I had the extreme privilege of attending Oprah's Live Your Best Life Weekend for O Magazine's 10th Anniversary celebration with a very good friend of mine (waves to Gina) where we learned life tips from experts, like Martha Beck, Suze Orman, Elizabeth Gilbert, Nate Berkus and the grand dame of inspiration, Oprah herself.
Along with eleventy-hundred of Oprah's biggest fans, I mean -- you can almost see the end of the line, at the traffic light, waaaay over there -- so, how the heck did WE get in anyways?
My good friends at Truvia (pronounced, tru-vee-uh) invited me (SWEET!) and said I could bring a friend (Gina knows I'm a dork, IRL, and STILL likes me, sort of) and, like, there's a reason why we look so, wide-eyed and windblown.
We both had to get up at 5 a.m. (on a Saturday!) to catch the train to NYC (on a Saturday!) and it was a very, very windy...ahem.
"Javits Center, please."
Seriously, I know Jersey is just across the river (blows kiss to NYCityMama) and I am grateful for the opportunity to attend really cool events, like this, so close to home (waves to BlogHer folks) however, the commute is NEVER an easy one.
"Here are your V.I.P. passes."
Then again, how can you say, "Thanks, but nuh-uh," to Oprah...right?
Did I mention, I'm NOT very good with BIG crowds and my friend Gina is really, really fast?
9 rows from front of the stage (nice job, Gina!) look, it's Oprah! She looked wonderful, albeit a little tired; playing hostess to eleventy-hundred of your biggest fans will do that to a person, I can ONLY imagine:
"I really believe when you give to other people, you give to yourself." — Oprah
Then, she introduced Elizabeth Gilbert, author Eat, Pray, Love (associate link) and, well, the woman IS a walking inspiration:
Have you seen the movie trailer for Eat, Pray, Love with Julia Roberts yet? Well here you go..."Mistakes will be made. Failure will occur. You pick yourself up and carry on." — Elizabeth
Then, we tried to meet with the Truvia people, who were located on the second floor, along with the rest of the event's sponsors, along with eleventy-hundred other folks, who tried to merge onto one (1) set of escalators, at the same time.
Me, not good with crowds, remember? Besides, the Truvia people were already deep into conversation with Top Chef Sam Talbot and fellow bloggers, Kristen Chase (a.k.a. Motherhood Uncensored) Liz Gumbinner (a.k.a. Mom-101) of Cool Mom Picks and Isabel Kallman (a.k.a. AlphaMom) and I told the nice intern...just fuhgetaboutit and NOT to interrupt them...I didn't want to be late for Suze Orman, anyways!
Because, she, in my opinion, is the ying to Elizabeth Gilbert's yang:
"It is people who give you a raise or get you a job. It is people who control money." — Suze Orman
I mean, the woman is a financial expert and even joked about giving women permission to divorce their husbands (sort of) and I wasn't the only one who left her workshop feeling like somebody...anybody...puhleeze, just show me the money, already!
Then, there's Nate Berkus -- his website is still under construction, but you can find Nate's designs on HSN -- who I now just absolutely adore and his workshop totally deserves a separate blog post...so, stay tuned.
"Design is not about the money or keeping up with anyone else. It's about the story behind [your choices]." — Nate Berkus
At this point, we took a break and, as the crowd thinned out for lunch, we headed back upstairs to check out what the Truvia folks were doing.
Did I mention, they had lots and lots of fresh strawberries, dipped in Truvia?
So, I guess now is a good time as any to tell you just what the heck Truvia is -- a natural sweetener is made from rebiana, erythritol, and natural flavors -- you can learn more about Truvia by visiting their website.
Chef Sam Talbot developed recipes for Truvia, like my favorite Banana Berry Smoothie he made at the Oprah event with Soledad O'Brien, who is also, well, absolutely adorable in person...DAMMIT!
Aaaanyway, here's the recipe:
Banana Berry Smoothie with Truvia Natural Sweetner
Ingredients
1 cup strawberries
1 cup blueberries
1 banana
1 cup fat free plain yogurt
1 cup orange juice
1 cup ice
4 packets Truvia natural sweetenerProcedure
1. Add all ingredients to blender
2. Blend on high until smooth
3. Enjoy
We ended the afternoon with life coach Martha Beck and, quite frankly, I didn't know what to expect.
Okay. I lied. Ms. Beck has three (3) children AND three (3) Harvard degrees (aaaaand, 3 kids?) so, my first thought was THIS is what it must have been like, being a kindergartner, on my first day of school.
"When you do the thing you fear, the thing loses its power to scare." — Martha Beck
In other words, next time, I'm going to walk right up and politely interrupt:
"Hi, I'm Liz...boy, it's windy out today...isn't it?"
Perhaps, I won't scare people, like me, so much, and that, my friends, is totally worth the price of admission -- thanks for a truly awesome day, Truvia!
© 2010 This Full House - All Rights Reserved.
DISCLOSURE: TRUVIA PAID FOR MY (AND MY GUEST'S) ADMISSION FEE INTO THE OPRAH EVENT, ONLY. NO PAYMENTS WERE RECEIVED FOR THIS BLOG POST.
