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

 

dogga in snow website box copy

 

Filed under: Awakening, Flawed Wednesday, Identity, Navel Gazing, Possibility, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

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

 

milleniumparktree website box copy

Filed under: Awakening, Flawed Wednesday, Love, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Sit On The Wire [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on December 18, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

birds on a wire copy

Google the question, “Why do birds sit on a wire?” and you’ll get a curious tidbit of information. This is what I read: birds are able to sit on electrical wires because the current ignores the bird’s presence.

It’s human to ask the question “why?” In fact, asking the question “why?” is probably a central characteristic of the critter called human being.

Another characteristic of a human being is personification: attributing human characteristics to things non-human. For instance: the current ignores the bird’s presence. I laughed heartily when I read the phrase. The electrical current dissed the birds on the wire. Wait. Is that why the birds sit there?

Now we have two possible questions.”Why?” you might ask, “did the current dis the birds?” OR, you could ask,”Why do the birds taunt the electrical current?”

Either way it sounds like the beginning of a really good joke. Or, a good question to ask in a philosophy class: why and when did the conflict between birds and electrical current start?

All good stories, like all good jokes, begin with a hearty conflict. Yearning meets obstacle. Bird meets wire.

Why?

We critters are excellent at asking the question. Why, you might ask, is there rarely a definitive answer? Well, asking the question seems to be the point. Curiosity is what makes us human. Don’t ask me why.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about BIRDS ON A WIRE

 

sunsetonisland website box copy

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Identity, Random, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Know The Matter [on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on December 11, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

healthcare.gov copy

I’ve had this conversation twice in my life. The first time I was working in The Netherlands. The second time I was working in Canada. The conversation, both times, started with exactly the same question:  What’s the matter with you Americans?

It is an irrefutable fact: we (Americans) pay more than 7 times what any other nation on earth pays for healthcare and we provide poorer coverage for less people. Our life expectancy is shorter. We are an obese nation. Our infant and maternal mortality rate is higher than any other developed nation.

What’s the matter with (us) Americans?

Here’s another irrefutable fact: the top 1% of households owns more wealth than the bottom 90% combined. The gap is, in fact, growing.

We are being force-fed the fear of socialism* but, if you dare, take off the blinders, plug your ears to the noise of heated misdirection, and look at the data. It’s clear that our fear should be of the oligarchy.

What’s the matter with (us) Americans? We are too easily led, susceptible to diversion by division, and extraordinarily fact-averse. We are too lazy to question, research or otherwise investigate the easy tribal narratives of red or blue. We are (to borrow a great book title) a confederacy of dunces.

The stresses of “healthcare” are making most of us sick while making a very, very few of us as rich as Croesus. That is another irrefutable fact and is the crux of what is the matter with (us) Americans.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about HEALTHCARE.GOV

 

*try this experiment (I have and it is eye opening): To everyone who screams in fear the word “socialism,” ask them to define the word “socialism.” You will find, as I do, the screamers can’t define it. They don’t really know what they are screaming about. They (we) also are inordinately incapable of defining “oligarchy.” That is (sadly) why I’ve provided links. It is also an alternate answer to the question, “What is the matter with you Americans?” I decided in the final moment to exclude a link to the words “representative democracy.” Given the irrefutable but too often denied facts, it begs a whole other set of questions.

 

footprints in sunlit snow website box copy

 

 

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Rants, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Gather [on Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on December 4, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

for the times... copy

Sometimes you are running ahead of the ball and then the ball rolls over you. Generally, those are momentous days. Today was on of those.

I love the phrase, “The day got away from you.”  Personification of the day. It ran away. A wild thing. It was not controllable and got away. Generally, those are momentous days. Today, yes, today was one of those.

A baby was born. A friend peered into the darkness. Someone was strong-armed into compliance. Trusty relationships went sour. And all of it happened at the same time. The same day. Momentous.

Sometimes change slips in unannounced. Sometimes you see it coming and look away.

Knowing that the universe is out of joint, Jim, at the end of the day, texted a Dylan lyric. Gather ’round people wherever you roam. Yes. It’s the people in our story, those we gather around us, those we join when the landscape is barren and lonely, that make days like today seem better. Momentous.

These times, they are a changin.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about PEOPLE

 

 

windyHHwebsite box copy

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Random, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Ask A Simple Question [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on November 27, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

everything to lose copy

Here’s a very sexy beginning to a blog post: this morning I read that sales of durable goods in these United States are up .06%. Stoves. Washing machines. Dryers. It is a dubious statistic. The week before our wedding, our washing machine AND dryer died. The nice salesman at the appliance store, an older man, began his sales pitch with reminiscence. “I remember when we actually made good products built to last. Now we make crap built to fall apart.” The next 45 minutes was a lesson in what’s built to break in 5 years or less. He steered us away from more appliances than he tried to sell. It was eye opening.

