Creativity---always interesting new definitions of it popping up here and there. In reading through an old pile of New York Times articles, saved for a rainy day (does snow count?), I came across a NYT magazine piece about Tom Binnes, artist extraordinaire of found objects. Jewelry and masks are among the prominent pieces in his collections from the past 20 years. That’s along and illustrious career!
What caught my eye was what Binns said about his own art: “I am always trying to reassess the value of something.”
Isn’t that what all creativity is about?
I have my saying, “There is always something new under the sun” on products through www.cafepress.com/UPositve. What I mean by that is, I think, what Binns alludes to. That whether or not there are new factual objects in our universe, there is always a new way of seeing what’s already there. A new interpretation, a redefinition, a turning something on its side or upside down, whether it’s an object that can be held, a way of moving, a turn of phrase, a meaning or an insight.
Art, in all its forms, is in that way, alchemy. Turning something into something else.
We are all magicians!
---Batya
Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Dreams, Beliefs, Plans, Actions
“To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.”--Anatole France (as quoted in Chapter Five of The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for Creative People)
I often read about goal setting or achievement as taking action. If only you do the steps, you’ll reach your goal.
“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” Or does it? Does it begin with the act of taking a step? Or does it begin with the dream of walking a thousand miles? Of having the intention to go somewhere other than where you are at the moment? To accomplish your goal, you need not only the dream or vision of it, but then the plan of how to get from here to there, of which direction to head in, and the belief that you are able to take the steps, and that with your plan, the steps will lead you to your goal, to your “great thing.” Taking a step, if you have no dream or direction, no plan or belief, can just as easily start you walking in a very small circle as it can start you heading on a journey. A thousand steps without direction can get you into a very close, very deep rut.
The “down” time is so essential to success. If you only work toward your goals, only act, you’ll exhaust yourself. Dreaming and believing, internal rather than external activities---done best during periods of “rest”---empower the actions you take toward your accomplishments.
Revisiting your dream, your vision, your visualization of your goals reinvigorates your passion, which then guides your reticular activating system and fuels your actions. When you dream and believe, and add plans and action, you pave the way for miracles to happen: you-made as well as Universe-made.
So, dream away! Believe in yourself! And then make your plans and take the actions you need to get you there.
I often read about goal setting or achievement as taking action. If only you do the steps, you’ll reach your goal.
“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” Or does it? Does it begin with the act of taking a step? Or does it begin with the dream of walking a thousand miles? Of having the intention to go somewhere other than where you are at the moment? To accomplish your goal, you need not only the dream or vision of it, but then the plan of how to get from here to there, of which direction to head in, and the belief that you are able to take the steps, and that with your plan, the steps will lead you to your goal, to your “great thing.” Taking a step, if you have no dream or direction, no plan or belief, can just as easily start you walking in a very small circle as it can start you heading on a journey. A thousand steps without direction can get you into a very close, very deep rut.
The “down” time is so essential to success. If you only work toward your goals, only act, you’ll exhaust yourself. Dreaming and believing, internal rather than external activities---done best during periods of “rest”---empower the actions you take toward your accomplishments.
Revisiting your dream, your vision, your visualization of your goals reinvigorates your passion, which then guides your reticular activating system and fuels your actions. When you dream and believe, and add plans and action, you pave the way for miracles to happen: you-made as well as Universe-made.
So, dream away! Believe in yourself! And then make your plans and take the actions you need to get you there.
--Batya
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Worthy Goals
“What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for some goal worthy of him. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost, but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him.” --Victor Frankl
This is the first quote in The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for Creative People (available from www.UPositive.com). It's an important thought: not only that people need goals, but need goals that are larger and more meaningful than the everyday. What goal is actually worthy of your true self? Of your ‘largest’ self? What goal is big enough and encompassing enough to be worthy of your soul?
Notice, too, that Frankl doesn’t speak about the attainment of the goal, but of the “striving and struggling” for it. He isn’t referring to the success or failure of reaching the goal, but of the process of living toward that goal.
We often make our goals too small. We envision only that which we are willing to think we CAN reach. What would happen if we made our goals large enough that reaching them stops being the issue, but striving and struggling for them becomes the purpose of our days and nights?
I’m impressed by a number of the movies Robert Redford has chosen to act in. Putting aside my attraction to the man for a moment (not his looks, but him)… I have thought often about what common thread runs through many of these films: Brubaker; Havana; Milagro Beanfield Wars; and Quiz Show (in reverse), among others. What I see in these is a main character who becomes bigger than himself (in Quiz Show, smaller) by acting from a private passion or commitment. By engaging in the process, they become more human, more effective; their actions extend farther past themselves into the world; they make more of an impact than they could imagine even in their own minds.
If we commit to a larger vision, something we might not even believe we can reach, and commit to the process, how much farther along the path we might get! I have a little sign framed in my house that reads: “Reach for the moon: even if you fail you land among the stars.” It reminds me of just this: the farther I reach, the farther I’ll get. If I aim for a large, distant goal, even if I don’t get there, I’ll get farther than if I reach for a small goal that is a sure thing.
I remember in the ‘60s and ‘70s when we had the audacity to try to end world hunger. We haven’t done it yet. Knowing we wouldn’t accomplish it in 40 years…we might have given it up. But look how much closer we are than if we hadn’t taken it on as a goal then. There are food banks all across America. There are hunger relief programs all across the world. Even the US Postal Service conducts a food drive: we started that ‘way back when. So many more people eat now; so many fewer starve. Do we still have a very long way to go to alleviate world hunger? You bet we do. Might we achieve that in the next 40 years? Who knows? But if we continue to aim for it, we’ll end up with a lot fewer hungry people than would exist if we decided it was an “impossible” goal and gave it up.
And, what are you willing to attain, even by miracle? If you don’t engage in the process, even a miracle can’t get you there. How would you feel if you find a goal worthy of that stress and strain, worthy of your soul---and by your daily efforts (and miracle, if necessary)---you do reach it?
