What’s the Perfection in that?

December 8, 2010 at 12:04 pm (The Artist Life, The Gardening Life)
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After you’ve been asked that by your life/biz coach a few dozen times, you stop fighting it and … well  …   start seeing the Perfection in that question. 

But it can take a while to get to that.  And some days it’s easier than others to find the Perfection around me. 

And as Perfection would have it, this morning was one of those times.  I didn’t feel like writing about Perfection, but this blog topic was pre-determined — I’m part of a “blog-sharing” group, and once per month, we write about the same topic from each of our individual perspectives, starting with ideas by Lorin Beller Blake of Big Fish Nation.  (See Lorin’s blog post this week: “Where can we find perfection?”)

Today was one of those slow start, grumbly, “I-am-One-with-my-flannel-sheets-don’t-even-THINK-of-making-me-leave-them!” sort of days.  Coffee did finally lure me out of my down-comforter cave, but although it tasted good, it did diddleysquat for my motivation. 

I hid from the day for a while behind my new book, “Animal Speak” (omg, thank you for the surprise, Rebecca!).   Soaked in some tidbits about the significance of specific animals in my environment, the importance of interacting with and learning from nature. 

Finally pushed myself thru the frrreeezing cold (exercise room above our detached garage) to the spin bike and grumbled my way through a 25 minute ride (yeah, it was supposed to be longer than that).

All the while wondering how I was going to write about seeing Perfection around me.

Perfection in this tired, doubtful, internal-argument day?  I don’t think so.

Jazzy "Li'l J" Oreo Manne King

So I went back inside.  My freakin’ adorable cross-eyed tuxedo kitty Jazzy met me at the door, meowing.  Remembering what I had just read in “Animal Speak,”  I picked her up to see if she’d maybe give me some of her usually spastic energy.  

Wouldn’t you know it, today she just hung there in my arms… quietly, happily watching the birds outside while licking my thumb.  So I watched with her.  

Then I remembered my friend earlier this week pointing out the different birds in her backyard.  And how she looked up the identification of some of them while I was on the phone with her.

So I got my bird book and looked those little guys up.  Sure enough, Tufted Titmouse.  And of course the usual Cardinal pair, and some sort of woodpecker, and Chickadees, and a House Finch or two. 

I forgot about my grumbliness.

I forgot about my resistance to the day.

And I found Perfection all around me.

It’s not that everything has to be perfect.  It’s that we trust that there is Perfection in whatever is there. 

Trust that Perfection is all around you right now … and even on those days when you’re too off kelter to seek it yourself, Perfection will find you  

(and just now as I type, Jazzy jumps up on the desk and curls herself around my laptop…)

********
My colleagues’ posts on this topic:
Whitney Ferre (Creatively Fit): Creative Thinking Around Perfection
Rebecca P. Cohen (Rebecca Plants): What is there to love about cold weather?  A lot.
Peg Calvario (Letters to Jodi): Where is the Spirit of the Season?

12 Comments

Power of Three

April 19, 2010 at 11:02 am (Relationship, The Power of Three)
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Not one, not two, but THREE. 

Three minds, three hearts, three voices.   Three energies poured into the same goal.  Three dreams intertwining into one feasible reality.  Powerful, isn’t it?

Yes, working alone is sometimes necessary (and admittedly sometimes preferable).  And partnerships of two have their own rich value.  But three… three has exponential potential. 

“When a group of individual brains are coordinated and function in harmony, the increased energy created through that alliance becomes available to every individual brain in the group.”
- Napoleon Hill, “Think and Grow Rich“

That’s the idea behind “The Power of Three” – a new (exciting!) collaborative adventure I’ve just begun with life coaches Clint Griess and Judah Kurtz.  We have created a triad alliance committed to supporting each other in contributing to others’ lives through Inspiration, Connection, Education and Entertainment. 

Our current medium is writing… our blogs:  we’ll meet weekly to brainstorm important blog topics and key points, then each of us will write a blog on that topic, using our own voice to add our particular flavor to the topic.  Make sure to explore Clint’s blog and Judah’s blog.

Why three??  Three is a magic number – as the very first Schoolhouse Rock video taught many of us (click here to watch it ).  There’s an intrinsic stability, flexibility and strength in collaborations/alliances among three (or more) people.  Like a stool that requires three legs for balance, and the geodesic dome using triangles (“threeangles”? :) ) for strength and to distribute stress across the structure.    

Here’s the part that really intrigues me:  each person in the triad is committed to supporting and nurturing the relationship of the other two people.  Or conversely, you have two other people looking out for your relationships within the triad alliance.  (read more about this in Tribal Leadership by Logan, King and Fischer-Wright).  

This is not just about sharing tasks.  Powerful triad connections are built upon shared values and shared dreams… so this is about enhancing the quality of our connections – at work, at home and inbetween.    

