There will be times when all that will fix it is a good book...

In my mind, there is nothing a good book can't heal for my emotional self.  I will ask of you, today, to create a list of books that give you visual escape.
If they have gorgeous covers, say yes!
If they have embossed letters, say yes!
If they have illustrations, say yes!
If they are the color of the sky at a gypsy picnic, say yes!
Now, picture what your book would look like if you were one.
I say this because you are the best book you've never read.
I want you to see what you would put in your table of contents!

I drew this table of contents long ago, because it was a faerytale-like book and faerytale-like table I had in my heart.
What I have come to realize is my art, like this drawing is part of my heart.  I have an intriguing, vast, table of contents in me.  I want to know that it is there when I feel I have lost my place. 
Sit quietly, maybe with yourself, maybe with a furry friend and tap into what is and what will be in your table of contents.

How you see is how you will be...

"And above all, watch with glittering eyes, the whole world around you.  Because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places.  Those who don't believe in magic will never find it."
~Roald Dahl
I feel the healthiest choice in creating balance, positivity, and creativity, in life is to recognize how we see the world and make a decision to be clear about our thoughts.
It can feel like one is walking in the dark, at times, in our day to day lives.  I know, though, there is always, an unexpected light in the night.  We know it is not gone, we just aren't seeing it.  For many, seeing is believing, but, as the old turn around goes, I often feel that believing is seeing.  We have to be careful what thoughts we believe.  Are they blocking our path to an answer we have been seeking?
Find your light, see your might, and yes, it will turn out right. 

There are things I do

to

remember how to see...

I question everything... even what I think is true.

I look at beauty.

I recognize other's efforts.

I count each day as one I have the opportunity to give to myself.

I remember who I am.

Be kind...

To be healthy, be kind.
To grow, be kind.
To watch others flourish, be kind.
It benefits you to be kind, if that is the motivation you need, 
but,
always be kind.
Art and words by Amy Sperry Faldet

"A tree...grows from a downy tip."

Poem by Lao Tzu in the Tao Te Ching.
A tree that can fill the space of a man's arms
Grows from a downy tip;
A terrace nine stories high
Rises from small loads of earth;
A journey of a thousand miles
Starts from beneath one's feet.

I remember when my third child (a great lover of popcorn, by the way) realized what popcorn was.  We were at a carnival and he wanted a bag of popcorn for a treat.  He was quite small, maybe 5, at the most.  He bit into a kernel and it was one that had a seed in it.
He asked, "What is this, Mama?" I told him that all things begin small and popcorn is really a seed that has burst open after being fired.
He was really excited in the way preschoolers get.  "So, just like the trees have seeds that flutter down on us, so do popcorn plants?"  he asked.
I said, "Yes, my little one."
He talked about a lot of plants that day, apples and their seeds, dandelions and their seeds...
All I could do was look at him, so small, with new ideas bursting forth from little concepts.
He was so small.
We all were once.  It is important to remember it is good to be new, to be fresh, just a bud on a branch.  We have the potential in our minds and hearts to make so much of this world.  We started walking down the fairway, he held my hand, and I reflected upon everything I saw.  Everything there started in the imagination.  Everything you could play, every light, placed, every color chosen, every ride designed, even the fairway itself in its layout, had been in someone's mind, a thought, a seed.  The goal is to not remain a thought, a seed.  To grow and change and to create more potential, foster new ideas, sow more seeds, are the goals. 
A seed is all about the future.  We have hope.  It is like when we buy the ticket to the ride.  The person hands us the ticket, but, that is not the product.  We bought what will be, what will happen, what we hope for.  We have bought an experience.
I see in each person, potential; it has gotten me in quite the dilemmas, at times.  I say this because, I give to some who are not ready to grow.  But, I tell them, those who ask me, "Why do you even try with some students, people, etc.?"
I just smile and think to myself,
"I am planting a seed.  I do not need to see the mature tree to do so." ~ Amy Sperry Faldet

If life is a circus...

In Entertaining the Elephant, by William McBride, Mr. Reaf, expresses great despair...
On page 54, he cries, "Don't you see?  If I change, it means I'm admitting I've been wrong.  If I change, it means that for fifteen years I've been wasting kids' lives.  And I didn't want to do that." 
The dilemma Mr. Reaf has put himself in is that he is in a state of conviction.  Convictions can become cages.  Would he continue to create pain, dis-ease, inefficiency, and despair to maintain his lie to self?  Letting go is the wisdom we all seek when we resist white-knuckled the ride of life.  Our "circus" can be filled with open-hearted innocence, fun, health, creativity, and kindness or it can be about deception, control, mistrust, and ego. 
Burn-out can be called many things.  It is a deadening of the senses, spirit struggling in the ashes and waste.  The scene from Disney's Fantasia 2 where sweet, green, innocent, growth is seemingly burnt-out in the finale is how any who have felt depression or burn-out or despair picture themselves. 
The belief that there is too much to fear, to fight, to strive for, is the only thing keeping the ashes that smother.  Letting go, sometimes with a tear drop, opens up wide great possibility. 
Burn-out is a result of teaching, living, seeing, from a place of ego.  We all have gone to that place where it becomes about our perception of ourselves and our corresponding definition of success.
It is not a pretty place.  Those around us can tell when we are working form the "me, me, me," mindset.  If life becomes a circus, which, it inevitably does, our choice each moment is to decide what sort of participant we will be in that experience.  Are we looking at everything on the fairway of this carnival of life like a vulture?  Are we eyeing it all with a greedy motive?  If your words in your mind sound like this, "What can I get from all these people so that I come out on top?  How will they make me look more successful?"  or "If I can't control them, then, I am a failure." then, the positive results in your life, in every aspect of your life, health, creativity, and inspiration will be lacking. 
Burn-out is a direct result of setting an ego-based definition of success for one's self and holding onto that definition too tightly. 
If quotes like these from Entertaining the Elephant, are haunting your fairway, your heart, your mind, it is a result of fear-based thinking.  If you take Mr. Reaf's words here and think of things that creep into your own mind, it takes one aback.
"Do you know what it's like to teach kids that don't care?" or to be surrounded by those that don't care?
"It took me years and years to work out this system.  But, every year now, with only a few minor adjustments, because of holidays and assemblies, I know exactly what I'll be teaching on each and everyday."  or if I am sure of everything, I feel in control.
"I developed a new persona.  I deadened myself to this job so it wouldn't kill me.  I created a teaching system so I could expend my energy on keeping control and surviving from day to day." 
The fear comes from a few places.  There is a tendency to go to routine or to stay with what is "known" when fear is a root in the mind.  Mr. Reaf speaks of his worry about being "killed" emotionally and even, physically.  People that live in fear will begin a dormant, survival, mode.
Letting go of the ego-based definition would (and does) help him realize he doesn't have to "manage" or control the students, he just needs to leap out of survival mode and into learning mode, for both, himself and for his students. 

Each day we learn we recognize we have much more to learn.  When that concept is embraced, ego has no part in our circus. 
The shady wants of creepy vendors disappear.  There is no one out to "take" you or make you out for naïve.  There is no one manipulating animals or others by threat or "breaking of the spirit."
These concepts don't belong in your open-hearted circus. 
Live by example the experience you want to feel, to create, to teach, and then, the only events allowed in your light-filled circus are ones with people with great and varied talents and experiences and strengths.  All that will be in your circus, will be the thrilling ride of letting go, putting your hands up and trusting the bumps, curves, highs and lows and sways of the ride.  Don't let the goal to be to never attend your own circus or worse, yet, blind yourself to the marvels around you by focusing on your role as master with chair and whip in hand.