So what goals are worthy of your striving and struggling in 2009? What are you willing to stress yourself for? What are you willing to maybe fail at reaching just to get that much closer?
This is the first quote in The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for Creative People (available from www.UPositive.com). It's an important thought: not only that people need goals, but need goals that are larger and more meaningful than the everyday. What goal is actually worthy of your true self? Of your ‘largest’ self? What goal is big enough and encompassing enough to be worthy of your soul?
Notice, too, that Frankl doesn’t speak about the attainment of the goal, but of the “striving and struggling” for it. He isn’t referring to the success or failure of reaching the goal, but of the process of living toward that goal.
We often make our goals too small. We envision only that which we are willing to think we CAN reach. What would happen if we made our goals large enough that reaching them stops being the issue, but striving and struggling for them becomes the purpose of our days and nights?
I’m impressed by a number of the movies Robert Redford has chosen to act in. Putting aside my attraction to the man for a moment (not his looks, but him)… I have thought often about what common thread runs through many of these films: Brubaker; Havana; Milagro Beanfield Wars; and Quiz Show (in reverse), among others. What I see in these is a main character who becomes bigger than himself (in Quiz Show, smaller) by acting from a private passion or commitment. By engaging in the process, they become more human, more effective; their actions extend farther past themselves into the world; they make more of an impact than they could imagine even in their own minds.
If we commit to a larger vision, something we might not even believe we can reach, and commit to the process, how much farther along the path we might get! I have a little sign framed in my house that reads: “Reach for the moon: even if you fail you land among the stars.” It reminds me of just this: the farther I reach, the farther I’ll get. If I aim for a large, distant goal, even if I don’t get there, I’ll get farther than if I reach for a small goal that is a sure thing.
I remember in the ‘60s and ‘70s when we had the audacity to try to end world hunger. We haven’t done it yet. Knowing we wouldn’t accomplish it in 40 years…we might have given it up. But look how much closer we are than if we hadn’t taken it on as a goal then. There are food banks all across America. There are hunger relief programs all across the world. Even the US Postal Service conducts a food drive: we started that ‘way back when. So many more people eat now; so many fewer starve. Do we still have a very long way to go to alleviate world hunger? You bet we do. Might we achieve that in the next 40 years? Who knows? But if we continue to aim for it, we’ll end up with a lot fewer hungry people than would exist if we decided it was an “impossible” goal and gave it up.
And, what are you willing to attain, even by miracle? If you don’t engage in the process, even a miracle can’t get you there. How would you feel if you find a goal worthy of that stress and strain, worthy of your soul---and by your daily efforts (and miracle, if necessary)---you do reach it?
So what goals are worthy of your striving and struggling in 2009? What are you willing to stress yourself for? What are you willing to maybe fail at reaching just to get that much closer?
--Batya
Friday, October 24, 2008
Goals and Depression, Mood Swings, ADD, OCD, etc.
Lately, a lot of people have been mentioning their frustration with Goal Setting. Sometimes they’ve read a popular book on the topic and tried to follow the suggestions in it. Sometimes they’ve visualized and listed their goals. Or even determined the steps and added them to their to-do lists for a few weeks.
And then nothing happens. Except frustration.
“There’s too many things to do. I’ll never get there.”
“I don’t have the energy.”
“I start something and get distracted; then I do the other task and get distracted again.”
“I just can’t find the focus to get much done.”
For one thing, if you get out of bed in the morning, go to work, take care of the kids, cook a meal---you’re getting things done. You’re taking steps toward your goals. Often, we forget to add the “ordinary” activities to our goals lists. “Continue being a good parent.” “Maintain my home.” “Make a living.” These are ongoing goals. Include them in your list.
Secondly, most of the material on goal setting presents a cookie-cutter approach that works for many people, but not all people. Often, you need to take the information in the books/seminars/classes and remold it to your own needs. In fact, finding your own style of accomplishing steps to your goals is included in part in many of these books.
Third: most approaches are tailored to people who are already functioning fairly well.
But what if you’re not functioning all that well to start with? What if you’re depressed, or anxious; what if you have severe mood swings, or have been diagnosed with attention deficit disorder or obsessive-compulsive disorder?
The most important step here, if you feel you really are suffering, is to see a doctor and get some medication to break through the biochemical side of your illness.
Then, you need to reassess your immediate goals. Yes, you want to do the long-term, 10- and 5-year visualizations, but I’d say, tuck them away in a safe place for later reference. Instead, concentrate on short-term goals. What would you like to accomplish in the next three months?
When you’re depressed, or suffering from any mental health problems, three months becomes a long time, subjectively. So start with three months, then work back to one month, one week, and today. Take it, as they say in the 12-step programs, one day at a time. Be sure, however, to write up your list of do-able steps, and set up your calendar so you can keep track of your accomplishments.
Here’s an example if you’re depressed. For those who are severely depressed, just getting out of bed can be a major accomplishment. Start with simple things, maybe one a day. On your way to the bathroom, open the curtains and let light in. It’s been proven scientifically that lack of light adds to depression; addition of natural light helps relieve it. Get out of bed and get dressed. Do not wander around in your nightgown or pj’s all day---even if you’re staying in the house. hoose one activity to accomplish each day. Make sure you acknowledge yourself for each small step you take.
For those with ADD (attention deficit disorder), you might want to choose a task and break it up into very small activities. Pay attention to your attention: can you focus for 15 minutes at a time? Only 10 minutes? Or five? Make each task into minitasks that take that amount of time to accomplish. Instead of exerting energy trying to focus longer (and then beating yourself up for failing), train yourself to return to the next step of a larger task. For you, choosing two or three tasks for a day, each one broken up into mini-tasks, and rotating from one to the next---and back again (that’s the trick for success!)---will allow you to get more accomplished.
