Me and the aardvark are over there today, answering Eileen and Briana’s questions and sharing our best tips and kung fu maneuvers for creating things.
(Also, I tell a wee secret about how Sassypants came to be Sassypants).
C’mon over to the Green Room. At the Hopscotch Distillery.
Posted by | September 9, 2010 | Leave a Comment
What moves you? What turns you on? Shepard Fairey, at the ICA.
Posted by | August 7, 2009 | 5 Comments
What moves you? I mean, what really moves you?
What takes your breath away and renders you incapable of averting your eyes?
What fascinates you? What grabs you by the collar and doesn’t let you go until you look, really look?
What wakes you up in the middle of the night? What makes the sweat pool in your palms?
What moves you? What makes you want to get up and shout? What makes you melt down and weep?
Whom do you crush on? What do you admire? Whose picture would you plaster on your wall?
What turns you on? What makes every last hair on your arms rise to attention? What makes your brain light up like ten thousand fireflies? What inside or outside you is so intense it could spark a flame in a monsoon?
What takes your breath away? What threatens to dismember you if you don’t give it a pen already? Or a brush? Or a pound of clay? Or a voice? Or a mallet? Or a wrecking ball?
What turns you on?
That. Do that! For the love of life, do it already.
That. See it. Play it. Make love to it. Pay attention to it. Get curious about it. Read it like a 4-year-old asking for that bedtime story night after night. See it again and again until it saturates every pore in your skin. Hear it until you catch its essential thread. Feel it until the need you hadn’t even known was there cries “Uncle” and begs for mercy.
Last night I went to see the Shepard Fairey exhibit at the ICA in Boston. It was my third time in as many months. The first time I went I had no idea. I went because my friend had tickets. I said, “Shepherds? Fairies? Wha—?”
Shepard Fairey began as a street artist in Boston in the 80’s when he began making posters of Andre the Giant. Something inside him needed expression and, apparently, he listened and gave it a voice. Or rather, a can of spray paint.
I vaguely remember noticing Andre graffiti plastered or spray painted on the random box, or in the corner of a billboard, and every so often, large on the wall of some abandoned building. Eventually I saw the ObeyGiant posters in enough places that I wondered what they were all about. But I never really stopped to find out. I was too immersed in my own inner saga, my turmoil, my drama, my bad dreams, my own world of trying at once to fit in and be special.
Which is sort of his point. Or at least the point where I go with Fairey’s “ObeyGiant”, which is to remind us of how “powerful visuals and emotionally potent phrases can be used to manipulate and indoctrinate.” In other words: Believe this. Not that. Try this. Buy that. This is cool. That’s not. We are good. They are bad. And so on…
When I walked into the Shepard Fairey exhibit for the first time, I was greeted with the Obey images that had been peppering the odd places in my city. Oh that, I thought… hmmmm, weird.
And then I entered the next exhibit room to find larger-than-life murals that fairly took my breath away.
Standing back, I saw a Palestinian woman peering through a curtain, a boy too young to shave with machine gun on shoulder, an Arab woman’s fiery eyes on a face otherwise veiled. Up close I could make out newspaper headlines, ads, propaganda campaign slogans, the subtle juxtaposition of visuals we can’t help but constantly take in unless we live in a cave (and maybe even there), the information we are spoon-fed at every meal and at every snack and at every drive through, all of which add up to what to me feels some kind of endless noise.
It comes at me from everywhere. Clutter. Filler. Agendas. Causes.
Not even in the privacy of my own home, with no TV, does it stop. I shut my laptop, and there it is, still, yet so not still, but frantic. Chattering. Blathering.
It’d be easy to blame. I often do. My blame lands, probably fully justified in many people’s minds, on a million and one targets, many so beautifully portrayed in Shepard Fairey’s art.
But blame deflects. Blame very quickly turns into the very same noise and clutter and filler and agenda and endless causes that made me point the finger in the first place.
When I stop and recognize the part I play in what I would blame, I’m left with an inner noise so loud it makes me feel an awful lot like this. I’m tempted, and often do, add distraction to the noise so as to numb it. It does, for a nanosecond. But not very well. When I stop and when I notice I am often, these days, brought to weeping. And then always I am left with a powerful longing for essential.
Essential. Ahhhh, fresh air.
Essential. Ahhhh. Direct. Upfront. No excuses. No apologies. No convincing. No preaching. No converting. No finger wagging. No pointing. No hemming and hawing. No hiding. No pretense.
