Merely A Thought Monday | The Direction of Intention

Turn The Phrase [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on April 1, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

them apples 1 copy

I just read this phrase and laughed aloud: Conversation in English is often full of phrases not to be taken literally.

It’s the word ‘often’ that got me chuckling. I’d have been more sober if ‘always’ had been the adverb. Conversation in English is always full of phrases not to be taken literally.

My head exploded! She turned the tables on me! You don’t say! I’ll be dogged. It’s nothing to sneeze at! It’s more than you can shake a stick at! I’d rather stick needles in my eyes!

Isn’t it the best of paradoxes? Language, at it’s best, is inexact. It is referential. It can only point toward experience. It’s why we have legal opinions, religious debates and news pundits that scream at each other. It’s why we have differing points of view.

“I didn’t say that!”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Just what are you implying?”

Nothing. No thing. The absence of a thing. The absence of a thought (in English, a thought, however fleeting, is a noun, a thing).

Of course, in it’s inexactness, there is also an infinity of space. There is as much reason to reach, to ask, to discover as there is to push, negate, or differ. To put down your end of the rope. To shake hands not make fists. A common ground.

Word for word. Line for line. To the letter. It’s never black and white. In a toxic time, a poisoned well. Find the middle way. Heart felt. We need not stab each other in the back. Kill two birds with one stone. Pull your head out of the sand. It’s a piece of cake. It literally blew me away. They put down their swords. They reached across the aisle.

Well I’ll be! How ’bout them apples?

read Kerri’s blog post BOUT THEM APPLES

Filed under: Language, Merely A Thought Monday, Uncategorized | Tagged: common ground, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, idiom, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, language, literal, nonsense, power of language, referential, studio melange | Leave a comment »

Consider Context [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 25, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

civility 2 copy

It’s an idiom. A turn of phrase. When push comes to shove. The moment when a decision must be made. Look it up and you’ll read that the expression carries a connotation of escalation. Shoving is more aggressive than pushing.

A moment of decision. On the threshold of escalation.

Like all idioms (or all words, for that matter) context is everything. We saw this phrase on a billboard. It is a campaign promoting civility at a time when civility seems in short supply. We liked it and thought it would be a good quote for Merely-A-Thought-Monday. Context: Civility.

Google the phrase and you’ll discover the disease that plagues us. Namely, the lack of capacity to consider context. Or, perhaps, no capacity to recognize context. Or, perhaps, no capacity to consider a context that differs from one’s own. The top of your Google search will reveal a rage of opposition to the billboard promoting civility. Shove harder. “…so basically they’re telling you let the son of a b$&@? push you around…”

Wow. It’s an idiom. Context: Civility.

To be fair, a scroll down the Google chain includes motivational stories, a dance piece by Twyla Tharp, more links to PassItOn.com images and tv spots, a song by The Grateful Dead, a lyric by Rascal Flatts. A festival of differing contexts and usages of this phrase when push comes to shove.

Here are a few other idioms: where the rubber meets the road. When the going gets tough, the tough get going. When the chips are down…, When the dust settles…, When in Rome…

A moment of decision. On the threshold of escalation. Context matters.

read Kerri’s blog post about CIVILITY

Filed under: Education, Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: civility, context, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, disease, Google, idiom, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, language, passiton.com, phrase, power of language, Rascal Flatts, studio melange, technology, Twyla Tharp | Leave a comment »

Bust Yourself [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 18, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

something wrong with me box copy

As you know, I am a lover of the paradox. Among my favorite incongruities in this American culture is the hyper-celebration of the individual amidst the hyper-pressure to swim in the mainstream. To belong by standing out. To be distinct by shopping the brand stores. Within our national schizophrenia, we are, each of us, a festival of quirks, a riot of split intentions.

I laughed out loud when 20 told us his grocery store story. Standing in an aisle of hundreds of soap brands; ice-blue, blossom-pink, orange-orange, lemon-yellow, cool lilac… stacked taller than most people can reach, 20 carefully scrutinized all of the bottles. He gasped! He spotted a bottle of dish soap that seemed to have an ounce more in it! Elated, he looked left and right to make certain no other shopper had yet seen what he saw. With stealth, he reached way to the back of the shelf to snag his prize. The hunter trapped his game and wrestled it into his basket. He quickly sped from the aisle putting distance between him and other dish-soap-hunters. “There must be something wrong with me!” he exclaimed laughing at himself.

A mountain of choices, an ounce of triumph. Do you recognize it? Life lived in the paradox. It is in our national dna.

It makes for a festival of beautiful quirks. A riot of split intentions. We laugh when we bust ourselves standing in the paradox. You’ll know you are there when through your amusement you exclaim, “There must be something wrong with me.”

read Kerri’s blog post on SOMETHING WRONG

make me an offer. seriously. it’s that time.

