m letting go of fear.

so what’s this?

#reverb10 is an annual event and online initiative to reflect on your year and manifest what’s next. The end of the year is an opportunity to reflect on what’s happened, and to send out reverberations for the year ahead. Get in on this.

As the holidays begin to close in on us, the days are quickly getting away from me one by one. I have been feeling like I need to “get caught up” on all these reverb posts – both reading and writing – and I do. But today I realized it doesn’t necessarily have to be in order. I do plan on writing on every single topic, because it’s my goal as a writer to answer every prompt. (Yes, I realize the objective is to get myself writing on the daily, not just on each prompt, but hopefully in pushing myself to write on them all, I’ll try to avoid letting them pile up like this again.)

So, on to it.

Prompt: Community. Where have you discovered community, online or otherwise, in 2010? What community would you like to join, create or more deeply connect with in 2011? (from Caligater)

So, did this happen to anyone else? You graduate college, and then suddenly a year or two later, discover that there’s all kinds of hobbies and clubs and crap out there? You suddenly realize you have time for all the stuff you were too busy studying  to enjoy back in school. No? Just me?

In 2009 I was all “OMG bikes and blogs and clubs and yoga and stuff!”

In 2009, I discovered a lot of communities.

and in 2010, i started to build one.

I am the president of a four-person club called Ad2 Reno (that’s DOUBLE our membership from a month ago, thankyouverymuch). It’s a club I almost let die, and it’s a club that is constantly reminding me why I’m here, living this life, working in advertising, doing what I do. I mean, advertisers are obvs the most fun. But Ad2 helps foster something in me that is essential to my well being. In Ad2, I get to teach, to lead. In Ad2, I get to make my very own local community a better place in a very real, tangible way, through public service. So yeah, I’ve found community there. I discovered a national community that is there to support me and my baby little club.

and in 2011?

We’re going all the way. We’re creating a community for young advertisers, and I’m going to deeply connect the crap out of it.

so what’s this?

#reverb10 is an annual event and online initiative to reflect on your year and manifest what’s next. The end of the year is an opportunity to reflect on what’s happened, and to send out reverberations for the year ahead. Get in on this.

Prompt: Moment. Pick one moment during which you felt most alive this year. Describe it in vivid detail (texture, smells, voices, noises, colors). (from Ali Edwards)

This one is hard for me to answer today. I’m feeling particularly un-alive today, and waiting all the way until 4 p.m. has not made addressing this topic any easier for me.

I have a lot of answers to this question, depending on the day. Which makes me feel like there’s something wrong with me. In a really big way. If you’ve gotten through week one of The Joy Equation, you’ve answered this question before. I don’t have my journal in front of me, but if I’m remembering correctly, I answered this prompt on a particularly lost, sad little day. Concerned that I’m not doing things that make me feel alive, that must have been a tear-stained page.

but then i remembered. i remember.

There are two things in my life that make me feel more alive than anything else. The first, I’ve sort of written about before. I feel the most alive when I’m giving of myself in the truest ways I know how. Right now, that’s serving as the president of a club that’s found itself in infancy. Again. It’s mentoring students, bridging gaps and building relationships. I learn SO. FREAKING. MUCH. from helping other people learn.

The second is family. I feel most like myself, the person I was born to be when I’m around family. I can be 100 percent the most real version of me. My little sister? That’s my soul right there, sitting outside of my body. And when I think about Brad, and the life we’re building, it literally starts to bring tears to my eyes. (Holy cow – sap much?) But really, his family is mine and mine is his. Completely.

So, a specific moment? No, not really. I got promoted this year, we found The House, he asked me to be his forever and ever. But it’s the collection of moments that make me know how very alive I am.

so what’s this?

#reverb10 is an annual event and online initiative to reflect on your year and manifest what’s next. The end of the year is an opportunity to reflect on what’s happened, and to send out reverberations for the year ahead. Get in on this.

Writing. What do you do each day that doesn’t contribute to your writing — and can you eliminate it? (from Leo Babauta)

You know, writing for prompts is a funny business. It forces you to think about something that you may never thought was worth thinking about. Or to look at something in a new way.

There are at least 100 things I can think of that don’t contribute to my writing. Some things contribute to my life, my livelihood, which indirectly contributes to my writing.

All #reverb10-ers should probably read Matt Chevy’s post today on second guessing. I second guess myself all the time, and my writing is no different. But I think the one thing I can – and should – eliminate from my day is the separation, the divide, that exists from the writing I do for work and the writing I do for me.

It’s almost an entirely different process. In some way, I’ve been incapable of seeing how the two writers in me are the same.

one voice

Though I agree with Liz when she says originality is dead, one thing that I have is my voice, my heart. It’s what got me here today. When clients come in to my office and say, “I just love your blog,” what I hear is “I love your voice.” And while writing style is different here than it is when I’m drafting a client newsletter, or press release, the process needn’t be.

Because, if I’m going to call myself a writer, the writing I do for work can, and should, be infused with as much passion as there is here. And you know what? I am getting there.

so what’s this?

#reverb10 is an annual event and online initiative to reflect on your year and manifest what’s next. The end of the year is an opportunity to reflect on what’s happened, and to send out reverberations for the year ahead. Get in on this.

Prompt: One Word. Encapsulate the year 2010 in one word. Explain why you’re choosing that word. Now, imagine it’s one year from today, what would you like the word to be that captures 2011 for you? (from Gwen Bell)

It’s only 9 a.m. and I have seen quite a few posts on change already. While 2010 was a big year of change for me [for everyone on the planet, I think] – I went through a specific kind of change this year.

adulthood.

