The power of the words: but what if........

He looked at the painting on the easel, shook his head

and then asked me: "Where do you get all your ideas from?''

''I don't know, they just come to me. Perhaps it has something

to do with that I often tend to ask ''what if?'' I answered.

''What do you mean?'' he asked.

''Well, whenever I am doing something, 

whatever that something may be, it seems I have an inbuilt

''urge'' to ask myself if what I am doing can be done

differently, better, faster, and or more effectively.''

Since then I have realized that my ''what if'' urge is not limited 

to ''doing'' only, but also to thinking and feeling.

Examples: ''What if I change the way I think about xyz, will that

change how I feel?''

''What if the way I feel about xyz is a response to having a bad day

and not about what I think of him/her?''

''What if I haven't thought this through enough, as in considered a

number of different possibilities? If I did, would I view it differently?

(At this point you may be wondering about another kind of ''what if'',

as in the ''what if'' that has the added ...''I would have''...

''What if I would have/had not''..... is a totally different creature

and belongs more to the past than the now or the future, so, 

bearing in mind that the past can not be changed, I am going to

stick with the ''what if'' that brings us forward.)

In my view, asking ''what if'' stirs our creative juices, helps us

to think laterally, helps us to stay in the domain of possibilities

rather than staying stuck in the same old muck.

According to Stephen King, ''what if'' is always the key question when

it comes to coming up with new ideas, and the reason that the

''what if'' often works so well is that it can stimulate us into

combining ideas in new ways.

(All through the history of mankind there have been people asking:

but ''what if''.... we could fly, go to the moon, split the atom,

prevent deadly diseases, harness energy, etc.etc.etc.)

Us humans are said to be creatures of habit, slow to change,

and hesitant to embrace new ideas. 

Asking ''what if'' can be tricky because more often 

than not, it opens a door to change.

Unfortunately, change is not something that comes easy for us, 

we prefer the predictable to the unpredictable,

the certain to the uncertain, 

yet if we want to move ''forward'',

change of some kind is inevitable.

Example: For years you have been expecting your partner to

change his/her habit of leaving wet towels on the bathroom floor. 

You have asked nicely, you have asked angrily, yet no change.

It bugs you no end, then one day you ask yourself why it bugs

you so much. (What is it in me that finds the wet towels

such a bother?) What if the wet towels is not the issue?

Suddenly you realize that it is not the wet towels that 

bug you, rather, what bothers you is that you feel disrespected 

by your partner. You decide to tell your partner how you feel,

he/she listens, apologizes, and promise to do better.

Suddenly, no more wet towels on the floor.

In my experience we can seldom change another person's behaviour,

thoughts, attitudes, and or opinions, we can only change our own.

To do so, it can be really helpful to begin with asking ourselves:

what if I...........

Asking the question ''what if'' can be the beginning

of a wondrous, exciting, and enlightening journey.

About the above image: It began as a photo of plaster-cast statue of a child 

holding a basket standing in the middle of a shopping center.

I decided to edit it. What if I removed the background, 

what if I changed the basket into a fish, what if drew in a

sketched background, what if I changed the colours,

what if I put the figure next to the ocean, etc.etc. 

Are your spikes showing?

Some people view hedgehogs as ''pests'' but I am not one of them.

I view them as wonderful and intriguing creatures with traits

that in some ways are quite similar to some human traits.

There are hedgehogs called ''Huffers'' and they tend to be very vocal,
 often ''huff'' about many things and frequently curl up, spikes(spines) out.
Then there are others called ''Runners'', they can't be still, they run around
and want to explore everything.
Thirdly, there are the ''Couch Potatoes'' who love to do as little as possible,
who prefers to eat, sleep, and just curl up.
(I got this information from Google, so exactly how accurate it is, I'm not sure.)
Hedgehogs, cute as they are, do have spikes/spines.
When threatened, up they come, when safe, flattened they stay.
A bit like us humans methinks, although our spikes are
not visible and we call them ''words''.
A hedgehog uses its spikes for defense only, humans on the other
hand are very good at using their ''spikes'' forcefully,
devastatingly, and offensively.
Some say that hedgehogs tend to be ''loners'',
often shy and cautious, which I believe can probably
also be said about some of us humans.
(Although, I do wonder how such a conclusion 
about the ''personality'' of hedgehogs can
be ascertained without speaking as it were ... hedgehog.)

