Monday thoughts -- letting June be the month of love

 

For David Lobenberg

Self portrait
Acrylic on canvas
12 x 12 inches
Barbara Muir © 

Happy Birthday to my friend Suzanne -- sending you lots
of love. I just bought Austin Kleon's latest book shown above,
and can't wait to read it.  A teacher friend of mine says that self
doubt and criticism about art starts at about eight years
old.  I've noticed that in my young relatives, and I'm
eager to read Austin's book.  I just opened it a few minutes

ago, and he begins by explaining that he learned so
much from watching his children make art. Agreed.

One thing I've started to do to get back to being happy after digesting
the news is a technique called the Love list which came to
me in my dreams one night. How does that work? Create a

simple list in your mind of 20 things you love about your current life.

I list things like my morning coffee made by my husband, the beautiful
flowers from my neighbours in the kitchen, a phone call with a friend
in The Netherlands, a note from a friend in France, the view out
the window.

In the spirit of trying to be happy with one's life, I found this great
blog about loving yourself, and I want to share it tonight:

"When I taught Positive Psych one of the first things we said

to students was that if you don't know yourself, you won't love 

yourself, and if you don't love yourself, you can't love anyone else,

and you won't be happy.

This was totally not acceptable when I was growing up -- loving 

yourself smacked of narcissism.  But in fact nothing could be 

further from the truth. If we love and accept ourselves, the world 

is less about us, and more about the people we love.  It's when we 

don't love ourselves that we go around hurting other people, don't end up

doing what we love, and generally don't enjoy our lives.

I credit Louise Hay, excellent therapy and Frank Daley, who

was my boss, and wrote the book Who are you and what are you
doing here? for helping me get that concept.  It is an excellent 
idea.  When you love yourself, you love others."

And I'm pretty sure what Austin Kleon will suggest is that when
you think of art as play, it's fantastic.  Thank you Austin, I can't
wait to learn more.

Have a loving your life day!