Dating Me

November 18, 2022 by

About Me:

I’m a musician who loves gathering friends for evenings of good food, friendship, and singing.  I love ecstatic dance and music festivals. I enjoy soaking in a hot spring or skinny-dipping under a waterfall.  A good adventure brings me joy, and finding a loving, smart, liberal adventurous partner would make it all that much better.  I’m interested in your passions and all the interesting things that make you tick.  Let’s discover all of these things together!

I’m a good person who treats others with kindness and I look for companions who feel the same. I have a crush on Sarah Cooper. And Sarah Silverman.

I’m 63. I live in Portland, Oregon (for 22 years), like kids, and have never had any of my own. I’m a solopreneur (I run my own business), and I’m seeking someone who feels some resonance with what I’ve written here. Feel free to pass this along to someone you think would be a good fit. Thank you!

Got someone in mind (or are you the person?): Please show them this post – and have them get in touch if they want to meet me via albert@albertideation.com –  Thank you!

Albert Kaufman

Our soundtrack:

8.12.24 – I have been on 10 dates (since last Summer) so far via Autum the Matchmaker! Sadly, 2.10.25 – she’s no longer in business.
I just appeared on my friend, Lori Stein’s new podcast – Dating and the Interesting Man – August 2024

 

I’m going to add some fun dating articles and links down here.

  1. A story about free dating assistance in Philly. https://archive.is/5FzLz
  2. Pitch a Friend Philly + Their form for participating + some past pitch examples. Their website for more.  And why to throw a Pitch a Friend Party…

Albert 8.24

Come and Get Me!

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Chess

October 22, 2022 by

My Chess History and Love of Chess

I first started playing chess when I was just a lad. My Dad taught me the moves and I quickly caught up to him. I’ve continued to play over the years and I think this is one of the passions that helped me make it through the pandemic over the last couple of years.  I wanted to share some of my thoughts about chess and why it’s such a fantastic game and some of my history with it. 

After playing chess as a child, I ended up playing many games with a mentor I had in my early teen years. Lee and I would play games while listening to the latest records he collected – Bruce Springsteen, The Grateful Dead, The Rolling Stones, and lots of our folk heroes of the day. These included David Bromberg, John Hartford, and Steve Goodman – three artists which were also touring a lot in the area during those times. This combination of sitting with a friend and playing chess and listening to great music continues in my life to this day.

I eventually moved to New York City and studied from 1980-1984 at NYU in Greenwich Village. The main park in the Village is Washington Square Park. This park is known for many things – it was a place for music and good times in the 60s and when I got there that vibe continued. Washington Square Park also hosts a wonderful corner with many built-in chess boards and seating for dozens of games. The area also boasted a number of chess stores where one could buy a board and pieces but also rent time at a table and easily find opponents (almost always men) to challenge to a game. This was especially useful during winter months and at night, though I also remember playing chess in the park at night in warmer weather times. Between the park and these shops (one was open 24 hours if I remember correctly), I spent a fair amount of my free time during my college days playing chess. I noticed I didn’t see too many other students on these boards.

The scene in Washington Square Park around the chess boards has always been fun. There’s a lot of kibitzing that goes on and some people play for money, though it’s usually just a dollar or two. I probably got my tuchas handed to me more than I won in those days, but it was a free and fun way to pass the time and keep my mind sharp. I love seeing how many of the videos of people playing trash-talking chess sharks in parks take place in New York City. It’s a great way for me to relive the scenes of my youth and every once in a while I think I see someone I’ve played with. But those guys were mostly older than me and are probably not the ones featured in the videos.

I’m also a musician, so I’m used to challenging my mind with that different language, too. Chess adds one more layer to my active mind. I wish I were better at other languages – I’ve tried learning many and I hardly know enough to order a cup of coffee in most. OK, that’s not completely true – I can do more with German, but in Spanish, my speaking is pretty limited unless I’m in a Spanish-speaking country for a while. Then it picks back up.