Essential says: Here I am. This is it. This is what I’ve got. No more, no less. Hello.
It sounds a whole lot like truth. Truth with room for black and for white and for every color in between.
Essential. So heartbreakingly honest. No need to cover up.
The weeping stops. Everything has grown oddly still. And into this you-could-hear-a-pin-drop quiet comes the sound of hooves. Far away at first but quickly gaining. Pounding in my chest like a herd of wild horses galloping down a beach.
Life. It wants out! And it’s coming.
(Shepard Fairey: Supply & Demand will be at the ICA in Boston through August 16. Hurry!)
A tight box + big energy + curiosity + Leonard Cohen = change
Posted by | June 2, 2009 | 14 Comments
Change. It happens. It’s the way of things, of life.
Inside me something’s been pent up for something like forever. Tied up. Stifled. It’s some kind of energy.
Isn’t energy a property of matter related to its ability to perform work? You know, work. As in motion, movement. (I had no idea I had this physics stuff left in me. But don’t get your hopes up. Or, don’t get worried, whichever the case may be. That’s it for physics. Promise.)
Lately some kind of herculean pushing is going on inside me. As if something’s gotten way too small for the space it’s in and now it’s pushing to get the hell out. Sometimes its energy is desperately intense, like it’s buried alive, trying to claw or hoof its way out. Even when more subdued it feels like something growing that has run out of space: there is no way it can keep growing, or even stay alive, where it is, how it is.
IT wants expression. I don’t know exactly what IT is, but its medium is written. And I do have some hints about IT.
This whole buried alive feeling is getting reeeeeally uncomfortable. It’s amping up majorly. We’re at a Spinal Tap 11. Or “a todo full,” as we said growing up in Chile.
I’m curious about the box. The coffin. The majorly confining thing that feels like it’s killing me alive.
Thing 1 about that.
Something is afraid. It is trying to protect me. It has to do with wanting a guarantee of success. Or, better said: It wants to know I won’t fall flat on my face, because from its point of view? That would suck.
Suck how, I wonder—
Um, duh! Major shame. Crimson cheeks. Hide in closet kind of shame.
From its point of view it’d actually be better to stay stuck and stifled in the box than out and free and in danger of falling flat on my face in shame.
Thing 2: “What will they think” and “it’s too much”
These thoughts invariably come nipping at the heels of the push to express in a big way.
Ironically, all the hints I get about the IT point to ITs having to do with taking the shame out of being human. Hmmm! Curiouser and curiouser.
The IT wanting to be written has to do with saying things without pretense. Without prettying them up. Without uglying them up. Saying things as they are.
But in order to say things as they are or in whatever way they ask to be said, I have to get out of their way. The agenda of having me look good doesn’t fit. The hidden motives of teaching anyone anything, making a point, or having a cause don’t fit.
IT may very well allude to or come right out and talk about things people often feel they should hide. (And it’s so not about airing dirty laundry. No). But again: Hello, Shame!
It sure does seem that much (all?) of the reeeeeally hard and stuck stuff of our world—hate, war, prejudice, murder, lies and everything that separates rather than connecting us—touches on shame in some way.
Who would we be without our shame?
I know many people who would say that shame is what keeps us in line. Case in point: Watch the news. Notice the language used in relation to the “bad guys”. Or, adults saying to children: Shame on you!
But really: How IS that working for us? I’m beginning to suspect that line of thought. It seems much more true that shame keeps us hiding and small and, ironically, doing the things that make us feel ashamed.
In all this pondering I have noticed something odd: The people I find most beautiful, endearing, attractive, crush-worthy… and the stories that most speak to me, are not Pollyanna-ish Hallmark-y tales with pretty Hollywood endings. At all.
Rather, they share a quality of almost heart-breaking honesty and openness, usually or often about the very things that would shame me. They are at once incredibly vulnerable and incredibly strong. These people look life in the eye, no matter what looks back. They are as resilient as they are fragile. Their skin is as leathery tough and wrinkly as it is tender and soft. Their transparency is breathtaking. And they don’t care what others think of them. Or if they do, they don’t let that stop them. They go ahead anyway.
Which brings me to
And, um, Leonard Cohen? In case you’ve not been near planet Heidi for the past several years? Newsflash! I am in love with him. In love. Unapologetically and irrevocably: in love.
