Wake Up To A New World

Posted on September 4, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

891. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

“It isn’t explanations that carry us forward, it’s our desire to go on.” Paolo Coello, Brida

I had a very late night. Combined with a very early flight I had no choice but to sleep my way across the country. Not only did I wake up in a different city, a different time zone, a different climate, I also felt as if I woke up into a different lifetime. I was away for a very long time. In that time I traveled by car across seven states in less than 24 hours. I stood in the pouring rain. I heard thunder roll without ceasing for over 15 minutes. I drank too much wine, ran from a skunk, loaded a truck with furniture and boxes, played poorly a ukulele, laughed until I had to sit down, cleaned a pond of leaves and debris, put my feet in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, fell asleep on the sugar white sands of the beach, danced like it was the last day of my life, ate when I was hungry, walked at midnight almost every night, sang a James Taylor song over and over, and took a load of treasured shoes to the salvation army. In that time, Tom died and I was inundated with calls from people who wanted me to know. Friends long lost reached out to me to wrap me in their warmth and condolences. I had conversations of grief and celebration while standing on a pier, sitting on a park bench, riding in a car, sitting in my bed, and walking through the leaves fallen too early. I took off my shoes so I could feel them crunch beneath my feet.

When I stepped off the plane I entered into a familiar airport but it seemed as if it was familiar from another lifetime. I knew the place but was no longer the person who knew the place. I stood in SeaTac for a few moments and wondered if I was dreaming. People raced passed me. They had flights to catch and family to meet. I was in the way so I stepped to the side. I kept waiting for the scene to change. I kept waiting to wake up but I didn’t so I wandered through the airport, I taught a tourist how to buy a light rail ticket, I bought one for myself and rode the train into downtown.

Once, many years ago, I visited my elementary school and although everything was as it had been when I was a boy, it all seemed so small. As I walked from the train station to my studio I had the same impression. This place has become small. Or I have grown and what once seemed boundless now feels tight and confining. Standing in my studio, I opened the windows to let in the air, I remembered Carol saying, “I’ve broken up with the world. I want a whole new relationship with it so I’ve let the old relationship go.” That’s it, I think. I have broken up with the world. I’m not going to wake up from this dream because I woke up into this dream. While I was gone I let the old world go. I can’t explain it. I have new eyes. I’ve awakened to an opportunity for a whole new relationship with the world.

Filed under: Perspective, Possibility, Truly Powerful People | 1 Comment »

Dream And Follow

Posted on August 8, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

869. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

Patti used to say that she refused to make business cards because a business card was a commitment. Say it and you will have to walk it. I’ve learned in the past several months that entrepreneurs resist talking to potential customers for fear of learning that their idea – their dream – may not have merit. Today Sean said it best: people are afraid of failing at their dream so they find a thousand reasons not to pursue it.

Dreams can be deferred but they will not be denied. A dream rejected becomes a knot in the belly. A dream ignored becomes low-grade anxiety, heart palpitation, road rage, a good reason to drink too much, an investment in notions like perfection or not-good-enough, a deathbed regret. Ignore a dream and it will twist and block all flow.

“What if…?” is a powerful question when in reference to the future. It is a call to action, a fount of possibility, an imagination tickler. “What if…? is equally powerful question when in reference to the past. No action is possible. It is an imagination tormentor. it is an abdication of responsibility to your self.

It is an old adage: the only certain road to failure is to not try. Failure is an abstraction. It is a construct that exists only as a story in your mind. It is an investment in what other people might think. Hint: other people have their own dreams and usually if they are negative about your dream it is because they are ignoring theirs; they need allies in their impotence.

As Tom used to say, “A painter paints.” A Painter does not succeed or fail. A painter paints and becomes a better painter. Failure is not an option when you are following your dream. Success is not an option when you are following your dream. Dreams do not dally with failure or success. Dreams call. All that is required is to follow, to grow, to learn, to live. To love.

Filed under: Art, Business, Creativity, entrepreneur, Possibility, Story, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: | 1 Comment »

Be Very Human

Posted on July 8, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

839. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

Being human is messy. We are a mass of contradictions. We say one thing and mean another. We hold others to standards that we do not ourselves hold. We change our minds. We often hear but rarely listen. We misunderstand, miscommunicate, mistake, and simply miss. We judge and run and hide and then pretend that we have courage and conviction. Sometimes we do. Mostly we have courage when we don’t try to have it; courage usually feels like terror. Conviction shows up when there is a distinct absence of dogma.

And we learn. We try again. And again. We gaze at the next hill and wonder what is beyond it. We get back up after being knocked to the ground. We are eternally hopeful even if we do not see it. We reach. We take another step. We desire to get better, be better. We want to know. We read self help books and aspire to create a better world. We want fulfillment and peace.

