Do you want to know what is impossible? A relatively obscure Austrian bodybuilder who can barely speak English becoming one of the biggest international movie stars ever and THEN becoming Governor of the most populous state in the USA. That is impossible.
Here’s another one: A divorced B-list actor, on his way out in popularity, becoming the President of the United States. That is impossible.
One more: A clinically depressed unwed mother on welfare becoming the biggest selling author of the last 20 years with a net worth of over 1 billion dollars. That is impossible.
Necessary
Each one of these examples followed the process in the napkin. First, they did what was necessary. They did the hard work to reach their first goal. That first goal is not where they ended up. It was the necessary first step. If you aren’t willing to do the dishwashing in a restaurant, chances are you aren’t going to become an owner of a restaurant.
Possible
Each of the people above had a vision of what was possible. One knew he could become a world famous bodybuilder, the best that has ever been, before or after. One had the foresight and courage to change direction mid-life from acting to politics and public service. The third believed in all her heart that if she could get this book finished and into the right hands it would be a success. Their necessary hard work gave them glimpses into what was possible and they took advantage of those opportunities.
Impossible
Once the possible is taken advantage of with the foundation of necessary hard work, then those things that were WAY out of reach, that were impossible, all of a sudden became no longer impossible, just unlikely. Then more possibles came to pass and then the unlikely became a possible. Then, the impossible became real.
Arnold, Ronald and J.K.
Arnold Schwarzenegger was just another bodybuilding meathead. Ronald Reagan was just another washed up actor. J.K. Rowling was just another wannabe writer. But that’s what others thought of them. It wasn’t what they thought of themselves. They saw themselves, AND applied themselves, as if they were much greater and much better than how others saw them.
They Knew
They knew they couldn’t let others opinions decide their fate.
They knew hard, focused work was the key.
They knew they had to take advantage of the possible for it to become real.
They knew their vision had to expand and adapt as the future played itself out.
They knew not to be afraid of failure OR success.
Do you want to achieve the impossible? That’s how to do it.
Here are some rags to riches stories that illustrate this process again and again.
I usually think of perseverance as just sticking with something. But this quote brought to the fore a different aspect of perseverance for me. This focuses on the underlying reasons so many people don’t persevere; they think they’ve already worked hard enough or they simply tire of the work. That make me think about my own work differently.
Seems To Me
Yes, I’ve done a lot of work in my Napkin Dad efforts over the years. Sometimes it seems like it should be enough work to have succeeded. But what difference does it make if it ‘seems’ like anything? You can’t go by what something seems like. You have to go with reality. And the reality says I have more work to do to get where I want to go. In other words, ‘seems’ is irrelevant.
The Top of the Rock
Have you ever watched TV reports of rock climbers attempting to scale some giant cliff? They never have as their goal to get half way up the cliff, right? They say they are going to conquer that mountain, not conquer the half way mark of the mountain.
Often in rock climbing you see these beautiful photographs of the climbers in little tents hanging on a vertical cliff taking a break. They have food, shelter, warmth and they can actually survive days and weeks going up a cliff that way. They sleep all night and start up again the next day or they may have to wait it out a day or two if there is a storm.
But they stick to their goal, the top. No matter how tired they are, they can’t say ‘I worked hard enough, I am now at the top.’ They aren’t at the top until they are at the top, no wishing or feeling they should be at the top will change that.
It’s no difference with our goals. Do we want to achieve something? Then let’s set our minds to it and get started. Take little steps, keep at it, and let’s not fool ourselves into thinking we are done before we are done. We know it will be hard work and we commit ourselves to doing it. When we are tired, we take a break. But, we don’t shortchange ourselves and we don’t shortchange the world waiting for us to contribute what we have to give by quitting. We get out of the tent the next morning and resume our climb to our goal.
Periscope
Here is the Periscope video of the #NapkinKin trying to ‘guess the quote’ as I drew.
