Creating Something Delicate and Fleeting

Cover of Common

"When I'm doing a freestyle, my mind is working faster than my mouth, and my memory is all but shut down. You can ask me what I said three minutes after I finish, and I won't be able to tell you the first thing about it. Sometimes you create for posterity; you create with that sense of timelessness. But sometimes you create something that's so delicate-so fleeting-that it can last only for a moment. To me, that kind of creation is no less beautiful, no less miraculous. It's just its own thing."

- Common from his memoir "One Day It'll All Make Sense" pg 44.

Imran Yusuf Delivers Some Laughs

Stories Voice What Can't Be

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"I have said that feelings are the hardest of human responses to put into language. Stories express feelings we recognize, and permit us to identify them, to experience them in language."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 105

Stimulating Conversation

Cover via Amazon"Good communication is as stimulating as black coffee and just as hard to sleep after."

- Anne Morrow Lindbergh from 'Gift From the Sea'

Discover the Treasure in Daily Life

Image via Wikipedia"Develop interest in life as you see it; in people, things, literature, music - the world is so rich, simply throbbing with rich treasures, beautiful souls and interesting people. Forget yourself."

- Henry Miller

While It Lasts

Cover of The Razor's Edge"Nothing in the world is permanent, and we're foolish when we ask anything to last, but surely we're still more foolish not to take delight in it while we have it. If change is of the essence of existence one would have thought it only sensible to make it the premise of our philosophy.

- W. Somerset Maugham from The Razor's Edge

Hide Your Sources

Image via Wikipedia"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."

- Albert Einstein

What?

Shouldn't we give credit where credit is due?

I understand that creative people can be influenced by everyting around them, and maybe we can hide those influences in our own creative work.

I guess that is what Einstein meant.

A Story Can't Be Verbatim

Image by kilo75 via Flickr

"A storyteller is a life poet, an artist who transforms day-to-day living, inner life and outer life, dream and actuality into a poem whose rhyme scheme is events rather than words—a two hour metaphor that says: Life is like this Therefore, a story must abstract from life to discover its essences, but not become an abstraction that loses all sense of life-as-lived.  A story must be like life, but not so verbatim that it has no depth or meaning beyond what’s obvious to everyone on the street."

- Robert McKee. Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principals of Screenwriting. ReganBooks: New York, 1997. pg 25

Don't Stand By

"The world will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch them without doing anything."

- Albert Einstein

Happy Monday Everyone! Here's an inspirational quote that will hopefully motivate us to stand up and take action when we see injustice.

I think this would be a great quote to use in the classroom. It relates to bullying and would work well with the prevention programs we see in schools nowadays.

p.s. Found this image on Facebook. Feel free to head on over there and friend me. I haven't used it much in the past but am starting to get more active on that site now. 

You Can’t Donate People Out of Poverty

“You can’t donate people out of poverty.”
- Paul Polak on The Hour 10 June 2008

This quote reminds me of the old cliché,

“Give a man a fish and he’ll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he’ll eat forever.”

It's Always About The Adventure

Image via WikipediaLaura: "Greg, I am so sorry. I really meant to marry you. I did. And suddenly, I put on that wedding dress and I thought, 'Here I go, my last great adventure.' And then I realized, I was only 22 and I've hardly had any great adventures."

Greg: "You don't think starting a family is an adventure?"

Laura: "Why, sure it is. It's just not-"

Greg: "Paris."

Laura: "You still finish my sentences."

Greg: "And you are still the prettiest girl I have ever laid eyes on."

Laura: "You need to let me go."

Greg: "When I was 15, I read a story in Boy's Life about climbing Kilimanjaro. And it seemed about as far away as the moon. But I mowed lawns all summer so that I could make the trek. Saved almost three hundred dollars. It wasn't enough by a long shot but I put it in the bank and I swore that someday that money would go towards an adventure."

Laura: "And what did you spend it on?"

Greg: "A ring. But that's not the point.If what you are leaving me for is-"

Laura: "Kilimanjaro"

Greg: "Then Bon Voyage, Laura. Safe journey."

- Pan Am television series: Season 1: Episode 2 "We'll Always Have Paris"

How to Disarm all Hostility

Image via WikipediaHenry Wadsworth Longfellow once said, "If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each man's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility."

When we’re hurting or angry or betrayed, and we can still find the inner strength to tap into that compassion within our soul to disarm our hostility towards others, then we have made the dream of transcendental love a reality.

- Judy Croome - from an interview on Positive Letters.... inspirational stories

When you're playin' a game of make-believe, are you still you?

"Little boys are like doors into the impossible. Like when you're playin' games.When you're playin' a game of make-believe, are you still you? Or are you a spy? Or a cowboy? Or a knight? Who are you when you're playin' those games? And what do you think you're doin' when you play those games? You're telling another story."