Some species of hedgehogs hibernate for
a few months during a year, although, they often
change nesting sites at least once during that time.
Well, strictly speaking, human beings don't hibernate,
but most of us probably have times in our lives when we
may feel a need to ''withdraw'' temporarily from the company
of others and spend some ''alone'' time in order to recharge.
Sometimes that may mean that
we change ''nesting site'' temporarily and head for the
mountains, the seaside, the rain forest, etc.etc.
Hedgehogs are nocturnal animals and do their
''hunting'' for food at night, well, perhaps not so much
hunting as foraging.
Some humans are also more ''nocturnal'' in their habits
than diurnal(daytime), although, not always by
 choice but by necessity. For instance, in order to put food on the table,
some of us have to work at night whether we like it or not.

But for all we may have in common with hedgehogs,
there is one glaring difference;
hedgehogs don't use their spikes offensively,
they only use them defensively.
We, on the other hand, often use our spikes (words) to intentionally
hurt and belittle others. ( as in for instance internet ''trolls'')
 But here's the good thing about
being a human being,...we can choose not to.

It's okay to feel blue sometimes.......

(This painting is called ''Blue in Green'', and the reason it is called

that is because I painted it while I was listening to Miles Davis

track ''Blue in Green'' on the album ''Kind of Blue''.)

Perhaps you, like me, may have days when you

just feel ''kinda blue''.

Sometimes there may be a definitive reason for

why one may be feeling blue, but in my experience,

sometimes that's just the way one feels.

Some may classify feeling blue as a ''negative'' feeling,

a feeling best avoided, but is it not possible that

experiencing the occasional bout of feeling blue may

actually contribute something ''positive'' to our lives?

In other words, can something positive come from feeling 

blue every now and then?

According to brain research and with the help of fMRI imaging

we supposedly now know that the answer is yes.

Here are some of the benefits suggested: 

(Bouts of sadness, not prolonged episodes or depression)

Improved memory and attention to detail. Apparently on

bright, shiny, sunny days we tend to forget things that

 on somber, rainy, gray days we remember.

So, what they are suggesting is that being ''overly'' positive

it is possible for us to be less focused and attentive

when we are processing ''information''.

Sadness can improve our ability to make ''sound'' judgments.

''Positive'' bias can cloud our thinking, as in; ''she'll be right''

even if there is a niggling feeling that it won't.

Sadness can increase our sense of motivation.

Suggestion here is that when we are feeling happy we

are less motivated to engage in something that may

 alter our mood, whereas when we

are feeling sad, we are often motivated to do

something that improve our state of mind/feelings.

Sadness can improve social interaction in some circumstances.

A person who understands and has experienced sadness

is often more patient and compassionate than someone

who ''knows'' (is that even possible?) only happiness.

(Just to be clear, I have paraphrased others views and suggestions

so far.)

Feeling blue now and then, judging from my own

experiences and from speaking with others, can bring with

it benefits depending upon how the person experiencing the sadness

deals with it.

As human beings we experience many different kinds of emotions,

and sadness is one of them. Recognizing our own sadness we can

recognize it in others, and when we do,

we will hopefully respond to someone who

is feeling blue with compassion, patience and understanding.

After all, some of the most beautiful works of art created by

 humans, often have tinges of sadness, and or melancholy in them.

''The word 'happy' would lose its meaning if it were not

balanced by the word sadness.''  (Carl Jung)

Do you have a ''happy place''? It may be worthwhile having one......

I wanted to paint a place, a place that was still, a place that

was beautiful and full of colour. A place with space for

the imagination to run free, a place that is absent of

the confines of any kind of judgment, and of

critical and limiting thoughts.

A place that I could visit when the world seemed

colourless, arduous, baffling and complex to the point

of appearing insurmountable.

 I stared at the white canvas on the easel waiting for the ''muse''

to stir my imagination. Nothing. I closed my eyes.

(I had discovered that sometimes it was easier to ''see''

when I closed my eyes.)

Suddenly, a gush of wind brought a familiar aroma of 

dry heat, the ocean, and Mediterranean pine trees to

my attention and before I knew it, image after image

 flashed before my (closed) eyes.

I opened my eyes, ... the canvas was no longer white.

I saw a cornflower blue sky, a white chalked

''maison'', terra verte green pine trees in the distance,

a field with a mixture of yellow ochre, gold ochre and

different hues of sienna interspersed with blotches

of olive green.