Drawing and Commentary @2015 Marty Coleman | napkindad.com
Quote by Newt Gingrich, 1943 – not dead yet, American politician
This is what happens when I decide to ask the #NapkinKin on Periscope what I should draw! I had the quote and had just the word ‘wish’ in the top and bottom quote areas. They had to guess the quote as usual but this time I decided I would let them suggest what I would draw as well. The result? A funny, crazy, unique and totally original napkin! See the bottom of the post to read the chronology of the drawing’s creation.
Prints are still available. $25.00
Someone Else’s Help
Sometimes self-help is knowing when you need or want someone else’s help. You don’t have to NEED someone’s help like when you are in a burning building and need to be rescued. You can just need or want someone’s help because it’s more fun than doing something alone.
I do my drawings alone. I come up with the ideas and images and I find the quotes. I choose the elements, the characters, the backgrounds. I then choose the colors and the type and degree of shading and rendering. I do it all. What that means is sometimes you start to get in a rut. You do the expected thing a little too easily. You fall back on a character or a color or a concept you may have done a few times too often.
Better Together
How many of us have never said, “I wish it were easier.”? Maybe it was losing weight or getting in shape. Maybe raising kids. Perhaps your marriage or job or family or home ownership or….or all of it. People just wish all of life was easier sometimes. right?
What I’ve noticed is that often that desire for things to be easier is actually a desire for a sharing of the burden. You aren’t opposed to the hard work of life, you just sometimes want to have some support in making it through. I know it’s true in my life as a runner. I run 5 days a week in a group I coach. I do all my own miles obviously, no one runs them for me. But I am not alone. I have companionship and support as I run the miles. Most of the people I run with think I am there for them, since I am the coach. But that is not completely true. I am a coach in no small part because I want to run with others. They meet my need as much as I meet theirs.
Friend in the Head
This week and next I am off from coaching and so am running on my own. I have been running 12 years now and it’s STILL not easy getting out my front door for a solo run. I can think of a bazillion reasons to not go between my bedroom door and the front door. But if I had a friend waiting in my driveway for me? I would not have those bazillion reasons going through my head. I would have my friend in my head. That is the power of doing things better.
How It Came About
So, as I mentioned, this funny and strange drawing came about via crowd sourcing on Periscope. Here is how it came about. All the people mentioned can be followed on Periscope.
The first suggestion was from @orion. He said draw stars (based on the fact that ‘wish’ was the only word showing).
@frogulox (Aaron) said there should be a top hat. I ended up drawing a sort of stove pipe top hat.
I had a suggestion of a rabbit from @futureartist123 (Mario). My attempt rendered a whale instead who fit snuggly under the top hat.
@feynwoman (Julia) suggested flowers. Since the whale was looking up, I decided flowers growing off the tree would be what he was looking at.
Then @ladyNynah (Antonia) said a tree and @JCahoonArtist (Jennifer) said a cactus about the same time. So, I drew a cactitree.
A cane with a bauble on top was then suggested by @frogulux, which I gave to the whale, along with a bow tie. Fred Astairewhale was born. He also asked for a hole in the tree for a gnome. I made the hole, but later @gintonics2 (Ginny) suggested a little bird instead so I drew a bird we named ‘Gnome’.
Then a turtle was recommended by @sfgianttortuga (Steve, a SF Giants and Turtle fan) and @Frogulox. I decided to make Turtle have a fascinator on her head and voila, we have Ms. Gingerturtle, the perfect friend for Mr. Astairewhale !
@LadyNynah reminded me Mr. Astairewhale needed water to survive so I gave him a swimming pool.
Then what to put in the middle. We had suggestions of a waterfall, a ladder, and from @PeteMtz, a stepladder. I decided a stepladder would be the right size.
@hammyton (Natalie) was thinking about danger and suggested a banana peel. I made it a whole banana to make it easier to comprehend quickly.
But what to put on the stool, anything? @VictoriaJamesUK (Victoria) suggested a vase of flowers and it seemed just right.
Then it was just the background left. @VictoriaJamesUK wanted a mountain and I fit it in behind Mr. AstaireWhale. I added a small hill on the other side, behind Ms. GingerTurtle. Then it was just a simple road going back into the distance and it was done.
