We pulled into the driveway after a lovely Mother’s Day weekend out of town visiting my parents to find an unexpected parcel on the front porch.

It was wrapped in brown paper and in pretty, handwritten letters I saw my name. I love that feeling.

But what I love more was what I found inside.

It was a hand-sewn bag with a handwritten note from my dear friend, Franchesca, who just moved away to the beautiful state of Arkansas.

Inside the hand-sewn bag?

Ah, yes. Some homemade chocolate chunk cookies just for me. Just for Mother’s Day.

I was overwhelmed by her thoughtfulness. Nothing like an unexpected gift to make a girl feel truly loved.

…

A day later, we arrived back into the same driveway from a family walk around the neighborhood. Another curious parcel sat patiently on our porch, awaiting our arrival.

But this time, it was for my husband.

Who’s it from? What is it? What’s the occasion? we asked each other.

We could tell it was a gift — ordered from Amazon.com. Similar to my gift, there was a mysterious note taped to the top of the box:

Happy Getting Old? I thought. Wasn’t your birthday, like, 9 months ago?

And with our 3-year-old and 18-month-old by his side, Matt slowly opened the box to find:

Nose Hair Trimmers. A (very) belated birthday gift from a long-time friend.

Apparently, they can be used for eyebrows, ear hair and beards as well.

At that moment, I looked at my darling husband, who was grinning from ear-to-ear with the same appreciation and joy that my homemade cookies brought me. And suddenly, the difference between men and women had never been clearer.

And when my toddler is older and asks me to explain some philosophical matter about gender roles and how we’re made, I will simply say:

Honey, women are like delicate, handmade bags full of scrumptious, chocolate chip cookies.

And men — well, they’re like a funny, belated gift of nose hair trimmers.

And together, we couldn’t be happier.

My aunt Gerry once told me, while smearing her toasted bagel with cream cheese, “I liked bagels before they were trendy.”

It made me laugh.

And when it comes to food trends, few have been more ubiquitous than the ever-so-tasty “cupcake bakery.” Matt and I had cupcakes instead of cake at our wedding back in 2007 — and the little cup-sized treats are still as popular as ever.

But there is one woman in particular who takes the cake on starting the trend — and that’s Candace Nelson, founder of Beverly Hills-based cupcake bakery: Sprinkles Cupcakes. 

 Photo by The Houston Press

I first found out about Sprinkles on an episode of Oprah. But according to Sprinkles.com, their praise and press doesn’t stop at Ms. Winfrey. Some other media outlets who have sung sweet praises for these tasty treats? The Today Show, Nightline, Martha Stewart, Good Morning America and The Tonight Show (just to name a few).

And now, Candace has been kind enough to participate in my 3 Questions series. (Hint: the interview is best enjoyed over a Red Velvet cupcake.)

Me: What is something that makes you giddy like a kid?

CN: A decadent hot fudge sundae with nuts and whipped cream!

Me: What is something that makes you passionate like a grown-up?

CN: Working on new concepts for the Sprinkles brand.  Right now, we’re working hard to launch Sprinkles Ice Cream and I’m pouring all my energy into the recipes – from housemade sauces to waffle cones to cookies and brownies.

Me: What were you looking forward to most when you woke up this morning?

CN: I’m flying home from a quick stint in New York where I visited our bakery there.  I had to leave my family at home so I woke up looking forward to seeing my husband and two sons later today!

***

Find a Sprinkles location close to you. Or, follow Candace on Twitter at @sprinklescandac.

“As a pastry chef, I just create flavors that I myself love to eat. The one exception would be a big one, which is our Red Velvet cupcake. I was never really a fan of Red Velvet — but my husband, being from the South, insisted we have a Red Velvet cupcake. And to this day it’s our number one selling flavor.” – Candace on the Oprah Winfrey show

Sigh. My husband is always right, too, Candace.

*3 Questions is a fun interview series where I ask the same 3 questions to different interesting people. See more interviews here.

It’s my last two weeks working full-time at my marketing agency.

Soon I will bore you with diatribes about diapers and ruminations on recipes — but until then, my day-brain is in marketing mode. (But wait, there’s more!)

We’re currently re-branding a new client and have delved into the world of “brand archetypes.” As many of you literature or psychology majors may know “an archetype is a human type in its purest form: the classic hero, outlaw, ruler, etc. Each type has its own set of values, meanings and personality traits.” And in learning the 12 Brand Archetypes, I’ve found that it’s like a Seventeen Magazine personality test for companies to figure out their true selves. (i.e. Nike would be a “hero” archetype).

