Greetings, Highroaders, and welcome to 2020! We are certainly living in interesting times.
For me, the year started out with a sad shock. As many of you know, my favorite band is Rush. The band and their music have been an integral part of my life since age 14. I’ve been the lead singer in a Rush tribute band called The Spirit of Rush for almost seven years. About two weeks ago, Rush’s drummer and lyricist Neil Peart passed away after a long battle with brain cancer. I took his death very hard.
Neil was often called The Professor because of his intelligence, thoughtfulness, and constant reading. You simply can’t help learning from him. For my first blog of the year, I want to 
honor Neil by offering you a quote and an invitation.
These words come from my favorite Rush song of all time called Mission.
“Hold your fire, keep it burning bright, Hold the flame ‘til the dream ignites, A spirit with a vision is a dream with a mission.”
As the year begins, most of us are already off and running. We might be catching up on dozens of emails that piled up over the holidays, or getting started on a new project.
Here is my invitation: Pause and remember the mission.
Why are you sending all those emails? Why are you having a conference call today? What is the purpose of your team? Whose life gets better if you do your job well? If you are a leader, what common goal can your team rally around?
A mission does not have to be something grand and profound. It simply needs to be a sense of purpose that stays front of mind.
My mission is to help my clients make inclusion a way of doing business and a way of life. How about you?
I invite you to pause, reconnect with your vision and mission, then speak it out loud. Remind your team, your organization, yourself. Keep striving to make the lives of others better.
I wish you an inspiring and successful year ahead, and Neil, wherever you are, rock on.
To make a difference in the fight against brain cancer, consider a donation to the National Brain Tumor Society: https://braintumor.org/take-action/ways-to-give/
