Snatching some reflection time

The other day my friend Paula was lamenting the amount of time and energy she spends taking care of details and learning the intricacies of technology that are supposed to help us manage life. She said she can write a blog that millions can read, but she no longer has the time to reflect enough to have anything worth saying.

Since I know exactly what she’s talking about, let’s reflect on that. What solutions, what joy, what brilliance, what creativity are we and the world missing because we fill every waking minute with work and amusement of some kind?

I know Paula wasn’t talking just about amusement, but sometimes words grab me and that one just did. To muse is to think. In ancient Greek mythology, the Muses were the creative inspirations for the arts. A- means the absence of the thing that follows. Hence, a-musement means the absence of thought, the absence of creative inspiration.

Of course sometimes we need amusement as a stress reliever. But do we live such stressful lives that we perceive a continual need for amusement? If that’s the case, I fear we’ve lapsed into a mental and emotional form of insulin dependence. We crave amusement to relieve stress, which is made worse by the lack of time to reflect on life. And round and round the hamster ball rolls.

What if we choose to set aside some amusement-free time? Time to mull over events and ideas and even get to know ourselves. (Ah, there’s the thing most-to-be-avoided…) Depending on how strong the dependence is, we’ll have to be intentional about it, even set a timer, starting with small increments of electronic free time, since that’s the main culprit. It doesn’t have to be sit in the dark and do nothing time. Vacuum at the same time, or mow the grass, or knit. Without headphones. What’s the worst that could happen?

Right now I’m going to bed and reflect as I drift off.

 

 

 

 

Just a plain, ordinary day

“Today is just a plain ordinary day.”

I have writer’s block and this is the first thing that came to mind.

When I was nine, I got a five-year diary for my birthday. Each space had only four lines to write on, which is just ridiculous, but some days those blank lines stared at me, mocking my dull existence. So I’d write “Today was just a plain ordinary day.” After all, and don’t ask me why, I had to write something. Talk about sucking the joy out of writing.

Eventually I figured out that some days I would have more things to say and need more than four lines with which to say them, so I started to forego the “ordinary day” mantra and just left it blank, banking the space for the good stuff of another year. Why should someone else’s template of a five-year diary keep me in a strait jacket?

Why, indeed? Why did I not just chuck the thing and buy a steno pad to write in? Well, because my Aunt Edith had given me the diary as a gift and spent her perfectly good money on it. I loved her, and I would use it, by gum.

I long ago threw that diary away. I’m sorry I did, because as embarrassing as it might be, it was evidence of the girl who still lives inside me. Some days I struggle to get back in touch with her, and a read through that old diary might help. Might even break loose my dammed up flow.

For now, in what should be a more wise place, remembering that diary spurs me to ask this question: What about today is not plain and not ordinary, or at least worth noticing?

Today the redbud trees and flowering plums and greens from citrus to almost red are brilliant. In a few days they’ll begin to soften and blend.

Today at church the welcoming smiles and words of Karen and Jeff, Brenda and George, warmed us.

 Today, driving by fields, we saw brand-new calves getting used to this big world. Nothing about their day is plain or ordinary.

I will notice, and I will write. I will try.

 

Lesser known movie lines revisited

Last week we posted some of our favorite lesser known lines from old movies. Time to fill in the blanks:

 

“What, this old thing? I only wear it when I don’t care how I look.” 

• Who said it: Violet, with an extra flounce of her skirt, to the original Bert and Ernie, as she walks down the street very aware that she stops men in their tracks. 
• Movie: It’s a Wonderful Life

“Aw, Diz, don’t say it’s a nice name. Say it’s the prettiest name you ever heard.”

• Who said it: Saunders, to her reporter friend about her first name, Clarissa, when she wishes the new Senator Smith saw her as more than an efficient staffer.
• Movie: Mr. Smith Goes to Washington

“Gray, Ryan. The world is gray.”

• Who said it: CIA sleazeball Ritter, to Jack Ryan, who insists on truth. (On too many Indiana mornings, gray is truth.)
• Movie: Clear and Present Danger

“I didn’t want you to be this miserable. A little bit’s all I asked for.”

• Who said it: Not yet supportive Mr. Stoler, to his son Dave, who just got sabotaged by the Italians in a bike race.
• Movie: Breaking Away

“Dear Lord, help him to be agittin’ his land.”

• Who said it: Ma York, praying for her son Alvin to achieve his dream of earning the money to buy a piece of bottom land and marry Gracie. (We say it when we pray for our children, and God knows what we mean.)
• Movie: Sergeant York

“That’s one of my problems–I’m an anorexic spender.”

• Who said it: Stuart Smalley, when a friend told him to go practice some retail therapy. (One of us says it about herself.)
• Movie: Stuart Saves His Family

“Be careful. You’re playing in the big leagues now.”

• Who said it: Computer consultant Richard Sumner, to a colleague who had yet to gain respect for the formidable talents of Bunny Watson and her staff in the TV network’s research department.
• Movie: Desk Set

“Nevertheless.”

• Who said it: Rosie, to Charlie, when he was trying desperately to convince her that death awaited them a thousand times over if they kept going down the river to take out the Louisa. (We say it whenever we have our own rapids to shoot.)
• Movie: The African  Queen

 

Whole and human

This blog will probably be a melange* of business, personal, and faith. That’s how we live our life, so why not?

 

We’ve lived enough years to know that life cannot be divvied up into little packets. As people who are trying to live whole lives, we realize that even when we offer professional services to other businesses, we are dealing with people. And we don’t want it any other way.

 

*French for mixture or mess, depending on your point of view.

 

Lesser known movie lines

Lesser known movie lines that still communicate plenty:

These all come from old movies. I’d say classic, but that’s debatable among People Who Know More Than We Do for at least one of them. I may not have the quotes word-perfect, but they’re close enough to be recognizable. Who said each, and in what circumstances?

1. “What, this old thing? I only wear it when I don’t care how I look.”
2. “Aw, Diz, don’t say it’s a nice name. Say it’s the prettiest name you ever heard.”
3. “Gray, Ryan. The world is gray.”
4. “I didn’t want you to be this miserable. A little bit’s all I asked for.”
5. “Dear Lord, help him to be agittin’ his land.”
6. “That’s one of my problems–I’m an anorexic spender.”
7. “Be careful. You’re playing in the big leagues now.”
8. “Nevertheless.”

 

 

Strengths-based living, or golden handcuffs?

Marcus Buckingham writes in The One Thing You Need to Know that sustained individual success comes from figuring out what you don’t like to do and finding a way to stop doing it. Sounds easy enough.

 

I believe in this strengths-based principle. I want to make choices based on my strengths as much as possible. But what too many of us run up against is how to get out of golden handcuffs called health insurance benefits.

 

Speaking of which, isn’t the term golden handcuffs negative? I always thought so. Sure, it refers to benefits like insurance and retirement funds. But we’re talking handcuffs here. Being controlled by someone else. A punitive loss of freedom. Going and staying where you wouldn’t otherwise choose to be, doing work you don’t want to do, because someone more powerful imposes it on you.

 

But the other day I Googled golden handcuffs, and guess what turned up? Lots of human resource sites tout golden handcuffs as a strategy to retain “talent.” Makes my stomach sour and the rebellion crawl up the back of my neck.

 

Retain talent? If that’s the only reason you give people to hang around, no way. The people might stay, but the talent will go dormant.

 

Toe in the water

Our first blog post–not much, just to say we made it. The good stuff is yet to come, as we learn our way around. Thanks, WordPress.