Awakening | The Direction of Intention

Ripple [on KS Friday]

Posted on February 28, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

ymad copy

“you make a difference in their life, even though they don’t know who you are, you make a difference.” ~ Kerri Sherwood, You Make A Difference

I catch myself in webs of my own weaving. There are things that I know to be true but willingly ignore when I am feeling blue and indulge in a warm bath of self-pity. For instance, my move to Wisconsin brought me to my great love but also came as a career killer. I have, in the past few years, spent inordinate amounts of time pondering my worth to the world. Beyond “husband,” who am I now that “no one” finds value in my work?

When my eyes and heart clear, I know that I have willingly stepped into the single greatest trap plaguing the Western world: investment in the notion that my experience – my life on this earth – is a product. That I must, as John O’Donohue writes, “…strive to garner a quota of significance from the world.”

How isolated we are, searching for purpose, trying to make a mark, seeking an experience, trying to find our voice,…have value, like so much property or stocks to be traded. Reduction. People as bottom lines. What is my value? What is yours?

I’ve decided that my favorite movie is ABOUT TIME. The main character, Tim, is afforded the opportunity to live each day over again. The second time through, instead of grinding out his task list and exhausting rush to achieve, he pays attention to the little things, the relationships he has all throughout the day. He is afforded the opportunity to shift his focus from “life as a product” to “life as relationship.” He makes a difference, not because he makes millions or wins the case, but because he smiles at the clerk of the convenience store. He pays attention to the “space between” and realizes he is nothing more or nothing less than a relationship. Ultimately, he has no need to live each day twice because he ceases throwing the first chance away. He releases the life-dulling-I-am-a-product-mentality and embraces the life-giving-I-am-a-relationship reality.

Sisyphus, in his first trip to the underworld, watches as a thousand souls wander the river bank, so lost in the fog of their own stories that they, each and every one, believe that they are all alone. Finally, their manic little stories play out, the fog surrounding them dissipates, and they see each other. In that moment, they return to their natural state, their most powerful state. They blend together into a single, vibrant mist (relationship). In that moment, Sisyphus is forever changed. He comes alive, returning to the upper regions, knowing that the real vitality, crackling life, is available if he looks beyond his isolating story-fog.

Instead of reducing his life to a measurable value, a few gold coins extracted from the world, Sisyphus expands beyond his little story-prison of worth-seeking to paying attention to what he brings to the moment, focusing on the shared space between. His life ripples and those ripples have no end. In fact, he understands that his life is a ripple.

Instead of trying to be somebody (separation) he simply recognizes and fully inhabits the utter miracle of his being (relationship). In that simple, profound shift, the difference is made.

It’s in Kerri’s song. You make a difference in their lives, even though they don’t know who you are. Your life, and their life, are one and the same thing.

YOU MAKE A DIFFERENCE is available in iTunes& CDBaby

read Kerri’s blog post about YOU MAKE A DIFFERENCE

you make a difference ©️ 2003 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Awakening, Emergence, Energy, Identity, KS Friday, Story, Uncategorized | Tagged: cancer research, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerri sherwood on itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life giving, life lessons, life worth, meaning making, product-thinking, ripple, sisyphus, story, value, worth, you make a difference | Leave a comment »

Leave It At The Door [on DR Thursday]

Posted on February 27, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

assumeawe WITH EYES jpeg copy 2

There is a simple exercise that I am particularly fond of but less than terrific at practicing. It goes like this: don’t drag yesterday’s trash into today. See this day as it is: new. Live this day without the control fantasy of believing that you know what will happen, that you know or can control what other people think. Recognize that the burden you carry is exactly that – something you carry. Put it down for a spell. It will be there when you are ready to pick it up.

It’s not an exercise in denial. It’s actually the opposite. It’s an exercise in dealing with the real moment rather than the imagined monster. You’ll be amazed at the world of light, color, and possibility that opens when yesterday’s trash stays in yesterday, when the weighty story wrapped around the past-moment drops away.

I used to tell my actors, when entering the rehearsal hall, to leave their day at the door. Rehearsal halls, like artist studios, are sacred places. The art of the theatre is the mastery of presence and it’s a necessary skill to tuck the story-of-the-day into a safe keeping box before stepping onto the stage. And, what if, as master Will wrote, all the world is a stage? It seems to me that the art of living is the mastery of presence.

