Sappy hearts, monkey minds, scary world

My heart is pushing me over yet another edge. This just might be one of the scariest, one of the most vulnerable and revealing edges I’ve crossed.

A few months ago I read a fantastic book: Awaken Your Inner Genius by Carolyn Elliott. In going through her inspiring process I got into dialogue with my heart. I have many creative projects to explore and an abundance of world work I want to do.  So I thought I’d let my heart – instead of my monkey mind – point me in the best direction for me now.

My heart told me to become a blessing artist.

Say what? What in the world is a blessing artist? How would I become one? And why would I even want to?

Blessing artist sounds way too sappy. It sounds like that wasted and cowardly response to human-made crises of “our thoughts and prayers are with you.” It sounds like syrupy, flowery, nails-on-chalk-board-y, sentimental greeting cards. It sounds like the donation basket or the Kool-Aid will soon follow.

It sounds like a distraction from the action-oriented, absolutely necessary hard work of political change.

The idea of becoming a blessing artist terrified me. And it intrigued me – kinda like a horror movie. You know what’s coming but you go there anyway.

For the past months my heart has kept at me and my monkey mind has been too blown away by all the bat-shit crazy stuff going on in the world, so I’m going over this edge. I am becoming a blessing artist.

I’m still not all that clear on what this means. My best guess now is that I want to use my words and my being, images and jokes, deep thoughts and shallow whimsy to extend good will into this combative world.

Now don’t get me mixed up with the thoughts and prayers crowd because I’m still firmly committed to action. My rational mind is not surrendering, nor is my anger. I’m still furious over all of the inhumanity and injustice in my country and the world. I’ll still be writing letters, carrying signs, getting out the vote, and I’ll still be a stand for inclusion and human rights.

At the same time, none of these feelings or actions diminishes my desire to extend love and to imagine good will forward and outward. In fact it is because of my desire to include everyone in the beauty and abundance of this planet that my heart wants me to do what I can, right now, in my own wacky, sappy, risky, creative way.

I’m starting my Blessing Artistry with some intentionally uplifting memes and some posts on embracing the polarities of science based facts and practical magic, extending love while being furious for justice, and the radical vulnerability of following our hearts over scary edges. I hope you’ll join me in this exploration, or at least hang in with me a bit to see what we might create together.