50 Coffees

There are many iterations of this practice, but I was first inspired by an article I stumbled upon from Peter Thomson in Inc. titled How 50 Cups of Coffee Can Change Your Life. The premise behind this idea — which I fully identify with — is that our lives are shaped by the people we meet and the stories we hear. At times of change in your life, the 50 Cups endeavor pushes you to get solid with your goals and encourages you to share them with the world, one person at a time. The project is capped at 50 people, simply for the sake of knowing when you’re finished. Honestly, I think 50 was chosen arbitrarily, but that number sounds right to me! You listen to the stories of these 50 people, learning from their experiences and enriching your life (and hopefully theirs!) along the way.

So, that’s what I aim to do!

Maybe not all of these encounters will be actual cups of coffee. Some of these conversations may happen over a glass of wine, on a walk in the city, or while we’re sweating our butts off in a fitness class. The point is to just have the conversation. I don’t want to prescribe too many rules to this, but I do want to set some goals and a rough sketch of a process, just so my analytical brain can be at ease.

Goals:

  • Connect, face-to-face with community.

  • Explore the experiences of my friends and strangers alike.

  • Dream about making a difference in the world.

  • Lean into the creativity of the process.

  • Document my time.

Process:

  • Some people endeavor to complete this in about a year, with one conversation taking place each week. Personally, I believe in setting attainable goals and that just sounds impossible to accomplish. So I am not going to assign a time constraint to this. I think I’ll just enjoy the journey and use the check ins here as my accountability tool to keep moving forward.

  • I will choose a list of folks that I want to chat with. I won’t post that here because I might change my mind or the order before I actually get around to having the cup of coffee. We love some mystery in our lives! I’ll set an initial list to get me started, but I think there is a beauty and excitement in seeing where and to whom this thing takes me!

  • I will snap a photo of each person or the setting in which we met.

  • I will document with a short summary of the session, where we were/what we did, lessons learned, and key takeaways.