tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79431758727212909362024-03-13T14:40:40.112-07:00Jazmine ArtsPJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.comBlogger69125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-80312986636659451702014-03-21T15:53:00.001-07:002014-03-21T15:53:48.949-07:00"Keep Away from the People who try to belittle your ambitions. Small People always do that, but the Really Great make you feel that you, too, can become great." -Mark Twain<br />
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The quote at the top of this post was sent to me by a friend who threw me a life line. I am sharing with you below the e-mail she wrote to me because it is so useful:<br />
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I’m reading 2 books now that are changing how I’m thinking about pretty much everything. The books are “<a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Gift-Play-Playing-Again/dp/0595234267">The Gift of Play</a>” by Barbara Brenner and “<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Play-Shapes-Brain-Imagination-Invigorates-ebook/dp/B001SCK720/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395442007&sr=1-1&keywords=play">Play</a>” by Stuart Brown. Although both authors agree that it is almost impossible to create a definition of “play” since it is so different for everyone, the key elements are:<br />
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- apparently purposeless (not done for practical value, money, etc.)</div>
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- voluntary (no one is making you do it)</div>
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- inherently attractive (fun and makes you feel good)</div>
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- freedom from time (lose sense of time when doing it)</div>
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- diminished consciousness of self (stop worrying and thinking about ourselves)</div>
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- improvisational potential (potential for serendipity and chance)</div>
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- continuation desire (desire to keep doing it)</div>
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Both authors talk about the vital importance of keeping play in our lives, which includes everything from physical health, having a healthy brain in later life (like a 63% better chance of having a healthy brain), creativity, emotional balance, etc. and that the elimination of play is the root cause of many problems in children as well as adults, like ADD, ADHD, depression, violence, anti-social behavior, problem solving abilities. There are studies that supposedly show that the one common attribute among the most violent criminals is that they didn’t have a chance to play as children. In Stuart’s book, he described some recent problems they were having at NASA’s JPL (where most of the engineering for the space program is done) with the new, younger people they were hiring. Many of their older employees recently retired, so JPL started recruiting the best of the best college graduates from all over the country, but found that these new employees were not good at problem solving or finding creative solutions for things. They did an extensive study and found that many of the older employees who had retired had grown up “playing” by taking things apart to see how they worked and then figuring out how to put them back together. The newer employees at JPL did not do this growing up, but instead focused on book reading and academics and never learned how to “play" this way to solve problems. So now JPL has questions during their interview process to see how much the interviewee has “played” with the types of things they do at JPL. Both books keep pointing out how <u>purposeless</u> playing that is done just because you find it interesting and love to do it, leads to health and well-being. .</div>
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I was having an hard time figuring out how I like to play until I read the following “play personalities” In Stuart’s book. He came up with these through his observations of people, although he says these are just basic categories and were created so he could address the “engineering” types at corporations who needed to have things more defined:</div>
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<u>The Joker</u></div>
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The most basic and extreme player throughout history is the joker. A joker’s play always revolves around some kind of nonsense. Indeed nonsense is the first type of human play we engage in: all baby talk begins with nonsense. Parents make infants laugh by making silly sounds, blowing raspberries, and generally being foolish. Later the class clown finds social acceptance by making other people laugh. Adult jokers carry on that social strategy.</div>
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<u>The Kinesthete</u></div>
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Kinesthetes are people who like to move, who - in the words of Sir Ken Robinson - “need to move in order to think.” This category includes athletes, as well as those who find themselves happiest when moving as part of dance, swimming or walking. Kinesthetes naturally want to push their bodies and feel the results. They may be those who do football, yoga, dance or jump rope. While kinesthetes play games, competition is not the main focus - it is only a forum for engaging in their favorite activity.</div>
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<u>The Explorer</u></div>