- A story within a story from Laura Lee Gulledge's graphic novel "Page by Paige"

Always Pretending

Cover of The Way to Love (Image Pocket Classics)

"Only the adult human being is able to be one thing and pretend to be another."

- Anthony De Mello. The Way to Love: The Last Meditations of. Image Books, 1991. pg 99

We Are Interesting Parts of a Whole

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"According to Margulis and Lovelock, the earth can be understood as a giant living organism, attending to its own needs – an organism of which we, for the moment, are interesting parts."

- David Leeming. Myth: A Biography of Belief. Oxford University Press, 2002 pg 46

I love this idea. It reminds me of the Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy and how we are all here for a larger purpose that we cannot even fathom.

We Need Longer Acknowledgment Pages

Image by heather via Flickr

"Many people, other than the authors, contribute to the making of a book, from the first person who had the bright idea of alphabetic writing through the inventor of movable type to the lumberjacks who felled the trees that were pulped for its printing. It is not customary to acknowledge the trees themselves, though their commitment is total."

- Rada and Forsyth, Machine Learning

"I’ve got an idea for this week, an antidote for the fear being foisted upon us by people who want to manipulate and profit from it. An idea that doesn’t involve chest thumping, flag waving, or the naming and elimination of our enemies: Do what the Amish do. Forgive.

- From the article "Forgive Those Who Trespass Against Us" from Game Changers

Zig Recommends it Daily

Cover of Zig Ziglar

"People say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing. That's why I recommend it daily."


- Zig Ziglar. Newsletter 2, October 2007

High Value - No Cost

Image via Wikipedia"Forgiveness is a gift of high value. Yet its cost is nothing."

- Betty Smith. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Perennial Classics, 1943, 1998. pg 157

Monogamy is a State of Higher Evolution

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Waverly: "I think what he is trying to say is that monogamy isn't natural. The male species is hard-wired for genetic diversity. So, the instinct is to, ya know, fertilize as many eggs as possible - to have sex."

Smash: "Exactly!"

Waverly: "Yeah, but human beings are different. I mean, civilization is based on the repression of instincts. When we act contrary to out instincts, that's when things get interesting. A lot of people would say that monogamy is a state of higher evolution - with the right person."

- Friday Night Lights Season 1: Episode 10 "It's Different for Girls"

Desire to Achieve

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"A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others."

- Ayn Rand 

One Text - Multiple Pictures

Image by Rick Smit via Flickr

"The reader can apply what is for him an accurate picture to a word."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 68

I find it amazing that our minds can paint completely different pictures based upon the same text. We have so many different interpretations. If you doubt that, you've probably never enjoyed a book only to be let down by a movie adaptation.

Language Evolved

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"Language is what human beings have evolved, over millions of years for conveying meaning."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 68

Writers & Readers - Give and Take

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"Writers provide language that can evoke feeling; we readers supply the experience."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 107

This give and take between writer and reader is fascinating. We use our experience when reading to identify with the character. The writer hopes that we will be able to do so and thus evoke an emotion in us. This is the greatest form of entertainment. Living and experiencing through each other's stories.

It's All Connected

"In memory, the images are connected like events and characters in a story."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 81

This quote reminds me of the book The Modular Brain, in which examples are shown to illustrate how the brain is connected in ways that allow it to function differently according to the patient; perhaps like how stories function through characters.

Fiction is the Best Medium

"Fiction is the best medium for providing contexts for feelings by using language the reader may not be able to supply for herself."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 111

I agree. Fiction allows us to experience things we cannot even vocalize. We can identify with a character or situation and this can free us somehow. It is an amazing power that fiction has.

I can understand why Gold uses fiction to help his patients. This book is inspiring in so many ways. I always knew that there was a lot of truth in fiction. Gold shows us how this is indeed the case. It's a great book.

A Funky Introdcution of How Nice I Am

"Now here's a funky introduction of how nice I am
Tell your mother, tell your father, send a telegram
I'm like an energizer 'cause, you see, I last long
My crew is never ever wack because we stand strong

Now if you say my style is wack that's where you're dead wrong
I slayed that body in El Segundo then 'Push it Along'
You'd be a fool to reply that Phife is not the man
'Cause you know and I know, that you know who I am

A special shout of peace goes out to all my pals, you see
And a middle finger goes for all you punk MC's
'Cause I love it when you wack MC's despise me
They get vexed, I roll next, can't none contest me

I'm just a fly MC who's five foot three and very brave
On job remaining, no I'm chaining 'cause I misbehave
I come correct in full effect, have all my hoes in check
And before I get the butt, the jim must be erect

You see, my aura's positive, I don't promote no junk
See, I'm far from a bully and I ain't a punk
Extremity in rhythm, yeah, that's what you heard
So just clean out your ears and just check the word."