Back to chess and current times. About a year before the pandemic hit us I had been playing chess against a friend who beat me most of the time. He started telling me about how he was learning from better players online via videos they would do – playing while annotating their games. I got pretty into this and found myself watching more than I was playing. But I think it was important that I spent this time researching the game and learning some information about opening moves (also known as openings). At this point, I’m still watching these games, but luckily I’ve gone to playing more than watching.

During the pandemic, I signed up with chess.com and have been playing there almost exclusively since. I still play over-the-board games, too, but I have about 11 games going at one time on chess.com – feel free to reach out to me if you’d like to connect with me and play. I’m there under my own name so I’m not hard to find and challenge! Some of my favorite games right now online are with my 2 nephews who are on the East Coast. This has become a way I keep in touch with them and it’s also been interesting to see them develop as players.

When the Queen’s Gambit came out I rushed to watch it and I figured that would lead to a lot more chess playing in the world. That may have happened. It’s a strange universe, the chess world. I enjoy playing the most, but watching people who are advanced in the game is certainly interesting, too.

I encourage you to learn how to play chess. It’s fairly easy to learn and it will help you stay sharp as you age. And who knows, maybe one day we can hang out and play together!

Have a great one, Albert

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Money

October 13, 2022 by

Money!

Corvallis Oak Prairie, Oregon 10.13.22 

I don’t think I’ve ever written about money, but since I tend to have thoughts about just about everything, I figured I’d give it a try. I think from my earliest times as a child I knew a thing or two about money. Partly, I knew that it was something that could help you get things you wanted to get. My parents gave me an allowance from a young age and eventually, my allowance was tied to things like mowing the lawn. It’s kind of humorous that now I spend hours during my week trying to figure out how to get rid of lawns, but that’s another story that, if you’re a regular reader, you know all about!

Eventually, I started making money of my own. My Dad, Richard Kaufman, 86 now, and living in Jenkintown, PA with my Mom (81), had a small computer business in the 70s. One of the clients he had was a group of doctors (pediatricians that I went to see as a kid, actually) and they needed help with their computer billing. So, every month my Dad would come home with computer-generated bills which we’d have to rip apart (they were on computer-fed paper which was perforated), and then we’d take them and stuff them into envelopes. We’d get $3/box and also free pizza and soda. This effort needed to be done once a month and he brought my brother and sister into the mix, too. This went on for years. It was dull work, but we did it for the money and I’m sure it helped my Dad out, too. Now that I think back on it, I realize at the time I really was only doing it for the money. But I realize that it was a huge help to my Dad who would have had to pay someone real wages to do this work if we hadn’t done it!

This work led to me selling things I would make – candles – door to door. I also tried selling seeds for Burpee door-to-door, but that didn’t last long. Eventually, I had my first job as a newspaper delivery boy in Junior High. I remember my first morning of waking up at 4:30 am to find a stack of papers on our doorstep and then I went around our suburban Lawrence neighborhood by foot to deliver the papers. I remember throwing up that first morning. I’m not sure why. Then, there was going around from door to door to collect payment for the paper. I think I did that weekly – and that led to some fun tips over the years and also a chance to see into the houses that were around me in my neighborhood. I really could have used a better calculator during those times to make sense of what I was taking in, though doing it the way I did probably helped my math skills.

After that job, I went on to work at Arthur Treacher Fish & Chips. That experience could probably be written up in a small book. My main work was to drop frozen triangles of fish and rounder frozen chicken fillets into a large vat of boiling oil – without getting my hands burned. I also lived nearby and somehow ended up being the one to close up at night. That job led to a sweet gig at Sam Goody’s where I was the guitar/amp/instrument/effects pedals salesperson. This was probably one of the best jobs I’ve ever held. I spent my time tuning decent instruments and learning what the different effects pedals did. Had I played my cards right I’ve always thought I could have been a part of a band that went somewhere – or been a musician who would tour, but of course, life had other ideas for me in mind. I watch people like Jackson Brown or Bruce Springsteen play and I am just 10 years younger than them. I know if I’d focused I probably could at least be backing them up if not leading a band of my own 🙂  But instead…

I went on to have jobs like – working on a kibbutz in the Negev Desert in Israel with milking cows (feeding them, milking them, driving a tractor, etc.)

