What is your first memory of creative energy?I remember so clearly that night in our family room in Houston. I was about three… and I could feel it. I was dancing around, laughing and waving my arms in the air. But something was different.Suddenly I could feel that the other people in that room were uncomfortable with me, wanted me to stop. What did I conclude? “I’m just too big. I’d better reel in my energy. And quick!” It was a turning point in my life. But it took me...
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Vive la (R)evolution!July is the month we celebrate Freedom, both here in the USA and in my other home country France. Yesterday was Bastille Day, the day in 1789 when an angry crowd of Parisians stormed the Bastille. Only seven prisoners were released that day, but Quatorze Juillet initiated the French Revolution and the end of the monarchy in France.Freedom celebrations throughout the world are expressed with picnics and parades, fireworks and family. And it would be...
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Vive la (R)evolution!July is the month we celebrate Freedom, both here in the USA and in my other home country France. Yesterday was Bastille Day, the day in 1789 when an angry crowd of Parisians stormed the Bastille. Only seven prisoners were released that day, but Quatorze Juillet initiated the French Revolution and the end of the monarchy in France.Freedom celebrations throughout the world are expressed with picnics and parades, fireworks and family. And it would be...
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Why are we all so angry? Thirty years ago I spent a day in Cook County Jail in Chicago. I was there to shoot a segment for a documentary program I was producing about prisons. That day I met 25 teenage boys (most awaiting trial on murder charges) locked in a classroom with their teacher. I felt privileged to spend the day with them, and to interview a few about their experiences. Through their program with led by their teacher Charles Rankin (based on the work of Les...
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Over the years people have told me that vulnerability is my superpower. But recently, I’ve also become aware how reluctant I’ve been. I’ve hidden behind figuring things out, doing things right, working harder than anyone, having a fixed idea of how things need to be. Vulnerability is easier to own as an idea than an actual practice. But it is a powerful teacher.Because in creativity, vulnerability changes everything. Vulnerability according to Brené...
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I’ve just returned from 10 days in Texas with the woman I have loved as a sister all my life. Mary Carol came with her younger brother to live in our home at 16 after spending 10 years in an orphanage. Her father (my father’s brother) and mother both died of cancer when she was six and her brother was just 18 months. Six months later I was born, so she was there as long as I can remember. You kind of think life will go on forever until a certain age. You think that the...
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