I found this all very interesting today and when I first started writing this blog post, I was going to title it, “What’s your brand archetype?”

There was going to be some sort of brilliant connection between your personal brand and brand archetypes and I would tie it up into some sort of pretty red bow.

But then, I realized that I didn’t like that idea. At all.

Mostly the part about your “personal brand.”

So I stopped writing and found this video by best-selling author, Seth Godin (also a recent interviewee in my Three Questions series!)

On the topic of Personal Branding, Seth shares with Entrepreneur Magazine:

“[As a waitress], your job is not to bring the eggs from one place in the restaurant to another — [patrons] can do that themselves at a buffet. That’s not why they’re coming. They’re coming because you are a human being, And what human beings do is art, is new stuff, is connection. Tom Peters wrote a magazine story years ago called, ‘The Brand Called You.” It was brilliant and it totally changed the way people thought of branding. But my new thing is: I am not a brand. You are not a brand. You are a person. And there’s a big difference between being Dell and being Michael Dell.”

I loved Seth’s point in this interview, because this ubiquitous “Brand Called You” has truly affected everything we do. Blogs, social media, Facebook pages, Twitter feeds, etc. have not just changed the way we share ourselves — but the way we see ourselves.

Recently, one of my blog readers asked for some advice on how to blog more confidently. She felt that half the time she would write something — and then erase it because she didn’t like it. So I encouraged her to think about her motivations differently. If you enjoy writing, I said, do it anyway.

After all, you are not a brand — you have no set style guide or color palette to adhere to. You are not bound by a “brand book” dictating your tone or logo. You are a human being. And when it comes down to it, nobody else can do what you can do best:

Be yourself.

“You can do something I cannot do. I can do something you cannot do. Together let us do something beautiful for God.” – Mother Teresa

In the last years of her life, my Grandmother lived in a log cabin on the family land in East Texas. The home is still in the family and we gather there for holidays and long weekends to celebrate life, each other, and her legacy.

On her wall in the bathroom hangs a hand-painted sign that reads:

“The purpose of life is a life of purpose.”

I’ve read it many times while visiting her home — and tonight, in my quiet living room, after the children had gone to sleep and the lights had turned dim — the phrase popped into my head.

A life of purpose, I mused. It’s something that I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. In fact, I’m starting to think that living a “life of purpose” is less about the big question, “What’s my purpose in life?” (i.e. some big over-arching assignment like to be a famous cello player, a heart surgeon, or a foreign ambassador) — and that it’s more about the little (and big) purposeful decisions that we make every day.

Because the truth is, if you’re like me, many of your decisions may not be all that purposeful. You’re hungry, so you grab what’s fast. You’re frustrated, so you say what you feel. You’re busy, so you live life as though it were a to-do list. But none of that has much thought involved.

But I want to live more purposefully. When I’m hungry, I want to grab what nourishes me. When I’m frustrated, I want to say what’s productive (often times, nothing). When I’m busy, I want to step back and re-evaluate my schedule, trimming the fat where needed, changing the path where important.

I started doing a little research on this subject, but got distracted by some purpose-filled quotes that I find quite inspiring:

On purposeful thinking:

“A man is but the product of his thoughts. What he thinks, he becomes.” — Mahatma Gandhi

On purposeful parenting:

“Everybody today seems to be in such a terrible rush, anxious for greater developments and greater riches and so on, so that children have very little time for their parents. Parents have very little time for each other, and in the home begins the disruption of peace of the world.” — Mother Teresa

On purposeful purchasing:

“You never can get enough of what you don’t really need!” — Matthew Kelly, The Rhythm of Life

On purposeful giving:

“The only really happy people are those who have learned how to serve.”  ― Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth am I Here for?

On purposeful eating:

“Get people back into the kitchen and combat the trend toward processed food and fast food.” — Dr. Andrew Weil

On purposeful prayer:

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” — Philippians 4:6

On purposeful decisions:

“Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.” — Pope John Paul II

What I find interesting is that in making purposeful decisions like this in all aspects of life (i.e. stepping back and making sure we’re not just on auto pilot), we sometimes stumble upon something bigger. And before we know it, we’ve found our life’s purpose — by doing things on purpose.

I have wanted to blog this week, but have been wearing a lot of hats (my husband and I have both had an especially hectic work schedule.)

