I was honored to be a guest panelist at the BlogHer '09 Pepsico Roundtable event hosted by Jill Beraud, the passionate and dynamic marketing CMO for Pepsico, and my favorite Role Mommy, best selling author and journalist Lee Woodruff, who moderated the discussion.
Lee is truly a role model for purposeful living - having created the Bob and Lee Woodruff Foundation and Remind.org along with her husband, former news anchor Bob Woodruff who suffered traumatic brain injuries while covering the Iraqi war for ABC news. Following his miraculous recovery, which the couple recount in the New York Times bestseller, In an Instant: A Family's Journey of Love and Healing
", the Woodruffs have made it their life's mission to find ways to help war veterans who have suffered brain injury as a result of combat. And in doing so, they have touched countless lives along the way.
Lee moderated a panel devoted to purposeful living with a diverse group of female bloggers at the 2009 BlogHer convention. The goal for the "Purposeful Life Tweet-up" was to create an annual event at BlogHer that encourages women to explore what's important to them and what gives their lives meaning. The results will be archived in a digital index and examined to explore how women's attitudes and perceptions about purpose in their lives changes over time.
I couldn't believe how quickly the hour passed and yet, within those 60 minutes, we bonded over topics that were of great importance to us such as advocacy, our careers, giving a voice to a cause through our writing, work/life balance and of course, our families. While we laughed quite a bit during the conversation, there there even intense moments in the conversation that moved all of us to tears.
Throughout the chat, Lee read tweets that were submitted from around the world - and even Sarah at Genesis Moments joined in with a tweet from Philadelphia. And, my partner in crime, Traveling Mom's Kim Orlando sent in the tweet "You can travel with a purpose and make an impact." A special thanks to Kim for helping me discover my purpose - the ability to touch others through my writing. I laughed, I cried and it was one of the most fulfilling hours of my life.
While the discussion may have come to an end, the Live With Purpose challenge is still going on. So now it's your turn. If you got the chance to take a year off, what would you do? Send in your tweet and add the hashtag #livewithpurpose and become a part of this incredibly worthwhile initiative.
As Lee stuck around to sign copies of her latest bestseller Perfectly Imperfect: A Life in Progress
I had to call my husband and find a zone in the hotel that had decent cell phone reception so I could cancel my flight - which by that point, I would have missed anyway. Why do you ask? Let's just say I hitched a ride on a corporate jet and had the time of my life.
I'll be sharing more of my adventure with Lee and Jill in the coming days...
Lee is truly a role model for purposeful living - having created the Bob and Lee Woodruff Foundation and Remind.org along with her husband, former news anchor Bob Woodruff who suffered traumatic brain injuries while covering the Iraqi war for ABC news. Following his miraculous recovery, which the couple recount in the New York Times bestseller, In an Instant: A Family's Journey of Love and Healing
", the Woodruffs have made it their life's mission to find ways to help war veterans who have suffered brain injury as a result of combat. And in doing so, they have touched countless lives along the way.
Lee moderated a panel devoted to purposeful living with a diverse group of female bloggers at the 2009 BlogHer convention. The goal for the "Purposeful Life Tweet-up" was to create an annual event at BlogHer that encourages women to explore what's important to them and what gives their lives meaning. The results will be archived in a digital index and examined to explore how women's attitudes and perceptions about purpose in their lives changes over time.
I couldn't believe how quickly the hour passed and yet, within those 60 minutes, we bonded over topics that were of great importance to us such as advocacy, our careers, giving a voice to a cause through our writing, work/life balance and of course, our families. While we laughed quite a bit during the conversation, there there even intense moments in the conversation that moved all of us to tears.
Throughout the chat, Lee read tweets that were submitted from around the world - and even Sarah at Genesis Moments joined in with a tweet from Philadelphia. And, my partner in crime, Traveling Mom's Kim Orlando sent in the tweet "You can travel with a purpose and make an impact." A special thanks to Kim for helping me discover my purpose - the ability to touch others through my writing. I laughed, I cried and it was one of the most fulfilling hours of my life.
While the discussion may have come to an end, the Live With Purpose challenge is still going on. So now it's your turn. If you got the chance to take a year off, what would you do? Send in your tweet and add the hashtag #livewithpurpose and become a part of this incredibly worthwhile initiative.
As Lee stuck around to sign copies of her latest bestseller Perfectly Imperfect: A Life in Progress
I had to call my husband and find a zone in the hotel that had decent cell phone reception so I could cancel my flight - which by that point, I would have missed anyway. Why do you ask? Let's just say I hitched a ride on a corporate jet and had the time of my life.
I'll be sharing more of my adventure with Lee and Jill in the coming days...