Archive for the ‘Soulful’ Category

2012, year of the exhale

January 3, 2012

by Roxanne Krystalli

Looking at 2012, with daring hope.

There is a genre of music my brother has dubbed “college music.” In his mind, college music encompasses some combination of sappy lyrics, acoustic guitars, hipsters, or whining lyrically. College music to him involves the likes of Damien Rice, the National, Bon Iver, and Cat Power — in other words, every artist whose music strikes a chord with me. One summer, he and I were sitting on his balcony in Greece and I was listening to Ray LaMontagne.

Worry… worry, worry, worry, worry. Worry just will not seem to leave my mind alone, LaMontagne sang.

“College music,” my brother retorted.

My life’s music, I thought. I am a professional worrier. I worry frequently, and I worry often. It seems dissonant that someone whose whole day can be uplifted by a perfect blue sky will crash with dark thoughts. I am an equal opportunity worrier: I worry about hurting someone’s feelings, about sufficiency and enoughness, about safety, about the world, about my loved ones, about my health, about the future, I worry about what all this worry will do to me in twenty years, about everything that can be a cause of worry under the sun and that perfect blue sky that will fill me with joy.

“Well, duh, you worry. You work in freaking war zones,” I am often told.

Yet, I am less afraid when I am fully immersed. When I am delivering a workshop in a conflict zone, or conducting interviews in a post-conflict setting, or doing something that makes me come alive, fear fades into the background. It is in the quiet moments of the night that the worry gets back into bed with me, holding me in a suffocating embrace, tainting my dreams.

It is not journeys I long for this year. It is not novelty or fireworks I crave, though I welcome all of this into my life and am open to it if it comes. In 2012, I am willing a quiet mind. In 2012, I want to banish Ray LaMontagne for Damien Rice and his belief that I can “look into my eyes and see that noone will harm me.” Some former smokers say that months after quitting smoking, an exhale comes and they breathe deeply, making it all worth it. In 2012, I am living for the exhale.

Roxanne Krystalli writes, photographs and worries at Stories of Conflict and Love. You can follow her on Twitter at @rkrystalli.

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Posted in Aware, Fearless, Soulful

For Now, I’ll Take It

December 20, 2011

{Ann Howley ~ another world traveler ~ and Vineeta Nair last week at the Desire to Inspire book launch. Photo by Justin Davis Davanzo.}

I have wanted to visit India for years. Drawn to its wild juxtapositions, color, energy, and intensity ~ all details that I have read or heard about from fellow nomads who have been there ~ I imagine being overwhelmed in ways that would not be possible elsewhere. I don’t know when I will go there, but I know I will. In the meantime, I drink up stories from a country that is halfway around the world as if it were a magic elixir, capable of transporting me to this place I have been drawn to for a very long time.

One of the ways I have been able to get my “India Fix” for the past many months has been Vineeta Nair’s Indian design blog, ArtnLight. Full of color and beauty and vivid imagery, I go there when I need a dose of inspiration for my artwork as well as my travel bug. When I began compiling my list of potential contributors for Desire to Inspire, I knew I wanted Vineeta involved. I simply had to have a little bit of India in the book, and, thankfully, she said yes.

In addition to sharing her stories, sending images, and being an all-around force of good throughout the entire process of writing the book, Vineeta endured an intense visa application process and two long flights in order to be in Santa Monica for the book launch last week. As soon as her flight was booked, I started telling anyone who would listen that I had a contributor ~ and friend ~ coming for the book launch all the way from India….INDIA!, each time punctuating my sentence with the all caps, bold repeat of the name of her home country. At the book launch, I lost track of how many people came up to me and asked, “Where is the woman who came from India (INDIA!)?” and I would happily point her out, our celebrity from Mumbai.

