Be an Expert, Be a Learner

Artists and writers are always pushing ahead–pushing their boundaries, pushing themselves to learn a new technique. That’s growth. But there is also a time for being an expert and sticking to what you know.

First, sketch the raven. Then, cut out words and letters about ravens and glue them in place, using tweezers. Tiny, fiddly steps. There is no worthwhile project that doesn’t require time, attention, and practice. © Quinn McDonald, 2018

I’m learning how to create and run an online class. I’ve been teaching for many years,but it’s always been face-to-face. Online is a new medium for me, and a new medium always brings a learning curve. I don’t always love steep learning curves.

While creating a course (The Invisible, Visible World will be an online class as well as a book), I began with a brain dump of all the things I wanted to do in a four-week class. I had so many great ideas! But then I began to cram them into the modules. Either just a taste of an idea, or too many to finish in one class. Stop!

I backed up and looked at what I had a lot of experience in. I narrowed down the content, because too much information is just passing on my feeling of being overwhelmed.  The modules are simple and leave time for practice. Practice bring out expertise.

With less to learn and more time to practice, I see a better course emerging.  I hope so.

–Quinn McDonald is a certified creativity coach and a trainer in business writing topics. The Invisible, Visible World is a book on what we miss.

Lawn Ornament as Art

Here in the desert, we often don’t plant lawns. They get shriveled by May, and need too  much water. We use rocks instead.

This lawn had a big chunk of brown glass. I’ve never seen such a large piece of glass. (About the size of a shoebox.) But the sun was at the perfect angle. The glass looked as if it were on fire.

Sometimes is just a pile of rocks, sometimes its a piece of art. Up to you, always.

—Quinn McDonald is writing a book about the invisible, visible world. She is a writer and creativity coach.

The Tiny Fence

The Invisible, Visible World depends on perspective. Seeing things differently than others. Appreciating what shows up in front of you as you walk.

I am two different people: one who wants to know how everything works, is interested in reasons and causes and one who wants to experience the world through my senses.

Sometimes I see something and just want to enjoy what I see, what it makes me think of, the memories it brings out.

Here’s an example of how it works: I saw the tiny plant, clearly planted as a seed, surrounded by sticks, clearly broken off by hand, and stuck in the ground.  A tiny, wireless fence. It looks as if a child did it, but there were five of them, all in a neat row. Too neat for a small child. How could that protect anything?

But as I stood and looked at it, in the middle of the downtown front yard, I realized that the most likely attacker of the plant would be birds. (No rabbits in this part of town.)

The sticks were too tall for the birds to reach over, too close together for the bigger birds to squeeze through, and too tall for them to jump over.

A week later, the plants were bigger, and still there. I noticed the shadows the sticks cast, and the health of the plant. I noticed that the soil was damp and smelled like rain.  The things that protect us don’t have to be fancy, or complicated. Simple works. On plants. On people.

–Quinn McDonald is a creativity coach who helps people discover their creativity and put it to use. While she helps people who are labeled “creative,” she works with parents, investment bankers, teachers, and marketing executives, who often don’t know how to find their creativity.

 

Dust You Are

You see something, and your brain doesn’t quite understand it. Your brain, trying to be helpful, makes up information for you to believe. You not only believe it, you will defend what you are sure you saw.

About a dozen people have seen the photo above. Most of them guessed it was some sort of archeological dig, showing a partial skeleton. Some decided it was a sketch of a skeleton using pastels. I can see that.

But this is much more commonplace. It’s truck tire tracks into a construction site. The dirt mixed with rain to create the look.

–Quinn McDonald is writing a book on The Invisible, Visible World. It takes a look at commonplace things that have a more interesting story to tell.

The Shadow Side

Shadows play an important part in our lives. They depend on sun to exist. Without sun, there is no shadow. And a lack of shadow indicates a lack of sun. Simple enough.

But shadows have another meaning. Our “shadow” side is our darker side. The side that we don’t like as much, because it is mean, and shallow, and possibly dark. Without our shadow side, we could not be alert enough to compare one emotion to another. Sadness to joy, kindness to meanness. Without our shadow we would not be able to stay in balance.

