What Do You Give Your Voice To?

Radiation treatment left my throat raw and excruciatingly painful – as though I had swallowed hot lava. Eventually it became too painful to speak and I succumbed to communicating with nods and gestures. I spent months virtually silent. As I slowly began to heal and reassemble my post cancer life, every area was up for review, including how I use my voice. It felt as though my house burned to the ground and I  got...

Listening In

Listen Not as a stranger Listen Belong to solitudes Green Wisdom Remember me?...

The Art of Doing Nothing

It’s been hard to write for the past month or so.  The weeks have been fruitful with personal and family events that have inspired, surprised, challenged and deeply touched me.  There is something I sense I want to write about, yet I haven’t been able to wrap my arms around what it is.  The integration is still underway.  It hasn’t felt like the right time. Today I have the time.  Several topics are...

Follow the Juice

    There are times in our lives when we feel stuck, bored, or uninspired. We know we want something different but don’t know how to get it.   We spend lots of time hanging out in our minds trying to figure out either what’s causing the dis-ease or the fastest way to be relieved of it.  It isn’t useful to wait around for a nice, inspiring epiphany to fall into your lap.  The issue is we’re not feeling any...

But First…

One of the ways we sabotage our natural creativity is a pattern I call “but first.”  Though it feels and looks like we’re being productive, it’s resistance in disguise. Remember those draw-the-line-to-the-right-answer questions in school?  In this one any combination of the pairs is a match.   Take any item from the 1st column and pair it with any item in the 2nd column.  Feel free to make up your own. I want...

Progress Not Perfection

A new cast member has revealed herself in my Gremlin ensemble.  Tall and lanky with a thin face and hawk-like nose she bears a striking resemblance to my elementary school principal.  No surprise that she goes by the code name: Mother Superior. The Gremlin ensemble is made up of those voices of judgment and criticism that arise to sabotage our best intentions. They are sneaky and clever.  Mother Superior’s script...

Taming Your Gremlin

I discovered a new voice in the choir of inner critics that serenade me on a regular basis.  In Taming the Gremlin – A Surprisingly Simple Method for Getting Out of Your Own Way, Rick Carson suggests we name those unhelpful voices of judgment– a.k.a. gremlins – when we become aware of them.  Give them a personality, a nickname.  Makes them more manageable is the theory. This one is called ST – the Sullen...

The Art of Disappearing – Part 2

        The Art of Disappearing by Naomi Shihab Nye When they say Don’t I know you? say no.When they invite you to the party remember what parties are like before answering.Someone telling you in a loud voice they once wrote a poem. Greasy sausage balls on a paper plate. Then reply. If they say we should get together. say why? It’s not that you don’t love them any more. You’re trying to remember...

The Art of Disappearing – Part 1

How good are you at disappearing?  Vacation used to mean getting away from it all.  Time to rest, play, relax without the worries or concerns that envelop us at home. Savoring time without a clock or agenda  feels strange when we’re used to go-go-go and do-do-do.  It usually takes me a couple of days to settle into a slower rhythm when I get away; to keep my twitchy fingers off the keypad, not check email,...

Not a Through Trail… Oh Yeah?

Catching up with a friend last week I heard a marvelous story about his son.  Joey finished college without knowing what he really wanted to do.  What he loved was surfing and he did a lot of that.  The parents were probably a little worried. Joey did some substitute teaching and helped out when needed at a Montessori School where his Dad worked. After he’d been around a while, one of the preschool assistants went...

Feel the Awkward and Do It Anyway

I’ve been blessed to work in what some would call exotic places around the world. When I travel so far from home (and the client is paying for my flight), it seems downright negligent not to extend the trip to explore a new place.  I love to travel and take great delight in learning about cultures different from my own. I have had some wonderful adventures and they all come with a good story.  Anyone who knows me...

The Poison of Comparison

What do you do when you see that someone else has written your book, is marketing a workshop you could teach in your sleep, is making art that you could do (maybe better), is humming along in a health groove that leaves them glowing and you seething with resentment? You know what I mean.  When someone else has the audacity to create art that is so close to what you’ve been dreaming about and actually put it out...

I Don’t Wanna

This week I didn’t feel like writing a blog post.  I was feeling kind of funky – not a lot of energy and a vague sense of empty after the completion of a run of juicy teaching and coaching that I was really fired up about.  It got me thinking about what to do when I don’t wanna do. One of the reasons I started this blog was I wanted a reason to write on a regular basis. Things have been hummin’ along until I...

A Tip From ‘Ol Blue Eyes

A surprising gift from the year of building birdhouses is this blog about creativity.  The title “Creativity For the Rest Of Us” came to me about three years ago – the summer I got a pair of binoculars and took up bird watching in my garden. (It’s amazing the insights that come in stillness.)  I didn’t understand what the title meant at first.  It stayed with me and I played around with it from time to...

Teachings From the Banana Slug

On a recent outdoor adventure, I had the opportunity to spend some extended time up close and personal with a banana slug. Here’s what I learned. Move at your own pace and with the intuitive rhythm of nature.  Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly and never in a straight line, slugs get where they’re going with grace and ease.  With curiosity, they investigate everything that crosses their path.  They also stop to...