Awakening | The Direction of Intention

Covet The Right Stuff

Posted on October 7, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

I did this drawing for my book, The Seer

This morning Kerri shared a nice definition of the word “covet:” insufficient gratitude for what you already possess. It made me laugh because the definition exposes the ethical double bind of being human.

I imagine that in some distant past, a hairy guy stepped out of his cave and was startled to find that his neighbor had a new thing called fire. Being cold and also tired of eating sushi for every meal, he coveted his neighbor’s fire. He wanted some of that. A healthy lack of gratitude for what you already possess is often how good ideas spread (a random anthropological note: I read this morning that the average life span of a cave man was 18 years. I suspect coveting warmth-by-fire increased the average by a couple of years).

So, to covet is sometimes useful, especially where essentials like food, fire, and stories are concerned. It is only human to want enough food, a roof over your head, and a life-story that has meaning and purpose.

To desire is human. To want a better life is universal. What is the line between desire and coveting? To want what others have, to a certain extent, is pack behavior and we are, like it or not, creatures of the pack. Product marketers around the world count on our capacity to want what other people have and so our covet-muscle is exercised daily. The creation of imaginary need is a super trick for selling stuff and coveting what others have is key to lack creation. It’s hard to sell things if people are fulfilled.

So, to covet may be a warning signal that you are building your tower of meaning on sandy soil.

And that loops back to gratitude. All day, Kerri and I have been talking about being conscious in the moments of your life. None of us have unlimited time on this earth. The only thing we actually possess is our moments and our choices within our moments. The other stuff is really on loan and generally passing. Spiritual teachers and artists throughout history are unanimous on this point: the path to a rich life is built upon presence. Paying attention, exercising deep gratitude for the moments of your life, will always illuminate the extraordinary in the ordinary. Cultivating the capacity to see your extraordinary life will help you will covet the right stuff. Feeling grateful for your moment is always easier when you are warm and your brontosaurus burger is cooked just right.

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Filed under: Art, Awakening, Gratitude, Seeing, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: covet, fulfillment, meaning, paying attention, purpose | Leave a comment »

Open The Box

Posted on October 6, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

JIm Marsh of the band, Mom’s Chili Boys, tuning up for rehearsal.

It is often the simplest of actions that rock the world. I had one of those moments yesterday. It was a threshold moment. Its power took me by surprise. It changed me and all I did was open a box.

We flew to California to work on a play. I’ve worked on dozens of plays and performance pieces in my life but this one is special because it’s not an abstraction. It’s not a made-up story. I’ve lived it and lived with it for nearly a decade. The event, the catalyst of the play was the discovery of a box, a time capsule plastered into the walls of a ranch house over 130 years ago. Tom found the box. It held the possessions of an ancestor, a small boy who died in 1885. The boy’s mother, Isabelle, put his clothes and toys in a small trunk, wrote notes, some brief anecdotes about the boy, and then hid the box in the walls of the house.

Nearly ten years ago, we began creating the play when, late one night during a visit to the ranch, Tom asked me to help him. He asked, “What am I supposed to do with this box?” At first, much of the body of the play amounted to organized transcription. During each visit I recorded hours of conversation with Tom, hours of late night storytelling, and then flew home and transcribed the recordings. I wanted to catch the cadence of Tom’s vocal patterns. I wanted to catch the rhythms of his extraordinary voice and gift of storytelling. The play was his to perform; my work was simply to craft it, to draw a clear story-path for him to follow. The play, a one-man show, was ready for production when Tom’s health failed. He died a year ago.

During Tom’s decline I rewrote the play so that I might narrate the story and added another character to the piece. The Chili Boys had a battery of new music for the play so we gathered in Stockton to integrate the new music with the new text.

When we arrived in California, we visited Tom’s widow, Marcia. She gave us the trunk so we might photograph the clothes, toys, and notes. I’d seen the artifacts many, many times. Tom and I wiled away many nights unpacking the box and reading the notes, talking about his family stories. When our rehearsals were finished, sitting with Kerri and Jim moments before driving back to the airport for our return flight, we decided to open the trunk. Kerri had never seen the artifacts. As I lifted the lid, as I opened the trunk, I realized it was the first time; Tom had always opened the box. Tom had always reached inside, removed the shoes, the tattered coat, the hobby horse, the diary that contained the tracking notes of a fever that killed the boy. This boy was not fiction. Tom would say, “Look at this. Look at what she wrote on this.”

