6 Insights into Falling Back in love with your work, creative practice and life.

Every so often, I hear from an artist friend or in the pages of my studio journal, as sense that our work as artists is boring or repetitive, or not all that interesting. I’ve heard this from artist’s whose work delights and inspires me and many others. I’ve also seen and felt how these thoughts can feel paralyzing. 

We may look at one body of work and think: I love this, but it was too easy to make, too much fun, too simple, doesn’t have consequence, doesn’t address an injustice, isn’t clever….

or similar stories. 

It’s a little like how you might feel about your hair: It’s frizzy. It’s flat and lifeless! It’s oily as soon as I wash it! I don’t have any! It’s heavy, thick and weird! It’s graying, it’s thinning, it’s such a blah color. 

Whatever you do with it, your hair is your hair. Even if you’re bald, it is what it is. It’s what you have. Art and Hair: not always in our control.

When a friend of mine expressed her relief at finally deciding to let her hair be: go grey, look like it does, it was uplifting and liberating to me too. 

As for art, the fact is, I can’t make someone else’s work, and if I try, it’s not going to go well. I can learn from them, try out a technique, but if I’m being honest in the work, genuine and deeply engaging the work, it’s going to be singular. And what it is, is independent of me and whatever I think about it. 

From this meandering thought trail, I pull a few insights:
1) I am not my artwork. I am not what people think of my work. I am powerless to change or even truly know what others think of it. Some people will like it, some people won’t, it is what it is, on any level of notoriety or obscurity.

2) I am the steward of my work, it’s foster parent, and it’s my job to honor, care for it, and see it. To be curious about it and learn from it, to show up for it as best I can, which’ll be human, imperfect and OK.

3. Genuineness and your relationship to work comes through, so explore, discover, and pay attention to what you enjoy doing, what you love to do, OR, what you feel you need to do to see something through, or to break through to something else which is sometimes the case. 

4. It’s not always fun or pleasant, nor does the work always come together - but the messes themselves have great things to show and to tell you.

5. Want what you have, and practice this as a discipline to enjoy your life and work and creative practice more. Wanting what you have is a discipline that helps you feel lighter, clearer and more in love with what’s actually here in your life. Do this by becoming curious and playing with this line of inquiry:

What’s happening here?
I wonder where this’ll go?
Hmmm. Now this is happening!
What do I appreciate and enjoy in my life?
(Nothing is the answer that will make you feel the worst so dig a little deeper and come up with something)

6. When you see something amazing in anothers artwork, life or career, see it as something your heart is waking up to in your own life, something being remembered about who you are and your inherent worth and abundance, and say YES, THAT. That’s amazing. I choose THAT! from the catalogue of life experience. I am open to experiencing that in my own life. 

Prior to this practice, it might feel somewhat like an impoverished, smouldering jealousy, comparison or rejection of that other. For an easier experience, see it as a mirror. This plane we live on is dynamic and collaborative. Your part is to know what sparks joy in your life, art and in others.

And further, even if it’s scary, practice the expression of appreciation and gratitude to others. You may find as you do your heart expanding, relating, connecting and serving, instead of - as was my case for much of my twenties, contracting, retreating, judging, comparing, hiding and becoming brittle in the comfort of familiar and inaccurate stories.

With the normalized practice of awareness - not the zen-stylized kind with rice paper and bells, but simply: Oh, here I am seeing something. Here’s driving. Here’s noticing. Here’s irritation. Here’s tiredness. or, What do the hands feel like right now? or noticing, warm water, clinking dishes, bubbles. 

The more that : awareness - becomes normal in my world and life, something entertaining starts to take place. 

When say, at a family holiday gathering someone does or says some outrageous but predictable thing, flossing with a plucked hair or trying earnestly to set you up with your second cousin, or something less interesting like a stony silence from your child when you thought all was well…

When this type of ‘thing’ happens, for some reason the phrase that springs to mind recently is: And now This is happening!

This phrase has a surprisingly humorous and helpful effect: It has within it a sense of engagement, interest and also a kind of acceptance built into it. 

Try it right now: And now This is happening! 
Look around and see what ‘this’ is. 

An empty room with a reasonably quiet refrigerator running within earshot.

And now This is happening.

The urge to pee or an ache somewhere. 

This occasionally thought phrase is so easy, and it’d be easy to read about and consider but not try. Try it! Try it for 5 minutes and see if your lie doesn’t take on even a quality of simple interest, dare I suggest even a playful, creative engagement. 
It's also fun to do while working on a creative project: the paint spilled or the colors ran into each other. It dried funny, or something went not according to plan... And now This ​is happening...

The holidays are challenging. 
1)There’s festivity pumped into everything like hormones into a purdue chicken.
2)There are genuine invitations to celebrate, give and receive, mixed in confusingly with the corporate branded version
3)There’s just a tremendous amount of PAIN - layers of painful memory, loss, violence, loneliness and disappointment circulating through the pepperminty air. 

It’s a confusing time. A pressure cooker for many. A lot of socializing for some, when being alone is often preferred and needed, and not enough connection for many many others, accompanied by feelings of unlovability, resentment, hopelessness or grief. 

Every year the holiday season has it’s own special flavor, according to the life events that befall us all in different ways, times and degrees. 

I have found it useful as a general practice in my life, to first Lower my Expectations as much as I can. This heads off disappointment. But to lower my expectations while also Acting As If, things could go smoothly and well. I just won’t cross my arms expecting it to happen where it often has not. 