I’m writing an eBook that addresses these issues in more detail. The working title is: The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for People with Depression, Anxiety, Mood Swings, ADD, OCD, and more. It will be available at the beginning of 2009. In the meantime, if you’d like to learn more, please email me at Batya@UPositive.com., or visit www.UPositive.com.
If you have stories about your own frustrations and successes attaining your goals, feel free post here, or send me an email.
--Batya
And then nothing happens. Except frustration.
“There’s too many things to do. I’ll never get there.”
“I don’t have the energy.”
“I start something and get distracted; then I do the other task and get distracted again.”
“I just can’t find the focus to get much done.”
For one thing, if you get out of bed in the morning, go to work, take care of the kids, cook a meal---you’re getting things done. You’re taking steps toward your goals. Often, we forget to add the “ordinary” activities to our goals lists. “Continue being a good parent.” “Maintain my home.” “Make a living.” These are ongoing goals. Include them in your list.
Secondly, most of the material on goal setting presents a cookie-cutter approach that works for many people, but not all people. Often, you need to take the information in the books/seminars/classes and remold it to your own needs. In fact, finding your own style of accomplishing steps to your goals is included in part in many of these books.
Third: most approaches are tailored to people who are already functioning fairly well.
But what if you’re not functioning all that well to start with? What if you’re depressed, or anxious; what if you have severe mood swings, or have been diagnosed with attention deficit disorder or obsessive-compulsive disorder?
The most important step here, if you feel you really are suffering, is to see a doctor and get some medication to break through the biochemical side of your illness.
Then, you need to reassess your immediate goals. Yes, you want to do the long-term, 10- and 5-year visualizations, but I’d say, tuck them away in a safe place for later reference. Instead, concentrate on short-term goals. What would you like to accomplish in the next three months?
When you’re depressed, or suffering from any mental health problems, three months becomes a long time, subjectively. So start with three months, then work back to one month, one week, and today. Take it, as they say in the 12-step programs, one day at a time. Be sure, however, to write up your list of do-able steps, and set up your calendar so you can keep track of your accomplishments.
Here’s an example if you’re depressed. For those who are severely depressed, just getting out of bed can be a major accomplishment. Start with simple things, maybe one a day. On your way to the bathroom, open the curtains and let light in. It’s been proven scientifically that lack of light adds to depression; addition of natural light helps relieve it. Get out of bed and get dressed. Do not wander around in your nightgown or pj’s all day---even if you’re staying in the house. hoose one activity to accomplish each day. Make sure you acknowledge yourself for each small step you take.
For those with ADD (attention deficit disorder), you might want to choose a task and break it up into very small activities. Pay attention to your attention: can you focus for 15 minutes at a time? Only 10 minutes? Or five? Make each task into minitasks that take that amount of time to accomplish. Instead of exerting energy trying to focus longer (and then beating yourself up for failing), train yourself to return to the next step of a larger task. For you, choosing two or three tasks for a day, each one broken up into mini-tasks, and rotating from one to the next---and back again (that’s the trick for success!)---will allow you to get more accomplished.
I’m writing an eBook that addresses these issues in more detail. The working title is: The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for People with Depression, Anxiety, Mood Swings, ADD, OCD, and more. It will be available at the beginning of 2009. In the meantime, if you’d like to learn more, please email me at Batya@UPositive.com., or visit www.UPositive.com.
If you have stories about your own frustrations and successes attaining your goals, feel free post here, or send me an email.
--Batya
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Definition of "Goal"
While reading Dan Miller's excellent book, 48 Days, I once again came across the accepted definition of "goal," which is, simply put, A goal is a dream with a timeline attached. Recently, a coaching client asked me a similar question: Don't all my goals need time determinations?
I've been thinking about that. For a while, I'd accepted that definition, but something just didn't feel right. Today, sitting on the sand in Long Beach, NY, I realized what my problem with it was.
Attaching a time determination to a goal is left-brained, and only half the story.
Sure, having a time for your goals in mind: 5 years, 6 months, etc. and then adding the smaller steps to your weekly and daily list of do-ables is essential. Especially for charting, and for the left brain.
There's a danger, though, in defining a goal as attached to a time limit. What happens when life intervenes and you miss your deadlines? Have you failed at your goals? Obviously, the answer is a resounding "no." If you renegotiate your timeline, does that mean you're redefining your goals? Again, I'd say "no."
So I don't think a timeline is the definition of a goal.
I think the definition of goal is:
Once you have the commitment, the timeline, the do-ables, the actions within the reality of your days, weeks, and months are all tools to use to get there. And commitment is as much a right-brained activity as it is left-brained. Commitment is a whole-brained approach to defining "goal."
I'd love to read your thoughts and responses to this redefinition of "goal."
--Batya
I've been thinking about that. For a while, I'd accepted that definition, but something just didn't feel right. Today, sitting on the sand in Long Beach, NY, I realized what my problem with it was.
Attaching a time determination to a goal is left-brained, and only half the story.
Sure, having a time for your goals in mind: 5 years, 6 months, etc. and then adding the smaller steps to your weekly and daily list of do-ables is essential. Especially for charting, and for the left brain.
There's a danger, though, in defining a goal as attached to a time limit. What happens when life intervenes and you miss your deadlines? Have you failed at your goals? Obviously, the answer is a resounding "no." If you renegotiate your timeline, does that mean you're redefining your goals? Again, I'd say "no."
So I don't think a timeline is the definition of a goal.
I think the definition of goal is:
A goal is a dream with commitment attached.
Once you have the commitment, the timeline, the do-ables, the actions within the reality of your days, weeks, and months are all tools to use to get there. And commitment is as much a right-brained activity as it is left-brained. Commitment is a whole-brained approach to defining "goal."
I'd love to read your thoughts and responses to this redefinition of "goal."