Working in NYC at a place called Lox, Stock, and Bagels during my freshman year at NYU. I’ve actually worked at 3 different bagel places, but this one was for the longest time. Another short book there – this place was across from Madison Square Garden where I ended up seeing many a Grateful Dead show and a few hockey games!

I’ve had a job for 6 months as a rodman in a surveying crew. Another 6 months after that – this was 1986 – as a data miner (a bit before computers came into fashion – so we were on the phones) at Peterson’s Guides for Graduate Schools. Then there have been years of temping in NYC for the investment banking and perfume worlds.  Now that I think of it, I did do a short piece about some of these positions and my thoughts on work. I wonder if other writers have that happen where they find themselves repeating their writing after a while.

Anyway, I love this topic and I’ll probably come back to it again as I’m trying to figure out money now at 61, too. I have enough at the moment, but I also feel limited to moving about the gameboard as I’d like to. I also know that having more money is an attractor to the opposite sex and I am in “wanting to date” mode. So, we’ll see if I take the dive into more money-making efforts. We’ll see!

Squash Blossom

Squash Blossom, Fall in Portland, Oregon 2022

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Pickathon 2022

August 10, 2022 by

Pickathon 2022 – a Review

Earlier this Summer I wrote a short piece called Gentle Guidance about how to enjoy this summer’s offerings – as I knew they’d be different and we’d be different. Earlier this Summer I had planned to attend the last String Summit – then I got Covid and had to sell my tickets. I thought that attending Pickathon might assuage some of my remorse and sadness, but like Charlie with the football, it didn’t have quite that effect. I’ve attended Pickathon 3 times before and I thought my visit in 2017 would probably be my last – sadly, much of what I found missing/wrong that year seems to have continued to be part of the festival. But Pickathon does a lot well, too – so I’ll start there before adding the “room for improvement” section.

First of all a little bit more back story. This year there was a very welcoming and friendly Pickathon FB group this year. This was something that was missing the last time I attended, and I was grateful to find it. This group led me to the purchase of a weekend ticket for $300. I also posted that I was seeking a parking pass and a friend reached out and sold me his for $70.  That’s also where I found a Spotify playlist featuring music from all this year’s performers.

Positive: the Pickathon ticket system allows easy transfer of tickets between people – well done!

I dilly-dallied around on Friday and then saw a message that Pickathon had oversold their parking and that parking at the festival was sold out and that people should instead make their way to the Clackamas Transit Center and they’d be shuttled from there. OK, minus one point, but luckily in my case I had friends near the festival I was staying with – so headed to their house and got a personal shuttle to the festival. Once there I was able to get my wristband and parking pass in about 20 minutes of standing around in a weaving line. Great – soon after I walked into the festival and started finding my way.

In 2019 there had been a terrible accident when 2 Guildworks workers had fallen to their deaths after the festival as they were taking down the collection of white fabrics that had flown over the main stage area every year for years. I somewhat expected that that area would have had some sort of memorial, but instead, it felt very empty and simple compared to other years. I met a few friends on the way which was nice as I was traveling solo.

One of the cool things about Pickathon is that it takes place at Pendarvis Farm which is a big property with a lot of woods on a hill. So, all of the stages are on hillsides – either in the woods or in a clearing. There are pathways everywhere and you can go get lost in the woods which is where thousands of participants and volunteers make their homes for the weekend. When I first attended in 2007? or so I recall hardly anyone camping – and even then it was tough to find a place that was level. But nowadays people come early and bring shovels and brush hooks and make camp all over the place. There are also lots of hammocks.

