There are two types of men in the world :
Those who think there are two types of men in the world, and the others!
Nasreddin
Month: January 2017
Marie Carroget, #French #Photographer
Don’t misinterpret Marie’s work. A first glance will make you put her into “I see beauty in ordinary or dirt”, that’d be too easy.
There’s something about that, yesss, but also a smile, a tenderness, a casualness, a talent which forces us to stare, touched or intrigued. She plays with our eye, with the fake, with childish weirdness, too. I love her!
Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/mariakdolores/
Tumblr : http://mariecarroget.tumblr.com/
Vincent Giarrano, painter
Why do you blog? The mess of #motivation theories – #blogging
Ah that good question it is, “Why do you blog?”. You can pick another one if you want : Why to you run? Why do you paint? Why do you shop? Why do you have sex?
I use it as a pretext to write about Motivation Theories, which are a whole messy basket of attempts to explain why I do something.
Why do you blog? Well, it depends…
- You want to grow, to accomplish something
- You want new competences
- You want to meet people, affiliation
- You need to express yourself
- You believe in it
- You need more self-esteem
- You want money, or a job
- You want power, you want to influence people
- You want to be rewarded, posititive feedbacks, recognition
- You want to impress someone, or a group
- You want to be heard, you want readers, followers
- You think it’s a way to gain something else, to enter something
- It’s interesting
- You fear something, like punishment
- You need a goal, a discipline, a frame, to push yourself
- You are pulled, or triggered by something, orders for example
- You need schedules, to be driven by something
- You need to be busy, tasks
- You need to forget something else
- You want to reduce something
- Expectancy
- You want to meet your future husband or your wife
- Motivation needs to become words and expression
- You want or need to explain yourself
- You search something and you find it little by little
- You need to be productive, to produce something, to have results
- You like numbers, statistics, you count visitors, likes, followers
- You’re drunk
If you want to find more, Google “Motivation“, that’s really funny to dig. At the end, I found one day a single way to express this mess (your reason you blog is a melting cheese of reasons, right?) that could be the ultimate height of social motivation :
You blog, because you want to be loved
Thanks for reading!
Keep a part for later – Masterpieces from Masters
If you’re an explorer, you sometimes discover an artist you… adore.
It’s so good that you can’t resist : here you are exploring the whole chest, pigging out the whole thing. We are all lost souls, craving for…
But sometimes you climb “one more degree”. It’s so good that you decide something.
Keep a part for later. More in reserve. Some gas left in the tank.
This is what I did with a few masters : Puccini, Chekhov, Faulkner, Borges, Jünger. Who are yours?
I know Manon and La Bohème by heart, and pretty well some of other Puccini’s operas, like Tosca or Butterfly, and one third of Trittico. Each time I listen to a part of Turandot I’m floored… but I keep it for later!
Chekhov wrote hundreds of short stories. I have shelves of that guy! But I never read “everything”. It’s the same for Jünger or Borges, or Faulkner.
- Keep the pleasure to discover something new from a Master you love.
- One day it’s maybe to late : you’re dead. Or you’re not interested any more.
- You sometimes don’t remember if you read this or that. Even better, right?
- There’s a middle choice : listen or read once, and then wait for years.
- Years after, you read or listen… another way.
- Choose an infinite area. Restaurants in Paris for example. Hmmm?
Thanks for reading!
Instagram : hallieartwork
How to #meditate ? Try the candle! #mindfulness #meditation
You read many books about meditation, about mindfulness. Perfect. You tried.
You understood, I hope, that nobody can “really” meditate. Even skilled masters. It’s a process. You just try. You climb, very slowly.
You understood that it’s just BORING, and that’s a part of it, right?
You understood that you can not and will not stop your spirit. It “thinks”. It’s life, after all. Your brain is an engine, and you will never tame it. OK.
This is a good path. Meditation is a process.
What you know now, it’s that in order to meditate you have to focus on something which is “there” but has absolutely no importance.
You can serve tea the Japanese way, you can stare at a mandala, you can speak a mantra in loop (I suggest “Tululu” – no, just joking), you can visualize the path of air going in your respiratory system. Inhale/Exhale. Good! You can even meditate when you watch the course of the clouds…
Something works perfectly : the candling candle.
