REsources for Living
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Many, many years ago I visited the palm reader’s booth at a Renaissance Faire. The palm reader studied my hand for a minute or two, and then pronounced: “You have a lot of creative energy.” Read more →
Did You Know?
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…that the CLF has its own talk show? Catch The VUU Thursday mornings on YouTube live, or watch the archived version on YouTube at your convenience. Read more →
Your House
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Your house has 1000 rooms.
Every closet, drawer, cupboard,
box and bin opens up
onto another world. Read more →
Creativity
April 2017
Creativity is piercing the mundane to find the marvelous. —Bill Moyers
Articles
Creativity, Art and Failure
Neil Gaiman, who is a writer and creator of many things, gave a commencement speech that was later published as a book. Read more »
We Journey Together
We journey together in a way that we believe is best for supporting an individual’s growth in the community. Read more »
The Creative Spirit
My son is in kindergarten. Every morning before we leave for school, I check his backpack for the essentials… Read more »
Pure Imagination
We each were born with the powers of creativity. While we’re not all going to be famous artists or poets or musicians, we each have the faculties to use our imagination to create. Read more »
The Spirit of Creativity
While I believe it is true that no one can take your creativity away from you, there are those who sure try. Read more »
From Your Minister
Years ago, a therapist told me that people would rather feel absolutely anything besides helplessness. Read more »
Notice of Annual Meeting
To all members of the Church of the Larger Fellowship, Unitarian Universalist… Read more »
REsources for Living
Many, many years ago I visited the palm reader’s booth at a Renaissance Faire. The palm reader studied my hand for a minute or two, and then pronounced: “You have a lot of creative energy.” Read more »
Did You Know?
…that the CLF has its own talk show? Catch The VUU Thursday mornings on YouTube live, or watch the archived version on YouTube at your convenience. Read more »
Your House
Your house has 1000 rooms… Every closet, drawer, cupboard… box and bin… opens up onto another world… Read more »
Your Body is Your Body
The chorus of this song by Peter Alsop is “My body’s nobody’s body but mine. You’ve got your own body, let me run mine!” It’s a good little bit of song to keep in your head for times when someone else seems to think that your body should look or act a different way than what is right for you.
In the Circle of Love
The poet Edwin Markham, who was born in 1852, and became the poet laureate of Oregon from 1923-1931, was invited to read his poem “Lincoln, Man of the People” at the dedication of the Lincoln Memorial in 1922.
But UUs most often remember him for a tiny little poem that expresses his Universalist beliefs in love that is big enough to include everyone—and offers a radical understanding of belonging. The poem, called “Outwitted,” says:
He drew a circle that shut me out—
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!
Think about what the poem says: He wanted to shut me out and say that I didn’t belong. He said that my beliefs made me someone who had to be pushed away. But because I live from a place of love, I did something very clever and sneaky—I found a way to include and welcome him, even when he wasn’t willing to include or welcome me.
That’s Universalism—love big enough to offer belonging to every human soul. Not because everyone is like us or even necessarily likeable, but because Love is big enough to include everyone.
Dance Break for Joy
We can express joy in so many ways. One way is with our bodies. You might want to wiggle your fingers and toes. You might want to stretch like a cat or hop like a bunny, you might want to wrap a warm blanket around yourself. You might want to hug a friend, or wiggle in your chair.
Just like there are so many ways to express joy, there are so many ways to use your body to dance your joy! You can dance whenever you feel joyful. You can dance any way you like. And when you don’t feel very joyful, something magical might happen if you can dance anyway. It might even change the way you are feeling!
Send in the Clowns
Most of us only see clowns in parades and circuses. But for refugees and people who cannot go back to their homes, there are not many parades or circuses, and the children who live in the refugee communities don’t get to see many clowns-or have a lot of fun in general. It’s a hard life for anyone, especially for children, but these clowns are clowning for a cause!
Clowns without Borders is a troupe of performers who visit refugee camps and displaced communities and perform for them. They juggle, they do magic tricks, they make everyone laugh and smile. For more than 20 years, these joyful folks have brought joy to the loves of people who have experienced great struggles and loss. They call it Resilience Through Laughter.
Why is this posted in the UU & You section of Family Quest? Because there are UUs participating in Clown Without Borders today! Here’s an interview with lifelong Unitarian Universalist Sarah Foster:
Sarah Liane Foster, a lifelong Unitarian Universalist, traveled as a professional clown with Clowns Without Borders to Haiti, Turkey, Colombia, Swaziland, and South Africa where children have experienced conflict and injustice. “Laughter is a critical way to heal trauma,” Sarah said. You can read more about Sarah’s story in the Spring 2016 Family pages of UU World as well!
Beautiful and Broken
A mosaic is a kind of artwork that is made by creating a picture out of pieces of pottery. It’s a way that something broken can turn into something beautiful.
One way to play with the idea of a mosaic is to draw an abstract picture, full of color and shapes, but not necessarily of a particular thing like a cat or a robot. Then cut the picture up. Break it on purpose. Then glue the pieces onto a piece of construction paper, leaving just a little gap between each piece.
You will create a new, and maybe surprising, piece of art by taking the original drawing apart and putting it back together in a different form.