Recently I watched an irate woman frost a birthday cake. I thought the cake looked fine but she was fuming with herself, thinking she should have done better. When I asked why she was so upset she cried, “Because it matters!” It is the little things that matter. It is the small stuff that rings our humanity.

Another day and I wade through the muck. In the mire I had a conversation that upset me. She saw me retreat and said, “Come back out again.”

I said, “No!” and pouted like a five year old refusing to eat broccoli. I shook my head to emphasize my resolve.

She said, “Please. Please come out.” I looked up and realized that she was not trying to hurt me and that I was being silly. I stepped out from behind my steely resolve. No one wants to be in a shell. We reach toward each other even when it looks like refusal.

We humans are optimistic. We tip toward love even in the midst of the murkiest moments. Lurking beneath the phrase, “I don’t know how I am going to get through it,” is the faith that transformation is not only possible but it is imminent. We get through it every time and we never know how. We understand how only after we have done it. The stuff of life is in forging the path through it. And then we are changed; we are better for the slog.

“Step into the love. Move toward it.” I said. She was hurting. When she scowled I added, “It is all that I know how to do.”

She said, “That sounds like a phrase from Saint Michael! It’s not very human.”

In fact, it is the very thing that makes us human. To step the other way is a path to nowhere. And I know in her despair that she said one thing and meant another. We are both humans. We are messy. Transformation is imminent.

Filed under: Gratitude, Perspective, Possibility, Truly Powerful People | Leave a comment »

Root And Reach

Posted on June 19, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

822. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

Here’s a simple image that came to me from Megan-the-brilliant. She and I have been having an extended conversation about roots and hope. She told me that roots are filled with hope. The green plant that grows from the hope-root is an expression of faith. Hope reaches into the earth providing a sturdy basis for faith to reach into the sky.

Both are nourished in their reaching. Hope is fed from reaching deep into the warm, fecund earth. Faith is fed bountifully by opening its green leaves to the sun and drinking deep draughts of light. The earth nourishment is released into the sky while the sunlight is pulled into the earth via the hope-root.

One cannot live without the other. They are, in fact, not separate even though it would seem that they reach in opposite directions and are nourished from seemingly different sources. The separations do not exist. The root-hope and plant-faith are in fact a single organism – as are the earth and sky. The separation lives only in our language and necessity to distinguish the parts.

Filed under: Language, Love, Metaphor, Possibility, Seeing, Truly Powerful People | 2 Comments »

Taste. Test.

Posted on April 10, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

762. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

Many years ago I spent most of my time in the studio. I spent hours each day alone with my paintings and my thoughts. I’d go out at noon to get food. Later in the evening my friend Albert would meet me for coffee. He knew I would twist and fall into my self if I wasn’t forced to emerge and speak to other humans. He was right. The life of a painter is a lonely existence. In addition to my gypsy tendencies I used to tend toward the hermit and it was wise and loving friends like Albert that saved me from myself. Now my inner gadfly has the keys to my personality; I just can’t leave people alone.

I had occasion to go through old journals this afternoon. It is a quirk of mine that my personal and work journals are one-and-the-same. I’ve never understood the separation between working and not working, playing and not playing. I’ve tried to explain that to the IRS to no avail. Apparently one must separate oneself to be in compliance with the regulations. My life is my work. Megan told me that I am purpose driven and she is right. So sorting through old journals is a funny affair because I’ve collaged dream imagery with workshop notes with thoughts about paintings with personal insights with notes from calls. And, since I’ve never learned what the lines on the paper are used for, my notes go in multiple directions. Ask me which came first and I will squint and turn the journal upside down. I also noticed that I sometimes start an entry on the right hand page and then move to the left hand page – essentially moving one step back before taking two steps forward. I refuse to entertain this journal practice as a life metaphor. I intend to lie to the IRS if they ever ask me about my journaling. I am linear, linear, linear.

I opened a journal from 2009 and found this thought from Ana-The-Wise: For every child everything is new and unknown. They see with the eyes of the new and that is okay. For the child, it is all unknown and so it all must be tasted and tested.

We dull our palates. Last night in class a man asked me what is the point of courting chaos once you’ve made order of your world. He liked order. Arriving at order was his goal. I’d just finished telling the class that chaos is where innovation lives: if you are playing in the fields of the known you are not innovating. I edited my reply and stayed in the context of business and entrepreneurship. What I wanted to say was that, just as innovation, vitality and life are found in the unknown. Order is not a fixed state. It is fluid and flows toward chaos. Life is motion. Try and stop the movement and you will one day look up and wonder why your life has no meaning. You’ll wonder where you lost your passion.