A candle is great because it’s warm and beautiful, but mainly because it’s, at the same time, always the same thing (breathe/mantra) and at the same time, the flame is like going to you : “HEY, watch me!”. Like one finger calling you : “Focus, silly!”. It moves!
A flame is like a little firm and fair beast telling you constantly to be there. And it “means” nothing. It’s just there, with you.
You just have to follow her way of being in the world… Sshhh…
Thanks for reading! Have a nice day!
Feather moon
Scarlet sky
Living clouds
My blinded eye
Waters black
Wood in snow
Dead of night
How bright you glow[Chorus (4x):]
Breathe in breathe out
Exhale and inhale
Scarlet sky
Living clouds
My blinded eye
Waters black
Wood in snow
Dead of night
How bright you glow[Chorus (4x):]
Breathe in breathe out
Exhale and inhale
Seven sins
God of stone
All is true
Down to the bone
Feather moon
Scarlet sky
I love you endlessly
Not knowing why
[Chorus (8x)]
Exhale and inhale…
Exhale and inhale…
Instagram : vzcomood
Is it OK to be a #Muse ? Part II #Inspiration
I tried one day to write about the idea of a muse. It was hard so I just asked questions. Today I will play it further.
In history, the idea of the muse is a bit too much “charged”. A muse is a woman who “inspires” a male artist, right?
I’m not talking about this at all. I dance here with the adult concept of the Muse (and I add a capital to the word), the tool, the pattern if you want. Call it SuperMuse (oh I like this word!) or HyperFriend if you want. Here are a few tracks :
- What do you do as a Muse? You disturb, you ask, you laugh, you listen carefully, you fight, you understand, you don’t understand, you give seeds, you play, you offer, you smile, you sparkle, you inspire, you surprise, you disagree, you push, you coach, you disappear, you help, you think, you give birth, you take care, you are present…
- It’s a fulltime or a “sometime” process. You can be a Muse for 5 minutes a month.
- To be a Muse is a decision. A smiling one. It’s a friendship most of the time.
- To be Muse is often to be a Double Muse, a vice-versa game : you are a Muse to each other.
- To be a Muse is a part time job. You need to be alone, and in your own life sometimes. Good. You plug as a Muse when you want it.
- To be a Muse is important in both ways. You give your Muse part because it’s a matter of generosity. You welcome it with gratitude, because you know the other works and thinks of you as a Muse. It’s a role, yes.
- A Muse is also a part of disruption, disturbance. Our need to be disturbed is (sometimes) real. Sometimes we ask for it. Sometimes we don’t even know it.
- The Muse thing is a joy, and a bond. Sparkling seeds is a happiness.
- A Muse sometimes doesn’t know what to do. There’s an easiness in being a Muse. You have the right to be fragile, too.
- You can apply and use it and ask for it on little areas of your life. On love, on art, on writing, on job, movies, pictures, inventing : anything.
- You can be explicit if you know a friend of yours who can be a Muse : “I need you for my novel”, or “I think you need me for your management issues, am I right?”.
- You will maybe have to define rules about the rich “Double Muse Activity”.
- A Muse can be a muse without any knowledge of being a muse. As a fan, you can use “the existence of the artist you love” as inspiration. After a bereavement (oh a new word for me!), you can work for the memory of someone, or using the “what if he/she was here?” tool).
- I really think we can incarnate as a Mood Muse. Some people can (and know they can) bring you something : a calm, a happiness, a security, an energy, a focus, an accuracy, a way of being ignorant. Your best friend can do that. Your parents too. Yes they do.
What do think about having a Muse, about being one?
Today I reached my 50th follower on WordPress, thank you for reading!
Instagram : pavel_fedoseyev
“There’s hope, but not for us” #Kafka
from Instagram: http://ift.tt/2jgBmOf
Superfriends, a possible commitment treasure between man & woman
- – Grandpa, why are you sad sitting here in the sun?
- – I’m not sad, kid, I’m melancholic.
- – You think about the past?
- – I think about loss, dear, yes.