--Batya
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Improved Memory
NEWS
The Creativity Empowerment Celebration for the launch of UPositive Creativity and Life Coaching on Friday was great fun! In spite of the Nashville gas crisis, which did keep a few people away. The rest of us shared good conversation, and funny and inspiring right brain/left brain skit, delicious food and drink (and scrumptious quadruple-chocolate brownies!), and won lots of door prizes!
I'm working on a membership program for UPositive. I'll post the details here as soon as I have them, so my blog-readers can have the first chance to participate. There's going to be a lot of value in membership, I can promise you that!
Improving Memory
Back in April, Gary Marcus wrote a short article for the New York Times Magazine entitled “Total Recall.” He described the difference between how a computer accesses its memory and how humans (and other animals) access memory. The computer, of course, is better at it. By the end of the article, he suggested that there might eventually be a “neural prosthetic” (implant) that would stimulate our memory pathways.
No thanks.
I’d like to stick with the human brain remaining human; I’m not interested in becoming even part cyborg, thank you.
But there was some interesting information in the article. For instance, there are studies showing that environment, body posture, secondary senses, all increase memory. If you learn a word while stooping, you will better remember it while stooping. It’s been known for a while that visiting the room where a test will be given beforehand, and keeping the image of that room in your mind while you study increases your score on the test.
I’d like to propose a different solution to improving memory than adding a computer chip to our gray matter. I’m going to try this myself, do an informal study. Here’s my theory:
Choose a different posture for different kinds of information input.
Keep a written list (so you don’t have to remember it on your own).
Practice, practice, practice. (repetition increases synaptic firing: think of a deer creating a path to the stream---it gets easier with each trip)
Reward any success. (behavioral modification technique).
Here are some suggestions (I want to make these so they’re not too obvious or distracting to others):
1. Rub the top of my ear as I learn someone’s name.
2. Put thumb to middle finger as hear people talk about computers.
3. Lace right and left fingers together for writing suggestions.
Do you have any experience with improving your memory in a similar manner? Did it work?
If you decide to try it, let me know what happens, please!
--Batya
The Creativity Empowerment Celebration for the launch of UPositive Creativity and Life Coaching on Friday was great fun! In spite of the Nashville gas crisis, which did keep a few people away. The rest of us shared good conversation, and funny and inspiring right brain/left brain skit, delicious food and drink (and scrumptious quadruple-chocolate brownies!), and won lots of door prizes!
I'm working on a membership program for UPositive. I'll post the details here as soon as I have them, so my blog-readers can have the first chance to participate. There's going to be a lot of value in membership, I can promise you that!
Improving Memory
Back in April, Gary Marcus wrote a short article for the New York Times Magazine entitled “Total Recall.” He described the difference between how a computer accesses its memory and how humans (and other animals) access memory. The computer, of course, is better at it. By the end of the article, he suggested that there might eventually be a “neural prosthetic” (implant) that would stimulate our memory pathways.
No thanks.
I’d like to stick with the human brain remaining human; I’m not interested in becoming even part cyborg, thank you.
But there was some interesting information in the article. For instance, there are studies showing that environment, body posture, secondary senses, all increase memory. If you learn a word while stooping, you will better remember it while stooping. It’s been known for a while that visiting the room where a test will be given beforehand, and keeping the image of that room in your mind while you study increases your score on the test.
I’d like to propose a different solution to improving memory than adding a computer chip to our gray matter. I’m going to try this myself, do an informal study. Here’s my theory:
Choose a different posture for different kinds of information input.
Keep a written list (so you don’t have to remember it on your own).
Practice, practice, practice. (repetition increases synaptic firing: think of a deer creating a path to the stream---it gets easier with each trip)
Reward any success. (behavioral modification technique).
Here are some suggestions (I want to make these so they’re not too obvious or distracting to others):
1. Rub the top of my ear as I learn someone’s name.
2. Put thumb to middle finger as hear people talk about computers.
3. Lace right and left fingers together for writing suggestions.
Do you have any experience with improving your memory in a similar manner? Did it work?
If you decide to try it, let me know what happens, please!
--Batya
Monday, September 15, 2008
Time, Again
NEWS
Big news this week: Creative Empowerment Celebration launching UPositive Creativity and Life Coaching is happening this Friday, 6-9 pm, at HA Gallery in Nashville, TN. I’m really looking forward to seeing everyone there! I’ve written a short skit about conversations between the right and left hemispheres of the brain; we’ll be giving out a lot of door prizes; Shirley Geier’s brilliant illustrations for The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for Creative People and the first two for The UPositive Guide to Time Management for Creative People will be on exhibit; products and sayings from cafepress.com/UPositive will be displayed, and lots of great people will be wandering through. And, yes, there will be nibbles to nibble.
TIME, AGAIN
Back to that annoying topic. My friend Heather is writing a truly engaging and well-crafted novel about time travel, which has gotten my brain thinking---and reeling!
My cyberfriend and most frequent poster on this blog, Elysabeth, just assumed that time flows smoothly. As we all assume. But what if scientists just conjured up measures of time in order to pretend control over it? What if time really is more of a subjective type of thing? What if all this clock stuff is one large agreement we’ve all made (especially the Swiss and Germans who are quite punctual) so that sometimes people show up in the same place at the same time?
We all know the difference between subjective time and objective time.
Case in point. Since I’m very much into balancing the right and left hemispheres of the brain I pride myself on scheduling. Last week time got all twisted for me. No matter what I did, it went wrong first, then went right. So I decided to stop fighting it and embrace it. I began to schedule my time to include the SNAFUs.
What happened? I sat in my car for an hour waiting for friends to show up for lunch---because as soon as I tried to have control over the chaos, the chaos tricked me and went away. The only thing that didn’t go right was the not-going-right part of the day. MetaSNAFU.
