I am intensely grateful to Stuart for upgrading our company blog software to improve its spam filtering.... again. Hurray! hurray! hurray! I know that it probably won't last, but for the moment... my inbox feels like a more welcoming place of brightness and light again! The barrage of spam our little company receives is full of spirit harm. It takes the wind from one's sails, and leaves me feeling.... like I need a shower....at the very beginning of the day. Such a waste of time and energy. It gets old, real fast. It is nearly impossible to share anything of one's heart, or to be open and generous of spirit knowing that the next day there will a flood of grossly boring nastiness that outnumbers the genuine comments by a factor of a hundred or more. I continue to be awestruck by the absence of spam on zaadz, too. It is wonderful to have that be a non-issue.

The question of the day is: "Where do you get your ideas?" ...but then the question goes on to ask a bunch of stuff with very different answers. And I believe that there are distinctions to be made here that can really help you do better in different circumstances. "What inspires you?" I never lack for inspiration and motivation, I just have to the awareness to be on lookout for it. I am inspired by anyone who is doing something that adds to the world in a positive way, and who is committed to it with all their heart. Their ability to express that commitment through action is what shines through them. And it is that beacon of heartfelt positive action that inspires me to add my little firefly sized glimmer to the world too. It doesn't have to be anyone famous, although there are heros a plenty out there too. Lately, I've seen that beacon shining brightly in the strength of my family. I am also blessed to have lots of customers who are doing amazing things out in the world, from rescuing animals to mapping the sea bed, and they also inspire me everyday to keep doing what we do. As long as I'm looking for it, I can count on that beacon to be there somewhere for me. "When you feel stuck...." Okay, that supposes a problem exists that I can't get my mind around with the direct approach. You can't always solve a problem as if you were storming the beach at Normandy! For me, that "feeling stuck" sensation is a real signal to do something else for a while. Like taking a walk, or gardening. Anything else that will let my mind work on the problem sideways. "...or at loose ends..." That sounds like when I am tired and exhausted, and I need rest. That's a good time to rest and refresh. Sleep on it. Meditate. Quiet the over active, over stimulated, over caffeinated, over wraught mind. Rest. Rest. Rest. "...where do you get your best ideas?..." Direct Observation. If you are looking for an original idea, there's no substitute to looking right at things and bringing to it your own unique point of view. Since only you can do that, it guarantees originality, if not popularity. Experiment. You have to tinker. Some things will work. Some won't. The doing brings new ideas either way, and it is better than getting stuck in a cartoon like thought bubble of analysis paralysis. "Is is by reading? Journaling? Talking with others? Taking some time in nature? Or something else altogether?..." Yes. All of those techniques can be helpful. Although, anything too predigested will certainly not yield up an original idea. Of course, you don't always need an original idea. You may just need to know about something you haven't heard of yet. I am more than willing to do research, and to learn from the collective experience of other people. Combined with direct observation, you can often gain insights that you wouldn't have otherwise. There's nothing wrong with climbing up onto the shoulders of those amiable giants over there to have a look see. :-)

My mom, Jean Blake White, in addition to working with us with the customer support center for my business, is an accomplished professional artist. I paint too, but I would say that I dabble. I’m maintaining my amateur status for when they add watercolors to the Olympics. :-) She and I did this painting together in mixed media — watercolor, pastel, and ink, on one Sunday afternoon recently. It was kind of a fun painting “duet” in visual form. My mom was on the left side of the paper, and I was on the right. Of course there was also some cross over into each other’s territory as we got into it. We were just “messing about” with a new set of watercolors that we had just bought, and wanted to try them out to see what they could do. And of course, Stuart and I have been “messing about in boats” with our sailing lessons so the theme evolved naturally as we worked. My mom and I were really pleased with how this painting turned out, because it looked like one composition rather than two, and the page had a lot of brightness and positive energy. You can almost feel the wind gusting across the page and our happy artistic playfulness as we swished our brushes gleefully over the surface of the paper. Even though we hadn’t set out to do anything in particular, we decided that this painting was definitely a “keeper” and we were delighted to be able to share it in the Summer Newsletter for our Life Balance software customers. And now I get to share it with my friends on Zaadz too! :-)