Experienced athletes understand there are always different ways of doing the same thing. Different motivations, different purposes, different techniques. The know their golf swing could change if it isn’t working well, their kick could have a different technique if they need to adjust. Just as often they ask themselves ‘why am I playing this game’. They need to find new motivation, new reasons. It used to be ‘love of the game’ now it might be ‘secure my financial future’ or ‘the camaraderie of my fellow athletes’.
Why can’t we do that outside of athletics. Be aware when a reason isn’t working any more. Be able to find new reasons, new purposes for living and doing and acting in the world. Asking, searching, looking, paying attention, being open, those are the elements that can help you find those new reasons when you need them. Be an athlete whose sport is living.
“Distress about life might mean you are living for the wrong reasons, not that you have no reason for living.” – Tom O’Connor
Can anyone think of anything more stupid than to hate someone because
of the melanin level of their skin? I have.
Some competitors for the Stupid Hate Award are:
The language they speak
Their accent
The amount of wrinkles they have, or don’t have
The specifics of their genitalia
Where they were born
The clothes they wear
Their job or career choice
What do you think? Is the list accurate, what else would you
add or subtract and why?
Give your opinion and you will be helping me out by testing
my comment box. I think it is working well but I need people
out on different machines and browsers to check it out for me.
“Racism is man’s gravest threat to man – the maximum of hatred for the minimum of reason.” – Abraham J. Heschel, Jewish theologian and philosopher, 1907- 1972
I am bad at this. Not as bad as I used to be, but worse than most I think.
I learned how to deal with this in actual teaching, long ago. I realized what the student didn’t know, the student didn’t know. They didn’t know what I couldn’t get in the presentation, they didn’t know how much I still needed to learn about the lessons further down the road, or even the lesson I was teaching that day. I realized I only needed to prepare for that day, and prepare enough to give them the best information I could in that time. And it worked. I always had enough to give, even if I didn’t have the entire topic figured out. Less is more is the motto.
But when it comes to the relational and conversational arena, there I still struggle. Once again, I have made progress, but still have an inclination to try to cover every angle, every argument, every idea, all at once.
I think of myself like a very curious and energetic dog. Yes, you can teach him or her to heel and stay and sit and come, but underneath all that learned behavior is still a dog that wants to run and roll and bark and jump and splash and lick. I am that dog when it comes to talking about something. My wives and kids have been my main trainers and they have had some success, but they know they are dealing with a certain type of dog, so most of the time they are understanding.
“Don’t try to teach an entire course in one lesson.” – Kathryn Murray
Work is always about the external and the internal. Externally what is it
that makes you love, hate or be indifferent about your work? Internally
how does your attitude, education, mindset, beliefs, assumptions, expectations,
and behavior make you love, hate or be indifferent about your work?
What do you have control over out of all those external and internal elements?
“The privilege to work is a gift, the power to work is a blessing, the love to work is success.” – David O. McKay
It’s Geographic Thursday again!
Here are all the cities ending in A that came to visit this past week:
Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA – 10 miles / 16 km
Wichita, Kansas, USA – 190 miles / 305 km
La Vista, Nebraska, USA – 352 miles / 567 km
Temecula, California, USA – 1,209 miles / 1,947 km
Doha, Ad Dawhah, Qatar – 7,691 miles / 12,377 km
Petaling Jaya, Selangor, Malaysia – 9,508 miles / 15,299 km
Brazilia, Distrito Federal, Brazil – 4,770 miles / 7,676 km
Aurora, Colorado, USA – 539 miles / 838 km
Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada – 1,079 miles / 1,737 km
Omaha, Nebraska, USA – 352 miles / 567 km
Cordoba, Andalucia, Spain – 4,816 miles / 7,750 km
I was raised in a fighting family (yes, mostly Irish). Not fistfights, but
verbal ones. We argued, fought, yelled and ‘expressed’. Alcohol played a
role but the fighting would have been there anyway at some level. My father
was the best, louder and angrier than the rest of us. He wasn’t only that,
he was charming and funny and adventurous and kind and encouraging.
He wasn’t a control freak, he didn’t demand my sisters or me go in a certain
direction in life. He was, and is, a good man. Which made his anger all the
more curious and odd in many ways.
