Why do you think people become preachers and teachers anyway! I know how easy it is to tell others how to be good, after all a lot of my drawings and commentaries are all about that, and I think it’s a pretty cool thing to do with my life.
But, a critical part of what I do is examine myself to see if I can honestly say I am following my own advice. Sometimes I am, sometimes not so much. I don’t avoid topics just because I struggle with them, I wouldn’t say much of anything if that were the case.
But, just like a good preacher, I do try to get across that I am preaching first to myself. If I need to learn something it’s often through talking to myself via my writing and drawing that I get the chance to clarify and refine what it is I am hoping to achieve or become.
It’s after that I am hopeful what I have come up with will help others as well.
About 4 or 5 years after our divorce my first wife called me to apologize. Not for divorcing me, but for making assumptions about what I was doing during our marriage. What she learned that led to the call was that what was in her mind about my motives and actions wasn’t necessarily true. She was projecting her understanding of things onto my actions and my life.
She felt that that was not a good assumption to make. She understood that It MIGHT be the case, but there shouldn’t be the assumption that it is. Assumptions build on top of assumptions, just as a house is built on a foundation. If the original assumption isn’t solid, then the rest of the assumptions aren’t solid either.
Jealousy and many other responses can be like that. Don’t let your judgment and understanding of yourself cloud your judgment and understanding of others. See less of yourself in others and more of who they really are. You might find out that your suspicions are valid, you might find out they are not. But either way, you will see the truth, and that is better than seeing too much.
Oh, and no, the drawing is not my unwife and myself. She was not and is not an angry or mean-spirited person in any way. I, meanwhile, am much more handsome and have several more hairs than the guy in the drawing.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily
Quote author is unknown
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One year ago today at the NDD – Passionate Hatred – including the animation I did of me drawing the actual napkin. Check it out!
Part 1: I remember Jackie from my days working at Eulipia Restaurant in San Jose, California. We, along with our many co-workers, work intensely hard under incredible stress then hang out and relax after the shift. We do this for almost a decade together. We all know each other’s strengths and weaknesses pretty well. I know her as being, first and foremost, very strong. She can pull more than her weight in work, surpassing almost anyone else in energy, going for hours and hours without a break. She can also be emotional, with strong feelings and strong opinions. And she has the ability to have a great deal of fun. She is the epitome of the saying ‘work hard, play hard’. I think she is a fantastic woman and love working with her. I have the opportunity to draw her a few times over the years.
We reconnect on Facebook in 2010. I find out that she is married with children and is into martial arts and kick boxing. That strength I saw way back when obviously has found an incredibly positive outlet. I read about her enthusiasm and love of her sport. I see photos of her training, fighting and enjoying her life. I am very happy for her.
ronald (far right)
Part 2: I am speaking at a conference in 2011. I am 1,600 miles and 24 years away from the drawing I did of her. I meet a fellow speaker, Ronald Skelton, for the first time. We have the group photo taken of all the speakers and it’s posted on Facebook. I am tagged in it so it shows up on my FB wall. Jackie visits my wall and sees the photo. She comments : ‘Wow, I know two people in Oklahoma (both on my Facebook), and they’re both in this photo. Ron Skelton used to train at my martial arts school, Tribull, and still helps us periodically with our web site! Small world.’
Jackie (2nd from left)
ronald (middle in red)
Part 3: I contact Ronald and we talk about the coincidence. He shows me a photo of the two of them together in a group shot from 2004.
Part 4: Ronald and I are going to get together, see how we can help each other in the future.
Part 5: I love coincidences. They make me smile. …………………….
Only once before had I spoken in a public forum about the Napkin Dad story. It was at a Rotary Club meeting. I remember trying, in the early stages of putting the presentation together, to make it inspirational and motivational. But what they ended up hearing was a dry chronological recitation of the story. It fell flat.
