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SOBCon 2010 starts today and a whole buncha folks get to hang with Liz Strauss also known as "the Story behind the Story" and author of "Successful and Outstanding Bloggers."
And I'm sorry I'm not one of them.
So instead, I'm offering a thank you hug-post for Liz.
While I've not yet met her in person, I think I caught a really awesome glimpse of her heart, her motive, and at least one of her true 'why's' for being in this social media space a few months back.
And it's why I'm writing this at 2:30 am as I sit here excited for her that her conference is in it's 4th year and thinking how cool she'll get to meet in person so many she's helped along the way and visa versa...as attendees will get to interact with her wonderfulness.
So lemme tell bout the Liz I met not too long ago on twitter.
It was a balmy sunny warm 80 degree blistering hot January Sunday afternoon.
Oh heck no it wasn't. That was where I lived 2 years ago.
Eh hem.
This year, this January, it was a very freezing, blistery cold winter Sunday afternoon and my voice was as frozen as the icepacked streets and sidewalks and I was braving having at twitter again, because dag gummit I'm gonna get this social media stuff down I thought.
(giggling now ...as if it's mine--any of ours-- to ever try to master or conquer. whatever. but back then...um. yeah. well....).
Kay. So while I'm braving tweetdeck, I notice this enthusiastic woman beaming from her avatar complimenting bloggers and retweeting everyone she was reading, And she impressed me. Her tone moved me. She seemed like a true friend and advocate. For many.
Like me, she was smack dab in her heated apartment also braving a winter afternoon, probably a colder one than mine.
But she had it goin on. And always does I might add.
And her tweets and praise and insights and offerings were authentic and informative and just plain good.
So I told her. I dm'd her something like "wow. you're on roll today" -- something like that.
And she immediately tweeted back somethin 'bout either that or she's just working too hard on a Sunday.
And then, I'm sure a bitta poor me kicked into my tone (where it comes from I just do NOT know) and I tweeted another dm saying something like "golly I am just really struggling to own my voice and figure out who to be on here."
And that was it. The next response would leave me pausing in awe and hit me upside the head with fascination much the same way, kidd you not, I felt when I learned how to ride a motorcycle for the first time, or slalom waterski for the first time...half thrill, half panic, half wow. I can do this.
Liz responded this way:
"Do you own your fingers?"
That simple. That crystal clear. That definitive.
I pause.
I ponder.
I wait.
I'm really good at doing those three things: Pausing, pondering, waiting..one could say I gave my 30s to them. :).
She dm's again:
Do you own your fingers? It's a simple question.
Lump in throat. Big gulp. HOLY WOW. She wants me to answer her.
and my grown up me says "Um. yes Tre...this is the land of direct messaging on twitter. It's as direct as it gets and you initiated ....yes. You need to respond."
Um...I hesisitate cause I was thinking. Remember? I like to pause, ponder and wait a bit or a lotta bit.
Well. I couldn't lie.
Of course I own my fingers.
But I knew...or at least I thought I knew where she would go next.
And that assumed conclusion is what kinda scared the heeby jeebies outa me.
But I braved it anyway.
I tweeted back:
Yes. Yes. Yes. I own my fingers.
To which Liz responded exactly as I knew she would:
Then you will have no problem owning your voice.
At this fine moment, my disposition turns into the me I was at 12-years-old:
