#1 - Start a book club. (6/101)

If you have looked at my list, you might notice that I love reading. My friends and I decided to start a book club to combine our love of reading with hanging out, drinking wine and discussing something a little bit intellectual. For our first book, we read All the Light We Cannot See, a book set in World War II that follows a blind French girl and an orphan German boy who's paths collide in occupied France. It was a great read and I'd highly recommend it.

In other news, while discussing we drank one of my favorite wines for this price point, the Apothic Red blend (pictured to left).

Can't wait for our next book club, we will be reading The Girl on the Train.

#5 - Plant something for my patio. (5/101)

I moved into a new apartment a couple weeks ago and now have a little patio with lots of sunshine, so I decided to try gardening. A little bit of background - I told my mom I was going to plant a garden and she said "good luck, if you succeed you won't have gotten your green thumb from me". When I was little, I remember all my friends planting flowers with their families in their yards. My family's idea of "planting flowers" was choosing what color of flower the landscaping crew would plant in our yard. Due to allergies and no "green thumbs", our family never planted anything growing up. But it was on my list, so I had to try!

I did some research by asking questions to my family and friends that garden and reading articles on the internet. I decided I wanted to try planting a couple flowers, a few herbs and a few vegetables. I took a trip to Home Depot and had a great conversation with one of the garden designers there who walked me though everything I would need to start and helped me refine my list of items to garden. I picked up everything I needed, headed home and planted my first potted garden! Here is what I ended up planting:

• Mint
• Cilantro
• Basil
• Cucumber
• Red bell pepper
• Banana pepper
• Marigold and other type of annual flower

I'm excited to watch my mini-garden continue to grow and hopefully get to cook with some of the herbs and vegetables!

#19 - Have a conversation with someone who has a job I’d be interested in pursuing. (4/101)

One of the best pieces of career advice I've received is to speak to as many people as possible in careers that you think you might be interested in pursuing. To complete number 19 on my list, I was excited to meet an amazing leader and new friend this past week and have a conversation with him about his story and the philanthropic sector. 

This past week I attended the ROI Summit, put on by the ROI Community, a gathering of 150 change-makers that brings together Jewish leaders from around the globe and enables them to turn their passion into action and shape the future of the Jewish world. Part of the conference including something called brain dates, which allowed participants to take advantage of the incredible human capital by offering their expertise to fellow participants for thirty minute powwows.

As I was reading through the bio book and perusing possible brain date options, I realized there was one participant who was in a career that I have always found fascinating. He serves as a Vice President and Program Officer for J.P. Morgan Private Bank in their Corporate Responsibility group, basically the philanthropic arm of the huge bank. I work in the philanthropic world, currently for a family foundation and am so thankful that I get to do the work that I do. But I have always been interested in how philanthropy and the corporate business world can intersect, so was excited to chat with my new friend about his work. 

I started by telling him a little bit about me - my mom works at a large brokerage firm so I've always had a business influence in my life. My parents instilled in me from a young age the importance of giving and have been great philanthropic role models. I went to university thinking I'd study business, realized I really disliked the classes, didn't get into the business school (thank goodness!) and ended up studying religious studies and leadership. I got very involved in extracurricular activities and the common thread between all of them were giving and resources. Either I was running a small grant pool for my American Cancer Society fundraiser, donating proceeds of baked challah to hunger fighting organizations, serving on the board of my University's Hillel on the fundraising committee, serving as my sorority's philanthropy director...you get the idea. I realized that I loved being involved in these endeavors and could turn my hobby into a career. My favorite class I took at UVa was one in which our class was given $100,000 to grant out to worthy organizations in the Charlottesville community and beyond, instilling in students the values and thought behind philanthropy. After graduating I spent a year in Argentina working for two different nonprofit organizations and now work for the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation where I am lucky to get up everyday knowing that I am doing something good in the world with an organization that aligns with my personal values and passions.  

I then asked him for his story, it went something like this: "I was very involved with Hillel and other Jewish organizations at my university and got selected for a fellowship with Hillel International directly following graduation. While in that position I realized I couldn't really figure out who made the decisions and who had the "power". I started asking my supervisor questions which led me to ask their supervisor more questions and led to me sitting down with Hillel's CEO and President at the time to ask him questions. I still didn't think I had asked everything so I sat with one of the board members, who was also the national director of a Foundation that was one of Hillel's biggest donors and from her I finally started to realize philanthropy was a lot more than just writing the check. She explained to me the meaning behind strategic philanthropy and I realized this is what I wanted to be doing. I asked her how I could work at a foundation and her answer was "well you can't yet, you need to get a bit more experience, become a master in a certain area and then you will be able to work for a foundation". This answer didn't sit too well with me but I thought ok, I'll do something else then I'll work at a foundation. So I found a job working for something called the Jewish Funders Network and liked working at an organization where I got to learn a lot about philanthropy in the Jewish world and have somewhat of a birds eye view on the scope of the community. After working there for awhile, I felt an itch to try something new so was looking for jobs in the Jewish world and instead ended up finding a job in the philanthropic arm of J.P. Morgan advising philanthropists on utilizing their resources to actualize their goals. While working there I completed a Masters in Public Administration. I have recently switched to this new role in which I am working on philanthropy for J.P Morgan as a corporation instead of with individual philanthropic clients and am involved with Jewish organizations as a volunteer leader." We went on to talk more about his current job, general interests, thoughts on the sector and more. 

It was a fascinating conversation! I was excited to gain his insight and learn from him, I hope we will stay in touch.

#76 - Send 10 random letters. (3/101)

In today's digital age, there's something special about receiving a letter in the mail. As opposed to receiving an email or a text, where someone can take out their phone, type the message, input the name quickly and push "send", receiving a letter implies the person took time and thought to create and send it. It means that the person took the time to buy or create the stationery, write out the letter in their own handwriting, find out the address, buy a stamp and actually put it into the mailbox. 

It also suggests that the letter took some thought. In today's world, when writing on a computer or my phone I find myself "word vomiting", meaning I type my thoughts out as quickly as possible knowing that I will be able to easily edit and revise later on. When I write a handwritten letter, I must sit and think about what I want to write before writing because I only have one chance to write out the message (unless I throw it away or scratch it out and start over again). Writing handwritten letters is an exercise in "thinking before acting", something that I take for granted in our world full of technology. I love giving and receiving "snail mail" because of the time and thought that goes into it. 

I spent this last week in Israel for work so I knew I would have some time in airports and on planes. I hunted down ten of my friends addresses, brought some stationery along and completed number three of 101 by writing ten letters to friends. By writing these letters I realized I want to make a practice out of sending handwritten letters more frequently. I really enjoy the act of writing them and like the intention I put into the action. My goal will be to send one handwritten letter a month, I hope I will actually remember to do it!