Freedom: An Edict to Participate in Creativity

Musing…

“Everyone is a genius. But if you judge a fish on its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” - Albert Einstein

Charise’s Turn:

Before I launch into the current creative endeavor, both Kate and I want to close the year with our prospects for 2016 – which includes you! We will be taking a hiatus from our usual posting format to collaborate on a publication based on our blog writing over the past six years. We invite you to participate by giving us feedback; help us decide what to include, highlight, distill for this project. And enjoy our archives – 166 posts! Beginning mid-January we’ll be blogging monthly to check in with you, as well as to offer updates and inspiration. What project would you like to germinate in 2016?

As for me, I’ve been composing a poem that draws inspiration from Ornette Coleman’s musical genius. This is ekphrastic – art speaking to art. And what I hear in Coleman’s art, his free jazz, is an evolution. He coined the term harmolodics, encouraging a freedom of expression for himself as well as his band members. I’m finding my way, with his lead, to be inventive with my language within the instrument of a canto, a poetic structure of specific rhyme patterning and rhythm meter. You don’t have to be a jazz enthusiast to appreciate Coleman’s integrity; maybe you don’t even need to like his music. He breaks barriers…not so much pushing outside of the box as transforming the box into another geometric form.

We need more evolution on this planet…dispelling beliefs and ways of thinking that are harming us. What is your part? Your genius? 

Get Fired Up:

Tap into your genius, your inquiring mind, your passion for life and creativity – humanity will benefit.

“Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.” Pablo Picasso

www.charisehoge.com

Freedom: Wordlessness

"Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I'll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass the world is too full to talk about."  - Rumi

Musing…        

Freedom of expression is our constitutional right. And yet it is in wordlessness that our freedom lies…in Source energy.

Kate’s Turn:

People around the world are fleeing for their freedom….many are dying for their freedom. There are no words……there are too many words. When I can find no words, when there are no words, I fall to my knees and pray…opening to Source energy, opening to the field beyond, the stillness of Wordlessness, to lead us to Oneness.

“We see the truth of our lives in the stillness of the Wordless mind; we sense love and connection to others through Oneness; we prefigure our desires, solve our puzzles, and picture new solutions with Imagination. When all those technologies are used at once, it requires only a slight push to create, in three-dimensional reality, the conditions, objects, and events we’ve Imagined. That gentle push is the fourth tech-nology of magic: the art of Forming.”  - Martha Beck

Get Fired Up:  

Let us drop down into Wordlessness, and in that stillness, Imagine…finding a way of Forming a new way to live together. Peace.

“In the midst of the cacophony of voices, shoulds, to-do lists, and all those fierce defenders of positions, how can we find a way to sit and breathe some calm into the conflict that surrounds us?”  - Diane Walker, Contemplative Photography blog

www.kroskalifecoaching.com

Finish: Changing Course

Musing…

“Life is a progress, and not a station.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Charise’s Turn:

Sometimes you have to catch up to the changes that are occurring internally, within your self. From my point of view, these are the best sorts of changes because they don’t spring from an agenda or plan which can actually be limiting. Thoughts and ideas are often small, small minded you could say. Open your mind to a vaster field of inspiration and imagination - a source of so much growth. How? The “how” is probably an individual choice, but for me this means practicing emptiness, being with my self in solitude rather than in “doing” mode.

After a two week vacation I resumed my routine, but something had shifted that I couldn’t put my finger on. You may remember that I published a blog post “Color it In” which referenced a desire to gain a better understanding of my logo for my website by coloring in the image of bare feet stepping (coachingmoves). I have not finished that coloring. My intention was to finish it at the start, but I have changed course. An “aha” moment led to the recognition that much of what I do isn’t represented by this website or by the name “coaching moves”.  Back to the drawing board - I have built a more comprehensive site that replaces and also integrates coaching moves. Please visit me at charisehoge.com.

Get Fired Up:

It’s not flaky to change course in the midst of completing something - this is known as progress, growth, artistry. 