I have had a passion for travel ever since I was thirteen years old, and this passion has taken me all over the world. In addition to the journeys I have taken on airplanes and ships and trains, this passion has also taken me to faraway places through friendships, and many of these friends have brought a little bit of where they are from into my home when they’ve visited. I know I can’t really say “I have been to India”, but in a strange way I feel like I have…or at least that India has been to me. And for now, I’ll take it. I’ll take every single bit of it.

“So far as I am able to judge, nothing has been left undone, either by man or nature, to make India the most extraordinary country that the sun visits on his rounds. Nothing seems to have been forgotten, nothing overlooked.” ~Mark Twain

Christine Mason Miller is an artist, writer, and explorer from Santa Monica, California. She’s off to the Big Apple next month, and after that, who knows. Her latest book ~ Desire to Inspire ~ is now available on Amazon and in bookstores everywhere.

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Posted in Inspired, Places, Soulful

Crossing Over

November 15, 2011

{Time to let go and run wild! Photo taken by Desire to Inspire contributor Pixie Campbell.}

Expectations ~ they can make for many a perfect, sparkling fantasy in the wide expanses of my imagination, where the anticipation of how something is going to look, feel, taste, and happen can amplify unfettered. I use the phrase “I am looking forward to….” a lot, and if I’m using it, it is in relation to some kind of longed-for, hoped-for, planned-for experience:

“I am looking forward to the day this project is finished.”

“I am looking forward to the dinner I have planned with my friends.”

“I am looking forward to the day I can teach Tilda to fold laundry.”

Such imaginings are not inherently bad, but I have learned the importance of keeping them in check. I’ve also come to realize that no matter how much I try to manage these particular ribbons of thought, they are going to find a way to unfurl without my even noticing, until the day I physically step into whatever moment I have been looking forward to and run smack into a situation that looks nothing like I thought it would. Whether I decide an actual outcome is good or bad is irrelevant; the more important point is that it is different, often times wildly so, than what I had so carefully (or perhaps unconsciously) sculpted in my mind.

The glaring exception to this occurs when I travel. In no other circumstance in my life am I better adept at releasing expectations and literally going with the flow. Because I consider travel, particularly overseas, such a wondrous adventure, I am always more open to the twists and turns that each journey is going to offer me. It is not only fun and exciting to get my passport stamped, it is also thrilling to let go of so much of the control I delude myself into thinking I have under my own roof.

Ever since I signed a contract with North Light Books for the publication of my forthcoming book ~ Desire to Inspire: Using Creative Passion to Transform the World ~ I have considered it a journey of sorts. It has been a journey of writing and collaboration, where my work has been to explore and then (hopefully) clearly express some of my most deeply-held values with the help of nineteen amazing contributors. And it is the kind of project that, if I had not been especially vigilant, could have become so weighted down by expectations that when it came time to release it to the world, it might have hit the earth with the thud instead of gently setting off like a heron.

I do not know where Desire to Inspire will go. I do not know whether or not anyone will like it and I can’t predict whether or not it will lead to more book projects. With its now mere-days-away official release date*, I feel like I am getting ready to board a proverbial airplane (or rocket ship, or magic carpet, or what have you) with the book in hand, where an unknown adventure awaits us.

Whenever I go on a trip, the officially crossing over from journey preparation to journey commencement occurs when I get through the security screening at the airport. Once I’m through the scanners with ziploc baggie re-packed and shoes back on, any and all mental or actual to do lists melt away. I have done what I can do and prepared as much as I can, and if I’ve done my work, my only task from that point forward is to enjoy myself. In just a few days, Desire to Inspire will begin shipping from the North Light warehouse, and then the journey begins. Whatever happens will happen, and I’m just along for the ride.

* The official release date from North Light is November 22nd, so it should start popping up in bookstores and on Amazon 2-3 weeks later!

Christine Mason Miller is an artist, writer, and explorer from Santa Monica, California. The official book launch for Desire to Inspire will be held there on Thursday, December 15th. Click here for details and let her know if you’d like to join in the fun!

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Posted in Creative, Fun, Inspired, Soulful