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Each of us started out our lives by exploring the world around us. Some people never lose their enthusiasm for it. Exploration becomes their preferred avenue into the alternative universe of play - their way of remaining creative and provoking the imagination. Exploring can by physical - literally going to new places. Alternatively, it can be emotional - searching for a new feeling or deepening of the familiar through music, movement, flirtation. It can be mental: researching a new subject or discovering new experiences and points of view while remaining in your armchair.</div>
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<u>The Competitor</u></div>
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The competitor is a person who breaks through into euphoria and creativity of play by enjoying a competitive game with specific rules and enjoys playing to win. The competitor loves fighting to be number 1. If games and keeping score are your thing, this may be your primary play personality. The games can be solitary, or social - either a solitary video game or a team game like baseball - and they may be actively participated in or observed as a fan. Competitors make themselves know in social groups, were the fun comes from being the top person in the group, or in business, in which money or perks serve to keep score.</div>
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<u>The Director</u></div>
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Directors enjoy planning and executing scenes and events. Though many are unconscious of their motives and style of operating, they love the power, even when they’re playing in the B-movie league. They are born organizers. At their best, they are party givers, the instigators of great excursions to the beach, the dynamic center of the social world. At worst, they are manipulators. All the world’s a stage, and the rest of us are only players in the director’s game.</div>
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<u>The Collector</u></div>
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What good is a world of random objects? The thrill of play for the collector is to have and to hold the most, the best, the most interesting collection of objects and experiences. Coins, toy trains, antiques, plastic purses, wine shoes, ties, video clips of race car crashes, or pieces of the crashed car themselves, anything and everything is fair game.</div>
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<u>The Artist/Creator</u></div>
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For the artist/creator, joy is found in making things. Painting, print making, wood-working, pottery, and sculpture are well-known activities of artist/creators, but furniture making, knitting, sewing, gardening and decorating a room or a house are also in their purview. Artist/creators may end of showing their creations to the world and even selling them for millions, or may never show anyone what they make. The point is to make something - to make something beautiful, something functionally, something goofy. Or just to make something work - like fixing a pump.</div>
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<u>The Storyteller</u></div>
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For the storyteller, the imagination is the key to the kingdom of play. Storytellers are, of course, novelists, playwrights, cartoonists, and screenwriters, but they are also those whose greatest joy is reading those novels and watching those movies, people who make themselves part of the story, who experience the thoughts and emotions of characters in the story. Performers of all sorts are storytellers, creating an imaginative world through dance, acting, magic tricks or lectures. Because the realm of the storyteller is in the imagination, they can bring, play to almost any activity.</div>
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“You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.” <br />― <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/879.Plato">Plato</a> </div>
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PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-9568615086126666492014-03-16T19:52:00.000-07:002014-03-16T19:53:37.080-07:00What Is a Normal Goal for a Young Person Becomes a Neurotic Hinderance in Old Age - Jung<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I was finding that when I did the activities that had previously helped induce a state of 'wonderment' I was temporarily relieved of the increasing despair I was feeling. I was part of a book club and at one of the meetings a new person showed up. I think we are impacted more often by a persons energy than their words and she transmitted a life energy that I was drawn to. At the end of our book meeting she invited us to an 'intuitive painting' workshop and I decided to go.</div>
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Years before I had heard of a teacher, <a href="http://www.michelecassou.com/workshopsUSA.htm">Michelle Cassou</a> who had developed what she called process or intuitive painting. I was in the midst of learning painting and drawing skills and eagerly looked at her book: <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/140167.Life_Paint_and_Passion">Life, Paint, and Passion</a>. I rejected her perspective immediately due to her emphasizes on painting for the process or experience of painting and enjoying it’s meditative qualities. She clearly stated that it’s not about the end product. It is not about what you “should do.” It’s about becoming conscious and present.</div>
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Well, I was ready to give this intuitive painting process a try now.</div>
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At the intuitive painting workshop I loved the colors, the feel of the brush on the paper, and putting whatever I was moved to on the paper. However, I did not want anyone to see my finished painting! While we were driving home from the workshop I was considering how I could hide this 'painting' from my partner. He knew I was going to a painting workshop and I was concerned about his judgment of what I was bringing home.</div>