Later in life I can look back on why he was so angry so often and see all sorts
of reasons that I couldn’t see then. But my number one reason I think led to
his anger was his dissatisfaction with himself. He had secrets, habits, events,
stresses that made him angry. Angry because he couldn’t be free. He couldn’t
say what he was doing or thinking or wanting. I am convinced it made him
lash out at others with more irritation and disagreement than he would have
otherwise.
And, of course, I see it in myself as well. I know that I am much more likely to
be bothered by someone else’s actions or ideas when I am most bothered by my
own life. So, it comes down to honesty and peace with yourself. Not an easy thing
to have and practice with success, but it really is the path to peace with others.
“We are never so much disposed to quarrel with others as when we are dissatisfied with ourselves.” – William Hazlitt, 1778-1830, England
Averages are always seen at a distance, and we are all average if looked at from far away. But get close enough and none of us are average. We don’t like to think of ourselves as average and the reason for that is we know that we aren’t. It isn’t a hopeful wish, it is a truth. Each of us have elements of the average, of course. But none of us is average in our totality.
The key is not to realize it about ourselves. We know that already. The key is to realize it about others.
“The average person thinks he isn’t.” – Larry Lorenzoni
At some point in time you realize most people people don’t look at the
world the same way you do. When I was very young I had no idea what
a shy person was or a worried person, or a scared person. I thought
most people were like me. I wasn’t afraid, I wasn’t worried and I wasn’t
shy. I was excited about trying new things, exploring vacant lots, riding
my bike to the town next door, swim in the surf, or something like that.
Eventually life gave me lessons and I learned about being worried and
scared and shy, but I still didn’t know that for some people it was something
they carried with them all the time. The first time I really understood
how fear ruled some people’s lives was when I started teaching drawing.
Some students were just PETRIFIED of taking the class, petrified of failing,
of not being able to learn, of looking stupid. The fear list always goes on and on.
Obviously, if they were in my class they had already taken the first step.
They had begun. They now had help. They had direction, encouragement,
progress to see. They all finished the class, they all were able to draw much
better than when they came in. None of them were made fun of, none were
embarrassed, none were left behind.
If you are one who is fearful of things, worried or shy, then get yourself into a
group or class. Get into a running group, or a reading, bird-watching, rock and roll,
dancing, skydiving, geneology, swimming, theatre, or something else.
Just take the first step, the rest will take care of itself. Don’t stay home alone,
don’t wish it were different.
Go, take the step.
“The miracle isn’t that I finished. The miracle is I had the courage to start.” – John Bingham
I am currently reading a Turkish book (English translation) ‘The Long White Cloud’ sent to me by a flickr and blog friend, Senay, from Istanbul. It is the story of the Battle of Gallipoli, where 130,000 young men died.
It has many letters from the two main soldiers on either side of the conflict. They are filled with small remembrances of home, anecdotes of the front, admiration for their fellow soldiers and respect for their enemy. there is more anger at the incompetence of their own leaders than hatred for the enemy.
How similar are the millions of letters sent home over the centuries from soldiers. They don’t talk about wanting to kill. They talk about appreciation for the love of their family, the love of their community. They want life to be normal again. The romance is a myth, the glory disappears as their friends die and they are left with a terrible mission. They must kill people. A lot of people.
Remembering who died is important. Remembering what it is we made them do in our name is important. We are making them kill people. Even if it is a valid war, we always must remember we are asking our children to kill people, and often not the right people.
If you have a book that you think would help me understand
your country, I would love to hear about it. I would need an
English translation of course, but if you email me the title and
author I will try to find it. marty@martycoleman.com
Call it an paradox, an oxymoron, or just a complete absurdity. Whatever you call it warfare is not civilized.
It’s Memorial Day weekend here in the USA and I have deep admiration and humility when I consider the living, heart beating souls who found they had to fight for their lives and ended up perishing in that fight. I have equally great feelings for those who fought and returned damaged and changed. I am sorry that had to happen to you. I hope you find the positive out of such a terrible negative. I hope your family can as well.
That is the better paradox to consider. Is it possible to find the good in the brain damage? Is it possible to find value in the lost leg? Is it possible your calling in life was found when your spine was severed? I don’t know. But I do know that paradox happens everyday in life. The person stuck sick in bed for months watching movies realizes that is her greatest desire and goes to Hollywood to fulfill it. The man who lost his hearing only to find he now leads a great university because of how hard he worked to overcome that deafness.