Yes, we need to schedule our time, because we still live in a world that has an agreement to operate by the clock: factual ticking or not. But we also need to give ourselves a break, regularly, when the clock and our schedules forget about each other and go their own ways.
That said, see you on Friday at the gallery, somewhere between 6 and 9 p.m.
--Batya
Big news this week: Creative Empowerment Celebration launching UPositive Creativity and Life Coaching is happening this Friday, 6-9 pm, at HA Gallery in Nashville, TN. I’m really looking forward to seeing everyone there! I’ve written a short skit about conversations between the right and left hemispheres of the brain; we’ll be giving out a lot of door prizes; Shirley Geier’s brilliant illustrations for The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for Creative People and the first two for The UPositive Guide to Time Management for Creative People will be on exhibit; products and sayings from cafepress.com/UPositive will be displayed, and lots of great people will be wandering through. And, yes, there will be nibbles to nibble.
TIME, AGAIN
Back to that annoying topic. My friend Heather is writing a truly engaging and well-crafted novel about time travel, which has gotten my brain thinking---and reeling!
My cyberfriend and most frequent poster on this blog, Elysabeth, just assumed that time flows smoothly. As we all assume. But what if scientists just conjured up measures of time in order to pretend control over it? What if time really is more of a subjective type of thing? What if all this clock stuff is one large agreement we’ve all made (especially the Swiss and Germans who are quite punctual) so that sometimes people show up in the same place at the same time?
We all know the difference between subjective time and objective time.
Case in point. Since I’m very much into balancing the right and left hemispheres of the brain I pride myself on scheduling. Last week time got all twisted for me. No matter what I did, it went wrong first, then went right. So I decided to stop fighting it and embrace it. I began to schedule my time to include the SNAFUs.
What happened? I sat in my car for an hour waiting for friends to show up for lunch---because as soon as I tried to have control over the chaos, the chaos tricked me and went away. The only thing that didn’t go right was the not-going-right part of the day. MetaSNAFU.
Yes, we need to schedule our time, because we still live in a world that has an agreement to operate by the clock: factual ticking or not. But we also need to give ourselves a break, regularly, when the clock and our schedules forget about each other and go their own ways.
That said, see you on Friday at the gallery, somewhere between 6 and 9 p.m.
--Batya
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
More Creativity and Goal Attainment Blogs
Hi everyone!
Yvonne Perry, of www.writersinthesky.com, a brilliantly helpful website for writers of all kinds, spoke at our nonfiction meetup group last night. She mentioned that the more often a person blogs, the more the keywords will be picked up by the search engines and the happier those of us using blogs for our friends, families, clients, and potential clients, will be.
Well, I like being happy. My right brain loves being happy! And, as we all know, when the right brain is happy....everybody is happy!
So, I'm going to try to add a post or two a week. These will be short, and on helpful topics...bliphelps or something.
They will be about Creativity and the Creative Process. They'll also be about Goal Setting and especially Goal Attainment. Breaking through Creative Blocks. Time Management. Right Brain/Left Brain compatibility. And just plain ol' making-it-through-the-day thoughts.
Please feel free to participate in the discussion, in agreeing or disagreeing with my posts, in adding thoughts, info, ideas...whatever!
And, Elysabeth---special thanks to you for your continued support and posts to these blogs!
--Batya
Yvonne Perry, of www.writersinthesky.com, a brilliantly helpful website for writers of all kinds, spoke at our nonfiction meetup group last night. She mentioned that the more often a person blogs, the more the keywords will be picked up by the search engines and the happier those of us using blogs for our friends, families, clients, and potential clients, will be.
Well, I like being happy. My right brain loves being happy! And, as we all know, when the right brain is happy....everybody is happy!
So, I'm going to try to add a post or two a week. These will be short, and on helpful topics...bliphelps or something.
They will be about Creativity and the Creative Process. They'll also be about Goal Setting and especially Goal Attainment. Breaking through Creative Blocks. Time Management. Right Brain/Left Brain compatibility. And just plain ol' making-it-through-the-day thoughts.
Please feel free to participate in the discussion, in agreeing or disagreeing with my posts, in adding thoughts, info, ideas...whatever!
And, Elysabeth---special thanks to you for your continued support and posts to these blogs!
--Batya
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Productive Sleep
News
The celebration launching UPositive Creativity and Life Coaching is happening September 19. If you’re interested in attending and haven’t yet received an invitation, please email Batya@UPositive.com
The website, www.UPositive.com, is running---except for the “subscribe” button. Again, if you’d like to be on the free newsletter list, email Batya@UPositive.com and I’ll be happy to add you. If you’ve already subscribed on the website, please send me an email; I haven’t been able to collect those names. The problem will be solved one way or another in the next few days (I hope).
Speaking of newsletters. The first issue should be out by Friday, although I’m fighting a computer glitch. Here’s hoping!
Productive Sleep
A number of articles have crossed my path recently about sleep. Sure, there were the gazillion about how to get a better night’s sleep (I run a two-hour seminar about that), but these caught my eye because they brought up a subject that had caught my eye decades ago: how to use sleep productively.
Back in the mid-1970s, Patricia Garfield wrote Creative Dreaming. Later on, Robert Moss, Stephen LaBerge and others expanded on the topic, exploring aware and awake dreaming in the spiritual realm and in the psychological realm.
Now, the topic seems to have awakened again.
One of the many marketing e-newsletters I receive focused on using the hours of sleep to add time to the day. He suggests assigning problem-solving tasks to the brain, extending the work day through the night. Does it work? Usually.
The Scientific American Mind, which I’ve mentioned before and which is one of my favorite magazines, included an article in its recent issue entitled: “Quiet! Sleeping Brain at Work.”
All these discuss the ways we can program the brain to solve problems while we’re sleeping. It takes time and persistence, but it works. I’ve done it myself!
My question is this: should we be doing it regularly?
