Creativity - Cooking it Up #2/8

And the first ingredient is....Calm. Sitting with my cat across all the days of his illness was to sit in calm. His steady composure was contagious, and created a kind of joyful peace that I will always remember despite the sadness of those days. In setting an intention to evoke and share the creative in community, then I have to start with Calm. The largest sense of calm for me comes from the natural world whether in sight, sound, touch, smell, or taste, the calm "is always there, except when it is not" (cf., Bill O'Hanlon). Today, I blend Calm in a slideshow below on the sidebar; sharing some resources for Calm, for us and for those who may live with us. I give a shout out 3 times to Dr. Lee Bartel, a University of Toronto musicologist who started his career by putting babies to sleep. His CDs evoke the magical by inviting the brain to settle into coherent brain waves. Calm creates a foundation for creativity, whether we believe we have it or not. Finding the sense of calm, noticing and connecting with that, then opening our eyes from that place within is how we begin to cook the creative.

New Recipe - Creativity #1/8

Today I am creating a new recipe for community. I like to cook up unique verse projects that nourish the soul; turning them into singular books, iconic images, or collaborative verses that are shared among us. The opening verse is a decorative passage, honoring an iconoclastic cat who lived strong and well across the nine years of his existence. I miss him beyond the beyond, and hold his spirit in my heart. ONE is my verse of his passage into grace. The witnessing of his love and courage was a gift that he would want shared with you.