the first 40%

I was cleaning out files this evening and had an envelope in my hand to pitch when I flipped it over and saw this statement from Deb. I was on the phone with her at the time, and we were trying to finish up a project when she said the following:

"I always forget that the initial work takes 40% of the time."

Her statement lays out a problem most of us deal with over and over and over. We have in our heads an idea of the work to be done on a project. We reach the end point. And then we do all of the things that must be done for a completed project to move from our own personal brains out into the world. You know: the other 60% that's not done - heck, usually it's not even started.

The tenet applies to projects of all sizes. Deb and I were probably completing a book proposal when she made the statement, but I ran into the 60% this week while finishing my column for Today's Woman magazine. Got the big scene written that was to constitute the piece and drew what I thought was the conclusion -- except it only took up two sentences, and that was stretching it. Where I come from, that means there's something more important to say, if only I can determine what it is. I made a few reference phone calls, walked the dog a time or two, and generally bored myself half to death. Finally, I remembered a second story, one told to me years ago, that shifted my understanding of what I thought I was talking about.

I'd have guessed I'd done 90% of the work when I completed that first run at writing. Turns out Deb was correct, though: I was only at about 40%. With the new story included and a segue to glue the two stories together, I was at 100% -- unless you count the cliches and flat diction sprinkled here and there. Once the whole piece is at 100%, I do one or two (okay, three) final look-sees. That's my chance to plump up the pillows and straighten the comforter and put a vase containing a yellow posie on the dresser. That's my chance to end up with a piece that when I see it again in a few months or years I'll find something in it to admire, even if I disagree completely with my own conclusions. And that's how I reach tranquility in my professional life.

The Premise

I'm deconstructing my 2003 book -- literally -- and turning it into small artworks. (You can see them at my It's Only a Book blog. If you'd like one, just let me know.) A paragraph I ripped out today got me to wondering if a new religious awakening (not fundamentalism but a true springing forth of loving our neighbors and feeding sheep)is going to accompany the economic disarray in which we've found ourselves.

Here's the paragraph:

Even God makes more sense from the premise that life's a nightmare. Who needs God when nothing bad can ever happen to you because you have a late-model car, health benefits,and a retirement account? In that circumstance, God's a sidekick, a buddy, a fuzzy blanket you sleep with at night bcause it's comfortable. Then when disaster arises you whine because God was supposed to be your personal defense system, keeping you safe. On the other hand, if you know life to be a nightmare, then the presence of God is a sanctuary, like the shell of a turtle, traveling with your wherever you go, rain or shine, sickness or health, for better or worse.

This week, think and write a little bit each day about sanctuary: what it is; where you find it; whether your understanding of the concept has ever changed; what precipitated the change.

Temporarily Tranquil

I was telling someone a few weeks ago that I'm writing about tranquility; and how I think it becomes both more attainable and more precious the older we get. She thought it over and said, "It's always temporary."

"YES!" I said, because I'd come to the same conclusion just the day before. It's ALWAYS temporary. Sometimes big things interrupt it, sometimes little ones; but it's always getting away from us. That's why we need to remember and reclaim it.

For instance -- and I hate even going down this road, but there it is -- some fool who lives up the way from me takes her dog onto the tennis court. I'm fine with that part. I take my dog onto the tennis court, and he chases the tennis ball and smells all around the base of the fence. If my compadre's along, the two of them take a nice lope or two around the net. And then we leave.

This person to whom I'm referring with the dog? She lets her dog take a dump on the tennis court and then -- because apparently that's not proof positive of what a slob you are -- she doesn't pick it up but leaves the pile there. I fume about this matter every time I catch sight of the tennis court.

The most gracious way I could resolve the matter is to use one of the extra bags I always carry and pick up her dog's refuse. What I actually WANT to do is put a sign on the fence that says, "If you can't pick it up, get rid of the pup." That's not completely true; really I'd rather install a flashing arrow in front of her house under a sign saying PICK UP AFTER YOURSELF.

Yep, that's me: tranquil as all get out up until the moment I'm not. Or until the moment I think about the moment I started being not tranquil. Which is to say it's only ever temporary. Luckily, we can step back toward it whenever we're ready to stop having our life disrupted by a (no doubt sweet) dog we don't even know.

Three a Day

Yesterday on the way to the post office I was ruing my long To-Do list, populated with items I'm not interested in, some of them dating back a few weeks, or perhaps even a month; one or two actually go all the way back to Christmas week. None of them can be expunged. I just have to do them. But how without betraying my own rule of moving within the moment; of choosing to do that to which I'm led? (Not everybody can follow this rule. Children in the house rather preclude it. Also, if you're not deadline-motivated -- which I am -- it can lead to disaster.