“Life is a series of natural and spontaneous changes. Don’t resist them; that only creates sorrow. Let reality be reality. Let things flow naturally forward in whatever way they like.” - Lao Tzu

www.charisehoge.com

Finish: Strong

“A tree that can fill the span of a man’s arms grows from a downey tip; a terrace nine stories high arises from clods of earth; a journey of a thousand miles starts from beneath one’s feet.”  -Lao-tzu

Musing…         

This maple is showing a bold, strong finish to this autumn season. But is it really the end? Isn’t an apparent end simply the start of a new beginning? Putting final touches on a creative project and finishing STRONG elevates it to a new level, a new beginning.

Kate’s Turn:  

Finish is also a noun. The finish on furniture protects it for the life of its use; we re-finish items in order to extend its usage for another lifetime. The finish of a wine carries us into another experience. I venture to say that the finish protects so that the life cycle completes (can finish) and begins once again.

As a creative person, I have many ideas, and start many projects, but it’s the passion, along with persistence, that takes me to the finish. Intention, effort, work…showing up consistently in the process of ‘Creating form from light’ (my intention in 2015), much like photosynthesis “showed up” daily to produce this golden form from light. The strong showing of beauty brings the seasonal cycle to a new level…..and continues from there in the composting of leaves, nurturing the soil to nourish while resting in the winter…you know the way. Each day that I show up strong insures that I finish strong in the future.

“What’s the real secret to creativity?

Showing up!

Yes, that’s really it. Showing up is the main thing!

Be consistent in showing up. Getting to your creative work only once in a while won’t keep it alive. Make “routine” and “regularity” sacred words! ….use the phrase “I’m going directly to work” as a mantra and memory aid. “I’m going directly to work!” Can you feel the power in that phrase? The phrase is energizing, encouraging, even heroic-sounding. “I’m going directly to work!” To my ear, it sounds like your victory is assured. Do give it a try. Say it out loud right now. “I’m going directly to work!” Or just, “I’m going to work!” Or just, “Work!””  - Eric Maisel from The Creativity Book

Get Fired Up: 

“I’m going directly to work.” Say it…feel the power…then go directly to work in order to finish strong!

“Take care in your minutes, and the hours will take care of themselves.”  - Philip Dormer Stanhope Chesterfield 

www.kroskalifecoaching.com

Flair: Words

Musing…

“Lists are the butterfly nets that catch my fleeting thoughts...” ~ Betsy Cañas Garmon

“One must be drenched in words, literally soaked in them, to have the right ones form themselves into the proper pattern at the right moment.” ~Hart Crane

Charise’s Turn:

I have a fondness for words, for the choice of words in speaking, writing, describing. This isn’t really about vocabulary; it’s about a feel for the flair of language. When I write a poem, the words have to agree with the experience conveyed or they fail to communicate, they loaf around on the page. It gets to be a pretty ruthless task to eliminate the loafers, but they will suck the life right out of a poem. A word speaks when it catches your attention, when it seduces you out of a stupor, when it promises new meaning.

On a recent trip to Italy – in addition to taking a plethora of photos – I took notes of words that cropped up over the course of a day’s meandering. The only reasoning behind the list is that these words offer possibilities of metaphors I hadn’t thought of, words like “fresco” and “lagoon”. In my wanderings through Verona, I found a bookbinding studio where a young artist makes miniature leather bound books on copper necklaces. The paper pages beckon for inspiration, and I knew this would be a birthday gift to delight my friend Lisa. As she contemplates what to inscribe on the tiny pages, I look forward to her choices. Knowing her, maybe some Rumi or some ruminating? Nothing like experiencing the treasure of words…

“Dancing in all its forms cannot be excluded from the curriculum of all noble education; dancing with the feet, with ideas, with words, and, need I add that one must also be able to dance with the pen?” ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

Get Fired Up:  
How do words come alive for you? 
Make a note of words (or phrases) that catch your attention – you can use them for inspiration in your writing, journaling, art, business, website, etc.  Develop your unique flair for language.  

www.coachingmoves.com

Flair: Sprezzatura

Musing… 

Sprezzatura is an Italian word originating from Baldassare Castiglione's The Book of the Courtier, where it is defined by the author as "a certain nonchalance, so as to conceal all art and make whatever one does or says appear to be without effort and almost without any thought about it".

 -Wikipedia based      

 Definition of flair:  a natural aptitude; a uniquely attractive quality.