I call it the “garbage layer,” those moments when I am first coming out of sleep. Coming up from the bottom of the slumber-ocean there is a surface layer where all the trash floats. It is coming through the garbage layer that I have the option of leaving behind or picking up yesterday’s flotsam. The nagging to-do list, the contention, the worries, the fears and fights can all be scooped up and hauled into the new day or the story-of-yesterday can be left at the door.

And when I leave yesterday’s garbage in yesterday? An entirely different set of experiences and assumptions become available. Awe at the light in the trees. Awe at the smell of coffee brewing. Awe at the sun and the enormous cat that purrs when I sit close.

[Chicken Marsala was one of our cartoon creations. He tickled the syndicates but never got picked up. We love him still. We designed all manner of cool prints, cards, cups and other stuff that you can find here]

read Kerri’s blog post about ASSUME AWE

chicken marsala ©️ 2016 david robinson & kerri sherwood

face the sun, mixed media, 18 x 24IN

chicken marsala ©️ 2016 david robinson & kerri sherwood

face the sun ©️ 2019 david robinson

Filed under: Awakening, Creativity, DR Thursday, Possibility, Story, Transcendence, Uncategorized | Tagged: assumptions, awe, chicken marsala, Chicken nugget, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, denial, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, reality, society6.com/chickenmarsala, society6.com/davidrobinson | Leave a comment »

Snap Your Fingers [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on February 17, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

we should be wide awake billboard copy

When I was roaming the world working with corporate types, tilting at windmills, I would tell my be-suited crowd that words matter. I’d relay a story I heard from Don Miguel Ruiz. He told his audience that people in the United States completely misunderstood the word, “spell.” He said, “You think to put a spell on someone is magic, like hocus-pocus. But, that is not it at all. Tell a little girl that she is fat and you will have spelled her forever.”

She will hate her body. That is a powerful spell.

Words matter. Tell the nation that the “Democrats are vicious” or that the news is “the enemy of the people” and the enchantment is undeniable, angry. Push the spell through a propaganda machine and it magnifies in intensity. Like a ritual drum, the thump-thump whips the glassy eyed adherents into a red frenzy. Insist that long debunked conspiracies are real or that the deep state is out to get us all and the spellbound will see demons threatening everywhere.

The nation body splits and just like the little girl looks with hatred at the other part of itself. A powerful spell.

‘Hoax’ thump-thumped in the face of undeniable fact and the mesmerized fall into line, repeating what they are told to repeat. “Cluck like a chicken!” the hypnotist suggests and the sleepers dutifully cluck. Common sense surrenders to the spell.

Teachers of consciousness use different techniques but are in general agreement about how to awake from a nasty spell. Step back. Doubt what you think. See what is there and not what you think is there. Detach from your attachment to what you want to believe, to what you are being told. The salesman always wants you to buy the car. He is not your friend. He does not have your best interest in mind. He will use his words tell you anything. Despite what you are told, this car will not make you happy, it will not solve all of your problems. It will not make you sexy or powerful or complete. Uncouple from the words, the spell being woven, and see.

If she is lucky, the little girl one day wakes up and realizes that the hatred she experiences is not her own; it was planted in her with a word. The hatred she wields against herself and turns on to others is not of her creation. She learns that she must snap her own fingers and call herself awake. The hypnotist, she understands, only has authority if she continues to cluck and sleep.

read Kerri’s blog post about WAKING UP

Filed under: Awakening, Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective, Seeing, Uncategorized | Tagged: consciousness, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, don miguel ruiz, doubt, enchantment, hate, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, mesmerize, propaganda, seeing, spell, story | Leave a comment »

Suspend And Rest [on KS Friday]

Posted on January 31, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

rest with frame copy

Kerri took a fall earlier this week and broke both of her wrists. For a professional pianist there are few injuries more debilitating and frightening. Needless to say, our world stopped. We’ve stepped out of time.

Judy once told me, after her husband suffered a terrible stroke and she became his full-time caregiver, that she could not think about tomorrow or even an hour ahead. The moment at hand, the task immediately before her, was all that existed. I understood in an abstract way what she was experiencing. The weight of presence. The unbearable lightness of presence. All that exists is now. Today, I understand what Judy experienced beyond a simple abstract appreciation. At this point, there is no sense in thinking ahead.

