What Story Are You Telling?

To positively move forward, we must create new normals.  We must shift our ways of thinking, seeing, and doing.  We must embrace the world around us and become part of its story.  We must tell new stories.

How?

First, expect beauty.  Move from a place where beauty is only captured in art museums, ocean side vacations, or photoshopped models.  Instead, start noticing color, texture, depth, creation, conversation, uniqueness, and love.  When we do that, everything begins to change.  We can expect to be surrounded by fragments of beauty each and every day.

Second, revel in it.  When we see beauty, capture it, breathe it, draw it, etc.  We must do whatever we can to experience the beauty we've found ourselves in.

Third, make it our story.  The story of beauty needs telling, and retelling, and retelling again.  Because in the story of beauty, is a story of creation, creativity, humanity, and love.  When we experience beauty, we must be confident in the promise that, "It is good."  And in the goodness of this new found beauty, may we make it our own stories to tell.

Peace,
Ross

You Are What You Art [re-post]

You all know the phrase, "you are what you eat."

It's 100% true.  The molecular properties of the foods you consume are brought into your body, alter your own physical and psychological makeup, and produce everything from growth to moods, disease to genetics.

Now consider this phrase: "you are what you art."

Art has always been something that compels, confronts, confuses, and creates new worlds.  Cultures change because of art; politics are overturned, and the world is changed forever.

The artist has an incredible role within humanity.  The truest artist has always been on the forefront of creating culture - not simply reacting to it.

Which brings me again, to the new phrase, you are what you art.

Biologist James Zull writes, "Neuroscience tells us that the products of the mind--thought, emotions, artistic creation--are the result of the interactions of the biological brain with our senses and the physical world: in short, that thinking and learning are the products of a biological process…This realization, that learning actually alters the brain by changing the number and strength of synapses, offers a powerful foundation for rethinking everything."

Art changes the mind, which changes the biology in one's brain and the physical world.

Consider the following artist…the chef who refuses to use genetically modified plants and animals to create a dish that is sustaining the biology of the consumer, as much as he/she is sustaining the environment. 

The culinary artist is transforming how we think about food, how we consume it, and even our most basic genetic and biological synapses.

Now consider the poet or songwriter…he/she writes to provoke and change a once held truth.  Over time these ideas and hopes become reality.  There's an incredible amount of power in the words, chords, melodies, and textures that the artist is creating; so much so, that our biological synapses are modified and we become a different person (in thought, reaction, and as society).

Are you creating beauty and tension and words and worlds that is worthy of biological change?

Consider your art in these terms. 
Consider the power of what you create. 
Because you truly are what you art.

Peace,
Ross Christopher