Joey Garcia’s leap year guide to using those extra 24 hours for good

The earth's do-si-do around the sun takes 365 days and six hours, so every four years the Gregorian calendar plays catch-up by adding one day.

In addition to tacking an extra day on to the calendar, leap day, February 29, is also well-known as an opportunity to flip old-school gender roles. For example, in the 19th century, women were encouraged to ask men for dates, or even propose marriage.

Since then, however, we’ve obviously come a long way, baby.

Need inspiration for a leap of faith, a leap of logic, a leap to love or a leap to consciousness? Here are three tales of risk-taking to help you spring into action:

Sacramento native Laura Cardinali, 23, was single and studying conflict mediation in Sweden when she unexpectedly became pregnant. She married, gave birth to a daughter and then, to a movement. Last November, Cardinali launched Reproductive Justice Hour, a free monthly gathering where young professional women can talk openly about reproductive health. Similar programs around the country are happy hour-centric mixers, but Cardinali created RJ Hour true to her social justice roots. Held in various coffee houses and bars, Sac's RJ Hour features speakers, question and answer sessions and, of course, socializing. Topics have included “Islamophobia and Reproductive Health” and “What a Sex Worker Can Teach Us About the Empowered Sexual Experience.”

The diverse nature of the topics have, not surprisingly, brought about impassioned debates, Cardinali says.

“Even in the RJ movement, pointing out the spectrum from pregnancy, to pro-life, to pro-choice to old age is controversial,” she says. “People think RJ should just be about abortion. I believe in the full spectrum of the reproductive narrative. Women should be empowered to be healthy.”

Cardinali is planning a three-day training in April to help women understand federal and state laws that protect their medical rights.

“We need to give the power back to people. We call it health care—care—but we’re separating people from their bodies. We have no say in how our bodies should be touched or treated,” she says.

Cardinali has traded in her conflict mediation studies and is now training as a doula. The change stemmed from what Cardinali says she saw as the need to get down to the basics of social reform.

“I was drawn to conflict mediation because I wanted justice in the world. But conflict mediation didn’t get to the root of why countries are in war or conflict,”she says. “The most efficient and proactive way to solve these problems starts with reproductive justice for women.”

That realization required Cardinali to wrestle free of the anti-abortion values she was raised with so she could be open to all possibilities.

“If my identity had not been so tied to pro-life beliefs, I could have asked, ’When does life really begin?’ and, ’What happens when a woman gets pregnant with a child she can’t afford to support?’ and ’How many people are sexually abused?’”

Cardinali credits her daughter as the inspiration for her advocacy.

“It wasn’t until I became sexually active, got pregnant and chose to become a mother that my reproductive narrative became relevant,” she says.

Tapping into your own experiences, she says, makes it easier to awaken the social conscious.

“My pregnancy helped me understand what spirituality and what social justice really is.”

David Blanchard, 65, left a steady job in the music department of a Catholic school, a seemingly illogical leap for a professional musician. But the exit was motivated by his sudden unwillingness to hide away parts of who he is in order to appear a perfect fit for that gig. “I'm too old to play that game,” he says, chuckling.

Now retired, Blanchard is busier than ever. Blanchard and his husband, Thom Green, just celebrated their 30-year anniversary together. Legally married in 2008, they beat Proposition 8 to the altar. But don’t call him gay.

“I don’t like to say I’m gay, because I’m not a label,” he says. “It’s just the preference I have for sex.”

Blanchard and Green recently co-wrote Left, a reimagining of Lord of the Flies as a musical. It’s dark, he says, and challenging. The jazzy harmonies are difficult to sing, and the music he wrote is pushing him to learn new techniques—despite 60 years of experience as a pianist. “I don’t think I’ve done anything longer than that except eat and breathe,” he says.

Blanchard understands the human hesitation to take risks but doesn’t recommend it. Risk can lead to growth and adventure, he says.

“I think there is too much emphasis on being secure. There’s no security in life, not really. It’s always better when I take a risk and try the next thing.”

Growing up, Mark Adams, 40, learned the home repair trade by working on his father's Bay Area investment properties. But he didn't plan to enter the family business. Determined to be the first college grad in his clan, Adams exceeded his goal, eventually securing two bachelor's degrees from UC Davis, and an MBA from Sacramento State. He says his dream was to catapult up the corporate ladder and into a top spot. But while working at Hewlett-Packard in 2003, he had a rough awakening.

“I thought companies were loyal to their employees. Then Carly Fiorina came in as CEO, and let’s just say I saw things happen to people I never expected to see.”

His division was closed but he was offered an out-of-state move with the company. While Adams and his wife prayerfully considered options, he donated 16 hours of handyman services to an Ebony Ski & Racquetball Club fundraiser auction. When the package sold for $800, Adams realized his prayers were answered. “I’m a strong believer in God, in declarations of victory, and writing down where you want to go,” he says. He stuck a ladder in his 1980 El Camino and started a handyman business. Now a licensed contractor, Adams employs 10 people in his West Sacramento-based AHI Construction.

The takeaway lesson? “When you take a leap of faith, the universe will pay you back.”

Shed old beliefs and raise your consciousness, decide that age is irrelevant and push deeper into your creativity, or believe in a power greater than yourself and leap into a career than truly suits you. Let leap day 2016 be your launch pad into something magnificent and surprising—even to you.