Welcome to District 101 Toastmasters!

District 101 serves the area from Mountain View to King City, including Santa Cruz, Monterey, and San Benito counties and most of Santa Clara county – we call it “Silicon to Surf”.

Message from the District Director

Today is the beginning of the new Toastmasters year 2020-2021. A few months ago our planet decided to shift gears and change lanes. We met the pandemic of our times. It forced us to explore the uncharted territories in all aspects of life. Toastmasters was no exception. As a Growth Mindset community, we showed resilience and it inspired me. At the same time, I also feel the pain our brothers and sisters have been going through in past weeks.

As Marcus Aurellius would say, the good times test the strength of our character and tough times shape it. This, clearly, is the time to shape our character and much more. As Toastmasters we have the foundations to rise up to this occasion.

“Integrity”, “Respect”, “Service” and “Excellence” are our core values. We are not strangers to transformation. We live by the ethos: “We can create a better version of ourselves, one step at a time”. Now more than ever we are called to create that better version. Every toastmasters meeting, every role that we play, every responsibility that we take up is an opportunity to reinvent ourselves.

This year I invite you to reflect on this opportunity to reinvent as a toastmasters member. Reflection often begins by asking questions. In his bestselling book Tribe of Mentors, the author Tim Ferris says: “…Conscious thinking is largely asking and answering questions in your own head. If you want confusion and heartache, ask vague questions. If you want uncommon clarity and results ask uncommonly clear questions”. One question that has been useful to validate any idea in my experience has been , “Can I design an experiment around it?”.

As a toastmaster should I be actively setting SMART goals? Should I work on Pathways projects? Will I benefit from working on my projects consistently? Should I take up an officer role? Can an officer role help me learn how to prioritize and manage my time better? What will I learn by creating a vision? Is it worthwhile to create a plan and execute it? What happens when a club has a motivated group of club officers? …..It is true that you already know the answer to these questions. Have you experimented with them? The key to our transformation and self discovery lies not in the answer of these questions but in the experiments with them.

This year I invite you to experiment and find out your truth. Akin to any good experiment you have heard of, Define your question, measurements and timeline, Derive the actions and Deduce your truths.

If you have already been experimenting, share with us your questions and truths. Your story can inspire us all. The district leadership can bring it to all our members. Stay tuned to d101tm.org for opportunities to experiment.

I wish you A Year of Experiments, transformation, self discovery and growth.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Stay well, stay curious.

Sincerely,

Vaibhav Singh