Hu - More!

Because humor is such an essential life ingredient! I really love what John Cleese had to say during a talk on Creativity, in which he points out that humor is one of the main ingredients in the creative process:

"And now, the last factor, the fifth: humor.
Well, I happen to think the main evolutionary significance of humor is that it gets us from the closed mode to the open mode quicker than anything else.
I think we all know that laughter brings relaxation, and that humor makes us playful, yet how many times important discussions been held where really original and creative ideas were desperately needed to solve important problems, but where humor was taboo because the subject being discussed was {air quotes} "so serious"?
This attitude seems to me to stem from a very basic misunderstanding of the difference between 'serious' and 'solemn'.
Now I suggest to you that a group of us could be sitting around after dinner, discussing matters that were extremely serious like the education of our children, or our marriages, or the meaning of life (and I'm not talking about the film), and we could be laughing, and that would not make what we were discussing one bit less serious.
Solemnity, on the other hand… I don't know what it's for. I mean, what is the point of it? The two most beautiful memorial services that I've ever attended both had a lot of humor, and it somehow freed us all, and made the services inspiring and cathartic.
But solemnity? It serves pomposity, and the self-important always know with some level of their consciousness that their egotism is going to be punctured by humor -- that's why they see it as a threat. And so {they} dishonestly pretend that their deficiency makes their views more substantial, when it only makes them feel bigger.
{John blows "raspberries" with his tongue.}
No, humor is an essential part of spontaneity, an essential part of playfulness, an essential part of the creativity that we need to solve problems, no matter how 'serious' they may be.
So when you set up a space/time oasis, giggle all you want. (25:39)
And there, ladies and gentlemen, are the five factors which you can arrange to make your lives more creative:
Space, time, time, confidence, and Lord Jeffrey Archer."

© 2014 Slowly The Eggs aka Maria Papadimitriou

Prayer

There is an incredibly beautiful prayer, that Robert Holden shares in his fabulous book 'Loveability', I often come back to during times of self doubt and confusion. It is a prayer by a Benedictine nun named Macrina Wiederkehr:

'O God, help me to believe the truth about myself
no matter how beautiful it is! Amen'

This is an illustration inspired by it.

'Life Drawing' Poem

In 2003, while at art college, during life drawing classes, I would sometimes look at the model and the set up and write a poem instead of draw. For some reason this 'life drawing' poem I wrote that year drew my attention this morning...

'Don't die with your music still in you' !

'Don't die with your music still in you' - I love this quote by Dr Wayne Dyer and was inspired to make an illustration expressing it. It means that you don't allow yourself to live any life other than the one you were born to live! May we all remember , remember, remember this... :-)

'Don't die with your music still in you' © 2014 Slowly The Eggs aka Maria Papadimitriou