A phrase or prayer if you like that makes this more actionable is from Chogyam Trungpa and some ancient Tibetan slogans: May I be free from attachment and aversion while still continuing to care. 
Another similar thing I can mutter to myself along the sloggy, jingly sidewalk on my way to that work party: May I act as if it could be fun and enjoyable, while having no expectation that it should or will be. 

I have also found it useful as a general practice in my life for entirely selfish reasons, to notice the details of what is working, what I can feel grateful for: these boots are warm and dry, I am a woman and I get to live alone undisturbed and free, I get to vote, I get to drive as a woman. my socks match, I am holding a warm beverage, I heard from a friend today. 

WHen I can ratchet up this practice a little further to include what really does not feel OK - to have gratitude for that, strangely, it opens up for me a whole new level of freedom.

I don’t find it easy to do this. When the hot water runs out, or there’s a cancelled flight, I have one friend who actually says Thank You to the ether in these moments. I’m not there myself. But I can ask: 

How is this cancelled flight or cold shower the best thing that could be happening right now?

or

What if this is as good as it gets? What if this is the last week of my life? What if I never get that project done or find the right partner? 

When I apply this kind of twisted logic, I find it liberating and empowering. 

I can also preface the situation with And now this is happening! to pipe in a little playful acceptance. 

These lines of inquiry help me to actually consider that maybe I’m right where I’m supposed to be, that all is well, that I’m unimaginably ok, not a hair out of place, even though I wouldn’t choose this and it’s not comfortable. 

If you look back on your life to date, you may also discover this makes sense in retrospect. 

Think of a shitty time in your life. How did it lead to what followed? How has it turned out ok? How was it the best thing that could’ve happened at the time? 

The point isn’t to lie to yourself or to be fake. The value I find is in the reframe. The loosening of the calcified familiar story for something unknown, open and dynamic. 

Last night, I hauled and dragged a christmas tree four blocks to my house. When I got there, I kicked the halloween pumpkin, which had been disemboweled by a single-minded, grapefruit-shaped squirrel, off the stoop into a bush. Time for new seasonal holiday flora. 

The tree is now up, wrapped in lights and covered in the sparkly sentiment of ornaments. I keep looking at it surprised, like: How did that get there, all decorated? I do remember one-pointedly deciding to go for it, get a tree and decorate it last night, and being in motion for a couple of hours, but somehow it still surprises me that at some times, a thing is not there, then it is. And even more surprising, I’m the one that brought it there and set it up. 

Everything is kind of like this: a fluid action of things arising and passing away. Last summer, after leaving the 2017 tree to dry out back, I limbed and fast-burned its crackly remains in our fire pit. Now its ash beneath ash 10 inches or so down, currently being covered with snow - freed gases long gone. All the summer fires: where are they now?    .....

I am knee deep in this book project on the Elements. It’s the third book, it is currently being crowdfunded, and I’m going to share in a little more detail with you about what’ll be inside and where I’m at with it. 
I have completed all of the artwork for the book. There are two sets of drawings, one completely monochrome, silent and abstract, and the other vibrant and descriptive of each element. The monochrome works on paper are in the Element Index section. The vibrant, colorful, descriptive drawings are in the Element Sketch section.    .....

Last year, I made my first, limited edition calendar. It was so much fun to share, to infiltrate your walls in a new way, that I’ve done it again! This may become a tradition folks. 

This year’s calendar Time is Color 2019  features my own selection of favorite works on paper, most are ink and graphite on paper. I had great fun selecting and then pairing the images with each month of the year. Also, I listened! and learned from last year that y’all want boxes for your days so you can keep track o’stuff, instead of just elegant and floating numbers. So boxes you’re getting!      .....

My life has been included times of extreme, big, scary, and sometimes all-at-once change.

Three times, I’ve lost a job, a relationship, and had to move within the span of a week. Can you relate? Certain things have been constants. Family nearby and an art practice I’ve always had. Last year I moved half way across the country, and now family is far away too: The world itself appears to be going through relentless unfolding processes, losses, big shifts in understanding, incredible challenges: big effin’ change.
This summer I’m taking some major action on things I’ve dreamed about for several years, chewed on, but never seen a way to make happen. In the last month I’ve begun learning how I might Scale Up by doing these 8 things:

• build an online learning community on how to collaborate with the universe
• finally make ebooks for books 1 and 2
• share my third book, and raise funds for its printing in this fall
• present my books at art book fairs in the region this fall
• find sales reps for my books, and an editor for this new one
• expand my coaching commitment and offerings
• do these things while maintaining a spacious, abundant feeling: A life that prioritizes relationships, genuineness and presence.

What has kept me from diving into this stuff before, as far as I can tell, has been fear, overwhelm, distraction and inertia, a rich inheritance of these. Picture a little Roz Chast character in my head throwing up her hands.
I’m sharing this post with you because this is one on a long list of scary things I’m doing right now to get honest and stay accountable. I’m managing my time in a more specific way, working up the nerve to share things via video, re-alphabetizing a lot of index cards and solving strange problems. I’m also listening to people to whom I can’t relate very much, who share what they did to find their audience, and taking their suggestions. I’m showing up to practice what it feels like to be seen going through this, instead of only sharing the finished product as if it was seamless and delightful to pull together.