Yesterday, though, I decided to try an experiment. For the next howeverlong, I'm going to do three things a day that I don't want to do.

My intent? To bring myself back into harmony by eliminating the cobwebby details clunking up my brain.

I'm hoping this will be a limited engagement, that in short order I'll either have swept down all the cobwebs; or that I'll come to a rapprochement with life and no longer assign judgments to tasks that need done but will simply do them immediately, thus removing them to the state of inconsequence they warrant.

I'm moved in part by an e-mail from my friend Nicole who had open heart surgery one month ago yesterday and was gloating because the doctor had just told her she can now drive AND VACUUM. "I never thought I'd miss vacuuming," she said.

It's the vacuuming, but it's also the normalcy I imagine she was missing. And that's what I'm after: regarding boring, repetitive, inconsequential tasks as normalcy; and thereby creating in them an invisibility that will allow for increased tranquility in my own life.

Do you think it will work? If so, might you try something similar? Or perhaps the inverse is true for you; that you do the required tedious stultifying items on your list and somehow never quite get to the fun part. If so, might you try the opposite, and make yourself do three fun things a day?

(Here's a dastardly thought: I find the idea of doing three fun things a day harder than the idea of doing three things I don't want to do. What's up with that?

The Power of Plodding

My good friend Debra Engle and I have come up with a new book concept. We're not ready to break out the title yet, but the brilliant subtitle she invented today is "Finding Grace in the Tough Times." Amazing, isn't it?

Moreso because in observing the economic crisis I'm amazed at how deranged this supposedly Christian nation has become. Do people not listen when they go to church? All those folks who believe the Bible is the inerrant word of God handed down in red letters in the Felizabethan English - what, they think it's all inerrant except that pesky little Matthew 6 verse, "Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through"?

Any Christian out there reading the Bible with a bit of attention shouldn't be surprised if they got Madoffed. How could you miss something right there in black-and-white?

Moths, rust, corruption, and thieves -- could it be more clear that putting your faith in bank accounts and IRS is not the right path?

From my work in the domestic violence movement years ago, I know violence in the home increases when the economy tanks. Layoffs, cutbacks, stress over credit card and grocery bills -- they all put stress on the family unit. Lovely people I know report raised voices in their own personal living rooms and the concomitant shock over the tempestuous natures they didn't know until now dwell in their own tempestuous breasts.

At moments like this, proverbs and slogans and morals of the story can sometimes grant surcease, however temporary. I'm going with "Slow and steady wins the race" -- slowly and steadily we (individually and as a country) are finding a way through this never-before-visited maze. Plod on in the direction that feels correct; eventually we'll be somewhere different.

Nobody inflicted this mess upon us. (In honor of Lent, I'm exonerating the immediate past president.) We(individually and communally)got into it ourselves. We (individually and communally) can plod our way out.

That instant gratification thing we've become accustomed to? Say bye-bye. Instead, it's time for Plodding Power.

For this week's adventure in penmanship, choose a proverb, Aesop's fable, myth, or slogan as your theme for the week. Contemplate it and jot notes about it as the week progresses. Next Sunday or Monday, write a paragraph about the insights you gained.

We're curious what proverb, etc., you chose. Feel free to leave us a comment. (I'm pretty sure you can do so anonymously if the thought of going public makes you nervous.)

Why I Love Sam Pickering

Yesterday I was just getting started on a damn fine rant rant about how newspapers keep laying off the important people -- journalists who cover finance, science, and the environment -- while hanging on to the sports and celebrity reporters.

At the same time I was reading Sam Pickering's Letters to a Teacher, a 2004 collection of his essays about teaching, and came upon this statement:

"In truth sports are popular because they are trivial."

It's hard to rant well after that. The triviality of sports and also of celebrity coverage is their real power. They don't matter. Everybody knows they don't matter. Even the people who can recite statistics about every baseball team or recall the outcome of every Super Bowl game or remember when Eddie left Debbie for Liz or the day Britney and K-Fed split -- those people are lodging their attention and emotion in things that don't matter because putting attention and emotion into the things that do are too taxing. They might stir up things better left unacknowledged or unaddressed. They might bring about change, and who knows what will happen then? But sports? We know the score there. Literally, we know the score; and some days that's enough to know.

Do you follow sports or celebrities? If so, how do you perceive their role in your life? If not, what allows you relief from the stresses and vagaries of real life? Where is your safe hiding place?

Those darling Unitarians are at it again

I love Unitarian Universalists, not least because they believe that kindness and common sense are critical aspects of a living faith. Like every other denomination, individual congregations fight like cats and dogs from time to time; but the divisiveness that sits on the shoulder of trinitarians is, if not excluded, at least rare.