Positive: there are some really fun art pieces that are great to look at during the day and I’m sure are even more fun at night when they’re lit up.

Video Player

 

Positive: by every music stage there is a DJ stage – when there’s no live music playing a DJ steps up and plays tunes. Most of the DJs are from local stations like KMHD and XRAY.fm – some of my favorite music in 2017 and this year came from the DJs! The DJ stations also had the best fidelity – surprise surprise 🙂

I spent Friday wandering around – seeing some folks I hadn’t seen in a while and trying to avoid breathing in too much dust along the pathways. A couple of people had put together a singles and solos meetup @ 4 pm – and I went to that and had a fun time with those who attended. It reminded me a little of my time at WDS – attending Meetups for a couple of days straight.

Highlight: I got to see Yasmin Williams perform. She’s quite a talent and she also mentioned on the stage that she attended my alma mater – NYU. In all my years of attending musical events, I’d never heard a performer mention NYU before – and my heart nearly leaped out of my mouth. My NYU years were pretty special. It sounds like they might not have been as good for her – but still, it was a fun moment.  The juice/smoothie place at this stage made me ginger carrot apple juice which was delicious!

Another Highlight should have been hearing/watching Nubya Garcia on my favorite stage – The Woods Stage. And here’s where we get right back into a central problem with Pickathon (that I talked about in my 2017 write-up). It’s the same issue I have with many music festivals. I sat for an hour with a new friend leading up to this show. The DJ behind us was from KMHD and was playing some delicious cuts. Eventually, though it was time to get the band ready to play. The sound people spent about a half hour testing out the bass and drums. I think it makes sense to take the time to get it right – but it was the volume that was the problem. Why subject an audience that is there for the music to testing out drums and bass turned up to 11? And this seems to be a common occurrence at Pickathon.

Then, there’s the volume level of the music, in general. A friend send me a video from Pickathon 2010 yesterday and it was so subtle and lovely. You would probably not ever hear that anymore at Pickathon. I sure hope someone at Pickathon reads this – or, perhaps take a freaking poll?  Pickathon goers – do you want to hear all the music at such a high volume that you and your kids should probably be wearing significant ear protection all weekend? People – save your hearing! There’s also the general cacophony aspect – if you click on the fun video image above – you’ll hear DJ music playing at the same time as a nearby stage is playing – this was happening a lot.

It’s Really Simple: Turn Down the Volume

I have a couple of other minor suggestions – but the above is my main beef and probably why I’ll not return. Pickathon does a great job of picking interesting music for all of us – but then makes it challenging for (me, at least) to enjoy. Of course, that leads to people having conversations over the music – but that’s another story.

All that said – I actually had a pretty fun time on the day I attended. The next morning I woke up and thought: do I want to do the push-me pull-ya dance of being attracted to go hear some music only for it to be too loud to handle? And I decided that my one day was going to be it. An interesting part of that is that as I consider my time at Pickathon – there really is so much good going on there. The family area is lovely – and there’s so much encouragement for people to bring their kids (wear earplugs!). And there are a lot of great volunteers and the community that come together to make this big festival happen.  That’s fun to watch.

I imagine that this year’s festival was super challenging to put on. Pendarvis Farm is in a section of Happy Valley that is filling in with McMansions at a quick rate. It used to be possible to park right next to the festival – but that property is being filled in right now and was not available. So, we’ll see if Pickathon tries it again at their current location or ends up moving elsewhere.

Finally, so much would be improved if someone just got serious about the sound levels. I’d come back in a minute and probably camp for the weekend. But I won’t be back until Pickathon makes some sort of public announcement about this issue – which I doubt they will. No one likes to admit publicly they are doing anything wrong. I get that.

I’ll probably add to this review as I think of more things – and until we meet again – enjoy the music! Albert

PS – I am open to feedback – please leave a comment below or write me. Thanks. Also, if you enjoy my writing and thinking, I publish a few newsletters which you can sign up for here.