When Cheryl Lawson, the SMTulsa Conference organizer, gave me the opportunity to speak, I was determined this time around that the Napkin Dad story would be told in a way that moved people, inspiring them and motivating them. After all, that’s what I work on every day in my drawings and commentary, why shouldn’t it be what I do in public, right?
Cheryl Lawson
The title of my talk was ‘The Napkin Dad Explains: Strategies and Attitudes in Social Media Engagement’. Each chapter of the Napkin Dad story had a strategy, an attitude and a lesson to be learned. I had 9 of each but in the early stages of preparation I had about 24 of each. That wasn’t going to work! I really had to focus on editing at that point.
Here’s a funny thing. One of my chapters was about making what you do real. I mean materially real, as in something you can hold in your hand real. The great thing about making something real is that revelation occurs. When you have to move your communication from one medium to another you have to edit it, you have to transform it. That act leads you to understand yourself and what you do better. I was doing that exact same thing as I prepared my talk.
Becky McCray
The keynote speaker at the conference was a woman named Becky McCray. She is from a small town in Oklahoma and has become a nationally known speaker on the topic of turning small town values into success in business. Her presentation was fantastic, with great stories, images and lessons to be learned about how America and the world can benefit from the best aspects of a small town mentality.
When I got to the room where I was presenting I found the Keynoter, Becky McCray, listening to the speaker before me, a friend of hers named Mandy Vavrinak. Becky didn’t know me from Adam but Mandy was going to stay and hear my talk and encouraged Becky to stay as well.
Mandy Vavrinak
The very beginning of the Napkin Dad story, as many of you know, is when my daughter gave me all the napkins I had drawn that first year back to me on Father’s day. She had kept them all without me ever knowing. (if you don’t know the story you can read it here). While I haven’t spoken often in a formal public arena about the story, I have told that portion of it out loud many times. So, I was NOT expecting to get choked up as I came to that point. But, boy did I. It came out of nowhere! My voice wavered and I got a bit flushed, but I simply stopped, looked at the screen for a moment and continued on.
The rest of the talk followed the outline of the story from then to now, with each chapter followed by three napkins, one illustrating a strategy I used, an attitude I had while going through it, and a lesson I learned from it. I felt pretty good about it afterwards. I got applause and I even heard a hoot in the back. I was happy.
You can see my Presentation Slides (as a PDF) here. I will also have a video of the talk up in the next week or so.
I was even happier when Becky McCray came up to me and was very positive about it, giving me ideas and recommendations of where I could go with it all. I was even happier when I read her tweet that she posted right after my talk:
@beckymccray: Prediction: @TheNapkinDad is a rising star. You will hear much, much more about and from him. #SMTulsa
Wow. Not much else to say but thanks!
SMTulsa 2011 speakers
After I was done I was able to enjoy the other speakers. I heard Michael Butler talk about Social Good, Carlos Moreno on Traditional vs. Social Media and Blake Ewing give the closing talk on Making Good Things Happen in Tulsa. I was in good company, that’s for sure. I also had great conversations with speakers Ronald Skelton, Heather Cupp and many others.
And of course, it wouldn’t be complete without a Napkin! Michelle Butler asked me to draw a napkin at the cocktail party afterwards. Here it is.
Guest Napkin – Social Media Tulsa Conference 2011.
Thanks to Michelle Butler for unknowingly posing for me!
So, all in all a VERY positive and exciting experience. My thanks goes out to first and foremost Cheryl Lawson of Social Media Tulsa and Party Aficionado who put on the conference! Thanks to all who attended, especially Becky, who tweeted and FBed their positive feedback. It really made my day!
Did you notice I didn’t post a napkin yesterday? It’s because I was busy doing last minute prep work for a presentation I gave at the first ever Social Media Tulsa Conference yesterday afternoon. I did however draw a ‘guest napkin’ while I was there and will post it and my reflections on the day tomorrow.
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But as for today, it’s the last day of Metaphor Week!