- – Tonight I dreamt you were dancing with a woman, very slowly, in this same garden, surrounded by a few hummingbirds. It was beautiful!
- – You saw it? Awwwee… You know, I was not dancing, it was Qigong, my dear.
- – Who was the lady dancing with you, grandpa?
- – An old friend, kid, an old friend…
Between an man and a woman you can live many bonds : mother and son, father and daughter, siblings, lovers, spouses, friends, teachers, colleagues!
Today I would like to talk about another type of bond, a strong one, I would call it “superfriendship“. It’s like being strong close friends, but with more solemnity and commitment. Like a very important friendship.
I think it’s better, as it is between a man and a woman, when each other is married, or have a lover. Superfriends are “friends only” and shouldn’t mess with sex, I mean really – because they would be lovers, and that’s another story (maybe, yes, they can be exes).
Superfriends talk about their bond, about rules, frames, and commitment. They are aware that it is a different friendship, stronger than anything – and I would say : different than marriage, too, stronger than love maybe. Because you avoid the difficulties of love, of living together…
Whatever happens: dramas, arguments, difficulties, anything, a superfriend is here for you, and each other knows it. It’s so important that any disagreement will be fixed, as a rule, and they know it. Because it is very, very, very, very important. For her. For him.
For me, being superfriends is about conversations. It’s a personal view of course. Just invent your own friendship about sports or creativity! With a superfriend, you talk and use ideas, concepts, discussions and words as if they were a whole treasure for you both only. It’s a jubilation! Nobody can and will understand this bond.
You can invent everything, from “call me whenever you want” to straight happy schedules like “Let’s see each other once a month”. You don’t mess with sex, with boredom, with intimacy, with daily organization. You just weave your friendship with conversations, helping hand, coaching, truths, questions. You ask for truth. You say it. You disturb each other. You need each other!
Yes it’s an idea of “ideal”, because you can keep it very pure, very rare, very precious too.
I imagine superfriends without any contact, sending a paper “real” email once a week as a rule, or planning a “Whole Day Skype Session” once a month (dinner included) and nothing else, or keeping a “One Hour Walk” (under an umbrella, if it rains) or a restaurant twice a month. Or a 5 minutes phonecall once a day, why not?
They say it to their respective spouse, as something nobody could ever change, “I see my superfriend”. This IS important, and I don’t and won’t negociate!
Superfriends often say “I LOVE YOU”. It’s a different kind of love, that’s all!
I hope you have one. Really. And, thinking about grandpa at the beginning of this article, I hope you will never know this loss.
Thanks for reading!
Fleeing Pressure the Wrong Way
A clever kid! His parents want him to be the successful guy of the family. He will become a doctor!! He studies hard, hard, hard, under pressure, and… gets Multiple Sclerosis – or a motorbike accident.
Pressure! There are so many ways to pressure someone. Orders. Injunctions. Work.
There are many ways to shunflee strong moral pressure. If you’re a strong adult you just accept it fiercely, or you quit, you fight, you learn detachment – you protect your mental territory. There are so many ways to resist discreetly : sabotage, inner resistance, sarcasm, preparing revenge or a funny stunt. Escaping ways…
If you are a child, if you’re weaker than the pressure-provider, if you are stuck or prisoner of the situation, you can’t resist.
Then your body takes over.
Your body will find a way to say stop. Can’t stop the source of pressure? He’ll stop you!
Nervous breakdown. Burn-out. Accident. Serious disease. Somatization. It’s just a burst of resistance, and a full stop, most of the time. Against moral pressure, the last shunning way to say “fuque off”.
Tool/dial : Watch yourself. In both ways.
See also : “Be Spontaneous, please”
Thanks for reading!
In #French #Zodiac, a Virgo is a… Virgin, oops!… ( #language & #astrology )
Well, that’s true. In English you have a very poetic way to name zodiac signs. In French we stay closer to… to what, after all?
A Virgo is a Virgin in France, une Vierge. So you can imagine the embarrassment of a Virgo when she’s asked, and the smart smiles of the guys, haha.
What else? Aries is un Bélier (a Ram). Leo is just a Lion. Libra : Balance (it’s Scale, yesss). And Pisces are Poissons (Fishes, yep).