 

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Bizmissive

July 23, 2022 by

Bizmissive – a One-Year Summary

I send out a business newsletter called The Bizmissive. Here is a collection of this past year’s newsletters. You can sign up for the newsletter here. I use Constant Contact to send these and I try to send them every month. 

August 2021 – How to put yourself more into your marketing. https://conta.cc/3jfFzyQ

September 2021 – https://conta.cc/2XihvCU – Why create email newsletters and a success story!

October 2021 – https://conta.cc/3a8dtAe – Holiday Marketing

November 2021 – https://conta.cc/3p3cfgK – Thanksgiving message – How newsletters continue to thrive as a marketing channel

December 2021 – https://conta.cc/3rHpZkf – Info about a free class I offered and why I offered it.

January 2022 – https://conta.cc/3HFyaT2 – The Value of cross-promotion and recommending friends – word of mouth!

February 2022 – skipped

March 2022 – St. Patty’s https://conta.cc/3KOqSOt – Using holiday templates – Holiday marketing – Small Business Market Trends

April 2022 – https://conta.cc/3qRKKZh – Deep Dive Webinar that I offered + Info on working from home trends

May 2022 – Skipped

June 2022 – https://conta.cc/38M2nE2 – Annual Reader’s Survey – Offer to share your newsletter with my readers (still valid!)

June 2022 – https://conta.cc/3NyhBeh – About Text 2 Join – a fantastic way to build your list!  – you can try this out by texting ALBERT to 22828

 

The Bizmissive

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WDSX

July 3, 2022 by

World Domination Summit 2022 (WDSX)

All right, I’ll do it! Here are some thoughts about WDSX – this year’s 10th and final World Domination Summit – if you like pictures, here’s an album of ones I (mostly) took. And there are more commentaries linked below. This might get a little weepy as I’m on my 8th day of steroids and I just took 2 pills a few minutes ago – we’ll see. Enough lead-up – here we go!

I first attended WDS in 2018. Then again in 2019. Both years were pretty interesting and my curiosity about this movement/conference/experiment really grew with time. During the pandemic, we all waited patiently for the next in-person gathering. It was fun to hear Chris G. explain this year how he’s learned his lesson never to print a year on swag again – he printed up a bunch of 2020 pins which … are fun keepsakes, but… the event didn’t happen then. What did happen that year, though, was a very interesting weekend virtual event in which I still relish participating in. And really, participating is what WDS is all about. Take a try. Reaching. Trying. Testing the waters. That virtual event and our monthly community check-ins really meant a lot to me during the pandemic. They were the biggest gatherings (besides a couple of co-counseling workshops) that I participated in. And Chris and his able team were able to create some real magic online by making use of some fancy technology and a really great crew of helpers. 

During the community check-ins, Chris would pose a question and people would take a minute each to weigh in on things like “what they were learning”, “what was hardest”, etc. It was heart-warming to hear people’s responses. These are people who are spread all over the world so some of the people were up in the middle of the night. People were in all sorts of situations, too – you could really get a sense of the vast differences in peoples’ situations. Some would be in a closed-off closet – others would be sitting on a balcony overlooking the sea. Sometimes there would be couples happy together. Sometimes, families – it was really all over the map in terms of representation – but one thing that really stood out was how dedicated these (usually) over a hundred people would be to arriving on time, paying close attention, and being interactive. Sometimes people would be asking for help with a venture or just looking for a shoulder to cry on. I really got a sense of community watching the strangers come together and try to connect and help one another through tough times.

Then there was the virtual WDS Weekend. That also had a ton of magic to it. It had the same unconference feeling that much of WDS does. People around the world offered workshops throughout a long weekend – one presenter offered an awesome class on how to make Zoom workshops go better for all participants – he dialed in from New Zealand! There was another great workshop that someone put on from Nairobi, I recall. All throughout the weekend, it was as if we were together – learning, teaching, connecting, crying, laughing. It was quite impressive how well it was organized and it was a shining light in a sea of darkness at the time – thanks to WDS for pulling that together!