(Blushing-aside: In fact, halfway through the concert, pro’bly during Chelsea Hotel or Suzanne, I turned to my dear friend who was visiting and had gotten us the tickets, and told him that if there were, you know, any chance of, um, you know, with Leonard Cohen, that, well, um, we’d have to find him—my friend, that is—my camping mattress and sleeping bag so he could sleep on my living room floor for the night. Or something. He laughed and said, of course. Yah. Now that’s a friend!)
So where was I? Oh yes. About my love—
Leonard Cohen, exquisite lover of word and world, is my hero. Such accessible poetry. None of this intellectually aloof blah blah. He is clever, but never in an I-need-to-impress-you way.
But most of all I love him for not hiding his humanity from me, from you. He is imperfect and heart-breakingly honest about his foibles and mistakes. Which makes him all the more beautiful. He teaches me to embrace wherever I am at.
And he shows me how to age with the utmost of grace. Talk about vintage wine. Oh my. The man is 75 and he’d skip onto and off the stage. He was sporting his fedora, of course. His backup musicians were all stellar in their own right and when their moment came, Leonard Cohen was the embodiment of generosity: he’d take off his hat and listen, rapt, sometimes getting on one knee right alongside them. The man can listen.
The entire concert felt like some kind of a passionate, mysterious, sensual, divine yet oh-so-human prayer.
Thank goodness my days praying to inaccessible perfect gods are over. Give me human. Give me heart. Give my honest. Give me life, any day.
I’m left to ponder this: What if I cared what people think AND went ahead and expressed IT anyway? What if?!
“But what about that shame?” something asks.
“Awww, Sweetheart,” I say to it, “it’s OK. Here, give me your hand. There’s enough room on this human bus for every part of us. Stay with me as long as you need but how ‘bout you and me get the hell out of this tight box and start writing? What do you say?”
Dearest Life, Bring it on! Love, Heidi
Posted by | March 19, 2009 | 2 Comments
A facebook friend’s status line said: “Write 500 words on what you are at your most happy, prosperous and healthy. Amazing fun. Do it now.” I do so love receiving simple direction. Here goes!
At my most happy I am calm in my heart and belly even when my mind is a-buzz with ideas which I can hardly wait to write.
I am at ease and filled with joy. I look forward to the future and don’t regret the past. I sleep like a baby. I have amazing and creative dreams.
I have nothing to lose and I do what I love. I don’t mind failing over and over again because I’m doing what I love. Everything is a success because I do it for its own sake. I am not needing your approval but am simply doing what I love and putting it out into the world.
At my happiest I have friends in person and all over the world. Friends that come to my gatherings. Friends that meet me for tea or a drink. Friends that I pop in on just to say hi. Friends I go skinny dipping with. Friends that hold me. Friends that laugh with me. Friends that cry with me without worry or freak-out. Friends that get me.
At my happiest I feel completely free and am doing absolutely nothing out of obligation or guilt, or fear of hurting anyone.
At my most prosperous I am at ease. I feel the support of the ground below me and the generosity of the air I breathe. I feel cared for and caring. I feel safe and held by the world.
At my most prosperous there is enough to have the meal plus the appetizer plus the glass of wine plus the dessert plus I can pay for the other person. Or hell, the entire group. I am openhanded openhearted. I have left over to pass along or do with what I want. To give huge tips. I surprise all my friends and family. I leave people totally anonymous no-strings-attached gifts. I sign up for all the awesome classes I want. To study anything, anywhere I please. I pay in cash.
At my most prosperous I rent a zip car whenever I want to go wherever I want. I take vacations. I travel and am free. I have 10 massage clients a week and can raise my price when people are pounding down my door. (And I get a 90 minute massage every week, at least).
At my most prosperous I write write write. I have written and published a book that continues to bring me unexpected joy and income. I have finished my play and it’s being produced in cool theatres around the world. And I have a website with a rocking blog and a lovely community of people that read and comment.
At my most prosperous I move into a simple lovely place where I can have a dog. And an awesome kitchen. And a lovely room of my own to write and muse. And a porch with a swing and enough chairs for all my friends.
At my healthiest I eat meals that I prepare with love and delight or I go out to eat and in my prosperity I order exactly what I want.
At my healthiest I get fresh air and movement every day. I do not need to compulsively check the internet or anything else. If I am online it’s because there is a good reason, even if that is simply delight and joy.
At my healthiest I am not thin and not fat, and I have me some nice delicious curves. I love my body. I love my hair. I love my newly arriving wrinkles. I am sexy as hell and I do not try to hide it.
At my healthiest I smile openly and warmly without shame. Without holding back. My body and mind feel balanced. I express and I receive, all the time giving and taking as if in a dance.
