As Is

Musing….

“Enough is abundance to the wise.”––Euripides

Charise’s Turn:

As we are coming around to the close of 2019, certain expectations have to fall by the wayside. Whatever has been accomplished or set into motion will have to be enough. Not only is this okay, this is a chance to accept everything as is.  And when we can do that, we are living from a place of presence rather than absence (of what could be). We are also giving import to another year of living, making, dreaming, caring, changing. All our experiences have brought us to this moment. 

Here are some of my experiences that highlight 2019: 

~Celebrating my father’s 90^th birthday 

~Traveling in Italy with my eldest daughter

~Hosting a poetry tent at an arts festival

~Giving a poetry performance on a streetcar

~Meeting Kate, our fellow muser, in person for the first time

Some things didn't materialize or go as planned, and to this I say, "so what?" There's richness in sitting with everything as is. In truth, it's a happy place. 

“In the end, our intention is more important than anything we do.” – Adyashanti

Get Fired Up: 

What are some of your experiences that highlight 2019? Allow yourself to sit with everything as is.  

www.charisehoge.com

Stuck?

Musing…   

“I believe that getting stuck is often an essential part of the creative process.”––Alan Lightman, In Praise of Wasting Time

Kate’s Turn: 
I seem to be stuck on the idea of doing nothing, being idle, taking time, as I seem to be doing more of that lately. I recently read Alan Lightman’s book, and loved the reframe of ‘wasting time.' In his research of great scientific discoveries, he identified a common pattern that followed stages of 1) preparation, 2) being stuck, 3) new insight or perspective, and 4) discovery. This second stage feels like an impasse and can lead to a belief that one has failed. But being stuck catalyzes the creative imagination; it can be viewed as a long incubation period. Our minds can roam amidst possible solutions, free to coalesce and carry us to the next stage. This can happen when we embrace this stage, escape the rush of life in solitude, quiet our minds, and open the space for the creative process to do its magic.

“The soul has been given its own ears to hear things the mind does not understand. 
The quieter you become, the more you are able to hear.”––Rumi

Get Fired Up:
Where are you being called to embrace feeling stuck and ‘give it a rest?'
Shshshsh…..allow your soul to listen.

 www.kroskalifecoaching.com

More Nothing

Sky gazing on a lunch break

Musing… 

“We need a mental attitude that values and protects stillness, privacy, solitude, slowness, personal reflection; that honors the inner self; that allows each of us to wander about without schedule within our own minds.”–– Alan Lightman, author of In Praise of Wasting Time

Charise’s Turn:

After a busy summer, I am relishing the beginning of autumn. It seems contrary to logic that summer would be a productive time, while the season of autumn would amount to slowing down. Maybe this has something to do with the fact that I was without the luxury of a car for a month while it was being serviced. Maybe this has something to do with the temperate weather and the effect of October light on clouds and leaves. Maybe I have more faith in what has already been accomplished and less of a need to prove something. Maybe I’m okay with the moment. I don’t feel compelled to do anything. Of course, I’m still doing everything necessary, but this newfound desire to do nothing is refreshingly without ambition. It’s like being in love…with life. And there’s nothing to do to get to this state; it’s natural. 

“Doing nothing often leads to the very best of something.”–– Winnie-the-Pooh (A.A. Milne)

Get Fired Up:

To be in love with life is a natural state of being. Give yourself the chance to be there.   

www.charisehoge.com

Virtues of Doing Nothing

Musing…

“…There is a great deal to be gained from doing nothing. We need space to brood and ruminate and mull. We need to slow down to get where we’re going.”––Christian McEwen, StarTribune.com “Ideas come to the idle, and we are not”

Kate’s Turn:

Doing nothing, simply being. During the summer, that means lying in a hammock, walking along a beach, sitting in your backyard and gazing at the blossoms and garden produce and clouds. However, I am as guilty as others in feeling rushed, being so busy, having no time to reflect on what I am doing. We all travel at the speed of life.

Yet it is in those unexpected times of apparent idleness that a creative spark has a chance to land in your awareness. Cognitively, your brain works at an amazing speed; emotionally, time is needed to develop qualities like empathy, love, and imagination. Taking the time to make space in order to foster these has merit and value; it provides the space in your brain to receive that spark. And it puts you in the league with other artists who have testified to its virtues as well: Mozart wrote that walking after a meal was the time when his ideas flowed best; Mary Oliver, poet, said that creative work needs solitude; Robert Frost retreated to the country and worked the land.

It doesn’t matter how you go about ‘doing nothing’––it does matter that you support your creative spaces of dreamy delicious imagination.

“Growing is something we do in our own time, not by schedule…Growth comes from removing and removing, ceasing, undoing, and letting ourselves drop down or even fall into the core of our living being…You have to have time, and you have to have quiet.”––Linda Hogan

Get Fired Up:

How can you honor your own ‘doing nothing’ times? 