The highlights? A profound run-in with a kind one-armed man, a fish dying of old age, and today: a free Chick-fil-A sandwich + dessert coupon (do you know they have hot chocolate chip cookies now?)

I don’t like going days without blogging — in fact, I like to blog even more when I’m busy. It forces me to think on my feet, even if I don’t have anything in particular to talk about. It exercises those creative juices in my brain, helping me be more on-point in my workplace (as a creative writer at an ad agency) and it forces me to step out of routine and think about the little things in life.

But sometimes, when I am in auto-pilot mode, my creativity can get a bit… stuck.

Do you know how that feels? It’s not just for us “creative” types. Whether you’re trying to break that “What’s for dinner?” rut or redecorate your bedroom or organize the silverware drawer, we all need a little inspiration sometimes.

In a Success Magazine article that I read recently at work (ironically titled, “Get Unstuck”), the author, Patty Onderko, lists 17 ideas to help you cultivate your creativity.

There were some obvious ones, some interesting ones, some weird ones — and one in particular that I have always intuitively believed:

#16: Don’t buy into “writer’s block.”

“I believe creative block is a choice,” Henry says. [Todd Henry, author of The Accidental Creative: How to Be Brilliant at a Moment's Notice.] “I think it’s a mental trick we play on ourselves that goes something like, ‘I don’t know if what I’m about to make is any good, so I’d rather not make anything than violate my assessment of my capabilities.’ The artists I know who make really brilliant work also make a lot of not-so-brilliant work. It comes with the territory.” The point: Just do it. Pour yourself into the work until ideas start to come again.

And so, though I was tempted to make my own “obvious, interesting, weird” list about how I get creatively unstuck, it really just boils down to: just do it. Don’t feel like writing? Do it anyway. Not sure how to decorate the baby’s nursery? Just start. Bored with what’s for dinner? Look up a new recipe.

Humans have a tendency to not do something simply because we don’t feel like it. But then, “ah, there’s the rub” as Shakespeare would say. It often takes doing it to feel like doing it. Whether that’s exercise, creativity, kindness, or whatever.

I have a lot of people tell me, “I wish I were creative — I don’t know how you do that all day, just come up with ideas on demand.”

And I think: I may come up with a lot of ideas, but it’s because I have to do it every day that I sometimes hit a good one. Even with this blog, I rarely know what I’m going to blog about until I start typing. But once I start exercising my brain, suddenly it feels more in shape to think differently.

And when all else fails? Just browse Pinterest.

“To have a great idea, have a lot of them.” – Thomas Edison

When I wrote the title of this post, it reminded me of a love poem that I used to like in high school by the same name: Resignation, by Nikki Giovanni. I was going to cut and paste the whole thing here, but turns out it features some 387 words, so I’ll just share this relevant excerpt from the last stanza:

I love you
because you made me
want to love you
more than I love my privacy
my freedom, my commitments
and responsibilities
I love you ’cause I changed my life
to love you

And so I have done the same and a life change is upon our family. I resigned from my full-time “office” job this week.

Nikki’s 387-word love poem is written to a lover, no doubt, but as she has resigned in acquiescence to love — I have resigned to full-time mommyhood, a role of love that I do not take lightly. It has been on my heart for some time – this work/life balance thing – and any reader of this blog knows so.

I feel lucky to have the opportunity to focus more on my family. I feel sad to leave coworkers who often feel like family. I feel excited to see what God has in store for us — but mostly, I just feel blessed.

As I was ending this post, I stumbled across the below quote — a status message on my Facebook newsfeed. Being a woman requires many hats to be worn, and I am ready to spend more time wearing my favorite.

“How can it be a large career to tell other people’s children about the Rule of Three, and a small career to tell one’s own children about the universe? How can it be broad to be the same thing to everyone, and narrow to be everything to someone? No. A woman’s function is laborious, but because it is gigantic, not because it is minute. I will pity Mrs. Jones for the hugeness of her task; I will never pity her for its smallness.”
― G.K. Chesterton

I watched a fascinating presentation at work today on Millennial moms — also known as Gen Y (or the generation born after Gen X). Dates are conflicting as to what decade you must be born in to qualify for this demographic category, though Wikipedia says:

“There are no precise dates for when the Millennial generation starts and ends, and commentators have used birth dates ranging somewhere from the mid-1970s to the late 1980s, early or mid 1990s, or as late as the early 2000s.”