My word to describe 2010 is adulthood. At some point over the course of this year, I entered it. I came to the bold [or perhaps completely not bold] realization that this is my life that I am here living. There’s no one moment to pinpoint when it happened. It was a gradual change, over the course of almost the entire year, from going through the motions to real-live-functioning-grown-up.

scary, right?

Let’s look back, shall we:

• I got my first promotion, at my first big-girl job. I was given more responsibility, and I liked it. I was ready for it.
• I used everything I’ve learned in school and on the job to stand on my own [okay, with a ton of support] and manage the media for one of my community’s most cherished special events.
• I redesigned this blog and have been more committed to writing than ever before. It’s not a perfect streak, but I’ve been committed to writing on this blog more often than I have not in the last 12 months, so that’s something. Right?
• I became a leader.
• I learned that I can learn something from everyone.
• I bought a house.
• I got engaged!

So here I am, in what appears to be true adulthood. I think that part of welcoming myself to this era [that's not the right word, but go with it] is knowing I’ll never stop learning things, getting to know myself, finding my footing in this world, confronting demons and growing into a more conscious individual.

push.

My word for 2011 is push. 2011 is about knowing that I can do what’s been set out before me and do it awesometastically. And be true to myself, and take care of myself all the while. It’s going to require a lot of pushing. I don’t mean push* in the negative, get-down-on-myself-if-I-fail kind of way. It’s not really like me to do that. I mean push as in making time for the things that are important to me, moving past lazy or reluctant tendencies, and living up to the get-shit-done person I want to be.

It might seem like a lot of pressure. And it is. But it’s what I need to remove myself from the complacency I’ve been living in. Again, this is my life that I am here living. Time to start living it 100 percent.

so what’s this?

#reverb10 is an annual event and online initiative to reflect on your year and manifest what’s next. The end of the year is an opportunity to reflect on what’s happened, and to send out reverberations for the year ahead. Get in on this.

* Is my repeated use of the word “push” making anyone else think of Mean Girls? “I’m a pusher, Cady, I’m a pusher.” No? Just me then …

There’s something about writing for prompts that just … makes sense.  When you want to write and need to write, but maybe feel a little … guilty about spending so much time thinking critically about what it is you’re writing. It might just be me. But it’s a way to get the juices flowing, prevent me from giving up on myself and just write.

So, that’s why I’m going to join in on #reverb10, a series of blog prompts in reflecting on 2010, and holding intentions for next year. I half-assedly participated last year, when it was focused on #best09, so I’m excited to really commit to this reflection. There’s big stuff going on in my life right now and I want to be 100 percent present for all of it.

you can do it too!

Sign up to participate here, and then come back and let me know you did! And we can high-five!

which brings me to

#reverb10 doesn’t start until Dec. 1, but I saw this prompt on Doni’s blog today, and really really really wanted to do it too.

Between the snow and Pandora's Christmas station, I really can't help myself.

What are your plans for the holidays? Do you travel at Thanksgiving? If you celebrate Christmas, do you travel then, too?

The last several years, we’ve alternated between spending Thanksgiving in Vegas with my family, and in Sonora, Calif. with Brad’s. This year though, we’re making a trek to the hippie town of Asheville, NC because my madre is getting married! Either way, I’ll be with family, which is the important part (less because of the mushy family feeling, and more because the most fun I ever have in my whole life is when all the sibs are together and laughing).

Because I grew up Jewish, we’ve always (for the past five Christmases, at least) gone to Grass Valley to celebrate Christmas with Brad’s parents. It’s a generally laid back time, but always feels like family. This year, we’re going to do a Hanukkah night, with the menorah and some zucchini-potato latkes, I have yet to invent. Because of the timing, and the fact that my sister and I both worked retail during school, we try to make it down to Vegas for New Years, and do our family gift exchange then.

How do you make the plans for the holiday? If you have a significant other, how do you decide which family to visit?

Oh noes, I answered that one already, didn’t I? This “problem” generally answers itself because of timing, work schedules, ease of travel, etc.

Do you have your Thanksgiving meal at lunch or later in the day?

Mid-afternoon, I think. I have no idea what Thanksgiving will hold this year though!

Do you have a favorite Thanksgiving tradition?

Everyone going around the table, saying what they’re grateful for. I try to make it a point to be thankful regularly, but there’s something that just feels right about making a formal proclamation when you’re surrounded by the love of friends and family.

After a big meal do you lounge around or get up and take a walk?

Oh, definitely lounge. And then maybe walk. And then maybe play cards. I honestly don’t think there’s a set tradition in my life on this one.

Do you shop on “Black Friday” or do you avoid it?

Hell to the no. I worked in a department store all through high school and part of college, and always had to work Black Friday. No. Thank. You. I did do some Black Friday shopping online last year, and got some great deals.  If you’re buying lightweight stuff, this is a great option, btw!

When do you usually finish your Christmas shopping?

Within a reasonable amount of time before Christmas, but not much earlier. (Have I started yet? Nope.)

Do you and your significant other exchange gifts? Is there a budget?

Yes, but he is all about surprises. This year, because of all the house stuff, we have a $20 max for a little bitty present.

When do you decorate for the holidays?

Sigh. I never really have. The last few years, I’ve put out a candle, hung a little snowman on the door handle, but have never truly decorated. Our new house has a great big window that just wants to have a Christmas tree. I don’t know if we’ll be able to get the boxes and stuff cleared out in time to make decorations worthwhile. Though I did buy my first ornament this year. We’ll see …

Do you go “all out” with the decor or do you keep it simple?

I would probably keep it pretty simple. I’m drawn to classic and simple decorations, and am lusting over these candle holders.