- Phife Dawgs verse from "Check The Rhime" by A Tribe Called Quest

TV doesn't allow Deep Understanding

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"Television can’t sit still.  In fact, it can’t even slow down, which makes any sort of deep understanding or involvement in issues almost impossible because the average person requires time to contemplate issues like education or the economy or the environment or health care in order to fully understand them.  And that’s the problem.  Because what most people don’t realize is that contemplating or reflecting deeply gets you to insights that you can never get to if you’re just rushing through a question or an issue or from one topic to the next."

- Gordon J.H. Leenders. May Not Appear Exactly As Shown. pg 92

Mystical Consequences of Karma

"Advocating for story architecture is like teaching your kids about the world—tell them to do as you say, not as you do, you tell them about the golden rule and the law of attraction and the mystical consequences of karma, and you do your best to explain that good things happen to good people who live by these creeds.

And when it doesn't . . . well, that's life, and it's not always fair. Doesn't mean it's not a valid principal."

- Larry Brooks. Story Engineering: Mastering the 6 Core Competencies of Successful Writing. Writers Digest Books, 2011. pg 216.

It Was A Good Day

"Just waking up in the morning gotta thank God
I don't know but today seems kinda odd
No barking from the dog, no smog
And momma cooked a breakfast with no hog
I got my grub on, but didn't pig out
Finally got a call from a girl wanna dig out
Hooked it up for later as I hit the door
Thinking will i live, another twenty-four
I gotta go cause I got me a drop top
And if I hit the switch, I can make the ass drop
Had to stop at a red light
Looking in my mirror not a jacker in sight
And everything is alright
I got a beep from Kim and she can f*ck all night
Called up the homies and I'm askin y'all
Which park, are y'all playin basketball?
Get me on the court and I'm trouble
Last week f*ck around and got a triple double
Freaking niggaz every way like M.J.
I can't believe, today was a good day

Drove to the pad and hit the showers
Didn't even get no static from the cowards
Cause just yesterday them fools tried to blast me
Saw the police and they rolled right past me
No flexin, didn't even look in a niggaz direction
as I ran the intersection
Went to Short Dog's house, they was watchin Yo! MTV Raps
What's the haps on the craps
Shake em up, shake em up, shake em up, shake em
Roll em in a circle of niggaz and watch me break em
With the seven, seven-eleven, seven-eleven
Seven even backed on little Joe
I picked up the cash flow
Then we played bones, and I'm yellin domino
Plus nobody I know got killed in South Central L.A.
Today was a good day

Left my niggaz house paid
Picked up a girl been tryin to f*ck since the twelfth grade
It's ironic, I had the blunt she had the chronic
The Lakers beat the Supersonics
I felt on the big fat fanny
Pulled out the jammy, and killed the punanny
And my dick runs deep, so deep, so deep
put her ass to sleep
Woke her up around one
she didn't hesitate, to call Ice Cube the top gun
Drove her to the pad and I'm coasting
Took another sip of the potion hit the three-wheel motion
I was glad everything had worked out
Dropped her ass off, and then chirped out
Today was like one of those fly dreams
Didn't even see a berry flashing those high beams
No helicopter looking for a murder

Two in the morning got the Fatburger
Even saw the lights of the Goodyear Blimp
And it read Ice Cube's a pimp
Drunk as hell but no throwing up
Half way home and my pager still blowing up
Today I didn't even have to use my A.K.
I got to say it was a good day."

- Ice Cube "It Was A Good Day" from the album "The Predator"

An Essential Relationship Between Play and Pleasure.

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"There are four distinct phases of the playing experience: brooding, attachment, immersion, and satisfaction.

Play begins in brooding, in the brooding moment.  It can be a moment of absolute horror.  The uninitiated experience the terror of a formless moment . . . The brooding moment is not only the child who tugs at your sleeve saying, “I don’t know what to do,” but also the writer staring at a blank sheet of paper . . .

The second movement is attachment.  Out of brooding comes attachment, a spark of intensity.  Attachment requires the ability to recognize what has intensity, to feel the resonance.  In the midst of brooding, although it remains unseen and unconscious, and important process unfolds.  Pattern and form circulate until the structural resonance finds alignment.  Then the writer finds the sentence . . .

And then comes immersion, the moment of being lost in play.  This is the transitional state, a different state of consciousness . . . Immersion is the sense of fantasy activity becoming “real.” Then the writer feels the story writing itself and hours are lost . . .

Finally, there is satisfaction—a sense of resolution and release.  There is an essential relationship between play and pleasure.  Enactment releases the tension.  The satisfaction in play, I think, is a result of the sense of completion, not necessarily of achievement."

- D. Stephenson Bond, Living Myth: Personal Meaning as a Way of Life. Shambala, 1993 pg 113-114