Hi there! I’m Lauren Creagan, welcome to Unlocking Your Nonprofit Potential, the podcast where you’ll get advice, inspiration and learn how to use social media for your nonprofit. It’s episode 60! We made it! 60 podcast episodes that are tailor made with your challenges in mind. That’s what this podcast is all about – helping you use the right tools to unlock your nonprofit’s potential. You don’t want to be mediocre. You don’t want to spin your wheels anymore. You want to have a growing, thriving nonprofit that helps people in need. That’s why you’re here! So you can learn to use Facebook, Instagram, and email marketing effectively to get more people in your door, at your events or meetings, and supporting you with their money so you can help more people and make a difference in more lives. If you’re here and listening to this today, you should be so proud of yourself – you are proactively taking steps to make your nonprofit better than ever. Now, speaking of making things better than ever… I have a BIG announcement to share with you.  This is the last podcast episode of Unlocking Your Nonprofit Potential. WHaaaat!!! I know… But here’s the good news – Unlocking Your Nonprofit Potential isn’t going away; we’re just changing the way we’re doing things.  Over the past year that I’ve been recording these episodes and interacting with you on social media and reading your emails and because I am always doing research, thinking about this podcast and what’s the best way to help you – I’ve come to understand that the best way to serve you is with a blog that you can read and see what I’m teaching you. I’ll get to why a blog is the right way to serve you in a minute, but first I want to tell you a story… A couple weekends ago, I went for a hike in the National Forest by my house on a section of the Continental Divide Trail. If you’re not familiar, the Continental Divide Trail is 3,100 miles long and it runs from Mexico to Canada along the Continental Divide (hence the name) — it goes through Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico, and it usually takes people about SIX MONTHS to hike it. I was with my friends Cindy and Kathy, and we met a girl – probably 21-22 years old, from Chicago – who was hiking the trail by herself. Yep, she was hiking all the way to Canada ALONE. We were the first humans she’d seen in days, and she was SO happy to see us – she asked if she could walk with us to the trailhead, which of course, we said yes, and she chatted away the entire time peppering us with questions about our lives and what it was like to live in Wyoming – I’m pretty sure she knows my friend Cindy’s entire life story now, and might have earned herself an invite to Thanksgiving dinner at Cindy’s house. Anyway, after meeting this hiker, her story and what she is doing really stuck with me. For the next few days, I just sat with the idea of hiking such a long distance. What was it like to start such a journey? Probably scary, exciting, full of rookie mistakes, and figuring things out. What was the day to day like? Probably some days were harder than others, probably full of reminding yourself to focus on the trail in front of you, putting one foot in front of the other and just focusing on that next step. What was it like to finish such a journey? It’s hard to imagine, but I’m willing to bet a person feels an undeniable sense of pride and accomplishment. Six months of little steps forward propelled you 3,100 miles up mountains, down through valleys, across deserts and plains until you accomplish what you set out to do. As I thought about all of this, I couldn’t help but draw about a million life lessons from it all.  There is one thought that sticks with me that applies to all of us, as I think about hosting this podcast, and about you, as the nonprofit leader… Life is a long journey.  And if something isn’t working and you know you can fix it, you do. I have gotten to know you over the last year and I learned that while you listen to