Welcome!

At the current time, I am just establishing this Blog. As more content is created, I would suggest also checking out the links that I have provided to the right of this Blog. Tom Magness, Thom Singer and the others provide great opportunities to develop your leadership and confidence in networking.

For now, I am posting this photo that I took last summer at the top of Whiteface Mountain in upstate New York. Lake Placid is in the foreground, as viewed from 4,800 feet high. While this photo is inspiring, it does not do complete justice to the view from the top of that mountain. However, to get to this spot, I had to walk probably a 1/2 mile across a thin mesa that had 1000+ foot drops on either side, and raised in elevation about 800 feet total. While the walkway had some minor handrails and was about 6-8 feet wide, for many the pathway is too intimidating and they can't make the journey. For those people, hopefully this photo will show the view! Awesome!

In life generally, many of the great opportunities we find only exist because we made the venture outside of our normal lives. We can't simply hide away in a confined life, and hope that these great opportunities and views of life will find us in our hidden corners. While often venturing out can be scary, in most instances any falls that might occur will not be fatal. As I recently heard from another, the falls of life only give us the opportunity to learn to pick ourselves back up.

While networking is often not as inspiring as this Mountain view, it can be as, if not more, rewarding. It can also be as, if not more, scary for those unused to being socially outgoing. My suggest is to find those people around you who will help you along your pathway, and make sure you don't fall, or can at least help you get back up if you do. A poem that often inspires me in such circumstances by Ranier Rilke states in translation, "Life has not forgotten you, but that it holds you in its hands. It will not let you fall."

The following were also photos we took from the same vacation. This photo is of High Falls Gorge near Whiteface Mountain. The falls drop a total of 80 feet, but it seems much higher. You can actually walk along a metal walkway (barely visible in this photo to the right) from where you can get right up on the falls. I have also posted below a photo of Texas Falls in Vermont. Obviously attracted to the name of the falls, it was probably the best falls that we found in Vermont.









Now with that, I do have to admit even I have my limits. We all have to determine to what limits we will push ourselves, and also the boundary within which our happiness resides. If you have a boundary, you are happy with being within it, and never will need to go beyond it, well ... maybe you just stand at that boundary, enjoy the view, and be comforted that your passions and intellect are defining your boundaries, not your fears.


This last picture, however, shows the daring nature of some people and animals. The dog, "Hydro," had no fear of the water and demonstrated it. In talking to one of the swimmers, he said that it had been a few years since anyone was seriously injured by swimming at "Devils' Potholes" outside of Waterbury, Vermont. Comforting! Even without that knowledge, I was good just standing at a distance and trying to get some neat pictures. I was glad the timing of it turned out.

jtp.