What do you need to let go of in order to protect your idleness and dream time?  

www.kroskalifecoaching.com

Wired for Compassion

Musing…

“Let’s get loose with compassion. Let’s drown in the delicious ambiance of love.”––Hafiz

Charise’s Turn:

To get “loose with compassion” is a wonderful body-based idea. It acknowledges a truth that we are wired for compassion––we only need to release a tight hold on whatever blocks us. Maybe a block is a belief. Maybe a block is a feeling, or an expectation. I notice that anytime I’m being hard on myself, the ease of connection with others is affected. It’s not easy to feel free and open in the grip of self-judgment. 

Here’s a simple yoga mudra practice that builds on this idea of opening the heart: open your arms to your sides with the palms facing forward and turn your head to focus first on the right hand and then the left hand. Feel a connection through the heart to the open palms of the hands, and let your breathing be natural. This mudra of compassion can be done several times in one sitting.

“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.” ––Mother Teresa

Get Fired Up:

Let’s embody compassion.

www.charisehoge.com

Moving Forward

Musing…    

“….instead of becoming fixated over exactly when you’re going to reach your new destination, it’s more helpful to simply stay focused on always heading in the right direction.  As long as you are moving away from the distractions of the world and toward that flame of God inside your heart, you’re doing fine. Remember, everyone’s transformation takes place at its own pace.”  

––Russell Simmons, Super Rich

Kate’s Turn:    

I have been dismayed by the small amount of time that I actually take to play with my watercolors painting. Oh, I think about it often; I see the perfect watercolor subject and remark that it is a watercolor waiting to happen. Yet I struggle with taking the time that I envision in the actual creative expression. I work full time; I have commitments; I’m too tired to focus. Maybe I’m not an artist.  After all, I don’t devote myself to the practice whole-heartedly. 

Yet I see beauty in all the summer glory. I notice color, value, composition; nature’s canvas is all around me. My creative expression occurs in flower arrangements, garden landscapes, summer fruit plates. I am an artist in my living. I prefer and am encouraged in that perspective as opposed to limiting my artist identification to only one medium of expression. In order to satisfy my longing for watercolors, I am signed up for two workshops in which I get to immerse myself in that medium, painting garden florals.  I am also enjoying an online course in nature journaling. It guides me to take just ten minutes to sketch the beauty I see. Creators, makers place their focus on what they want rather than the obstacles; their vision remains fixed in heading in the right direction.

"Do not be impatient with your seemingly slow progress. Do not try to run faster than you presently can. If you are studying, reflecting and trying, you are making progress whether you are aware of it or not. A traveler walking the road in the darkness of night is still going forward. Someday, some way, everything will break open, like the natural unfolding of a rosebud.”   ––Vernon Howard, The Power of Your Supermind

Get Fired Up:

Be like water that flows around a boulder – keep moving forward.

What are the many ways that you express your creative nature?

What small steps can you take that keep heading you in the right direction?

 www.kroskalifecoaching.com 

Expand Rather Than Plan

Musing…

“If you do not expect the unexpected you will not find it, for it is not to be reached by search or trail.”
––Heraclitus

Charise’s Turn:

What if you put less importance on a plan, and allow for an impromptu expression of creativity? “Impromptu” is the latest poetry prompt of David Lehman’s column “Next Line, Please” of The American Scholar. Based on events of a Tuesday morning, I sat down to write a nine line impromptu poem, in about thirty minutes:

So

When the paper isn’t on the stoop, 

violet heads have drooped 
overnight, buds of lilies are snapped 
from stems as if eaten or snatched
for spite, you know whatever it is––
spirit, sprite, thief, or deer––isn’t 
thinking of you in the slightest, 
which could be the largesse
in this little upset. 

                                    

Maybe this poem example can make the case that creative work isn’t so much about taking time, but more about giving space. A creative urge needs space to exist, to show up, to be known. A plan can be a good idea, but it can also be limiting. Whatever creative tendency you have, give it more space. Expand, and let the muse do her work. 

“The creative person has to dissolve all should and should nots. He needs freedom and space, vast space; he needs the whole sky and all the stars. Only then can his innermost spontaneity start growing.”––Osho 

Get Fired Up:

Set your plan aside to let the moment reveal itself.  

www.charisehoge.com

Impassioned

Musing…      
"Be yourself.  Everyone else is taken.”
––Oscar Wilde

Kate’s Turn:    
I have been so inspired recently by a number of people whose story was told in a movie, documentary or interview: Mary Oliver, American poet who recently passed; Ruth Bader Ginsburg, US Supreme Court Justice who is a forceful advocate for women’s rights and gender equality; and Mr. Rogers, educator, activist and advocate for children. Each has given significant contributions to our world by living their passion out in their work, by being themselves fully, and manifesting the fires that burned within them. Their creative contributions have been borne out of who they are. Now, you may not reach their level of notoriety in your creative expression, but who you are and how you live out your passion is important and felt nevertheless. It is borne out of simply being yourself.   

“It’s not so much what we have in this life that matters. It’s what we do with what we have. There is something of yourself that you leave at every meeting with another person.”––Mr. Rogers

"I would like to be remembered as someone who used whatever talent she had to do her work to the very best of her ability."––Ruth Bader Ginsburg

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”––Mary Oliver

Get Fired Up:
How can you allow your passions to be expressed simply in being yourself? 