How about your language?
I’m a Taurus. Hi! I post the positive keywords, OK? The negative? Well…
Thanks for reading! Bonne journée !
“More of the Same Thing”, when insisting is a failure #Watzlawick #Change
More of the same thing is what I call a “wrong tool”. It means : INSIST. Sometimes it’s good. Sometimes it’s stupid. Push push and push in a dead end. Seems easy, but we all do the same mistake.
The pattern is simple :
You have a problem. You think you have the solution. You act. It fails. So you think you have to insist, push, go stronger, “more of the same thing”. you fail.
The problem is “you think into the box”, and you are SURE you have the solution, and that if you insist enough, you will get it. And it’s wrong!
It’s an old classic, told by Palo Alto therapy searchers and Paul Watzlawick. If you want to save your couple, if you want to help someone, if you want to flirt, if you want to talk to someone who doesn’t want to talk : STOP. The solution? It’s at the end of this article!
The book? Paul Watzlawick : Change. Principles of Problem Formation and Problem Resolution.
The author gives an example (which I translated rapidly) :
A teacher in a class has a single kid “with problems”. She asks to meet the parents and learns that he has huge issues, comes from a broken family and is very lonely all the time. So she tries her best to take care of him and give the boy much more interest; but the solution is worse : his notes crash, he is more alone. She insists and it goes into a dead end. The therapist says that “the more of the same thing” she does, the worse it’ll go (what she does isolates the boy from the other kids, for example). She’s asked to ignore him. Only to compliment him if the notes are good. And it worked!
If a wife asks her husband to talk more to her, spontaneously, about his days or thoughts, he will tell little things as an effort, but he will feel more and more closed, which will… make the wife to be more focused on him, waiting, and “more of the same thing”, arguing continuously about why he doesn’t talk to her enough, which will embarrass him more and more, etc.
Chögyam Trungpa, who was a Buddhist Meditation Master, says that if someone answer “No” when you want to talk with him, you just have to disappear. If you don’t, if you insist, you just transform yourself into a nagging (oh, a new word!) Demon. He’s so right!
Of course you know the story of the bunch of guys flirting everyday with the beautiful lady in a bar, with no success. Only one guy understands the problem (“More of the same thing”). He just sits in the bar, no interest, showing his back to her. And paying her the most neutral way every night. And guess what? He become the only one who gets her interest…
The tool is also a dial :
It’s hard to detect when you insist “more of the same thing” stupidly, because you are SURE you’re about to succeed. Don’t be a demon. And think out of the box. Buy the book, by the way, it’s very good.
Thanks for reading!
Break Ups & Taking Things into Consideration
This winter I’ve been invited for lunch by a couple, I spent a delicious day talking with them and other friends, and the lady of the house lent me a CD of the music composed by… her ex-husband.
I was amazed by that, because divorced people have a nasty tendency to hate everything linked to their ex-lover – they love solemn dramas, probably.
If your love has a talent (for photography, poetry, writing, composing, lecturing or singing), why the hell this person would become a Dumb Zero once the love story is over??? Mmhh?
“Taking things into consideration” is a simple good tool (we say “Faire la part des choses” in French, “to make portions of things” which makes sense, I think) :
Take the pie, cut the love off : the person stays the same! Magic!
“Listen to this CD, tell me if you like it!”, with a big smile : her ex was good in this area. And well, he stayed a good composer…
Or… if you said to your crush he/she’s a good photographer, and you really don’t think he/she is, it means that… oh no, no no no no no no : that’s impossible, right?
Thanks for reading!
#blackandwhite #instagram #street
from Instagram: http://ift.tt/2klgW3g
Patterning Unusual : thus my own casual #blogging #French #poetry – #ESL #meta
“It’s what I do that teaches me what I’m looking for”, says Pierre Soulages (painter). This is exactly what I felt when I began to blog in English.
Well, I’m French, and if I’m able to write in English, I’m still and stay an ESL (English as Second Language) guy. It’s a strange way to stay focused, I can tell you!
I thus know I make little mistakes everywhere. At the beginning I asked some friend to fix them, then I had to think about it and decided to let go, and forced to learn a certain form of casualness.