The coloring was done to be as fun and bright as possible.
So, there you have what went into making this drawing, one I never could have made by myself!
You can follow all the people mentioned on Periscope. Tell them I sent you!
Yesterday I watched a Periscope by a friend in the UK named Victoria (@victoriajamesUK). She is starting a new daily broadcast where she and her followers will all say one positive thing about themselves each day. It’s a good practice to get into, especially if you are prone to beating yourself up over anything and everything.
She was talking about using a hashtag so everyone would know where to find the broadcasts and tweets and she used a phrase that included the words ‘mind and flowers’. I wrote back, shortening it to just #mindflowers. She liked that quite a bit and decided to use it.
In the meanwhile, A few days ago I had written down some quotes on the topic of self-help. When I went to start my drawing, and the accompanying Periscope, I saw this quote among the ones I had chosen. It was an obvious choice to use today!
Patience
I got a text last night from a friend who was upset that she couldn’t argue a certain point very well. She had posted a statement on Facebook and had gotten some backlash for it. She tried to argue her point, and I thought she did it pretty well, but she did not. The reason? Because the person she was arguing with ended up not agreeing with her. Boy, if I felt I failed every time my simply brilliant arguments didn’t lead to the reader or listener to come to their senses and agree with me, I would feel like a failure ALL THE TIME.
What my friend was hoping to see was an immediate acknowledgement of the rightness of her position. Don’t we all, right? But the truth is most changes of opinion don’t happen like that. Changes of opinion do happen, and I am all for arguing your position. But changes happen when the time is right for them, not necessarily when you happen to make the argument.
Rain
Think about a garden. in the middle of winter you can have seeds or bulbs underground getting plenty of water from rain or snow melting, right? That doesn’t mean those seeds or bulbs are going to sprout and blossom. They have a much more complex dynamic going on, as does our minds. The water (argument) is essential. But so is temperature (society) and soil (biology) and fertilizer (circumstances) and more. One argument is like one watering of the garden. It isn’t going to grow the garden if there isn’t another watering later on, if there isn’t good soil, the right temperature, the right nutrients. The garden will grow in it’s own time, when it is ready to grow.
Our minds open and blossom in their own time, and it’s wise for us to be patient with ourselves and others as to when and how that is going to happen. It doesn’t mean you don’t put forth your beliefs and opinions of what is right. It just means you understand and trust the process.
Periscope and Katch
I am now having my Periscope videos automatically saved at Katch.me. Here’s the one from yesterday where I drew this napkin.
I have been doing a fun thing on Periscope lately (you can go to the ‘periscope’ tab above to read about what that is if you don’t know). I am calling it ‘Guess the Quote’. I start a drawing with just part of a quote. In this case I started it with what you see below. ‘_____is better’ on top and ‘______than’ below.
Here is a recreation of the napkin as I started.
Then, as I draw, my viewers (the Napkin Kin) try to guess the rest of the quote. It’s a lot of fun, very interactive and engaging.
While I draw I also write down the guesses on a napkin. Here are what they guessed. Don’t scroll past the list if you want to guess since the finished drawing is below it.
By the time I am done with the line drawing someone has usually guessed the quote. We then have a great conversation about the quote and it’s meaning. I usually don’t want the scope to end, it’s that much fun.
Here is the final drawing and quote.
So, what do you think of the quote? And don’t forget, if you are on Periscope (Android or iOS) make sure you follow me so you can enjoy the next ‘Guess the Quote’!
Also, if you enjoy this post (and any of my other work) I would love it it if you would be so kind as to share it with others via social media. The buttons on the left and below can be used to share on twitter, Facebook and more. Thanks!
There are good reasons to not change your mind and good reasons to change it. Solid reliable evidence is a good reason to change your mind. Faux news stories on the internet that claim someone said something about something and is written by someone to get you to click on a headline and is obviously biased is not.