The ''muse'' had arrived. I grabbed a bunch of different 

sized brushes, a palette, and then started to cover it with 

globs of colours that I had ''seen'' with my ''minds'' eye.

As if injected with an adrenaline shot, I ''attacked'' the

canvas. I stepped into my ''zone'', a place where time does

not exist, only pure experience, and started to paint. 

In the zone, there is no awareness of doing, 

there is only doing. Until, ...one stops.

And has a look.

Something was missing.

Of what, I wasn't sure.

Standing in front of the painting, I closed my eyes.

Suddenly I saw it.

What was missing was vermilion red.

I filled a small spray bottle with vermilion red paint

and then walked up to the painting.

Standing there, I was unsure of what my next move was.

 ''Nothing worthwhile was ever

achieved without an element of risk''  suddenly popped 

into my head. 

As if in a dream, I sprayed a red line at the bottom

 of the painting, then proceeded to paint all the sides

of the canvas with the red as well.

My heart was pounding. Had I destroyed the painting?

I could hear people saying: ''But, why did you paint that

red line at the bottom?''

Why? Because I wanted to paint a place,

 a place that was still, a place that

was beautiful and full of colour. A place with space for

the imagination to run free, a place that is absent of

the confines of any kind of judgment, and of

critical and limiting thoughts.

A place that I could visit when the world seemed

colourless, arduous, baffling and complex to the point

of appearing insurmountable.

And red, red is a colour that for me represents passion, desire, 

love, hope and strength.

''Red is the ultimate cure for sadness.''  (Bill Blass)

The Barfly.....are you having a drink or is the drink having you?

I used to see them on the way to the conservatorium.

The ''Barflies''.

Waiting for the doors to the pubs and liquor stores to open.

Reeking of urine, excrement and cheap booze.

Sucking on crooked cigarette butts, coughing, and talking to themselves.

Unkempt, unsteady, and unaware of the rest of the world.

Mere shells of who they once were;

Someone's dad, someone's mother, 

someone's sister, someone's brother, 

someone's son, someone's daughter.

Two doors down from where I live,

a mother lost her son to alcohol.

Her son's life had spun out of control due

to his drinking and standing before the court, 

the son was given a choice: jail or moving in with

his mother. His mother brought him home with her.

He committed to go to AA, to get control of his life again,

and his mother supported her son the best way she could.

She believed him when he said he was getting his drinking

under control. However, coming back home after having spent a few

days away with her sister, she found her son dead at the bottom

of the stairs. After his body had been taken away and the mother

started to clean out the stuff in his bedroom, she found

that the wardrobes in his bedroom were full of empty bottles 

and wine casks. 

Sadly, her son never managed to silence the ''siren song'' of alcohol.

It took his life.

There is a saying: ''First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, 

and then the drink takes you.'' (F. Scott Fitzgerald)

I find it problematic that there often seem to be

double standards when it comes to alcohol:

We know that alcohol abuse and misuse, is detrimental

in many ways to most societies, yet we advertise it, we sell it,

we serve it, we promote it, we portray it as a ''social lubricant'',

etc.etc.

We tell our children not to drink, although we ourselves do,

you are a wuss if you don't drink, you're a drunk if you 

drink too much, you're a ''lightweight'' if you don't drink ''enough'',

you're a ''party-pooper'' if you don't drink at all, etc.etc.

We condemn and judge those who we consider to drink ''too much'', 

too little, too often, too seldom. We drink when we feel down, when we feel happy,

when we feel angry, when we feel frustrated, basically, if we feel we need

to have a reason for drinking, we will find one.

We often find it easier to judge other's drinking habits, than 

to objectively view our own habits.

Occasionally we also use alcohol use as an excuse for bad behaviour:

''My bad, I was drunk, or Ignore what I said, I was drunk, or I am

so sorry I did that, I had had too much to drink, or It meant nothing,

I was drunk.''

We have warning labels on cigarettes and poisons, descriptions of side-effects on

prescriptions, but no such thing on ''drinking'' alcohol.

 (Beer, wine, whiskey, gin, etc.etc.)

If there was a label to go on bottles containing drinking alcohol, 

maybe it could

say this: 

So, here's my thinking:

Should perhaps those who make money out of selling alcohol

perhaps also be the one's picking up the bills for

the damage it does to society?