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Even though I had heard and resonated strongly with the instructors prompts such as: " With painting it's what has happened inside of you that is important. Not the product." Or “Creativity works the same in every medium. It’s not the painting, it’s the process of creativity.”</div>
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I could not get past my fear of judgment and what I perceived to be the consequences of a 'negative' judgment.</div>
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As it turned out I was unable to sneak my painting inside, my partner was right inside the front door as I came in. Nothing in me wanted to show him what I had painted. The pain of this did not escape me either. Here I was 56 years old and I was stressfully concerned about preserving some kind of 'idealized' self image. Was this self image worth protecting? This 'upset' was out of proportion and I knew there was something for me to understand and at this stage of life, grow beyond. Couldn't the art form of a human life transcend egoity?<br />
I remembered reading about Gustav Klimt and how when he began his inspired painting with gold all of his friends, most of whom were painters, told him that he could not paint with gold, it was somehow against the rules of fine art. He did give up painting with gold. What if he had been able to endure their criticisms because he was moved by something greater? Where would this creative process have taken him?<br />
My own expression of art had once come from a depth of felt 'brightness'. Over time, rather than stay true to that guiding brightness I had been impacted by criticism, something we all deal with and yet the limiting rules I took on as a result of how I dealt with criticism had caused the expression of brightness to dim.<br />
One must have great strength to stay on the path lead by the mysterious creative process. This pathway does not care about egoic destiny, it is about burning up self image as one transcends self to become one with Light. </div>
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"Who Am I Standing In the Midst of this Thought Traffic?" -Rumi</div>
PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-26085511524622808682014-03-13T20:30:00.000-07:002014-03-13T20:30:46.593-07:00Had the Experience But Missed the Meaning - T.S. Elliot<br />
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In time I was able to use the pointer finger on each hand. So I was able to type with two fingers for short periods.</div>
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I began to type out what kinds of experiences for me frequently induced a sense of wonderment when I participated in them. I needed this list to help address the despair that was constantly gnawing. I wrote a list out over a week and noticed that all the activities fell into five broad groups:</div>
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Nature</div>
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Friends</div>
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Creativity</div>
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Walking</div>
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One morning I woke up remembering an experience I had had when I was young, elementary school age. I was outside in nature, alone sitting by a running river. I had in my hands a small garter snake and in an instant my small personal viewpoint disappeared. I don't know how long this experience went on for but when the sense of 'me' came back everything was shimmering in light and I knew that everything was One and that that Oneness was Love.</div>
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I was so happy about this I jumped up to go and tell my parents. As I made my way to the house I could feel energy moving through everything, and heart felt: How wonderful! There is a beautiful, bright energy underlying everything!</div>
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As I put my hand on the screen door to open it and saw my parents inside the thought hit me, "I can't tell them this, they will think I am crazy." I continued inside and said nothing.</div>
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I think all of us, when we are young have some experience, by Grace, that informs us of Oneness. People call this experience by many names: God, Spirit, Light, Love, and many other words.</div>
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Einstein, before discovering his unified field theory maintained an underlying presumption that, "whatever reality is, it would show itself to be simple and beautiful."</div>
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Within a couple days of having this experience I doubted and then forgot it though the memory of it would surface at different times throughout my life, often when what I called 'Oneness' would again break through my personal point of view and fill me with wonder and mystery.</div>
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Though I had experienced knowing that we are all truly One, the profound meaning of these experiences had yet to truly penetrate my sense of reality.</div>
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PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-46721341791957838752014-03-12T10:01:00.000-07:002014-03-12T10:01:27.281-07:00Where You Stumble and Fall, There You Find Pure Gold - C.G. Jung<br />
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Fabric Weaving as taught by <a href="http://spiritcloth.typepad.com/">Jude</a> Hill</div>
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I was facing something I did not want to see or acknowledge. While I was saying " I do art for the love of art" I was clearly not doing this. I intuited the truth and beauty of doing art or truly any activity as an expression of love and yet once again was faced with a realization that below these words I was ego-driven and not heart lead.</div>