Kate’s Turn:

Sprezzatura: effortless grace, all easy, doing something cool without apparent effort, nonchalance. It brings to mind watching a magician or a figure skater or a flamenco dancer.  They make it look so easy. This is what people say when they see me cooking and presenting a scrumptious meal; it takes effort, Yes, but that is not how it appears to someone not so adept in the kitchen. What I don’t have a flair for, or a natural aptitude in, is public speaking – I need much more practice to pull that off nonchalantly. But I do have a way with words, and I love crafting the message. And I love how this word, sprezzatura, sounds when it rolls off my tongue. So I would venture to say that sprezzatura is both flair (natural aptitude) and practice.

Now if we widen our perspective, we see how Mother Earth has sprezzatura in her generous giving. It is most noticeable during autumn season, when her abundance pours out with effortless grace and apparent ease; we witness this in the abundant beauty and art of a farmer’s market display or brilliant autumn foliage. Certainly the life force flow is constant, her effort and energy perpetual, in her natural aptitude to produce life and beauty; her flair for giving is her nature. Applying this to creativity means I practice in areas that are uniquely attractive to me, so the manifestation, with my effort, appears to result naturally, with such ease that the practice/refinement is not evident.

“You were born with wings.  Why prefer to crawl through life?”  - Rumi

Get Fired Up:

What do you naturally have a flair for?  Your practice makes it look perfect!  Have as much fun with your sprezzatura as I am having with mine.

www.kroskalifecoaching.com

Finesse: Color It In

Musing...
There’s form and there’s finesse, or there’s outline and there’s filling in. Form, structure, outline are a starting point. Once you’ve achieved some mastery of a skill, craft, art, practice, or routine, it comes into living color by your own richness.

“And all the colors I am inside have not been invented yet.” - Shel Silverstein

Charise’s Turn:

Coloring books for adults are a new trend. The last time I was prompted to color, other than with my daughters, was for an anatomy for dancers class, with the anatomy coloring book. Learning about muscles and bones became a participatory act – the time and care it took to fill in each segment made an imprint on memory that staring at a chart can not provide.

On a recent visit with my co-author of A Portable Identity, I eyed a coloring book on her coffee table. One page consisted of an image that corresponds to the logo of my website – bare feet stepping. Debra offered this to me, and I plan to locate all the colored pencils in my home to color it. I imagine that in the course of coloring, I will learn more about what my logo means and why I picked it. Of course, the feet stepping has to do with movement and also travel, hence “coaching moves”. Color play will allow for attentiveness to detail, greater individuality, more imagination...we'll see what happens as my feet bloom! 

Get Fired Up: 

It's common to get into a rut with routine and structure. You know this is happening when you lose the nuances of inspiration, acting more by rote or habit. Access your vibrancy, focus on finesse and find subtlety - color it in! 

www.coachingmoves.com

Finesse: Teasing Out Essence

Musing…       

Our fine-essence is held in the seed of our being…we simply need to draw it forth, to finesse the largess of our potential.

Ira Progoff, author of At a Journal Workshop, uses the metaphor of an acorn:

“. . . what is involved is a sense of the largeness of a human person. The unconscious is not so much the part of the psyche that has been repressed, the unconscious is not so much our past experience, as it is that part of the human being that has not yet been experienced, just as an acorn contains in its unconscious the dream of the oak tree and that dream expresses the coming into being of the oak tree. That means that working with a person, we have to have a method of drawing forth what is in the seed, the still unlived potentials of the person (ed.).”

Kate’s Turn:

Finesse is a term I’ve learned in the card game of Bridge. Simply put, it is a strategy used to tease out the location of the power cards. This applies in coaching as well – we want the refinement of ones essence to be manifested; we use “power questions” to tease out the unlived potentials, to draw forth what lies in the seed of their being. This is my current power question: “What is the most compelling, beautiful work I’m capable of creating at this point in my life?”

“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters, compared to what lies within us.”