Another way I engaged in this community was via a few FB groups dedicated to alums and people about to attend. Each year a new FB group was started for the coming event, and this year was no different. These groups are a great way to hear about each others’ efforts and join a workshop; learn about a book launch; or support someone’s efforts in some way. From the group, I learned about a neat font (Teach Font) by Moataz Ehab Ahmed that I’ve used on my new calling cards and I’m working with my brother, Dan, to get some t-shirts going. Team Everybody is one of the phrases that WDS has emphasized over the years and I lost my t-shirt and want one that says that s0… currently, it looks like this.

OK, time for 2022.

This year I was ready for WDS. After having attended 2 previously and all that off-season time – I was ready to dive right in. I went to my first event the night before WDS week actually started. It was a fun evening that Jan Keck (Ask Deep Questions and so much more) led. We met in NW Portland and asked each other deep questions while randomly picking our route through the NW hills. We saw some great views and had lots of laughs figuring out how to get where we were going. The walk ended at the ice cream shop Salt & Straw where more people joined the group and my friend Cherie and I bowed out. I noticed that even that bit of activity was more intense (being around strangers – being forced to do a bunch of challenging things at once…) pushed some buttons for me and I ended up skipping out on all of the fun activities the next day – and instead, spent the day doing something familiar – playing music on my porch with my good friend, Steve Bennett. 

But on Weds. I was ready to participate again and then spent the next 5 days heavily immersed in the event. I went to meetups on retirement and re-why-erment and 2nd acts. That’s a big theme for me at this time in life where I have some freedom to choose what I do with my days. I led a singalong on Weds. night which was a lot of fun. People joined me at the Hotel Zags – WDS HQ this year – and we sang from Mark Bosnian’s excellent collection (and easy presentation) of singable songs. Anytime you want to sing some songs with someone, pull up https://portlandsings.com/and have at it. There are so many great memories of this week – here are some random ones in no particular order to give you the flavor of how this conference/event works. 

  1. Fantastic academy by Yes, Yes, Marsha inside the Winningstad Theater. First time inside a venue like that with so many people and I’ll probably have more to say about this event. She also involved Gary Ware and Jeff Harry in helping get the audience to participate in fun ways.
  2. Holding up Happiness Sprinkling signs on Saturday morning while everyone waited to go into the mainstage sessions. I hadn’t slept well the night before – and this brought me up and out of my funk in a big way and brought lots of joy!
  3. Hosting a Saturday Happiness Sprinkling where I had 20 RSVPs and only one person came and joined me! This made me doubt everything and kind of threw me – but I had fun wandering the Farmer’s Market with the signs, anyway, and then ended up canceling the same event for Sunday as I realized people were at that point being drawn all over the place – during Sat. and Sun. afternoons there were so many meetups – it was incredible.
  4. Saturday night we hosted a Campfire Conversations event (pic below) led by Amy and Jan. That was a delicious highlight. So many nice people came and participated – and it was the first time we’d had a fire in a very long time. Louie the cat also had a blast that night being petted by many.
  5. I got to see my long-time friend’s most recent version of her show Plan V which she’ll take to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival soon! Ding! That was a very special event – and so fun to see so many of my fellow WDSers open their minds/hearts to Eleanor’s work. I’ve been following Eleanor’s creativity for many years and she always brings really good things to life. 
  6. Trying to figure out how to stay safe during the week’s events was a little challenging. Eventually, I settled on masking indoors (mostly) especially when sitting in a theater with thousands of people. I did hear a couple of people caught Covid during the event, but it did not seem like a lot – it was somewhat early in the Omicron wave that is currently (7.16.22) engulfing our area. This was not a perfect solution, but luckily I did not get sick and have continued to stay clear of the virus. Time for that 2nd booster, I know!
  7. The SWAG – well done once again. I picked up a lovely mug and a nice t-shirt. I love the imagery that WDS has put forward over the years and I will treasure some of the things they gave us which have a special place in my head/heart. 

