Edges | The Direction of Intention

See Sisu [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on November 12, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

sisu box copy

Sisu is a unique Finnish concept. … Sisu is a special strength and persistent determination and resolve to continue and overcome in the moment of adversity…an almost magical quality, a combination of stamina, perseverance, courage, and determination held in reserve for hard times. [definition from The Sisu Group, Inc.]

Until I met Kerri, I’d never heard of Sisu. Her company is named Sisu Music Productions so I asked a lot of questions. What’s Sisu? What does it mean? She has Finnish roots so Sisu runs in her veins. Her family invokes it during difficult times. “Sisu, yes?”

When obstacles arise, Kerri gets this look in her eyes. It’s the same look her momma, Beaky, would get in the face of a challenge. It’s Sisu. I’ve learned it’s best to step aside when the Sisu tide rises. Sometimes I AM the obstacle and, believe me, there is no place to run, there’s no place to hide. No amount of resistance or self-righteousness will win the day. I have the Sisu tracks on my back to prove it. Now days, when I see the look, I simply step aside. Occasionally, self preservation and wisdom look a lot alike!

It is Sisu week at Studio Melange. A celebration of grit and determination. As I started to write this morning I made a list of the people I know who are teeming with Sisu. Chris and Janelle, 20, Horatio, Judy, Skip, Master Miller, Wendy, P-Tom, Jen and Brad, Kirsten, Heather, JimmySue, Craig, Dan,…. the list goes on and on and fills me to the brim with gratitude and awe that I get to walk life with these people.

It’s a good exercise. Focus on the Sisu that surrounds you. And then, consider putting yourself on the list. When have you drawn on your Sisu? In the face of adversity, when have you been surprised by the perseverance-spirit that arose with in you. Courage rarely feels like Hollywood defines it. Can you see it? Sisu, yes?

read Kerri’s blog post about SISU

Filed under: Edges, Merely A Thought Monday, Power, studio melange, Uncategorized | Tagged: david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, determination, grit, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, perseverance, sisu, studio melange | Leave a comment »

Give To Life [on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on November 6, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

Today is voting day in these United States of America. Our election cycles are usually ugly and interminable affairs but this cycle has established a new low bar. These days my country’s narrative is anything – and everything – but kind. Anything goes, it seems, but kindness (or truth, but that’s a theme for another time).

It’s a complex challenge. People wrapped in an ugly narrative see an ugly world (of course). People wrapped in an ugly narrative respond with ugly actions (of course). As the saying goes, ‘If the only tool you have in your bag is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.’ Ugly narratives are a one-tool-bag.

An ugly narrative is never changed through another ugly narrative. Resistance will always create a fight. Hammer, nail. Hammer, nail. It’s a great strategy for inflating the ugliness. Winning at all cost usually costs the things most valued: ideals and values. Decency. Division as a strategy works in the short term but the long game is, well, ugly.

Reach Through Time no wordsjpg copy It is not a secret, though rarely put into practice, that bridging a philosophical divide is easy. It’s rarely practiced because it’s counter-intuitive: Reach. Reaching is a distinctly different action than resisting and it generates a distinctly different response: reconciliation. It does, however, require a set of tools beyond a simple hammer:

Listening.
A dedication to truth, even if it doesn’t support the belief-of-the-moment. Reconciliation is impossible without leading with the truth.
Operating out of a bigger picture – one that transcends self-interest.

Pie-in-the-sky you say? Why is it less possible to choose kindness than it is to choose violence? Why does reaching across the aisle seem more difficult than demonizing those on the other side? Demonizing is easy. Fear is easy. Planting a flag in the sand and casting yourself as victim is so much easier than stepping across the line and standing in the other’s shoes. Or, if standing in their shoes is too difficult, standing side-by-side is an option.

Many years ago, a student, a former gang member said it best: “Any idiot with a gun can take a life. Taking is easy. The real work comes when you choose to give to life rather than take it.”

