Okay, I’ll be honest. I had never been a big fan of Chevrolet. I don’t really know why. There was never a big reason for it. I just never thought to go over there and test drive one. In my head, I kind of had a thing against American car-makers (please don’t hate me) because I never felt they were doing enough to build a car that was fuel efficient and environmentally friendly. (Is there such a thing?) Now, please understand, I am completely ignorant when it comes to vehicles. I am certainly not up-to-speed on what any car company in the world is doing in the back room. This is completely how I felt before the experience I had with Chevy.

So, my great friend, Kelly Olexa and I, were given a 2010 Chevy Camero to drive and review over the Indy 500 weekend. They also invited us to do some really fun stuff like ride in the pace car, meet Robin Roberts, and took us on a tour of the track. (We also had some pretty sweet passes and seats.) Boy, did we have a blast! So, here’s our low down on this beautiful, fun, and fast car. The good and the bad:

Now, all that said, I loved the car. Aesthetically, it’s a beautiful car. I would definitely consider owning one. I loved driving it and really, I can handle the higher windows. The blind spots were the only thing that we weren’t too excited about. Other than that, it’s fantastic. We literally had people walking up to our windows and making comments about how hot the car was.

But let’s talk Chevrolet for a minute. I was so impressed with their representatives. They went above and beyond for us, and in the conversations we had with them, I truly believe they treat their customers in the exact same way. They have events all the time to give back to the people that have bought cars from them. I had no idea how service-oriented they were and that made me feel really good. It completely changed my perspective on the company.

My suggestion – Go out, hit up a Chevrolet near you, and put your butt in a seat. I’m pretty sure you’ll have a blast. We did! And right now, they’ve got some amazing deals with 0% financing. (Chevy did not ask me to say any of the things in this blog nor promote for them. This is my genuine attitude and experience.)

Happy driving! Let me know what you think!

Okay. I have like three blogs I’m working on. They all tie in together. So, this is the first. I feel totally compelled to just take a moment and lift up two people in my life who affect me in some way everyday, whether it’s through a tweet, a blog, a phone call, or a coaching session. It’s just the way it happens. One I am only in contact with online. The other is my beloved business coach and dear friend. (No, they are not clients.)

I have gone through tremendous changes this past year, but the bulk of my growth personally and professionally was because I got committed to a coaching situation. Ever since I began coaching with Deseri Garcia, Founder and Pres of Vida Aventura, things began to change for me.

At the end of March, Amber Naslund wrote of post on the Power of Definitive Affirmations.

Man, it hit home. Then I got excited because she was nailing it and writing about it. She is by far one of my favorite writers. She takes chances. She calls it like it is. She uses her voice, and I get her. I learn from her. There are only five blogs I receive in email. Hers is one of them.

Back to Deseri: I have recently learned in a very real way that I manifest my future. Not you, not my clients, not the music my band creates, not my work, not the jack that cut me off in traffic. ME.

Deseri taught me how to get very real about being intentional, writing down clear goals, and taught me the POWER of definitive affirmations and meditation. Which, BTW I have my affirmations saved to my desktop and read them aloud at least once a day. And also on my desktop is Gaping Void’s “Moronic” cartoon because it reminds me that my dreams are so outrageous and crazy, but it really doesn’t matter. I keep pushing toward them. (Oh the little things that make me smile.)

I can’t believe…or wait…I CAN believe how when you begin to CHANGE the way you think, how you believe, and what you focus on, life begins to happen. Doors open. This is life-changing stuff! This is why I got so excited by Amber’s words:

We are cynical creatures, many of us. We look at things in terms of what we don’t want to have happen, where we don’t want to go, who we don’t want to associate with, and so on. Avoidance of the negative in hopes that the positive will emerge.

Much more rarely do we get really, painfully, brazenly specific about what it is we DO want.

And I mean specific.

Not “better work-life balance.” Screw that. That tells me nothing about what I need to do in order to achieve it.

I just want to jump up and down.