Yes, it takes some consistency to train the sleeping brain to respond to direction. But after the training period, do we really want to keep our brain on-task 24 hours a day? It seems like we’ll be making robots out of ourselves.
Sure, if there is a pressing problem and we can’t seem to find the solution after a few days of concentrating on it (awake time), hand it over to the sleeping brain for help. Makes sense to me. After all, I am a proponent of whole-brain thinking.
But the sleeping brain already has its own agenda: processing daily activities, stressors, joys, experiences, thoughts, input in its own, subconscious way. It takes our awake time and sorts it out, works it through, and puts it aside with a finesse we couldn’t create if we tried. It’s already at work while we sleep.
My concern is that if we take the sleeping brain away from its subconscious, free-and-do-it-the-way-it-knows-best processes regularly, what will happen to the things that are usually processed at night?
Like everything, I think moderation is important---yes, let’s use our subconscious mind to help solve pressing problems. But let’s pick and choose carefully what we direct our sleeping mind to do…and leave it to its own brilliant work, in its own way, most of the (night)time.
Any thoughts?
---Batya
The celebration launching UPositive Creativity and Life Coaching is happening September 19. If you’re interested in attending and haven’t yet received an invitation, please email Batya@UPositive.com
The website, www.UPositive.com, is running---except for the “subscribe” button. Again, if you’d like to be on the free newsletter list, email Batya@UPositive.com and I’ll be happy to add you. If you’ve already subscribed on the website, please send me an email; I haven’t been able to collect those names. The problem will be solved one way or another in the next few days (I hope).
Speaking of newsletters. The first issue should be out by Friday, although I’m fighting a computer glitch. Here’s hoping!
Productive Sleep
A number of articles have crossed my path recently about sleep. Sure, there were the gazillion about how to get a better night’s sleep (I run a two-hour seminar about that), but these caught my eye because they brought up a subject that had caught my eye decades ago: how to use sleep productively.
Back in the mid-1970s, Patricia Garfield wrote Creative Dreaming. Later on, Robert Moss, Stephen LaBerge and others expanded on the topic, exploring aware and awake dreaming in the spiritual realm and in the psychological realm.
Now, the topic seems to have awakened again.
One of the many marketing e-newsletters I receive focused on using the hours of sleep to add time to the day. He suggests assigning problem-solving tasks to the brain, extending the work day through the night. Does it work? Usually.
The Scientific American Mind, which I’ve mentioned before and which is one of my favorite magazines, included an article in its recent issue entitled: “Quiet! Sleeping Brain at Work.”
All these discuss the ways we can program the brain to solve problems while we’re sleeping. It takes time and persistence, but it works. I’ve done it myself!
My question is this: should we be doing it regularly?
Yes, it takes some consistency to train the sleeping brain to respond to direction. But after the training period, do we really want to keep our brain on-task 24 hours a day? It seems like we’ll be making robots out of ourselves.
Sure, if there is a pressing problem and we can’t seem to find the solution after a few days of concentrating on it (awake time), hand it over to the sleeping brain for help. Makes sense to me. After all, I am a proponent of whole-brain thinking.
But the sleeping brain already has its own agenda: processing daily activities, stressors, joys, experiences, thoughts, input in its own, subconscious way. It takes our awake time and sorts it out, works it through, and puts it aside with a finesse we couldn’t create if we tried. It’s already at work while we sleep.
My concern is that if we take the sleeping brain away from its subconscious, free-and-do-it-the-way-it-knows-best processes regularly, what will happen to the things that are usually processed at night?
Like everything, I think moderation is important---yes, let’s use our subconscious mind to help solve pressing problems. But let’s pick and choose carefully what we direct our sleeping mind to do…and leave it to its own brilliant work, in its own way, most of the (night)time.
Any thoughts?
---Batya
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Expect the Unexpected
NEWS:
The website, www.UPositive.com, is up and running, except for the newsletter signup and refer to a friend links. If you’d like either of these, please email me directly at Batya@UPositive.com from outside the website. Thanks for your patience.
The second set of Creativity Challenge and Goal Attainment Tip videos are up on www.YouTube.com/UPositive, or through www.UPositive.com. Take a look! Let me know what you think!
The first eBook in the series, The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for Creative People, should be available by the end of this weekend…August 17. The second eBook, The UPositive Guide to Time Management for Creative People is due out in September.
The UPositive Relaxation and Visualization audio CD is available from the website at www.UPositive.com.
Mark Friday evening, September 19, from 6 to 9 pm in your calendars for the official opening celebration of UPositive Creativity and Life Coaching! More information is coming here and through the first newsletter, which should be going out sometime next week. (If you’d like an evite and the info, or to be on the mailing list in general, please email me at Batya@UPositive.com or UPositive55@aol.com).
The first 9 sayings from UPositive’s Batya Sez… shop are now available for purchase through http://www.cafepress.com/UPositive. The next nine are in the works---I’ll let you know through this blog and the newsletter when they’re ready! It’s never to early to shop for Christmas and Hanukah and Kwanzaa, and it’s never the wrong day to buy yourself a gift!
The Passion-for-Life Psychotherapy practice has a few openings for new clients in Nashville; please email UPositive55@aol.com for more information. We can talk about depression, anxiety, mood swings, ADD, and family and relationship issues.
UPositive’s Creativity and Life Coaching practice is available locally, but also through telephone and Internet-based services. Please visit the website www.UPositive.com or contact me Batya@UPositive.com for more information.
EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED
Sorry this blog is late again this week, but I didn’t expect the unexpected and have been preoccupied with positive but time-consuming emergencies. So I thought I’d address the issue head-on.
In goal setting, establishing to-do lists, setting today-ables into planners, managing time, business planning, and pretty much everything else, we tend to work with linear, clock time. It should take 20 minutes to go to and from the corner grocery for a gallon of milk and some eggs, so we schedule 20 minutes. I can write for 15 minutes every morning---no problem! Creating a CD should require about two week’s worth of work, then about two hours in a studio.