World Kindness Day is a week away. Choose to give kindness. Give to life. In little ways. In small moments. And, if it feels good, perhaps consider choosing it everyday, rather than once a year. Kindness is a great addition to any tool bag.

read Kerri’s blog post about WORLD KINDNESS DAY

kerri’s Be Kind designs are still available

be kind designs ©️ 2018 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Edges, Two Artists Tuesday, Uncategorized | Tagged: 2018, choice, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, divides, fear, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, kindness, November 6, Novvember 13, reaching, society6.com/kerrisherwood, ugly narrative, victimhood, Voting day, world kindness day, www.kindnessUK.com | Leave a comment »

Expand Your Bubble [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on October 22, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

Everyone has their insurmountable mountain to climb. Everyone has their fear to face. Everyone bumps against the edges of their comfort zone. Everyone.

And, the beauty of this life is that the insurmountable mountain is different for everyone. What seems easy to you might be impossibly scary to me. You show me it is possible. I show you it can be done. We inspire another look at what’s possible.

In the film, FREE SOLO, Alex Honnold says that, for him, fear is not something to be conquered. Comfort is something to be expanded. And, comfort is expanded through exploration and practice. Through experiences and reaching. Testing and discovery. Trying again and again until what once looked like a monster becomes known. It’s remarkably practical. It is what education is supposed to be.

How we ask the question determines the paths we see or don’t see. It’s all in the language we use. “Facing a fear” is oh, so, warrior-esque. We are inundated with “going to battle” metaphors. Defeating a part of myself in a battle against myself seems…contrary to the bigger picture. Win by losing. Division as the only available route? Armor, armor everywhere.

There is wisdom in putting down the swordplay. There is hope in choosing cooperation instead of conflict. Instead of picking a fight, instead of perpetuating the power of the fear, how much better might it be to turn and look. Really look. Study. To reach and test. To take a step. To try and fall down so that you might try again with a little bit more experience. Study. Open to possibilities.

It’s a pattern. Focusing on the obstacle, fighting the fear, is learned. It’s a great strategy for keeping yourself afraid and encased in armor. Other patterns are available and far more productive. It’s possible to climb like Alex: study your mountain, learn the terrain, practice the difficult moves over and over, internalize safety, and one day, when you are ready, when you have a relationship with something other than fear, climb your once insurmountable mountain.

read Kerri’s blog post on COMFORT ZONES

book/hire/buy

Filed under: Awakening, Edges, Language, Merely A Thought Monday, Pattern, Uncategorized | Tagged: alex honnold, conflict, cooperation, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, discover, division, documentary, edges, Free Solo, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, language, learn, metaphor, mountains, national geographic, pattern, split intention, studio melange, study, the melange | Leave a comment »

Show Up [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on October 15, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

Sometimes something is so obvious it actually needs to be said. The real difficulty in this life is not arriving at the finish line but showing up to the starting line. This phrase, a quote from our Life Below Zero addiction, encapsulates the essence and great challenge of many of my coaching clients – of most people. There is often a glass wall between yearning and action. I wonder how many times in my life I’ve offered this phrase: the actions you need to take are never the problem; the challenge is the story you wrap around the actions.

It comes down to this, yet another simplicity: starting brings change. Start the race and you will never be the same. Start the race and there’s no guarantee what you will learn or find. You may win or lose or simply not finish. You might learn that you are in the wrong race or that you care nothing for races. But mostly, there is this. If you take another look at the quote you’ll discover the crux of the matter is not about lines, it is never really about beginnings or endings. It’s about showing up. It’s about taking action on the thing that you most yearn to do. Or be. It’s about showing up, being seen. Starting requires a relinquishing of control.

Damn! There’s so much complexity in simplicity!

read Kerri’s blog post about SHOWING UP

Filed under: Edges, Merely A Thought Monday, Uncategorized | Tagged: challenges, complexity, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life below zero, national geographic, showing up, simplicity, sled dog racing, story, studio melange, the melange | Leave a comment »

Open The Time Capsule [on DR Thursday]

Posted on October 11, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

Kerri calls this morsel ‘Waterfall Dreams’

This week some long lost paintings came home.

Nearly 15 years ago, an acquaintance opened a physical therapy office. She asked if I would hang my work in the reception area, hallways and therapy rooms. I was delighted and installed 8 paintings, all wildly colorful. I was in my phase of vibrant swirling color. The local galleries told me that my work was too colorful so I was delighted to have any opportunity to share my paintings. Over time, three of the paintings sold. I brought in a few more. They sold. Ownership of the office changed but the paintings remained. Years went by.