7 Reasons Why I’m Doing This
1. What I have to share is genuinely, practically useful, tested and delivered uniquely.
2. I’m here to share what I make. Why not master the sharing part?
3. I’m curious and interested to see what’s going to happen. I know what happens if I do things the way I’ve always done them. What if I go about it full boar instead of half-assedly?
4. I like learning, and man, is there a steep learning curve right now! Every day, I’ve got about 8 new major questions to answer. It’s a self imposed boot camp.
5. It says in some 12-step literature I value: I can’t transmit something I haven’t got. Anywhere I’m staying small and Eeyore-esque, is an area where I’m not able to be useful to others.
6. Freedom. Did I mention? I don’t do anyone any favors by staying small.
7. My success is your success, and your success is mine. Somehow, it really comes down to my relationship to you. I don’t understand why or how, but it’s clear to me that I’m not supposed to, and can’t do this without you. We are deeply, all of us, interconnected. I’m swashbuckling through new territory and so are you. You can steer me clear of the ditches as I share practical process, metaphor and creative work to support you right back.
By sharing this with you, I’m taking a risk, but I’m also hoping that you will keep me accountable, human, and honest throughout. Sometimes I may have to be honest about being full of shit. Or thinking something was a good idea that turned out not to be. But I won’t be alone. We’re like a field of daffodils, all opening under the same sun, interwoven and strong in a root system that is our collective.
As I do this, I’d love to hear from you, support your conversation with one another, and know what you value. I want to be responsive and in conversation with you.
What edge are you working right now? How uncomfortable is it? What/who is supporting you through this transformation? How are you caring for yourself? Why are you committed to this change?

​

I came across this short film about the profound impact that turning and seeing the earth from space has had on astronauts: The fragile bubble of atmosphere that we see down here is described as endless, impervious blue sky, the profound aliveness of the planet itself, its backdrop, it's indivisibility. They describe an experience of looking into a cosmic mirror - and the open, awake quality revealed through spiritual inquiry and meditation for many hundreds of years.
​It's worth a watch!

The other day Guy brought home water balloons. He sometimes does this: gets something plasticky and colorful at the dollar store that brings him an inordinate amount of delight. He wanted to play catch with them after filling them up with hose water, as one does.
As we stood there, barefoot on the lawn, I had a visceral memory of being 8 or 7 or 10 with my cousins up in Maine, standing around absorbed in a mission, out in the grass and heat.
I had had a crappy day working on some new business strategies and feeling a little bit like a fish out of water. What I excel at is coloring, drawing, zoning out and looking out at the leaves fluttering in a tree; less so the roll-up-your-sleeves and get-in-there and fall-down-and-get-up-again attitude of much of the business world. And yet I am a business owner, and lately have taken seriously the notion that it’s up to me to care for and run the business as professionally as I can. 
The game was to toss the water balloon back and forth, and to take a step away from each other with each turn, like a colorful and wet version of Russian Roulette. At first I noticed that my teeth clenched every time I went to catch the balloon, as if in anticipation of something bad. Not only does that make my neck veins pop out and my face look like a scary, cornered, feral animal, the clenching is unpleasant and a waste of valuable life energy. The body automatically reacted this way, but it's the mind's faulty logic that imagines this kind of contraction to be in any way helpful. It's saying to the body: Brace yourself, this could be bad...
So I began to play around with consciously doing something else with this face and body of mine. With the full threat of balloon breakage upon me, and the body on edge, I tried bouncing a little side to side, lowering the shoulders and softening the face a little bit, and even putting a something between a smile and a slack jaw expression on my face instead to see how that felt. 
As a kid I was always the sensitive one: running away and crying, easily hurt, even though I was pretty tom boyish. Of my cousins I was probably the least rugged, as well as the youngest. I found myself often sniffling in a corner, feeling lonely, after an outburst. 
Consciously softening and lightening my face muscles while reaching up to receive this water balloon that might instantly explode was a great metaphor for how to ‘be’ with all these scary new things I’m trying professionally.  
I’m not sure if it’s true but right now I seem to be getting the message that I need to move out of my comfort zone if I want things to change. That includes the real possibility of visibly falling on my face, skinning knees, bee stings, and having the next water balloon explode all over me. And even the possibility of having bystanders point and laugh. 
Giggles, camaraderie, and expanded sense of possibility may accompany that next bursting balloon.

​

This summer is different. I don’t recognize the people, places and things that have been a part of my summers since I was about twenty. I thought christmas time was when I’d be missing home, and yes, it was. But this Michigan thing in summer is just plain different. Here there is a lot of water. And subsequently a lot of green. And birds, and a lot fewer traffic jams and cars. And black raspberries littering the sides of parks that no one cares if you pick. But the rituals of summer are nothing like what I’m used to. There’s no ocean here. Lake michigan is 3 hours drive away. Everyone is fishing, and doing lake sports. The boats are different. People aren’t inwardly tortured like Bostonians, more pleasant and open, but yet also still in their struggles like anywhere on this planet.
What I most miss is the friend stopping by, or meeting up in Harvard Square for a stroll, sitting and having an iced tea and swapping stories of the last few months: processing it all, as we do. So in other words, I miss you. Seeing you at BBQs, stopping by my moms to lecture her about something that’s none of my business, and forgetting to pick up the ice before I show up. I also even miss my old smoking neighbor John, and his war to insist on assigned parking spots when there were none. It’s all filed away somewhere, but no longer right here.
So here’s another love letter, to let you know that what’s right around you, and me, right now, won’t stay this way. No matter how boring and forever-seeming it feels. It’s over in a minute.
Look around you like you were just born, forget the names of the objects and the people, like a newborn. I’ll do the same. That way, we’ll be together in that open field, no longer under the story and sway of small, alone, separate selves.