That being said, my amazing coach was just featured in the IBJ (Indianapolis Business Journal). I’m sharing this with you because she is one of the most powerful women I know. She embodies integrity. She is the epitome of “calm in the storm.”  Here is Tawn Parent’s story on her:

Forget the couch and the remote control—Deseri Garcia gets her dose of athletics live and in person.

The Indianapolis consultant spends her weekends “adventure racing,” which can mean running, biking, rappelling and kayaking, among other sports. Some events last 38 hours.

What’s the appeal of something so grueling?

“It’s discovering that you can push beyond what you’ve done before,” said Garcia, 44. “It gives me courage to push boundaries in other areas—business or relationships.”

Believing that this strategy might pay off for others as well, Garcia five years ago launched Vida Aventura (“adventurous life,” in Spanish). The local firm uses obstacle courses, scavenger hunts, trust games and other nontraditional activities to build teams and develop leaders.

Her clients range from small businesses to Clarian Health and Cummins Inc. She uses hundreds of activities, depending on the size of the group and their goals. She is certified by the Association for Challenge Course Technology.

Christopher Overstreet met Garcia two years ago when she was president of Rainmakers, a local networking organization. He hired her to lead team-building exercises for his Indianapolis marketingfirm, Xiik. His staff had been having trouble communicating, so he brought in his employees from other cities for a half-day workshop with Garcia, and immediately noticed results.

“It was amazing,” Overstreet said. “People were able to talk to each other better, collaborate more. It was a phenomenal change that I noticed.”

He has since hired her for another workshop with employees on goal setting, and for some one-on-one coaching for himself. He said he has been impressed with Garcia’s ability to lead people out of their comfort zones. One employee was so moved by her own success in letting go during a challenging exercise and trusting her co-workers that she broke down crying. It was a turning point for her.

Garcia said she strives for such “Aha!” moments. Through team-building exercises, people sometimes become newly aware of their own qualities, she said. For example, an employee who rushes through instructions and fails at a group exercise may realize he needs to slow down at work.

“It’s about creating analogies for learning,” Garcia said.

This isn’t all feel-good, fuzzy stuff, she added. It affects the bottom line. Contented employees usually work harder, improve profitability and hang around longer, saving companies the expenses of turnover.

Garcia said the 20 years she spent working in business development at local companies Langham and Roadway Express gave her experience in workplace dynamics that she now puts to work through Vida Aventura.

“I went through a leadership development workshop about five years ago and fell in love with coaching and doing facilitation work,” Garcia recalled. “I discovered it was my passion.”

She runs the company out of her Broad Ripple home. She is the only employee, although she frequently contracts with other facilitators when she works with large groups. She hopes her company will eventually grow large enough to take on more employees. She said she misses the camaraderie of working in a larger setting, although she doesn’t miss the drama.

Last year, Vida Aventura brought in less than $150,000. That was a challenge, Garcia said. But as the economy improves, she hopes to reach $250,000 to $500,000 in revenue in the next couple of years.

This year has started off strong, she said. Many companies that have shed staff are looking to reignite those who remain, she said.

She hopes to branch into culinary team-building as well as increase “destination-based” work—taking client groups to interesting places, both here and abroad. For example, she led a “Survivor”-type activity with Cummins employees from all over the world in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Garcia said she doesn’t think being a woman and a minority has hurt her business success. She follows the example of former boss Cathy Langham, CEO of Langham, a transportation and logistics company. “Cathy Langham made [being a woman] a non-issue,” Garcia said. For her part, Langham praised Garcia’s listening skills, her tenacity and her ease with people.

“Deseri is a warm, dynamic person,” said Langham, who has known Garcia for 15 years. “It’s easy for her to meet people and they like her. They continue to like her as the relationship grows. That’s a stand-out strength in my mind. She’s got a great energy and great personality. She’s in the right career.”

Garcia’s love of teamwork sprang from her experience with fellow athletes in adventure racing, which she stumbled into 10 years ago after a lifetime of various athletic pursuits. She started with roller speed skating as she grew up in Fort Wayne, the child of a Cuban father and an Irish-German mother. At Ball State University, she took up lacrosse and running, and began tackling marathons. She’s a 15-year veteran of the OneAmerica 500 Festival Mini-Marathon.