The mainstage presentations are a bit of a blur to me now – but I did enjoy being inspired and all of the lighting and interesting use of video mapping was a lot of fun. I look forward to re-watching some of the mainstage presentations – they are very much like TEDx talks and are often full of great messages and inspiration.

Somehow I managed to write this far without really saying anything super meaningful about it so here go some ideas. WDS really pushes you to try things as I mentioned, it gives you the opportunity to try things and FAIL and to try things and succeed and to ask for support. And really just offers a chance to get vulnerageous – which is a word I think I heard Jan Keck say for the first time – a combination of vulnerable and courageous. Where you are putting yourself out there constantly to see what you can do; what your limits are; where the edges are – you fall sometimes. You do fall – you get teary.  YOu get happy. You get sad during the event. There aren’t many places where there is enough safety built into the experience where you can actually try and fail. So, I really appreciate WDS for that.

And it also brings together people who are actively working on projects. And who are lifetime achievers  – People who have succeeded sometimes and failed sometimes. You learn a lot from those peoples’ stories and that gives you an opportunity right there during the week to take some chances and see what works and what doesn’t work. And that can be hard. It can bring up some emotions. It can be vulnerageous.

Here are a couple of things that did not go well for me and which I tried to adjust, but had no luck with. 

  1. The opening party on Friday night was in Pioneer Square Park. I would have loved to participate but the sound volume was so high I just couldn’t be anywhere near the event. So, I left early. I attempted to talk to the sound person, but they wouldn’t listen. Also, this party happened on the same day that Roe v. Wade was overturned – and playing sort of crappy 70s one-hit wonder music too loud in the middle of the City felt very tone-deaf to me, and I’m sure others. I ended up joining people marching in the streets for a while before heading home early. 
  2. Sort of the same issue @ Sunday night’s closing party – but the music was a little better as the night wore on and it was also not as loud. Perhaps someone heard me. I kind of wish I had pushed myself and attended both parties for more time, but these big parties have generally not done much for me. I much prefer quieter one-on-one time vs. loud unconscious stuff. That said, I’m very sorry I missed seeing DJ Prashant’s closing dance on Sunday night. 
  3. The whole “setting a world record by dressing up in dinosaur costumes” went right past me. Looks like people had a blast, though. 

Well, that feels like a good first approach to this event. I’m sure I’m not alone in wondering how things might move forward. Chris G. did hint that he loves putting on events in one of his closing remarks. So, we’ll see. There are now thousands of people who have had hundreds of thousands of interactions and have been drawn into lots of new relationships over the years. I have a feeling some of them are going to instigate some cool stuff. 

Will WDS itself happen again? Will there be a WDS Y?  To be determined. I would go. In fact, I’ve been encouraging people to set that time aside next year. Perhaps we Portlanders will pull something off together. This town is a good one to host such an event, I believe, and I’d be happy to participate. I hardly know what it takes to put something like this on – but the unconference part where people are meeting in various coffee shops and hotel lobbies is something that might be doable. Since I think the mainstage speakers part of the event is less memorable and possibly not as necessary- perhaps we just move to an unconference format. Or, maybe we all fly to Melbourne and go visit Bill Simpson! To be determined! On this note Vanessa shared: 

🎉Many people in our community are asking “What’s Next?” – as an event creator, conference connoisseur, & person who really loves to gather, I’ve been blessed to have been “nominated” by our community to try to answer this & really it starts with each & every single one of YOU! We must create it, share it, build it, invite ourselves to it, & attend it. If you want to know more – whatever that is – go ahead & drop your simple contact details here & I will keep you posted! https://tinyurl.com/TheNextThing2023

So, we’ll see! I’m always open to feedback, questions and comments – feel free to add below 0r reach out to me.  As I mentioned I’ve shared some other thoughts I’ve found posted below and perhaps these will help round out my recollection above.