I opened the lid, for the first time, reaching inside, pulling out the shoes, the jumping jack, saying, “Do you see this? Someone must have made it for Johnny. And here, this is the notebook that Isabelle kept of Johnny’s fever. Look at what she wrote.”

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Filed under: Art, Awakening, Play, Surprises, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: catalyst, fund raiser, funding, performance, story, theatre | Leave a comment »

Sit Down

Posted on September 30, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

google "Chicken Little" and this one will come up. www.homesforsaleinlascruces.com

Google “Chicken Little” and this one will come up. http://www.homesforsaleinlascruces.com

Many years ago I was feeling disoriented in my life. I told my friend Rob that I was lost in the woods and looking for my way out. He replied, “Sometimes when you are lost in the woods the best thing to do is nothing. Just sit down.” His message was clear: no one gets oriented or reoriented by spinning. Running in circles, although it might feel useful, will only make you dizzy. Sit down. Get quiet. Listen. It was great advice and at the time nearly impossible.

Orientation to life comes from getting quiet. In one of his books, Deepak Chopra wrote that an important practice on the path to success is a half hour of meditation in the morning and another half hour at the end of the day. Make a practice of getting quiet. Exercise the muscle of stillness. Listen. Clarity will ensue. That way, when the inner compass goes awry, the right tool for the job will be more readily available.

Sitting down can be hard. Stillness and disorientation are not natural bedfellows. The impulse is to action, any action. I was once in a car on a remote mountain dirt road. The road collapsed and the car slowly rolled into a gully. My friend and I spent two days trying unsuccessfully to build a road out. It was only after we gave up and sat down that we were capable of thinking things through. Disorientation generally inspires panic. Panic-driven actions, like running in circles or hauling stones to build a road, are generally comical and make for great stories after orientation is restored. We’ve all turned the wrong way down a one-way street when lost and panicked. Pulling over would have been better but much harder to do when dedicated to forcing an outcome.

Beneath Rob’s message to me was a more important lesson: let go. Let go of the need to do. Let go of the need to solve, fix, or find. The path to orientation always leads through a necessary disorientation and the disorientation comes from hanging on to old ideas, old roles, old baggage, old heroics. The cycle is perfect as hanging on necessitates letting go and letting go often means to sit down, surrender, and breathe. To sit down always affords the opportunity to see where you are as distinct from where you think you should be. To surrender is to open. To breathe is to invite in the new. No one is lost when they stop trying to be some other place.

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Filed under: Awakening, Edges, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: meditation, orient, quiet, quiet mind, reorient, stillness | 2 Comments »

Step Into Your Sanctuary

Posted on September 12, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

An oldie simply called ANGEL

It is night and I am hanging out in the sanctuary while Kerri attends a meeting. I never in my life thought I’d hang out in a sanctuary but I quite like it. It is quiet and I am by myself. It is a good place to meditate or just get still. I am sitting with my stain glass window wondering if there is a conversation in the offing. I’ve spent many nights in my life sitting alone in dark empty theatres and always felt the same sense of peace that I feel at this moment.

I like the word “sanctuary.” It implies a safe place, a resting place. If all the world is my studio then it is also my aspiration to live as if all the world is my sanctuary. I’ve always understood my studio to be a holy place, a place of creation and presence. Going to my studio has always been a step into a safe space. It is where I rejuvenate. Tonight, sitting here, it occurs to me that “studio” and “sanctuary” are very similar words. They are very similar places just as “theatre” and “church” have, for me, been mostly interchangeable: where we go to affirm the stories that identify and transform us; where we go to find our community. My sister finds her community in a church. I have, until lately, found mine in the theatre.

This rambling path begs the question, “What is sacred and what is not?” Yesterday Diane told me that she is a spiritual teacher and I believe that is true. This morning while walking I remembered her words and wondered if we are all spiritual teachers to each other. Some of my greatest teachers had no idea that they were teaching me.They had no intention of teaching me. One great teacher was sweeping a floor and had no idea that I was watching him. He was one of the happiest people I have ever seen. He was shining. He was doing a job that most people would deplore. Everyone who saw him smiled, myself included. He was not his job. He was not his body. He was…connected and alive in his moment. He was living in his sanctuary and helped me know that all the world can be a holy place. He helped crack my understanding of what is possible.