There are mistakes left – I hope it’s a little charming (?)…
I add some French words here and there, voilà, your turn to learn!
I have to make it short too, because
- 1/ I know you don’t have time
- 2/ I’m not skilled enough, and my vocabulary is poor
I learn new words and idioms in each article, though, because I have to dig for them (I use Word Reference now, my neighbourtab all day long). Call it “ESL stairs”.
I also don’t care about inventing new words (I often aggregate two), most of the time because I hesitate between two.
As I present tools, dials and levers here (which are usable concepts, right?) in one-paged-articles, I really have to forget to be rigorous, and I know I take many shortcuts. That’s fun (or funny?) –
I catalog here all the tools I found useful in my life, and it makes me explore my shelves, which is a source of good bliss and reassessment – oh a new word!). I hope some of you will peck the seed…
I really observed and gazed at some other people’s blog to understand how to pattern and structure articles, and how to title them. I did it my way, then…
All this produce a sort of “Poetic License”. My few norms are strong (produce a short tool minilecture), but I really acquired a freedom I had to learn… from being an ESL.
Some neuroscientists say that having another language is good for the brain. Why wouldn’t you try to blog in French, ehhh?
Thanks for reading! Bonne journée !
“Haecceity” : it’s about Labels on your Forehead – #Deleuze
Haecceity. I learned about this strange word in a book about Gilles Deleuze, a French Philosopher.
When we argue, when we talk, when we define ourselves, when you get an official letter, it puts a label on us. It says : “You are that”. So there!
It depends on the box, it depends how the society calls you :
Sociology, Psychology, Religion, Morals, Urbanism, Politics, Literature, Anthropology : every discipline PINS you on a board, as a woman, a muslim or a lover, a mother or a manager, et voilà!
The problem is WE ARE NOT AN ELEMENT OF A STOCK. We are human beings, and that implies that we are plugged, we change all along the day(s), we grow, we stop, we meet, etc.
Haecceity, says Deleuze, says that we should use more the word AND. Jean is a woman and a mother and a knitter and a fan of this group and has four good friends and likes France and just decided to divorce and plans to move and just began to blog and loves to bake with fruits, etc, she’s an INFINITY, and a moving one!
We are made of a series of events, of connections, of changes, and what defines us is our nature but also, a constant variation of plugs and deplugs, multi-events, joy, powers, feelings, intensities…
Wiki says :
Haecceity : the discrete qualities, properties or characteristics of a person that make it a particular thing. Haecceity is a person’s or object’s thisness.
There’s a danger is the way we write “We Are”, which label us and then put us “stuck in a stock”.
Deleuze says we are more accurately longitudes and latitudes, a group of different speeds and slownesses, an individual, a singularity, constantly inventing grapes of possibilities, a play of forces or encounters.
So play with words. Let people define you and other people. But don’t forget they are words. You are more than that.
There’s a article on WordPress about Deleuze’s singularities here.
Thanks for reading!
21 ways to “put a poo, but mindfully”; N°17 is great! – #mindfulness
So well OK, you will find entire BOOKS about Mindful Eating, Mindful Walking, Mindful Mindfulness, whatever. One lever about creativity is combination, so I think you should write a book about another thing to do mindfully.
Put a poop mindfully is one of the best way to be a good mindfuller. Here are the 21 secrets, in disorder. Mindfulness does not care about sequence, order, etc.
- Don’t watch your cellphone, or any magazine, silly!
- Be awaaare of what’s happening
- Feel it, visualize the poo’s journey in you until, well, voilà
- Inspire, and visualize the air’s journey into your lungs
- Focus – but not too much
- Put down your panties… mindfully
- Never force out, but grin
- Be grateful and graceful, it goes without saying
- Between each push, think about it, and breathe deeper
- Know how and when to wait
- Watch the door and free your mind, that’s it
- Watch your hands when you grab paper, they’re dancing for you
- Be mindful about what you do with the paper, roll, fold : mindful always!
