On Feeling Good, Being Good, Doing Good, Doing Well in 2010 (Intention)

These are my intentions for 2010. They seem both like a lot and not enough. Some of it’s plain common sense. Some is just living better. At any rate, I’m saying it here. This is what I have.

Let the fun begin!

body~mind

• Heal my body. I’m still plagued by bouts of lower back pain, am starting to feel stiff in the knees. Want to be limber and energetic. Water, exercise, stretching. Would love to take yoga. More walks.
• Slow down. Be present to what I do. Don’t hurry. Take at least one retreat. Maybe two if Jim wants to do one. But one alone for sure.
• Early rise. Get my sunrise on.

family

• Take care of them. It’s OK to be a wife and mom. Love them to pieces.
• Take my girls abroad. Stop saying it, do it.
• Be present for their development. These are heavy times. Make them light.
• Get up and go. Movies, hikes, day trips. Be active together.

art~writing

• Get serious about Angels & Demons. Finish Axis of Evil. Plan other works. It’s a long-term series. Go as far as I can.
• Have fun with the other stuff. Pendants, bracelets, what else? Experiment.
• Doodle a day. Easy stuff. Keep doing complex doodles but let doodle-a-day be a scribble, if that’s all I can get to.
• Writing Group. Keep it up. Three times a week. Other writing? Nurture the books percolating. Leap on opportunities that come.

business

• I have a number in my head. It’s not huge. It’s a start. (Or, rather, last fall was the start. This is the first lap.)
• Figure out what I want to do and where I want to be. New shows? Get into a gallery? New websites? Don’t rush it. Slow and steady wins the race. And just the right amount of pressure keeps it doable.
• Stay organized. Get taxes done early. Keep my space to where I can work every day. Lists. I loves them!

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This post is the Intention portion of the exercise laid out in WRITING TOPIC — REFLECTION & INTENTION. Unlike resolutions, intentions are put out to the universe. (At least for me they are.) I log ’em in my noggin’. They have a way of coming to fruition. I can’t say exactly why it is that they work for me while resolutions don’t, but they do. I trust the process.

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BlackBerry 365 Project — White Winter Squirrel

White Winter Squirrel – 1/365, BlackBerry 365, Minneapolis, Minnesota, January 2010, photo © 2010 by QuoinMonkey. All rights reserved.

Intentions for 2010. My first is to focus on my photography. I have a print project in progress in the studio. I hope to have 12 framed pieces done by Art-A-Whirl in the Spring. Some of you are familiar with my Writers Hands project that I’ve been working on since 2007. I have quite a collection of photographs now, and am combining them with stories of actually meeting the writers. It’s exciting to think about a dozen framed pieces of writing and art on the walls by May.

I’ve discovered I do best when I focus on one project at a time. So I can finish what I’ve started. If I set too many goals, I fall flat on all of them. I’ve given myself permission to let my writing go for a while, to work on my photography. Another thing I’ve learned is that I need something fun that runs parallel to tough creative work projects. For 2010, it’s the BlackBerry 365 photo project.

When it came time to renew our phone contracts in 2009, Liz and I spent a few hours in the Verizon store, checking out all the different options for mobile devices. We could not resist the features and BOGO deal of the BlackBerry. It was October, right before my trip to Pennsylvania, then Down South with Mom. We were on the road, buzzing by the Blue Ridge Parkway, when Liz called and said, “Why don’t you Tweet photos along the way with your BlackBerry.” She gave me a quick ÜberTwitter lesson and an obsession was born — I love my BlackBerry.

I’ve taken over 1000 photos since then, posting them in various places around the Internet including Twitter, Flickr, and TweetPhoto. Many photographers have done a photo-a-day practice over the years. But I never have. I started with 0/365, the Blue Moon the last day of December. The second was the White Winter Squirrel. And though I take many BlackBerry photos over the course of a week, I’ll only post one daily favorite in the BlackBerry 365 Series.

I’ve also decided to post thumbnails of the photos in the comments on this post each day. The idea with cell phone photography is that it creates a different way of seeing. I find that taking photographs with the BlackBerry frees me up. I got to know my Canon PowerShot more intimately this year at a writing retreat and will continue to take RAW photos. But sometimes with the larger camera, I feel pressure to take a great photograph. With the phone camera, I feel free to experiment to my heart’s content.

I’d love it if readers wanted to join me in a phone photo-a-day practice. Just drop the link to your photos into the comments section of this post.

To be clear, here are my photo project intentions for 2010. I’ll try to check in on my progress over the course of the year:

1. BlackBerry 365 — continue to take BlackBerry Shots each day of 2010. Post my daily fave in the BlackBerry 365 set.
2. Complete 12 final prints, writing and bios, matted and framed, in my Writers Hands Series by May of 2010 where I will show them in Art-A-Whirl
3. Start a monetary presence for my photographs in the form of an online store with sets of cards and prints available for purchase (which also involves revealing my identity)

A wise woman recently told me that I had practiced enough, that it was time to complete some of these projects and get them out into the world. She’s right. My practices are important to me, but it’s crucial that I follow through on the finished work. And focusing on photography doesn’t mean I’ve abandoned my writing. From the time I was a small child, photography and writing have been inexplicably linked for me. I’m excited to set these intentional goals. And I know you’ll help hold me to them!

-posted on red Ravine, Monday, January 4th, 2009

-Follow the BlackBerry 365 Project on my Flickr set

-related to post: Reflection — Through The Looking Glass

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WRITING TOPIC — REFLECTION & INTENTION

Somewhere between Santa Fe and Albuquerque (one), on the RailRunner Express, December 30, 2009, iPhone photos © 2009 by ybonesy. All rights reserved.

 
 
 
 
 

2009: re-flec-tion

 
–noun
 
 
1. the act of reflecting or the state of being reflected.
2. an image; representation; counterpart.
3. a fixing of the thoughts on something; careful consideration.
4. a thought occurring in consideration or meditation.
 
 
 
 
 
 

 




Get out your fast-writing pens. The year 2009 (and the first decade of the 21st Century) is over. What did it reveal to you? What did you reveal to yourself?

Reflect on the past year. Write it out. Write about the trip to Santa Fe, the visit to your favorite store (the one with fake geese walking in a line to the front door) where you found an elegant wrist and hand made of blue glass for storing your rings.

Write about the books you read, the movies you saw, the many bowls of popcorn, salted and buttered, you ate. Write the tears and the illness and the losses and gains, the itches and tics, people and places, the time you laughed so hard you fell off the green sofa.

2010: in-ten-tion

–noun


1. an act or instance of determining mentally upon some action or result.
2. the end or object intended; purpose.

Make a list of your intentions for the new year. What do you plan (not hope, but plan) to realize? Reach far and wide, but do so in a pragmatic way. You can achieve what you set your mind to do. Put it out to the universe.

I will…I will…I will…

Fill in the blanks. What will you do this year?

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Postscript: For many people, this New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day are the start of a long weekend. Take time these next few days to look backward and forward. Even a half hour spent quietly—reflecting on 2009, thinking about 2010—will help you enter the new year with a sense of being grounded, feet on the ground, ready for what comes.


To all red Ravine readers, we are grateful to have spent the past year with you. We look forward to another one.

Happy New Year!


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The images in this post came from a day trip from Albuquerque to Santa Fe and back on the RailRunner Express, December 30, 2009. It was a cold day. Low clouds threatened rain or snow, and by the time we boarded for the one-hour-fifteen-minutes back, the snowflakes had started falling.

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