An Unbalanced Life.

Colorful drops by tanakawho

Many of us are trying to reach that magical place where life is a perfect balance of work and play, good and bad. Although most of us are probably making steady progress, I offer another solution: an unbalanced life.

An unbalanced life is one where we not only admit our flaws – we embrace them! All of our wacky quirks and strange habits now become our strengths. Let’s say you like making personalized Christmas cards, but you get the inspiration in July. Who cares? Go for it! There’s no real reason not to get those cards done early, and your family and friends will appreciate the time and effort you put into them; no matter what time of the year they were done.

Look for your natural rhythms. Who cares if you like to exercise at 9:00 pm at night? If you sleep soundly and can fit it into your schedule, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it. Maybe you prefer to clean first thing in the morning? As long as you don’t disrupt anyone’s sleep, go for it. What if you like jazz, but your spouse likes country? That’s what MP3 players were invented for.

Instead of trying to fight our nature, we should welcome it openly. If you’re a morning person, do your hardest tasks early in the day when you have the energy. If you hate making dinner every night after work, try fixing 3-4 meals on Sunday and freezing them for the week.

Stop doing things at a certain time or a certain way just because that the way it’s always been done. Free yourself! Be creative and experiment to come up with your own schedule and preferences. Switch dinner for breakfast so you can eat your biggest meal early in the day. Barbeque in the winter and drink hot chocolate in the summer. Let go of other people’s expectations and enjoy your journey.

What quirks, oddities and eccentric behaviors do you enjoy? Feel free to share them in the comment section. Thanks for stopping by.

New Environments of Fun.

Happy Honu by jurvetson

It happens to all of us. For no particular reason we start feeling out-of-sorts and bored. We get stuck in a dull, repetitive pattern and all of our energy and creativity flies right out the window. Our minds shrivel and dry up, and we suddenly find ourselves spending too much time with the TV.

But have hope, my friends. As easy as it is to slip into a rut, it’s just as easy to get out again. All you need to do is introduce something new or different in your life. Even the smallest change, like taking a different road to work can make a difference. You could take the scenic route and see the sun rise over the water, or find a course that takes you by your favorite coffee shop. Add some perk to your morning.

Although I admit I’m a bit of a sissy and afraid of looking foolish, I have been trying more new things over the past few years. Everything from moving from Florida to West Virginia, to taking a course on writing children’s books, to white water rafting, and flying in an experimental open-air plane. Also, I do dance more (although not in front of other people), and I go more places that I haven’t experienced before.

One way to get inspired is to see what other people are doing. For some great ideas on that visit 43 things, and look at the entries under “try new things”, my favorite being Ru’s breathe deeper life list, especially #4 “find at least one thing each day that makes me happy and record it everyday for a year.” Now there’s a great task to try!

Even more revealing is listing the things you’d like to do before you die. Far from being morbid, this activity actually helps you find those things that fill you with passion and excitement. They can be small or large, but the main idea is fill you with enthusiasm and fun just thinking about it. Maybe you’d like to take a cruise to another country, or visit The Coliseum in Rome. You could yearn to climb Mount Everest, or simply like to learn how to ski. Perhaps you’d like to sky dive, ride in a hot-air balloon, or just visit your local aquarium.

For more fantastic ideas on new environments and things to do, visit Grant Thorpe’s “100 things to do before you die,” as well as “Creating a bucket list.” Some of my favorites include; learn Mandarin (for you Firefly fans), take a belly dancing class, swim with sharks, watching the Space Shuttle take off, and ride a camel in the desert. These lists are filled with fun and unique activities certain to get you out of your comfort zone and into something new and exciting. Try it for yourself and let me hear about your success.

What Do You love?

Balloons by Crystl

There are so many things I absolutely adore! Anything from visiting an amusement park and scaring myself silly on a roller-coaster, to watching butterflies bumble around on a sunny day. I love my family, and spending time with all my nieces and nephews. I love eating chocolate, rocking out to the radio, reading books of every kind and taking a long, hot shower when I’m cold.

I love the Internet, connecting with people and ideas all over the globe. I love technology, from computers and cell phones to the latest video games. I love going to the movies with that gigantic picture and all the popcorn you can eat. I love fireworks on 4^th of July, snow at Christmas and play in the water in the hot summer sun.

The great thing about love is that when you express your joy and excitement to others, you get to share your passions and then your love grows even bigger. And, the more you think about the things you love, the more happiness you feel. Remembering times of delight and bliss lets you experience what you love over and over again.