And then life happens.
Life happening is not a problem: we want life to happen. If everything we did came in fifteen- and twenty-minute, or even two-hour, tick-tocking segments, we’d bore ourselves to death. So life happening---meeting an old colleague at the grocery store and stopping for a cup of coffee to catch up; finally getting into the secondary character’s head and heart and typing a pivotal scene for an hour and a half without taking a breath; getting to the studio and being treated to a half-hour tour and demonstration of fascinating drums of the world---these are the joys of life. But we hadn’t scheduled them.
Life doesn’t happen in linear time. It scoffs at linear time. Thunder isn’t the Norse gods bowling---it’s the deep belly laughs of the Universe at all the linear-time planning we do. There’s that old adage: If you want to make God laugh, make a plan.
For creative people, getting in the zone is the goal to get to the goal of doing our creative work. The Zone is clockless.
So do we make a big bonfire and through all the DayTimers, DayRunners, calendars, pdas, and Palm Pilots in it? No. Not at all.
We expect the unexpected (sorry for the cliché, Heather, but it’s a cliché because it holds truth). We plan for the unplannable.
The best way to sew a button on something is to stick a pin under where your thread loops go, then take the pin out when you’re done. Why? Because it provides just enough give so that your taut stitches won’t rip at the first tug on the button. The tree that bends in the wind lives through the storm. (ok, old, used, but gets my point across)
When you do schedule your to-doables from your goals list, when you apply time management to your activities, add in some extra time---an hour or two a day.
I can feel the panic. Yours. Mine. But…but…I have so much to do. I already can’t get to it all. Take an hour or two a day to do nothing?
Not at all. Take an hour or two a day to participate in life. To have some breathing space. To take the tension out of things. To talk to a friend you meet on the street. To let a character have her way on the page. To explore a new combination of dance movements inspired by the piece you must get choreographed. To flip through a magazine that catches your eye as you rush to get your research on green insulation for new structures finished.
And if, at the end of the day, you haven’t used up your extra time, take a bubble bath, read a book, put your feet up and just breathe…that’s right…get the air into your body and feed yourself some extra oxygen! Catch up on sleep (the way to do that properly is to get to bed earlier, not to sleep late in the morning), if nothing else. You’ll have more energy and clarity the next day, so you’ll be more productive in the time you do schedule your work and creative endeavors.
--Batya
The website, www.UPositive.com, is up and running, except for the newsletter signup and refer to a friend links. If you’d like either of these, please email me directly at Batya@UPositive.com from outside the website. Thanks for your patience.
The second set of Creativity Challenge and Goal Attainment Tip videos are up on www.YouTube.com/UPositive, or through www.UPositive.com. Take a look! Let me know what you think!
The first eBook in the series, The UPositive Guide to Goal Attainment for Creative People, should be available by the end of this weekend…August 17. The second eBook, The UPositive Guide to Time Management for Creative People is due out in September.
The UPositive Relaxation and Visualization audio CD is available from the website at www.UPositive.com.
Mark Friday evening, September 19, from 6 to 9 pm in your calendars for the official opening celebration of UPositive Creativity and Life Coaching! More information is coming here and through the first newsletter, which should be going out sometime next week. (If you’d like an evite and the info, or to be on the mailing list in general, please email me at Batya@UPositive.com or UPositive55@aol.com).
The first 9 sayings from UPositive’s Batya Sez… shop are now available for purchase through http://www.cafepress.com/UPositive. The next nine are in the works---I’ll let you know through this blog and the newsletter when they’re ready! It’s never to early to shop for Christmas and Hanukah and Kwanzaa, and it’s never the wrong day to buy yourself a gift!
The Passion-for-Life Psychotherapy practice has a few openings for new clients in Nashville; please email UPositive55@aol.com for more information. We can talk about depression, anxiety, mood swings, ADD, and family and relationship issues.
UPositive’s Creativity and Life Coaching practice is available locally, but also through telephone and Internet-based services. Please visit the website www.UPositive.com or contact me Batya@UPositive.com for more information.
EXPECT THE UNEXPECTED
Sorry this blog is late again this week, but I didn’t expect the unexpected and have been preoccupied with positive but time-consuming emergencies. So I thought I’d address the issue head-on.
In goal setting, establishing to-do lists, setting today-ables into planners, managing time, business planning, and pretty much everything else, we tend to work with linear, clock time. It should take 20 minutes to go to and from the corner grocery for a gallon of milk and some eggs, so we schedule 20 minutes. I can write for 15 minutes every morning---no problem! Creating a CD should require about two week’s worth of work, then about two hours in a studio.
And then life happens.
Life happening is not a problem: we want life to happen. If everything we did came in fifteen- and twenty-minute, or even two-hour, tick-tocking segments, we’d bore ourselves to death. So life happening---meeting an old colleague at the grocery store and stopping for a cup of coffee to catch up; finally getting into the secondary character’s head and heart and typing a pivotal scene for an hour and a half without taking a breath; getting to the studio and being treated to a half-hour tour and demonstration of fascinating drums of the world---these are the joys of life. But we hadn’t scheduled them.
Life doesn’t happen in linear time. It scoffs at linear time. Thunder isn’t the Norse gods bowling---it’s the deep belly laughs of the Universe at all the linear-time planning we do. There’s that old adage: If you want to make God laugh, make a plan.
For creative people, getting in the zone is the goal to get to the goal of doing our creative work. The Zone is clockless.
So do we make a big bonfire and through all the DayTimers, DayRunners, calendars, pdas, and Palm Pilots in it? No. Not at all.
We expect the unexpected (sorry for the cliché, Heather, but it’s a cliché because it holds truth). We plan for the unplannable.