Ana-The-Wise spoke truly: it is all unknown and so it must be tasted and tested. I’ve not yet lived tomorrow and I will miss it if I think I know what’s coming. There is so much to be tasted, so much that begs to be tested.

Filed under: Identity, Play, Possibility, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a comment »

Step Away

Posted on April 9, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

761. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

The actions necessary to create change are often counterintuitive. For instance, increased efficiency comes from moving slower, not from speeding up. Great love stories are filled with examples of the counterintuitive. For instance, the time and space between Odysseus and Penelope made their love powerful. Yearning creates closeness. Missing heightens appreciation. Being away from home is the best way to fully appreciate home. Perspective is gained by stepping away.

The point of a pilgrimage is to find the essential, to inhabit the center. You must journey to be still. Not to hammer too hard on a cliché but life is a pilgrimage of sorts. We walk a path that is both well known and well trod by previous generations – we know the end of the story – and yet the path we walk is unique, completely individual and surprising. I will live the metaphors in my way, experience the cycles of death and rebirth, know order because I have experienced chaos, and only live fully if I know that my time here is limited. Boredom is only available to those who have forgotten that they will someday die.

I have been wandering for months. Each day I recognize how little in this life I actually control. My wandering has brought into crystal clarity what is important and what is not. Wandering is a great way to become found. Tonight I taught a class for entrepreneurs and did the opposite of what I know to be useful; I strayed far from experience and kept them locked in analyzing and abstractions so although the discussion was interesting, it was not very useful. I stepped away and affirmed what I know in my heart to be true. Talking about life is not living, talking about learning is not learning, and talking about love is not loving. The experience must come first in order for the talking to be useful.

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Amplify The Possibilities

Posted on March 15, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

736. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

Vanessa’s business is called Visual Minutes. She draws conversations. She maps discussions. She and a colleague, Amber, mapped the recent Transformational Presence Summit in Vught, Holland that Alan and I facilitated. Her work was gorgeous, informative and inspiring. The dynamic of a group changes when there is an artist working in the room. When a group’s words and thoughts serve as the source of a communal image, something shifts. A loop forms: people visit the image during breaks. They take ownership of what emerges. The images inspire conversations and the conversations show up as images. The resonance amplifies the possibilities.

Over the four days of our summit the mural began to stretch around the room. Soon, we were surrounded by our conversation; the four walls of the conference center were changed by Vanessa’s work; we no longer sat in a generic space but occupied a room specific to us, designed for and by us, a chronicle of our unique wisdom. The art transformed us. We were 35 people from 11 countries made one through our intention and the circle that the art invoked.

Vanessa shared with me a letter written to her from Canadian artist Robert Genn. She thought it might tickle my imagination. He writes about artists as a tribe (a universal tribe). Here are three snippets from the letter worthy of tickling the imagination and also descriptive of Vanessa’s gift to the world:

“The idea that art has the ability to rise above religion, nationality and race is well understood.”

“…I get the idea that art might even be a vehicle for peace. We artists certainly bring a worldview based on respect, observation, play, learning, celebration and mutuality. In the machinations of humanity, these traits must surely hold some value.”

“We dine at a table of many nations. As artists we celebrate our creative joy and toast our mutual humanity. While we all speak with some sort of accent, we do so in the universal language of art. At your table, when you get a chance, please consider raising a glass to our tribe. It is a tribe beyond tribes, and in my heart of hearts I believe our tribe has an illustrious future.”

Filed under: Art, Possibility, Truly Powerful People | 3 Comments »

Seek The Open Door

Posted on March 2, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

723. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

Era’s begin and era’s end. Sometimes the line marking the end is distinct and sometimes you simply discover that a chapter closed. The early phase of a new chapter always feels like being lost. Feeling lost is a certain sign that a new chapter has opened.

When dealing in story you learn that beginnings, middles, and ends are arbitrary designations because they are not linear. Stories are cyclical. At what moment did the infant become a toddler? At what moment does vitality become contentment: when does becoming transition into being? When do we cross into old age?

Once, many years ago, while watching a rehearsal, an era ended. I was the artistic director of a company that I’d nurtured and grown for years. I was directing a play and it was a few weeks before opening; in that rehearsal, in a single moment the door closed, I knew I was done. I knew I needed to leave. It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done to finish that rehearsal process and open that play. I had to work very hard to treat the people around me with kindness. I did not know how to leave the people I loved. I did not know how to leave so tried hard to push them away. They knew. Sherry came into my office, sat down, took my hand and told me that it was okay if I needed to go. She assured me that everyone would be fine. Sherry knew the truth: once you are done, it is soul crushing to pretend otherwise and she was looking after the health of my soul. “Take the step,” she said. “You can’t receive a call and not follow it.” A door closing is a calling. It is guidance that says, “Not this way. Look for a door that opens.”

