Lori Todd’s transformational insights are given as part of a larger purpose. Lori Todd is committed to creating a world community of authentic leaders standing in integrity where all human beings express their unique gifts. This blog includes transformational distinctions, quotes, and techniques to support people in choosing authenticity, connection, oneness, integrity and ultimately making a profound and unique difference on this planet.
COVID-19 All Masks are Not Created Equal
COVID-19 All Masks are not Created Equal I have a PhD in engineering. My expertise is worker safety, which means respiratory protection, and that includes Face Masks. Yeh! Many of the “designer masks” I have seen are barely protective. Those pretty bandanas and loosely woven scarves may look good, but they won’t protect you or others. Sticking a piece of material across your nose and mouth may be better than nothing, but not by much. At best, a single thickness of fabric filters less than 30% of potential virus particles. Single-layer masks are generally a no-no, even if they have pretty colors. Masks that fit loosely or leak around your cheeks or nose will filter less than 15% of particles. Those pesky viral particles will always find the path of least resistance. If you get masks from the many generous people making them or selling them online, please find out what materials they are using. It’s important. In general, at least four layers of different tightly woven materials are needed to provide good protection. You can cut up your 600 count cotton sheets, 100% silk shirts, and sexy polyester spandex pants, and you will have enough material for many masks. [...]
WorldLegacy Leadership in Minnesota
WorldLegacy Leadership Team in Minnesota Imagine having two weeks to plan an extreme makeover to install a playground and playground equipment in a Minnesota school with extreme requirements. The team of eight cannot spend any of their own money, most of the work needs to be done by the community, and the project must be complete in less than three days. Failure is not an option. In addition, there is snow on the ground, cold temperatures and only one team member lives in Minnesota. These are just a few of the challenges faced by a high level WorldLegacy Leadership program from WorldLegacy in Chapel Hill, NC. Here is an excerpt about the process from one of the team members, Delaney Burger. "People of the world!!!! My wife and I have been part of a 4 month accelerated leadership with world class coaches helping us to be the most extraordinary versions of ourselves so we can make a extraordinary impact on humanity! For only the 2nd time in 20 years Minnesota has been selected! We took proposal nationwide and accepted St Helena school in Minneapolis! They are getting a playground makeover! Our vision is that children of the world will [...]
Homeless
A Love Poem To Our Homeless I send love to the parts of us that we think are the worst, the parts that we hate. The parts that we shun or attempt to lock away, like a homeless person begging us for a buck. I send love to that One in us that judges people, casts people aside, wishes to be alone, feels like an outcast, feels separate, wants acceptance, is afraid to risk, makes you or others wrong, that One that is defeated, a victim, a righteous jerk, that fails, never stops to find out, kills love and is starving to be seen and understood. I send love to the parts that we don’t let live, that leave scars and cripple our unique purpose. Without love we will only yearn to sing the song we came to sing. Or believe there never was a song. So I send love to all of our homeless people. We all dance the same dance and we are all perfectly imperfect, and beautifully ugly. By Dr. Lori A Todd
Resilience
Resilience Resilience isn’t just about bouncing back; it is about using the tragedies to create something even greater. It requires critical awareness of the feelings and thoughts you are having when you are triggered. It requires seeing the limiting beliefs that are present in the moment that have been around for many years. What are those limiting beliefs waiting to be activated, turned on or be plugged into? You invented these beliefs many, many years ago. Resilience requires being curious. Curiosity allows new possibilities to enter your life. You will think different thoughts, and have increased clarity. Be curious as if you are an alien that has just landed in the middle of your life. Have childlike wonder at the interesting events, feelings and thoughts that are in your mind and life. Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom. - Viktor E. Frankl Before your knee-jerk response to an event, see if you can slow time down and be Curious.
Leave Your Heart Print On This Planet
Leave your heart print on this planet If you are lucky, you will grow old and then die. And then it is over. So why spend another day wondering if you are enough? Why spend another day beating yourself up? Why waste any of your moments worrying what people think of you, or proving yourself to them? They really don’t care anyway. Someone who judges you isn’t worth your soul. The next day, they will be on to someone else. And you gave your integrity away for nothing. Time is ticking away. Humanity needs your unique purpose and perspective. BE BOLD BE AUTHENTIC BE BEAUTIFULLY IMPERFECT RUFFLE SOME FEATHERS. LEAVE YOUR HEART PRINT ON THIS PLANET There is still time to leave a mark Here is a poem I wrote after watching my Father take care of my mother. I am here for you. Even though my 87 year-old back hurts, I will lift your body from the chair to the bed and back to the chair when you are too tired or sick to do it yourself. I am here for you. I will bathe your body, I will cook your meals, I will push your wheelchair, I [...]