The best way to sew a button on something is to stick a pin under where your thread loops go, then take the pin out when you’re done. Why? Because it provides just enough give so that your taut stitches won’t rip at the first tug on the button. The tree that bends in the wind lives through the storm. (ok, old, used, but gets my point across)
When you do schedule your to-doables from your goals list, when you apply time management to your activities, add in some extra time---an hour or two a day.
I can feel the panic. Yours. Mine. But…but…I have so much to do. I already can’t get to it all. Take an hour or two a day to do nothing?
Not at all. Take an hour or two a day to participate in life. To have some breathing space. To take the tension out of things. To talk to a friend you meet on the street. To let a character have her way on the page. To explore a new combination of dance movements inspired by the piece you must get choreographed. To flip through a magazine that catches your eye as you rush to get your research on green insulation for new structures finished.
And if, at the end of the day, you haven’t used up your extra time, take a bubble bath, read a book, put your feet up and just breathe…that’s right…get the air into your body and feed yourself some extra oxygen! Catch up on sleep (the way to do that properly is to get to bed earlier, not to sleep late in the morning), if nothing else. You’ll have more energy and clarity the next day, so you’ll be more productive in the time you do schedule your work and creative endeavors.
--Batya
Monday, August 4, 2008
Permission Granted
News!
Website is almost fully functioning---please visit it at www.UPositive.com. I’d love feedback. The email link isn’t quite working yet, but we’re getting the kinks out. Email remains UPositive55@aol.com for the time being.
Products are halfway there! Nine of the first 18 sayings are available on T-shirts, mugs, coasters, mousepads, magnets, caps, and bumper stickers! Check them out at http://www.cafepress.com/UPositive. Remember---Christmas decorations are out in some stores already, so it’s about time to stock up on stocking stuffers and gifts for yourself and others! If you see a saying you like but would prefer it on a different product, drop me an email and I’ll see what I can do.
SEPTEMBER 19—BIG OFFICIAL UPositive OPENING PARTY!! If you’re in Nashville, TN, drop me an email at UPositive55@aol.com and I’ll send you an invite. Door prizes, fun, great networking opportunity for everyone! Food and wine and creative people everywhere!
PERMISSION GRANTED
One of the joys of my career is to watch people as they realize that going for their personal and professional goals really is ‘okay.’ So many people learn (from parents, teachers, religious leaders, etc.) that working toward their heart’s and soul’s desire is ‘selfish,’ or ‘impossible,’ or ‘just a pipe dream.’
It isn’t. Those things that excite you, that impassion you, that fire up the light in your eyes and the energy in your face---those are goals to go for!
There are clients who come to me hoping it’s okay to say aloud the dreams they’ve carried around silently. That tense up when we start describing and outlining those dreams, taking the first steps toward changing them into goals. As they see the steps emerge on paper…actual actions they can take to live the life they really want…a transformation occurs.
I love watching it.
The anxiety drops and their faces clear. The hazy dullness of their eyes clears and sparks fly. Their backs straighten and their shoulders drop and open. Their voices shift, soften yet become stronger. They breathe deeper. Sometimes they cry.
They become their selves---their centered, empowered selves.
I’m blessed to be present during their transformation, and very thankful that they allow me to see it and experience it with them.
So let me give you all permission---right here and right now---to turn your dreams into goals, your goals into steps, your actions into success!
(Really, you need no one’s permission, except your inner self: but, sometimes, hearing it from someone else helps.)
(One caveat: this applies to dreams and goals that do no harm to others---of course.)
Have any of you experienced this? The moment when you have permission---from yourself or someone else---to claim your dreams? What did it feel like? What changed for you?
---Batya
Website is almost fully functioning---please visit it at www.UPositive.com. I’d love feedback. The email link isn’t quite working yet, but we’re getting the kinks out. Email remains UPositive55@aol.com for the time being.
Products are halfway there! Nine of the first 18 sayings are available on T-shirts, mugs, coasters, mousepads, magnets, caps, and bumper stickers! Check them out at http://www.cafepress.com/UPositive. Remember---Christmas decorations are out in some stores already, so it’s about time to stock up on stocking stuffers and gifts for yourself and others! If you see a saying you like but would prefer it on a different product, drop me an email and I’ll see what I can do.
SEPTEMBER 19—BIG OFFICIAL UPositive OPENING PARTY!! If you’re in Nashville, TN, drop me an email at UPositive55@aol.com and I’ll send you an invite. Door prizes, fun, great networking opportunity for everyone! Food and wine and creative people everywhere!
PERMISSION GRANTED
One of the joys of my career is to watch people as they realize that going for their personal and professional goals really is ‘okay.’ So many people learn (from parents, teachers, religious leaders, etc.) that working toward their heart’s and soul’s desire is ‘selfish,’ or ‘impossible,’ or ‘just a pipe dream.’
It isn’t. Those things that excite you, that impassion you, that fire up the light in your eyes and the energy in your face---those are goals to go for!
There are clients who come to me hoping it’s okay to say aloud the dreams they’ve carried around silently. That tense up when we start describing and outlining those dreams, taking the first steps toward changing them into goals. As they see the steps emerge on paper…actual actions they can take to live the life they really want…a transformation occurs.
I love watching it.
The anxiety drops and their faces clear. The hazy dullness of their eyes clears and sparks fly. Their backs straighten and their shoulders drop and open. Their voices shift, soften yet become stronger. They breathe deeper. Sometimes they cry.
They become their selves---their centered, empowered selves.
I’m blessed to be present during their transformation, and very thankful that they allow me to see it and experience it with them.
So let me give you all permission---right here and right now---to turn your dreams into goals, your goals into steps, your actions into success!
(Really, you need no one’s permission, except your inner self: but, sometimes, hearing it from someone else helps.)
(One caveat: this applies to dreams and goals that do no harm to others---of course.)
Have any of you experienced this? The moment when you have permission---from yourself or someone else---to claim your dreams? What did it feel like? What changed for you?
---Batya
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
