We don’t know what awaits on the other side of the doorway; we don’t know where it will lead or what will happen.

We’ll have to figure it out as we go.  It’s how Humans grow best.  We’re all in the “School of Figuring Things Out.”  Such a big world.

Of course, some have traded this for clarity, for knowing, and with this they colour their world, but it’s a smaller world.

It’s not the right time to begin.  You haven’t got all you need.  The market hasn’t established.  You still need more time to work on your idea.

Who you are and what you can do is tangible: knowledge, skills, experiences, curiosities, passions … and the list goes on.

The bad news is, you’ll never be ready.

The good news is, you’re ready right now, for today.

It doesn’t have to be something big big: an experiment or expression of your art sees you moving.

something really big

Is the ability to keep going.

It’s about possibilities opened up by keeping going, keeping growing.

In her book Mindset, Carol Dweck writes about open-growth mindsets and closed-fixed mindsets.

The winner can be tempted to live in the win; the loser tempted to lower their sights.

We measure ourselves differently to how others measure us.

These are my three questions for keeping going:

What is my creativity?
What is my generosity?
What is my enjoyment?

What are your questions?

Spotting doors, which are all around us, is an art or skill.

Here are three ways of not developing the skill:

Believe you know all there is to know about people, the world, and all things in between;

Do not try to extend what you care about beyond your small world;

Let the fear of doing something different or new hold you rather than using it as a means for momentum.

Doors come in all shapes and sizes, many forms and guises.

Humans are always on the lookout for ways of framing their day, their lives.

Today’s my birthday. I woke up to this text from a friend: “Happy Birthday Geoffrey!  Have a bold year ahead.”

That’ll do it.  I’m going to be imagining exploring more of what a bold year may look like for me.

Be bold and prosper.

‘the adventure of yes seemed more alive than the safety of no’*

Can “safety of no” people become “adventure of yes” people?

I was reflecting on someone’s comment to me, about my asking people to take a step too far into the unknown, I think I’ve been more a safety of no person and am becoming a little more an adventure of yes person.

How about you?

(*From John Ortberg’s All the Place to Go.)

In The Adjustemnt Bureau, the protagonists discover there are many unseen doors in life.  Real life has even more doors than the movie.

An invitation, an idea, an experience, a person, even an actual door, can be a door into some new adventure and/or community.

Spotting doors is a skill which can be learnt.  We can train ourselves through daily honing and practising  our curiosities, skills, and connecting with others.

In the end, the best thing to do is try the door.

When is a door not a door?  When it’s a missed opportunity?

(Thin|Silence is on holiday, so cartoons will be poorer quality.)

Momentum happens when the different parts of our lives come together and find their rhythm.

Your rhythm will be unique because who you are, the skills you bring, the way you see the world are unrepeated.

No-one can tell you what this rhythm ought to look like because only you know what it feels like.  When you find it and begin playing with it, momentum follows.

Prototyping is powerful.

Turning an idea into some immediate action is becoming increasingly possible.

Makerlabs are accessible places in more and more cities and towns.  It’s not even necessary to be geographically close – the internet and cloud make it possible for our ideas to be sent anywhere to be posted back to us.

These are physical maker spaces, but a space may also be relational: lobbying, care,  support, interest groups.

‘Perhaps, most important, concrete embodiments of big ideas spark imagination in ways that abstracting arguments cannot.’*

When we turn an idea into something tangible, lives are changed: we actually did something.  When others say, “It can’t be done,” we can point out, “Oh, it has been, come and see.”

I think the scary and exciting journey I’m making into new work and new home can be traced to all the prototyping I’ve been involved in with others these last years.  I don’t believe I would have been where I am now if I’d only been thinking about it.

Prototyping is also powerful because it leads to What next?  The things we can’t see until we try something out.

(*From Peter Senge’s The Necessary Revolution.)

‘In shaping life beyond the Bubble, many visions will be needed.’*

The Bubble being the unsustainable present.  The same old same old what you see is all there is of economy, society, and the natural world.

Simply redefining life in the Bubble will not be enough.

Life beyond the Bubble will require new-ancient attributes and skills on our part.  Humility, gratitude, and faithfulness will not only allow us to survive but thrive.

Humility is about accepting the fullness of who we are.
Gratitude about recognising all we have.
Faithfulness about identifying ways and means of living these out towards others.

The practice of these leads to inward and outward alignment, and alignment is powerful:

‘An inner alignment starts to develop that can release extraordinary energy and creativity, qualities previously dissipated by denial, inner contradictions, and unawareness of the situation and oneself.’*

There is a boundarylessness to be explored – taking everything we are into everything we do.

What is my task today?

I could say it’s getting on with moving things from our old home to our new, but it’s more.

My task today is to be as Human as I can be.

‘There is a deep beauty within each person. … In the real sense, beauty is the illumination of your soul.’^

(*From Peter Senge’s The Necessary Revolution.)
(**From John O’Donohue’s Anam Cara.)