“What are the conditions you’d need in your world in order to feel like you were living in paradise?” – Richard Geer

Doesn’t that quote fill you with a bit of a delicious tingle? To me it feels dangerous and big. I’ve been surrounded by delicious and dangerous thoughts lately. They have been streaming out of the world towards me as if they have just all been waiting – lining up – until I began to pay attention.

Something I was reading lately said that everything you need to know is always all around you, but until you are ready for it – until something in you resonates with it – it will remain invisible. I love that. I played with that thought yesterday as I had a big-city adventure. I tried to notice what I noticed. Why did I see certain people and things and not others? More importantly, what wasn’t I seeing? What are my filters keeping from me?

I watched a video this morning by Christine Kane. In it she talks about being in the “Play-Big Zone.” Funnily enough, it was when she talked about “playing medium” that my little soul perked up. I saw that part: it got through my filters. Playing medium means that you feel like you are nearly there, but you don’t let yourself be bigger. You catch glimpses of who you could be, but then you get scared and turn away, falling into bad habits and avoidance tendancies. I heard Christine loud and clear right then and recognized myself in her words. But I don’t want to resonate with medium! So I backed the thing up and watched her video again. I paid better attention, and found that it scared me a lot! No wonder I hadn’t really listened the first time. Part of me wanted to make art out of her words and hang it on my door and begin to play bigger. The other part of me was scared: “But I’d have to take it down if people came over, because what if people saw it?” HA! and: “But I don’t think I can do it, it’s too much pressure.” Double HA!

Maybe I am really not lazy. Maybe I have just been avoiding potential. It’s safer and warmer here in the land of medium. It’s not too hot or too cold,and I don’t have to put my head above the parapet and risk rejection or mockery or worse still: success. I don’t have to forge my own way, I can sit and read about other people’s adventures. It’s nice here, all snug and safe and almost.

But am I finally ready for big? Are you?

Work hard and become a leader; be lazy and never succeed. – Proverbs 12:24

When I thought about starting Creating Wings, I was afraid.  I was afraid that I couldn’t do it.  I was afraid that I would be too lazy to come back and post.  I was afraid that I would leave this little project hanging in the corner like some of the other creative ideas I have had.  Instead I find myself thinking about it all of the time.  I have begun to see things through the eyes of potential change!  I have surprised myself – but I am still afraid.

This morning I decided that I needed to start questioning a new belief.  I need to start making a new feather.  I’m  going to tackle the belief that I think is the key to this whole operation: I am lazy.

Am I lazy?  I say that I am.  I act like I am sometimes.  The mess in my office would say that I am lazy, but the sparkling counter in my kitchen would say that I am not.  My boss at work would say that I am far from lazy, but the view between my crossed feet as I watch mindless television instead of rewriting my book proposal would illustrate that I am.  Which is it?  Is it all or nothing?  Is it possible to be selectively lazy, and if so, can we make that selection conscious?  Or is lazy trying to tell me something?  Does it mean I don’t actually want to do something or that I am afraid in some way?

Is there value in lazy?  I’m going to try to find out.

“The sun, with all those planets revolving around it and dependent on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as if it had nothing else to do.” - Galileo

Strange things have been happening to me. Everything, and I do mean everything in the last two days has gone completely NOT to plan. Everything. Even tiny insignificant things have somehow got caught up in this lesson in not-to-plan.

Yesterday this left me in a strange place emotionally, but this morning I woke up and remembered that there is a reason for things – how could I have forgotten that? – and that today has the potential to be the most wonderful day of my life!

Every gift I got this morning on my 35th birthday was exactly right. Mark looked at the pile and said, “Everything here is creative!” I am changing day by day, and those that love me have honoured that in fun and practical ways. (Thank you!) I am going to be cooking things up like crazy both in reality and metaphorically in the coming months. Watch this space. (Remember “I can’t cook” is one of my rules. Yikes.)

Mark’s parents sent me the most wonderful book (that I have been picking up and putting down in bookstores for years because it terrified me and I wasn’t ready for it and now I think I AM!) I am going to share just a tiny bit of it with you as my gift to you today. I’m sure you will get more of it as I make my way through. (Just holding it makes me feel dangerous!):

Act as if the universe if a prodigious miracle created for your amusement and illumination. Assume that secret helpers are working behind the scenes to assist you in turning into the gorgeous masterpiece you were born to be. Join the conspiracy to shower all creation with blessings.” – Rob Brezsny

Have a wonderful day! You are loved.