Today I found something unexpected while I was gardening. While flailing a hand scythe into clumps of grass and clearing out dead leaves in a neglected box garden, I discovered a baby bunny the size of an avocado sheltering under a head of lettuce. He was very still. His eyes were open. He did not move and didn’t appear to tremble. I was moved with cuteness and excitement. I went inside and got my husband; together, we quietly observed him, made supressed squealy noises, then went about our business doing other things. I moved to clear out the other side of the garden box, and there I found this bunny’s baby brother, even smaller (the size of an apple) nestled with his nose in the chives. As I stood there, I recognized a few feet away, a little warren that had been crafted with care out of our thyme bush: a circular tunnel, dusted on the edges with soft bunny fur. Just like that we had a nursery in the middle of our front yard. The whole experience lent a tenderness and a kind of sacredness to what would have otherwise been a glorious afternoon in the sun. It turned into summer just about three days ago.
Later this evening I went out to an art opening with my friend Kirsten. When she picked me up, I ceremoniously shared with her the bunny situation. When she got a peak at them, she also got verklempt with delight and excitement and tenderness. We were very careful not to remove a large dry leaf that I had placed over the first one for shade. There was a hole in the leaf through which we could see the bunny’s eye, still unmoving but very much alive. I went to the art opening and enjoyed it. I spent some time catching up with Kirsten, looking at the art, supporting our friend who had work in the show. It turned into a very social evening. I met a several really nice people. She dropped me off at home at about 8:45 pm, it was still light out here in Michigan. I checked on the bunnies, amazingly they were still right where we left them.
That these little bunnies had not moved in the time where I was networking, looking at art, handing out business cards, trading thoughts and ideas with Kirsten - in all of this human doing, that creature stayed still. I imagine in the bunny world, the mom must have said You stay, you stay right put, don’t make a sound, don’t make a rustle. And I’ll come feed you tonight after dark. It looked almost as if the bunnies were hibernating or in stand-by mode. Their eyes were open, there was an alertness, but there was no trembling, and no darting about going on.
When I came home, there they were. Presence itself. Just there. Like the face or the form of eternity in which all comings and goings are held. All over this neighborhood and town, bunnies are nestled, still, hidden - animals alert and unmoving, a wider presence than the mind can hold.

​

When birding with others, everyone looks together. Each of us sees different things, and the quality is open, observant, quiet, and quite sociable at the same time. It’s one of the only kinds of crowds I enjoy. Birders help each other hear, see and learn birds. They describe in extreme detail where: up the tree and at 4 o’clock, and next to that dead branch and then over six feet , then look straight through where those two leaves are. Do you see him? Or listen: do you hear that? That’s a warbling vireo! Information travels from one birder to another like a warbler from branch to branch.
Some of us are strong spotters and others know the songs and calls. Some have failing eyesight but know the markings of a species, or the flight behavior of a particular bird.
In birding, the senses open up and alertness mingles with connection: to people and to the larger stream of wind and temperature and conditions that bring in birds, and the bird nerds walking beside me. During spring migration, at times, the wind blows the birds down, or the heat swells from the south and a cloud of new birds float in. It’s extraordinary.
A birding posse is like one organism with many pairs of eyes, many ears and a wealth and history of knowledge, all pooled together in a slow moving, disorganized cloud. If you’re not a birder, it can be extremely irritating: everyone stops for 5 to 30 minutes about every 20 feet. Yet it’s a very unusual way to spend time with other beings: both the birds and people. Everyone loses a track of time and the world beyond the immediate senses.
When I go to certain parks on my own, I will inevitably encounter someone with a pair of binoculars, or a few people, and we share our sightings and what we’ve heard. The park becomes lit up with shared experience and community, all in reverence to the incredible variety of birds that land and move and dive and jump as the light and conditions prompt them.
Yesterday I saw over thirty blue jays in migration overhead. I usually think of the Blue Jay as a showy, loud and slightly manic backyard bird. As a community however, in a shared pursuit, I felt a new respect. My neck certainly hurts from craning up so much toward the tree tops (a condition called warbler neck), but I’m ok with that. I am more than just me when I bird with others, connecting with the more than just one bird, part of the phenomena of spring migration.