Love means pleasure, satisfaction, energy, exhilaration, and cheerfulness. It’s important to know what you love so that you can eliminate things you don’t enjoy to make room for fun, laughter and light-heartedness. If you don’t know what makes your heart smile and your eyes bright, now is the time to start your list.

Here are a few ways you can start your list:

• Think back to experiences where you felt peaceful, full of energy, and bubbly. Write down what you were doing that made you feel that way.
• Look through a magazine at only the pictures. When you see something that makes you laugh or smile, cut it out. Add those activities to your list.
• Brainstorm ideas, places and things that could make you happy.

More things I love are; the smell of freshly cut grass, balloons of all sorts, new sheets for my bed, extra-long hugs, learning about history, the wind singing through the leaves, the color purple, and drives through the country. How about you?

Inspiration – we all need it!

Monolith by Zest-pk

Inspiration is that creative spark, often a sudden moment of new ideas, insight and motivation that can come from the smallest spark of conversation. It’s that moment when the most mundane or unexpected bit of information ignites a fire of understanding and awareness.

Inspiration can be a joy of discovery. One minute you’re feeling discouraged, down-in-the-dumps and blue. The next you’ve suddenly woken up to the beauty of the trees around you, the sunlight shining brightly down and you feel energetic and hopeful.

Encouragement can come from anywhere - a smile from a child, a flash of color in a woman’s dress, a humorous joke that hits home. The beauty of enlightenment is that is can come from any where at any time. You can look for it, but even if you are not searching it can appear totally at random.

Motivation however, is usually a bit more fleeting. How many times have I been inspired by a wonderful story of a hard-working athlete, a disabled man or a family full of adopted children? In them I recognize how easy my own life is and how much more I could do with it if only I put in more effort.

Over the last year I have found inspiration in the many kindness organizations and happiness students found on the web. Everywhere are people spreading joy, fun, laughter and best of all hope. People who share their time, skills, knowledge and money for the simple pleasure of seeing a smile on the face of a stranger.

My personal wish is that by writing this, I may stimulate a new energy or a brainwave of new ideas in a reader, who will then bring encouragement, hope, and inspiration to someone who needs it. Just think of the delight of knowing that your advice, book, music or gift of listening opened someone’s mind to the plethora of abundance and wonder available in the world. To know you gave someone else hope is one of life’s greatest gifts.

Please feel free to share your own experiences of insight, understanding, and creativity, whether through your own discovery or through someone else. For fun, here are just a few of the things that have inspired me recently; watching a robin listening to the earth to find a meal, seeing the sunlight shine on my cocker-spaniel’s golden fur, a great joke that even made me laugh at death and enjoying my favorite blogs, including Kim and Jason, Urban Monk, Jarkko Laine and many, many more. What has inspired you today?

Imagination – the Gift of Possibilities.

The world through my eyes by aussiegall

Besides laughter, imagination is one of the greatest gifts of human beings. Our imaginations allow us to contemplate such mysteries as how we can lower our electric bill and save money, to the merits of brawn versus brain in a Hulk versus Superman fight to the finish. With the power of our minds we can create new worlds, new ideas, and new ways of thinking. With a little help we can make our imagination limitless.

Imagination is often underrated and overlooked. Parents are heard shushing their children, “There are no such things are monsters under the bed,” while in later years advertisers pay millions for successful product ads filled with the same type of originality and wonder.

Imagination is part of our world in a wide variety of ways; from new recipes and taste combinations, to the books we read, movies we watch and of course the art we enjoy in our homes. Imagination is the powerhouse of creativity and ingenuity that create new products and services and grow our economy and our world. Inventive and visionary people from all walks of life are sought for an assortment of jobs, businesses and careers.

Imagination has played a part in my life since the very beginning. As a child my love for reading and learning came in large part from the colorful, creative and unusual world of Dr. Suess. Cartoons which allowed a suspension of reality filled my head with wonderful and marvelous new ideas. Fun and playful commercials enticed me into a fantasy world with my favorite characters where adventure and excitement lay around every corner.