Most shadows depend on a bit of dark blocking out light to create a shape. This shadow of a fence blocks out most of the light, but it is the light through the fence that defines the fence.

—Quinn McDonald is a writer and coach. She is writing a book on the Invisible, Visible World.

That One Moment

In that one moment, when I turned the corner and noticed a breeze in the canyon the streets make, I noticed a flash of color.  A fabric flower, discarded, was picked up by the breeze and tossed down the city street.

It was incongruous all on its own–a piece of pink fabric in a sleepy downtown city street. The pink petals lost the lift of the breeze and settled on a eucalyptus tree branch.  It was a perfect moment–a flower on a green tree against a white block fence.

I took the photo knowing that I was caught in a special moment. In another minute, the flower would be shaken out of the tree by another breeze. It might be blown into a pool, or run over by a car. But in that one instant in time, I could witness this temporary tree in fantasy bloom. We all need such moments.

—Quinn McDonald is a creativity coach who teaches creative problem solving and healing trauma through poetry. She also takes photos of the Invisible, Visible World.

Accidental Glass Mosaic

From the Invisible, Visible World–a piece of trash on the sidewalk. A piece of tape used to peel off glass pieces from a smashed windshield.

Another look, and you can see dragon scales, or a transparent snakeskin. Or a breathtakingly careful glass mosaic. I discovered that artists use broken tempered glass to make mosaics–they purchase large pieces, break it (using proper care) and then use the pieces (dyed with alcohol ink, too!) for mosaics.

The extension: don’t we all use broken pieces of our lives to re-assemble them into a useful, often beautiful, assemblage?

–Quinn McDonald is fascinated by the Invisible, Visible world. She’s writing a book about it.

Smiling Over Spilled Milk

During my morning walk, I came across some spilled ice cream on a sidewalk. In another city, or in another time, a rain may have washed the spilled milk away. In Phoenix, it dries in place. Fast. Which made it the perfect image to photograph.

While the lines and dots in the sidewalk were beautiful in their own right, I loved the way the melted ice cream ran into the safety portion of the sidewalk.

It seems that when we spill out our life, it can create art for people to see hours later. But only in the Invisible, Visible World.

–Quinn McDonald sees accidental art on her morning walks through Phoenix. She calls this temporary art part of the Invisible, Visible World. She’s working on a book about it.

Seeds and History

Seeds hold the history of the plant. Because a plant’s growth depends on favorable conditions, a seed will also reveal the amount of water, nourishment, sunlight, and care the plant received. Seeds from one area will be smaller, harder, and tougher if their lives were harder.

And sometimes, just because the sun is at the right angle, because I looked up, because the seed pods had light shining through them, sometimes I can see the future.

—-Quinn McDonald is a writer and creativity coach. She walks the emotional path with people in pain, and the dusty streets of Phoenix because she loves the invisible, visible world.

Asking for What You Need

We all need basics: air, water, food, friends. Once we acquire those, we have to start asking for what we need. Our friends are not mind-readers, no matter how much we wish they were. They may offer help,  but it’s up to us to ask for the kind of help we need. We aren’t very good with that.

“You’ve known me for 10 years! How can you think I’d do that?” or “Why didn’t it occur to you that I needed a babysitter?” Each of us has enough on our plates. And yes, you have to risk being told “no.” Asking for what we need is half of the solution. Handling “no” is the other half. It’s not easy being a friend and an adult at the same time.

This cactus cannot ask for what it needs. It needs water. It’s growing by a canal–all the water it could ever need is no more than 15 feet from its roots. But it can’t move and it can’t ask, and the canal is a concrete channel, so the water won’t leak over to it. Like most cacti, this one is hardy. It hasn’t rained significantly in three months. There are limits to hardy, too. Nature is not always soft and gentle. The cactus may well die, the soft parts dry, leaving a beautiful skeleton.

Note: these photos and brief essays are a prompt to help you think about the changes you might want to make in your life. I photograph the Invisible, Visible World to help us all become aware of what is around us. To think deeply about what we care about.

–Quinn McDonald is a creativity coach who helps people in emotional and psychological pain. She also helps people finish that book, painting, music, or dance. Or get started. But you have to ask for what you need!