Find More Fun and Engagement During Your Next PF Event

Building a success pack is an essential part of getting your most important projects done. That’s mostly because no matter the nature of your project, you’re going to be more capable of doing it if you have a group of individuals who can keep you accountable. Here at PF, we are grateful our success pack includes the wonderful members of the Academy.  The Academy–if you haven’t already heard about it–is a private educational community for leaders, business owners, and creatives to find support and expert feedback on what matters most to them and their communities. We love our members of the Academy for so many reasons, but chiefly it’s because of the light and life they bring every time we meet.  One principle that arises with great frequency in conversations in the Academy is the magic of play, as well as our fundamental need for fun, joy, wonder, and curiosity. Creative people are inherently creative, no matter what context you put them in. Shifting the focus to productivity doesn’t make that go away, it only enhances it. The key to balancing fun and productivity is to find your joy, and then to follow it.  Though we might all need little reminders here and there, the PFA crew always manages to find the fun. But rather than try to explain it, this is best shown by example. Recently, a team of folks from the Academy decided to go in on a secret project for the community that had its roots in several conversations both in the PF community and within the Academy. At the PF Academy’s last Momentum Day, Sam, Cristina, and Maghan presented the Productive Flourishing BINGO cards, and there’s been optimum fun playing ever since!  

Here’s how PF Bingo works: there are no prizes; we play on the honor system; there are 37 (and counting) different ways to mark a spot on your sheet, and there’s not always a singular right way to mark them. For instance, if you’re feeling seen, you’d probably mark the “Feels Seen” box, but not necessarily because someone else mentions it.  No matter how you play, have fun with it, and let us know when you have a BINGO!   We loved the cards so much that we asked the creators of the Bingo cards to say some words about the project, and how it came to life.  Cristina Kramp said: “Sam (an Academy member) had just moved, Maghan was busy with different contracting jobs, I was finishing some commissioned projects, as we were made aware that Momentum Day was coming. Somebody had started a master list for PFA product ideas, and the Bingo idea was a popular one. We kept adding potential phrases to it. Sam and I had brainstormed about making an actual set and all the different ways to make it work, but we put it on the shelf for when we had more room in our schedules. That time never manifested. Well until, Miss Maghan advocated for the project 2 weeks before the next Momentum Day. We all made time, divided and conquered. We talked, zoomed, texted, and emailed.  We distributed tiles to each member to work on, and Sam became the master builder; she put it all together and made it work. We picked a color to ground our styles and just went for it. Sam is a great project manager; she kept things on time and task. We gave her our tiles with enough time to fiddle, to not add stress to her life. I was on a family vacation, but in the moments I had Wi-Fi, I would check in with our group. I couldn’t be at the grand reveal, but I was so glad to be able to see the recording and it was epic!  It is so fun to give back to a wonderful community that gives so much to me/us. Maghan and Sam did great at presenting it and they do [a great job] playing Bingo while chatting, paying attention, and taking notes (all at the same time!) in our PFA meetings. Working together with people you love and for people you care about is magical.”

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Sam Hunter’s thoughts on the conception of the PFA BINGO game: Somewhere during Momentum Day (the one before the last one), Charlie quipped “put that on your Bingo card” – I think in relation to quoting the Tao Te Ching, and within minutes, as happens with a bunch of bright peeps in the Zoom, there was a Google doc running and a bunch of us were feeding quotes and ideas into it for possible PF merch and a Bingo card.   It was a fun thing to do during the intensity that Momentum Day can be. Over the next few PF calls, it got mentioned a few times as one of those things “we should get to” but it never made it onto the list as a Project. Then [finally] Maghan reached out to Cristina and me to see if we could pull it off by a “celebrate the wins” meeting right before an upcoming Momentum Day, about two weeks away. I had just moved and was feeling like my creativity was still in a box somewhere, but with Maghan and Cristina to partner with, I knew the load would be shared, and besides, they are some of my beloved people. I laid out a structure, we chose 37 options from the list, and we all agreed to make a handful of illustrations each. We each picked some of our faves or ones we felt personally seen by: I’m all about the BadAss Liquid Feels! I was worried that our divergent drawing styles might not look good together (code for I’m insecure about how I draw!) but in the end, I think they blend beautifully and illustrate our friendship, trust in each other, and our desire to give something back to this community that supports us so much. Our goal was to delight our fellow PF members and to honor Charlie and Angela with some love, and I feel like we nailed it!   Many of the Bingo tiles are things that get said often in our meetings precisely because we need that repetition to really embody these concepts, and get working with them. We tried to bring a little fun and sass into the words and drawings. I think, in hindsight, it was one of my fave projects this year!

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Maghan Haggerty summed up the experience of crafting the game in her own words: The Bingo cards are a love letter to PF and the Academy. They are a way of showing Charlie and Angela how their care, attention, and efforts have had such a positive impact on our lives. And to get to create them with two of my dearest friends (who I’ve never met in real life!) was a magical experience.  Since my very first PF call years ago, I felt a part of this community, I felt welcomed. Our intent for the Bingo cards was to further that feeling of belonging allowing anyone, no matter if their first time joining a PF call or their hundredth, to feel right at home. As the center square states “You Belong Here.”  P.S. We’ve been capturing more things in recent meetings, and will be making Version 2.0 for the next Momentum Day!

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Creativity constantly overflows from the Academy. And what better way to reflect the cohesion and brilliance of the community than creating from scratch a Bingo game full of references and inside jokes.  If you’re feeling called to explore beyond your current limits and to bring your leadership, entrepreneurial, and creative endeavors to the next level, please join us in the Academy. You can apply here.