Month: May 2011

What is the only inevitable thing in your life? You will die. everything else between birth and death is not inevitable.
You may think you know what will happen based on past experience, but anything could happen at any minute.

I was thinking about a woman and her child who were playing on a beach in San Francisco not very long ago. A rogue wave(they called it) came in and they were both swept out to sea. Just like that. Or think of those people just minding their business when the earthquake started shaking the ground and everything went flying and crashing down.

Well there are tons of examples of things that go wrong on any given day. But we forget about that almost immediately and have this sense of nothing bad will happen again. What it should do is make you fearless. We don’t have to worry that our plan might not work. Everything might not work. The best thing is to trust that no matter what happens you will be ok.

We all have a defined time between living and dying. I believe it is preordained. So did Stonewall Jackson. he would ride right into battle without a care. And then the ironic thing is his own men killed him thinking he was the enemy. He knew it, you know it too on some level, worrying does not add one day to your life. Make sure the afterlife is squared away and this life should be worry free. You have to meditate on this a long time to get it in your brain, but it is ultra true.

The goal is not the be-all and end-all. Every step before you attain your goal is Life.  The Chinese proverb “a journey of a thousand miles is started with a single step” – well that is what I am talking about – all the steps.  The steps are just going somewhere but where they are going is not as important as the steps themselves. That is where we thrash about and grow and live and prosper. We don’t have to despise the steps before the goal.

The goal is just another step that we have ordained.  The goal itself is really just another step.   Stepping out in living stepping up the pace. stepping out in faith. all these phrases we use. Love your steps.

I remember a story about Kirk Douglas. He had attained fame and he was looking at a little apartment that he had rented when he first came to Hollywood. He said it was more fun then when he was all dreams and no results yet.
Reaching goals is fun for about 10 seconds and then you have to make a new one so don’t idolize goals too much. they are but a vapor. disappearing in the breeze as quickly as you see it.

But the struggle.  Ah, yes.  That is the great thing.

I went to a panel discussion on Creativity. The panelists were a successful singer songwriter, an art critic, a guy who started a branding company, a guy who started a successful poster designer company, a genius 11 year old girl who took amazing pictures. and a dance company owner.

They were the creative ones in the room.

They told how they were creative and what it is like. It was pretty interesting except when they got to the part about how some jobs were not creative, they mentioned engineer, and plumber and service type jobs.

I did not say anything but just sat there taking it all in.

I disagree after thinking it over.

Saying you are a creative type and someone else is not is profoundly wrong. We are all creative, just in different ways.

Take my Mom for example. She would run away if you asked her to be in a creative group. She would run screaming away.

But she is profoundly creative. She makes soup that you would not believe. She starts with a recipe then leaves the pages behind and begins to improvise. Her soups have a taste that is so extraordinary and unique she could open a store and have a line out the door.

But she only makes them for her family. She can never give you the recipe because she alters everything so much each time that you never have the same soup twice. She is a soup genius.

Yet she would say she is not creative.

My husband can fix anything in the house and he never went to school to learn that. He generally eschews directions and rarely reads them yet he manages to be able to do anything doable without any guidance. He is creative in that way. He also can design structures that are so unique I am sure he could open a shop and do that for people.

My webmaster works all the time on my website designing new and interesting ways to make the site interesting. He is profoundly creative. His wife designs and sews projects for me that are absolutely wonderful.

Yet they call me the creative one. I am the artist.

I disagree. We all seem to have the same amount of creativity. We are creative because God is creative. It is His gift to us. Think about that today as you go about your incredibly creative life. Look for the genius in you.

 

 

Find out about Cheri Obrien in the Art Club menu (top right).

Soap Lake has a lot of rocks. they are Lava rocks and are everywhere you look. Climbing up a rocky hill can be tricky as you slide down every few steps. one step up and slide down three.
You have to keep going up and try again.
It is a weird feeling to be falling down a lot. just cant get the momentum to go straight up.
It is like climbing a mountain of marbles.
There is something else like that.
new ideas.
you get one and it seems easy enough and totally doable but then here comes the slide when you experience the reality of playing out your plan. some things are beyond our control and will slide you down. but you cannot tell when that will happen . You just cant see the unstable places until you place your weight on them. When you find them you are already sliding down the hill again.
But what is the most true thing is this. You are going up the hill in the first place because it is tricky. anyone can go up a grassy hill.
But climbing up a marble rock hill is way way way more fun.
It seems impossible but eventually you get to enough steady rocks to get up. You have to figure out ways to trick the rocks to overcome the slide. you have to use your whole body to get up. You have to get cut up a little and you have to be scared a little when you look down but when you are done it is very satisfying. and you want to do it again.
so even though you have to redo your idea a million times to make it work. that is the fun of it. climb that hill ,beat that sucker down. You Can do it. eventually! what is the alternative. look at the hill your whole life. and then die!