A sip of coffee through a straw. Move the hair from her eyes. Help her sit up. There is the task at hand. That is all. And in “that is all” comes a great gift: instant perspective on what has actual importance and what does not. In these past several months everything has felt like a fight to swim upstream. Today, since Monday, there is no fight, there is only stream and it carries us where it will. We let go and are resting. A whole rest.

It is ironic to me that since her fall, in addition to the pain and the real fear of losing her capacity to play the piano [read: lose who she understands herself to be], we have laughed more in four days than in four months. We have let go. We look at what-this-time-last-week appeared to be so heavy with importance and merely shrug. Not important. It floats away. Or we float away from it. In this whole rest there is no capacity to push, no desire to paddle or resist. Suspended, we rest. We take this bite, sweet or savory, and that is all.

read Kerri’s blog post about WHOLE REST

Filed under: Awakening, Body, KS Friday, Uncategorized | Tagged: david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, injury, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, letting go, non resistance, pain, presence, resistance, rest, timeless, whole rest | 1 Comment »

Check Your Reality [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on January 21, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

We parked the truck in the Kemper Center lot, far enough from the shore not to be hit by the flying debris, the chunks of seawall and pavement being hurtled from the impact of the waves. Kerri has lived here for over 30 years, “I’ve never seen anything like this,” she repeated as a towering wave engulfed the gazebo, took down a piece of the wall of the art center, a hunk of coastline disappeared.

Later, after the storm, we went back. Trees were down, encased in ice. Huge sections of the walking path were shattered and tossed into the flooded mess of the parking lot behind the center. Walking was treacherous. Like the trees, the ground, the rocks, the destruction was coated in a thick layer of ice. It was beautiful and inconceivable.

Words mask all manner of reality. We have a word, nature, that can’t even begin to touch the magnitude, the power of where it points. Mother Nature. I have been thrown out of bed in an earthquake that brought down freeways like they were so much satin ribbon. Go to Pompeii or Herculeneum, visit Mt. Saint Helens, watch with disbelief any of the news footage of any one of the tsunamis that have wiped communities off the map. Wrap your mind around it, if you can.

We are cavalier in our conversations about global warming. We impact, we do not command. We reduce it to questions of business, of protecting the beef industry. Which economy will suffer most? We make up these strangely insignificant divisions. We imagine that we are the center, holding all the controls. We imagine that it is all about us. So small, a chihuahua yipping at a forest fire.

Sitting in the truck, feeling the boom of the waves in my chest as they tore off chunks of the shore, I felt tiny. I remembered a snippet of film I saw about a man who wore a superhero suit and stood in the face of an oncoming storm. He flexed and stomped and raged for the camera. And then the storm hit. The best he could do was run for his life.

aftermath copy

read Kerri’s blog post about THE STORM

ice ©️ 2020 kerri sherwood

for prints of “ice” go here

Filed under: Awakening, Energy, Language, Perspective, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: climate change, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, destruction, global warming, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerri sherwood on itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, nature, power, storm | Leave a comment »

Believe [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on January 8, 2020 by davidrobinsoncreative

believe ornament copy

Kerri just said, “I think I’d believe more if I had another glass of wine.” After I was done laughing (and getting her another glass of wine), I realized that belief is too often like that – contingent on circumstance.

When I was a wee lad (seriously, this stuff ran rampant around my little kid brain), I’d wonder what happened the day after the bloody battle when both sides raged about god being on their side. What do you need to reconcile when your team loses? Why do you need to win to confirm your belief? A side note, another of those rampant ramblings racing through of my too tiny skull (no wonder my parents were at a loss of what to do with me) – this one is to really get me in trouble: if your god takes sides, chooses a team or otherwise reinforces a separation from the whole, how can you not see that it must be a very small god indeed? For perspective, an existential reboot, go outside and look at the stars and understand what you are seeing. No sides. Beyond comprehension.

Conditional belief. It is run amok.