They've now formed a group for spiritual directors that has the potential to enrich lives across the country. My favorite statement in their news release says that you don't have to believe in God to engage in spiritual direction.

Does that statement surprise you? If you agree with it, write a paragraph each day this week pointing out why it's wrong. If you disagree, write a paragraph each day this week pointing out why it's right.

Feeling tension at the very thought of writing against your inclination? Excellent!

Red shoes

I've just been reading an interesting blog called Like the Wrench and the Cracker. The author wears size 11 shoes and, as a result, has her relatives and close friends on notice to buy any cute pair of red shoes they run across. She has also taken to ebay -- and no wonder -- no one location is going to have sufficient red shoes, now are they?

She listed the five or six kinds of red shoes (sandals, boots) she owns and went on to question whether the wearing of them is sufficient to make up for the absence of anonymity while in a bathroom stall at work. Her comments reminded me of my friend Jack, who used to work at a law firm. One day I saw him on his way to the office, all gussied up in suit, tie, and red tennis shoes. When he noticed me noticing, he said, "I know it's going to be a rough day today, so I'm wearing these shoes to keep my spirits up."

Well, that would be the point of red shoes, wouldn't it? To keep your spirits up. To let your heart sing a little bit. To remind yourself that, while God may count every hair on your head, you're really not important enough for the color of your shoes to wreck anything that matters. Which led me to wonder how my world would be different if I'd worn red shoes every day for ... oh, pick a number ... the last ten years.

And what about you?

This exercise is similar to the question of who I'd be now if my parents had named me Alcott (on the one hand) or Tiffany (on the other). The name question, though, gives agency to other people. The red-shoe question gives agency to you, yourself. That's where the energy lies. That's where the traction lies. So spill some of that energy-traction on the page and see where it takes you.

Let me know, if you'd like. I'm curious.

Our True State

The only problem with books is that you have to actually write them before they can be published. Which is what Deb Engle in Iowa and I in Kentucky have been doing, with calm resolve, for over a month now. With the deadline nearly upon us, we're sifting through notes we've made over the last few years, gleaning treasures here and there. I want to share this one with you:

You don’t have to move or change jobs or leave your husband or unnaturally alter your state of consciousness. We’re not after an altered state; we’re after our True State – unbridled joy. Jill Conner Browne, The Sweet Potato Queens’ Book of Love, p. 209-210


Brain/Soul Teaser: I'm totally in agreement with Jill, but you may feel differently. This week, write out what you believe our True State is. How close are you to enacting it in your life?

The Dalai Lama, Jean S. Bolen, Desmond Tutu & Deb

I've learned that my co-author, Debra Landwehr Engle, has an essay included in The Art of Living: A Practical Guide to Being Alive, a book released in October 2008 in both English and Spanish by publisher Editorial Kairos in Barcelona, Spain.

Deb joins voices worldwide who share "their thoughts on those questions of being alive which concern us all." Other contributors include the Dalai Lama, Jean S. Bolen, Desmond Tutu, Mikhail Gorbachev, Sir Richard Branson, Deepak Chopra, and a 104-year-old Holocaust survivor. The editor is Claire Elizabeth Terry.

Proceeds from the book will benefit Green Cross International. Founded by Mikhail Gorbachev, the organization's motto is "Give humanity a chance. Give the earth a future." Copies are available from Editorial Kairos in Barcelona. To order or for more information, e-mail them at info at editorialkairos dot com.

"The Dalai Lama, Mikhail Gorbachev, Mario Vargas Llosa, Muhammad Yunus, Deepak Chopra, Federico Mayor Zaragoza, Jean S. Bolen, Desmond Tutu, Sogyal Rinpoche, Michael Douglas, Sir Richard Branson, John Berger, and others.
"The Art of Living consists of a cross-section of voices from diverse cultures worldwide, each of whom share with us their thoughts on those questions of being alive which concern us all – irrespective of our religious or cultural backgrounds: in effect, ‘pooling our resources’, in order that we may all help each other learn the beautiful and complex ‘art’ of being alive.
"From the Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Michael Douglas, Mario Vargas Llosa, Muhammad Yunus, Deepak Chopra and Mikhail Gorbachev, to a Native American storyteller, an Armenian Shaman and a 104-year-old Holocaust survivor, The Art of Living doesn’t pretend to be an exhaustive study of every single aspect of being alive, but it is compiled with the hope that it may help to shift our perspectives – just a little.
Claire Elizabeth Terry studied stage-management at the Central School of Speech and Drama, London. After working for several years in British theatre, she became a travel writer. Short-listed for the Shiva Naipaul Memorial Prize, she has written for the acclaimed Rough Guides travel series, as well as for several international publications. Claire has lived in Paris, Berlin, Crete and Florence. She now lives in Barcelona with her son, Roberto."