Welcome to 2005! For the past three or four months I've been working on a series of articles for the Club Managers' Association of America's 'Outlook' publication. The articles have been focused on the concept of building a personal foundation. And although I haven't reached the point of the discussion where I talk about the importance of building a strong family and a strong community those pieces of my personal foundation have really shown up in the month of January.

On the day after Christmas, we call that Boxing Day in Canada, we woke up to hear some news of the enormous, devastating wave that hit distant shores in southeast Asia. Although the information was a little vague in the beginning, we all know the magnitude of what happened that day. A few hours later that day, on a personal note, my family received word that my wife's mother had passed away. Rose, my wife, had been surrounded by family with her mom for about ten days prior to her mothers death and on the day we got the news we were surrounded by our family and friends. Two days after her mom's funeral, on New Year's Day, my mom suffered a heart attack and it was now time for my family to come together.

Now that it's a month later, I look back on what happened. My mom is back home, although at 88 years of age what happened has taken a toll on her. The outpouring of concern, support and flexibility (particularly from my clients) and constant contact from concerned friends has really shone a light for me on the power that building a strong family and community can bring.

For Christmas one of the gifts I received was a book called "From Me to We". A brilliant book by Craig and Mark Kielburger. In the book they talk about what happens to us when we reach out to support others. When we go beyond ourselves to care and support those who need it. To see what nations of the world have done to support people who were victims of the tsunami is inspiring and to hear of the work of these two young authors and the thousands of people who support them in the community they built is a tremendous lesson. In this new year, take some time to think about the communities that you have.

I'd like to challenge you this month with a series of questions.

What communities are you involved with and what communities support you?

What do you do on a daily basis to support others?

Who do you need to call or contact right now because you've been thinking about them?

Is your community your town, your country, your industry, the world?

Who in your community or family needs to hear your voice?

The way people have reached out to me and my family has inspired me to continue to reach out to others.

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; there is where they should be. Now put foundations under them.
Henry David Thoreau

From Me to We by Craig and Marc Keilburger

In 'Me to We' you will discover stories about people whose passion is infectious and whose life lessons are profound. You will learn that the self-help culture that has shaped so much of modern life has led us up the wrong path with its focus on "me" and not "we". As the many people who have contributed to this book can attest to, the road to happiness and fulfillment is a much different road.

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