If our capacity for belief was not conditional, what might we actually believe? Who might we become if we understood that we are expressions of this great universe and that this great universe was cheering for us and those rowdy huzzahs had nothing to do with our winning or losing, with borders or righteousness or rules or books or councils or sexual orientation or money or the color of our skin? Or beliefs. Every atom a delight. Every creation a miracle. Would we be hope-full? Would ‘the enemy’ look the same through the eyes of unconditional belief?

I know. Pie-in-the-sky thinking. Only a child could believe so completely, so unconditionally in…goodness.

Anything is possible if you just believe.

[note: this beautiful ornament was a gift that came atop a container of ‘slushy’ – a life giving concoction brewed in Dan’s secret laboratory and delivered each year to my squeals of delight. If my belief is conditional it is Dan’s fault and I blame Gay for not reining him in. She found this beautiful ornament so I also blame this post on her generosity and good taste. These two people make me believe wholeheartedly, without condition, in goodness].

read Kerri’s more coherent blog post on BELIEVE

Filed under: Awakening, Flawed Wednesday, Identity, Navel Gazing, Possibility, Uncategorized | Tagged: beleive, belief, conditional beleif, conditional love, contingent, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, delight, division, gods, goodness, hope, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerri sherwood on itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, miracle, separation, unconditional belief, uncondtional love, unity, whole, wholeness | Leave a comment »

Learn The Single Lesson [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on December 31, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

dogga babycat end of day copy

At the end of each day, with great enthusiasm and mission, Dog-Dog herds us into the living room. Because it is hysterical to see how many different strategies Dogga can pull from his Aussie bag of tricks, it has become a game for us to give him several false starts. We step toward the living room and then return to the kitchen. We say, “Let’s go!” and he races away with fervor while we remain firmly planted. He returns moments later with a wildly wagging tail. He never gets frustrated. He only gets more clever, more lively in his intention. He is eternally hopeful and more excited by the chase than the finish.

It is the single lesson I hope to learn from him. He is an excellent teacher and I am a very slow student.

It is the last day of 2019 and it has been, to put it mildly, an exhausting year. We are making special preparations to launch the good ship 2019 into the annals of time-gone-by. We might wave a polite so-long as it departs but most likely we’ll turn our backs on the passage, and, like Dogga, we’ll run into the next year with hopeful-tails a-wagging.

We know it is an imaginary line, a made-up calendar distinction. We don’t really expect a clean break, a new, fresh start. Or, perhaps we do expect it. Or perhaps, we desire it in the same way Dogga desires us to go to the living room. It’s the game of chase!

Perhaps the coming year will be less exhausting and more fulfilling if I learn the single Dog-Dog lesson: drop all expectation of outcome, all fear of circumstance, all investment in things that exist only in my too-active-imagination, and love my people whether or not they meet me in the living room. Love my people when they send me on a wild goose chase, not once, but many times. Love them because they love me and it’s fun to be alive and, after all, the circles I run will bring me back to them. Or to myself. Why not laugh?

Perhaps in this new year I will at last learn to fully live what I preach and enjoy the chase simply because it is ALL a game of chase, even the parts that look momentarily like completions. Even the parts that look overwhelming. They pass, too.

The mantra many years ago was to cultivate surprise. Expect surprise. The truth is, I don’t know what will happen in ten minutes or two seconds or in ten days. Do you? Why do we pretend that we know? I think it is the key to Dog-Dog’s delight, he doesn’t pretend to know. He lives in the truth of surprise as opposed to the preconception of boredom or fear or fulfillment. He leads with his heart and his heart is bursting with hope (another name for the expectation of surprise). It is why, after his people-sheep have ambled to the couch [what?! A surprise!], he can sleep so soundly, so completely unburdened by resistance to the day gone by or trepidation-stories of tomorrow.

read Kerri’s blog post about THE END OF THE YEAR

Filed under: Awakening, Love, Play, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: BabyCat, chase, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, desire, Dog-Dog, end of year, expectation, game, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, lessons, life lessons, master teacher, new start, peace, play, surprise, Tripper dog | 2 Comments »

Feel Them [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on December 25, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

heartlights copy

This is a symbol and as symbols go, this one is arguably the epicenter. It is universal. It transcends all other symbols, religious and otherwise. The others deal with energies, vertical and horizontal, masculine and feminine, spiritual and secular. They are symbols of polarities, separation ends that point to a center, a unity. This symbol is the unity. Heart. The meeting ground. The commons. The push-me-pull-you of life.

