I don’t mean religiously.

Your gift is special.  It’s different to the gifts of others – it sets you apart.  Holy.

It’s also holy because it comes to you from somewhere or someone else: a muse or genius, a people or person, the universe or God.

Of course, this means the gift of others is different to your, meaning theirs is holy too.

‘I think a race looks prettier when everybody comes in even’*

Except someone’s reaching the line as a sprinter, another as long-distance runner, another as a cyclist …

Some say not everyone can be special.

Why not?

We’ve traditionally understood specialness in terms of ego, how we compare ourselves to others.  We’re coming to understand specialness from the place of eco – our connectedness to all things and people, including connecting to ourselves.

This eco-attitude, incorporating humility and gratitude, allows what wants to come to to come:

“You get a good poem and you don’t know where it came from.  ‘Did I say that?’  And so all you feel is: you feel humility, and you feel gratitude.  And you feel uncomfortable, I think, if you capitalised for much on that without admitting at some point that you got it from the Muse, or whatever, wherever, or however.”**

At the moment I’m reading Elle Luna’s excellent short essay on Should and Must.^  Must comes from within and reaches out to others so is more about the eco: the holy gift which comes to us and the holy gift we give to others, and doesn’t need popular recognition

Should comes from without, what others think we should do and is more about the ego: desiring the gratitude and plaudits of others.

Must is holy.

I hope today finds you caught up in the magic of your Must.

(*From Ruth Krauss and Maurice Sendak’s Open House For Butterflies.)
(**Poet Gary Snyder, quoted in Lewis Hyde’s The Gift.)
(^Elle Luna’s The Crossroads of Should and Must.)

‘So long as the gift is not withheld, the creative spirit will remain a stranger to the economics of scarcity.’*

Bring who you are.

Bring what you have.

Bring what you can do.

Don’t wait for inspiration.  Turn up everyday with the things you work with and trust something will come.

Poet Allen Ginsberg said writing, as an expression of gift, is “just writing what yourself is saying”.**

For “writing,” substitute whatever activity is yours.

Mark Levy tells writers just to start writing.^  This translates into whatever your gift is.

Don’t be afraid of those who will criticise your gift.  It’s probably not for them.  Focus on those you give your gift to.

When you have given, you’ll find you want to give again: you cannot empty yourself:

‘Bestowal creates that empty space into which new energy may flow.’*

Gift-giving is always a risk.  Yet you know you must do it:

“I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: The only ones among you who will be really happy are those who sought and found how to serve.”^^

(*From Lewis Hyde’s The Gift.)
(**Allen Ginsberg, quoted in Lewis Hyde’s The Gift.)
(^Mark Levy’s Accidental Genius.)
(^^Albert Schweitzer, quoted in Seth Godin’s Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck?)

It wouldn’t be a dream if it were easy, if you were already doing it.

‘Well it turns out that the Must is scary, hard, like jumping off a terrifyingly high cliff, where you can’t see anything down below.’*

There have to be at least two whispers.

One comes from beyond you, out there, somewhere a need, a call, a question, a request.

The second comes from within, the way you want to respond, must respond to what you hear.

Dreams ask us to remain open when everything we are screams to be closed and known and decided.  Dreams also ask whether we’re willing to fail – it’s quite possible we’ve found a life which minimises failure, but dreams require we leave this behind:

‘If failure is not an option, then neither is success.’**

When you dream, others will be prepared to dream.

Another thing is, dreams don’t stay put.  As you move towards them, they say to you “yes and” and watch to see if you’re willing to play.

“Yes and” is who we are as Humans when we are at our most generative.

“”Yes and” isn”t a technique …. It’s a way of life.’^

Keep dreaming.

(*From Elle Luna’s The Crossroads of Should and Must.)
(**From Seth Godin’s Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck?)
(^Cathy Salit, quoted in Daniel Pink’s To Sell is Human.)

When we find our Must, we also find our deep concern, taking us deeper, beyond the surface of an issue, to the source and to a future possibility.

‘Must is what happens when we stop conforming to other people’s ideals and start connecting to our own.  Because when we choose Must, we are no longer looking for inspiration out there.  Instead, we are listening to our calling from within, from some luminous, mysterious place.’*

This is the deeper now, a different way of engaging and reimagining a circumstance – especially a different way for someone to engage with and reimagine their life.

We’ll likely be surprised by what we find at the deep source of ourselves and one another.  Here we are, ordinary people going about their lives, but connected to their Must (element, purpose, calling, vocation, strengths, superpowers, gift, genius) bringing extraordinary impact.

(*From Elle Luna’s The Crossroads of Should and Must.)

One of the favourite sayings of my friend Alex McManus.  He’s provided me and others a place to connect with deep creativity.

More than eleven years ago, Alex told me the future will come through those who must, setting me on a path that has led me to today.  Literally today, as I met some great people wanting to explore their deep creativity for the sake of others.

‘Must is who we are, what we believe, and what we do when we are alone with our truest, most authentic self.  It’s our instincts, our cravings and longings, the things and places and ideas we burn for, the intuition that swells up from somewhere deep inside of us.’*

You belong here is about being both centred and adventurous, shaping the kind of spaces in which others can explore, individually and collectively.

“When I walk into my library it feels like optimism and hope.  It simultaneously offers a sense of adventure and comfort.”**

(*From Elle Luna’s The Crossroads of Should and Must.)
(**Poet Joseph Mills, quoted in Laura Damon-Moore and Erinn Batykefer’s The Artist’s Library.)

