Permission to Believe

Seems to me that there are many ways to hear the voice of God.  Sometimes it’s through nature, as in this magnificent Cottonwood tree that engages me in “conversation” as I walk through Mill Pond Park.  Sometimes it’s through dreams or art experiences, inspirational speeches or readings.  And sometimes it’s through the internet! 

Ever since I returned from retreat in Colorado in late August, I’ve been on a heightened path of discovery as I yearn to hear the story of who I am, what my mission is and how I proceed with this next phase of my life.  It’s as if a familiar door has opened just a bit wider than usual to reveal the obvious connections between the different “rooms” in my life, such as the clay wee folk, simplicity, storytelling, spirit, creativity, teaching, expression and service. 

What triggered this new burst of inquiry was a conversation that I had about Crazy Wisdom, Wise Fools and the Trickster Myths.  Something there was calling my name.  I wanted to learn more.  As I went from one website to another looking for relevant info about those topics, I was sidetracked into other areas (YOU know how it goes!) until I temporarily forgot what I was searching for and ended up in a different area altogether.  As I did so, one of the things that struck me was how much joy, life and creativity some people exhibited through their websites.  I was so inspired, and I wondered, why do I put limitations on my own imagination?”

 Instead of feeling overwhelmed, which I have tended to do in the past, I have been using these websites as part of my own Curriculum of Possibilities, with these people as my private mentors, so to speak, as they teach me what it means to show up, to be present, to be true – or at least that’s how it seems to me. 

Last night in a conversation with a friend we were talking about how important it is to BELIEVE in our own gifts and abilities, in ourselves, that without that belief we remain stuck in our limitations.  We struggle.  We strive.  We compare, feel less than, or not able.   And so we don’t.

And how do we get past those limitations and become believers?  How can we be healed of our unbelief?  How do we stay open to positive, creative possibilities day after day after day after day, even in the midst of what may seem to be limitations and roadblocks? 

Here are a few answers that come to me at this moment.  PLEASE ADD TO THIS LIST, if you like, in the comment section:

• Ask for help.
• Find spiritual mentors and/or teachers who model a belief in possibilities.
• Keep company with friends who believe in possibilities, who are creatively engaged in life.
• Give yourself permission to believe that it’s OK to believe in yourself.
• Tell yourself that what you do DOES make a difference to the world.
• Tell yourself that again until you do believe it!
• Ask yourself what you care about?
• Listen to yourself.
• Be willing to dream BIG.
• Envision yourself doing those things that you love, about which you have passion.
• Learn and master new skills so that you are equipped to follow through with your vision.
• Give yourself permission to make mistakes.
• Have courage. 
• Take calculated risks.
• Show yourself and others what you can do.
• Forgive yourself – and others.
• Laugh.  Dance.  Sing.
• Take a break and get a little perspective.
• Don’t take yourself so seriously.
• Take yourself seriously.
• Laugh, dance and sing some more.
• Keep company with people who give you honest AND positive feedback about yourself.
• Ask for help.
• Ask again.
• Remember that life is a journey, not a competition.
• Give thanks for the journey.

Gathering Seeds

It’s nearly fall.  This long summer of cool sunshine with bursts of rain-fed growth is coming to a close.  One can smell it in the cool mornings and see it in the drooping yellow of the morning glory leaves.  Have I done enough watering and fertilizing, deadheading and pruning, thinning and hoeing of my summer experiences in order to yield abundant inspiration for the coming winter of my artisitic production?  I think I have.

Just last week I was in the rocky mountains where I absorbed the changing shapes and colors of the sky.  I spied the watchful disinterest of a mother moose as she and her single offspring grazed among the yellowing poplars.  I saw the splashing of the trout at sunset as I stood silently among the river willow and the waving grasses.  I heard the call of the heron and the rasping of the Kingfisher as they flew above the marsh.  And today, with Dan, I walked along Lake Marion and saw how man has changed the landscape with his MacMansion Houses and clean-swept paths, and yet the Sandpipers still return and stop to visit on their migration south to warmer places.

It’s also in spring and summer that I have the most contact with students as they travel by plane and car, and sometimes foot, to take classes at my Center for Creative Arts in Jordan, Minnesota.  They share their stories, their struggles to create a vision that only they can see, their laughter and, once in awhile, their tears.  These things make their way into my heart and soul to become the seeds and fruit that, in winter, I will withdraw as colors, forms and texture to place into my art.

