measurement | The Direction of Intention

Higher Than Ten! [David’s blog on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on June 10, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

The AccuLumen Brightness Index is low today. A solid two. It’s a cloudy day so the low number is not a surprise. On sunny days it soars to a full 10 points! In fact, the number is never a surprise. We tease each other with the Index. We don’t really need an instrument to tell us that the sun is bright today. “Whoa!” she says, dropping her shades over her eyes, “The AccuLumen Brightness Index is soaring!”

“We should have checked it before stepping out!” I quip.

The optometrist told her that, as she ages, her eyes will grow more sensitive to the light. “It’s your Scandinavian heritage,” he smiled, adjusting his instruments to look more deeply into the windows of her soul.

We wandered into the shop in Breckenridge. Magical Scraps. The towel immediately brought Simon & Garfunkel to mind. The 59th Street Bridge Song. Feelin’ Groovy. “Slow down, you move too fast/ You got to make this morning last…” The owner of the shop, Jess, explained that they make much of the merchandise in-house. It’s also a shop dedicated to local artists, a place to sell their work. “Artists have to have a place to sell what they create,” she said.

“Amen to that,” I thought, rubbing the ears of the shop dog, Stella. My AccuLumen Heart Index was registering a full ten. We were in the mountains in one of our favorite spots, the day was bright (at least a nine on the brightness index), the shop felt good, a perky song was wafting through my brain, I was on the floor with a happy dog…feelin’ groovy. I could have stayed there all day but we entered the store a few minutes before closing-time so courtesy – and Kerri’s polite nudge – required me to move on.

As we strolled down the street, breathing-in the sweet cool mountain air, I noted that my AccuLumen Happiness Index was in lockstep with my AccuLumen Heart Index, both registering a 10+! “I didn’t realize you could score higher than a ten,” I said.

“What?” she asked, clearly lost in her own AccuLumen Experience rating.

“Let the morningtime drop all its petals on me/ Life, I love you, all is groovy”.

read Kerri’s blogpost about FEELIN’ GROOVY

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Filed under: Gratitude, Love, Merely A Thought Monday | Tagged: AccuLumen Brightness Index, artistry, breckenridge, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, Feelin' Groovy, groovy, happiness, heart, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, Magical Scraps, measurement, peace, rating, Simon and Garfunkel, story, studio melange, The 59th Street Bridge Song, the melange | 3 Comments »

Unbridle Your Enthusiasm [David’s blog on Two Artists Tuesday]

Posted on February 6, 2024 by davidrobinsoncreative

In our house, no single question evokes more genuine excitement than, “Do you want to go on errands?” Vertical jumps. Full body wags. Circle zoomies. Finally, a “sit” so we can clip on the small leash that we call his necktie. He gets gussied-up for errands.

Last week Kerri wrote that our bar of contentment is low. It’s true. We don’t need much to feel fulfilled. A walk in the sun. A good cup of coffee. Cooking together. Laughter with friends. Life reduced to the moment.

We recently had a significant-morning-conversation about our egos. We discussed how these past few years have lowered the bar on our self-images. “I’m not all that,” she said, summing it up.

Quinn used to say that, “There are six billion people on this planet and you’re the only one that gives a damn about what you think.” Or how you look. Or what you feel. The other five-billion-nine-hundred-ninety-nine-million…are more concerned with how they look and what they think and feel. You are not the star in their movie. He was a terrific perspective-giver.

It’s a powerful day when you realize that you are not all that. It’s a powerful day when you realize that you are the single steward of your gifts and like any other gift they are meant to be given with no regard to how they are received. Your job is to give your gift. It’s an especially powerful day when you realize that your gift is no better or worse than any other person’s gift. It is just uniquely yours. It is not better-or-worse-than.

When the measurement falls off, when the ego takes a much needed belly punch, then the fun really begins. Flow. Love of what you do and who you are. A giddy return to child-eyes. A low bar of contentment means more and more contentment. Paint to paint. Play to play. Unbridled enthusiasm at the simplest of things. Like full body joy when going on errands.

read Kerri’s blog about ERRANDS

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buymeacoffee is a low bar of contentment offered to the artists tilting at the rowdy windmills of ego.

Filed under: Identity, Love, Metaphor, Perspective, Two Artists Tuesday | Tagged: artistry, child like, contentment, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, dogdog, dogga, ego, excitement, fulfillment, gifts, in the moment, infinite games, joy, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, measurement, perspective, perspective giver, play, play to play, presence, self actualization, self image, simplicity, steward, story, studio melange, the melange | 4 Comments »

Fail At The Box [on Merely A Thought Monday]

Posted on May 23, 2022 by davidrobinsoncreative

Among Don Miguel Ruiz’s Four Agreements is this gem: do the best that you can.

Through the lens of the Occident, those folks on earth oriented to the idea that their nature is bad and needs taming, the Agreement is a statement of self-forgiveness. Do the best that you can. It’s a good bit of advice when everything on earth seems to come with a measuring stick.

Don Miguel is Toltec so his Four Agreements are rooted in an entirely different understanding of nature. To do the best that you can has little to do with performance or achievement. There’s no judge sitting on the high bench scrutinizing goodness or badness. There’s no book with black marks next to your name. This Agreement is about setting an intention. The other Agreements are about speaking with impeccability, making no assumptions, taking nothing personally. In other words, it’s never about you; you can’t possibly know the reasons why; your words matter. So, do the best that you can.

Circumstances are uncontrollable. Sometimes people are mean. Sometimes the tornado comes through and blows your house away. It’s not personal. You probably can’t do anything to change the tornado and even less to change other people. So, change yourself. Or, better, be yourself. Attend to your story and free yourself from the illusion of living under grand judgment or any of a number of other control fantasies. Do the best that you can.

Lately, I’m pondering the too-tight-image-boxes we squeeze into and try, but can never quite, fulfill. The impossible image; a too tight expectation. The Pleaser. The One Who Knows What Is Right. The Peacekeeper. The Strong One. A step away from the box-expectation, the-role-I-think-I-must-fulfill, is a giant leap into happiness. Inside the box it is virtually impossible to do the best that you can. Boxes are alive with assumptions (what I must do, who I must be); buzzing hives of judgment, and, when in a box, speaking truth is frowned upon, so editing and/or silence rules the day. Just try doing your best when living in a too tight box!

Fear and anger fill boxes. That is, after all, the purpose of the box, the fruit of the impossible mission.

Here’s my advice to myself: fail at the box. Cut it up and put it into the recycle bin. Then, free of the too-tight judgments, it’s possible to set mistake-free intentions. Life as finger painting: do the best that you can.

read Kerri’s blogpost about SOME DAYS