Children, trees and soul-birds are the best teachers.

Thursday!

Today's little art...

Hello everyone - hope you are enjoying the breeze and the sun.  My thoughts for today - let's think like little kids, read some stories, make some art and get outside!

Here's your inspiration starting point: 

Watch the most brilliant part of Adam Sandler playing Billy Madison HERE!

(not joking -it's relevant!)

But it's true - so today - find your "blue duck" - find something you've always wanted to see and never seen before - and create it.  Find some aspiration, yearning, goal that you've never even thought possible before, and want it like MAD!!!

Lil' update from me...

I'm not spending as much time down in the studio not only because it's gorgeous out, but mostly wedding planning as the date is quickly approaching :)  and preparing some monologues to perform at Beechwood Art's Arts Immersion Salon on Resilience and the Power of the Human Spirit - you can find lots of updates and fun stuff on the home page of amyoes.com as I keep putting up some art in galleries, singin' a bit here and there and writing... 

My article "Never Lose Your Hunger" was published today in The Change Blog which is a wonderful site, so a big thank you to The Change Blog!!!

In The Studio...

My studio is a mess.  I have no excuses.  I'm just messy.  And lazy.  

I put some singing flowers on a small canvas I had built up in lots of spackle, paint, glitter and glazes.

I'm somewhat sorry I did because the spackle was very beautiful without all of the felt and doodads on it.  Oh well.  Now there are flower and it's Spring.  SO there.

And I did this one too:

Because the only thing better than a tree with eyes and  singing flower is a tree with eyes, a singing flower and an orange fish.

Children's Book Inspiration...

I'd love to share with you a favorite children's book of mine called "The Soul Bird" by Michael Snunit.  The message is simple, we have a "soul bird" within us who has thoughts, feelings and dreams.  It's a beautiful way to visualize the self and soul within us and understand why it might feel the way it feels.

Deep within us lies the soul, and in the soul lives a special bird.  The bird opens and closes the drawers of our soul, in which lie all our feelings: there is a drawer for jealousy, one for happiness, one for love, one for every human emotion.  Only the soul bird keeps the keys to these drawers and opens them when we ask it to.  Sometimes the bird is contrary and opens the wrong drawer - instead of silence, there is speech; when we most want to be patient and calm, there is anger.  How can we hear the bird's message and find out more about our true selves?

You can listen to it read out loud HERE.

This also reminds me of The Little Prince by Antoine Saint-Exupery - I was actually assigned this by my 10th grade English teacher who told me it would change my life forever.  This children's book is chock full of precious images, messages and thoughts you'll ponder the rest of your life.

Some of these quotes I've thought of time and time again and every time it means something different.  Perhaps because so many changes are taking place in my life right now, and reading this book in high school, I had not been through any kind of life-altering trauma.  But I love how the same words can be transformed through life experience.  

Here are some precious quotes from The Little Prince...

“It is such a mysterious place, the land of tears.” 

“And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” 

“All grown-ups were once children... but only few of them remember it.” 

“It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important.”

 "To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world....” 

“You - you alone will have the stars as no one else has them...In one of the stars I shall be living. In one of them I shall be laughing. And so it will be as if all the stars were laughing, when you look at the sky at night...You - only you - will have stars that can laugh.” 

“What makes the desert beautiful,' said the little prince, 'is that somewhere it hides a well...” 

“Well, I must endure the presence of a few caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies.” 

“People have forgotten this truth," the fox said. "But you mustn’t forget it. You become responsible forever for what you’ve tamed. You’re responsible for your rose.” 

A good children's book is one you can reread again and again and take something different away.  Dr. Suess books are like that for me, so is The Giver by Lois Lowry, and so many Shel Silverstein stories and poems.  What children's book stays close to your heart and still inspires you to this day?

Before I go...

So those are some thoughts I wanted to share with you today.  Let's all think like children for a bit and recklessly create what we've never seen, but have sensed, wanted, or just felt like.  And let's keep revisiting our childhood memories and books - because thoughts that are true, inspiring and from the heart are usually the simplest ones - straight out of a children's story...

And now...

LET'S GET OUTSIDE!

You carry Mother Earth within you. She is not outside of you. Mother Earth is not just your environment. In that insight of inter-being, it is possible to have real communication with the Earth, which is the highest form of prayer.

Thich Nhat Hanh