Getting in to the zone on Whyte

I'm back from two days of painting on Whyte Avenue, as a participant of the Art Walk. I painted, painted, and painted some more. Interested passers-by asked me about my technique. I handed out all my business cards. The last time I was there was thirteen years ago...would you believe it?




For two days I flowed in the zone, so eloquently described by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi in his book, Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience (P.S.) . I immersed myself in the moment, the images, the brush, the behavior of the paint. The result is I have one commission completed, and another more than three quarters done. Oddly I was barely hungry while in the zone, though I did take breaks to eat and drink.

Two days later, I am still mellowed out from the experience. Boy, if I could design my workaday to live in the zone, that would be something. A life of hard, enjoyable work, reminds me of the hard working centenarians of Sardinia.

Soggy Potato Chips

This past weekend I completed a facilitator training course called, "Becoming a Master Instructor (BMI 100). At one point in the course I'd moaned about those people who refuse to budge from a job they hate, making themselves and their bosses miserable. My instructor, Dan Jelinski from Wisdom Speaks, told me about the soggy potato chip theory. Give a child a choice between crisp potato chips and soggy, and he will take the crisp every time. Give him a choice between a soggy potato chip and none at all and he goes for the soggy. (I've found the source, How to Discipline, With Love: From Crib to College by Fitzhugh Dodson).

It's like a light bulb went off in my head; of course! This ties in also with my thoughts about selective observation, how some people miss obvious opportunities. If we aren't primed to find the good in situations, we'll miss our chance altogether.

I'm very lucky that way. My mother taught me to be a bird watcher, and I see more birds in the bush by the chirps and rustles and flashes of brown and red. My art teacher taught me to see the complex play of light, shadow and color that brings objects to life. My deaf friend taught me to catch flashed hand signals, the language of emotion that plays across the face. My dad taught me by patient sanding, to find the play of grain glowing across fine wood. The world is a much richer place if one is taught to see.

For a person who has allowed the job to grind them down, who are convinced that their leadership is at best indifferent and at worst openly hostile, they can't see the opportunities presented them. In that sort of compromised existence, a paycheque is better than nothing at all. I am reminded also of an old preacher who said to try and take a dirty old bone away from the dog and he might just bite you. Throw down a big, juicy steak and he will be happy to drop the bone. (Remembered from The Cross and the Switchblade by David Wilkerson). For those who are blinded to the opportunities around them, they first need to find new ways of seeing the world around them.

We spend far too much of our lives at work to put it all to waste. Make sure you love what you do.

I borrowed the picture from Granny's Old Fashioned Common Sense blog.

Am I a workaholic if I love what I do?

There's lots of talk about work/life balance these days. And it's true that there are those who sacrifice all - relationships, friends, health - for a misplaced passion. Workaholism in my mind shows all the marks of other addictions. There's the shame/reformaton/abstension/fall cycle to them all, whether it's reaching for the dirty syringe, the liter bottle of wine, or the fatty doughnut.

But on the other hand, I think we underestimate the rich benefits of community that work provides. We spend time with some of our co-workers than we do with some of our family and friends. All that investment of time and commitment very often builds in to something good.

Then there's the matter of how much time I have to invest. I'm in the happy place of middle age where my children have flown the nest and are building their own lives. If I want to spend an evening working on a proposal, I can; and I do so without sacrificing time elsewhere.

So am I workaholic? I am not slaving away at the tasks with no thought to time, health, or relationships. The time I invest I enjoy, and what I produce is it's own form of creativity. I don't hide away when I spend on these activities.

Creativity can be all-consuming, but I don't think that is necessarily bad. In those moments I can enter a flow state. These are moments of intense pleasure, with no fear of a subsequent crash.

Which brings me to a pet peeve of mine. There's talk of limiting hours that workers can access their work account. Due to my peculiar cycle of hot flashes, I am often my most creative and productive at 3:30 in the morning. I know this is unorthodox, but it's me. When I am engrossed in an idea, the fastest way to rest is to put the idea down. Then I am at rest. If I were limited to government hours, it would increase my distress, not reduce it.

I borrow the picture from nature.com