And the exponential potential part?  Consider this: by just adding one person to a triad, you get three more triads.  3 people = 1 triad;   4 people = three triads.  Exponential expansion. 

Which means more people looking out for other people’s relationships.  And more people powerfully connecting “members” of their triads with other like-spirited people based on shared values and shared dreams.   Each of those relationships you initially foster takes on a beautiful, rich, energy-giving life of its own.

So today, think about your relationships… who can you introduce a friend or colleague to in order to enhance their work, their spirit?   And in partnership with you, who might I connect you with so you too can experience the Power of Three??

6 Comments

Front Porch Transitions

July 17, 2009 at 1:31 pm (Uncategorized)
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Transitions.  Yikes, that’s a BIG topic. You might wanna go get a cup of coffee/tea/beverage of choice, then come back and settle in. Actually, get snacks too.  ALWAYS include snacks. 
 
Ok, so there’s the Before part, the After part, and the Middle (Transition) part.  And quite frankly, the Transition part can suck. But it doesn’t HAVE to.  Really!  

murky waters of transitionThis has been one heck* (*censored version) of a year for me so far around transitions.  So much so that the topic keeps coming up in my 1-1 sessions with my amazing life coach, Nancy (of Big Fish Nation)… giving me a chance to get up close and personal with my transitions. Scary stuff!

clawsSome of my transitions have fangs and claws, as I’ve already described in previous posts, Mo(u)rning and Ah, Spring?  I bet you know what I’m talking about, yes??

So what’s the big deal with that darn* (*censored) middle transition place?  Why does it have the power to leave me angst-ridden and mauled by self-doubt? 

sjk_self_portrLet’s look at a quick case study, shall we?   Allow me to use Starla J. King as our subject here. 

My first major emotional challenge this year was dealing with the obvious transition from Winter to Spring — indoors to outdoors work, internal to external emotional focus, the whole deal. Long story short, I got all sorts of coping tools working with Nancy, and got through that transition period. Scraped, bruised, even bleeding a little, but I got through it nonetheless.

Then I had a whole transitional blindside.  WHOMP!

Here in Ashburn, VA, we had day after day after week after week of Spring rains.  As a professional gardener, this meant for me a daily re-assessment of my schedule based on rain forecasts, then actual rain amounts, then the soggy levels of the soil, etc.  Day after day of rescheduling workers and clients at the last minute. 

After about a month of this, I kinda lost it.  Well, maybe really lost it… like crying in frustration over seemingly little things.  And suddenly finding it really hard to make decisions.  And thinking that I must really suck at this whole scheduling thing b/c I had to make so many changes therefore I must really suck at being a business owner therefore I must really suck at everything I do therefore I must just plain really suck as a person. 

Turns out I was reacting to dealing (or not dealing!) with DAILY transitions – EGAD!!  

So, as Nancy does, she prompted me toward a self-discovery exercise, which I wrote about in an April journal entry:

 “***********journal
Nancy said my homework is to observe, just observe during the next rain storm.  Drizzle earlier this morning bummed/stressed me b/c I was faced again w/having to decide if we work today or not.  Once it was definitely a go and weather not iffy, I relaxed more.

Rain STORM tonight was great – no middle-ground iffy-ness.  Clear decision – raining too hard to do anything outside.  Totally meant to be an indoor evening, cozy feeling, comforting.

It’s the ½ rain drizzle that can get me – the middle ground, the transition b/n sun and rain and rain and sun. 

Transitions are the times I have to find my own way – not clearly one direction or another and I need extra courage to be authentically me.”
***********

 Good heavens, is it any wonder transitions can be so daunting???? 

Yet there’s another perspective – one that I’m starting to learn how to hold onto: Transitions as possibility. 

If we can step outside of our fears and “shoulds” and insecurities long enough during a transition time to allow for possibilities and the excitement of what could be, transitions can be our most creative times ever! 

If we can just sit with those feelings, uncomfortable as they may be, they become more manageable. 

porch1One fantastic “get comfortable with transition” tactic comes from my friend Cheryl.  When her young-ish son is anxious about the transition of going from home to somewhere else, or vice versa, he simply takes some time to sit alone on their porch to prepare himself for the transition.  He sits on the porch with his transitional thoughts and feelings until he’s ready to actually make the transition –isn’t that brilliant??

So perhaps as we sit on the front porch of our transitions, we can take it one step further and look at that murky muddy-looking transitional place as melted chocolate…just waiting for us to pour it into whatever mold we create so in time we can savour every delicious bite of the After Transition place.   

My wish for you and myself is that our transitional porches become welcoming, calming, and full of life’s sweet chocolate!  Thank you for sitting on that porch with me through reading this blog! chairs1

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