Although the specific dates aren’t nailed down, specific behaviors are. And there were plenty shared today:

- 51% of moms say they are “addicted” to their smartphone. 1

- Half of “BabyCenter.com-surveyed” moms sent text messages or updated their status on social sites during labor. 2

- 76 percent of women announced their baby’s birth by phone, 72 percent sent text messages, 72 percent posted updates on social networking sites, and 44 percent sent email announcements. 2

- More small children can play a computer game than ride a bike. 3

- More kids aged 2-5 can play with a smartphone application (19 percent) than tie his or her shoelaces (9 percent). 3

The stats weren’t overly surprising — we see these things all around us. But what was surprising was my reaction to this video:

It’s just Alice in Wonderland for the iPad with flashy animation and interesting graphics. But after watching how it works — in tandem with the onslaught of digitally powered statistics — I felt a surge of motivation.

I’ve written about it before: I remember the way my Alice in Wonderland book smelled in 4th grade. It was bound with leather and had over-sized, glossy pages full of bold, color photography.

And I thought about my children growing up scrolling through a lit-up iPad rather than thumbing over glossy pages of hand-drawn illustrations, dreaming about how the characters move and talk, reading the book over and over until the pages are bent and smudged.

And suddenly, while my fellow marketers were thinking of how we can ignite mobile strategies to meet this growing affluent market, a rally cry rose within me and I thought with passion: “By God, I shall read them books!”

It’s a small thing, really. And I certainly have nothing against emerging technologies in balance. (In fact, my smart phone has saved us on more than a few restaurant outings with the kids). But to me, I want my children to love the tactile things of the world  like I want them to eat natural food and get fresh air, knowing that gratification is not always found in an instant, but within an imagination.

“A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupery

When I was pregnant with my first born, a woman handed me a small card with the following written on it. It is still on our fridge behind a broken magnet that says “Don’t mess with Texas.”:

The most important person on earth is a mother. She cannot claim the honor of having built Notre Dame Cathedral. She need not. She has built something more magnificent than any cathedral — a dwelling for an immortal soul, the tiny perfection of her baby’s body.

The Angels have not been blessed with such a grace. They cannot share in God’s creative miracle to bring new Saints to Heaven. Only a human mother can. Mothers are closer to God the Creator than any other creatures. God joins forces with mothers in performing this act of creation.

What on God’s good earth is more glorious than this: to be a mother?

- Joseph Cardinal Mindszenty

The language may seem a bit magniloquent (how do you like that for a vocab word of the day?), but I was reminded of the sentiment when reading the lovely comments on my latest post. One comment in particular made me think:

If you were to build a cathedral with your bare hands, stacking brick after brick for years, painting ornate designs for decades — and then open that cathedral to the world to inspire and delight the millions: would people say that you are just a builder?

If you were to create a cure for a worldwide disease after years of research and practical experience — and then share that cure to heal the many suffering: would people say you were just a scientist?

But if you were to grow and create a unique human life never before existing — then teach and encourage and inspire them to live their purpose, go forth and change the world: why do we say you are just a mom?

I like ole’ Joseph Mindszenty’s opening line. It’s not “The most important person on earth is the CEO or the Celebrity or the President.” It is: The most important person on earth is the mother.

Now that is someone who can change the world.

I read something yesterday. It was an article in the Huffington Post, forwarded to me by a coworker. The title? Sheryl Sandberg: ‘There’s No Such Thing As Work-Life Balance.’

For those of you who don’t know (and I didn’t until yesterday), Sheryl Sandberg is the Chief Operating Officer at Facebook — and she used to be an executive at Google. The article cites several passages from a recent interview with this smart, popular COO, one that is getting high praise from working moms everywhere for many reasons, including the following passage:

Sandberg noted that for years she’s left work at 5:30 PM so she could be home for dinner with her children, but has only recently started saying so publicly. Her hope, she said, is that discussing it openly will encourage others to feel comfortable doing the same.

I read this and thought Bravo, Sandberg! It’s not rocket science, but it’s encouraging to see parents setting visible parameters around their work in order to focus on their family. Otherwise, I read the rest of the article without much thought.

Until I got to a particular sentence.

I couldn’t figure out yesterday what compelled me to re-read it — and then re-read it again. And it wasn’t until I was reflecting more today that I realized why the simple string of words (used mostly as a transition point) caused me to pause. The sentence reads:

Helping women to reach their full potential requires the world to become more accepting of powerful and successful women, Sandberg argued, adding that women face a tradeoff between success and likability that men do not.