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I had experienced this realization before and yet here I was, painfully visiting it again.</div>
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I have learned over time that life does not progress in any kind of straight line forward and yet wondered: do lessons ever get learned in some final way?</div>
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I also cannot deny that human and non-human suffering goes on everyday. Suffering is a very evident part of life. Any person who I have gotten to know below their 'surface' has dealt with suffering. No one escapes it. And having done animal rescue and rehabilitation work for years the suffering of the non humans goes without saying. So I could not feel sorry for myself or blame anyone for the use of my hands being taken away.</div>
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I felt, deeply that I would use any activity egoically, insisting on uniqueness of self rather than trusting and following the Mysterious Creative Process.</div>
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I clearly felt how in general I was moved by anxiety and fear and not trust in something greater than my ego. </div>
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Yet I also whole bodily knew, that there was something so much greater than the egoic self. I knew that both stillness and movement could be done in love not egoity and that when anything was done from this place beyond the ego that true Beauty occurred. </div>
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I was clearly obstructing Light from coming in.</div>
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I felt both emotionally and physically frozen.</div>
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I had stumbled and fallen.</div>
PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-58511643115868322242014-03-10T09:10:00.000-07:002014-03-10T09:10:43.241-07:00A Journey of Mystery<br />
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Experimenting with fabric weaving as taught by <a href="http://spiritcloth.typepad.com/">Jude</a> Hill</div>
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I could not have understood at my core what I had come to believe about 'art' and specifically drawing if I had not lost my ability to draw. And, like any belief, these beliefs directed how I interacted with myself and others. Of even more importance I was able to understand how these deeply held beliefs once known, actually were preventing me from growing in artistic expression as I had seen a number of my friends grow and flower.</div>
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I realized that 'art' for me had become linked with my understanding of and expression of "me".</div>
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I had developed strong convictions that the ability to draw was equivalent to being an artist and I had spent years working to develop this skill. </div>
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After understandably grieving this loss it became obvious to me that I was looking to my ability to produce 'art' as a way to be loved rather than as a way to express love.</div>
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How had I so unconsciously taken a form of expression that had once been a source of joy and turned it into something that had to provide my life with meaning?</div>
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Carl Jung has written: " The greatest and most important problems of life are fundamentally unsolvable. They can never be solved but only out grown."</div>
PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-16696880721235691232014-03-08T16:43:00.000-08:002014-03-08T19:59:16.260-08:00A New Hello!Often to get to a different perspective something has to change. Getting arthritis in my hands was a big change that included a number of endings. In order for me to move past the self pity and entropy I was swimming in I had to question and make shifts in strongly held beliefs.<br />
I found out very quickly how strongly my sense of meaning was tied to what I was able to DO: drawing, painting, cleaning, cooking, gardening (all activities that I needed my hands for) and was not very connected to who I am.<br />
I will be writing more in the coming weeks about this Grace Filled process of discovery and sharing how in the midst of changes it became very clear to me that mysterious creative process is always present and available.<br />
I have been doing different types of art:<br />
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And have been rediscovering creating out of love rather than to get love.<br />
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My arthritis is healing and that too involved a significant change in diet. If anyone is interested in the diet that has been helping me it is called the <span id="goog_1669125629"></span><a href="http://www.gapsdiet.com/Home_Page.html">GAPS<span id="goog_1669125630"></span></a> diet.<br />
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If you are brave</div>
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enough to say</div>
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goodbye, life will</div>
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reward you with</div>
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a new hello</div>
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-Paulo Coehlo</div>
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PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-50777046299156180172013-02-13T20:40:00.000-08:002013-02-13T20:40:03.276-08:00Happy Day of the Heart<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Fjn89NGEBwk/URhp9l_djPI/AAAAAAAAApw/_JVxbmzGSco/s1600/100_0940.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Fjn89NGEBwk/URhp9l_djPI/AAAAAAAAApw/_JVxbmzGSco/s400/100_0940.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