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Get Fired Up:   

What is your dream that expresses the coming-into-being of your seed destiny? What is your power question?

www.kroskalifecoaching.com

Fun: Lightheartedness

Musing…

“Life isn’t as serious as the mind makes it out to be.” - Eckhart Tolle

“A light heart lives long.” - Shakespeare

Charise’s Turn:

I know the antithesis of this theme, to be heavy hearted. Times of loss, grief, and illness lend to a heavy heart. About two years ago, when a loved one was diagnosed with an illness that put on hold her immediate plans for her life, derailing the start of college education, I sank into a kind of stupor of defeat. On an afternoon in the countryside, sitting on a rocking chair in view of the mountains of George Washington National Forest, I rocked and sighed - repeatedly - to relieve the internal heaviness I was feeling. This was an unconscious act. Then the unexpected happened. A butterfly started flittering around me, and landed on my lips. Have you ever been kissed by a butterfly? It was startling, amusing, and instantaneously lightened my mood.

The supportive nature of this simple event has proven itself over and over again, as I see how that dark time was part of a greater transformation. The butterfly was real and also a metaphor; evidence of hope, of change. There is more and ever increasing lightheartedness in my life. I’ve arrived...at a golden age of fun.   

Get Fired Up:

Lighten your heart; all is well (even when it seems otherwise).

www.coachingmoves.com

Fun: De-Light

“I wish I could photosynthesize so that just by being, just by shimmering at the meadow’s edge or floating lazily on a pond, I could be doing the work of the world while standing silent in the sun.”    – Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass

Musing…        

Summer is all about having fun in the sun, enjoying the full light of the season. No one feels like ‘working’, especially if cooped up indoors.  Creativity has its summer side as well – shining loving light on any creative spark brings de-light to form…..much to our delight! 

Kate’s Turn:

I recently spoke at a support group for breast cancer survivors. Part of my message was to take seriously the notion that ‘laughter is the best medicine’. I offered information that a smile brings about numerous chemical releases in the body that are conducive to healing whereas a worrying frown stresses the body. My qigong teacher (Master Chunyi Lin, SpringForest Qigong) has an acronym he teaches: S.M.I.L.E. – START MY INTERNAL LOVE ENGINE. Love is the healing force, the carrier wave of divine intelligence. Doing what we love, what delights us, nourishes our body and our soul. This IS our work – enjoying our days, backed by love, shining our creative spirit, in fun and delight.

“O traveler, traveler along the way,
there is not a single soul who lacks a pathway to God.
There is not a stone or a flower— 

not a single piece of straw lacking the divine essence.
In every particle of the world the sun of love
causes the heart of each atom to shine.”

- Muhammad Shirin Maghribi from Recitations, translated by Lynn Bauman

Get Fired Up:   

Time to photosynthesize! Have fun in the sun! Take de-light, and smile!

“Allow yourself to SMILE – notice the sunshine that radiates from your being when you smile… allow your smile to send the sunshine of your being throughout your body and your environment… take this being into life with you.”     - Meditation closing by Jeddah Mali, spiritual teacher

www.kroskalifecoaching.com   

Flow: Threshold

Aboriginal artist at work

Musing…

“One of the most beautiful gifts in the world is the gift of encouragement. When someone encourages you, that person helps you over a threshold you might otherwise never have crossed on your own.” 

- John O’Donohue

Charise’s Turn:

I’m here to encourage you, to offer my current view on being stuck. Being stuck feels like a standstill, with no flow… of ideas, energy, inspiration, motivation. It can be a dull and disappointing place. When I sit with it, or allow a kind of non-attachment relationship with my muse (maybe she’s taking a walk, having a nap, or just wants some space) something happens. I realize that I’m not stuck; I’m on a threshold. Whatever is beyond that threshold is not apparent – yet.  At some point the floodgates will open, and flow is plentiful. This is assured.

My most recent threshold moment was the other night when a word – not a phrase or sentence, a word – kept orbiting through me, to add to a poem I‘d been working on that day. Struggling to complete a phrase with this one word kept me awake for a couple of hours while lying in bed. Eventually I gave up for the sake of sleep. The next day, still stuck with the word, I meditated. You may think I’m going to tell you that this is where I got inspired, but no, what I got was the understanding that my fingers would figure this out. Once I put my fingers to the keyboard of the computer the rest of the phrase would emerge. The word was a trickle; I had to wait for the flow.  

