I’ve been teaching myself how to promote a conference. As with all things in my life, I’m not entirely sure what venues to use or if I’m using those opportunities correctly, but nevertheless, I just make educated guesses on what may work and what may not.
It seemed pretty obvious to me that it would be effective to hang up fliers around town. When I picked them up at Staples on Saturday, my middle daughter asked what the IDEA Conference is really about. She was confused, as I think a lot of people are.
Are we going to come up with ideas? Are we going to put all of our ideas together? Are we going to make something out of our ideas? And regardless of any poster or ad I put up, this is where I have not been an effective definer because the 2015 IDEA Conference isn’t really about ideas at all.
So, I spoke in a language my 11-year old daughter can understand. “The IDEA Conference is about doing things from the foundation of who we are rather than who we are told to be,” I told her. Don’t worry. She was pretty confused, too.
That little blonde girl is a learner. From the time she was two dreaming about princesses, she wanted to know how things worked and why they work and how she could make them work. During the summer months, she’s the one kid in this school district who cannot wait to get back in the swing of going to math and science class. Not only is she a sponge for information, but she also holds the curiosity of an explorer. She doesn’t wait for information or tools to be given to her, she will seek the resources herself.
I asked her why grades are important to her. “Do you want to get an A because you know it’s what you are capable of or because your teachers and parents want you to get A’s?”
In contrast, I definitely was not an “A” student throughout school. Or even a “B” student. And it wasn’t because I’m dumb, it’s because I just hadn’t grown into my curiosity yet. If I’m being truly honest, I grew up like most American kids not understanding the blessing of education.
I did work to get better than average grades, though, because I got grounded if I didn’t keep my grades above a C. I valued freedom. And that holds true even today. I’m a free-spirit. So is my daughter, but on a more responsible level.
We talked about how her good grades are not a product of pressures at home or school. She’s not trying to prove anything. They don’t come because she is a girl. Or because she’s working towards a scholarship. Her grades are a result of her innate curiosity and desire to learn.
And what she has not even realized is that these characteristics can be used for more than just good grades. At some point, they will translate into the workplace, but I also want her to understand how she can use them in other aspects of her life, too.
This is at the core of what the 2015 IDEA Conference is all about. Whether we want to admit it or not, so many of us are boxed in and herded into believing our gender, our beliefs, our backgrounds and our education should dictate what we do or do not produce. This often leads to anxiety, shame, depression, uneasiness, irritability and loneliness.
While developing this conference, all of the speakers agreed that we do not have the answers to life. We’re just trying to figure out this world and our place in it as we go along. But in talking through our processes of goal setting, we all realized that at some point in our lives we decided to let go of the preconceived notions of what we should do in order to live fulfilled lives through who we were created to be.
Consciously, each of us define our goals and values from this concept and use it to effectively succeed inside of our careers, our relationships, our faith, health and finances.
The scary part about all of this is that there is no manual. Who I am created to be is completely different than who you were created to be. But we also recognized that after the struggle of defining and accepting our characteristics, we were able to move forward, set meaningful goals and build community in ways which weren’t possible before.
And that’s what the 2015 IDEA Conference is designed to do. Our speakers will not only share experiences with guests, but they will also guide participants as they begin to examine their ingrained strengths and weaknesses in order to develop a year-long plan to take those next steps on the path to where they want to be.
Click here to find out more information about this event.
