We Need Each Other...

Lessons Learned

Each Other

A block party. In northern Illinois January. With wind chills registering in the forty below zero range for a few weeks in a row, we hadn’t seen the sweet face of a neighbor in a number of days. Layered up in insulated underwear, flannels, lined jeans, and wooly socks we remained holed up indoors awaiting a break in the unrelenting polar vortex or something of the sort. We were most assuredly safe and warm, which in and of itself was indeed a blessing, although quite completely disconnected, insulated, isolated really, from the world out there even next door; kind of lonely.  Then came the phone call which was an invitation to a neighborhood block party; a lifeline. With snow to our knees and scarves around our faces, we excitedly trudged through the elements carrying our dish-to-pass to the home of the block party planners. The glowing warmth inside pulled each and every neighbor right into the happily boisterous block party. Glorious interactions from serious to hilarious and everything in between, catching up on life, and watching the fireplace fire sparkling in everyone’s eyes, it was a critical and delightful evening of re-connecting. We need each other. We do better and feel better and everything better when we exist in community. A smile shared is a double blessing.  Laughter shared makes the heart joyful. Tears shared makes the burden a bit lighter. A meal shared builds community, builds connection, builds a bridge. A block party in January? Absolutely yes!

Winter's Peace...

Lessons Learned

Peace

It is winter in the Midwest.  Temperatures during the past week have hovered in the sub-zero range with wind chills dipping near thirty below. The snow is deep and has been swept into impassable drifts along both highways and country roads. The whistling wind sneaks into homes through unseen cracks supremely taxing even the heartiest of furnaces and demanding multiple layers of woolen sweaters and fleecy blankets for all inhabitants. It is winter in the Midwest. Rosy cheeks, piping hot homemade soup, and fireplaces a’blaze are the order of the day, and we smile for each delicate, unique snowflake that lands gently on a tongue.  Although the wintry conditions are certainly extreme and undeniably dangerous, there is a stillness and a peace and a wonder-filled beauty about the snow.  It’s a sparkling, chilly blanket that frosts the landscape like a fluffy dollop of butter cream frosting atop a scrumptious cupcake.  To stand outside in the snow, to walk in it, to traverse it in snowshoes or skis is to understand the stillness of it, which without the experience of it is completely indescribable. The chaos and cacophony of life at its outrageously presto pace, in its constant stereophonic dissonance, with its hyper-stimulation of lights, colors, and images can indeed numb the senses with all of its uber-overdoneness.  How can we be still? How can our children understand peace? How can we learn to quiet our hearts and rest our souls? Beneath a blanket of snow, the earth sleeps for an entire season, animals hibernate, and farmers move indoors and rest their fields.  In the stillness of the winter, the stars in the night sky seem to twinkle with greater intensity, the creaking and humming sounds of the forest are seemingly amplified, and if far enough north, the glory of the northern lights dancing across the heavens in surreal technicolor splendor is beyond breath-taking. In stillness there is infinite room for creativity and imaginative pensivity because those things that crowd and clutter our lives and bring much noise are delightfully absent. When there is stillness or peace around, it feels somehow easier to find a quiet place within. As we warm our hands during the coldness of this winter, may we be reminded to also quiet our hearts, for in the quietness, in the stillness, in the peace there is a longed for and much needed joy, comfort, rest, and restoration.

More Concerning Bridges

Lessons Learned…

More Concerning Bridges

The fifth grade class was down by five students due to early holiday family vacations, to some dangerously icy road conditions, and a bit to various colds and other bugs which kept a few students home. This meant our sixteen remaining students were going to have to really project as well as pick up all of the unaccounted for lines and scenes. Changing up a program on the spot while performing to accommodate for absences, such as this, requires a significant amount of confidence, memory, and ability. This is certainly an experience which would make most adults offer their most sincere apologies and then quietly bow out because this sort of “winging it” before an audience simply has far too great a risk of embarrassment. These dear fifth graders, however, were fearless.  With the audience excitedly gathering in their seats before us, we quickly accomplished some critical line reassigning.  With a room full of Christmas clad guests at the retirement center, our shining fifth graders sang and shared with great joy, flawlessly projecting every word and filling the hall with magical delight. Bright smiles and generous encouragement met each and every piece shared, and the connection between audience and performers was warm and strong and right. A bridge. They shared an emotional bridge of hope and joy, and it was precious and powerful. Minutes before our first song, we had learned that Ida, who sat in the front row and was wearing a purple sweater, would be celebrating her 100^th birthday tomorrow, and in honor of this and her, we added “Happy Birthday” to our repertoire as our concluding number. After the final song and the final bow, the fifth graders strengthened the bridge as each student carried out artwork gifts they had created for each resident. Heart to heart, the students and residents mingled and shared thanks for invitations and received thanks for singing. Eyes met, smiles erupted, conversations commenced, and bridges were built. The hall was filled with the warmth and beauty of friendship and kindness, despite the heavy drape of freezing rain covering the world beyond the walls.  Bridges bring blessing. After each student had greeted and brought an art gift to each resident, it was time to say good-bye. The fifth graders were anxious to know when they might be able to visit these friends again, and the residents unanimously extended an open visiting invitation. Smiles, hugs, and handshakes sealed the promise for more bridge-building to come.

