I am fearfully and wonderfully made. … In your book were written all the days that were formed for me, when none of them as yet existed.*

fewer days now
but enough
hopefully
to imagine
to play
to make

destiny schmestiny
keep changing
growing
developing

*Psalm 139: 14, 16.

generosity
bravery
insight

these need
not cost a
penny

But then, when you start drawing you can never be quite sure what is going to happen next, can you?*
(Quentin Blake)

Paradoxically, a self-centred self cannot become more complex, because all the psychic energy at its disposal is invested in fulfilling its current goals.**

I thought it possible
to get
there from
here but could not
and cannot only
move directly
or outwardly

indirectly and
inwardly
are my lessons
learned
am
learning

to there
replaced

keep exploring
old man
make maps
fill the blank
spaces

there are no
monsters
only wonders to
fall into

hope myself from
here
courage myself to
there
seek seek
seek
forward

keep exploring
old man
make maps
fill the blank
spaces

falling
failing
confess
begin again

through the wild
wrangling
wrestling
wrenching

keep exploring
old man
make maps
fill the blank
spaces

to there
replaced

*From Quentin Blake’s Angel Pavement:
**From Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s Flow;

But then, when you start drawing you can never be quite sure what is going to happen next, can you?*
(Quentin Blake)

Paradoxically, a self-centred self cannot become more complex, because all the psychic energy at its disposal is invested in fulfilling its current goals.**

I’ve been playing with a single blog that has altered a little each day.

I’ve included the quote that caught my eye and set up the doodle I’ll be working on through the week.

If you’ve tried doodling through the week, how’s yours been working out?

One of the things I’ve been learning is that what I want^ isn’t where I thought it would be, I had to move to somewhere different if I was to get there: physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually – something that I had to learn along the way.

Of course, the place I wanted to go to changed as well.

Who knew what I wanted wasn’t what I wanted?

I’m still learning and moving, with lots of course corrections.

That’s okay, though. T. S. Eliot declared that old men should be explorers. (Women too, please.)

In mapmaking, there was a time when cartographers would fill spaces they didn’t know anything about with sea-monsters.

Then things changed. 

A group of map-makers came along who said “we’re just going to leave areas blank that we don’t know anything about and we’ll fill them in as they’re explored and we know what’s there.”

There are three things I realise I need more of, though, if I am to be an explorer. 

Hope: to move me from here to somewhere out there.

Courage: to move from the familiar to the unfamiliar.

Seeking: to fall into the exploring life and never stop falling.

Here are three more words I need when things go wrong:

Failing: because I do, time and time again.

Starting over: there’s always the possibility of a new beginning.

Confession: a word to insert between failing and starting over because ‘fessing up not only makes a new beginning possible, but is likely to place us on a mightier way.

*From Quentin Blake’s Angel Pavement:
**From Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s Flow;
^I have just been reminded that want can also mean lack.

But then, when you start drawing you can never be quite sure what is going to happen next, can you?*
(Quentin Blake)

I’ve been playing with a single blog that has altered a little each day.

I’ve included the quote that caught my eye and set up the doodle I’ll be working on through the week.

If you’ve tried doodling through the week, how’s yours been working out?

One of the things I’ve been learning is that what I want** isn’t where I thought it would be, I had to move to somewhere different if I was to get there: physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually – something that I had to learn along the way.

Of course, the place I wanted to go to changed as well.

Who knew what I wanted wasn’t what I wanted?

I’m still learning and moving, with lots of course corrections.

That’s okay, though. T. S. Eliot declared that old men should be explorers. (Women too, please.)

In mapmaking, there was a time when cartographers would fill spaces they didn’t know anything about with sea-monsters.

Then things changed. 

A group of map-makers came along who said “we’re just going to leave areas blank that we don’t know anything about and we’ll fill them in as they’re explored and we know what’s there.”

There are three things I realise I need more of, though, if I am to be an explorer.

Hope: to move me from here to somewhere out there.

Courage: to move from the familiar to the unfamiliar.

Seeking: to fall into the exploring life and never stop falling:

Paradoxically, a self-centred self cannot become more complex, because all the psychic energy at its disposal is invested in fulfilling its current goals.^

*From Quentin Blake’s Angel Pavement:
**I have just been reminded that want can also mean lack;
^From Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s Flow.

But then, when you start drawing you can never be quite sure what is going to happen next, can you?*
(Quentin Blake)

I am going to be taking some days out, but thought to play with a single blog that will alter a little each day. 

I’ve included the quote that caught my eye and set up the doodle I’ll be working on through the week.

You also may like to doodle through the week fuelled by the quote.

One of the things I have had to learn is that what I want** wasn’t where I thought it would be.

That’s okay

It turns out I had to move to somewhere else: physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually – something that I had to learn along the way.

So I’m still learning and moving, with lots of course corrections.

That’s okay, though. T. S. Eliot declared that old men should be explorers. (Women too, please.)

In mapmaking, there was a time when cartographers would fill spaces they didn’t know anything about with sea-monsters.

Then things changed.

A group of map-makers came along who said “we’re just going to leave areas blank that we don’t know anything about and we’ll fill them in as they’re explored and we know what’s there.”

*From Quentin Blake’s Angel Pavement:
**I have just been reminded that want can also mean lack.

But then, when you start drawing you can never be quite sure what is going to happen next, can you?*
(Quentin Blake)

I am going to be taking some days out, but thought to play with a single blog that will alter a little each day.

Yesterday, I included the quote that caught my eye and set up the doodle I’ll be working on through the week.

You also may like to doodle through the week fuelled by the quote.

One of the things I have had to learn is that what I want** wasn’t where I thought it would be.

I had to move somewhere else: physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually, it turns out.

I’m still moving: lots of course corrections.

*From Quentin Blake’s Angel Pavement:
**I have just been reminded that want can also mean lack.

But then, when you start drawing you can never be quite sure what is going to happen next, can you?*
(Quentin Blake)

I am going to be taking some days out, but thought to play with a single blog that will alter a little each day. Today I’m including the quote that caught my eye and setting up the doodle I’ll be working on through the week.

You also may like to doodle through the week fuelled by the quote.

*From Quentin Blake’s Angel Pavement.

From the beginning I have believed the world an amazing place, full of marvels, unheard of, not yet experienced.*
(M. C. Richards)

The tree which moves some to tears of joy is in the eyes of others only a green thing which stands in the way. As a man is, so he sees.**
(William Blake)

Ask, search, knock … enter.

We can grasp the fact that at any moment what seems most certain to us is an illusion. It is an illusion in that it precedes a further revelation of ourselves.*

*From M. C. Richards’ Centering;
**William Blake, quoted in Maria Popova’s Brain Pickings: The Cosmic Miracle of Trees: Astronaut Leland Melvin Reads Pablo Neruda’s Love Letter to Earth’s Forests.

Copying is how I learn, it’s a way to understand what’s really going on, and drawing is a way of slowing down long enough to really look at something.*
(Austin Kleon)

Here’s a doodling idea for the weekend: copy someone else’s work that you enjoy.

Keep copying.

You’ll not only lose yourself in the slow practice but also find the way you want to doodle.

*From Austin Kleon’s blog: Drawing to remember.