The Thin Space with JC Lippold

Well, hey, everybody. Happy Sunday evening, no matter where you are. My name is JC Lippold, and this is thin space. So after the weekend has ended and before the week begins, there's this space in between that often maybe leads you to feel anxious or underwhelmed or like you can't really accomplish anything. It's within that thin space that we meet to see what there is to be seen. So as you may be able to tell from the awesome view out my window, I know it looks almost like a. Like it's a painting, but it's not.

That's. That's New York out the window behind me. I've been in New York this, this weekend to run the marathon with 50,000 people I don't know yet. And as always, anytime you're around people like this, it's a powerful situation and a story came to mind. So I'm a musical theater guy. There's a musical called Ordinary Days. And in this musical, there's this person, a dreamer or wanderer, who ends up meeting this very high performance driven character who's going to do all the where am I? And what am I doing?

And both of them ask a lot of questions through this narrative. And one of the characters talks about this hundred story city being New York. And they're referencing the fact that there are so many stories of buildings and stories of heart and soul. Right. Both usages of that word. And this character doesn't know what their story is. At the end of the story, these two characters are sitting at the Met museum, and one character walks up and says, this is the most beautiful painting. And the other character, the highly analytical, driven one, is like, what this painting of very ordinary things.

How is that beautiful? And the character goes on to say that things aren't beautiful all on their own. Beautiful takes some reflection. Beautiful takes a person. For beautiful to happen, the beautiful has got to be seen. The one without any value makes this point at the end that that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But the true beauty is when that person risks to share what they see as beautiful with others. So, Alec, Chris, Luke, all y'all, what are the beautiful things? What are the things?

And be incredibly precise. Like, what's that beautiful thing that you go, this is it. Like, this is where beauty lives. And other people may go, wait, what? What do you mean? And all of a sudden, you share your perspective with them, and all of a sudden, they begin to see the beauty that you see. Who would that benefit them? You. This whole hundred story city that we live in, I think so. Anna, nice to see you with these moments. Right. The moments where we don't have anything better to do. Meaning the weekend is done, the week is yet to start.

So what do we do in these moments? Often we wait until there's purpose to the moment again. So this evening, whether something comes to your mind right now that you want to share in chat or whether you message me later, I will say this. Something that I've seen great beauty in every single time I've spent time in this very big New York City is people truly make connections as you walk down the street, as they honk their horn, as they shout to the person that is on the other side of you. And them, the way that they allow you to be a part of their stories makes it a city that I could be creating this path.

Yeah. That's where I saw beauty today and where I see beauty every single time that I'm here. Yeah. Luke, right? I keep wanting to, like, assure everybody that it's not fake. Like, that's. That's out the window. Nine times out of ten, you open your hotel window and it's a brick wall or it's not that. And one time you open, and it's that. So think about those things, the things that when you reflect on them, you see something that maybe other people don't. Why? Number one, it'll benefit them. The expanse of the beauty they see will grow and amplify.

Number two, it'll benefit you. It's kind of easy to walk through life thinking that the things that you have don't have worth or don't deserve or merit being shared with other people. See what happens when you do? So, yeah, they'll benefit them. It'll benefit you. But also, how would the world shift different if we started to assume that someone's reflection is adding beauty to this world? So reflect, y'all, tonight, within this thin space or any other time that you have a beginning or an end, a season shifting, a good time and a bad time, there is that thin space in between what was and what will be.

In that space, there's power. Have a great night, y'all, and we'll see you soon. Bye.