Dr. Lori Todd – Everybody knows they’re going to die
As I sit in the hospital and watch my mother make a choice between living and dying, and watch many doctors and nurses in the hospital see her as an old belligerent patient and me as an annoying (or worse) daughter, I think about how we live our lives. I am drawn to the book “Tuesdays with Morrie” and what Morrie Schwartz said. If you haven’t read it, then buy it today. Yes, I am all about transformation; the good, the bad, the beautiful, the ugly. I am about life and death. I think about people who put their ego’s on the table everyday and stand for people; the people who are too afraid about the unseen ramifications; the people who forgot they really care; the people who think they have no voice and want to be right about it; the ones who think this is all about a training; the ones who want to be right. Well as my mother lies here I think about September 11. For some it has become a time to remember something horrific that happened and for some it is a memorial to visit. I think about September 23 where people could walk in [...]
Dr. Lori Todd Says, Be A Wake Up Call!
Dr. Lori Todd Says, Be A Wake Up Call! How lovely to think that no one need wait a moment; we can start now, start slowly changing the world! How lovely that everyone, great and small, can make their contribution toward introducing justice straightaway. … And you can always, always give something, even if it is only kindness! — Anne Frank Your past experiences have prepared you for now. Allow yourself to be delighted by life. Completely accept and appreciate what you see. Finding the gift and the gold in whatever shows up, will have your creativity and imagination grow. If your inner judge shows up and starts giving you opinions, thank him or her for sharing. Put a banana in his mouth. Just show up. That you are here makes a difference. Be a wake up call for people. Most people move through life half awake, ruminating, and living in their heads. They regret the past and think, plan, and worry about the future. The detail of each day takes place in front of us, moment by precious moment. How much are people missing? Almost everything. Dr. Lori Todd
The Butterfly Effect
Take action aligned with your principles, don’t judge the results you see. Too often we are afraid of failure so we do not act. Too often we judge success or failure by only the results we can see directly. A seemingly small act can profoundly alter humanity. A simple request of a person to see his or her greatness, even if declined initially, can be the seed that germinates in the mind. In chaos theory this is called the Butterfly effect. A simple act that changes one state of a complex system can result in profound changes in later states. For example, minor perturbations caused by the flap of a butterfly’s wing in China might produce a hurricane in New England several weeks later. This applies to humanity as well. The simple act could be a small group of people who come together to make a difference. It could be by each person in that group reaching out and making a relationship stronger, asking someone their dreams and inviting them to take action. It could be by one of those people choosing to take action and enroll in the July 29 Legacy Journey. In the realm of the potential [...]
Love Consciousness
The natural state of the fabric of the universe is giving and love, not fear and taking. If we are to have a consciousness of oneness, if we are to evolve as a planet, we need to rigorously align ourselves with integrity, responsibility, abundance and love. If we choose love, the energy has a ripple effect and liberates humanity. If we choose fear, we imprison ourselves and others. We need to wake up to love consciousness. "A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.”- Albert Einstein "The requirements for our evolution have changed. Survival is no longer sufficient. Our evolution now requires us to develop spiritually - to become emotionally aware and make responsible choices. [...]
Lori Todd Talks about Cats, Death, Grief and Baby Food
Five months ago I lost my cat of 19 years, died I mean. DEAD. Cancer, lots of IV fluids, chemo that did nothing. Lots of money. The magical part of it is that she waited until I came home from a Mexico trip so I could say goodbye. I said goodbye to Kasha. She looked so weak, I then said it is time to let go. Ten minutes later she was dead. I am not good with death. Not a great conversation about it. The WorldLegacy transformational trainings I have done have helped and it is a regular battle with being neutral about it. After she died I was shocked, never saw it directly before. I always had someone else deal with the dying part. I wondered if she was really dead. I touched her she was warm. I didn't want to box her up in case she was in a coma. My friend "E" said to put her body near the food just in case she wakes up. Ha Ha. Finally we boxed her up for the later burial. She was cold by then. And getting stiff. I guess I had to let go of hope. Damn.When I think [...]
The Conversation – Dr. Lori Todd
What is important in any moment, is only what we choose is important in that moment. It takes a phone call, a medical report, an animal walking by your window, to change everything in an instant. The world can go from black and white to color in an instant. The world can go from possibility to resignation in an instant. All that is left is our interpretation, and our inner reserve to choose the one that will forward our lives. The Conversation One moment you are worrying about those extra wrinkles Next moment you find out you have cancer One moment you don’t have enough time for everything Next moment you can’t move because of the surreal nature of life You look in the mirror and wonder what really matters And the answer is the same; nothing really matters Then you have an insanely funny conversation with someone You realize for a moment you forgot that you had problems Life is moving in slow motion; you wonder if joy will return Then you realize joy is just a pause button from pain The Conversation - By Dr. Lori Todd [...]
Mastery Takes Practice
Mastery takes Practice. When people ask me, “How long will it take for me to be transformed? Transformation is like any other discipline. Practice, practice and more practice. How many hours does it take to make it to the Olympics? How many hours does it take to master any discipline and keep it alive? Transformation is not a destination, it is a Journey. And the Journey ends (as far as we know it) when our lives end. Mastery takes practice, whether it is transformation, music, meditation, sports or enlightenment. In an interview, the legendary cellist and humanitarian Pablo Casals was asked, “Why, at age 93, do you still practice three hours a day?” The Maestro said, “I’m beginning to show some improvement. Of course, I continue to play and practice. I think I would do so if I lived for another hundred years.” “I am a very simple man. I am a man first, an artist second. My first obligation is to the welfare of my fellow man. I will endeavour to meet this obligation through music, since it transcends language, politics and national boundaries.” Pablo Casals practiced every day until the day he died in 1973 at the [...]
