When a group gathers around a campfire, a dinner table, or even a cause, the topic of conversation that tends to unfold hasn’t changed much in the last 2,000 years.
Nowhere does it say that the trend will set us free.
Just a friendly reminder for our lives, families, and businesses.
John W. Gardner wrote over 50 years ago, “The self-renewing man … looks forward to an endless and unpredictable dialogue between his potentialities and the claims of life — not only the claims he encounters but the claims he invents.”
What have you claimed today? Is it just ‘another’ Monday?
Self-renewal comes with today not just being another Monday, but seeing it as a gift. That being the gift of existence, presence, and the opportunity for awakening and renewal between sunrise and sunset. ‘Another’ has monotonous connotation to it, but a gift is unwrapped because we wonder what newness is under its wrapping.
Have you claimed just to have a job? The hope of self-renewal rests in not just sitting within your so-called job, but actively participating with it in the midst of your story and the grand story we are all collectively in. ‘Job well done’ always follows a life seeking to be well spent.
Until one’s palate is sophisticated for such endeavors towards daily renewal, it will never fully know what potential is there to behold.
What else are you claiming?
Perhaps the question itself is enough to invent an answer, a song, and a story to be renewed every day and thereafter.
Are you counting down the days? Or is today day one? Literally, your answer makes all the difference in the world.
After another negative news story in the background this evening, I turned the television off.
Off. Not muted or paused. Off.
Jazz has always felt appropriate as the moon swaps places with the sun, so I went with Miles Davis and shifted the mood. Eventually, the playlist led to a track called ‘Weirdo’. Something changed in that moment. The air became cleaner. Creativity fluttered. The food even tasted better.
Thank you clarity. Thank you Miles. And sweet Muse, please keep leading us away from our unnecessary and often blinding routines.
Emotional intelligence knows what is contagious. A life in pursuit of musical hope is and one that sits still in quiet desperation is not.
Emotional intelligence seconds Richard Bach when he states, “Argue for your limitations, and sure enough they’re yours.”
Emotional intelligence reads between the lines and sets up office there too.
Emotional intelligence understands the hope for everyone to understand, but knows that not everyone will.
Emotional intelligence, when shined upon, casts shadows of beauty, meaning, and purpose.
Emotional intelligence makes your art artsy.
In the end, emotional intelligence will trade math, science, and grammar any day for flow, vibe, design, and feel.
Ashton.Gustafson 