​

Here’s a piece of personal trivia for you: I have been coaching creative pioneers of many stripes, one on one and in groups for eleven years.
For some reason I’ve wanted deeply to compartmentalize this fact.
I’ve always loved the incredible, alive, one-on-one work of coaching, and it’s always felt natural and spot on. It’s been squirrely-feeling however, to share this openly. What I’m learning is that letting myself be more fully seen, sharing my fears and aspirations with people I trust, is grounds for closeness, intimacy and support, rather than judgement.
I call coaching the reflecting pool project, because I believe each human being is meant to be that for each other: a reflecting pool. It is a simple, beautiful and universal process: that’s what’s so rare about the space of coaching. We prize simplicity and reflection but find it very difficult to hang out in.
The coaching space is designed with a kind of feng shui about it. It keeps the lines clean and the airwaves open and clear. It’s a very disciplined form of communication; there’s a beautiful give and take in the way that my clients and I communicate with one another as their path through the sessions unfolds. What I do is quite rare, yet through the training and framework of coaching, it becomes a more natural way for my clients to relate to themselves, and to hold space for others. This work is sacred and its pure and it's powerful. No matter how hoaky the word coach might be, it’s a profound and transformative process we undertake together. Sharing this truth, being straightforward and honest about what I do, is freeing. I don’t have to cower. I don’t have to wait frozen under a little lettuce leaf like the bunny I found in my garden. His mom told him: You wait here until I come find you, don’t move a muscle, I’ll be back tonight. Theres a kind of faith in what that bunny’s doing. It’s a program running in the bunny. And at the same time, if I were to quote that as my inner voice: Don’t move a muscle, It would come from a place of fear.
Due to the bunny voice, I haven’t loved sharing this news, but here’s how I’m doing that now: I share what I do, I slow down, I take my time. When I take what I’m saying seriously, the other people in the room also slow down and hear what I’m saying and take it seriously also. I feel in a way like I’m waking up to myself in a more integrated form. I’m hearing messages in books and conversation right now that emphasize this sentiment None of it really matters, so make your own choices. We don’t get that much more time. Just take a stand for who you are and what you want, and don’t apologize for it. And don’t expect anyone to approve of you. And don’t worry because there’s only you here. 
So that’s it.  I’m a coach people, always have been, always will be. Deal with it. I’m here to serve, AND I’m making space for new clients.
Set up your free thirty minute conditional coaching session now while supplies last.
Learn more here.
​

When birding with others, everyone looks together. Each of us sees different things, and the quality is open, observant, quiet, and quite sociable at the same time. It’s one of the only kinds of crowds I enjoy. Birders help each other hear, see and learn birds. They describe in extreme detail where: up the tree and at 4 o’clock, and next to that dead branch and then over six feet , then look straight through where those two leaves are. Do you see him? Or listen: do you hear that? That’s a warbling vireo! Information travels from one birder to another like a warbler from branch to branch.
Some of us are strong spotters and others know the songs and calls. Some have failing eyesight but know the markings of a species, or the flight behavior of a particular bird.
In birding, the senses open up and alertness mingles with connection: to people and to the larger stream of wind and temperature and conditions that bring in birds, and the bird nerds walking beside me. During spring migration, at times, the wind blows the birds down, or the heat swells from the south and a cloud of new birds float in. It’s extraordinary.
A birding posse is like one organism with many pairs of eyes, many ears and a wealth and history of knowledge, all pooled together in a slow moving, disorganized cloud. If you’re not a birder, it can be extremely irritating: everyone stops for 5 to 30 minutes about every 20 feet. Yet it’s a very unusual way to spend time with other beings: both the birds and people. Everyone loses a track of time and the world beyond the immediate senses.
When I go to certain parks on my own, I will inevitably encounter someone with a pair of binoculars, or a few people, and we share our sightings and what we’ve heard. The park becomes lit up with shared experience and community, all in reverence to the incredible variety of birds that land and move and dive and jump as the light and conditions prompt them.
Yesterday I saw over thirty blue jays in migration overhead. I usually think of the Blue Jay as a showy, loud and slightly manic backyard bird. As a community however, in a shared pursuit, I felt a new respect. My neck certainly hurts from craning up so much toward the tree tops (a condition called warbler neck), but I’m ok with that. I am more than just me when I bird with others, connecting with the more than just one bird, part of the phenomena of spring migration.

​

I just went and did a search on Metta Practice, or loving kindness practice. I wasn't overwhelmed by what was out there. There are a lot of pictures of a buddha statue and this sort of thing. So I'd like to offer this tool of Sending Love in a simpler, less obnoxiously Glossy-Mag-about-Yoga kind of way.
Here's the practice. 
Take a break. Let your shoulders drop. Maybe close your eyes and give them a rest.
Bring to mind a moment of unbridled love. Not romantic love. Not sexy love. Just love. Maybe involving your favorite toddler, once upon a time, or a creature in its first month or so on the planet. The point is to start with bringing up the melty feeling of tenderness for someone uncomplicated. Once you're tapped in, bathe in that image and experience for a bit.
Next let others come to mind. If you were wanting to reach out and just share this feeling, who would you share it with? It doesn't really matter who, just somebody. Although again, this is low hanging fruit type people, with who its easy and uncomplicated to want to connect. What I do is not say a phrase (which you can do), but just flash on that person in their habitat, my stepdad on his porch so, in a moment of open, relaxed, peace. I picture him feeling lets say, satisfied, sitting in a little sun, belonging there. I don't imagine him to be the way I think he should be, or if he would just read this book then he'd *get it.* This is instead, a flashing on that alrightness that can take on the flavor of quite joy, and being right with the world for no reason. Your birthright.
Check in with your beloved ones far away or emotionally remote like this for a bit. Notice how good it can feel. Notice what this generates where you are, at no other time or place.
At some point, throw yourself into that mix. Send yourself love just like to all those other worthy beloveds.
If you find complicated or challenging feelings come up, send love to that feeling. It's like a kid grumpy in the afternoon. She just wants some space to be, and maybe a reassuring hand squeeze. Offer this type of wide pastureland to that feeling. Bathe it in that tenderness. It may be there for a while. Your honored guest. If aversion comes up to that honored guest, bathe that in your presence and welcome.
I find I rarely have to go searching out the next level of more challenging people or feelings to work with, they usually are fairly close at hand. But if you're still sitting there, into it, work now with some difficult people. Maybe don't start with Trump, but with the friend who didn't call you back. Again, notice if what's there is a bitchy griping self talk, and make some space and understanding for that one. And the friend, if there's time and space, imagine her limber and loose and giggling a little, or really loving the moment she's in for no reason. Breathe the feeling in and out.
The black diamond types then take it to Trump. Even just sending metta to the word Trump is a practice. Or to the suffering perpetrators of violence and destruction. Hold up a mirror there, see where those things live in yourself, open your heart there too, even if just a tiny crack open, some breathing, your willingness to stay open is profound in its transformative power.
And One Caveat: If you're fixating on somebody, be sure you're note just mentally stalking them! This means you stay in your experience, you don't go sniffing around in their airspace trying to feel connected to them. If it feels too entangled with someone, another approach is to offer this one up, to cut the kite string in a thoughtful, gentle way, but firmly resolving to return to more neutral people, and to drop that object/person/story, and instead to work directly with what is sparked within your own experience, tenderly and with presence.