Here are a few of my favorite imaginations:

• Shel Silverstein – author of “A Light in the Attic,” and several other wonderful books. Childhood poetry and books opened my mind to meeting new people and seeing new places.
• Roald Dahl – author of “Matilda,” and “The Big Friendly Giant (or BFG).” Dahl’s creative wordplay, playful attitude and funny characters are still a joy to read.
• George Lucas – director of Star Wars. Okay, we all know George. His movies have created one of the hugest fan bases in this universe. For over 30 years he his beloved films have inspired new generations of scientists, researchers, explorers across the globe.
• Beethoven, Bach, Vivaldi, Mozart and other classical artists have touched hearts and minds with their musical genius. Their legacy continues as the beauty of music continues to inspire countless generations.
• Thomas Edison, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Graham Bell, and the many past and present inventors, whose very job it is to have the biggest imaginations possible. Without them and their wonderful minds we’d still be in the dark.
• Your children and grandchildren. If ever you need a boost in how to access and use your imagination, spend a little time with some kids.

If this has inspired you as much as it has me, you may want to jump right out there and start using that noggin of yours. Use it or lose it as they say. Here are a few web sites to help you do just that:

Develop Your Imagination by Using it.

Guided Imagery for Relaxation

Robert Alan Black’s Creativity Challenge #14 (1999)

International Centre For Creativity and Imagination

The Car That Hated Vanilla Ice Cream.

Here’s an interesting article I found on the web that gives a wonderful example of how open-minded and creative thinking can help you find solutions in even the most bizarre situations. This is a brilliant example for customer service reps that shows how even when a customer makes an outrageous complaint there may be a grain of truth in it.

The great part is that although it took logical and rational thinking to solve the problem, it also took a willingness to suspend disbelief to find the truth of the situation.

This is a real story that happened between the customer of General Motors and its Customer-Care Executive. Please read on…..

A complaint was received by the Pontiac Division of General Motors:

‘This is the second time I have written to you, and I don’t blame you for not answering me, because I sounded crazy, but it is a fact that we have a tradition in our family of Ice-Cream for dessert after dinner each night, but the kind of ice cream varies so, every night, after we’ve eaten, the whole family votes on which kind of ice cream we should have and I drive down to the store to get it. It’s also a fact that I recently purchased a new Pontiac and since then my trips to the store have created a problem….

You see, every time I buy a vanilla ice-cream, when I start back from the store my car won’t start. If I get any other kind of ice cream, the car starts just fine. I want you to know I’m serious about this question, no matter how silly it sounds “What is there about a Pontiac that makes it not start when I get vanilla ice cream, and easy to start whenever I get any other kind?” The Pontiac President was understandably skeptical about the letter, but sent an Engineer to check it out anyway.

The latter was surprised to be greeted by a successful, obviously well educated man in a fine neighborhood. He had arranged to meet the man just after dinner time, so the two hopped into the car and drove to the ice cream store. It was vanilla ice cream that night and, sure enough, after they came back to the car, it wouldn’t start.

The Engineer returned for three more nights. The first night, they got chocolate. The car started. The second night, he got strawberry. The car started. The third night he ordered vanilla. The car failed to start.

Now the engineer, being a logical man, refused to believe that this man’s car was allergic to vanilla ice cream. He arranged, therefore, to continue his visits for as long as it took to solve the problem. And toward this end he began to take notes: He jotted down all sorts of data: time of day, type of gas uses, time to drive back and forth etc.

In a short time, he had a clue: the man took less time to buy vanilla than any other flavor. Why? The answer was in the layout of the store. Vanilla, being the most popular flavor, was in a separate case at the front of the store for quick pickup. All the other flavors were kept in the back of the store at a different counter where it took considerably longer to check out the flavor.

Now, the question for the Engineer was why the car wouldn’t start when it took less time. Eureka - Time was now the problem - not the vanilla ice cream!!!! The engineer quickly came up with the answer: “vapor lock”.

It was happening every night; but the extra time taken to get the other flavors allowed the engine to cool down sufficiently to start. When the man got vanilla, the engine was still too hot for the vapor lock to dissipate.

What a gift flexible thinking and an open mind can be! Next time you have a problem that seems to have no solution, remember this story and look at it again. There’s an answer there somewhere, if you know how to look.

To help you creatively solve your problems read the wonderful book “A Whack on the Side of the Head,” by Roger von Oech, and check out his web site here. This book made a huge difference in my thinking, and its 25^th anniversary edition is coming out in May 2008. I’d also like to thank Naveen’s Journal where this great article originated.

Harry Potter School is Cool!

I love to see innovation and creativity, especially for children. Thanks to the Good News Network, I recently came across a story of a school in Nottinghamshire, England that used the power of magic to interest children in learning. A school in the bottom-ranking has used themes to help teach children in every subject. Previous themes include Titanic, Africa and Princes and Princesses.

