Where's your focus?

The Artdog Quote of the Week

It's been shown that optimists tend to be healthier and live longer than pessimists. But are optimists born, or do they cultivate their attitude? If one is a pessimist "by nature," is that person doomed?

No, in fact. Resistance to pessimistic thoughts is not futile. Resiliency can be learned. It doesn't matter how horrible you think things are, bright spots exist. Look for them. Cultivate them. Foster positive things. Where life persists, hope is possible, but it depends on all of us and our choices.

It ultimately comes down to a basic choice: hope or despair. Where would you rather focus? Which would you rather pursue?

IMAGES: Many thanks to Kush and Wizdom's Tumblr, for this quote image.

A daring, creative choice

The Artdog Image of Interest 
The new year has begun, and if you're like me you've begun to think about the year to come. What new initiatives will you take on? What changes will you make? What new insights will you bring from the year just past?

I'd like to challenge you to look at things afresh, to rethink some of the areas where you may have settled into unconscious habits. To dare to make divergent, creative choices.

Can't imagine a cooler way to say it--or a more badass attitude to carry into the year to come. Be creatively bold!

IMAGE: Many thanks to Aga's Pinterest Board, via NanouBlue's Drole Pinterest Board, for this image!

Double standards and our kids

The Artdog Quotes of the Week 

Here's a double dose of quotable thoughts, this time on double standards, and that touchy subject of how to rear our children. When toy manufacturers still market to "the pink aisle" and "the blue aisle," what's a parent to do?

What creative choices must we make, to empower our children to grow up in ways that help them blossom into their full potential--whatever that may encompass?

IMAGES: Many thanks to the Gender Equality blog, for the Gloria Steinem quote, and to AZ Quotes for the quote from Madonna Ciccone.

Here's how to achieve positive change

The Artdog Quote of the Week

IMAGE: Many thanks for this image to The Motivated Type on Etsy, via Lori's Pinterest pinboard.

On picking up the pieces and moving forward

What is this week? Specifically, what’s the middle of this week? 

It’s the moment when the balance shifts, from Solstice-and- Christmas-stuff toward New-Year thinking.

It’s the time of the week when, if we’re back at work from a break, we’re picking up the projects we’d temporarily laid aside, and gearing back up for business-as-usual. Many of us are dealing with a pile of deferred work that’s been stacking up while we were gone, just waiting for our return to trigger the avalanche.

If we’re still on holiday break, we’re cleaning up the shreds of wrapping paper and ribbon, and deciding if it’s time to start taking down the decorations yet. If we had a live Christmas tree, it’s probably turning into a dry, brittle fire hazard. We’re living on leftovers (and more than a little bored with them by now). If the Christmas jigsaw hasn’t been fully pieced together yet it might be time to give up and put it back in its box.

The Unfinished Puzzle, by Daniel McLean

Some of us are traveling home. Some of us are still trying to figure out where to put stuff. Some of us are relieved that we survived for another year, while others are so depressed we’re not sure we did survive.

But the one thing about this point in the week is that while we’re making our Gotta-Go Soup* or Googling eco-friendly things to do with our old Christmas tree, we’re also shifting gears and moving toward the dawn of a New Year. What will 2017 bring? 

Well, some things are a given. A new Presidential administration, for example. That there will be more winter in the Northern Hemisphere before we get started on spring. That time passes and change happens.

Other stuff is less predictable, but when things happen they must be dealt with (even “good” stress is still stress). Perhaps a loss or gain in your family (or your waistline), a change in jobs, locations, or marital status. A new opportunity. A health issue.

Stuff happens. What we do about the stuff that happens is the test.

I hope you’ll move into the New Year from a place of wholeness and peace, but not all of us are so blessed. Whatever place you’re in, today, there are things you can do, steps you can take, plans you can make (although always with at least a Plan B, because life is like that).

I hope your plans will include two things:

(1) Being good to yourself
No one is as big a screw-up as they sometimes think they are, and everyone deserves a break sometimes. I don’t mean just pampering yourself, as with a “spa day,” though if that’s really what you need I hope you can find a way to manage it. I mean choosing good paths for yourself that lead to a better-for-you way of life, whether that’s an improvement in diet, a set of priorities that allow more exercise, or the setting of healthier personal boundaries.