The Blind Spot
I came across a Facebook post yesterday from an old friend. He was promoting a conspiracy theory about 9/11. I argued a bit about it with him and others. Another friend then private messaged me gently giving me the advice that I should let it go. The reason? This was a blind spot the conspiratorial friend had. He was blind to something he was fully aware of in other areas of his life; namely logic, reason, critical thinking. Me arguing using any of those tools wasn’t going to convince him because he had, for whatever reason, purposely blinded himself to them in this area.
The Mystery Spot
There is a funny little tourist attraction in the Santa Cruz mountains of California, not far from where he lives. It’s called ‘The Mystery Spot’ and it promotes the idea that the laws of space, time and gravity don’t apply in that locale. It has funny shaped rooms that make you think someone is small when you know they aren’t. It has other spaces that make you feel like you are defying gravity in some way.
Now a little kid might think this Mystery Spot really does defy those laws, that is the fun of it for parents and adults, to see their kids wonder about these tricks without understanding them. It’s a way to teach them actually. But it would be very disturbing if a full grown rational adult went to the Mystery Spot and actually believed those laws were suspended. We would think they had something go wrong in their brain because it would be obvious to all that it was just an amusing slight of hand trick and it would not be believable that a grown adult would fall for it.
The Emotional Spot
But that is what happens in life all the time. We have blind spots where we don’t change our mind in the face of evidence. It might be emotional, a person just has to believe their dog is coming back after being lost 25 years ago. We all know the dog is dead by now, but that person emotionally needs to keep hope and so suspends rationality for their emotional need.
The Mind Spot
But emotional, intellectual and physical health actually are better served in the long run by our ability to face truths, to face reality. That sometimes means changing our minds about something. If we can’t do that, we can’t change ourselves and we can’t change anything else.
What are some examples of this from your life and the life of the world around you?
I like to think of myself as mostly being in the traveler category. But I am also a tourist and go to tourist spots, especially when I am new to a location and I like that. They are popular spots for a reason and I want to see them just like most other people. What puts me primarily in the traveler category isn’t where I go as much as it is how I am looking at the places I go. I look with the artistic eye I have always had and I think that makes the difference.
Doing the Act
As an artist I am doing two things when I travel that others may not be doing. One, I am actually creating my art. Both times I have gone to Europe (and other places) I have spent each morning up early at a cafe drawing. My wife and daughters were sleeping still and I used the time to observe and create. I drew at other times as well, when going from one place to another. I have drawn in trains, planes, and automobiles.
Observation of the Juxtaposition
The other thing I do is look for the artistic moment according to my aesthetic and artistic inclination. This of course is different with each person, artist or not. I tend to see that artistic moment when I see a juxtaposition between two or more things. I don’t see it so much in a depiction of one thing, like the Eiffel Tower, though an image of that can be pretty. I instead will be looking primarily for the Eiffel Tower in relationship to a person. Someone at the Tower. Not posing, but being and acting. I have my eye and my camera ready when I am in a place like that to find that moment.
The Relationship
The drawing above illustrates that idea. I would be the one seeing the Eiffel Tower tattoo on the back of the woman looking at the Eiffel Tower and wanting to capture that. It’s not that I don’t like pictures of the Eiffel Tower, I tried to get a number of classic shots. It’s just that the really compelling images, the ones I truly love and am excited to have captured, show more than a place. It shows a relationship between that place and someone or something else.
The Difference
Here are two photos I took during my recent trip to Europe. Both are good in my estimation, but the second one is the one that moves me. It’s the one that makes me feel like I really captured the essence of the Eiffel Tower in it’s affect on a real person.
Tourist Eiffel
This one is all about the tower. It’s pretty. It might be a postcard or a stock photo. It tells someone it is a beautiful site. It’s me as a tourist trying to get a great photo of an iconic site.
Traveler Eiffel
This is about the affect the tower has on someone. It is telling the hint of a story and that draws me to her and what she is thinking and feeling. It’s the one that stays with me. It’s me as a traveler finding out about the people of the world.
Which are you?