Throughout the fall and winter I have closed the door on an era. And, just when I think the door is fully closed, there is another closure, a further completion (how’s that for a paradox!). It can only mean that another era has begun. Today, I pull closed another door, turn and look to the horizon and wonder in which direction to step. As new doors open the horizon tends to be 360 degrees; limitless possibility and lost-ness often feel the same. I’ve decided that it is not necessary to know which way to step. It is only necessary to step. It is only necessary to listen to the guidance and like a treasure hunt seek the open door.

Filed under: Emergence, Possibility, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: , | 1 Comment »

Call Your Name

Posted on February 4, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

697. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

It is not lost on me that I’m unable to get back to Seattle. The initial flight delay set off a ripple of stand-by lists with actual guaranteed seats on planes 2 to 3 days from now. I waved the white flag, let go of what I thought was so important, and decided not to spend 3 days in airports. Instead, I went on a road trip. I made a run for Omaha, renting a car and driving seven hours, into and through a white-out-snow-blowing-so-that-I-followed-the-tail-lights of the car ahead of me because I literally could not see the road. I talked with friends on the phone while I drove. I had hours of silence and quiet. I saw a part of America that I don’t often see because I fly over it instead of drive through it.

When I looked at the ticket agent and said, “I’d rather not wait in the airport,” she thought I was nuts. How could I make the decision to walk away? She said, “But, we can’t change and itinerary, we can’t transfer your flight to another city. You’ll have to buy another ticket.”

“That’s exactly right,” I thought. I would rather go off the reservation and drive, not knowing when or where I will find a portal into Seattle. Spending 3 days of my life sitting in an airport waiting for the smallest possibility of a seat on a plane seemed crazier than walking out of the airport and asking, “Well, what’s next?” I’ve spent too much of my life waiting for something to happen. I no longer have it in me. The ticket agent had a rule to follow and I realized that I did not. Rather, I have one rule and my rule is: don’t wait.

I have a mantra new to this year. It wasn’t a resolution; it just seemed to find its way in: Act. Try. Aim. In other words, practice what I preach: step into the unknown as a way of being, not as a once in a while activity. Act. I don’t need to know where I am going before I take a step. If something seems to take life from me, walk the other way. Try. See what happens. And then aim.

I now have a seat on a plane out of Denver on Wednesday. I will have driven or trained halfway to Seattle before getting on a plane. I’m having adventures, spending time with people I love, and not knowing what tomorrow holds. And, I am certainly more alive now than I would have been had I decided to sit and wait for my name to be called. “Isn’t it time.” I thought as I left the airport in my rental car, “that I started calling my own name.”

Filed under: Awakening, Gratitude, Possibility, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: , , | 10 Comments »

Await

Posted on February 3, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

696. Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

I awoke this morning to snow. It has been bitter cold during my days in Illinois but no snow. I put on my boots and took a walk across campus so mine might be the first footprints across the quad. There is rarely snow in Seattle so it was a treat to leave tracks, circles, arcs and squares in the fresh snow. And then I was very cold so ran into the Union for more coffee. The Barista said, “Welcome Back!” My first cup of coffee came just before my walk so it hadn’t been an hour since I was last at the counter looking desperate. “Your nose is red,” she said. I replied, “Yeah, I’ve been on a bender.”

My taxi didn’t show so the front desk called another cab. It, too, did not show up. The third and lucky cab came and the driver got lost on the way to the airport. I have been really bad at some of the jobs I’ve done in life and I wondered if my cabbie was having a moment of career revelation. I was certain I would miss my flight and busy making back up plans when we found the airport. Dashing into the counter, I learned that my flight was delayed for more than an hour due to snow in Chicago. I laughed and loitered and finally went through security. I’d be worried about my connection to Seattle but so far tmy assumptions have been distinctly off the mark so I’ve decided to deal with what’s in front of me and not what I think is in front of me. Lessons re-learned!

Megan-the-brilliant despairs and I am to blame and at a loss for words. Isn’t that an interesting phrase! I’ve lost all of my words. It is a blatant lie – clearly I am using words now – and yet I remain speechless. So, I sit in the airport more alive than I have been in years. It is not yet noon and the day has already been full of experience and texture and stress and forgiveness and snow. And coffee. And cabs. And, unexpected tours of Champaign. And, baseless assumptions (like all assumptions). I am in awe of a language that without question makes sense of a phrase like, “full of holes.” I am full of holes or perhaps full of wholes and either way I await what the next step will bring.

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