When I left Seattle, I left those paintings behind. I couldn’t get to them. I counted them as lost. And then, a few weeks ago an email popped into my box. They were looking for my address. They wanted to ship to me the paintings. Three remained.

Opening the box was like opening a time capsule into my past. A life I remember but am almost too far distant to recognize. They were a delightful abstraction like a TIME magazine from 1950 would be interesting, a curiosity, but intangible. It was looking at the baby shoes your mom saved for you, the drawing you did in kindergarten.

Skip and I talked yesterday about points of orientation. We – all humans – story ourselves based on events. We orient according to the passages of our lives. Every so often life pitches an event so profound that it reorients everything you knew. It changes who you know yourself to be. The first stage of reorientation is disorientation. Getting lost. Struggling to know who you are. And, in being lost, the very first thing we do is try to make the old orientation points valid. It is deeply human to hang on to what you know, to try to fit into an old suit even after the body has forever changed. In the story, the knight takes off his armor. He weeps. He can never go back.

Leaving Seattle was one of those passages for me. Looking at these three paintings was like looking at the old armor. I had a double rush of appreciation. The first for having armor when I needed it. The second for being so far from the place where I stripped it off and left it behind.

I can’t remember if I ever gave this painting a name so Kerri has dubbed it ‘Hot Springs.” acrylic on panel, 2′ x 2′

waterfall dreams/hot springs ©️ 2018/2004 david robinson

Filed under: Art, DR Thursday, Edges, Story, Uncategorized | Tagged: archive, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, homecoming, hot springs, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, lost paintings, society6.com/davidrobinson, time capsule, waterfall dreams | 1 Comment »

Realize It [on KS Friday]

Posted on October 5, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

i am alive song box copy

Years ago, at the retreat center on Whidbey Island, Kendy talked with me about her budding meditation practice. She was having difficulty quieting her mind chatter. To help, a teacher gave her a mantra to use in her meditation. The mantra gave her busy mind a focal point. It was a simple phrase: I Am. I Am. “It’s the craziest thing,” she said, “I feel like I need to add a description, I Am…what? I am happy? I am fulfilled? I am a loser? I am bored? And then it occurred to me that it’s the descriptor I’m trying to quiet! Why do I need to define everything? Judge everything? Assign a score to everything? Isn’t the whole point to realize how profound it is to be alive? I Am.”

There is a photograph of my uncle Al, just months before he died of cancer, fulfilling a dream of flying on a trapeze. At the moment of letting go of the bar, he reaches into space. The catcher is not in the frame. Al’s face, wracked with his disease, is shining with the joy of his moment. The simple pleasure of his moment of I Am.

There is a lyric in Kerri’s song, I Am Alive, that brings me back to my conversation with Kendy and the enormity of her realization. It makes me miss Al. The lyric goes like this: we are bonded by the power of this dream that is I Am.

Cut through all the chatter-of-the-day and it’s plain enough. It’s simple enough. Add the final descriptive word to the I Am. Realize, as Al did in that gorgeous moment of flight, of not-here-or-there. I Am Alive.

I AM ALIVE on the album AS SURE AS THE SUN is available on iTunes & CDBaby

read Kerri’s blog post about I AM ALIVE

i am alive/as sure as the sun ©️ 2002 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Awakening, Edges, Gratitude, KS Friday, Transcendence, Uncategorized | Tagged: as sure as the sun, awakening, cancer, cancer survivor, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, I Am Alive, inspiration, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, meditation, meditations, realization, society6.com/kerrisherwood | Leave a comment »

Long And Stand Still [on KS Friday]

Posted on September 28, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

longingSongbox copy

It’s been a week. How’s that for a non-statement statement? It reminds me of a phrase Roger taught me years ago. It’s an emergency phrase to pull out when the play you’ve just seen is rotten and the director wants to know what you think. He said, “Simply smile and exclaim, ‘Now that was a play!'”