A memorial is something of substance that reminds us of something great. Humans are made of the best substance.
I love this quote because it is so absurd as to be ridiculous. But not if you look into genetics and biology. Those who study in those areas will tell you that 1, many ridiculous ideas have turned out to be true, and 2, this idea isn’t so ridiculous.
The key to us not believing it is rooted in our arrogance of consciousness. We think because we are conscious we are the deciders (to quote a famous unpresident). What we don’t easily recognize is the genetic desire of smaller particles, less developed ‘us’ to want to survive, to want to exist and to want to propagate.
How does this apply to our daily life? After all, it isn’t something we have much control over, right? Right, we don’t. But we do have a lot of control over our consciousness. We can expand it to understand more of the forces working in and around us. It won’t explain it all, it won’t tell us all the details. But it will enlarge our awareness of how humanity, the earth and the universe works.
So, in the end, this is a simple plea to not be afraid of science, to not be afraid of learning more than you now know. You don’t need to worry about whether you are smart enough to get a Ph.D. All you have to do is read an article on something, watch a TV show about something.
Ignorance is not bliss, it is danger.
“A hen is only an egg’s way of making another egg.” – Samuel Butler
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If you are a twit, you can follow me on twitter at The Napkin Dad
“Snobbery is the pride of those who are not sure of their position.” – Berton Braley
Do you remember back in Jr. High and High School there were those quiet types who we thought were snobbish, then at some point in time we had some conversation, maybe helped along by mind altering substances (terrible, bad, deathly, don’t do it offspring) and you found out they weren’t snobbish at all, but were terribly shy and self-conscious, insecure about how to talk to people? Well, I am not talking about those people.
I am talking about those who use that as an excuse, but who actually do think they are better than others, who do judge incessantly and negatively towards those around them. Who do feel the need to live apart from the ‘rabble’. Those people make me crazy. I know they are insecure and unsure about themselves. I know they are afraid they will be found out as ‘less than’ others, not as smart, not as funny, not as wonderful. I know they can be understood and seen as vulnerable.
But sometimes I just want to schmack them upside the head and tell them the truth. The truth is the further they remove themselves out of pride from others the less the are, not the more. The more they judge others as inferior to them the more likely they are to experience it themselves. I want to ask how they could not know that the harder they try to be ‘up’ using the snob technique the farther ‘down’ they are morally, socially and ethically.
Being ‘better’ than others by being a snob is a useless endeavor. Why not instead come down from the tightrope and say ‘Hey friends, why don’t we all be better together?’
It’s Geographic Thursday! Those are just 8 of the 220 cities that have checked out a napkin or two this month.
Linkoping, Sweden Pune, India Bakoor, Philippines West Hollywood, California Sorocaba, Brazil Zaragoza, Spain Perm, Russia Kamloops, Canada
“Success is going from failure to failure without the loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill
Churchill understood that what is seared in our memory, what we remember when contemplating a new endeavor, is not our prior successes, but our failures. We can even look back on past successes and say ‘Who accomplished that? It couldn’t have been me, I don’t know how to do that!’
Then you remember that you did do it and you can do it again, but not before having to traipse through a mind field of doubt IN SPITE of evidence to the contrary. It is our perceived failures that are out to kill enthusiasm and we must be defensive in protecting it. We do that by being realistic. By looking at what we REALLY are capable of.
We all know that there are some people who don’t have this problem. They are overconfident and have an ungrounded enthusiasm that can be very dangerous to become entangled in. Avoid those people.
But my experience has shown me that many more people are in the self-doubting camp and need encouragement to look at themselves honestly and see that they are MORE capable than their self-judgment is telling them.
“Am I not destroying my enemies when I make friends of them?” – Abraham Lincoln
To do that I must be willing to see an enemy’s value, their worth and goodness. That isn’t easy when I have invested time and energy into finding reasons to not like the person. It means having to evaluate the reasons, giving up the invalid AND the valid reasons. It is akin to forgiveness in many ways. It’s something to always aspire towards, to consciously work at, not just hope for.
“It’s great to be over the hill. That is where you can pick up some speed.” – anonymous
I like this quote a lot. It reminds me of that reality TV show where the contestants had to carryall this weight from station to station. At each station they got to off-load a certain amount of weight. By the end it was just them, no extra baggage, and they were able to go very fast and free to the finish line.