Full potential. It echoed in my head for a moment and I read the sentence again. “Helping women to reach their full potential requires the world to become more accepting of powerful and successful women…”

What defines “full potential” in this scenario? And what defines being powerful and successful? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not being overly critical. I do think Sandberg is speaking more to creating family-friendly work places (and I applaud her for that), rather than making some philosophical statement about a woman’s worth. But it does point to a bigger idea that I’ve pondered lately.

At what point, do we differentiate full potential and life purpose?

It may seem like semantics, but the subtle nuance is this: when I think about my potential, I’m thinking of what I can do — whereas purpose lies in what I should do.

So for me, success has very little to do with how well I balance work ambitions with family responsibilities. Instead, it’s about being exactly who I was made to be. So for some women, maybe that’s working full-time, part-time or not at all. Maybe that’s having no children or 10 children. Maybe that’s running a Fortune 500 company or pursuing an artistic hobby. But if our priorities lie in finding and living our purpose — rather than meeting some worldly expectation of “potential” — then perhaps balance is closer than we think.

“If you are who you were meant to be, you will set the world ablaze.” – St. Teresa of Avila

My husband was working late in our home-office a few years ago and I was browsing our big bookshelf. Stuffed full of books (mostly my husband’s) on a variety of topics, I pulled out a plainly titled, My Life with the Saints, by Jesuit priest, Fr. James Martin.

Bored – and hoping my presence would urge my husband to finish up that last email – I plopped down on the floor and started thumbing through the book. I expected some sort of theological dictionary of sorts, but what I found was much more compelling. I flipped to the first page of the chapter about Mother Teresa — a hero of mine — and began to read.

A couple of weeks later, I had finished the book.

Written in mini-narratives, each chapter is an engaging story of Fr. James’ experiences with various saints — and with his own spiritual growth. In the book, he speaks of working in the ghettos of Jamaica, the gang territories of urban Chicago and of visiting various Holy lands around the world. Though the material specifically regards Catholic saints, readers of any faith (or no faith!) would enjoy his visual storytelling — and the historical context around his fascinating cast of characters. No surprise that My Life with the Saints was named One of Publishers Weekly’s Best Books of the Year.

Recently, Fr. Martin has written about a subject that I love: the importance of joy. His recent book Between Heaven and Mirth: Why Joy, Humor, and Laughter Are at the Heart of the Spiritual Life “invites believers to rediscover the importance of humor and laughter in our daily lives and to embrace an essential truth: faith leads to joy.”

Photo of Fr. Martin by Chris Crisman

I have appreciated his writing and perspective for some time — and was thrilled that he agreed to participate in my 3 Questions Series (on Easter Eve!)

Me: What is something that makes you giddy like a kid?

FM: Hmm…that’s a tough one. I could be pretty giddy as a kid! But I think it’s when I’m out with close friends over dinner and we start to find something really funny–even silly–and start to laugh and can’t stop. Then when it’s hard to control, I start to feel like a kid again. So laughter is the shortest route from adulthood to childhood.

Me: What is something that makes you passionate like a grown-up?

FM: Well, I love to write. And when I’m writing I feel like all the other cares and concerns of the world just float away. Of course I’m writing to “help souls,” as Jesuits are supposed to do with all their work, so it makes it easier to focus on the other when I’m doing it. So that’s what fills me with passion: writing to help souls.

Me: What were you looking forward to most when you woke up this morning?

FM: Oh, that’s easy: seeing my family. It’s the day before Easter and I’m on my way to see my sister’s family and my mom. Best of all, my two nephews–age 6 and 13–will be there, and they always, always make me laugh. Can’t wait!

***

Follow Fr. Martin on Twitter at @JamesMartinSJ.

“If you’re a religious person, or a spiritual-but-not-religious person, or if you’re a seeker or a doubter or an agnostic or an atheist, here’s some baccalaureal advice: Don’t take yourself so damn seriously. Laugh at yourself. Use some humor to speak truth to power, especially on behalf of the poor. See what happens when you incorporate joy into your spiritual life, and try to locate God’s delight. Overall: be joyful; cultivate a sense of humor and laugh — for God’s sake.” – Fr. James Martin in his Baccalaureate Address at the University of Pennsylvania

*3 Questions is a fun interview series where I ask the same 3 questions to different interesting people. See more interviews here.