Or at least have to put warning labels on their products and

 be prevented from advertising it as something glorious

and fun?

What's your opinion?

Animals are not mankind's underlings.....they are our teachers...

Hiding behind some bushes with my camera aimed at a solitary

sheep slowly walking across the snow covered landscape, the sheep

suddenly stopped and stared right at me.

''Great pose,'' I thought and pressed the shutter.

(The above image is an ink and water color rendition of

that photo.)

''Let us remember that animals are not mere resources

for human consumption. They are splendid beings

in their own right, who have evolved alongside us

as co-inheritors of all the beauty and abundance

of this planet.'' (Marc Bekoff)

Horses hold a special place in my heart though I must confess

that I prefer to just admire them at a distance rather than to

mount one. I did try to ride one once.....but the horse had

other ideas and so proceeded to throw me off quick smart.

Sitting in the sawdust on the ground I decided to respect the horse's 

decision. 

Some of us may perhaps view animals as ''underlings'' to human beings,

that their function/existence is to serve mankind,

 personally however, I don't hold that view at all. 

I prefer Chief Dan George's view: ''If you talk with the

animals, they will talk with you, and you will

know each other. If you don't talk with them, you will

not know them, and what you do not know, you fear.

What one fears, one destroys.''

Imagine a world without birds...

Or gentle ''giants'' such as elephants or whales.......

Or mysterious and patient elks......

Or even critters that can ''out-weave'' even the most

of brilliant human weavers.........

I will let Albert Schweitzer have the last word:

''We must fight against the spirit of unconscious cruelty

with which we treat animals. Animals suffer as much as

we do. True humanity does not allow us to impose such

suffering on them. It is our duty to make the whole

world recognize it. Until we extend our circle of

compassion to all living things, humanity will

not find peace.''

(In case you are wondering, all the images are made by my hands.)

Instead of ''Get over it!'', how about ''Get through it!''......?

They say that the eyes are the window to the soul.

(The above image is a sketch I made with white

charcoal on black paper and then edited in Photoshop.

I can't really remember where I found the original image,

or how true to the original it is, but I do remember how

this soldier's piercing eyes made me reach for my sketch pad.)

While in a chatroom chatting with a war vet, 

he disclosed to me that he suffers with PTSD.

(Post Traumatic Stress Disorder)

''You know how PTSD is often described as a form

of mental disorder, as an illness, well, in my view,

it's not.

 PTSD is a ''healthy'' human response to very unhealthy and 

traumatic experiences.''

''Think of it,'' he continued, ''how ''healthy'' is a person

who is not affected by trauma, whatever that trauma

 may be?''

His words rang true to me and for days those words

kept me busy researching PTSD.

How do soldiers coming home from wars ''get over it''?

How do first responders cope and ''get over it''?

How do victims of abuse ''get over it''?

How do children exposed to bullying ''get over it''?

Which brings me to my topic; telling someone to 

''get over it'', (whatever ''it'' may be) is in my view

hardly ever helpful.

As far as I can ascertain, there is no ''statute of limitations''

on how long it should take for a person to ''get over'' something

that they experienced as a trauma/heartbreak/disappointment/etc.

As not all of us react the same way to trauma, it can be good 

to remember that some of us may need

longer to recover, to process, and to find our way forward.

Talking to someone about our traumatic experiences

can often be helpful, but, in my view, it needs to be someone

who is supportive, patient and caring.

(Having learnt the hard way that this is very important, I suggest 

choosing a person to confide in carefully.)

It is not easy to open up and talk about things that

still hurts, or make us tremble, or gives us ''flashbacks'',

but, sharing our feelings with someone else, it is possible that 

that someone else may be able to offer us a different perspective, 

a different approach, and a different way to make ''sense'' out 

of a difficult experience(/s).

Like they say; ''a burden shared is a burden halved''.

In my experience, life changing events such as; wars, natural disasters,

loss of any kind, violence of any kind, etc.etc., leave indelible

marks on our emotional (/physical) well-being and 

can seldom be fixed by us just telling ourselves (or others) to ''get over it''.

Pain, whether emotional or physical, tend to be hard to ignore

as it asks for our attention, for us to tend to it.

''Rather than telling ourselves ''to get over it'', perhaps

we should tell ourselves to ''get through it'', ''move past it'',

understand it, and learn from it.''

(Citizen Z)