Dropping off baggage, physical, emotional and psychological, is really helpful if you want to pick up a head of steam and move forward, no matter how old you are!
“If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun.” – Katherine Hepburn, American actress
Yesterday I spent almost the entire day at two different arts festivals about 3 blocks from each other in downtown Tulsa. The morning was spent at the Blue Dome, a locally organized festival with local artists. The afternoon was spent at Mayfest, Tulsa’s premier outdoor arts festival bringing in artisans from around the country.
Going to an arts festival is sort of like searching for the needle in the haystack. You are looking for the one bright shiny idea in a sea of sameness. It’s always worth going just to have the pleasure of seeing
the artist or the person walking the festival who stands out because they are having fun. The pink shoes, the original idea, the little bird they carry with them or the weiner dog with the goggles. There is fun in
their hearts because they respond to what gives them joy instead of what constrains them.
“It has been my experience that folks who have no vices have very few virtues.” – Abraham Lincoln, 16th President of the United States.
One of the big problems the USA has, I think, is the harsh judgment of public figures’ vices without any balance between that and their virtues. The closet homosexual, the one who drinks to much, the gambler, the pantieless partier; we all have our vices. If those vices are doing damage to themselves or others then dealing with them is important. But just havingsome behavior you don’t like or find distasteful doesn’t mean you ignore or throw out the virtues that same person has.
I think we in the USA tend to feel that allowing something means weare approving of it. And that is not the case. We allow it because it is none of our business and isn’t hurting us or anyone else, even if we don’t like it. We can disapprove of it for ourselves, but we are in a country dedicated to individual liberty and if someone wants to gamble or not wear panties or spend money on silly things, then it’s their decision, not ours, and it doesn’t mean they are without virtue.
By the way, when I put ‘closet homosexual’ in the list, I am not saying homosexuality is a vice. I am saying that there are some people, including some who participate in it, who think it is and they act secretly because of it.
“Every parent is at some time the father of the unreturned prodigal with nothing to be done but keep his house open to hope.” – John Ciardi
I am one of those parents and I know many others. It isn’t always a sad thing, not always an argument or drama that has led to the child being away and uncommunicative. Sometimes it is that child inventing themselves, and the only way they know how to do it is on their own. Maybe it isn’t that the parent is too controlling or overbearing. Maybe it is that the child is too weak, too easily led and they know it. They are being courageous in stepping away. The child in them wants to stay with their parents, they want the protection and love. But they know they won’t find their own strength inside that home, they must venture out and find it where they will.
It isn’t easy for a parent to watch this. They want to protect, they want to guide, they want to participate. And they want to be loved. But to get the true love of an adult child coming back to you after their prodigal journey might just be worth it because you will have a truly unique and real person in your life, one you helped create not only by protecting and raising, but by letting go as well.
I don’t mean to downplay the trauma and hurt and fear that can accompany a child’s departure. I have had that in my life and it is hard. But one can have hope if they choose. Maybe a blind hope, maybe a well reasoned one, but hope nonetheless.
Many thanks to all who came to my opening last night. And special thanks to those who bought the 5 pieces. If you are interested in seeing which ones are still available, go to my website and the ones that are sold will be obvious. Absorbent Ideas Exhibition Don’t delay, buy the one you want!
An even greater thanks to my wonderful family! Linda, who made such yummy goodies, Chelsea for doing the same and playing guitar and singing, and Caitlin, who did heavy lifting and table organizing for me.
“Time heals all wounds and gives a scar to always learn from.” – Marty Coleman
No matter the wound, if it heals, a scar will remain. Funny enough sometimes the scar will be almost imperceptible when you are young, but as you age it will show up more an more.
I fell off the top bunk when I was 10, hitting a dresser on the way down and getting 10 stitches on my brow/bridge of my nose area. That scar is now one of my age lines, wasn’t even there for about 25 years, then started to show itself. I like it because it reminds me of getting to stay up late that night after coming home from the hospital and watching Johnny Carson on TV. I didn’t learn much from it, but to keep the guard rail up on the bunk bed.
Other scars I learned a lot from. I was burned on 70% of my body when I was 18 years old. I have a LOT of scars from that little mishap. I am not always thinking of lessons when I think about them, but often I do.
Scars are physical memories and as such can teach us lessons from our lives, new lessons each time we consider them.