These lines we draw between the sacred and profane are mostly imagined. They are convenient and sometimes useful but they are illusions that I am beginning to understand as destructive. Us and them. A divided house begins in a belief of divisions – a need for division. I’ve often told the story of the executive, red in the face, pounding the table with his fist, shouting, “I know how to compartmentalize my reason from my emotions!” I remember thinking, why would any one want to cut off their emotions from their reason? A better question might have been, who, in their right mind, willingly cleaves themselves into pieces? What delusion is necessary to entertain the notion that reason and emotions are distinct and separate? Separations are generally an indication of not-right-mindedness and a dedication to controlling the uncontrollable.

The angry executive was also a great spiritual teacher for me, too. He taught me to check my assumptions and step over the lines of false distinction that I draw. I can connect the dots directly from his table pounding exclamation to my desire to define my studio as all the world; to live consciously in my sanctuary all of my days.

Go here to buy hard copies (and Kindle) of my latest book: The Seer: The Mind of the Entrepreneur, Artist, Visionary, Innovator, Seeker, Learner, Leader, Creator,…You.

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Filed under: Art, Awakening, Language, Seeing, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: art, creativity, sanctuary, separation, studio, unity, wholeness | 1 Comment »

Know Your Meditation

Posted on August 13, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

Some random thoughts on consciousness:

Last night I read that, according to some traditions, all forms of separation are an illusion. Only the whole is real but to experience the whole, one must experience him or her self as separate from it. What a conundrum!

Or, is it a gift? Tonight we witnessed the most extraordinary sunset. It’s been stormy these past few days and this evening the storms finally broke. The colors of the sunset were subtle, muted, otherworldly. Breathtaking.

We witness all of creation. All of it. And, as witnesses, we experience ourselves as separate from it. A sunset stops us in our tracks because we glimpse the glory of it all. Once, I stood on top of a mountain at sunrise and cried for the sheer beauty of what I was witnessing. Or, perhaps I cried for the feeling; I was, for a brief moment, not separate.

Consciousness is like a flashlight. We point its beam. We see what we illuminate. And, we illuminate what we see. We assign meaning and value where we point our beam. Some experiences – like sunsets – we define as glorious. Some, we define as lacking. Both are forms of meditation. Every choice to aim the beam is a meditation. All assignment of what is found in the light of the beam is a meditation.

What is your meditation?

As Joe said, the entire universe tends toward wholeness. Every time I recall his words I realize a deeper truth in what he said. We tend toward wholeness because we are already whole; the illusion of separation makes us think otherwise. In fact, thinking makes us think otherwise.

The Balinese have an art form, the shadow puppet, called Wayan Kulit. The audience sees the story as shadows cast on a screen. The performance is meant to remind the community that what they see is illusion. It is meant to remind them that they (we) are all casters of shadows. Our minds are screens upon which we play our dramas. Behind the screen, when all the characters are put away, when all the conflict is resolved, when all the separate pieces unified, there is only one artist, and we are….all.

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Filed under: Awakening, Language, Transcendence, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: choice, conscious, consciousness, feeling, meditation, witness | 1 Comment »

Carry Your Story

Posted on July 19, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

I call this painting, “Canopy”

Since writing my post yesterday I’ve been rolling around in my mind the image from this quote from Deepak Chopra’s book, Life After Death: “Every former self you have left behind is a ghost. Your body is no longer the body of a child. Your thoughts, desires, fears, and hopes have changed. It would be terrible to walk around with all your dead selves holding on.”

All day I’ve been looking at people as if they are walking around with all of their dead selves hanging on. And, technically, we are. We define our present moment through the eyes of the past. I suppose the number of ghosts we carry depends upon the definition we carry about ourselves.

Definitions are stories. Thoughts, desires, fears and hopes are contained in the form of a story. Any thought you have is actually a form of storytelling. When we worry if this will happen or that, we are telling a story. When we tell our friends about being stuck in a traffic jam, we are telling a story. When we say, “This is who I am,” we are telling a story. When we say, “That is who they are,” we are telling a story. In a week, my family will gather to memorialize my grandfather; we will tell his story.

I’ve found in many parables and myths that an inner monologue (the story you tell yourself) acts like a fog. It obscures the present. For instance, in the Sisyphus tale, Sisyphus goes to the underworld and watches the souls of the newly departed cross the river Styx. Each soul thinks it is alone even though they are with many others; they cannot see the others through the curtain of their ego story. To enter the great “I am” they must first stop telling a story of separation.