I have been living in Oklahoma almost 17 years now and I have seen a LOT of video footage of tornadoes. I have even seen in person any number of storms that were threatening to become one. Luckily I haven’t seen an actual tornado. The most amazing thing about them is how tall and thin they are. They have virtually no substance to them at all and they usually don’t last very long.
Happiness is much the same way. Much like a tornado, happiness can effect much beyond it’s immediate borders even if it is only in existence for a few moments. What a person is rubs off on others. If you are happy AND express it, then others see it, feel it, and might be pulled in by it to move towards ‘happy’ as well.
Be a happiness tornado for a moment or two today. See who you can pull in.
It’s day 3 of Metaphor week. I am enjoying my new book, ‘I Never Metaphor I Didn’t Like – a comprehensive compilation of history’s greatest analogies, metaphors, and similes’, but I am realizing as I go that so many quotes I have read and used over the years have been in one of those three categories already!
Sometimes I feel like that myself. I am a very social person and I actually keep up with many people from my past, people who are life-long friends, but like many men, I don’t have a ton of close guy friends.
I first realized this when I got divorced in 2000. One of the elements that led up to the divorce caused there to be a split between friend and I. Until that happened I thought of him as a guy I saw once in a while. We socialized, had some creative and extended family elements in common, but that was about it. But after it happened I realized that he was one of my closest guy friends. It actually seemed sort of pathetic to me at the time. This guy I spend barely any time with turns to be one of my closest friends. It made the divorce all the harder.
That is one reason I like organized recreation, such as the running group I am in. I have been injured lately (achilles tendon) and so have not been running. I have really missed it. In part because of the exercise (I have gained weight for sure) but also because of the friendships. I miss hearing what is going on in people’s lives. I miss telling stories of my life. I miss encouraging my friends.
Yesterday I mentioned something I used to say to my daughters as they went to school in the morning. I would say ‘Make good friends, keep good friends’. How do you do those two things? ……………………………..
Don’t forget, if you are local to the Tulsa area, the first ever Social Media Tulsa Conference is this Thursday! I am going to be speaking in the afternoon, hope you can make it! ……………………..
It’s Metaphor Week at the NDD! First, a definition. A metaphor is a direct claim that
A is X. A simile is similar, but it says A is like X, not A is X.
About 3 years ago, on March 2nd, 2008 I was hanging out at Barnes and Noble in Tulsa. I saw a woman reading intently. I liked her face structure and the way her hair poofed up so I drew her. Here is the drawing.
Aime at Barnes and Noble
After I finished I went over and showed the drawing to her and the gentleman sitting with her. She liked the drawing and we exchanged emails so I could scan it and send it to her. I asked if I could draw her again and also take some photos of her. She liked that idea so a few weeks later we met so she could model for me. Here is the drawing I did at that time.
Aime at Shades of Brown Coffee House
After I did the drawing we went a few blocks over to the walled garden at All Souls Unitarian Church where we did the photo shoot. Here are a few pics from the session.
Purple Aime at Shades of Brown
Golden Aime
Aime and the Cracked Pot
We had a great time during the shoot and she and her by then fiance loved the photos. A number of months later Aime called me and told me she was getting married. Since they were originally from Boston they would be getting married back east, but they needed some engagements photos taken in advance. Here are a few of those.
Aime at the Make Up Counter
Engagement Portrait
They have since had a child and have another on the way. Unfortunately they moved back to Boston so my chances of photographing them are much slimmer these days.
Anyway, I thought I would show you the evolution of how some of my drawings leads to friendships and great memories. Hope you enjoyed the journey.
My older sister and I are a lot alike in some ways. Because of that, on occasion we can grate against each other. In 2009 my then 91 year old father had a fall and broke his hip.
My younger sister, who lives closest to him and sees him often, was just about to go on a long planned family vacation when it happened. My older sister and I flew out to take care of him while she was gone.
