The stories we share with ourselves and others are important – the ones we hold space for now and in the future can be powerful. And then there are the stories we don’t share, dare not share and/or aren’t even aware we have to begin with.
If I was a fish
and I swam among the stars
what
The paper calendar is a work of art, a journal of a kind, a noble beast to sit at our side. We feed it with our words, with the people we want to connect with, with appointments, and ideas we don’t want to forget.
For those of you trying to recreate my recipe, please be aware that I’m really not sure of the exact measures … For this recipe, I might have used a lot more than 1 1/4 cups of whipped courage or will by the time I have published. And for a book of this kind the mixing – how you put the ingredients together – is important and has everything to do with our individual process as writers, artists, and human beings.
My shadow waves back at me as if to say hello. It beckons me to be playful, to stop and share, to consider and reflect, to become more open minded. Shadows are varying shades of grey, they are metaphorical, they follow you and they light the path. They are long and short. The distort and they eccentuate. Shadows ask us to drop assumptions, or see or do something new – they invite inspection.
Are the stories you’re sharing and listening to personal stories? What stories do we share that are not personal?
How can we bring fresh eyes and ears to a project or to our loved ones, friends, clients, co-workers, and to our growing and changing selves? Basically what we need to do is to keep looking for new things, keep discovering – even in the routine – a new way of looking, seeing and being. I know this and still was fooled recently …
You’ve read it over a hundred times, or you haven’t proofed it once – in either case here’s my favorite proof reading, editing and perspective taking tip. It’s simple, doable and quick – read your book, article, text, email, speech or blog aloud …. this tip adds just enough to help the written word leap off the page so we can see it anew. Here are some examples:
Tree Play is a tool I developed to help me, in a playful way, keep track of my projects and accomplishments and build a little play into my day. I still use it for that purpose, and it has turned into so much more.
