All of my life I’ve been surrounded by people who believed in the impossible. At a school for developmentally disabled children, there were therapists who believed against all odds that they could help a child catch a ball. And, one day, after ten thousand tries, extraordinary therapies on frozen muscles, endless encouragement for the child and for each other, those little hands closed around the ball at just the right moment. A catch. Cheers, celebration dances and tears erupted, this feat greater than winning a Super Bowl. The impossible became possible. And then, as if there was not a moment to waste, the next impossibility was named: ball catching could become routine!
Artists, who go day after day to the studio or the stage, their lives an impossibility of economic headwinds and community disinterest. They create. They find a way. They keep the doors of deep humanity open, mythology alive. In this age of dedicated differences and echo-chamber-information, they reinvigorate the experience of a shared story. The impossible becomes possible, even if only for a moment. And the next day, they do it all over again, refreshed with inspiration and improbability.
Teachers who walk into classrooms every single day, their budgets cut, their student load swelling, their hands tied with standardized-testing-madness, and yet they reach. They try. They inspire. Like icebreakers, they cut new paths through impossibly frozen circumstances to locate and nourish the minds and hearts of their students. To free them from disbelief. To embrace the challenge of an obstacle. To encourage discovery of self and other. The impossible becomes possible. And, the next day, they do it all over again.
Inspiration. It’s all around us. It makes people do crazy things.
inspiration makes people do crazy things ©️ 2016/18 david robinson & kerri sherwood
Filed under: Art, Chicken Marsala Monday, Creativity, Edges, Possibility, Uncategorized | Tagged: artist, artistry, artists, classrooms, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, education, hearts, impossible, inspiration, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, minds, obstacles, opportunity, society6.com/chickenmarsala, studio melange, teachers, the melange, the possible |
The Direction of Intention 
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