What do you all think? How are you a tourist and/or a traveler when you go some place new? What do you see that you think others may miss when they are in a new place?
As some of you know, I have been heavy into a new app called Periscope. It’s live video with chat interaction. One of the first people I followed was Sara Haines, the weekend Pop News Reporter on Good Morning America.
One of her early broadcasts outside of the studio was a thoughtful reflection on how she works constantly to not be judgmental of celebrities she covers, especially ones like Kim Kardashian, who engender such hatred from so many. I did a blog post based on that for my Shame series. Here is the link to that. – ‘Sara Haines, Kim Kardashian and the Power of Empathy‘
Sara as Kim
A few weeks later Sara did a segment on GMA where she actually made up, haired up and dressed up to look as close to Kim Kardashian as she could. She did a periscope during the transformation and asked someone to take a screen shot. I took a few and sent them to her via twitter. Here they are.
Sara Haines in Kim Kardashian style makeup
Sara Haines in Kim Kardashian style clothing and shoes
In the meanwhile this is what she usually looks like on camera, not at all like the pics above.
Sara Haines as herself
Deeper
The interesting part of this story isn’t about her physical transformation into a KK type look. That was fun to see but it became interesting and insightful the next day when she went for a power walk and talked about what happened when she dressed up that way. She took the walk while it was raining. She had on no makeup at all, the exact opposite of the day before. Here is a very small and blurry screen shot I got during that walk. My apologies to you, Sara, that it isn’t better.
Better Than
Here is what I heard her say she discovered. First, many complimented her, saying she looked better than Kim. The compliments were appreciated but they also started her thinking about why they were being given in that way. Why didn’t they simply say “You look great in that style.” if that is what they thought. Why did they feel it necessary to say she looked better than Kim? Was it that they felt Sara needed to know she won a competition? Was that what it was about? While she was saying this I thought about the ‘who wore it better’ segments I used to see on Fashion Police (before I stopped watching it due to it being negative, gossipy and hurtful). It wasn’t enough to just give the compliment. Sara had to be propped up above the competition. In Sara’s mind that wasn’t true and it was a side to the experience she didn’t really like. It made her sad to think people had that need to compare and judge and that they felt Sara needed it.
Cutting Down
An even more disturbing discovery was how many didn’t just stop with the compliment of how she looked better than Kim. They went on to rant about Kim, cutting her down for her lack of talent, her exploitation of her body, her media overexposure, her big butt, her husband, her lifestyle, her TV show, her this her that…on and on and on.
This made Sara sad as well. It made her sad that so many of the people she came across, including friends, co-workers and family, spent so much time hating someone they didn’t even know. She said some of them seemed to be way too happy hating Kim. And then she said this to the camera, “Don’t love hating people.” and I had my quote for my next napkin.
Getting Smaller, Not Taller
It comes down to something we all started experiencing and doing as children, that is the cutting down of someone so you feel higher. It’s an immature and insecure reaction to life, to other’s success, to other’s looks or lifestyle or preferences, etc. And we all have moments where we do it or are tempted to do it. But when we are tempted remember what it really is we are doing. It’s the equivalent of cutting off someone’s legs so you can be taller than they are. You aren’t really any taller. All you have done is hurt someone else so you can grab hold of an illusion of tallness.
But really only one thing grows when we do that, and that’s hate. And when you fall in love with hating people, judging people, you become smaller. Much smaller.
Getting Taller, Not Smaller
So, if you feel you suffer from this, here is an exercise. Take a celebrity you hate and say five positive things about them. Now evaluate what happened. Did that celebrity suddenly feel empowered to do something bad? Did they feel justified about something? No, they didn’t. Why? Because they didn’t hear you. Only you heard you. Now do that same thing of saying something positive about that celebrity you hate in front of someone else. Was the celebrity affected? No, they weren’t. Just you and your friend. And how were you affected? You said something kind or nice or insightful instead of ugly and mean and gossipy. You aren’t approving of them or their lifestyle, you are simply choosing to find something kind and positive, just as you would if the person was a close friend of yours.