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Yesterday, I was looking at a giant amaryllis bulb, one that doesn’t require any water or soil as it grows. It’s very prehistoric looking. How, we wondered, can it grow like that? We decided that they are a little like a slow bomb, containing all but the sunlight and warmth needed to explode forth in imperceptible increments, until quietly, POW, a graceful explosion of softly unfurling petals, stamen: perfect. Itself.
Consider the many amazing threads to this phenomenon: Nature as unstoppable force, everything always changing, and your very own life’s trajectory, similarly  carrying itself out, according to the seed codes etched in each of billions of cells, that somehow get nourished and replaced multiple times while you move about the day, over and over again until one day, you no longer do.
I am looking at that bulb now, and it’s at least an inch taller that yesterday.Yet it’s the same bulb, in the same container, on the same table, in the same room isn’t it? Also, it’s Mine, right? My bulb, my container, my room. The mind makes up these rules, partitions territories, ‘things’ everything. The mind tells me it’s all Mine (my cells!) all the same as yesterday, and that yesterday is a thing, a real thing too. That flower bomb however, this slomo life exploding, is part of a going off that’s been underway since the big bang (or before?). That bulb is just a tiny nano moment of a spark of that event, as are you, all of this, even the strands of Donald Trumps combover are a part of this unstoppable sparking then fizzling.
What does that change, to see this as just an extension of one explosion? Every word spoken, hand squeezed, pie baked from scratch, expletive uttered, held gaze with a squirrel, burst of giggle? What if all of these are simply bursts of firework light, one and then another, an another, relentless, unstoppable, glorious, ablaze?
At this moment thousands of processes in plant bulbs in Trader Joe’s across the land, mysteries deep underground and in thermal vents on the ocean floor, in our bodies, corroding car bodies, weather cycles high up, the inner core of trees, plastics, stars burning out, moisture seeping into basements…: All are a part of this relentless event unfolding.
And yet, my story, and yours, of being an agent, a doer, in comparison to other agents and doers, is so convincing. It says, this story, that you are separate, a symbol or icon, as if surrounded by a white screen or page in a story book, or an object up for auction on Ebay, to be chosen or chosen over, forgotten or thrown away.
There is no such thing as a separate you. The trees are your very lungs. The tone of another’s voice can change the trajectory of your blazing, and that bulb on the table is a part of this burning, as is the table, the room, holiday food digesting, and the sensations in your hands. You are not, my love, an object, but part of a great blazing. Blaze on!

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Guess what just arrived?
A tidy little stack of Hannah Burr, limited edition calendars: Each signed.
A nimble print edition of just 80!
Yours is waiting to brighten your wall.
This is the very first project I undertook this late fall when I finally had a studio again, here in Michigan after a six month nomadic transition. Bundle deals with books are offered through Friday only!!

About the Calendar Series:
Each ink drawing in this series of twelve is its own universe of color and motion, loosely interpreting my experience of the tidy grid of calendar days. Where do they go? Odd the way that time moves, so unlike the charts, numbers and grids we try to capture it in.
Each calendar is signed, one of only 50 prints in existence, and arrives snug in a cellophane sleeve with an introduction to the project tucked inside. Order yours today! Deals below.

NOTE: THE CALENDARS for 2017 HAVE SOLD OUT!
Visit hannahburr.bigcartel.com to see her current 
And find more offerings and artwork at hannahburr.com
THANKS AND ENJOY.
 
 

Here's the talk I gave in Port Townsend MA, April 26th 2015 at the Quimper Unitarian Universalist Church. It was my first sermon, and the second of two identical sermons I gave that day. Enjoy!

I said to a friend of mine today: Today I feel excited about life! Though it may just be the green tea I’m drinking. I think it was the green tea actually, but life is still a big thrill right now.
I’m in my art studio, surrounded by boxes because….I am moving to Michigan! And before that, I am getting married.   (this is a pic of Colorado by the way, from our honeymoon - added a little later)
AND just now, I went live with the new hannahburr.com! Other than the fact that it somehow broke all of the backend wiring of my blog and there are no pictures anymore, I’m thrilled. And so I am writing to share my enthusiasm. Sorry about the pics! I’ll work on that soon.
I’ve also decided today that I am going to invite you all to a Farewell Studio Party, on July 8th, to wonder at what a supportive place its been, and to see you one last time. I will have artworks and studio treasures on view and for sale, in similar form to the project Yardsale, which you can see here on the new website. You may just find me sleeping in a dusty corner looking dehydrated by then, but I’m hoping to be ready for you, and inviting you as a goad to myself.
In the past several months it feels like time’s been speeding up. It has certainly been a very fresh experience, which is disorienting, and also, kind of like a death. Everything feels vibrant and poignant, and definitely not business as usual.
I will be relocating to Ann Arbor Michigan where there is a lot of art activity, and people regularly install tiny fairy houses in their front yards. UMichigan has a great school of Art and Design, and Detroit, the new wild west of the US art scene, is only 40 minutes away.  And then there’s Chicago and the rest of Michigan…all a place to be a blank page and see what gets written and drawn.
Please join me at 11 Humphreys Street on July 8th, at a time to be determined to celebrate how everything is constantly new and unrecognizable, even when you are sure tomorrow will be like today, and to say goodbye and huzzah.