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May you seek to give love more than to get,<br />
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May your heart be full from the giving of love and kindness,</div>
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May we celebrate our unity with and love for all of life,</div>
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Happy Day of the Heart</div>
PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-16477295073993291922013-02-08T17:18:00.000-08:002013-02-08T17:27:50.792-08:00Inspired by KindnessI received an e-mail from <a href="http://robyngordon.weebly.com/current.html">Robyn Gordon</a> her blog: <a href="http://artpropelled.blogspot.com/">Art Propelled</a> and her art are a deep source of inspiration and 'awe' for me. There are times when someone reaches out and it is just at the time a 'lifesaver' is needed. I was needing a 'hand' when Robyn's kind e-mail arrived letting me know that she too had addressed dealing with arthritis. <br />
Look at one of Robyn's amazing Niche Carvings:<br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hQJpl97f7XA/URWgQaVXM8I/AAAAAAAAAow/d4vHxabaAU0/s1600/RG+Niche.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hQJpl97f7XA/URWgQaVXM8I/AAAAAAAAAow/d4vHxabaAU0/s400/RG+Niche.jpg" width="378" /></a></div>
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Here is a stunning Tribal Door that she carved:</div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zootz7WTAM4/URWgoURFt7I/AAAAAAAAAo4/qOzbPOJKEKQ/s1600/RG+t+door.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zootz7WTAM4/URWgoURFt7I/AAAAAAAAAo4/qOzbPOJKEKQ/s640/RG+t+door.jpg" width="291" /></a></div>
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I encourage you to look at both her website (attached to her name above) and her blog. </div>
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I am a bit embarrassed to share the art I made for myself to remind me how important words of kindness are and yet here is my work sparked by Robyn titled: Inspired by Kindness</div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-BEQZiNCu7c0/URWiRymHn0I/AAAAAAAAApA/U8GdFlhKHJo/s1600/100_0938.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-BEQZiNCu7c0/URWiRymHn0I/AAAAAAAAApA/U8GdFlhKHJo/s400/100_0938.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a
listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which
have the potential to turn a life around. ~Leo Buscaglia</span></div>
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PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-57615252198967704062013-02-01T11:07:00.000-08:002013-02-01T11:07:20.867-08:00What will our children do in the morning if they do not see us fly? - Rumi<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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These are some pages from one of my art journals. This is a new approach for me inspired by </div>
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Matisse who described his paper cut out process as "drawing with scissors" explaining: "Paper cutouts allow me to draw in color, I see it as a simplification. Instead of drawing the contour and putting color into it--one modifying the other--I draw directly in color." </div>
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I used loose watercolors in the background and then cut out past drawings and glued them on. This was wonderfully fun! </div>
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"Creativity takes Courage" H. Matisse<br />
<br />PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-57991804674737010022013-01-25T18:50:00.000-08:002013-01-25T18:50:03.798-08:00A Change in Perspective<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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During this past November I had to address the arthritis in my hands and how it affected my ability to draw. After spiraling down into a dark hole and visiting there for awhile I picked myself up and began to explore what I was able to do. I could sew, work with clay, paint, collage, and do a bit of drawing. While drawing is a deep love of mine, allowing expression of the mysterious creative process that seems to flow through all of us was more important than drawing I discovered. This has been a journey that I am beginning to undertand enough to share. Some of my current pieces: </div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-P5hzoCMxcGE/UQM9yhcynqI/AAAAAAAAAoQ/SXuEnR8Nj-Y/s1600/100_0932.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-P5hzoCMxcGE/UQM9yhcynqI/AAAAAAAAAoQ/SXuEnR8Nj-Y/s400/100_0932.JPG" width="400" /></a></div>
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Here is a quote I find very inspiring:<br />
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The planet does not need more
'successful people'. The planet desperately needs more peacemakers, healers,
restorers, storytellers and lovers of all kinds. It needs people to live well in
their places. It needs people with moral courage willing to join the struggle to
make the world habitable and humane and these qualities have little to do with
success as our culture has set. " - H.H.The <span class="yshortcuts" id="lw_1359168370_0">Dalai Lama</span><var id="yiv2069374268yui-ie-cursor"></var></div>
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PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-24789927641985497832012-10-28T11:52:00.001-07:002012-12-06T11:39:34.953-08:00Reminders of Summer<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zcwe8Rqtmtg/UHSKHqYl1kI/AAAAAAAAAlE/Xjky3k5NTHo/s1600/100_0908.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zcwe8Rqtmtg/UHSKHqYl1kI/AAAAAAAAAlE/Xjky3k5NTHo/s400/100_0908.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
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The last Monarch Butterfly of the summer: </div>