(2) Finding or nurturing a passion
Without meaningful purpose in your life nothing is worth the effort. The needs of the world are many, and the challenges are great. We cannot solve all problems, but we can work with like-minded others to solve the particular problems that call to our hearts. We’ve recently had Boxing Day as a reason to consider what causes we value and believe in; now, more than ever, we must find ways to support and protect the things, the people, and the foundational principles we cherish the most.

So take this middle-of-the-week, picking-up-the-pieces day, and consider well how you will meet the New Year. We can go forward in despair, repeating old patterns hopelessly, or we can go forward with determination to hold the line on certain things and push forward for improvement on others.

Each of us gets to choose.

***

*Gotta-Go Soup:
If it’s Got To Go, it’s a candidate for Gotta-Go Soup (a variation on Leftovers Supreme). This is my grandmother's recipe:
(1) FLAVOR-MATCHING: Assemble your leftovers. Evaluate what flavors would go together best, and separate them out (put the others in the fridge or the compost/garbage, as appropriate). Figure out what kind of stock or base would best compliment the flavors you’ve assembled.
(2) COOKING: Get out a big pot. Put it on the back burner filled with said stock or soup base. Reduce all your other selections to small, bite-size pieces, and put them in the pot, too. Heat it all up and simmer for at least an hour (smell up the house real good). Season to taste.
(3) EATING: Serve with warm, crusty French bread or other favored accompaniment. You might be surprised how good it tastes!

IMAGES: Many thanks to Life on the Buy Side for the photo of the daunting office paperwork backup, to the blog Meanders for the wrapping-paper wreckage photo, and to Daniel McLean and his Flickr Photostream for the image The Unfinished Puzzle (permission granted via a Creative Commons License). 
I appreciate the availability of the snowy highway photo (in Eden Prairie, MN--doesn't look quite so Edenic in this photo, though) from Minnesota Public Radio's Updraft blog. Many thanks also to the Buy a House Club for the image of the discarded Christmas Tree (from an article on better things to do with them), and to Inspiring Buzz for the quotation image about changes in one's life.
I greatly appreciate the quotation image about being tender with oneself from Helen Hirst's "Self Nurturing" Pinterest board, and to The Huffington Post for the Fabienne Fredrickson quote on passions as our calling. Finally, many thanks to Video Blocks for the photo of the soup pot.

VOTE like your life depends on it! (Because it just might)

Elected officials make policy decisions that affect everyone--sometimes in life-or-death ways. Don't let the big-money guys fool you into thinking your vote doesn't count.

The only way for your vote not to count is not to vote!

IMAGE: Many thanks to Join the Coffee Party Movement's Facebook page, for this image! 

Please note that I am mirroring posts between this blog and the blog on my new website, Jan S. Gephardt's Artdog Studio. Each post goes live there a bit before it goes live here. 

Choose Wisely, O Queen! Artdog Quote of the Week

How often our circumstances try to hand us ready-made answers, about how we should choose what path we will take! But are those paths the right ones for us?

Do they serve our needs and help us blossom into our true calling (which is, I am convinced, the best way of giving ourselves to our world), or are they the manipulations of others, designed to serve other ends?

We have a choice each day. We can become and remain our best, truest selves--and we can be a profound blessing to others in the process. But only if we heed our calling and remain true to ourselves.

Throughout the ages, both women and men have been told what we must do, how we must behave, what priorities we should have. Some of these messages truly are the wisdom of the ages. Sometimes we really should hold certain truths to be self-evident.

Other "truths"? Not so much. We have been endowed with the ability to think: we must always keep refining the ability to discern our best truth from the tide of "shoulds" that bombard us each day. This is true for women, for men, for creative people of all types.

We must each be our own champions, or we'll always remain buried in the landslide of other peoples' value-judgments.

IMAGE: Many thanks to Queen of Your Own Life's "Queenisms," via Seline Shenoy’s “The Dream Catcher” blog!

