DESIGN THE LIFE YOU LOVE BY AYSE BIRSEL > VIRTUAL TEA #102 > LIFE BY DESIGN

Dear Designers of Life!

When I first started Design the Life You Love in 2010, I reached out to?Ralph Caplan,?author of the seminal design book?By Design,?Why There Are No Locks On The Bathroom Doors In The Hotel Louis XIV And Other Object Lessons?(my favorite subtitle of all time).

Ralph was my mentor, friend, and, with his wife Judith Ramquist and daughter Leah Caplan (yes, the same Leah Caplan you all know), my family in New York City.?

Ralph said, "Ayse, when it comes to life, there is no such thing as design. There is only redesign. You should call your program,?Redesign the Life You Love."

Of course, Ralph was right, even though I didn't change the title.

Ralph was not a designer, but he understood design better than any designer. In the intro of his book, Ralph wrote, "The truth is, designers won't save the world, but the design process can help make it worth saving."

He concluded, "For design is a process for making things right, for shaping what people need. We all live with designed objects that we love, hate, use, break and don't know how to fix. We need better ones. But we need more than manufactured objects, more than crisp and clever graphics, more than friendly kitchens and friendlier computers. We need . . . well, you know what we need. We can get it by design."

Ralph understood that a protest is a design and, like the?sit-in at a lunch lounge counter, in Portsmouth, Virginia, in the 1960s, it can change our lives.?He recognized that a McDonald's hamburger is an industrially designed product and that smart devices are not only designed, but they design our daily experiences—how we think, how we learn, how we communicate.?

Redesigning your life through design process also changes your life.?

I have been reading and re-reading Ralph's book for many years. Last week Leah and I were talking, and?I suddenly understood what Ralph meant?at a deeper level. In hindsight, I should've called my book?Life, By Design. It is as if Ralph has been telling me this for years, and I'm only genuinely hearing it for the first time. Life by design.

This past week has been that kind of a week, where I understand things that I know but at a whole new level.?Does that ever happen to you too??

I had a similar experience during a session with my coach where somehow the conversation ended with me saying, "I'm designing the arc of my life. Hah…! You know what, I wrote a book about that." We laughed a good solid three minutes.

That is what I'm up to, redesigning my life. How about you? We can do this together. Life is so much more interesting when it is?by design.

If you agree, you can come to the?Virtual Tea this Wednesday, 5PM ET,?where I will start a new cycle and share how I am redesigning my life. RSVP below.

We also have a dedicated session to Design the Honest Life You Love with my dear friend, Ron Carucci, author of?To Be Honest,?on Saturday, May 14, 11-4 PM ET. Mark Reiter, co-author of Marshall Goldsmith's bestselling books, describes it as "one part 'wax-on-wax-off' instruction that you don't realize is changing you until you are, in fact, profoundly altered."?We'd love to have you join us.?You can sign-up below.?Use Discount Code: VIRTUALTEA for a special $100 off.?

Come to our Virtual Tea #102!

Wednesday, April 27, 2022, 5:00 PM - 6:00 PM EDT.

Virtual Teas are complimentary.

?RSVP

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Thank you!

Ayse Birsel + Leah Caplan + Selin Miskavi

Inspiration:

Join?Ron Carucci?and me?to?Design the Honest Life You Love, on?May 14, Saturday, 11AM-4PM ET.?

Tickets?here.?Use Discount Code: VIRTUALTEA for a special $100 off.?

"What is most amazing about Ayse Birsel and Ron Carucci's Design the HONEST Life You Love program is not its extraordinary efficiency but the simple fact that it does what it claims to do – it will coax and cajole you to be more honest and transparent about the life you really want for yourself. It certainly did for me. Honestly.”?—Mark Reiter,?best-selling co-author?

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My dear friends Stefan Sagmeister and Anni Kuan have a new fashion company. Inspired by Stefan’s long-term thinking project, Beautiful Numbers, these garments can serve as a reminder that the latest Tweets and cable news don’t mean we’re standing at the edge of doom. We are creating long-term data visualizations on clothes that should last a long time.?

If you are interested in purchasing, please visit?Sagmeister123.com

Then we can be?matchy matchy as I bought them too!

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My friend and mentor Marshall Goldsmith started his daily calls with his 100 Coaches community at the beginning of COVID, saying if I can help one person, that's enough for me. That inspired me to do the same with my community and start the Virtual Teas. His new book,?The Earned Life,?is coming out on May 3rd. I love it and hope that you do as well. Please pre-order from Amazon!

Our Collaboration:

Do you have a question about your life and work projects? Email me a question or reflection and inspire my next Newsletter and potentially Virtual Tea.

Co-Design Workshops:

We make co-designing with you, your organization, your teams, and end-users easy and game-changing. Your project can be anything from Resilience to Hybrid Culture, from Luxury to Adventure to Excellence, from Birth to Long Life, from your Design DNA to Office Systems, Automobiles to Health. Join Amazon, CVS, Herman Miller, Staples, Walmart, and others and email us at?[email protected]?for a conversation and a short demo.By registering for this online Zoom event, you automatically allow your data to be used by Birsel + Seck. This session will be recorded and might be shared for marketing and educational purposes.