Two and a half years ago we committed to helping our community feel a community (we didn’t set out to grow one, but that’s exactly what’s happened and we’ve all been better for it). ⁣⁣

⁣⁣This has all happened without asking any guest, many of whom we’ve never met, to do or give anything except for their full selves (open heart, open mind) when they walk through those doors…⁣⁣

Tonight is our 13th Greater Good Party (our 10th in Los Angeles) and on THE LAST FULL MOON OF THIS DECADE closing out the past ten years. ⁣⁣ 🤩🏻‍♀️⁣⁣

Two artists will be playing Earth Wind and Fire (shout out to my mama), we’ll share in spoken word/poetry, as always, and two storytellers, also as always, and this time on the topic of committing to our core gifts/talents.⁣⁣

⁣⁣One question I’ll likely pose tonight ~ what if our “core gift” (may even call it a talent) is connected to that *feeling* you leave people with after they’ve had an experience with you? Experience being the operative word.⁣⁣

⁣⁣( Own the energy you bring to the room).⁣⁣

⁣⁣Here’s to closing out the year in community (and in silent disco love ⬇️) and to recognizing that the primary or genuine talents, gifts, abilities or passions we have, we’ve always had and it’s always high time to decide to use them…to use our optimistic and life-giving energy more fully…⁣⁣

Can’t wait to feel what the GGP has in store for us all in 2020!⁣⁣

⁣⁣#hightime⁣⁣
#brandoffeeling⁣⁣
#greatergoodparty⁣⁣
#ggp⁣⁣
#creativeheroine⁣⁣
#brandofwoman

Make happiness your business by creating your authentic brand…enjoy your business, enjoy your life!

Life is good,

Michelle Ghilotti
Success Designer, Brand Activator & Social Entrepreneur 

About eight or so years ago, I told Josh that I didn’t want us to buy each other gifts anymore. It didn’t seem that either of us were into receiving purchased gifts all that much.

Instead, I said, what if we spend time writing each other something (since we both like to write). 

Years later, as Nolan got older, while still also purchasing gifts for him for special moments, we brought him into the mix and made mama, papa and Nolan books which were/are simply journals that hold the notes or poems or stories that we write to the others throughout the year for special days.

Cut to last night, as I’m in my room, after having seen him in another high school soccer game (and having had heartfelt connection time in the car talking about a music artist he liked who passed away due to drugs (they think)), I yelled so he could hear me in his room: 

Nolan (pause, I didn’t really know what I was going to say next, but I knew I wanted to connect with him in that moment. I was feeling it)…I’m really proud of you. I LIKE YOU. And I love youuuu!

It was loud and seemed appropriate for what I was feeling. 

I didn’t know exactly what would come back through our walls and our two open doors and then — there it was:

(His own pause)…I reallyyyy like you too, Mama and I love youuuu!

And this is it, I guess. The best gifts include this, all of this ~ really liking one another (love is awesome and liking one another is a another ball game), genuinely connecting about the real stuff, finding the words to express that like or love, whether that be written or said, breaking down walls and keeping our doors open…….

Make happiness your business by creating your authentic brand…enjoy your business, enjoy your life!

Life is good,

Michelle Ghilotti
Success Designer, Brand Activator & Social Entrepreneur 

His first high school game is officially in the books and he did himself proud! 

What I want most…

What I want most for him is a comfort felt in his own skin. Over and again.

That he feels and expresses himself on the field or, say, with new friends or anywhere, really, as he feels or expresses himself or his ideas at home (in that complete and down to cells, ‘I’m wearing flannel pajamas’ type comfort). 

I want so much for him to feel himself as ONE beautifully complex person in the world and not seven, constantly changing to fit his environment, living others’ definition of life vs. his own. 

Because what is naturally FOR us (purpose, a deeper calling) can only connect to us when we are natural or natural-ly ourselves and I sooo want for him, for all kids/teens who grow to be adults, to feel on purpose.

We live in a world – a beautiful one – but where we feel fragmented, not solely as a result of technology or social media (or because long are the days of entire communities huddling around fires to simply talk), but because THIS is one of the biggest tests of our lives that’s part of our grand purpose ~> to find the way back to ourselves. 

To accept ourselves, our quirks, our powers, our blessings (some wrapped in sand paper, others wrapped in pure gold) because because because (to the sound of The Wizard of Oz) others only genuinely “accept us”, whatever that means, when WE do the job really well first (and then and only then do we realize it wasn’t *their* acceptance we were going or growing for, cheekyyyy).

#creativeheroine

#brandofwoman

Make happiness your business by creating your authentic brand…enjoy your business, enjoy your life!

Life is good,

Michelle Ghilotti
Success Designer, Brand Activator & Social Entrepreneur 

You are not alone. 

These words have come out of my mouth many, many times while at the prisons I’ve visited. 

They’re important words for all of us. 

They heal. They make a difference — a difference so big that it gives others the belief that they can do something different than they’ve done before! 

The Compassion Prison Project and Hustle 2.0, projects I have had the honor of being a part of in 2019 (and will continue to in 2020) do outstanding work to help give men on the inside a second chance at life on the outside (translation: they give them a chance at rehabilitation and the greatest chance at not going back, in fact programs like this reduce recidivism upwards of 80%, especially when consistent). 

This purposeful short film produced by some of the women I shared my first Hustle 2.0 experience with gives a look at some of the work that Hustle 2.0, specifically, is doing and what my time at Tehachapi Prison here in CA with the program was like. 

The men are not only learning how to start legal businesses, but they are also learning about compassion, forgiveness, connection, communication and emotional intelligence…

It was life-changing/perspective-altering for me and the men inside, the Mavericks (what Hustle 2.0 calls the men going through their program) also shared with us how this program has changed them, how they want more from their lives and from their time on the outside when released (and, for those in for life, how they want more [peace, purpose] from their time on the inside, too). 

The film: https://youtu.be/4reApYrkfSk 

To donate and help send more Mavericks in CA through the Hustle 2.0 program* ($5, $10, all of it matters): https://thesistersociety.com/cause/#donate

[Incarceration costs $75,000 per inmate, per year and it costs $1200 per Maverick per year to go through the program].

Change inside our system *and* inside human beings, not only can happen, it IS happening. 

Make happiness your business by creating your authentic brand…enjoy your business, enjoy your life!

Life is good,

Michelle Ghilotti
Success Designer, Brand Activator & Social Entrepreneur