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I will be taking a blogging break for an unknown period of time. Thank you for all of your support. </div>
PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-42361606437020891142012-10-15T21:09:00.000-07:002012-10-15T21:09:24.349-07:00Is it possible to make a living by simply watching light?" - Terry Tempest Williams<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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"Is it possible to make a living by simply watching light? Monet did. Vermeer
did. I believe Vincent did too. They painted light in order to witness the dance
between revelation and concealment, exposure and darkness. " - Terry Tempest Williams</div>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-PLRiTABjSXE/UHNkHE-cJgI/AAAAAAAAAks/o4gbVus27Ys/s1600/100_0904.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-PLRiTABjSXE/UHNkHE-cJgI/AAAAAAAAAks/o4gbVus27Ys/s320/100_0904.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
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PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-72895301916406987422012-10-05T19:25:00.000-07:002012-10-05T19:25:09.397-07:00The beauty of nature reflected in art is just another reminder of our need to protect it.<br />
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An interesting 'green' alternative to shopping is the 'Swap don't Shop' movement. I heard about it through <a href="http://www.nature.org/greenliving/gogreen/everydayenvironmentalist/swap-dont-shop.xml">The Nature Conservancy</a> and find it inspiring. This kind of movement is happening all around the country in all kinds of communities. Swapping is a sustainable idea that will help our planet. All kinds of things can be swapped, clothes are probably the most common (the average American throws 68lbs of clothing and textiles into the land fill EVERY YEAR!) but garden surplus, eggs, milk, art, dishes, tools, and many other items could be swapped.<br />
So many of the choices we make have a major impact on the planet. This means that there are Eco-friendly changes that we can make everyday that can have a lasting healthy effect.<br />
Hosting a 'Swap don't Shop' party is one way to be an everyday environmentalist.PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-4421045269026241402012-09-29T19:54:00.000-07:002012-09-29T19:54:37.910-07:00"The Universe is a Continuous Web. Touch it at any Point and the Whole Web Quivers." - Stanley Kunitz<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The upcoming Autumn Equinox can be a time of reflection upon the year’s successes and failure and a moment of celebration of the harvest cycle. This time of year reminds me to pause and look at the bigger picture of my life. I feel this due to the changes I am making in my garden and how the changes seem to suggest a time of reflection. I have been planting the winter garden, composting spent plants and planting cover crops.</div>
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I am also making this quilt from old clothes and material scraps. All of them would have most likely gone into a land fill because they were so ripped up and old. It is fun putting the different pieces together and composing a design.<br />
Here are a couple close ups of different places on the quilt:<br />
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Some snow peas ready to be put in the garden:</div>
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my garden changing into winter mode:</div>
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"The garden is, in a sense, the cosmos in miniature, a condensation of the world that is open to your senses. It doesn't end at the limits of your own parcel of land, or your own state, or your own nation."</div>
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- Stanley Kunitz</div>
PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-68432515908099266782012-09-21T16:04:00.000-07:002012-09-21T19:41:29.288-07:00"....Because He Loved the Sky...." - Brenda Ueland<br />
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A book I go back to over and over again for support and inspiration is called, "If You Want to Write" by Brenda Ueland. I think the title could be, "If You Want to Create Art of any kind." I just substitute the word 'write' for 'art' when I read this book. Here is a passage from this book:<br />
The author writes......<br />
".......the moment I read Van Gogh's letter I knew what art was, and the creative
impulse. It is a feeling of love and enthusiasm for something, and in a direct,
simple, passionate and true way, you try to show this beauty in things to
others, by drawing it. And Van Gogh's little drawing on the cheap note paper was
a work of art because he loved the sky and the frail lamppost against it so
seriously that he made the drawing with the most exquisite conscientiousness and
care. ”
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- Brenda Ueland (from <em>If Want to Write: A Book about Art, Independence
and Spirit</em>)<br />
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Perhaps anytime we do something from a place of love we are contributing 'art' to this fragile home we call earth.PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-75841355099170342052012-09-15T11:12:00.000-07:002012-09-15T11:12:36.417-07:00Deciphering work composed in yarn and thread<div>
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<em>I have been altering T-shirts recently, something I really enjoy doing.</em><br />
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<em>I enjoy sitting outside and sewing by hand. I have learned a lot from other artists' blogs. One in particular comes to mind called: <a href="http://eclectic-meanderings.blogspot.com/">Electic-Meanderings</a> created by Deanna 7Trees. Deanna's blog is filled with inspiration, how tos', and Deanna herself is one of the most encouraging people I have met in a long time. I encourage you to visit her blog and become a 'follower' .</em><br />
