[noticed at insights]

"Paths are not made for walking, but by walking."

Lack of Control

[noticed by Jordon Cooper]

When organizations fail, our first reaction is typically to fall into "control mode": One person, or at most a small, coherent group of people, should decide what the current goals of the organization are, and everyone else should then efficiently and effectively execute those goals. Intuitively, control mode sounds like nothing so much as common sense. It fits perfectly with our deeply rooted notions of cause and effect ("I order, you deliver"), so it feels good philosophically. It also satisfies our desire to have someone made accountable for everything that happens, so it feels good morally as well.

But when a failure is one of imagination, creativity, or coordination—all major shortcomings of the various intelligence branches in recent years—introducing additional control, whether by tightening protocols or adding new layers of oversight, can serve only to make the problem worse. {more here}

Discouraged?

[noted byjen lemen in this post]

but really, clinical depression & her cousins aside, how many problems do you have that would not be drastically improved if you had wonderful people in your life who actually descended on you when you were in a state and helped dig you out of whatever trauma you currently felt trapped by? what fog of dismay could not be dramatically lifted by someone scrubbing your toilet, feeding you hot soup in bed and generally treating you like you're horribly sick, only it's your soul that's making everything feel so crummy? what soul sickness could not be cured by the hourly, weekly or monthly sitting shiva for the parts of you that died along with that trauma? with nice cashews and dried apricots and hot kenyan tea to go around while everyone listened to your stories?

it's just that people have to get in their cars for that. and that no one has the time. not to mention everyone's already overloaded thinking about their own depressed damn self. the whole thing is just so sad.

Intoxication

[top quoted at Been There...Still There; bottom quoted at grrrl meets world]

"Why is it that the most unoriginal thing we can say to one another is still the thing we long to hear? 'I love you' is always a quotation. You did not say it first, and neither did I, yet when you say it and I say it we speak like savages who have found three words and worship them."

-- Written on the Body, Jenette Winterson

---

"I exist in a web of relationships - links to nature, people, God. I trace out these links, giving thanks for the life that flows through them. Some links are twisted or broken: I may feel regret, anger, disappointment. I pray for the gift of acceptance and forgiveness." --Sacred Space

Also from gaping void:

12. If you accept the pain, it cannot hurt you.

The pain of making the necessary sacrifices always hurts more than you think it's going to. I know. It sucks. That being said, doing something seriously creative is one of the most amazing experiences one can have, in this or any other lifetime. If you can pull it off, it's worth it. Even if you don't end up pulling it off, you'll learn many incredible, magical, valuable things. It's NOT doing it when you know you full well you HAD the opportunity- that hurts FAR more than any failure.

[from How To Be Creative]

Easy is Never Easy

[noticed on maggi dawn from gaping void]

Stamina is utterly important. And stamina is only possible if it's managed well. People think all they need to do is endure one crazy, intense, job-free creative burst and their dreams will come true. They are wrong, they are stupidly wrong.

Being good at anything is like figure skating- the definition of being
good at it is being able to make it look easy. But it never is easy. Ever.
That's what the stupidly wrong people coveniently forget.

If I was just starting out writing, say, a novel or a screenplay, or
maybe starting up a new software company, I wouldn't try to quit my job for a year and make this big, dramatic heroic-quest thing about it. I would do something far simpler: I would find that extra hour or two in the day that belongs to nobody else but me, and I would make them productive. Put the hours in, do it for long enough and magical, life-transforming things happen eventually. Sure, that means less time watching TV, internet surfing, going out or whatever.

But who cares?

-- from here, at How To Be Creative

Church of Fools

[noticed by Eric in The Door Magazine's Chat Closet; also referred by Lake Neuron Bait Shop]

Increasingly we disappoint the world with what appears to be hypocrisy. --Tony Campolo

[read the reactions here]

Divided They Stand?

[both quotes noted on grrrl meets world in this post]

from this article:

Nancy Reagan has told close followers she believes Bush and the current Republican leadership have divided America with their extreme views. She has told Republican leaders she wants nothing to do with the party or Bush.

During the week of Reagan’s funeral, the former First Lady “went ballistic” when she learned the Bush campaign was test marketing new ads that used Reagan’s photos and speeches in an effort to show he supported Bush and his re-election. She personally called Republican Party Chief Ed Gillespie to demand the ads be destroyed.

and from this article:

[...] My father, acting roles excepted, never pretended to be anyone but himself. His Republican party, furthermore, seems a far cry from the current model, with its cringing obeisance to the religious Right and its kill-anything-that-moves attack instincts. Believe it or not, I don't look in the mirror every morning and see my father looming over my shoulder. I write and speak as nothing more or less than an American citizen, one who is plenty angry about the direction our country is being dragged by the current administration.

Cult Status

It can be tough being a cult leader these days. The pressures of amassing a following, selecting a proper style for your appearance, purchasing property for your cult headquarters and coming up with a system of odd-ball beliefs, can get to you. That's why you need the forthcoming book The Purpose-Driven Cult: Growth and Stability Without Prosecution. Yes, The Purpose-Driven Cult is the perfect companion and guide for busy cult leaders. [the full post]

Cool, But Closed.

[from The Heresy]

Let’s face it, a lot of people who congratulate themselves on being cool are really deceiving themselves. I may be uncool, but I can tell what cool is, and most people I know aren’t all that cool at all. They are broken, hurting, insecure, needy people who constantly fail themselves and others. Watching people banter on about cool is like watching kids in a backwards 2 horse town talk about how much greater they are than the folks in the backwards 1 horse town down the road. It’s not cool; it is really kind of sad.
{the full post}