“A hole is nothing at all, but you can break your neck in it.” – Austin O’Malley
You know, the most dangerous holes aren’t the obvious ones with sharp edges and a straight vertical drop, those you can see pretty easily.
The ones I get caught in (and sometimes break my neck in) are the ones that seem to be just a gentle decline, you don’t evenknow you are getting in a hole at all. But soon enough you are init. The climb out is not fun and you are beating yourself up the whole time for, once again, getting in a hole you should have avoided.
My solution? Wear a helium pack on your back at all times.Either that or work like hell to be aware and avoid being stupidand easily tempted. Helium sounds easier to me.
“Pay attention to what you see, not to what you know about what you see.” – Marty Coleman
What we know about something can often get in the way of seeingit. We see a figure in a drawing class and we know many things. We know: nude, naked, skin, body, human, woman. All those havedefinitions that come with you when you see that person standing there. They are the filter through which you see her.
But they are also in the way of you seeing her. Do you see her body language, embarrassment, humor, age, color, angle, happiness, history, the space around her?
This doesn’t just apply to artmaking of course. How do you see yourchild? Your co-worker? Your backyard? Your city? Do you let the definitions that come easy and you know decide what yousee? How do you go about seeing with fresh eyes?
“People travel to faraway places to watch in fascination the kind of people they ignore at home.” – Dagobert D. Runes
I love to travel and am looking forward to getting back to Europe next year maybe. I remember visiting for the first time in 2003 and realizing how interesting people were, on the bus, at the beach, in the B&B or cafes. Then coming home and seeing that, if I just paid attention, there were interesting unique people and things in my home town as well.
I haven’t spotted mechanoman (see above) yet, but I will introduce myself if I do!
“Living with a saint is more grueling than being one.” – Robert Neville This is one of the original napkins I put in my daughters’ lunches. You can see the difference in drawing style and detail, but the ideas are still in the same vein.
I remember my college roommate and I went on a skiing trip with our church group and one of the young leaders was this saint of a guy. He was happy, courteous, positive, intellectual, kind, funny, helpful, yada yada yada. We liked him quite a bit. By the end of the trip we made sure we didn’t sit anywhere near him on the way home though since we felt like we were in the presence of a cartoon saint with nothing we could relate to.
Portrayals of Jesus that way always made me feel far away not at all interested in knowing more. Portrayals that brought out his humanity and his every day normalcy, while still being a loving and cool guy made me want to find out more and listen to what people said he had taught.
“The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.” – Samuel Johnson
Ain’t this the truth. Think of all the people who have said ‘I didn’t know I would get addicted’ or ‘I always thought I would stop when it got to be a problem’ or any number of other things we can say to explain how we got trapped.
With me it was alcohol. I quit drinking in 1993, long ago. In some ways I was lucky, in that my mother was an alcoholic and my father probably was as well and we lived through hell because of it. As a result I didn’t have the luxury of ignorance when I was older. I knew what I was doing and where it would lead. So, I quit and didn’t look back. I haven’t missed it and don’t regret the decision in any way. Life after that habit wasn’t as scary as I had imagined, and indeed was much better and fulfilling, not to mention safer and healthier.
So, if you struggle with a habit that you want to rid yourself of, take a chance, call a moratorium on it for a day, or a week. See what happens. Try it again the next week. Add something new to your life, join a club, eat a peach, whatever.
“Healthy children will not fear life if their elders have integrity enough not to fear death.” – Erik Erikson
I went to my exhibition yesterday to have two interviews about the show. The first reporter/blogger, Natasha of Tashadoestulsa.com called and said that both her son and herself were under the weather and she would have to reschedule. There has been a lot of weather to be under around here lately. We had about 6 straight days of rain at that point.
I had brought my markers and napkins so while I waited for the second reporter I drew today’s napkin. I was inspired by Tasha to think about children and found this quote that really hits at one of the age old ways in which we pass on strength and courage to the young. We show them we are willing to face whatever befalls us, the ultimate befalling of which is death.
I haven’t faced that for myself yet, but I have witnessed a number who have. this is a thank you note to Vivian Johnson and Connie Graham, my two successive Mothers-in-law, who passed away with more courage than fear, and more faith than doubt. I appreciate them and how they showed their children and grandchildren how to have courage in life.
