dragons | The Direction of Intention

Imagine It [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on November 17, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative

It looked like a spiny dragon’s tail or Nudibranch that abandoned ship eons ago and, somehow, its petrified remains traveled from the deep of the sea to a trail in Wisconsin. Perhaps it was the skeleton tip-of-the-tail of a dinosaur. My imagination flooded with mythic-creature-possibilities. As Kerri knelt to snap her photos, I carefully scanned the woods. One cannot be too careful when dragons and dinosaurs might be lurking about.

While I was pretending to be watched by Jurassic critters, it occurred to me that imagination is a muscle. In order to exercise it, to make it strong, it must be used. With intention.

In truth, we (humans) daily exercise our imaginations though we don’t know it. Imagining that we can control what other people see or think. Imagining that the worst will happen. Imagining what might have been. Imagining that our day will be mundane. Imagining ourselves too small in the story of our lives. Imagining ourselves as superheroes saving the day.

That’s one way of exercising the muscle. Another way is to imagine possibilities. Imagine the ridiculous. Pop open the expanse of conceivability. In this direction of imagination exercise, it’s hard to take yourself so seriously.

And, I suppose, that’s the point. Hope slips in when life is held lightly. Hope and imagination-in-the-direction-of-impossible-possibilities are one and the same thing. Spacious. Surrender. In my reckoning, when I have been in the tightest bind or stuck in the worst scenario, the person who shows up, the door that opens, the hand that extends…is beyond my imagining and arrives when I let go.

Last night, deep in the night, I lay awake and listened to Kerri’s soft breathing and Dogga’s gentle old-dog snores. The window was cracked to allow in the cool night air. The chimes sang softly in the midnight breeze. A decade ago, I couldn’t have believed such riches of life would be mine.

But like a dinosaur watching me in the woods, I must have, somewhere way back then, closed my eyes and imagined it.

Kerri’s music is available on iTunes or streaming on Pandora and iHeart Radio

read Kerri’s blogpost about SPINY STICK

like it. support it. share it. comment on it. imagine it. we do and thank you for it.

buymeacoffee is a dragon tale whispered to your soul from the deep woods in hopes that your imagination will take over and run wild. It could happen.

Filed under: KS Friday, Possibility | Tagged: artistry, blueprint for my soul, composer, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, dinosaurs, dogga, dragons, dreams, hope, imagination, intention, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, KS Friday, light heart, mythical creatures, nudibranch, possibilities, possible, solo piano, story, studio melange, the melange | 1 Comment »

Stop and Turn [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on March 20, 2023 by davidrobinsoncreative

“We have no reason to mistrust our world, for it is not against us. Has it terrors, they are our terrors; has it abysses, those abysses belong to us; are dangers at hand, we must try to love them.” Rainier Maria Rilke, Letters To A Young Poet

Open the door to the monster in the closet. Walk into the wound. Throw light onto the dark. Nothing is broken, nothing needs to be fixed. All stories of resistance released into flow. Deliverance of fear.

How many times have you heard or said, “I don’t know what to do with what I feel?” Or, the partner statement, “I don’t know where to put what I feel.” Feelings as spatial.

In an earlier chapter I dreamed that I was being chased by giant monsters. I quickly ducked into a warehouse thinking I could easily find a place to hide but, much to my horror, the warehouse was vast and empty. Open space. Nowhere to hide. No other door. There was only one thing to do: turn and face the monsters. Surrendering to my fate, I stopped and watched them come at me, certain they would gobble me. But, as they approached, they shrank. The closer they came the smaller they became. By the time they reached me, they were smaller than my toe. They dissipated the moment they touched me. When I looked up I saw an older version of me standing across the room, transformed.

It was a Rilke moment.

“How should we be able to forget those ancient myths that are at the beginning of all peoples, the myths about dragons that at the last moment turn into princesses; perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave. Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us.” Letter Eight, Letters To A Young Poet

A shorthand phrase from my coaching era that I’m certain Rainier would particularly appreciate; a phrase well known to the older version of me now standing across the room looking back: Invite your dragon to tea.

read Kerri’s blogpost about FEELINGS

Filed under: Edges, Identity, Merely A Thought Monday, Metaphor, Power | Tagged: artistry, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, deliverance, dragon, dragons, face your fear, fear, feelings, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Letters To A Young Poet, light, love, monsters, myths, Rainier Maria Rilke, story, studio melange, terror, the melange, transformation | 1 Comment »

Play [on DR Thursday]

Posted on December 15, 2022 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us once beautiful and brave.” ~ Rainier Maria Rilke

The poet would have us understand this: our dragons are waiting to see us. They do not transform once we are beautiful and brave. Dragons do not suddenly appear as princesses. No, we transform. What we see changes. Through beautiful and brave eyes, princesses no longer appear as dragons.

Waiting to be seen. Waiting to see. I think Rilke knows that we are all beautiful and brave but are convinced otherwise. So, we hide. Or pretend. We don armor. The view from inside a tank is not as clear or expansive as the view from the outside. The poet would have us feel safe enough to open the hatch and step outside. It is there, in the expansive outside, that dragons facades fall away revealing princesses.

Another poet, Rumi, wrote, “Live as if everything is rigged in your favor.” Even before you see them as princesses, know that the dragons are on your team. That’s why they are waiting to see us as we are. Knowing the game is rigged in our favor is the surest path to seeing them as they are.

We decided to take a day away from the grindstone. We lifted our noses from the stone and took a drive to a small town. There was a specific shop in the tiny town that we wanted to visit. We drove back roads and successfully lost all sense of time and direction.

Instead of the warm day we’d hoped for, it was cold and rainy. Our fingertips ached and the ends of our noses were crimson so rather than wander the streets as we planned, we spent our time inside, imagining outrageous purchases and talking with shopkeepers. In those shops, laughing with those warm-hearted-people, our dragons fell from our sight.

We remembered: beautiful and brave are qualities of playfulness. To be seen, to see the dragons transform, play. The poet would have us play! Why wait?

The town was alive with sparkling light. Colorful picnic tables, undaunted by the rain, waited patiently for warmer times. We played and everything tilted in our favor.

read Kerri’s blogpost about COLORFUL TABLES