Stories obscure.

We carry our stories forward. That is a legacy. Carrying a story forward is how we connect to our ancestry. Jean Houston once used an image that I like: we are the burning point of the ancestral line. We carry the story-torch forward. Like the Olympic flame our fire was ignited by a spark that stretches back eons. And through us, this flame will reach far into the future. We burn now. This story-torch, the family story, is the root story. It illuminates us.

Stories enlighten.

In both cases, obscuring and illuminating, stories can be heavy to carry. Or, they can be light. It may not be so terrible to walk around with your dead selves holding on if your dead selves tell a story love and connection, a story of hope and aspiration, a story of yearning and possibility. If illumination is the act of transcending your story, a step toward illumination certainly includes a story of love, and usefulness, and a deep appreciation of the ordinary moments that we story to fill our extraordinary days.

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Filed under: Awakening, Love, Metaphor, Story, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: ancestry, legacy, love, story, storytelling | Leave a comment »

Leave Your Ghost

Posted on July 18, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

from the archives. I call this painting “Demeter.”

As Alan said, this year for me is a year of departures. First Tom, then Kathy, Bob, and Doug passed; mentors all. Earlier this month Casey, who lived a long season and once told me that heaven didn’t want him and hell wouldn’t have him, finally found his way out of this life and into his proper place in the mystery.

When I was a boy my favorite book was an old college text of my father’s on comparative religions. It was moldering on a shelf in the basement with other long forgotten books. Finding it was like uncovering buried treasure. I fell into it, reading and rereading it. Among other things, it helped me understand that religion was not fact but a cultural expression of universal experiences. Human beings have to deal with the enormity of existence (who am I?), birth (where do I come from), death (where am I going?), and everything in between (what’s my purpose?). Human beings deal with the enormity of existence like they deal with everything in life: they story it.

Since there has been so many significant departures this year I’ve been doing some reading about death and dying. Lately, I’m reading Deepak Chopra’s book, Life After Death. He weaves the book around a parable of a young woman who must confront Death. The woman seeks the help of rishi, a wise contemplative who lives in the forest. In one of my favorite sections of the parable, the rishi introduces the young woman to ghosts. The first is a toddler; the second is young girl. The woman soon recognizes that the ghosts are her past; they are the phantoms of various stages of her own life. The rishi tells her, “Every former self you have left behind is a ghost. Your body is no longer the body of a child. Your thoughts, desires, fears, and hopes have changed. It would be terrible to walk around with all your dead selves holding on.”

He teaches her that death has been with her every moment of her life. “You have survived thousands of deaths every day as your old thoughts, your old cells, your old emotions, and even your old identity passed away. Everyone is living in the afterlife right now. What is there to fear and doubt?”

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Filed under: Awakening, Identity, Metaphor, Story, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: death, rebirth, Self Growth, self knowledge | 2 Comments »

Invite Them In

Posted on July 17, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

When Kerri read this poem I almost laughed. She was leading the Taize service and had chosen this poem specifically for me to hear. I had, all day, decided to have a very very hard day. In retrospect, nothing happened that was necessarily overwhelming. A tornado did not blow my house down. My paintings did not burn in a hill fire. All of the people I love survived the day, in fact, most thrived! My challenges were imaginary. They were walls of my own creation!

I chose frustration. I danced with disappointment. And then I got angry at myself for being frustrated. It was a feedback loop of self-incrimination. I told myself that I’d lost a perfectly beautiful day in my dedication to my mania. In the middle of my dark storm, Kerri introduced this poem. Enjoy it. Remember it the next time you choose to have a very very hard day.

The Guest House by Rumi

This being human is a guest house Every morning a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness Some momentary awareness comes As an unexpected visitor.

Treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out For some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice, Meet them at the door laughing And invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes Because each has been sent As a guide from beyond.

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Filed under: Awakening, Gratitude, Perspective, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: awareness, Rumi, self knowledge | 3 Comments »

Count Your (Minor) Miracles

Posted on July 15, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

This is a silly watercolor I did a few years ago. I call it ‘Dreams and Dogs.’ It’s not show worthy but makes me laugh so I keep it around.

Today I heard the phrase, “minor miracle.” It struck me as odd because I’m not sure that miracles come in major, minor, or standard forms. But, that being said, I decided to make a list of the minor miracles I experienced today:

I awoke. I was alive! And, being alive, I was excited to live another day of life.

