Generosity and Bakesale Betty

For me, the most gratifying Sunday morning involves a rockin’ celebration of worship at the East Bay Church of Religious Science followed by lunch with friends at one of the many great restaurants in Oakland’s Temescal District.   My favorite stop is Bakesale Betty. There is no sign, just a black awning.  In the window is the day’s menu scrawled on a piece of butcher paper.  It’s an easy place to find – look...

Get Your Feet Wet

LEARNING CURVE ALERT – This post is a semi do-over from last week.  I was on the road and posting while tired, indecisive and not completely sure how to handle the technology of deleting a post and substituting another.  The result?  A blog post that was missing the main graphic,  featured two posts back to back and a video link that didn’t work.  I’m sending the second post again complete with...

Letting Go of Expectations

Last summer when I was feeling stuck my coach suggested I write with my left hand for a while. Thanks to Julia Cameron and The Artist’s Way, I’ve been writing Morning Pages for over 15 years. Morning Pages is an exercise where you write 3 pages fast, in long hand, first thing every morning to clear the clutter that accumulates in your mind overnight.  Writing with my left hand was going to require some serious...

Musings on Miss Frizzle

The Magic School Bus was one of my favorite shows to watch with my daughter when she was growing up.  It featured the teacher everyone wished they had, Miss Frizzle (represented by the voice of Lily Tomlin).  Miss Frizzle came to class dressed to represent the subject matter about to be studied.  The solar system unit featured planet earrings, rocket ship shoes, and images of galaxies printed on her dress. The...

The Bamboo Dance

I’ll be blunt.  If you don’t develop flexibility, you are in for a rocky road.  There is more change coming at us faster than we’ve ever known and it is not going away anytime soon. Consider the bamboo reed – whipping about in the wind, bending so far at times as to touch the ground before springing back up – but it doesn’t break.  Bamboo is the very definition of flexibility – ready and able to change so as to...

Creativity and Artistry

Creativity is about much more than being artistic.  I was in a group last summer with a bunch of talented folks who you would classify as artists – people who draw, photographers, musicians, poets, writers, videographers, and the generous pixies who created the luscious and hospitable space for us to play in.  Those were the visible forms of artistry – the designated artists. I had an Ah-Ha moment when one of...

The Appointment

What if, on the first sunny day, on your way to work, a colorful bird sweeps in front of you down a street you’ve never heard of. You might pause and smile. A sweet beginning to your day. Or you might step into that street and realize there are many ways to work. You might sense the bird knows something you do not and wander after. You might hesitate when the bird turns down an alley. For now there is a tension: Is...

The Four Portals of Gratitude

In her audio book, Gratitude, Angeles Arrien offers the four portals of gratitude: Blessings – acts of kindness, consideration and generosity Learnings – life lessons that allow me to stretch, to handle the unexpected and unfamiliar Mercies – acts of compassion and forgiveness Protections – given to us by the seen and unseen worlds Gratitude is intricately linked to cultivating a creative way of...

What’s Your Question?

In the summer of 2007 I went on retreat in my garden. I was seriously in need of some reflective down time and didn’t have the opportunity then to get away. I pitched a tent, set up a chair and left everything else but a journal, water, and some snacks in the house. Three days and two nights later I returned rested, refreshed, and reinvigorated.  During that time, surrounded by the joys of nature, a question...

Look for the Synchronicity

Carl Jung defined synchronicity as “a meaningful coincidence of two or more events, where something other than the probability of chance is involved.” Some call it serendipity or “mere” coincidence. In a conversation with the late Joseph Campbell, Bill Moyers refers to “the hidden hands” that seem to guide us along when we are on the right path. This is how it feels to live in creative flow. Everything, absolutely...

The More Naps I Take…

“The more naps I take, the more money I make. “ – Sark One of the residual gifts of being pregnant was learning to nap. I became an aficionado of power napping in a variety of different and sometimes awkward places – under desks, behind closed doors, in cars, sitting on the floor propped up against a wall, and the always precarious – leaning on my elbows in a bathroom stall. After 20-30 minutes I was...

Are You Listening?

In over a decade of listening to and visually recording group conversations I’ve learned a lot about listening. In listening for the essence of someone’s thought, I’ve had lots of practice waiting. Waiting is key to being a good listener. Much of our communication comes with window dressing – the warm up, examples and embellishment, summation, repetition. Buried in all of that is a kernel, the heart of what...

Scathingly Brilliant Ideas

I’ve got the most scathingly brilliant idea! – Haley Mills It is natural to want reassurance especially when we are treading into new territory. The work is to look for it in the right places. Do not go to the person in your life who has always been the most critical and expect to find it there. Especially if what you want reassurance for is something that will upset their status quo. Find a person or...

Do or do not

In my twenties while I was “finding myself” in various workshops of the then burgeoning Human Potential movement, the concept of there is no such thing as trying took root in me. Think about it, you either do something or you don’t do it. You pick up the pencil or you don’t. You may not succeed at a task or a goal but once you begin, you are in the realm of action. Succeeding is not the point. Action is and...

Becoming a Tracker

The verb “to track” is defined as: to follow and note the course or progress of. I’m a big advocate of tracking so let me explain what I mean and how it works. At the base of your skull is a part of the brain called the reticular activating system (RAS). I am not a scientist so in very simplified terms, the RAS is a tracking system. It notices things. Ever wonder why when you get a new car, you suddenly see that...