Try an experiment and think back on these past weeks running up to the solstice (no matter your tradition of celebrating it); re-member the moments that you felt heart. Kerri’s song. A bonfire at midnight. A walk in the woods at sunset. Dogga buried in gift wrap. Craig’s face when we opened the package with smart bulbs. Kirsten clutching the sloth. There are too many to count. None are abstractions. All are experiences. Feel them.

Yearning can be filled with heart. Loss can be heart-full. This symbol is all inclusive. It does not discriminate. It’s bigger than any single desire, any hot pursuit. It, in fact, requires no seeking. It is ubiquitous. It everywhere and nowhere all at the same time because it has nothing to do with time. It asks little more than paying attention to the many faces it lives through, the many moments it simply waits for you to notice, to see/feel/hear/taste/sense what is already here.

read Kerri’s blog post about the NEON HEART

Filed under: Awakening, Flawed Wednesday, Love, Uncategorized | Tagged: david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, heartbreak, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, presence, separation, symbol, transcendence, unity | Leave a comment »

Decide To See [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on December 3, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

heart leaf copy

When you come to our house, pay attention to the small things. You will find many, many, many hearts. Heart shaped rocks, heart shaped leaves, shells that are the shape of a heart. This is not an accident. It’s also not a collection of “things” – like a collection of shot glasses or figurines. No, it is altogether different.

Kerri looks for hearts. Often on our walks she will gasp, pull out her camera and take a picture. I know that she has seen another heart. Usually, she engages with it and walks on. Sometimes she picks up the heart and it comes home with us.

To be clear: she doesn’t buy hearts from the store. She is not a collector of heart shapes. Kerri looks for hearts. When we are out in public she will gasp and move toward someone, striking up a conversation. Soon there is laughter; always there is a story. Usually, she engages with the heart and walks on. Sometimes she picks up the heart and it is in our life forever.

Since seeing the recent Mr. Rogers movie, we’ve been talking a lot about intentional thinking, about focus placement. We’ve been talking about what we look for when we go out into the world – what we decide to see. Everyone decides what they see but very few people know that they have that decision. Everyone decides what they think but very few people know that they have that decision. It’s what made Mr. Rogers so special. He knew he had decisions and he talked about it with children. Children are capable of listening.

It’s very easy to see the gunk. The dark is an easy choice; fear makes it so. It takes some intention to see the light. Hearts are always present but they require some attention and resolve to see. They ask that we look beyond the superficial gunk to see the heart-substance. That’s why Kerri picks them up and plants them around our home. It’s a practice. She’s built a practice of seeing the hearts. She goes into each day looking for the hearts.

It turns out that hearts are everywhere. You can see them, too, if you decide to see them.

read Kerri’s blog post about HEARTS

Filed under: Awakening, Perspective, Possibility, Seeing, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, decisions, fred rogers, heart, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, listening, meditation, practice, seeing, sense making, storying | Leave a comment »

Turn And See [on KS Friday]

Posted on November 29, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

grateful songbox 1 copy

Gratitude is a word easily tossed about in this season. It is often a nod to something that ought to be more present. It can be momentary, skipping a stone over the water. A commandment for how we should feel. Be Grateful.

Gratitude finds roots and deep resonance the day you turn around and realize beyond the abstract that this life is limited. These moments are limited. No longer an easy sentimental phrase on a Thanksgiving card, gratitude looks at what and who is present and loses all interest in what may-or-may-not-be missing. A sunset, each sunset, becomes a unique once-in-a-lifetime experience.

Last night, late, 20 came over. We sat at the table, told stories. Drank wine. Chocolate and raspberries. Heather and Brian Facetimed with Kerri. Her laughter in the next room, the enthusiasm of their conversation, made 20 and I smile. A long lost friend tossed a cryptic note into our ocean. We puzzled it deep into the night.

There has never been another evening like it. There will never be another.

Kerri’s GRATEFUL is not a Hallmark card. It is not a commandment or a should-feel. It’s not flowers and feel-good honey bees. It flows with the urgency, the power, and the recognition of that day when you at last turn and see an end to yourself. It is a love note to being alive, a meditation on the everyday priceless moments, a call to awaken to the unparalleled now.