Honestly I had a bit of anxiety wondering if my sister and I would get along. We ended up spending 10 days together taking care of him in the hospital, sometimes tag teaming it, other times being there together for the entire day. The rest of the time we were at my younger sister’s home. We didn’t argue, we didn’t grate and we didn’t disagree about anything, at least not from my perspective.
What we experienced was miniscule compared to what happens in a calamity the size of the events in Japan, Haiti and Banda Aceh over the past few years. But the idea is the same; in circumstances where you are either trying to survive or helping someone else survive you lose interest in petty squabbles and selfish positions.
The question is, how do you tap into that sensitivity when life is ‘normal’? What do you have to remember, do, say or not say to make it happen? Give your insight and advice in the comments, ok?
Sadly, it’s one catastrophe on top of another on Day 4 of Catastrophe Week at the NDD
The man who discovered the power of the atom, the man whose brilliant understanding of the universe led to a burst of scientific discovery, that man, Albert Einstein, said this. And he was right.
Our human mode of thinking is still dominated by fear, greed, power and prestige. It’s as if we were given new ingredients for a new recipe in a kitchen with new appliances but we insisted on cooking it according to an old recipe. We cook, disaster. We try the same recipe again, disaster. One more time, disaster.
I think it’s time we realized we are in a new human kitchen and need new recipes for how to cook.
It’s day #3 of Catastrophe Week at the NDD. Remember that even if your world is normal today, there are plenty of people in the world, Japan in particular, for whom this is still another very bad day.
Easy for me to say. I am not suffering in the cold of northeast Japan with no water, no electricity, barely any food, family missing, and a very real threat of nuclear contamination.
If I were my thoughts wouldn’t stay long on what I have escaped. My thoughts and actions would turn to survival, finding what my family and I need.
But here’s the thing. It doesn’t say make the escape thought your only thought, just that you make it your first. Why? Because it brings your heart and mind into a grateful attitude. That attitude will help you hold to what is good as you move into your hunt to survive.
Catastrophes, cataclysms, and calamities are the topic of the week here at the NDD.
When I witness from afar the past 2 earthquake/tsunami combination disasters, the recent one off Japan and the one in 2004 in the Indian Ocean, I am struck how education raced catastrophe in both cases. Both are immense disasters, both overwhelmed the affected area far beyond their ability to respond in time. But there seems to be a huge difference between the two.
In the 2004 Indian Ocean event there was no immediate warning to citizens close by in Indonesia and Thailand and no warning to citizens hundreds of miles away in Sri Lanka. Close to 230,000 people died in the land areas around the rim of the Indian Ocean.
In the 2011 Sendai event warnings were given immediately to the entire population of the region and the country. The millions who lived in the affected area knew to get to higher ground almost as soon as the earthquake struck. Those who were hundreds of miles away in Hawaii and even further on the west coast of North America knew well in advance about the Tsunami. So far the death toll, in a much more populated area than the epicenter of the Indian Ocean event, is hovering around 1/10 of the other event.
Why is that? It’s because of education. Education was crucial in knowing how to set up a warning system and how to evacuate. It wasn’t perfect, too many people died. Yes, money has a lot to do with it, I know. The blame game can be played out against capitalists, politicians, and many others. But, no matter where the blame is laid, the more educated we are about any subject, especially those that can adversely affect millions, the better chance we have in the race against catastrophe.
In honor of and remembrance for those killed and injured by the Sendai earthquake and tsunami. This is my interpretation of ‘The Great Wave off Kanagawa’ a woodblock print by Katsushika Hokusai. Here is the original:
Calamity is the great leveler. It did not care if the person was good or bad, rich or poor, old or young. It didn’t care if they were driving a fancy car or a beat up one. It didn’t care if the person was an office worker with a smart phone or a farmer with an iron plow. Calamity only knew to level. No morality, no ethics, no prayer, no wish, no hope dissuaded it from its mission.