Get Fired Up:

Flow isn’t something to force, it’s natural. Think of ebb and flow, and you know when a tide ebbs it will again flow. Keep a quiet witnessing of your creative tide; it will surprise you.

“Your soul knows the geography of your destiny. Your soul alone has the map of your future, therefore you can trust this indirect, oblique side of yourself. If you do, it will take you where you need to go, but more important it will teach you a kindness of rhythm in your journey.”

― John O'Donohue

www.coachingmoves.com

Flow: Grace & Ease

“When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you – a joy.”    - Rumi

Musing…  

This river is akin to the “tap opening to an inner wellspring” when the alignment occurs that Charise spoke about in the last post. It’s as if all the stars become aligned, and, what once was blocked, now seems to effortlessly flow with grace and ease.

Kate’s Turn:

I experience flow as a co-creative endeavor. It seems to result from holding the tension of the opposites: effort and surrender. You know how ducks glide so effortlessly across the water? We don’t see their little feet paddling furiously beneath the surface. Flowing with grace and ease is accompanied by a lot of consistent effort, commitment, and intentional focus. 

I moved this past month because the house we were living in sold with grace and ease. All the effort of clearing, fixing, staging, showing took place – then I surrendered my attachment with a walk around the house, asking the Universe to bring someone to love the house as much as I have loved it - love it! love it! love it!” I repeated. The agent’s text immediately after the next showing was “LOVE IT!  Presenting an offer.” Full price, as is, no renegotiation after the inspection – unheard of!  Now THIS is flow.

We have to aim our energy in the direction we want it to flow before it creates the intended outcomes. We must provide the effort, commitment, and diligence. And while taking full responsibility, surrender our attachment, empty ourself, and ask for inspiration and guidance. Asking for guidance frees us from the constricting effects of our limited mindsets – we co-create with Source, with our Muse.

“We each have a current that underlies our lives. An electric current, throwing off sparks. An underground current of water. It flows, meanders, bounces against things. It moves, changes shape. Always moving, it needs to evolve into something new. The spirit of life, the growth spark. The creative spark.  In touch with that current, my life, my creative work, has a flow. “    - Roderick W. MacIver, Heron Dance

Get Fired Up:   

Place a vibration of love on an apparent obstacle or roadblock; saturate it with the living energy of love, all the while surrendering the final form, trusting the co-creation of the power of Source energy and your own consistent efforts.

“Pay attention to the currents of life more than the obstacles.”     - David Whyte

 www.kroskalifecoaching.com

Follow: Alignment

Musing…

“Your life has an inner purpose and an outer purpose. Inner purpose concerns Being and is primary. Outer purpose concerns doing and it is secondary… Your outer purpose can change over time. It varies greatly from person to person.

Finding and living in alignment with the inner purpose is the foundation for fulfilling your outer purpose. It is the basis for true success. Without that alignment, you can still achieve certain things through effort, struggle, determination, and sheer hard work or cunning. But there is no joy in such endeavor, and it invariably ends in some form of suffering.”     - Eckhart Tolle

Charise’s Turn:

As a yoga instructor, I’m constantly aware of physical alignment, for my students and myself. How many times they’ve heard me say “knee over ankle…shoulders sliding down your back…feet hip-width apart” is anyone’s guess. Alignment is the foundation of a yoga practice, both on the physical level, as well as energetic. When you experience aligning, you feel spacious and free because nothing is tugging out of place or neglected in your awareness.

A spacious, free, aware feeling can be a metric for decisions and choices in your life.  When a decision is merely arbitrary, it’s like going through the motions without an enlivening effect. And when your actions aren’t in alignment with your being, there is a harming effect - in the same way physical misalignment can lead to injury. When a decision settles in your being like a welcome sigh, like a tap opening to a deeper wellspring, then you know you’re aligning with your “inner purpose”.

Get Fired Up:

Begin taking a personal inventory of your state of being as you go through your day. Notice what happens as you: sit at your desk; attend to a project, task or deadline; take a walk; talk on the phone; prepare food; read; dabble; think about different things. Let a mindfulness accompany you all through the day and be curious about yourself. Especially notice those moments that feel more effortless, even if challenging - see where your energy flows and where your inner listening goes. 

www.coachingmoves.com