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Shirts on my favorite rocking chair!<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-iCrLxMkeQkI/UFTDK1Y7RBI/AAAAAAAAAhU/8aOTZ0Y7h0A/s1600/100_0885.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-iCrLxMkeQkI/UFTDK1Y7RBI/AAAAAAAAAhU/8aOTZ0Y7h0A/s400/100_0885.JPG" width="300" /></a></div>
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<em>Much of the social history of early America has been lost to us precisely because women were expected to use needles rather than pens. Yet if textiles are in one sense an emblem of women’s oppression, they have also been an almost universal medium of female expression. If historians are to understand the lives of women in times past, they must not only cherish the Anne Bradstreets and Martha Ballards who mastered the mysterious ways of quill pens, they must also decipher work composed in yarn and thread.” </em></div>
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<em><br />–Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich</em></div>
PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-81178554646096856542012-09-08T14:50:00.002-07:002012-09-08T18:54:01.799-07:00“We should all do what, in the long run, gives us joy, even if it is only picking grapes or sorting the laundry.” E.B White<br />
These are some small mixed media paintings I am selling at "<a href="http://www.local.com/business/details/loch-lomond-ca/dinos-market-118516302/">Dino's</a>" in Loch Lomond, CA. Dino's is a wonderful Deli and market where you can get freshly made sandwiches, salads, drinks and much more. Loch Lomond is in Northern California a beautiful pine tree filled rural area.<br />
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<br />PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-25603319868452793922012-08-31T08:51:00.000-07:002012-08-31T08:51:45.638-07:00Living Jewels<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I have taken time to really look at some of the amazing beetles around our home. Their colors and patterns are stunning and inspiring for any artist. I chanced across this book by Poul Beckmann called, "Living Jewels" which is full of beautiful photos of beetles. I didn't know this but beetles have been called 'living jewels' due to their beauty. Here are some images from Poul Beckmann's book:</div>
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<br />PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-52984168600629382652012-08-25T07:43:00.001-07:002012-08-25T07:44:25.550-07:00Creating an Atmosphere<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: large;">"Every person, from morning till evening, is making invisible forms in space by what he says. He is creating invisible vibrations around him, and so he is creating an atmosphere."</span> <br />
-Hazrat Inayat KhanPJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-31673912542268542252012-08-19T18:31:00.000-07:002012-08-19T18:31:03.832-07:00May the colorful beauty of nature fill your heart<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I am moved by all the colors around me, sunflowers, hummingbirds, sunrise and sunsets, pine trees, butterflys, honeybees.....the colors in this world are amazing.PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-68597849678674351022012-08-15T22:53:00.001-07:002012-08-15T22:55:03.230-07:00"I thank you God for this most amazing day"<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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“I thank you God for this most amazing day, for the leaping greenly spirits of trees, and for the blue dream of sky and for everything which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes.”<br />
- ee CummingsPJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-9458359398706202512012-08-07T20:53:00.000-07:002012-08-07T21:15:16.158-07:00Take Your Busy Heart to the Forest<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #999999;"><span style="color: blue;">Take your busy heart to the art museum and
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #999999;"><span style="color: blue;">but take it also to the forest. </span></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #999999;"><span style="color: blue;">The song you heard singing in the leaf when
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: #999999;"><span style="color: blue;">from <i>Swan</i></span></span></div>PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-59958751834839070542012-07-29T08:21:00.001-07:002012-07-29T08:21:37.518-07:00Garden ArtI decided to make some paintings for one of our outside garden fences:<br />
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my loving garden art helper<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-NXBAph-yAKA/UBVUabogRKI/AAAAAAAAAc8/ttxUnU0IzWU/s1600/100_0866.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-NXBAph-yAKA/UBVUabogRKI/AAAAAAAAAc8/ttxUnU0IzWU/s320/100_0866.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-24446335720044425822012-07-17T20:36:00.000-07:002012-07-17T20:46:11.249-07:00Let's Start Our Days With Kindness<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I rescued Raven when she was approximately a year old (perhaps a bit younger) and often wondered what she was like as a puppy. This painting is one of my tributes to Raven and how I imagine her as a puppy! She starts my days out with her love and kindness so I titled this painting, "Starting Our Days with Kindness."PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7943175872721290936.post-48921388703759879482012-07-08T22:00:00.002-07:002012-12-06T11:40:24.724-08:00Horses lend us the wings we lack.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The power, grace and beauty of a horse....what joy!</div>
PJhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02727883964937065031noreply@blogger.com0