I can hardly wait to begin this more quiet time of fall and winter when I will take the time to look within and see what it is that spirit has to say through me and through my art.  I have a renewed sense that we as artists are hollow bones through which the world, and spirit, does its speaking. 

Welcome fall.  Welcome cold.  Welcome the windows and the doors that open and close and open again to reveal a new song.

Hearing the Hum

The world – or at least my corner of it – is humming today with the sounds and abundant energy of spring. And that kind of energy, spring energy, is full of hope and trust and thrust. It trusts that the seeds planted today WILL turn into succulent ears of corn come fall, and that the nest built so precariously in the crook of the crabapple tree WILL sustain itself long enough to shelter a new brood of robins into being.

Now I’ve been in this world long enough to know that sometimes the corn does dry up and wither in the heat of July. And sometimes a windstorm, or the neighbor’s tabby cat, does leave the nest – and its contents – splattered on the sidewalk. But without that hope and trust and bone-deep, spirit-filled belief in life, this world would come to a crunching halt.

My question today, as I listen to the hum within my own being, is whether to choose to align myself with spring energy or with that of fall?

“All my life’s a circle”, and “To everything there is a season …”, and yet might I also choose to see my big-life picture as one of spring energy? Trusting. Believing. Building. Doing. Knowing. And still humming along? Always? Forever?

Humming the World into Being

At the end of my last post I talked about defining the word creative, and how the phrase “I want to be more creative” is used to cover many different yearnings.  You probably already figured out that all of the expressions on the list are mine.  Yup.  It’s true.  I confess.  

But the idea that most absorbs me is the yearning to be more innovative and original.  There’s a trap there, though, for to use the words innovative and original could imply that the work is created in a vacuum, with no influence from the rest of the world, and I know that’s not possible.  The broader my knowledge is of the world of art and design, the more I am able to pick out possible influences and relationships between designs – and designers.  

So I’m going to use a phrase, rather than the words innovative or original, to express my creative goal.  What I strive for is to imbue my work with “the quality of being alive”.  For me that means that there is an energy inherent in the piece, due to a combination of factors, that calls forth an answering hum within me.  When that hum starts a-humming, then I know that I’m immersed in the creative process. 

Inherent within this definition of creativity is the acceptance that ”there’s different strokes for different folks” , so what makes me hum may leave you cold.  And that’s OK.  I suspect that the same would be true of any other definition or description.  When I look at or listen to a work of art that calls forth a response from within me, that makes me stop and smile, or cry, or think or chuckle or stand still with awe, then it has established a relationship with me, just as if it were alive.  Which it is – to me at least.

I believe that some day it will be common to see vibrational energy, just as today we see trees or flowers or each other’s faces.   If I am still around, I would be curious to “see” if a copy of a masterpiece, such as the Mona Lisa, would have the same vibrational energy as daVinci’s original.  And I wonder if my work that I do for hire would have the same energy as a work that I created from within the midst of humming.

Well, I’m off to do some humming. 

Talk to you later,

Maureen

Creativity Revisited

Remembering

Last Sunday Dan and I hung my most recent collection of work at the Fireroast Mountain Cafe in Minneapolis, MN, which is about 35 miles north of where my retreat center is located. I loved hanging the show, and not just because of the great coffee that they gave us as we worked! I don’t regularly sell my work at art fairs or galleries – other than the one at Maureen’s – so this yearly show is an opportunity for me to step back and see what I’ve been doing in the past year – what has held my interest – what direction my thoughts are flowing – where I might be heading in the coming year.

As I looked at the show, whose theme is About Faces, I saw that I had stayed true to my January 29, 2008 post where I said that I am willing to accept that I have the right, and the need, to walk along a line that threads its way between varying degrees of opposites. For there on the wall, not too far from each other, were my serene driftwood sculpture, titled Remembering, and my funny little elves, titled A Secret Place, who were hiding in a shoe. And I loved both sculptures. Both portray part of the story that is me – and how I view the world – yet they surely were opposites in terms of style.

While I liked the selection of pieces that I chose for the show, I also missed the pieces that were still in my mind, not yet created.  Seems that I always have more ideas than time or skills or courage – or lack of it – allow me to produce.  As a result I usually have to step back a bit from my work in order to feel “successful” at meeting my goals – of being true to my creative vision.  Which brings me to the subject of creativity.

Recently I have been having conversations with a group of fellow artists about creativity, what it is and how it is expressed, encouraged, nurtured and honored.