For a few moments, let your imagination run free.  You are going to throw a dinner party and you can invite anyone in the entire world – anyone whom you’d like to spend time with. 

Who Would You Invite?

You might start by dreaming up the categories of people you’d like to invite.   Will you invite friends?  Family?  Artists?  Actors?  Political leaders?  Religious leaders?  Celebrities?  Athletes?  Maybe you’ll combine categories. 

Will you want it to be an intimate dinner for two or a party of four or eight . . . maybe even more? 

Now, to add a bit of zing, you may decide to only include the people you most admire . . . living or dead.  That’s right, you might open your gathering up to include people who came before.  If you do that, you might consider Christ, Cleopatra or Johnny Carson. 

What Will You Serve?

You are hosting the event, what will it be like?  What will your guests experience?  How will it be memorable?  Will it mostly be conversation with just a bite to eat or will you create a fabulous meal?  Will you play games?  What about the music?

And, we certainly can’t forget, what will you wear?  Will it be something special so everyone recognizes you as the host?  Or, will you wear something to blend in?

What Will You Talk About?

There’s a reason for your choice of guests, what is that reason?  Your reasons may even become a part of the conversation.  Do you have questions for the people you plan to invite?  What do you want to know at the end of the event that you didn’t at its start? 

How will you turn the conversation so your desired subjects are included?  Will you kick everything off with a welcoming few words?

Time to Say Goodbye

Will you know when it’s time to say goodbye?  How will you feel at the end of your time together?  What will your dinner party have done for you?  What will it have done for your guests?  What will they be saying at the time of their departure?

In the end

In the end, you may wonder why on earth we’d go through this kind of an exercise.  Not only is it a pleasing mental exercise, it’s also illuminating.  It tells you about you; it fills in some of the details of what makes you happy.