What action is calling you to honor your becoming?

 www.kroskalifecoaching.com

Spring Opening

Photo by Robert Lin

Musing…

“When we were children, we used to think that when we were grown-up we would no longer be vulnerable. But to grow up is to accept vulnerability...To be alive is to be vulnerable.” 

~ Madeleine L'Engle

Charise’s Turn:

Spring will have its way with us, just as it does with nature. The direction of energy is to push things to the surface, and we are vulnerable. Have you noticed this vulnerability, maybe manifesting as irritability, teariness, or anxiousness? As we soften from the harshness of winter, we can pay attention to undercurrents of emotion that surface. The beginning of spring is the impetus toward growth. Let’s say that vulnerability has an inherent impetus toward growth because of how open we are. And, it’s slightly uncomfortable. 

“My inability to lean into the discomfort of vulnerability limited the fullness of those important experiences that are wrought with uncertainty: Love, belonging, trust, joy, and creativity to name a few." ~  Brené Brown

Get Fired Up:
Appreciate the promise of growth, understanding, and compassion that vulnerability offers. 

www.charisehoge.com

Spring Sun

Musing...

“In the name of the Fire, the Flame and the Light; Praise the pure presence of fire that burns from within without thought of time.”

––John O’Donohue  

Kate's Turn:                                                   

The intensity of the spring sun penetrates our winter’s blanket, under which all life forms have lain in rest, awaiting the attention of its enlivening warmth and light to resurrect new life. Paying attention to your creative intention, touching it everyday like the spring sun, activates your creative dreamseeds. Allow this poet, Nita Penfold, to beckon you: 

“Think of a time when you were truly yourself, 

that age before the mask was pulled tight

before the roles were welded like armor to your skin.

Remember the one thing you loved 

above all else, that, given perfect freedom,

you could be found doing

when they looked for you to do something else,

something useful; the thing that made

you feel whole and hopeful,

full of something that lifted you out of yourself

but anchored you home

so that you didn’t know where that thing began,

where you ended

so much were you in the river of it, the flow

of hand to heart and heart to soul,

that was all of one piece called you.

You know what it is.  Remember it.

Hold it up like a shiny vintage ornament

Turn it to and fro.

It is the true gift

just below your conscious thought, itching at you

to touch it once more.

Latch onto that feeling,

let the stillness find you and the wholeness

bubble up from the bottom of your stone well.

What might you do with it now?"

––Nita Penfold from Landing in Oz  with permission (nitapenfold.weebly.com)

Get Fired Up:                                                                                                                                      

Be like the spring sun and touch your creative work every day.  

www.kroskalifecoaching.com

Rest in Inquiry

art by Hilma af Klint 

Musing…

“Do not seek after what you yearn for, seek the source of the yearning itself.”  ― Adyashanti

Charise’s Turn:

How are your goals, aims, and resolutions for 2019 going? As for me, I didn’t make any. This may sound like a clever strategy to avoid failure, but my motive was to keep inquiry instead of intent.  

The first week of January, I had the opportunity to teach a yoga nidra class at a meditation center. Yoga nidra is sometimes called the 'yoga of sleep' because there is no physical movement; instead, it is a sensory experience of relaxation that allows for a dynamic shift in consciousness. For my class, I highlighted the idea of 'sankalpa'––the Sanskrit word for vow–– by asking a simple question, “what is your deepest longing?,” while participants rested, quietly aware. I’ve been carrying this question around, in the background of my day-to-day life, since the New Year. You could say that the inquiry works as an organizing principle for action.

Get Fired Up:

Allow for inquiry: let a question deepen in your awareness without any ready answer. Let that inquiry do its magic. 

www.charisehoge.com

Becoming

                                                                                    

Musing...

"Keeper of all life, Hidden Seed deep in the dark soil of the earth, Fertile Ground, Womb of the Night, bring us new birth.”                              
~ Sara Thomsen, lyrics from "Darkness Cover Me" 

Kate’s Turn:
The lyrics above are from a Winter Solstice event I attended that spoke to me about the ‘becoming’ that happens unseen. The darkest night of the year is a time when the Earth womb of darkness expands to her largest in order to embrace the dream seeds of a winter season.  

My winter practice entails lighting a candle in a daily meditation in which I stoke the inner light, my creative fire, building energy for something new to take form. I shifted my winter schedule to open space for being in relationship with my creative nature. I currently have no agenda for that time, but intend to take my light (creativity) and bravely go dark, being open to the new blooming that awaits. Simultaneously, I witness my amaryllis bulb, ever so slowly, beginning to show some greening and I anticipate its promise unfolding as well.

“To go into the dark with a light is to know the light.  

To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,

and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings 

and is travelled by dark feet and dark wings.

~ Wendell Berry, poem "To Know the Dark"

Get Fired Up:
How can you welcome the dark to gestate your dream seeds?  

What action is calling you to honor your becoming?

 www.kroskalifecoaching.com