Filed under: Merely A Thought Monday, Random, studio melange, Uncategorized | Tagged: david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, paradox, quirks, split intentions, studio melange | Leave a comment »

Lose Your Right Mind [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 11, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

in your right mind copy

I have made some incredibly bad decisions in my life that set off a chain of events that led to some extraordinary, life-illuminating experiences. Conversely, I have made some incredibly good, well-considered decisions that led me to total devastation. My life reads like one of Aesop’s Fables.

The “bad” decisions were “irrational” and “spontaneous” and some of my pals questioned whether or not I was in my “right” mind.

The “good” decisions were “rational” and I was lauded for using common sense, for my clear-eyed, right-minded logic.

Intuition, following your gut, listening to your heart has very little to do with the rightness of mind.

Back in the previous century (20 years ago), educators were awash in the term “the mainstream.” Getting divergent students back into the mainstream was the stated goal of most alternative education programs. Doug, my hero of the alternative path, champion of finding the stream that worked for the student (as opposed to channeling all students back into a single stream), used to snarl, “I’d love to see this mainstream if someone would be kind enough to point it out to me.” (note: this is not a direct quote as I’ve cleaned up Doug’s language for my less sturdy readers).

In mythology it is called the left-hand path, this route that makes no sense to adherents of the mainstream. The left-hand path is intuitive and counter-intuitive, all at the same time. It seems nonsensical to sail toward the edge of the known world. Explorers, artists, innovators, mystics, must take this road less traveled. They must wander off the main and cut a new path. They must. Their fellows will wonder if they’ve taken leave of their senses. Left their right mind. The answer: no. They are following a deeper call, something speaking to their senses. They’ve left a mainstream that appears to them like total madness.

If logic is your compass it is, of course, best to stay on the road well-traveled. If safety and security is your goal, then a known path holds what you seek.

If knowing where you’re going sounds a lot like a death sentence, then leaving your right mind for a left-hand path is the only choice that makes sense.

Truth? I think the right-mind is bit of rhetoric that has little to do with the realities of being human. We find the rational side of things comfortable so it gets good marks. No one gets a cake-walk in this life. Everyone has a mountain to climb, a valley to get lost in, a spontaneous jump to make, a gut feeling, a heart to be listened to – and some of the worst impulsive decisions inevitably lead to the most profound growth experiences. It is only after the fact, when we need to make sense of our nonsensical leap, our follow-the-heart choice, that we call on the “right” mind to make the story coherent. Just ask Aesop.

read Kerri’s blog post about RIGHT MIND

Filed under: Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective, Story, The Direction of Intention, Uncategorized | Tagged: Aesop's Fables, choices, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, heart, intuition, irrational, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, left hand path, logic, madness, mainstream, rational, right mind, story, story. sense making, studio melange | Leave a comment »

Ask, “Why?” [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 4, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

guidance framed copy

I’m told that every evening of her life, Margaret would stop what she was doing, and go outside to watch the sun set. If she was on the phone she would hang up. If she was doing dishes she’d turn off the water. She’d step into her back yard and attend the setting of the sun. It was her ritual.

Last year, Kerri, my mom, and I took my dad back to visit the small town where he grew up. He wanted to live his life there but that was not to be. Now, he is sliding into dementia. Before his sun set he wanted to make at least one last pilgrimage to the place he’s always considered home.

I draw and paint. Not because I want to but because I have to. As far back as I can remember that has been true. The rest of this world seems like Alice’s trip down the rabbit hole. Mad. Illusory. Missing the point. I know what is solid and true when I step in front of a canvas. It’s a paradox, yes?

Why do people make paintings? Why do they compose music? Why are we tellers of story? Inventors of story? Poets? Budget makers and parents alike caution that there is no real value in the arts. They rarely make money. Money making as the ultimate arbiter of value makes for an empty world, indeed.

Why do people climb mountains, jump out of airplanes, or kayak over waterfalls?

“Why does she say, ‘guidance is eternal?'” Kerri asked. We were streaming an episode of Life Below Zero on the National Geographic site and the Boeing commercial came up for the umpteenth time. Amid images of advanced technology and machines that fly, the narrator begins a countdown, 10, 9, 8, guidance is internal, 6, 5,… “I think she’s saying that guidance is internal, not eternal.” We looked at each other. Either way, what a great phrase! Guidance is internal. Guidance is eternal.

