Make It Ordinary

Posted on February 7, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

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

A midnight train, an early morning taxi, and a day at the Denver airport. Trains, planes and automobiles followed by a light rail into downtown Seattle and then a ferry to Bainbridge Island. I think in a single 24-hour period I will have only skipped submarine and hot air balloon as viable transportation options, though Judy reminded me that I had not yet traveled by camel. And, the day is not over yet so I knock on wood. These days I can make no assumptions about what the next moment will bring.

The benefit of riding on the rails, in the cab and on the concourse is that I’m very productive in transit. I’m a bit shocked at how focused I can be when rocking across Colorado in the dead of night or in the midst of thousands of noisy airport travelers by day. I finished the first true draft of the book. I caught up on emails (mostly). I untangled a banking knot, I made lists and all the while I watched the amazing dramas that unfold in an airport. I talked with Horatio and Diane and Megan. I had a text fest and toasted k.erle with a great cup of java. Judy played her harp for me just before midnight and it was among my favorite experiences all day.

I’m aware of the varied and glorious textures of this day. The amazing palettes of colors of this life are available if we only choose to see them. I saw the sunrise over the plains. I watched hundreds of small kindnesses and acts of generosity. Many were unknown to the recipient. A man pulled luggage off the train for an elderly couple. A woman quietly helped a young mother herd her children through security, doors were opened for baggage laden travelers, bus drivers waited for tardy riders, a barista left her post to give directions to a lost man and all the people queued for coffee stepped out of line to help.

And think about it – it was just a day like any other day. And, no day will ever be like this one. Little generosities swirl around us. The sunrise will never be the same as it was today; it was not like any other and the same will be true tomorrow. We have the capacity to see. We have the capacity to place our focus wherever we choose. The life we experience is a direct result of what we choose to see, where we choose to stand, how we choose to interpret and what we choose to celebrate. The day can be ordinary or extraordinary and the only difference is what we decide to perceive. Why not make the extraordinary ordinary?

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

Walk Simply

Posted on February 6, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

699. 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 am an Aquarian and live in my head and at 30,000 feet. Practicality is not my strong suit. That makes the theme of my work this past few weeks most unusual: I’m discovering the sensible, the useful, the concrete.

This bizarre phase started a few weeks ago with the first few chapters of my book. I shared them with Megan-the-brilliant and she rolled her eyes and told me I needed to come down from the clouds. “Smaller steps!” she insisted. “Break your thoughts into bites that people can actually take!” I protested but she was right. So I set about trying to find ways to bring my balloon closer to the ground. “More weight!” my inner sociologist cried! “Less hot air!” my inner archeologist chirped.

I thought I was failing until last week while facilitating a workshop I went on a rant about the practical steps, the utter simplicity of steps in re-forming a culture of control into a culture of empowerment. It made sense to me, and much to my surprise, it made sense to those dear people on the receiving end of my rant. They got it. I achieved small steps! I achieved bite size thoughts! For the rest of the workshop I couldn’t help but wade into the sensible. Who was this man?

The book is now falling into place. I’m channeling a tiny model maker or a watch repairman. I’m giddy with detail. And, I’m recognizing the larger lesson is this: the philosophy, the ideas, the theory are easy for me, but to put them into action is what is now required. The bite size steps are really for me. If I can’t act on it, if the steps are too big, it is not useful to me or anyone who meets me at the crossroads. I’m a great witness, a studied observer, a world-class listener. And it’s time to walk simply. Or simply walk.

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Allow The Silence

Posted on February 5, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

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

“After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.” Aldous Huxley

There are few things more satisfying to me than closing the studio door, picking up a large brush, turning the up the volume on the music, and giving over to the forces that want to find expression through me. The night before my latest trip, without really meaning to do it, I turned from my computer, saw the canvas stapled on the wall, and the next thing I knew several hours had passed, the music was rattling the windows, and both the canvas and I were covered in paint (it’s why I stopped buying new clothes…). It had been too long since I gave myself over to the call.

I used to draw everyday. It was my practice, my imperative. In recent years I’ve moved on to other practices. I write. I facilitate. I walk. I find the quiet. And then, like a starving man who stumbles into a feast, I disappear without warning into a painting gluttony. It is a different kind of quiet, ferocious, vibrant, and necessary. There is no thought; my body takes over and the painting comes through: silence in the center of a hurricane of movement and sound. When finally I step away from the canvas and come back into my body, I discover an image in front of me. It is less correct to say, “I did that,” and more correct to ask, “What just happened?” I’ve spent hours of my life standing in front of paintings that I just painted, thinking, “Whoa. Look at that!”