Garcia said she exercises four to six times a week, mostly to improve her health and vitality, but also to keep balance in her life. But she doesn’t expect her clients to share her penchant for extreme sports.

“You don’t have to be an Olympic athlete to work with me,” she said with a laugh.

Both Deseri and Amber deserve every ounce of success they manifest. So, I guess this is a “thank you” to these gals.  Read Amber’s blog. Work with Deseri. They’re out there making a difference. Intentionally.

I like you. Do you like me? …

For some people growing up, making friends could have been challenging. Honestly, it kinda was for me. I went to a small, Christian school that pretty much sucked because of hypocritical parents and politics. I tried to fit in as best I could, but my parents wouldn’t always buy me the newest charms for those charm necklaces that all the kids were wearing. (Do any of you remember those cheap plastic things?) They also wouldn’t spend a bunch of money on “hip” clothes, which my friends had. I guess I could say I never really fit in…in a superficial social way. (Plus I was a kid that questioned things…which was a no no for kids to do, so most adults would say I had an “attitude” problem.)

Then we grow up. We get to make our own decisions on how we want to be, drop all the lame friends who didn’t accept us for who we WERE, and move on to bigger and better if we so choose.

When I think about then and now, I have no choice but to tie social media into who I am TODAY…both personally and professionally.  I know I’ve written in previous posts how important the people who are in my social circles are to me. We’ve all been able to encourage AND empower one another through our posts, tweets, and friendships on and off line. INFLUENCE. PERIOD.

Now think about this on a bigger scale. Think about all the awareness of non-profits that social media has contributed to.  Think of all the money that has been raised on a local, national and international level due to the efforts of those who want to help make a difference in the world.  Could this influence have taken place without social media? Perhaps to a degree…but I honestly don’t believe it would have been the same.

Back in December, one of my favorite marketing companies, Firebelly Marketing, was working with one of their clients, United Way of Central Indiana. They decided to do a little social media experiment. They took some of us local social media folks to help them out with a little video to spread the word about Live United Give United. Ch-Ch-Check it!

The response was great! It raised awareness for the cause and also increased the number of $15-$100 donations between October and December immensely. (Note, it was difficult to pinpoint the ACTUAL amount, but they did feel their efforts pay off.) Not only did it increase donations, UWCI also saw a big increase in Twitter followers and Facebook fans. That’s not to say it was ALL social media…but overall, there was a huge impact on this amazing organization.

On a personal note, I’m not a news watcher. I rarely turn my television on, so all of my news comes from the web….more specifically, Twitter. That’s how I heard about the devastating earthquakes in Haiti and Chile. I saw so many efforts from thousands of people who helped raise awareness and funds for these countries.

Social media as a whole has proven it has the power to be a game-changer…perhaps THE most influential game-changer of our time. It has taken all of YOU to be a part of that change…to be a part of each other’s lives…to be a part of mine.  Yeah…that makes me feel good.  How does it make you feel?

Not that I want to open up with a cheesy line from a film or anything, but as I’d been thinking about what I wanted to write about today, what keeps coming up over and over and over again, is: “If you build it, they will come.” The popular line taken from 1989 hit film, Field of Dreams…starring Kevin Costner, is something that often comes to mind when I am wondering about an idea, thinking about what to say, putting something out there…whatever.

I’m a big dreamer/thinker. I believe people can do anything they want to if they put true intention behind it. I’ve been that way my entire life. I’ve heard people say I’m crazy, or unrealistic, and I’ve always thought to myself, “They have no idea who they’re dealing with,” or “It must be so sad to be so closed-minded and un-ambitious.” The list could go on, but I’m sure you get the point. This could tie into one of my favorite quotes by Oscar Wilde: “Those who live within their means suffer from lack of imagination.”

I look at social media the same way. I believe HUGE things can happen when small or large businesses begin to build with social media. The key word here: BUILD.