Why do people step outside each evening of their lives to watch the setting sun? Return like salmon to their birthplace? Listen to the wind and run to their piano?

read Kerri’s blog post about GUIDANCE

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Merely A Thought Monday, The Direction of Intention, Uncategorized | Tagged: art, artistry, creating, creative process, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, eternal, eternal guidance, Guidance, inner guidance, inner voice, internal guidance, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, studio melange, value, values | Leave a comment »

Live Into Simplicity [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on February 25, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

chip hailstone box copy 3

I am a fan of simple wisdom. Most of my mentors, the people I admire most, lived their way into simplicity. Measure twice, cut once. Know the hill you want to die on. An actor can only do one thing at a time. Write a good story backwards. Let go your technique.

I use the term ‘fools errand’ a lot because I’ve been on so many of them myself. Tilting at windmills. Trying to change the world, fighting ogres, slaying dragons. All the best stories, the simple wisdom tales, tell us that the thing we seek is with us all along and yet, we need to go looking anyway. We have to. It is the rare bird that knows who they are right out of the chute. The universal quest is always to find yourself.

Roger once told me that he went to graduate school to expedite his learning. “I can take forty years figuring it out for myself or I can go to school for three years.” It was a statement made sensible by his youth. It was a statement of arrival – of knowing – and, after a few years of living, it becomes apparent to artists and seekers alike that arrival is an illusion. Knowing is relative and ongoing. I’d love to talk to the artist he has become forty years after making that statement. My bet is that he’d laugh. We’d laugh at the jungle of nonsense we’ve both mapped our way through.

“You can make a piece of wood short but you can’t make a piece of wood long.” You can’t force a square peg into a round hole. If you chase two rabbits, both will escape. Nothing is broken, nothing needs to be fixed. Wherever you are is called Here.

The necessary action is always clear but the story wrapped around it makes it seem complex. Simple, yes?

read Kerri’s blog post about MAKING A PIECE OF WOOD SHORT

Filed under: Art, Awakening, Creativity, Merely A Thought Monday, Uncategorized | Tagged: chip hailstone, david robinson, david wagoner poem, davidrobinsoncreative.com, fool's errand, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, learning, life below zero, lost, parable, simple wisdom, studio melange, universal quest, youth | Leave a comment »

Save Your Nickel [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on February 18, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

where you can actually hear copy

We walk on snowy trails through the woods because it is quiet. I retreat to my studio to work because it is quiet. It inspires quiet. Quiet evokes quiet.

Scrolling through her news app, Kerri said, “Everyone in the world is angry.” It certainly seems that way, especially if the news is the lens through which the world is defined. Headlines shout. The advertisements flash and disrupt. Tom used to say that watching television, plugging into the news-of-the-day, reminded him of his childhood. The circus would come to town. Carnival barkers and bright signs, lots of noise and distractions. The one sure moneymaker, the tent everyone clamored to get into, lining up to pay their shiny nickel, was the freak show. Two headed cows in jars of formaldehyde. Things that gross us out or make us mad. “Nowadays, they call it reality television,” he’d say, shaking his head. “Or the news. It’s a lot of noise.”

Here’s a simple truth: conversation is impossible in too much noise. People shouting to be heard. A room full of shouting people actually makes listening more difficult and conversing impossible. It’s a feedback loop. Noise evokes noise. And, noise isolates. It is a perfect recipe for being alone together.

The Five20 is a little bar at the Stagecoach Inn in Cedarburg. Their tagline, “Where you can actually hear your conversation” is refreshingly accurate and seems a throwback to another era. People valuing conversation; a place, a space, intended to facilitate interaction sans noise. Our group, 10 people strong, the up-north-gang, began and ended our yearly trek to Winterfest there. Sitting at the far end of the long table, I could hear every word spoken at the other end. Even when the bar was packed. And, the best part, today, I can’t tell you what we talked about – the simple stuff of life – but I can tell you that we laughed and shared and left the Five20 full of friendship, warmed by sharing rather than exhausted from shouting.

As Tom would have said, “Save your nickel.” Sometimes the thing you seek is not in the tent amidst the noise but outside, far from the circus.

read Kerri’s blog post about WHERE YOU CAN ACTUALLY HEAR

Filed under: Merely A Thought Monday, Perspective, Uncategorized | Tagged: Cedarburg, circus tent, conversation, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Five20, freak show, friendship, isolation, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, listening, noise, quiet, Stagecoach Inn, Winterfest | Leave a comment »

Write The Essential [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on February 11, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

I’m not sure what stacks up around your house. At our house, the stacks are paintings, cartoons, designs, composition notes, manuscripts, folios, notebooks of ideas, scraps of paper jammed into the notebooks of ideas, lyrics a-go-go, and the supplies necessary to make the other stacks possible. Colored pencils, brushes, too many composition books, canvas, tissue paper, paint, sketchbooks, art books, and the stacks-and-stacks of stuff teetering on the piano and bench that somehow resemble a nest.

