Saturday, October 20, 2007

then i sat down and started writing... (qotd:102007)









Paul Budnitz is the founder and president of Kidrobot. The place where the toys of your dreams are made and sold (some results many vary). I ran across this post of his while reading his blog.

"Being creative has nothing to do with your mind. The mind exists to judge, to criticize -- because it's a survival organ, the mind's primary function is to make sure we're safe, to judge if that yellow blob over there is a scary lion or a broken bulldozer. The mind can't deal with uncertainty, and being creative is always, always putting yourself in the land of the uncertain. To the untrained mind that's equivalent to walking into traffic blind. The prospect of something new, something that arrives out of nowhere is intrinsically terrifying to our egos.
There is no place for the mind during the process of actually creating things. We take advantage [of] our minds later, at the end of the process, to evaluate if what we have made is beautiful, ugly, scary, worthwhile, or might land us in jail.

Learning to become perpetually creative is nurturing the habit of getting our mind out of the way. Writer's block is just a habit. The amazing thing about human beings is that we can nurture new habits. We can retrain ourselves to create differently."

words to take to heart. not easy though. i think i'll reference this thought often when i feel i can't write. sometimes you have to turn off all the issues and all the rules and all the drama and just create.

especially the rules!

then if you feel the need, there is always the post-create self-edit?

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

happy radiohead day (qotd:101007)

one of my dearest friends, gina, messaged me today.
“happy radiohead day”

omg! how could i forget...

“is that 2day?”
i scrambled (dramatization?) toward the radiohead “dead air space” website. i had meant to get their new only-downloadable-from-their-website album the moment it was self-leaked.
eep!

another im came.
“used liz’s dnld link... do you want mine?”

omg omg omgomgomg!

“sure”

gina: “you’re gonna cry”

13 minutes later i was listening to the album track by track. i got stuck at ”nude” and listened twice. then at “weird fishes/arpeggi.” listened several times.

then it started... i had called her a liar...

i cried.

and i kept listening... “all i need” is painfully beautiful “...i'm the next act waiting in the wings... i'm an animal trapped in your parked car... i am all the days 
that you choose to ignore... you are all i need...”

i think i’ve listened to this album through about a hundred times in the past 3 hours. so far this is my fav.

it’s called “videotape

“when i'm at the pearly gates
this will be on my videotape, my videotape
mephistopheles is just beneath
and he's reaching up to grab me

this is one for the good days
and i have it all here
in red, blue, green

red, blue, green

you are my center
when i spin away
out of control on videotape
on videotape
on videotape
on videotape

this is my way of saying goodbye
because i can't do it face to face
i'm talking to you after it's too late
from my videotape

no matter what happens now
you shouldn't be afraid
because i know today has been the most perfect day i've ever seen.”






Tuesday, October 9, 2007

...if you want it... (qotd:100907)

On today's date in 1940, John Lennon was born. To celebrate, we went to see Across the Universe the new film directed by Julie Taymor featuring the music of the Beatles. I suddenly realized the significance of the timing of this film. We are in a war that is often compared to the war in Viet Nam. And we still talk of peace as if it’s the silly dreams of hippie fairy tails.

Lennon’s message was simple and yet profound. The most profound things usually are straightforward. That’s why in his honor I chose this quote of the day.

“...All you need is Love...”




poster reads:
WAR IS OVER!
if you want it
Happy Christmas from John & Yoko