By implementing the new Harry Potter theme into art, history, geography, English and math children are stimulated by subjects that previously were dull and boring. As a result grades have improved as well as student behavior. I hope this inventive atmosphere will catch on and inspire more schools to adopt a more playful and flexible teaching style. To read the entire article click here.

10 unusual ways to have fun cleaning.

Picture by holliesanders

Okay we all know that most of us don’t like doing our chores. They are repetitive and boring, there are always other we’d rather be doing. So in an effort to make the drudgery a bit more palatable, here are a few unusual ideas on how to have a little fun while you work.

1. Dance while you work. Make up your own dance moves in the privacy of your own home. Most of like dancing but we have no time to practice. Warning: This can be highly addictive; don’t be surprised if you find yourself dancing in the stores to the overhead music.
2. Read. If you never have time to read, try listening to an audio book each night as you make dinner, wash dishes or pick up.
3. Race yourself. Time yourself to see how fast you can complete your chores. Try to set a goal that’s faster than usual but not so fast you don’t do the job properly. Reward yourself if you can do it faster for a week by purchasing a small gift for yourself.
4. Talk to friends and family. If you never have time to call people you want to talk to, try to do it while you do your weekly cleaning. Put on the headset that came with your cell phone and get two things done at once.
5. Watch a movie. Do you have a few favorite movies that you know almost every line word for word? Put one of them on while you exercise or dust. Even if you miss a few moments you’ll know exactly what’s going on.
6. Make faces at yourself. I’ve done this one as well. Sometimes you just don’t want to do those chores. Maybe you’re tired, or had a frustrating day. Whatever the reason, look in the mirror and make the grumpiest, grouchiest face you can think of. Do this every time you pass a mirror. You’ll find yourself giggling and chuckling at your own silliness and soon your bad mood will be gone.
7. Pretend. Imagine you are a fairy princess being kept as a slave by an evil sorcerer. You must get everything spotless or he will destroy your family and the man you love. Sure it’s silly, but sometimes a little imagination goes a long way. (You could also imagine the look on your mother-in-law’s face when she can’t find a hair out of place on her next visit.)
8. Music. Put on some of your favorite CD’s or a favorite radio station. I did this just the other day with my MP3 player and was amazed at how fast I finished everything. I didn’t get to all the songs I wanted to.
9. Aroma therapy. I have noticed that when I use products with a citrus smell such as orange or lemon I like the smell and enjoy using it more. I used to have a Rainbow vacuum that used water and you could put in different scents to fill the air as you vacuumed. Using more natural products or at least ones that smell good can make your cleaning chore more pleasant.
10. Bless your things. This is a great gratitude exercise. As you wash your favorite glass, put your favorite sheets on the bed, or mop your new tile floor, notice what you are doing. Give thanks for the wonderful things you have and the beauty and joy they give you daily.

While not every idea will work for every person, I hope this will give you something to work with. If you have an idea you’d like to share, please feel free to leave a comment. Thanks for stopping by!

Be creative and break the rules.

Giant baby Uploaded on March 11, 2007 by Greencolander

I used to believe that being creative meant being a famous artist, a musical composer or even a movie director. Now I understand that anyone who does something in a new way, or even views the world differently is creative. The mother sewing a Halloween costume for her child, the would-be inventor with his drawings and software programs, or the sister blessed with a knack for floral arranging are all creative.

The Internet has been a fascinating medium to display and promote so many highly innovative artists. Some of my favorites have been the hyper-realistic sculptures of Ron Mueck, the teeny tiny art on a pinhead from Willard Wigan and the driftwood horses of Heather Jansch. These unique and imaginative artists inspire us with their dedication to detail and distinctive designs.

The great thing about being creative is that you get to break all the rules. Color outside the lines; make the grass purple and the sky red. It’s your individual vision. Use clay, crayons, copper wire, or old forks. Make artwork so small it has to be viewed under a microscope, or give new life to dead, dried up pieces of wood. Your masterpiece is up to you. Construct whatever distinctive and extraordinary visions your mind can come up with. You get to decide. Experiment and try something new. You never know what you’ll discover.

As always, I have a few more lovely web sites to share the joy of creativity with you. These will stimulate your brain cells and get you thinking:

Creativity for life

Robert Alan Black

Jig Zone (online jigsaw puzzles)

Web Sudoku online