A very rich day

We had an out-of-character experience tonight—we attended a $175-a-plate fundraiser for the local branch of Girls Inc., (used to be Girls Club) that empowers girls to achieve and have high self-esteem. We went because Rick’s sister is a big supporter, and she and her husband had paid for a table and were looking for folks to sit at it, so we were invited. I’m betting that we had the least money of anyone there except, perhaps, the wait staff!

We were surrounded by millionaires, and it was amazing to see them spending thousands of dollars during the live auction just like it was nothing! I found myself thinking how cool it would be to be able to spend $5000 like that just as if it were $50. Of course, I’m not willing to do for the money what many of them have had to do for it—mine will have to come through me expressing myself passionately through books and workshops and stuff I love!

The whole evening was a lot more fun than I had expected it to be. It was a blue jeans affair and they served fried chicken in buckets, so it was very casual (thank goodness, or Rick and I would have had to decline!). Jeff Foxworthy, the comedian who is most famous for his “You might be a redneck if…” monologue, was the entertainer and he is side-splittingly funny. He did a 90-minute show and toward the end, I was praying he was almost finished because I was both exhilarated and exhausted from the non-stop belly laughing!

The most exciting thing of the day, however, was that I met a new friend for lunch. Someone I got acquainted with from a MoveOn.org event that Rick and I hosted emailed me last weekend and told me she had come across a Denver author that seemed to have much the same message as I do. I thought “Yeah, right.” But when I went and checked out his website, I found that our messages are quite parallel with the main difference seeming to be that he belongs to a Greek Orthodox church and, thus, very religion-oriented. I emailed him to suggest that we meet for lunch and got an enthusiastic reply so exchanged a few more emails and met today.

I feel like I have found my long, lost brother! He is so open-hearted and open-minded and our messages are truly so similar even though his is so strongly influenced by his church. We exchanged books and I’m eager to spend some time with his. He’s already read the introduction and Ch. 4 of mine before we had lunch and really resonated with it. I read a chapter from the next book he’s working on, and though I loved what he was saying, the language was a bit of a barrier. I will confess to having a major challenge with some of the more traditional religious terminology. And he seems to talk a LOT about “the devil.” I told him the next time we met for lunch, that would be our topic. I’m hoping he will have read my take on that by then and understand my perspective on the reptilian brain and the ego and energy in reverse polarity and…no devil! He’s certainly free to continue thinking however he does, but when I read his book and when we have conversations, I will have to translate “the devil” into my own terms to be able to deal with it!

Devil or no, I’m just thrilled to have connected with Tom Cladis.