All of this is to note that we are fantastic generators of content and equally inept marketers of what we generate. Thus, the stacks. It was this realization – and the necessity of making a living – that one year ago gave birth to the melange. Melange means ‘mixture’ or ‘medley.’

The idea was simple: Monday would be dedicated to our cartoon, Chicken Marsala. Tuesday would be dedicated to our Two Artists designs. Wednesday was Flawed Cartoon day. Thursday was for my paintings. Friday was for Kerri’s music. We created a Society6.com store for each day, set about designing 5 product lines a week (oh, god,…more content). Through our blogs we’d write about and publish the day’s selection, he-said/she-said-style. People all over the world would read what we wrote, be captivated by the cartoon, design or composition, and race to the Society6.com store to buy a print or a mug or a laptop sleeve or a greeting card. Content out, income, well…in.

And, it happened. People all over the world read our blogs. And, almost no one raced to the Society6.com stores. We studied a few things, learned a few things, reconfigured, tried a few social-media-marketing variations, bought ad space, waved our hands, jumped up and down, danced silly dances – we pivoted and pivoted again.

Look For It [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on February 4, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

it's not a problem correct aikens box copy

We live our lives diving for pen and paper or whipping out our phones to text notes to ourselves. We dive or whip because someone just said something interesting. We are trying capture something we just heard before it slips away. It is the reason we created Merely-A-Thought-Monday.

Watching an old episode of Life Below Zero, Sue Aikens, living on the frozen tundra, tossed off this yummy phrase and we both leapt. Kerri was faster on the uptake, “I got it!” she said, texting at lightning speed. I was still looking for a pen.

It is a statement of optimism made all the more meaningful because of the extreme challenges Sue Aikens faces everyday. Her bears are real. She can’t afford pessimism.

When you are a collector of phrases, a watcher of behaviors, a student of story, a few things become immediately clear. People generally focus on the negative. Take a trip to the office water cooler or go to the local coffeehouse and eavesdrop. You’ll listen to tales of dissatisfaction and conflict. Stories of blame. There’s tons of interesting customer experience data about how readily and disproportionately we tell our tales of woe versus how rarely we tell our tales of wow.

Conflict makes for good storytelling. Tales of wow and tales of woe are both conflict driven, both rife with challenges. I dove for pen and paper because this simple phrase, Sue’s mantra, captures perfectly the distinction, the line that defines a tale as wow or woe.

It depends upon where you place the conflict. In most water cooler tales of woe, the conflict is an endpoint. “Can you believe that happened to me.” The main character, the storyteller, is the victim in the story. Tales woe are told and forgotten. They are replaced by the next yummy woe.

In tales of wow, the conflict is a driver, a propeller toward an end that is not yet visible. The main character is a seeker. The challenge is fuel. “I will find it. I will make it happen.” Tales of wow are unique in that they are usually told by others.

It is human isn’t it? A messy walk between woe and wow. Who hasn’t screamed to the sky, “Why is this happening to me?!” Who hasn’t stopped the presses, found a quiet spot, and thought, “I’m going to figure this out.” Not a problem.

read Kerri’s blog post about SUE’S QUOTE

Filed under: Merely A Thought Monday, Story, Uncategorized | Tagged: conflict, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Kerri Sherwood, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, optimism, pessimism, problems, solutions, story, studio melange, tale, woe, wow | Leave a comment »

Compose A Letter [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on January 28, 2019 by davidrobinsoncreative

dear brain copy

As reductions go, this phrase is a good one. It is eastern philosophy pressed like a grape through western process: Dear Brain…Please Shut Up! Forced mindfulness. Mandatory meditation. Compulsory peace! It is the epicenter of compartments and cubicles: the dedicated belief that brain and body are separate entities, that heart and mind and body and spirit actually need unifying. Competitive non-competitors!

I have a brilliant new idea for a cartoon! It makes Kerri roll her eyes. I call it Bubbles. It’s a single panel cartoon. Two people, two thought bubbles. So, for instance, a man in a red convertible drives down the road thinking that he’s smokin’ hot! He’s especially peacocking for a woman walking her dog. The woman thinks it’s astonishing that the guy in the red convertible has such a bad toupe’. You never know what other people are thinking – especially when you are certain that they are thinking about you! My Bubbles premiere cartoon will be an overly enthusiastic cartoonist who thinks he has a brilliant idea and his beleaguered wife wondering why she married such an insipid man. I draw all of my best ideas from lived experiences.

Thought bubbles. My second Bubbles cartoon will be a brain going on and on and on, rolling incessantly through its fear obsession. Bills and deadlines and tragedy-imaginings. Important stuff! The heart, the neighbor living in the apartment beneath all the racket, will be at a desk trying to compose a letter. “Dear Brain…”

read Kerri’s blog post about DEAR BRAIN…