Inspiration
This section is deeply inspired by my hero, Tina Roth Eisenberg’s design blog. I was reading it one night and I thought, I absorb incredible content everyday too. Why not document my inspiration and share it with like-minded individuals? So here it is — a collection of my learnings and findings, things that make me pause and smile, think and reflect, and all the words, concepts, ideas, and art that inspire me to build my magical world within and invite others in.
Welcome to Exhale Magic!
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WOW has it been a week. I arrived too early to realize what I was so late to see. Here are a few things to ponder:
“The perfectly free life is the unattached and unremembered life.”
Big Mistakes:
1. Not listening to your gut.
2. Not keeping your word.
3. Not looking after yourself.
4. Not looking for the good in people.
With much love,
H
Another animated story. This one’s a little more abstract and not for kids, but equally (if not more) artistic.
It’s projects like librarian transforming an 110 year-old tree stump into a gorgeous free library that make me fall in love with the world.
In The five-minute trick that helps Instagram’s CEO crush procrastination, Kevin Systrom shares his favorite life hack: “If you don’t want to do something, make a deal with yourself to do at least five minutes of it. After five minutes, you’ll end up doing the whole thing.”
Clinical psychologist Christine Li explains that “most procrastination is caused by fear or conflict” —fear of criticism, failure, or stress. The fear isn’t necessarily in performing the task itself, but the result of its completion and therefore our fears becoming reality.
Julia Moeller, postdoc researcher at Yale further explains that this five-minute rule lowers inhibition, lulling us into the idea that we can dip quickly into a project with no strings attached. The idea that we can reconsider after 5 minutes gives us the feeling that we are in control, rather than feeling forced to check off a task list. Excellent read. Thanks Quartz At Work!
A Partnership Larger Than Marriage: The Stunning Love Letters of Kahlil Gibran and Mary Haskell; couldn’t stop reading this it was so beautiful. I think this is the kind of love all artists dream of, one so powerful and soul-moving that you never live a single day unmoved.
Thank you to brainpickings.
This letter from Jackie to President Kennedy is a reminder of the constant reflection and realignment that comes with atypical relationships.
After watching this short video on autism and ABA therapy, I was reminded that 1) I feel most alive when I’m learning, and 2) that it’s a miracle we exist as we are today. To think that a single gene mutation can alter how our brains function and the course of our lives. To know that every single moment of the day, so many things are happening in our bodies that we’re not aware of. Then factor the things that are happening outside our bodies – in the world, in the universe – that we have no control over. Wow, just wow, that we’re alive in this very moment. If this isn’t a miracle, I don’t know what is.
How Sigmund Freud’s Massive Art Collection Influenced His Theories makes me wonder what visual sources of inspiration we’re surrounding ourselves with, and how they make their way into our everyday thoughts and behaviors, and how they influence how we view our lives and the legacies that we build.
Nayyirah Waheed’s words are among the softest, most gentle forces I’ve felt.
These words remind me of a silly pattern I’ve been spotting at weddings. You’ll often hear in a groom’s vows, “I love how much love she has.” As beautiful as it is (and appropriate for the occasion), so often men see women as a source of love and nurture.
They look to women to teach them how to love themselves, to love the world, to love life. We’re learning too, and for the women out there giving every ounce of your love to your partner, it’s important to remember that the love we emit is a deep reflection of our relationship with ourselves. We can’t love someone into loving themselves. Your love journey is entirely your own, and so is theirs. Doesn’t mean you can’t share self-love, self-care, and inner beauty secrets, of course! 🙂
And for both parties out there, you only accept the love you’re ready for. Your partner can love you with all of his/her heart and soul, and carry all the love in the world, but you will only feel the extent to which you’re ready for.
This obviously doesn’t mean that women have more love, or are capable of more love than men are. Truth is, some of the people I know who carry the greatest capacity for love are men.
I wonder sometimes—how many lives must this woman have lived? How many lives do writers live in one story?
Some people live every moment they get, some live as many lives as they can, and some don’t even realize that they have one. I remember after my sister and I wrote our first novel together, someone asked us to summarize it in one sentence. We answered, “A pair of sisters—one destined to live out her life, and the other, to outlive her life.” How do you live your life? At the end of your life, could you be said to have lived at all? If so, when?
11 Free-For-All Writing Prompts To Help Get Those Creative Juices Flowing just inspired my next journal entry
6 Ways to Know If Your Relationship Will Last, According to a Couples Therapist; interesting perspective—how do you respond when you’ve unintentionally hurt or offended your partner?
What if we only worked on projects we’re willing to commit to doing 100 times?…a great reminder and excellent time-saver.