But calamity is no match for humanity. Humanity builds. It keeps what is good about being leveled, the lack of pretense and judgment, and builds from there. It does respond to hopes, wishes, prayers, ethics, morality. It does care. Humanity always beat Calamity. Always.
The first ever Social Media Tulsa Conference is Coming up on Thursday, March 24th at the Hyatt Regency, downtown!
I will be a featured speaker in one of the afternoon breakout sessions.
SESSION TITLE:
Strategies and Attitudes in Social Media Engagement
I will use the Napkin Dad story and drawings to illuminate key strategies and attitudes that work for me and can work for you in the social media platforms of 2011.
Come prepared to absorb (like a napkin) ideas that you can wipe up with! So, scoot on over to the Social Media Tulsa site and register. See you there!
It’s Day Infinity of Zen Week. Not unexpectedly, this week’s series has resulted in many more visitors from Japan than usual. I am hopeful you are all safe and have the support and strength to rebuild your homeland.
INFINITY Normal cat is insistently meowing to get in the house. I hear her through the open window. Light, fresh air is blowing through it as well.
She was insistent about wanting to go out earlier. She went out when I went to check on the neighbors yard. I heard something I wouldn’t usually hear and Wiggle dog was barking at the fence in that direction. All was ok. It was my neighbor, who is usually not home this time of day.
While I was out front I took the opportunity to pull up some long dead plants. I hit the roots against the warm brick wall so the rich soil would fall back in the garden. Then I threw them over the rusty barbed wire fence into the open field. I notice how well the chives came up again. I pulled one plant that had new growth I hadn’t seen and replanted it.
I didn’t bother to check the mail, the mailwoman doesn’t usually come this early.
When I came back inside I started water to boil some beans. They need to stand for an hour now.
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Drawing and story by Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily
Quote is a Zen saying
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One year ago today at the NDD – People don’t grow up, they just grow. Actually I thought yesterday was 3/11 so I posted the year ago napkin from that date. So, today I am making amends by posting 3/10/10. It’s a really good one, one of my all time faves.
I hope you are enlightened on day 4 of Zen Week at The Napkin Dad Daily. A shout out to all my Napkin Kin who have recently bought coffee mugs, thank you!
Enlightenment always wants to be grand. We like to make the grand proclamation that we have been enlightened about something. Maybe after we have done something bad, been caught, and had to publicly apologize. Maybe after having an amazing life transformation that makes us aware of new things. Maybe travel to a new country that opens our eyes to ways we didn’t know existed.
We like to make a spectacle of enlightenment.
But enlightenment is sustained when it is small, not large. When it finds the mundane being just as capable of expanded awareness as the heroic, then it has food to live on. We can’t feed our enlightenment every day with only our heroic deeds and thoughts any more than we are likely to feed our bodies on only gourmet restaurant fare. We feed ourselves in our daily life with more everyday fare and if you want enlightenment to stay with you, you have to find it there too.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily
It’s what Ash Wednesday and Lent is all about. It’s about sacrifice, taking something out of your life, not just to feel better or lose weight, but to experience the feeling of sacrifice, of emptiness of what you value and need.
It’s one of the reasons people don’t change easily. Change almost always includes taking something away, emptying something from your life. A relationship, food, drink, behaviors that aren’t replaced. Just an emptiness where something used to be. A big gaping void. Not easy to face, not easy to live with.
But every emptiness has a shape that contains it. It might be your stomach, your hands, your living room. You created that shape, that clay pot. It wasn’t always filled with what is now missing.
When you purposely empty something from your life, whatever it is, don’t forget the clay pot is still there and it can be filled with something new. Indeed, the great joy of Lent isn’t just that you learn about sacrifice, it’s that you have a new opportunity to fill that emptiness with something better.
So the Lent question today is, What are you ADDING into your life along with the sacrifice? What new thing can you fill your vessel with?
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And yes, I really am giving up cookies for Lent. I will report back on my success, and more importantly, what I filled my cookie emptiness with. Stay tuned!