We write posts everyday. Sometimes the real story we are trying to tell is found in the overview, where the posts are juxtaposed. For instance, the difference between what I wrote Tuesday: a nod to all the special people willing to help, and what I wrote Wednesday: routinely checking for exits, not feeling safe in a gun crazy culture, reads like a study in opposites or the ravings of a schizophrenic. And then, to ice my polarity cake, yesterday I wrote about the universal wisdom of finding the middle way. This is the moment when you would smile at me and exclaim, “Now that was some writing!”

Competing narratives. Seeing the pervasive kindness in a culture saturated in violence. We want things to be one way or another and it rarely is. It is both/and. We want Hollywood endings and Hallmark predictability all the while yearning for a life of unpredictability and excitement. We story a past that we claim was better than today, forgetting or editing, the hard parts, the ugly parts. “History repeats itself,” we caution out of one side of our mouths while, in the next breath insisting, “Things were better back then.” Competing narratives.

Sometimes I long to go back and make different choices. Sometimes I am intensely grateful that I’ve walked this rich and broken path; I wouldn’t change a thing. Longing is like that, I think. And, Kerri has caught perfectly both sides of longing, the collision of narratives in competition, the desire to go back in time, the utter appreciation of standing right here.

LONGING on the album AS IT IS is available on iTunes & CDBaby

read Kerri’s blog post about LONGING

www.kerrianddavid.com

you know what to do

longing/as it is ©️ 2004 kerri sherwood

Filed under: Edges, KS Friday, Pattern, Uncategorized | Tagged: AS IT IS, competing narratives, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, life, longing, narratives, society6.com/kerrisherwood, story, storying | Leave a comment »

Believe In The Impossible [on Chicken Marsala Monday]

Posted on September 3, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

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.

www.kerrianddavid.com

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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 | Leave a comment »

Stop At The Beginning [on DR Thursday]

Posted on August 30, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

Aqua Agua Mit Rouge

Aqua Agua Mit Rouge. Kerri laughed and clapped her hands when she named this morsel. It is a process snapshot of the early under-painting, the base layer of what would become Earth Interrupted VII. It is loose, fluid and free. It is a special layer – a visual marker of what happens before my thinking mind kicks in. Free. Fluid. Loose. Flow. For me, the first moments of painting are all intuition.

More and more I am learning from these morsels. I’ve spent countless hours gazing at finished paintings asking myself how I might grow, become a better painter. Reach into deeper pools of experience. It is only recently – because of the morsels – that I am spending time gazing at my process, the previously unconscious parts, and asking the same questions. How do I grow? Become better? Become more Fluid? Loose? Free?

The answer of the moment is as funny as it is clear: stop at the beginning. See through the eyes of intuition, feel your way forward. Stop before that talky brain weighs in with all manner of blah blah blah.

earth interrupted VII, mixed media, 48 x 36IN

STAY TUNED! The FALL VIRTUAL GALLERY SALE starts this weekend. An announcement is coming!

read Kerri’s blog post about AQUA AGUA MIT ROUGE

www.kerrianddavid.com

Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Edges, Uncategorized | Tagged: big brushes, creative process, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, earth interrupted, flow, fluid, free, intuition, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, loose, morsels, painting, process, society6.com/davidrobinson, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Take Another Step [on KS Friday]

Posted on August 24, 2018 by davidrobinsoncreative

in transition song box copy

In the past year I’ve been reading books a few pages at a time. Some days I only read a few paragraphs at a time. I’m not reading to get through a book. I’m reading to ponder. It’s become a form of reading meditation.

A few weeks ago, I began a slow read of my own book, The Seer. I published it nearly five years ago and immediately abandoned it. Today I read this: change never comes from the direction of what you know. It is a prerequisite of learning, growth and change to step away from what is known, from what is comfortable. From what feels safe. Learning and change are always in the direction of the unknown.

Kerri’s IN TRANSITION is a musical mantra for stepping into the unknown. As is true of all transitions, it is a yearning in two directions. Yearning for what was. Yearning for what will be. But more than yearning, it is a river of determination. Take another step. And another. And another. Discover.

If you are in transition, as we are, stand still for a moment and listen to the yearning, steep yourself in the simple encouragement of IN TRANSITION.