As a lady of art and other worldliness, I’ve been puzzling over How to Be with What’s Unfolding in our Country and Government: What is my role, how am I of service, what’s effective, what’s counter-effective. What drains and what builds? What?
Conversations and experimentation have yielded seven inspirations.
1. Guilt and fear are bad motivations for anything. If there is a giant SHOULD following you around, white fang that thing and get free of it. Each and every one of us has our way of contributing, of being of service, a different instrument to play. From one person to the next it is a personal decision. If the Should Monster is in the shape of a friend or associate, on fire with righteous indignation, this maybe a moment to pause and take some space as an act of re-centering and self care, done with love. If that should-monster is inside of you, what quiets it for you? A prayer like: Help me with the guilt, help me stop shoulding on myself. Help me to feel enough, be enough. Show me how to be at peace. Help me rest. Maybe one of these, uttered to God-knows-what-force you believe in, will be useful to you.
2. Who you are and what you do is vital and worth celebrating. When I saw Lady Gaga at the SuperBowl half-time show, she was standing in her power as a major performer and artist, staying true to her beliefs and her message as herself. This to me is not standing against anything, it’s standing for and living from who you are, and letting others do the same. How this looks is free and alive. You don’t need to nail down ‘who’ you are. Just be you, and nobody else.
Write a song that sings the truth you have if you make music. Lovingly sit with your elderly friend if that’s what’s on your roster for the day, be with what’s here for you, your own feelings, your own friendship, your own dirty dishes. Love starts at home, and the vibration is raised from the now that you are, the here that you are at. If it delights you to march and make signs, do it. If you are claustrophobic in crowds or have another job to do, make it something else.
3. Give Thanks. FOR ALL OF IT. Thank this situation for shaking and waking us up. I thank these unknowns for humbling me to how much a part of something greater I am, rather than an island unto myself. Every day I become more and more aware of my priviledge and wealth; Even if I’m the poorest person on my block, I’m fine! I can live alone, drive a car, protest, tap away on this laptop, make my own schedule…what utter luxury that is. This amazing abundance I can savor and give thanks for, while raising the vibration for all. Note: this is not guilt, it’s awareness. Be awake to the abundance in your life. If you are alive, there is abundance in your life. Find it and savor it.
4. Find or refind your personal practices for centering and grounding in the body. So much is polarized and intensified right now. I imagine it might get more so. It’s all out there. In here, where you are, touch the earth.
I think of the Buddha under the Bodhi tree, Mara’s armies coming up to intimidate, terrify, and ultimately cause him to falter, run away, doubt himself. The Buddha made a single gesture at Mara’s last attempt to judge, to cut down, and question Buddha’s right to sit and wake up. The Buddha did not judge, fight back, reject. Instead he touched the earth. He went into relationship. He connected. Right now, feel the ground, the support underneath you. Feel your legs. Notice the sensation in your hands. When things get charged, go into the legs, into the body, your own allotment of earth to care for.
5. Less is more. This is a huge subject, but feels incredibly relevant right now to me.
A conversation breaks out on politics. A news headline flashes up. It doesn’t make you good to flood your system, talk or read til three am, or hook into obsession. It doesn’t help anyone. It just drains your vital forces and makes it harder to sleep. Let yourself rest, we need you in good shape to play the part you play. The big news will find its way to you. Unless you delight at the whole play of political analysis, be with your child instead, your senses, your friend, your own feelings, the sounds around you. Your part to play happens on its own. You will find you get inspired to say, write a blog post or a friend will call. Go with what feels right and true and ignore the rest.
6. Diversify and keep it local in whatever way inspires you. Donald Trump was built on unbridled capitalism with no ethical base. He now is President of this country. I am discovering many ways in which I foggily participate in this capitalistic enterprise, every time I pay a giant conglomerate company for my phone service, or vaguely stop in a huge store for that cheaper thing they sell. There are a thousand and three ways to approach this topic, but the main point is, buy less, tolerate the giant companies monopolies less by going with the smaller ones. Diversify and keep it local in whatever way inspires you. I stopped using credit cards several years back, am discontinuing my plan with verizon in favor of a smaller company, and considering taking my books off of amazon. It’s imperfect and there are many facets to it, I still drive and fly in planes, but it feels good to realize these choices put me at a remove from feeding the beast in some way. It’s again easy to think you’re right and others are wrong, but no one can say what is right for you. It’s a first person decision and insight. Check out Grab Your Wallet for more inspiration.
7. Widen the View. While this can mean to take the historic long view, I will offer the vertical, locationless, timeless one. Try this on and see how it lands: This is your dream. Everyone here is some facet of yourself. It would be so great to be the good guy, with no shadow, but no one is. We are the victims. We are the perpetrators. We are one consciousness, no exceptions. When you can see that you are both the one in the movie and the screen on which the movie plays, the one in the dream and the one in which the dream is happening, the whole idea of fighting for anything becomes a tiny bit comical. Widen the view. Be awareness itself. When you are facing what you don’t like, be both and. Watch resistance fade, and become the one you are, the one that holds space for every new birth, and remains after every death.
A note about this last point: What I resist looms large and dominates my reality, my life, and my experience. I suffer to the degree that I resist. Stand For and Be and Act in accordance with your beliefs.   You are so much bigger than this circus. What outlasts it is openness, compassion, and curiosity. Why on earth is this showing up in your dream? What is the subconscious saying here?