Once, many years ago, Jim looked through all of my recent work and asked, “What is the significance of the three balls in your paintings?” I had no idea what he was talking about so he pulled out of the rack ten paintings, lined them up, and showed me that each had three balls as if some unseen figure was juggling them. I was gob-smacked. I studied the paintings for a few minutes and said, “Whoa. Look at that!” Jim laughed.

The silence is not empty; it is full. It is rich and vibrant. The silence is what happens when we get out of our own way, open to the forces, and let them come through. Words like “art” or “transformation” or “perspective” or any other word can’t contain all the meaning that becomes available when we learn to step out of the way and allow the silence.

Filed under: Art, Creativity, Perspective, Transcendence, 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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Just Ask

Posted on February 2, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

695. 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 snippet of paper on the desk in my hotel room states, “Help is available.” Help with what, I wonder? I’m sure I must need help or will need help at some point in my life. I usually need help with technology though today I have no intention of wading into the i.jungle so at the moment help is wasted on me. I’m glad that help is generally available and I find it comforting that there is a notice on my desk incase I find myself perplexed. And, since the snippet is without a phone number or reference point I’m left to assume that help will simply know when I need it and will magically appear.

Perhaps help will come with 3 wishes or wand or magic dust. Or, maybe there is a secret door in my room. I’ll not confess to trying to move furniture or peak behind the mirror. The thought never crossed my mind. Really. The question remains: how will help know when I need it?

If I were adrift in a rubber raft in shark-infested waters my paper snippet implies that the coast guard will automatically know and find me. An avalanche is certainly scary but since help is available, I’m comforted knowing that the ski patrol will somehow know of my predicament and dig me out before I run out of air.

My snippet of paper might have carried the message, “Have Faith” and I would be much less comforted. The blanket statement, “Help is available” implies readiness of action. Help is standing by. Faith is amorphous when help is required.

Of course, help might also be available to me in less extreme circumstances. I am easily lost in new cities and I find that help is always available if I ask. Today I facilitated a workshop in organizational culture change and I needed markers and paper and help was available – it was almost immediate, too. However, when driving and lost, help is certainly always available but for some reason when behind the wheel I become male-stubborn and I am reticent to ask for help; I’d rather figure it out for myself so help obliges me and is noticeably unavailable.

Once, while walking the lake country in England, Roger was delirious with fever and it was pouring rain. We were miles from the next village. I was scared and thought, “I don’t know what to do. I need help.” And, out of nowhere a Winnebago emerged from the mist and stopped. A nice couple picked us up, wrapped us in towels and warmed us with hot cocoa. Then, they drove us to the next village where we found a nice place to stay and medicine. Help knew and was waiting for me to ask.

So, my mystery is solved. I just modified the paper snippet on my desk to assist the next guest. It now reads, “Help is available. Just ask.”

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Emerge

Posted on February 1, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

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

Old structures do not like to give way to the new. The old structure, whether it is a personal identity or organizational system, resists change.

When I stepped off the plane Moira only said, “It’s bitter.” She meant the temperature; it was 16 degrees and the wind was blowing. We laughed and she drove me to campus to stay in the Illini Union Hotel on the campus of the University of Illinois. It’s a beautiful campus even with the wind chill making my eyes water. The hotel is actually within the student union, a massive brick and white-pillared structure that shouts, “academia!” It is solid and hallowed with history.

This university like all universities is an institution of education in a time that institutions of education are being pummeled by the waves of change. The internet is revolutionizing access to information and the power of the individual to create, pursue, investigate, and participate. The very role of “teacher” or “professor” is no longer relevant in it’s old definition and the new form is yet to emerge.

I’ve heard conversations questioning the very role of a campus in the face of the new world. There is most certainly a role but what is it? It’s emerging. Tuitions are unmanageable and unrealistic. In many circles the question, “Why not to put the money into a business start up instead college?” is leading the way. Experience is the best teacher and there are great business courses online and much information is free. Why not go into debt with something that has the potential to generate income than something that will strain your income for years to come? It’s a valid argument.

In various places around the country teachers are now refusing to administer the standardized tests. Students are refusing to take them. Finally, we are asking, “Why? What is the point? And what are we trying to do?” After all, what does it mean to learn?
This is the new form starting to emerge. The old is fighting back, ratcheting down and trying to contain and constrain. It is only a matter of time.

The old structure will fight the new, even if the old is irrelevant. Even if its existence impedes growth instead of facilitates it. In this way, organizations are no different than people. The imagination is never welcome in the old house but imaginations have a way of taking over and something new, wondrous, magical, and completely unpredictable always emerges.