“Durable” goods, these days, are built to be less than durable. They are built to be replaced. They are built to be thrown away. They are built to produce nice looking economic statistics. [note: Kerri and I have and still cook on a stove that is at least 40 years old. It looks like hell but works like a dream. It was built in the era before planned obsolescence was considered a consumer best-buy]. The seedy dark side of our consumer culture is 1) the mountains of refuse we leave behind and 2) how rarely we turn and look at the consequences of our consumption.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch , one of five garbage patches gyrating around our oceans, is at least twice the size of Texas and growing. When I was in graduate school I took a class about my city and the environment. Like me, none of my classmates knew what happened to our trash. None of us knew our watershed. None of us knew how our trash impacted our water.  We take our refuse to the curb. It goes away. Magic!

Where does it go? The latest National Geographic Magazine (12.2019) has an eye-opening article on our addiction to plastics and the pollution/environmental devastation it creates. One of the chief denials of the modern era is that humans are somehow separate from the environment in which we exist. We can do whatever we want to do to “it” and “it” will have no impact on “us” at all. According to the story, we are above it all. And, as is true of all denial tales, we either wake up and reorient or we hold fast to our delusion and drown as the unsinkable ship goes down.

Speaking into steadfast denial often requires a new, courageous, and unlikely voice. Enter Pattie Gonia, an environmental advocate drag queen. A modern berdache.  A powerful presence, an artist, standing in the trash, wearing the trash, asking (and answering) a very simple question: what do we have to lose?

 

 

Watch this short documentary to learn more about EVERYTHING TO LOSE and PATTIE GONIA:

 

 

 

read Kerri’s blog post about EVERYTHING TO LOSE

 

heart in island sand website box copy

Filed under: Awakening, Edges, Flawed Wednesday, Heroes, Perspective, Story, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Breathe The Same Air [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on November 20, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

network connections copy

For years I had a debate with my business partner. She was a first adopter, always jumping into the latest technology. Her position in the debate: real relationships were possible through technology. My position: you need to be in the same room with someone if you want a real relationship. Technology can provide connective tissue but can never approach the visceral, tangible, sensual realities necessary in a relationship.

Over time I’ve flip-flopped my position and then flipped back again. Connectivity is not relationship. I am connected with people all over the world – and I deeply appreciate the network connection – but I am only in relationship with the people I spend time with. It is simple. Relationship takes time. Relationship needs time. It is not an achievement; it is an ongoing investment in the heart of another.

John O’Donohue writes about the “digital instant,” the expectation of arrival compressed into a nanosecond. The absence of journey. If the website doesn’t come up in a second or two, we leave in frustration. We click our angry departure for another instant arrival. If I don’t answer an email within a compressed amount of time, the originator of the email wonders why I’m ignoring them. Connectivity comes with expectations that often prohibit relationship. Or, rather, connectivity is the low-bar expectation of what now qualifies for real relationship.

Yesterday 20 and I continued a conversation that we started four years ago. We will pick it up again because our conversation has no end. It is a lifetime conversation. There is no expectation of arrival, of conclusion. The focus is entirely on the journey, the friendship, the continuance. The laughter, the deep sharing of fear and frustration, the vulnerability, the sharing-of-time-to-listen-and-give-presence. What we share is not a network connection (that phrase feels scrubbed, antiseptic, even in the writing of it). It is something with breadth and depth and texture that can only come when two people breathe the same air, sit in the same room, read body language, and feel what is beneath the words.

 

photo-1

 

read Kerri’s blog post about NETWORK CONNECTIONS

 

slow dance party cropped website box copy

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Language, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

Decide To Create A Better Story [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on November 13, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

hate has no home here copy

To anyone who entertains the mistaken notion that they are not creative, look no further than your thoughts. Thought is a creative act. It leads to the chicken-and-egg conundrum of creating. Do you create your thoughts or do your thoughts create you? Either way, what happens between the ears ripples with creativity.

We live within our thoughts and our thoughts live within us. We feed our thoughts with our fantasies and fears. Universes open or close. For instance, focus on contention and you will see contention everywhere.  That is, you will create contention.

It is, and has been the dirty little secret of governing people since before Machiavelli: keep the masses focused on division and they will be easily manipulated. Create difference whether it exists or not. That way the good people will fight with each other and not focus on the actions of their leaders. It’s a magic trick. A sleight of hand. It is a strategy, not a conspiracy.

A people united as one is a very potent force. A united populace is dangerous to a corrupt and fearful leadership.