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It's five days into 2017. I declare this whole month a time to invite in what we most want. And I don't mean things. I mean qualities. In 2008 I wrote Your Year In Review. It was a bunch of writing prompts to reflect on what transpired in the past year, and a bit of looking forward to the next. So. Let's start fresh, looking forward! I have arrived at your door with a gift. Instead of preserved lemons or dilly beans, it's writing prompts for bright aliveness.
If it's grumpy or zapped times for you, begin with what's hardest to see past. This is very fertile ground to plant seeds of joy in. Don't spend too long in this stuff, and be sure you have time to spend on the next questions too. No editing.
1. What is absolutely not working in your experience today? Be specific. Don't make it about other people. Spend 5 minutes here. If you're already inspired, skip to Q3.
2. If you're feeling stuck: What old tapes keep getting played in your experience that you can do without? It's hard to see these sometimes. I find it's easiest when the patterning you operate under is presently, painfully evident. If not, you can save this one for another day.
3. Looking at the Q1 list: What would work better? For each line item, flip it around. Use positive language and be more specific than: I want to be happy or for the problem to go away. Tell me more. Eg. I want to feel energized and confident. OK! I'd love to find that the situation rights itself without any effort on my part - much to my surprise, we just moved on. It was replaced with...
What does happy look like specifically?
4. Imagine a day filled with energy and confidence. Write it out. Embellish. Bring out your kid-like, over the top imagination. This is dress up time. Go full out. It's play. End with THIS OR SOMETHING BETTER so the forces you live by have a chance to expand beyond our amazing-but-limited human imagination.
5. Now, What are you grateful for? Make as long a list as possible! What are you grateful for right now?
What's working that would you like to see flourish?
What do you want to acknowledge in yourself? In others?
6. How would you like to feel the next hour? What surprising situation would you thrill to experience (laughing so hard you snort perhaps?) (a suddenly neutral to enjoyable experience of being in a body?).
7. At the end of the year (or choose the time frame) you are blown away, awed, amazed, and a little astonished by what has taken place. You are feeling solid and grounded, and you have exceeded the measley visions of the past. If you're honest and tapped into your highest truth, what do you see around you, what has transpired?
The crap parts are inevitable, human, and invaluable in revealing what wants to be alive and vibrant just underneath. Write this all out. Let it all go. You can use this moment to collaborate with just this moment, which is who you are, and shift the currents. With these aspirations, you clear the decks for what comes next. Hold no expectation, while acting as if! it is so. This is your world.
Joy in our hearts in 2017.
Contact me to set up a one on one session. This is a taste of how I work but just us is a whole new layer of sublime and transformation.

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Neuroscientists find (some of them somewhere, according to Jeffrey Martin) that there’s a little squeeze of pleasure drugs in the brain when we solve a problem. We’ve been rewarded with learning to walk, saying words, throwing or catching a ball since infancy. Positive brain chemicals like dopamines flow when a problem is solved. These are the drugs we love.
On those days when the sky is blue, there’s food in the belly and a roof over one’s head, there can be kind of a malaise, or an itchy type feelng: Something seems wrong, like a problem needs to be solved, even if you can't identify anything in particular. This brain-body apparatus we each have says Martin, makes problems, manufactures them, so it can be rewarded with those chemicals and feel good again.
I used to smoke. I recall the day I noticed a mental process going on at the time. I found myself conjuring some stressful scenario prior to reaching for a cigarette. Something about the cortisol (stress hormone) and cigarette combo was truly satisfying. It was a real soother to get some nicotine in the mix when I thought about that thing…How tweaked.
Whatever is going on can be seen in problem terms, or in a different light, the very same scenario can be labeled as: Not a problem. Nothing to be solved.
For example, I get to the check-out line and discover that I’ve forgotten my wallet. Is this a problem? Are there lions? A fire? Yes it is not smooth, but truly, this is the nature of the road itself, not a personal failing. It’s how things go on this planet called Earth, and on planet Me. Feeling irritated then, or slightly growly under the breath is also the course of human response, it is the nature of the thing. Also, it's just what's happening in a parade of stuff happening. More road texture. Not a problem, nothing to be solved.
Nothing.
These problems and the attendant stories that give them dimension, you could see as elaborate plots designed to hold the attention, like a great film, and we are captivated - captives in the story. A major illness, a terminal diagnosis is also included. Feelings, big bumps, real physical pain. A broken down car? Trump is president. It turns out that the wallet was stolen. Not fun, no one is claiming that. Or easy. But somehow, it’s the very ticket in.
Can I, can you, enjoy this cliffhanger of a show? You’ve been watching for years, as have I. Our shows are singular, but consistently witnessed and known. Have you ever noticed that?
Let go of the splintering branch, and see how that feels. No one is immune. You, are welcome.

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