Embracing Aging and Cultural Innovation

I finally replaced my old picture on the right panel here, which first appeared more than four years ago when I started sharing my ideas and happenings related to creativity and innovation as this blog.  Our online presence has forced all of us to see (or pretend not to see) how quickly we are all changing. When is the last time you updated all your online pictures and profiles? 

It's true, I have aged.  Innovation is in many ways about embracing aging--change, risk and unknown possibilities--and letting go of that which no longer serves us. Not easy to do but I am trying.

I'm shocked to see it's already April, but I'm thrilled that the birds are chirping again and much is going on in my life and work in service of cultural innovation--both good changes for our culture at large and among our individual organizational and team cultures.  Here are a few creative happenings coming up and recently passed I'd like to share:

If you're in Chicago you can find me Thursday emcee'ing Cafe Finjan, an unusual evening of interfaith collaboration that includes performances by Muslim and Jewish artists.  The following Thursday I encourage you to join me at the April 11th Envisioneers event, which is a follow up from last November's Envisioning a World Transformed at the Nature Museum, featuring Chicago speakers on the forefront of social, ecological, educational and spiritual culture change. It will be a chance for cultural innovators to gather--greens mixing with spiritual folks, artists with activists, conscious capitalists with healers. 

Adam warms up the crowd as part a 4-school Interfaith
Community Evening hosted by Poetry Pals in March.

Poetry Pals, where I am part-time executive director, celebrated a special Interfaith Community Evening for its Chicago North hubs in March and will be hosting one more in the Western Suburbs next week on April 10th.  Check out the Poetry Pals website or Facebook page to learn more.

Finally, check out the collage below for a glimpse at some of my recent gigs.  Wishing you a very happy spring and may you use this renewal time to embrace your own forms of personal and cultural innovation.

Recent engagements include a creativity session for interior design firm Soucie Horner,
a communication and collaboration day for a team at Walgreens headquarters,
a Greenheart dinner with Chicago changemakers
and team facilitation for new MBA students at the University of Chicago.