Service, Community, Adventure – See you out there! Albert

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Jeff Harry is feeling grateful @ WDS X
As this WDS experience come to an end, it makes me think of the concept of beautiful sadness.
There is an inherent beauty in sadness, especially when an experience comes to an end. It makes me wonder if it has to end to allow us to cherish our WDS memories even more and put that inspiration into action.
If the WDS experiment was about how to live a remarkable life in a conventional world, it would have been the conventional choice for World Domination Summit to go on forever. There is nothing remarkable about that choice.
By ending, WDS has now cleared a path for WDSers to create the next iteration in building a community connected by service and adventure.
I think it can be both nerve-racking and exciting (Nerv-cited) to not know what is next, as it challenges each of us to come up with that answer.
Now, we may attempt to recreate what we’ve experienced this past decade, and we will probably be disappointed because “it just isn’t the same.” But maybe that isn’t the point. WDS is asking what is the next remarkable step each of us is willing to take in our lives and how do we want to do it with the community we cultivated here? It’s not an easy question to answer, but it sure is an exciting and remarkable one.
So, at the same time that I am really sad that it is ending, I’m also excited to see what adventures we come up with next. Thanks, everyone for creating such a magical experience at WDS! I’ll never forget it.
WDS 2022
And, away we go!

Paul Kim

6/27/22
I first learned about Chris after reading his book Art of Nonconformity. After that, he seemed to keep popping up everywhere, and I heard him on a few different podcasts where he kept mentioning this thing called the World Domination Summit. I looked at the website, but couldn’t quite get a clear idea of what it was. I searched all over the web and found a few blog posts here, and a couple of videos on social media there, but still nothing. Yet I felt something strangely drawing me to it, so I decided to book a solo ticket to Portland. Fast forward 6 WDSs later, I’m lucky to have brought my daughter with me this year to share this special place and all of you with her. She now finally understands what this thing is that I’ve been gushing about for all these years. This week made a wonderful impact on her and I can’t think of a better way to spend time with her before she heads off to college this fall.
I still think it was the universe sending me to this special place on that initial solo trip where I made so many close friends, met such incredible people, vastly expanded my knowledge and consciousness, and had truly amazing experiences.
Thank you so much, Chris. The positive impact you’ve had on me and on everyone in this community is immeasurable. It isn’t a stretch to say you saved my life in a lot of ways (and your long hair these days does more resemble a certain prominent religious figure after all lol).
Thank you WDS core team and every single ambassador ever for your years of planning, execution, support, and service. And to the larger WDS family, I never knew I needed years ago, I will miss seeing you in person dearly. Take care, travel safe, may your experiences be impactful and plentiful, and I hope to see you again down the road.
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Reflection and Transference prompts (for WDS and beyond) from Iggy Perillo (Iggy@wslleadership.com)

What were memorable moments for you? Who resonated with you? What spaces, systems, or structures made things easier or more challenging for you? What meaningful lessons or ideas stuck with you? Where are you headed from here? And what is your next step on that path? (Extra credit, when, how, and where will you do that next step?) How do you need to be to follow your path or get where you want to go? (This question was stolen from Monica Von’s awesome goal-setting workshop at WDS!)

Campfire Conversations with Jan

Campfire Conversations with Jan and Amy

7.23.22- Group Discussion Questions from a hand-out at 2nd Act meetup
  1. Can you paint a picture or articulate a vision of where you want to be in 5 years? 10 years?
  2. What excites you about this vision
  3. What concerns are lurking below, or perhaps even right on top, of the surface?
  4. What is one action you could do in the next month to work towards your vision?
  5. What would future you tell you about how to approach your Second Act?

Q during a mainstage talk where we were all handed sheets of seed paper. Q was: What are things you want to let go of from the pandemic? A: loneliness, being single, lack of touch, lack of connection, lack of purpose, lack of love.

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