Terrifying, Exhilarating and Amazing

That’s how I described my first IGNITE talk experience on LinkedIn. I left out “tons of thought, work and practice” as IGNITE founder Brady Forrest made himself available tirelessly to help birth our individual talks (me while visiting my mom in 110-degree Tucson — thanks for giving me feedback as I practiced with you mom! <3).

p.s. how awesome is Club Fugazi

Ich bin ein Berliner

All free men, wherever they may live, are citizens of Berlin.

I never met President Kennedy but it’s comforting to know we share this sentiment (though I might swap ‘men’ for ‘people’ but that’s the 2015 in me).

While Berlin and Germany have long been on my travel bucket list (a layover in Frankfurt doesn’t count), when the real opportunity to visit emerged through my work, I couldn’t believe it: could we really do this now? For reasons I couldn’t fully articulate, Berlin has long held a captivating if ephemeral appeal to me. So much history, so much culture and so much transformation in so little time. But these were all abstract concepts to me before last month. Continue reading →