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Pull Up Your Hood

Posted on January 31, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

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

As I walked across town today the mist tried to evolve into rain but didn’t quite have enough of a quorum so it remained mist all day. I wore my hood pulled up never the less. I have a very old sweatshirt with a hood – so old, in fact, that the zipper is nearly useless and the cuffs are frayed. I wear it almost every day. During the rainy season my old sweatshirt rides under my coat so I can use the hood when it rains. It is an old friend and has taken on my shape to better keep me warm.

Last night I washed my old friend and I waited patiently for the dryer cycle to finish. I was like Calvin waiting for Hobbes. It was cold in the apartment where I am staying so it was with great pleasure that I pulled my hoody sweatshirt from the dryer and put it on, almost too warm to wear. Even so, I sighed and settled back into a big brown chair and drank in the comfort of my new warmth. I’m beginning to see that my sweatshirt functions like a security blanket; I wrap it around myself and I feel safe and comfortable and home.

When I pull up the hood I cut off my peripheral vision and I am more aware of what’s directly ahead of me. It is a paradox: I am instantly meditative when under my hood and yet I become hyper focused on my surroundings. I see less and sense more. Also, my hood acts like a costume or a mask: I enter all manner of spy novels, street gangs, and Jedi tales when donning my hood. Talk to me in my hood and you will never speak to the same character twice.

Someone asked me yesterday, in my gypsy mode, what of my possessions do I cherish and what seems superficial. My old, grey, ratty, worn, paint flecked, hoody sweatshirt (I was wearing it at the time of the question) was near the top of my list. An old friend, a constant companion, having travelled more than a few decades with me, that I can wrap around me at night when I am cold, is worth more to me than gold.

Filed under: Random, Truly Powerful People | 3 Comments »

Hold The Image

Posted on January 30, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

692. 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’ve shared this image with k.erle a day ago, and with my class this morning and it feels like some kind of message. I can’t shake the image because it is speaking to me. Some images are powerful that way. This image wants me to pay attention. It is the image of the Wayfinder.

I came across the image in Wade Davis’ book, The Wayfinder. The title refers to the navigator in a traditional Polynesian canoe, sitting in the bow, sensing and reading the waves, the air, the stars, the rings of the moon, but mostly, the navigator holds in her mind the image of the island that they are attempting to find. Wade Davis writes that, according to the Polynesian belief, the canoe is still in the water and the Island finds them. The power of the Wayfinders’ image calls the island to them. They must simply point their canoe in the proper direction while the Wayfinder holds the image.

I ask myself as I sit in the bow of my canoe, what image do I hold? What island do I draw to myself? In my urban ocean have I developed the sensitivity to read the currents, the subtleties of energy in the waves that help me point my craft in the direction of the island that rushes from the future to meet me? Or am I out to sea? This ocean is vast. I have an image for home, a smell, a taste, an undeniable energy that makes me shake when I allow myself to fully feel it, and in the midst of this vast ocean I am taking my cue from the Wayfinders to remain still and know that the power and potency of my image will soon call my island home to me.

Filed under: Metaphor, Possibility, Truly Powerful People | Tagged: , , , , , | 4 Comments »

Ask “What If?”

Posted on January 29, 2013 by davidrobinsoncreative

691. 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 was reminded today that “If” is a very powerful word. It is a magic word that is shorthand for “imagine the possibilities.” When you think that you can’t do something, when you’ve convinced yourself that you will never be able to do…(fill in the blank); ask yourself this magic question: “What if…?” It’s alright, continue to accept that you can’t or will never be able to…; you need not change your disbelief or assault your defenses. In the midst of your wasteland, ask “what if…?” Imagine what you would do if you could? What steps would you take? What is the first step you would take if…?

Take the step. Hold onto your disbelief, invest in your limitation, and take the step anyway. No need to fulfill your dream, accomplish your impossible mission, move your mountain, or realize your potential – those phrases are misleading anyway, new age rhetoric, self-help marketing mantras that imply that your dream, your impossible mission, your mountain and your potential are some other place, things you might achieve, arrival platforms. Hint: they are really verbs, actions, and choices; you are infinitely un-full-fill-able because you are not a container with a limited capacity. You are your dream, your mission, your mountain, and your potential – you are uncontainable. Use upon yourself any ruler you choose, any metrics you think valid and at the end of the day your measurement will be false. Like a photograph you might capture a moment, an aspect, but you will never capture the all of you.

“What if” you started taking small steps without belief? What if you acted “as if” you could? Where might you someday find yourself? Magic and miracles are not dependent upon your belief; they are dependent upon your action. They are dependent on your capacity to realize that you, yourself, are fluid, moving, changing, dynamic,…, a living vital being. “What if” you started stepping in the direction of your “I can’t?”

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