The Gift Of Being Read To Is A Gift Of Imagination And Creativity

Lessons Learned…

The Gift Of Being Read To

I have always contended that reading a book is to the mind what being on vacation is to the soul; a brief, delightful, adventurous respite from the status quo and daily routine. It allows, no invites, us to disengage from the rat race pace which seems to swallow up our joy and drive up our blood pressure.  It is a place where the lockstep of life is temporarily replaced with wandering wonder of imagination and relaxation. Reading fully engages the imagination. As one journeys through the pages of a book, the encountered printed words paint vivid pictures seen clearly in the imagination and catch one completely in the creative swirl of plot, scenes, settings, and characters. Engaged. Captured. Enthralled. Have you ever been read to? Do you remember the magical feeling of being lost in a story, happily tangled in its moods and actions and relational webs? Do you remember not wanting the story to end? When did you last read to someone, whereby offering them a self-less, generous gift of a vacation to imagination? If we desire to foster imaginative development and creativity in children we must read to them. We must let them play, to be sure, but we must also read more than regularly to them. Their minds must practice the art of imagining, seeing the pictures made by words, and resting in the stillness of attentive listening. To build creativity, to stretch attention spans, to revel in the happiness of sitting side by side on the couch and sharing the adventure of a story, this is a deep and lasting treasure that costs nothing more than time. When there is not enough money for a family vacation, travel together to the library and check out a large stack of books to read together. When the busy-ness of the day has exhausted all reserve energy, sleep has been a bit sporadic, and tomorrow and the next day are looking to be more of the same, sit together on the couch and read, read, read together. When it rains the entire month of June and three little boys are longing to get outside to play, pitch a tent on the porch, bring snacks, a flashlight, a few toys, and a large stack of books, and travel imaginatively together to exotic, exciting places far and near.   Between the infusion of excessive screens and the cultivated impatience of continual demands for extreme immediate gratification, the quiet creativity of listening to a story has become desperately endangered. The gift of being read to is indeed priceless and needs to be high on everyone’s list this Christmas.

The Gift Of A Bridge

Lessons Learned…

The Gift Of A Bridge

Bridges connect east to west, uptown to downtown, north to south, city to city, and because of these bridges, we can easily cross one side to the other.  This is significant. Our cities today are under siege from a desperation, a loneliness, a despair that originates in hopelessness and chronic dysfunction and culminates in a fear-wrapped paralysis that can no longer see possibility. Our families today are under siege from a materialistic world that paints a spectacular mirage of how successful life ought to look, despite the fact that the closer one steps toward that lie, the more one horrifically realizes that it is not there.  So the pace is quickened, the dial on the treadmill is turned exponentially up, blinders are donned in hopes that faster and more focused can conjure OZ. It cannot. We wallow in the frustration of our delusion and live angrily because what the world tells us we want, we cannot have. Our schools today are under siege from a bureaucratic system so heavily laden with infinite, infernal paperwork, that the attempted fulfillment of our metrics obsession which is theoretically designed to enhance individualized instruction, does in fact consume an inordinate amount of prime, meaningful, relational, teachable time, leaving our students more stressed with little to no academic gain.  Our lives are under siege so we build walls and live alone. We give up.  We strike out at those around us and weep quietly in the darkness.  This is all wrong. Our lives are designed to be lived relationally, in community, sharing hearts and gifts and hope one life to another. Our hands are designed for reaching and helping not hoarding and hiding. We need each other. We need more bridges. Bridges to connect east to west, uptown to downtown, north to south, heart to heart in our cities, our families, our schools, and every aspect of our lives. Within our mirrored walls we see only ourselves and, truth be told, we do not like what we see. It’s selfish. We need us. We need bridges. We need to look out, reach out, for then we will find out that in serving and caring and connecting, we ourselves are blessed. We all fully know that a far deeper satisfaction is felt in giving a gift than in receiving a gift. The thing is, each life is packed with gifts, heart gifts that cost nothing to give yet mean everything to receive. The gifts of time, of compassion, of gentleness, of listening, of smiling, of helping, of patience, of generosity, of forgiveness, of willingness, of mercy; these gifts and so many like them cost little to nothing but have the strength and power to change a life, to balm a wound, to heal a pain, to offer hope. These gifts are bridges, the bridges needed by our cities, our families, our schools, and by all of us. This precious holiday, perhaps we need to consider the gift of a bridge.