Before you roll your eyes with my esoterica, put your highly creative thought on this: is it true that our nation is deeply divided? Yes.  Do we create division ourselves without question, eating heartily the divisive narrative we are being fed? Yes. We are daily meditating on division and daily claiming it as truth. We create division together.

Narratives are powerful and just as capable of obscuring as they are of revealing. Obscurity is a creative act. So is deception. Propaganda. Denial. Conspiracy theory. Lie.

It is the definition of ignorance to embrace a narrative without questioning it. Which brings us back around to the chicken-and-egg conundrum: do you close your mind or does your mind close you? Yes. Hate has no home in a questioning mind.

Are we capable of questioning? Of telling a common story? It depends on what we decide together to create. Yes.

 

read Kerri’s blog post on NO HOME FOR HATE

 

shadow in surf HH website box copy

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Pattern, Perspective, Possibility, Power, Story, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Hear What You Say [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on November 6, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

rest area copy

A deep dark secret: we write the melange for ourselves. It makes us pay attention. For instance, Two Artists Tuesday is always an image, a photograph of something striking or beautiful that we’ve seen. The necessity of having an image each week to write about makes us practice seeing. We are always on the lookout for the simple beauty that surrounds us. And, each week (this will not shock you), we find too much of it. There is so much beauty available if you make yourself available to seeing the beauty.

In addition to images, we’ve given ourselves the necessity of listening to language, hearing the odd phrase, the ridiculous statements we make or that spill out of the mouths of others. And, like the images, there are always too many of them. We never know where they will come from. We are constantly scrambling for a pen or speaking to Siri so we won’t loose a phrase. Choosing the material for the melange is generally an act of sifting through an embarrassment of silly riches.

We had a 24 hour turn around trip to Kansas City. On the way back, too tired to drive another mile, we stopped in a rest area somewhere in Iowa to catch a nap. In my imagination there are travelers all across this nation with photographs of our sleeping faces smashed against the window of our car. Swimming out of our most recent roadside snooze, Kerri said, “That was a good nap! I was dreaming and everything.”(note: I’m not sure what “everything” refers to but that is definitely a post for another day.) I remarked that, if you can dream at the rest area, you were supposed to be there. Kerri jumped for the phone, “Hey, Siri…”

Siri, ever the grammatical maven, had a few suggestions. Think about it: a silly phrase inspired silly-phrase-correction-recommendations from a mechanical device (with a name) that is capable of speaking back-at-us (in “her” preprogrammed schoolmarmish voice). It’s a wonderful, confusing world. Unhinged. An embarrassment of riches.

[my personal favorite and almost the winner of this week’s melange: if you can dream OF the rest area you’re supposed to be there. The implications of this Siri-suggestion are ominous!]

 

read Kerri’s blog post about DREAMING AT THE REST AREA

 

not our best morning minturn website box copy

Filed under: Flawed Wednesday, Language, Navel Gazing, studio melange, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

Grow More Beautiful [on Not So Flawed Wednesday]

Posted on October 30, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

Barney copy

Barney is growing more beautiful with each passing year. New colors emerge. His wood splinters and new patterns play across his keys. The laminate that once served as skin is loose, wrinkled and twisting.

He was once forgotten.  Years ago, someone thought it was a good idea to store him next to the boiler in the basement of the church. He sat in the dark for decades. He provided a surface for loose tools. He stood in water more than once; the basement floods and the boiler breaks. Over time his soundboard was ruined. He was no longer useful according to his original purpose.

He was rediscovered. He was rolled into the light. It was determined that he was too broken to be fixed and he was scheduled to be taken away by the scrap man. It took some convincing but we talked the scrap man into bringing Barney to our house. He helped us roll Barney across the grass. He helped us lift him into his resting place.

Barney has been a fixture in our backyard for the past 4 years. Kerri played him on his first day here and he sounded pretty good. The next day his sound collapsed, his keys stuck; he let us know his time for giving voice was over. He is content in his silence.

Now, he rests. He weathers. He drinks in the sun and the snow and rain as the years cycle through. The plants grow up around him as he slowly sinks into them. We watch and note his changes, the pieces falling off, the chipmunks who live beneath his lid. The purples and ochres and deep rich blues that were hiding beneath the laminate have surfaced. The changing weather, the long road of his life, has teased them to the top.

He quite simply grows more and more beautiful. We think that was his purpose all along.

 

read Kerri’s blog post about BARNEY

 

cropped head kiss website copy

Filed under: Emergence, Flawed Wednesday, Identity, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »

« Previous Page — Next Page »
  • buy us a coffee :-) Thank you!

  • visit the studio melange at kerrianddavid.com

  • The Seer available on Amazon.com

  • Lucy & The Waterfox is also available on Amazon.com