At my healthiest I laugh a lot. And I cry freely without holding myself in. At my healthiest I am an open yet mysterious and exciting book, never quite finished…
So bring it on, Baby.
Bring it on, Life.
Bring it on, Heidi.
Bring it freaking on.
I am here.
Here here! Ho!
Waiting a-la-Isadora Duncan & walking in momma’s heels
Posted by | March 13, 2009 | Leave a Comment
Sometimes the hardest thing is to be still. To wait for right action to arise. I’m not talking sitting on your butt waiting for life to come and find you. No. It’s more an alert kind of stillness even while in the thick of things.
There is a story of dancer Isadora Duncan, considered by many to be the mother of modern dance (retold by Eugene Gendlin in “A Process Model”). Sometimes Isadora Duncan would wait, very still, holding a position for long periods, maybe even hours, moving only when seemingly moved to do so, and maybe then only ever so slightly.
It’s as if she was waiting for the next move to arise, rather than forcing or bullying it by will or pulling it out ahead of its time.
Duncan was onto something great, if subtle. Simple, but not easy. At least not for someone who often feels like a puppy chasing her tail, or a squirrel hiding nuts. (Who me?!)
I notice that when I push and pull myself it is often from a place of urgency, propelled by a panicky sense. Usually I’m trying somehow to ensure my safety, my OKness. Nothing wrong with wanting to make ourselves safe and OK, but when my action comes from panic, there is nothing that feels OK about the result.
Something about forcing things feels like Cinderalla’s stepsisters (in Grimm’s fairytale version), where they are so convinced that they want the prince that they cut off their toes so their feet will fit into the dainty slipper. Alas, the prince sees through their scheme! (Oh my prince, is it the blood? What is it? I can clean that up!)
Way way way back, there was a time when “OK” was not a thought that crossed my mind.
Funny how before thought there just is what there is. After thought, there still is what there is, plus thought. Another layer’s been added.
Before the thought “I need to be OK,” there was OK. I was very very young, when concepts like “secure” or “safe” or “forever” would have been met with the likes of, “hunh?!” To the question of what I’d become when I grew up, that girl would have said something like:
“I don’t know about becoming but I sure do like stories and thinking up stuff and watching the way the rain trickles down the window here and noticing how things happen the way they do and being up in the tree picking cherries and chasing grasshoppers in the field and cracking open those hazelnuts from our bushes out back… and what about you?”
I notice the quality of my movement: Does it come from fear? Does it come with urgency? The trick is to become still again and wait. It doesn’t literally mean sitting still, though maybe. (Running round the track is one of my stillest times).
Byron Katie says: “Don’t pretend yourself past your evolution.” In other words, don’t pretend myself past where I’m at. I know the feeling of doing that. Of faking it. Of pretending. (Being what Havi Brooks endearingly would call “being an enlightened asshat” — you know, sounding like my shit’s together when, um, it’s not.
Giving advice usually comes from that enlightened asshat place. And that sort of pretend always backfires. Often it’s with the intention of putting a lid on what’s really there, not wanting to be seen as I really am.
There is another kind of pretend I sometimes do that is a bit different. It’s not from fear. It’s from fun. It’s kind of like a 3-year-old playing dress-up, walking around in her mommas heels… tripping around in shoes she may grow into… It’s experimenting, imagining. There’s no hiding that you’re 3 and in heels way-too-big, but there you are!
Sometimes, these days, it’s like that. My too-big shoes are writing. By golly, I’m swimming in these shoes but I sure do love the feel of them. And my feet are growing. And oh my! My letters are crooked and sometimes all over the page, but golly-gee-whillackers I’m writing…
I look around and see lots of space and empty. Some tears. A run. Some laughs. More laughter than ever before. A not taking myself so seriously. Some writing. Ideas. More writing. Some twittering. A bit more writing. Other tears. Some sitting on my hands so as not to start back in on the grabbing at what’s no longer or what’s not yet.
Here I am. On the big stuff, it sometimes feels like I got dealt a major learning disability, along with a slip of paper: “Learn to live your best life with what you’ve got.” Oh my, sloooow learning. But we all get what we get (and anyway, que le vamos a hacer!).
Regardless, regardless: I notice that I am the one I fall asleep and wake up with in sickness and in health, so help me God. No matter who else may come along or go away, I’m the one that stays. And if I can’t be OK with me, who can, I ask, who can?!
All for now, my friend, goodnight—
Heidi