Do You Bind or Liberate the Creative Spirit?

Lessons Learned…

Do You Bind or Liberate the Creative Spirit?

Time. Patience. Non-judgment. Safety. These things all are mandatory for a creative spirit to feel free to create. A creative spirit comfortably and frequently dwells in a place of great vulnerability. This place is one where wide open emotions, wild imaginings, and novel, exciting connections intersect.  It is an exhausting and exhilarating place all at once. The birth of an idea occurs in a place where a brave creative spirit is willing to take a great risk and expose his or her heart. For example, a composing artist might be inspired by a landscape, an event, a relationship, a life story, or any other of an infinite number of inspirational sources, and then the seed of that inspiration takes root in imagination’s fertile soil. While germinating, the inspiration, for a composing artist, develops an identifying sound and a musical color which will ultimately be creatively translated into a melody. Sometimes this creative process takes a great deal of time, sometimes it unexpectedly bursts forth from seemingly nowhere, but in any case, it cannot be timed, measured, demanded of, or really even controlled. It just is as it is. Which comes first, the lyrics or the melody? There is no standard recipe. There is no prescribed order or flow chart design.  It just is. And when pen finally puts creativity to paper, we see the fruit emerge. The fruit of this particular creativity is a song.  A unique melody.  A unique combination of words.  A unique color of emotion extracted from the original inspiration.  This unique musical composition depicts the artist’s very own musical connection to the object of inspiration, and to be invited to hear this melody by the artist’s hand is to indeed be considered a trusted confidant.  Words need to be few in this moment of hearing a new song.   One who snaps to reckless judgment, one who values to the highest priority the narrow parameters of extreme efficiency, one who typically favors status quo in general, one who is easily distracted and unable to simply breathe in the awesomeness of newness, one to whom nothing is ever quite good enough, these would rarely be the ones invited into this moment of creativity unveiled.  These are actually the ones who bind the creative spirit within boxes of ordinary, predictable, beigeness.  Within these boxes creativity suffers and dies, for creativity must be free if it is to exist at all. Be gentle with the creative spirits in life, in your home, in your classroom, in your workplace. They see the world a bit differently. They see possibilities unnoticed by others, and possibilities stir hope.  The gifts they bring to the issues of life we all grapple with individually and corporately may just hold the promise of a solution.

Patience And Creativity

Lessons Learned…

Sometimes Creativity Requires Great Patience

A conversation with a class of young students began with this question: What do you call the room where you sit with others before you are called into the doctor’s office? The waiting room. And if you are waiting in the waiting room to see the doctor, what are you? Probably sick. Well, that’s absolutely correct! The collection of everyone not feeling well in the waiting room would be known as the doctor’s what? We would be patients. That is also absolutely correct. Patients wait in the waiting room. The word patients is not the same as the word patience, but both are inextricably bound to the word waiting. The attribute of patience is learned through the discipline of waiting, yet, in our culture of immediate, we are not well accustomed to nor very amenable to waiting. A delay of game, a traffic jam, a black Friday checkout line, a power outage, these types of waiting circumstances frequently are accompanied by rising blood pressure and  angry outbursts, which do decidedly nothing to eliminate the required wait. We hate to wait. Now. We want what we want and we want it now. Waiting is for everyone else in line, but not for me.  I am too busy to wait. Too important. We rant and whine and complain and pound our fists on the steering wheel resembling our toddlers who throw similar tantrums when they have to wait. We are in such a hurry to not have to wait that we barely remember to breathe. Why? Why do we do this? If we never have to wait, we will forever suffer from impatience.  Children are not yet burdened with the consuming nature of over self-importance, because the wonder of play still fills their hearts and waiting for a turn on the swing or the slide is really very okay. Unfortunately, they do observe impatience in us and occasionally try it on for size, which is desperately sad to see. Waiting is not a bad thing. Waiting can be a time of great creativity; a contemplative time when ideas can swirl and connect in new ways. Our frenetic, impatient pace squeezes out creativity. We race to the finish line of whatever task is before us, driven madly by a competitive compulsion to be first. Relax. Wait. Smell the flowers. Hear the music. See for the very first time since childhood the wonder and beauty all around. Savor with patience the great gift that is life, which passes all too quickly. And in the patient savoring, who knows, one might just find a unique idea or even an original song.