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily – Making your brain bigger and your day better.
Quote by Lao Tzu, 6th century BCE, Chinese – Traditionally known as the founder of Taoism
This isn’t about Zen Buddhism, about which I know virtually nothing. It’s about perception and the precision of language.
Substitute any of a number of words for ‘Zen’ in the quote above. Then what? Let’s use ‘self’ for an example. Are you trying to find yourself? Are you trying to find your ‘self’, in other words?
Where is that ‘self’?
Does it reside in your career, if only you could get a promotion?
Does it reside in your hobbies, if only you could be finish a project?
Does it reside in your friendships, if only you could be worthy of them?
Does it reside in your makeup bag, if only you would not age?
Does it reside in your kids, if only they would not age?
Does it reside in your golf clubs, in only you could reach par?
Does it reside in your religion, if only you could be good enough?
Does it reside in the future, if only you can find it?
Does it reside in the past, if only you can recapture it?
Or does your ‘self’ reside right here, right now? If it isn’t here right now, how are you reading this? Is it someone else occupying your body doing the reading? No, it’s you, it’s your ‘self’ doing it.
So, back to the ‘precision of language’ I mentioned. What you pursue is not your ‘self’. Your pursuits are those things I listed and more. You may want those things better understood, better defined, better lived. And that is good, pursue them all with great passion.
But call them by their name and don’t be sloppy with your name calling. Their name isn’t ‘self’. You are named ‘self’ and you are here right now. Indeed that is the only place your ‘self’ will ever be.
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Drawing and commentary by Marty Coleman of The Napkin Dad Daily
I had an online conversation with an old high school chum this week about church. In essence, he hates the church and thinks it’s evil. He sees church-goers as being of one mind, one thought, one idea, one personality, one belief. He wasn’t discriminating between congregations, theology, creeds, or purposes. It seemed to me to be one broad condemnation of all who go to church.
I actually agree with him in many theological and social areas. BUT, One of the reasons I love drawing people in church is that it really help me to pay attention. Not just to the sermon, which I do, but to the person I am drawing. I notice details, real small details that help me to see them as completely unique people, not just another person in the pew. I see they sit a certain way, that tells me they are worried or stressed about something. I see another who is showing way more leg and cleavage than one might expect in church. I see another who still has his coat on even though it’s hot in the sanctuary. I see a young boy touching his father but never his mother. I see a really, really old lady who has the brightest, funnest, most smile-inducing hat and shoes on you can imagine.
In other words, I see individuals.
The upper class woman with the bra strap showing and a tag as well listening to the simple sermon by the Methodist who looks like that character actor who later did infomercials whose voice is coming to her as a flying turtle translating it into what she wants to hear so she can live the life she wants as do we all.
The beautifully coiffed mother sitting very still while her down syndrome child fidgeted and touched everything around him including his father but he never touched her once and she has a tired strong face that speaks to her pain and vanity and dreams deferred and love she goes to church to find and tries and tries and tries and tries and tries and tries and tries and tries and tries and tries and tries and
Vintage napkins put in my daughters’ lunches and taken to school. These are undated but most likely from about 2000. My daughters were in high school at the time so no, this is not over their heads.
What walls have you put up in front of your gravest dangers today? Are you now running headlong towards that danger because you have persuaded yourself it isn’t there anymore?
Quote by Blaise Pascal, 1623-1662, French writer, inventor, mathematician, philosopher and scientist
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One year ago today at The Napkin Dad Daily – Satisfaction
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A thankful shout out to the Napkin Kin who have visited this week from the cities and towns of the state of Texas, USA. Waco (home of Baylor University and the awesome women of the Theta Mansion), Houston, Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, Temple, The Colony, Stephenville, Universal City, Ft. Worth, Frisco, Little Elm, Bellaire and last but not least, Katy, home of my loyal reader, friend and Tulsa ex-patriot, Brett M.!
