by kyle | Feb 16, 2016 | Inspiration
I learn a lot of life lessons from my hobby, pottery. Sometimes I go to the studio and just want to express myself in a creative outlet. By thrusting my hands into the clay, I touch a substance that can express me, but isn’t me. Who knows what I’ll end up with?
Actually, it’s better to have a small notion of what I’m aiming for before I begin. Adventure and the unknown are good for certain things, but flying by the seat of your pants doesn’t usually improve your results.
When I sit down at the wheel with a round ball of clay that I’ve carefully patted into shape, I first get out the air bubbles and center the mound. Then I start making something. However, I have to at least know if I’m making something bowl-shaped or cylindrical, since that will determine how I begin. What I end up with will be far different from what I intend, if I don’t decide beforehand.
by kyle | Nov 25, 2015 | Inspiration
Hoping your turkey-eating, family-seeing, time-enjoying holidays are wonderful! No matter what’s happening a daily thankfulness habit is as good for your day as a session at the gym or a handful of vitamins. Or better. But at this time of year, I stop and look back, then look forward, filled with the certainty that all is well, and will be. God is good.
by kyle | Nov 6, 2015 | Encouragement, Journey
At times it’s uncomfortable being a beginner. I look at my Italian book and I don’t know how to say anything useful, other than “the dishes are in the kitchen”. Um…where else would they be?
Same thing happens in the pottery studio. I look at the pieces of art made by professionals who use the same studio, and it makes me feel pretty small. I wonder, just how LONG will it take to make something that doesn’t look like an artifact from Pompeii? (post-volcanic eruption, I mean…)
And I won’t get started about fiction-writing. There, the learning curve is so far out, you can’t see the end.
by kyle | Nov 4, 2015 | Encouragement
Today I got into a closet-cleaning mood. I really have to act on it when it happens, because it won’t happen again until the next comet is scheduled to fly by. As I re-organized, a couple of interesting things surfaced. A couple of necklaces I thought I’d lost, and a folded-up piece of paper. I was intrigued. I opened it and it was a copy of some encouraging quotes from different sources. I wrote them down several years ago for a group I wanted to do when I lived in France, a small group of...
by kyle | Sep 20, 2015 | Inspiration
I was thinking today about the different ways people come to God. Some don’t come until very late, others not at all. But those who come do so in different ways.
First, there’s the limp. Life has beaten us up. We’re emptied out and bruised all over. Maybe not even sure God has noticed or cares, but we still go, limping. Our journey may be slower because of it, but that’s okay. We get there. And we get a lot of TLC along the way. Or maybe limping demands more effort than our strength can supply, so we crawl. I’ve felt like that. I’ve also crawled in the other direction at times, too hurt to look at Him.