Artdog Quote of the Week: What are you waiting for?

Perspective:

IMAGE: Many thanks to Under 30 CEO.

Schaller's "Winter White" Show offers varied visions

I love artisanal ceramics. My sister once said, "If you're going to have useful items in your house, they might as well be beautiful." I wholeheartedly agree. Beautiful and useful items--including artisanal ceramics--add joy and texture to daily life.

The delicate texture of this Bowl and Dinner Plate set by A. Blair Clemo is my favorite of the show.

At some point, this interest got me onto the mailing list of the Schaller Gallery, of St. Joseph, MI. Each month they feature top-shelf ceramists in several themed shows, which they share online. I recently logged on to view their "Winter White" show.

Here's a different view of one of A. Blair Clemo's wonderful bowls.

I've always loved the effects that can be developed with a white overglaze on subtle textures, so I eagerly clicked on the link. My standout favorites in this show were the bowls and dinner plates of A. Blair Clemo, who teaches at Virginia Commonwealth University, and whose work has been featured in shows all over the world.

Martha H. Grover's subtle touch turns her Nested Bowls into something magical.

Another highlight of the show for me was Martha H. Grover's  Nested Bowls, which also offer a subtle texture and organic treatment to a practical object. Grover is a widely-exhibited and highly regarded functional potter and porcelain artist who lives in Maine. She describes her approach as seeking to create "a sense of elegance for the user while in contact" with each piece.

Here's a wider view of Grover's Nesting Bowls, which combine subtle elegance and organic form.

Minnesota regionalist Matthew Krousey turns a simple Berry Bowl into something more.

I also liked Matthew Krousey's Berry Bowl, featuring a graceful, spiraling base that turns a utilitarian object into a piece of practical artwork--just the aesthetic my sister described. Krousey describes himself as a "modern day regionalist" from Minnesota who regularly exhibits his pottery, sculpture and murals.

This angle gives a better look at the upper part of Krousey's Berry Bowl.

These three artists offer markedly different approaches, but they all arrive at the fusion of practical and beautiful which is the joy of fine artisanal craft art.

IMAGES: All images are courtesy of the Schaller Gallery's "Winter White" online exhibition. Please take some time to look at the entire show for yourself. There are many other wonderful pieces to see there!

Artdog Quote of the Week: What will we regret?

Creative work is all about the risk-taking, or it isn't about art at all.

IMAGE: Many thanks to Under 30 CEO, for this image.

Artdog Quote of the Week: The Gift of Gratitude

If you celebrate a tradition of Christmas, that holiday is most likely now in the rearview, unless your family has had to adjust it to accommodate an eccentric schedule. 

It's bare (or piled with opened gifts on display) under your tree, the carols are all sung, the egg nog mostly drunk, and the cookies are crumbling to dust. 

But have you given that one last gift?

Did you wear yourself out for the holidays? Did you shop for gifts in crowded places, and strain your imagination for just the right gift for each person? Even if you paced yourself wisely, it was a lot of effort, wasn't it? 

Wouldn't it be nice to know someone actually noticed? Or even better: appreciated all you've done?

That's how we all feel, really. It's nice to know someone noticed, and appreciated the work we did. So before you start wondering if anyone even noticed what YOU did, consider whether you've thanked anyone for what they did for you.

My amazing daughter Signy is the Queen of Thank-You Notes. That girl gets them sent almost before the gift is fully unwrapped. Not sure how she does it, but she's faithful in her task, and eloquent in her individualized expressions of thanks. I am not such a paragon, but I deeply admire what she does.

Even cold-hearted capitalism has noticed the power of a simple thank-you, in business settings. We need to hear it. The validation improves our health, our outlook, our relationships. So don't be shy! Thank someone who deserves it!

Oh, and by the way . . . THANK YOU for reading this!

IMAGES: Many thanks to Angie Rowe’s “Gratitude and Thankfulness” Pinterest board, for the quote image, and to the Overture Group for the image of someone writing "Thank you." Their blog post on crafting thank-you notes is also worth reading.