Dr. Lori Todd Invites You To Be Real
Is Anything More Important Than You Being Your Real Self? Be Real. Connect. Touch Humanity. Be Your Unique Self. Dr. Lori Todd Invites You To Be Real. To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting. ee cummings A real friend is one who walks in when the rest of the world walks out. Walter Winchell 'It doesn't happen all at once,' said the Skin Horse. 'You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand.” ― Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit “Authenticity is a collection of choices that we have to make every day. It's about the choice to [...]
Honor in Making Mistakes
I can look back at all my mistakes and feel buried, or I can be proud that I went for it. Regret mainly lives in the memory of a missed opportunity, inaction, our unlived life, and a forever lost moment. - Lori Todd Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new. - Albert Einstein It is not the things we do in life that we regret on our death-bed. It is the things we do not. All the mistakes, and all the dopey things, and all the times I was embarrassed — they don't matter. What matters is that I can look back and say: Pretty much any time I got a chance to do something cool I tried to grab for it — and that's where my solace comes from. - Randy Pausch (May 2008, 3 months before he died) A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing. - George Bernard Shaw
WorldLegacy asks, Where do you stand?
Where do you Stand? I CHOOSE UNCONDITIONAL LOVE I love those that betray, make wrong, justify damaging people for their own reward. My heart lives in the present, open. It is my EGO that judges and protects. I CHOOSE INTEGRITY We are all part of the same seamless Universe. We are all whole and complete and interconnected. By damaging myself, I damage you. I CHOOSE FORGIVENESS I forgive my stupid behaviors, actions or lack of action. I forgive your painful words, betrayal, gossip or actions, knowing it is not personal even if it feels like bullets. I CHOOSE TO LOVINGLY INSIST THAT YOU UNIQUELY SHINE Your unique gifts bring all of humanity oxygen. When we all embody our unique gifts, the Universe shines like a diamond. WorldLegacy Dr. Lori Todd
Global Transformation: The Future is in Our Hands
Wake Up and Remember It is time for us to wake up and remember the future that we came here to create: a future born of a distinct paradigm. Do you remember the future where you express your authentic unique self, and we are part of the same seamless Universe? A future where we are ONE yet each of us is an irreplaceable unique gift? A future where being our authentic gift provides the oxygen needed to heal humanity, and where we are undeniably connected to each other in mind, heart, body and spirit. If we are to heal our planet, our job is to uniquely shine and simultaneously love ALL of humanity. From your Ego’s perspective, choosing authentic love is not smart or rational. I am not talking about mushy love or cordial hypocrisy. Authentic love is a commitment to suspend our Ego, and to give deeply to another for the sake of their higher good whatever that may be, regardless of fear or how it feels. The authentic self is willing to stay open to love even when it is dark, scary, or the tide of the drift’s negativity is strong. The Ego in Transformation’s Clothing Waking [...]
Predict the Future By Inventing It
The best way to predict the future is to invent it—and we had better start now. "Aude aliquid dignum" - Latin: "Dare something worthy" How do you create your future? Do you predict your future based on what’s happened in the past? Have you limited what you imagine about your future to protect yourself from failure? Have your “good ideas” been steeped in a context of “realistic mediocrity?” A powerful way to “predict your future” is to invent it from a compelling vision big enough to impact Humanity. When you fully commit to your vision and step into Visionary Leadership, then every fiber of your being and all your actions are magical expressions of that vision. As a visionary leader, who you are is created from your vision, and that you, in turn, manifests your vision. A vision goes beyond a “good idea” by not only the unprecedented nature of the vision but the commitment of the person articulating it. When a visionary leader speaks, our listening is based on our trust in their credibility. When Steve Jobs spoke, people listened. When Warren Buffet speaks, people listen. When you speak, do people listen? Vision touches, moves and inspires people [...]
If You’re Angry And You Know It Clap Your Hands!
Positive psychology tells us happiness generally comes to those who practice kindness, gratitude and living in the moment. However, we can end up feeling like we need to be happy all of the time. If you believe that happiness is the “normal” state, the “right” state, suddenly you can be faced with an interesting problem. What if I’m not happy? What does that mean? Is something wrong with me? Am I sick, bad, or deficient? I should be happy. NOT. New studies say long-term happiness comes from allowing ourselves to be angry (and a full spectrum of other emotions). To be authentic, successful and in integrity, we get to let ourselves feel emotions appropriate to any situation—whether or not they are pleasant in the moment. Anger in the moment is different than holding on to resentment, guilt, blame, victim, or hate. Experiencing anger is not the same as holding on to it and then using it and becoming it to justify a belief. Anger is a basic human emotion. Anger can lead to positive change and can provide a great opportunity for personal insight. Give yourself permission to have flexibility and access to full self-expression, like a child. Different [...]