I had the best cup of coffee I’ve ever had. Although this happens every morning, the first cup of coffee never fails to be the best ever. It was the first. It was the best.

Mid-morning we took a walk. The day was gorgeous. The breezes from the lake were cool but the sun was warm. The collision of temperature was sensual, startling and enlivening. It was so gorgeous that we took an extra long walk so we might linger in the day.

During our walk, we were surrounded by a cloud of dragonflies. They ringed us and stayed with us for several hundred yards.

I had an epiphany.

We made a customer service call and talked with someone dedicated to serving customers. The challenge remains but the company is no longer an obstacle but is now an ally.

Later, taking Tripper Dog-Dog-Dog for a walk, instead of the usual sled dog technique, he actually walked like a real dog that was trained to heel. The change was so impressive that Kerri said, “This makes me believe anything is possible.”

I have a new painting tapping my shoulder. It wants to be painted. It won’t leave me alone until I pay attention. I admire its persistence.

At sunset, we sat in the hammock with cold beer and Skinny Pop popcorn watching the clouds seep brilliant orange and migrate slowly across the sky.

We sang a song on the voicemail of a friend in deep distress. It made her laugh. It changed her day.

The night air is cool. The windows are open and the breeze is almost but not quite cold. It is quiet and begs for a walk. It will be the third walk of the day and will most likely be filled with a few more minor miracles.

The day also held major miracles, too. But, being major, they are subject to a report on another day.

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Filed under: Awakening, Gratitude, Play, Seeing, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: awareness, mindfulness, miracle | Leave a comment »

Let Yourself Go

Posted on July 13, 2014 by davidrobinsoncreative

I have no idea how, but I’m making a mess of sound and will one day play the ukulele. Kerri says that I already am…

My meditation on the word “how” continues.

At our recent Summit in Holland, Alan and I asked the question, “What would you do if you didn’t have to know how?” It is a great question. The short answer is this: you’d figure it out. You’d try things. And if your first attempts led nowhere you’d try something else.

In this musing I have often written that “how” is something that is known at the end of the journey. We can’t answer “how” with any honesty until the story is played. Today I recognize that there are two distinctly different “hows:” 1) the explanation, “This is how I did it. This is how you do it. This is the “how” that presumes a path or a prescription. When dealing with this version of “how” I ask groups or clients to consider their life story and tell me how they got to this day in this place doing this job, etc.. The answer is mostly, “A clear path with a lot of happy accidents,” or something like, “I have no idea. I didn’t try.” Yes. Ask me how to paint a painting and I will tell you that I have no idea. I’ve painted a thousand of them and I can teach color theory or composition but I cannot tell you how to open to the muse, how to become a channel for something greater to come through. To paint a painting, to act in the play, to write the book, there is something akin to letting go. There is a divine surrender. So, how did you get to this place in your life? Divine surrender. Happy accident. Unstoppable forces.

If the first form of “how” is an explanation, the second is akin to giving permission. I have worked with a legion of blocked artists who set up studios, buy musical instruments, sign up for improv class,…, and then sit in their studio, stare at their musical instrument, and forget to go to class. When they call me, they tell me their story and always finish the telling with, “I don’t know how….” For my fee, I could say a single, simple word: start. Instead, what we usually do in our work together is find their internal permission. When they realize that their block has nothing to do with “how” and everything to do with the fear of being judged (“how” is an internal braking system meant to prevent starting), when they are ready to, as Saul would say, “Orient to their own concern,” they allow that their opinion of their work trumps all others, they give themselves permission. They start. They play.

Recently, a brilliant woman, an attendee of the Summit, a maker of incredible mandalas, sent me an email with a photo of the start of a painting. She asked for my advice. I wrote: make a mess. Paint on top of the mess. Then repeat. Today in my inbox I received her beautiful mess with a note that their would be more messes to follow. She started. She picked up a brush. She splashed some paint. She splashed some more paint in response to her first splashes. That is how art is made. That is how light bulbs were invented.

This morning I laughed when I realized the double definition of the phrase, “Let yourself go.” In common parlance, it is used as a negative, when people give up, when they stop trying to maintain their health or their appearance, “He really let himself go.” The second possible meaning is to start. To go. The next time someone is sitting in their studio and asks me the question “how,” I will respond like this: let yourself go.

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