Here we are, in a time where anything that anyone wants to say, any message that one wants to put out there, any video, song, book…you name it, there is a platform available in the social sphere to do it.

I will never understand why some still question the power of social media. Some still question what type of “ROI” they will get. I really don’t know if a number can be placed on building relationships or building a tribe.  It’s like getting the cart before the horse.  I mean, yes, there is legitimacy in when a CMO or COO needs to see the bottom line raise as marketing dollars are being spent. But these things don’t happen overnight. It takes time, commitment, and belief.

My career started as a marketing director for a small business here in Indianapolis. Someone introduced me to a social media platform where I could blog. I’m not one of those people who was on the “cutting edge” of blogging for years and years.

It was when I began blogging about the company I worked for, and really started to fall in love with social media…meeting people, getting meetings because what I was writing about placed some value on the company, that it showed me that through writing and building relationship, there was a community of supporters.  I am now able to do what I LOVE for a living, and there is nothing better than that.

I was (still am) a marketer who is looking for new ways to get my company’s message out, and now, the companies who hire me.

I have a business that is based in social media. I have experienced firsthand, the growth that can occur in a business sense, by being involved in an online community, be it Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIN, and the many others that are available.  But I also understand that no amount can be placed on the relationships that I’ve been able to build which have taken me to the different levels of growth. How are you building today?

I have taken some time off over this past holiday. I typically tweet and FB on a daily basis. I also spend a lot of time thinking about my clients, how I can rock it out for them, and make lists of things that need to be done or blog topics that need to be covered in my (or their) voice. But for a total of eight days, I hardly did anything. I sat back. I reflected. I spent time with my daughter, friends, and family…and watched A LOT of movies. I guess you could say I “renewed.”

So often, we (I) get caught up in “go, go, go.” It’s easy for me to drown in work and the everyday drama that occurs. I see myself sometimes making excuses and justifying. I want to stop that this year. I want to stop, not by making some “resolution” to do so, but by taking action and BEING who I really am, and then being okay with how it is I feel…good, bad, or ugly. People are not always going to agree with you. Many of you know this. I’m in my early 30’s and it still hurts my feelings when people don’t like me. Isn’t that silly? But when I really think about it, being in this thing called “social media” has seriously got me thinking about how social space has changed things for me so much in the past 4 years.

I was absolutely moved by an article I read yesterday on how to utilize social media for voicing worries and sharing concerns. One of my favorite things from the article is this:

As risky as it maybe to expose oneself to the unknowns out there, one should never forget the possibility of easily being hurt and betrayed by those who are “close” as well. With that in mind, I guess social media provides many different ways in which one could vent and feel at unity with others out there seeking peace of mind and healing of the heart and soul!

Mental health is one of the most important things we can have. I was just having a conversation about this with a friend the other day. I don’t care how many of us “think” we have it together. It takes a village, in my opinion, to keep us together. I am one of the most positive people that my friends know (at least that’s what “they” say), but it’s not like I have amazing days all the time. We all have feelings of loneliness, or sadness, or something that we may not even be able to put our finger on. Perhaps that’s why I’m always preaching about community. Maybe it’s because at my lowest times, all I have to do is reach out to my online social space, and there is always someone there to make me laugh, talk to me, and be my friend.

I have made some of my best friends online. Some of these friends were not a part of my life a year ago. I love it! But it took going through crazy times in order to see the blessings. I’m grateful for the challenges I’ve faced over the past 12 months. I am also grateful for a New Year to improve on what I’ve begun…my business, my continual role as a mother, and my continual role as a friend. I guess my challenge to you this next year, is to reach out to people and be as real as you possibly can. It’s not worth keeping your feelings to yourself. If you’re happy, I want to be happy with you. If you’re sad, I want to be able to lift you up. If you’re celebrating, I want to be able to celebrate with you. And if there is ever the opportunity you can make to get together with your online community, take it and love it. And if there is ever a time to start living authentically, it is now. 

Here’s to new friendships in 2010. And here’s to making business personal.

Cheers.

(In these photos: Chris Brogan, Suzanne Zaleski, Kelly Olexa)