- Feel the color of the paper, it means something, mindfullnessly
- Open and/or close the door mindfully
- If you can, put a poo under the open sky – mother nature etc
- Calm is strength
- Don’t think; thoughts are just harmless black birds passing by, that’s all
- Be aware of your force
- Close your eyes, sometimes but not always
- Listen! Feel all you senses and be in harmony with noises
So what do you think of all these posts everywhere, built on this pattern : “n things your must know about this subjects”? Can be 12 funniest lolcats, 5 sex revelations, 6 best new technology or 12 tricks for photographers… Can you resist these hooks (which aims at you to go to other pages full of ads, of course)?
Hmm?
Thanks for reading! Have a nice poo!
The Importance of rumunchewminating #Drafts in #WordPress #Blogging
Bonjour !
Someone one day explained me WordPress and its tools (thanks, dear). I needed time to notice, though, that instead of writing my blog ideas on a notebook, I could use the DRAFTS. As I’m writing this, I have… 86 drafts. Sometimes it’s just a Title, sometimes it’s a whole article… without the last sparkle or the binder that would allow me to publish it.
For “Draft”, we say “Brouillon” in French (and oh I already guess this word will be a total mess to pronunce for you), which implies a sheaf of meanings.
A draft is a draft. If a person is muddled, we also say “he is draft” (il est brouillon), which makes sense. You could say this person is drafty, but I just discovered it means “uncomfortably breezy”, how sad. I love your “drafted” or “draftee” words, though. OK.
Drafts are like external little brains or memories. I suggest you read over a few of them, from time to time, putting back some of their seeds in your mind, in a useful Le Corbusier Effect. Your brain will rumunchewminate them like a little cow it is.
Sometimes a draft will stay sleepy for months. One good morning though, you’ll open it, add a paragraph and bingo, idea deedee, une idée ! The whole package disembarks and you can click on “Publish”. How come?
Another day of brain-silence, try this : go down to your last and 110th draft, open it, add something, a word, two lines. If it doesn’t unfold, close it back, that’s all. Next! Make them climb back up!
Have a nice day. Thanks for reading!
Simmering & Fermenting Ideas of #LeCorbusier #creativity
Le Corbusier was a French architect. I just found a quote and I try to translate in English. It’s a good tool you can use to be creative (if you need to) :
When a task is given to me, I use to put it inside my memory, which mean I don’t allow myself to draw any sketch, for months. The human head have a certain independence : it is a box in which you can pour loose elements of a problem. One let then “float”, “simmer”, “ferment”. Then, one day, on a spontaneous initiative of the inner being, a click happens : one takes a pen, one gives birth on the paper. The idea comes out, the baby comes out : he comes into the world, he is born.
This is a great tool, and it can be mixed with other “common sense” plans (creative people know, for example, that they “work” in front of their blank page, but also that they get “ideas” elsewhere, walking in the street, washing the dishes or after making love). So, think about your problem and go talk to the birds, or bake a cake!
Also Google : Serendipity
Thanks for reading!
The Ravel’s Bolero Syndrome : when you know someone from ONE thing only
Some names are well known for only ONE work, one event, one place.
Dorothea Lange is well known for “this” picture only. Maurice Ravel is linked for ever to his Bolero. The city of Agra with the Taj Mahal. The Korgis have a great hit : “Everybody’s Got to Learn Sometime”. Where’s the rest?
I call it The Ravel Syndrome. The structure is : “Something is known for ONE thing and the rest is globally ignored”. It’s not necessarily one work, it can be one domain : for example, Chekhov is very well know for his theater, and nobody knows his short stories.
This dial should lead us to take the wheel, think, and explore. Lange probably took other good pictures, Ravel composed a great Daphnis & Chloe and his concertos for piano are fantastic, Agra is full of great other places to visit. The Korgis, well, I don’t knowww (there are pages of lists of “One Hit Singers” on the web)…
There are two lessons to get from this :
- This flaw could be called “Hit Laziness”. Let’s enter the house and discover the other rooms, why not try to see what the artist has behind his “hit”. Maybe treasures?
- “Someone is known for ONE thing and the rest is globally ignored” can be very cruel. I think of Monica Lewinsky, which is probably a much more interesting person than this label you just put on her, in your mind. Hmmm?
Thanks for reading!
a french toolbox 