Tag: Love

  • Moments of Awe

    Awesome is one of my favorite words. While my day is full of moments of awesome there are only a few moments in life described by the word awe.

    Here’s a few…

    • Hearing the words, “I’m pregnant” from your wife. (Trust me, as much “awe” is created the first time at 24 as at 34 when it wasn’t expected.)
    • Seeing the sunrise over the mountains or the sunset over the ocean for the first time. (Whoa, there are colors I never even imagined!)
    • Meeting a starving person who asks if they can pray for you. (Whoa, you mean you can really praise God even when you aren’t comfortable?)
    • The birth of your child. (Whoa, you and me doing that can result in this?)
    • Witnessing 50,000 worshipping God in a city where hundreds of thousands just died in an earthquake. (Whoa, how is that possible?)
    • A young lady sharing her deepest fear and how God showed up in front of her peers. (Whoa, her words are more powerful than mine.)
    • The realization that Jesus died for me. (Whoa, the son of God… was perfect… and gave his life for me?)
    • A jet-lag induced early morning walk through a crisply cold city in a foreign country. (Whoa, discovering this place is amazing!)
    • Riding the Maid of the Mist deep into Niagara Falls to feel the full force of gravities simplicity. (Whoa, I’m soaking and exhilarated at the same time.)
    • The moment you realize you both feel the same way and knowing you’ll spend the rest of your life with her. (Whoa, there really is someone just for me.)

    There are moments in life so full of awe that words truly defy them. I think that’s the history of the word awe right there. Something happened and a persons jaw dropped and said, “Awe.”

    Getting back, recreating them, and remembering them creates years of inspiration.

    Oh, that we might live a life inspired by awe.

  • 5 Things I Love about Mailchimp

    I’ve been a Mailchimp customer since July 2007. And unlike most web apps, my love for them is growing over time! I joined them because I loved their user interface and fun loving attitude.

    Here are 5 quick things I love about Mailchimp.

    1. Easter Eggs. Today was the perfect example. The picture above is their login screen. I wasn’t expecting it and it made me giggle. There’s also some funny stuff built into the site that will keep you laughing. I use Mailchimp several hours per week… it never gets old.
    2. Geo-location emails. Lemme tell you. As a guy who manages some big email lists I adore this new feature. If I’m doing a meet-up or an event, I can very easily send to users within 50, 100, 0r 150 miles. No more zip code segmentation!
    3. Easy autoresponders and mail merge tags. One of the reasons why people hate getting email marketing is that it feels so canned and impersonal. Mailchimp makes personalization and follow-up, even in an automated way, super simple. So I can set-up autoresponders to go to people who just signed up for my mailing list, have an upcoming birthday, or even haven’t opened emails recently. Love. Love. LOVE IT!
    4. Templates galore. When I first started using Mailchimp I was impressed that they had 30-40 templates to chose from. This is now basically infinite. They have tons of free stuff to use as well as the ability to easily import custom designs… or even turn ANY webpage into an email template. The chimp that came up with that needs an extra banana.
    5. Customer service. I’m a royal pain-in-the-neck customer. I’m always pushing the envelop and trying to use their service to its fullest. These folks are amazing. They take it all in stride. They bend over backwards to help. And they have a philosophy of educating their customer as opposed to just fixing stuff for you. For a bunch of chimps, they are really friendly. When we were doing NYWC in Atlanta last fall they were even polite enough to open up their offices to let me walk around and be a fan for a while.

    I didn’t even mention the price. If you have a list under 500 subscribers, they are free. Even for bigger lists (like my Youth Specialties stuff) they are super cost-effective.

    And since I am on a roll. There are some incredible power-user features. They seamlessly integrate with Google docs, Eventbrite, Salesforce, Highrise… and a few other things I haven’t even explored yet.

  • Post-it Love

  • So Long American Idol Season 8

    american-idol

    I watched most of the American Idol audition shows this year. I love the auditions! And I gave Hollywood Week a shot… and it was fun. But after last nights show, I’m out. I’ll come back in a few weeks when the quality of musicians starts to shine through. It’s one thing to have the occasional bad singing… and they had that covered last night. (The woman who went first probably killed their ratings; horrible outfit; she butchered that song. Someone please tell the 95 pound woman she can’t pull off an Aretha Franklin song, need I go on?) But I’ve seen and heard enough to know that they are merely hyping the “most talented group ever.” And the judge who is Paula’s stand-in just in case Paula falls off the wagon one more time… she was a complete Paula Abdul clone last night! What exactly did she add to the panel?

    I’ll be back for the finale. But I don’t think I can sweat it out all season with this cast.

    Then again, there isn’t a lot else on so I’ll probably just whine and watch next week. Yeah, who am I kidding? I have a love-hate relationship with the show.

    And I voted for Danny Gokey 25 times before going to bed. Man, that guy can sing.