‘When all property is privatised, faith is privatised and all men feel fear at the boundary of the self.’*

Lewis Hyde is tracking the move a loan as gift moves across a boundary into usury and interest.  We’re so used to interest on loans that it’s hard to comprehend that this wasn’t the case for the majority of people within tribes, communities, and societies until around five hundred years ago.

‘A good thing to know is this road is private for everybody.’**

Ruth Krauss’s children’s book from 1960 has some real gems in it and this is one of them.

We need to unprivatise our lives.  We need spaces for this to happen in product ways.

Elle Luna writes about the crossroads of should and must.

Should comes from without and must from within.  Should is about living the life others want us to.  Must is about living the life we must in order to make our contribution before we leave this world.  We need more spaces for must-creativity to he encouraged and explored.  Luna’s essay provides a space: ‘It is for anyone thinking of making the jump from Should to Must.  Anyone looking to follow the energy deep within their chest but aren’t quite sure how.’^

I like the idea of a new day being here.  That there are spaces we can walk into and request help to put the most in and get the most out of a new day.

Yesterday, I mentioned an exploration called #libraryofawesome.  Libraries have been around for some time but they remain islands of gift in oceans of commodity to everybody to use ‘as an intuitive space that fosters curiosity and investigation in a variety of delightfully unexpected ways.’^^

The library begins in you and you must bring your library to others.

(*From Lewis Hyde’s The Gift.)
(**FromRuth Krauss and Maurice Sendak’s Open House For Butterflies.)
(^From Elle Luna’s The Crossroads of Should and Must.  I have shared on a number of occasions how my friend Alex McManus believes the future will not come through revolution or evolution but through the people who MUST.  Check out Luna’s short video telling of how this all began for her.)
(^^From Laura Damon-Moore and Erinn Batykefer’s The Artist’s Library.)

“I am fascinated by the idea that you can borrow books for free and that these books will pass through many hands before reaching you.”*

The library is a real gift and a place for gifts to move around for everyone regardless of where they are from or who they are.  When someone fails to return a book and is fined, this feels doubly wrong.

It doesn’t have to be a library; we need all kinds of open, encouraging, and  creative spaces.  #libraryofawesome happens to be a concept I’m exploring with a number of friends: a place where anyone can become all they can be, doing all they can do to bring their art, their contribution into the world.

‘All being can correctly and rightly be spoken of with one voice (univocity) … .  What I am and you also are, and so is the world.’**

(*Photographer Doreen Kennedy, quoted in Laura Damon-Moore and Erinn Batykefer’s The Artist’s Library.)
(**From Richard Rohr’s Eager to Love.)

Sometimes we need experts.

I want someone who’s really good at flying to pilot the plane I’m on and not to do any experimenting.

More often, though, we need explorers:

“These are people who see a domain but not the path.  The fact that the path is not clearly defined is what excites them and motivates them.”*

Passionate explorers don’t just go this way, they turn around a lot,  realising there’s always more, and they’re always asking questions.

It doesn’t matter what they’re passionate about, these things describe them.  Passionate dreaming allows them to move beyond their present competence making rote obedience look increasingly clumsy and even  foolish.

And explorers know they need others to help them.

There so many people who will respond positively if you say to them, “I want to work out how my life can benefit others: will you help me figure this out?”

My friend Jo reminded me yesterday how we are on a journey from doing things to people, even doing things for people, and we’re discovering there’s something deeper than doing things with people, to doing things together.**

And they are the most worthwhile things in all the world.

(*John Hagel, quoted in Peter Diamandis and Steven Kotler’s Bold.)

Number One:

‘Suppose old people grow down as young people grow up.’*

Sometimes growing up can take us away from our creativity, but we can find our way back by nurturing our curiosity, playfulness, and imagination.

Journey Two:

‘It is ironic that you must go to the edge to find the centre.’**

We want centred, balanced lives, not realising we may be accepting less because none of us knows what we are truly capable of until we have journeyed to the edges.

Journey Three:

‘We champion the idea that the open and unpretentious library can offer a return to the quiet and unselfconscious art-making that so many adults have “grown out of” after childhood.’^

The third journey takes us into a community of explorers, rather than a community of experts.  Experts may be tempted to grow up and stop going to the edges.^^

(*From Ruth Krauss and Maurice Sendak’s Open House For Butterflies.)
(**From Richard Rohr’s Eager to Love.)
(^From Laura Damon-Moore and Erinn Batykefer’s The Artist’s Library.)
(^^If you’re in or around Edinburgh, I’d love for you to find TribePorty or VOXedinburgh.)

A phrase I heard at an event last night from someone facilitating the telling of stories, forming poetry, and moving around the space as in dance, first without and then with music.

So we ended up doing things we didn’t know we could.

This morning I was asked what I do and I told them about the dreamwhispering.  He smiled as he said, sneaking things into people’s dreams while they sleep.

Not quite, it’s really about listening to someone’s dreams while they’re wide awake.

Sneaky deep is a great phrase.

Amazing talents and dreams already lie deep within people.

So we have to figure out together how to sneak them out from behind the resistance of denial or unknowing.

You don’t need anything more than you already have; you only need to go sneaky deep to set these things free.

Your head may tell you that you’re not enough, but deeper, your heart knows better and wants to be listened to.

“I have done what was mine to do, now you must do yours.”**

(*Francis of Assissi, quoted in Richard Rohr’s Eager to Love.)