Postcards from the Funny Farm

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Last year upon turning 38 I blogged this statement in a post:

It’s been said “The more you learn, the less you know.” But that doesn’t mean you can’t know something.

A year later, there are some new things that I know. Here are 8 of them. Some are just facts, others are things that one should strive to do:

1. Some people are not the persons they seem.
2. Always be professional.
3. The ego is bad. The being is good. (Read Eckhart Tolle’s, A New Earth)
4. Every one of us will soon be old so create value in every day.
5. Do the best you can and let the chips fall where they may.
6. Do the things that you can live with and don’t worry about what “low people” think.
7. Get your marriage and house in order before you pour milk in your cereal.
8. This blog’s readership will explode in 2008-2009. (and I need some more dell memory!)

Those things I know my friend. Leave me yours … correction: PLEASE leave me yours! Here’s to another year! I’m 39 Monday. Did I ever tell you my funky B-Day? 6/9/69??? Yup yup. Believe it or not.

I ran across this inspiring photo today at Neurophilosophy, a recent addition to my blogroll. Mo, the author, describes the photo in a post there, but here is an excerpt:

Purkinje cells are the largest cells in the mammalian brain. They have a planar structure with a highly elaborate dendritic tree.

I’ve become inescapably fascinated with the brain in the past decade. I’ve begun to see our thoughts in a new way: organic. Just like fertilizer helps a tomato to grow ripe and delicious, so our brains are in a cyclical process of bloom and wilt all the time. Today I am interested in sharing a theory of creativity with you. Imagine that your creativity is like a tree such as the photo you see above. Now imagine something you’ve been told or imagined you “COULDN’T” do for one reason or another. The best way to conquer such a lie is through the stimulation of creativity, and hence: solutions.

Here’s an example of just one crazy thing you can do:

Is there water by your house you can jump in? Do it. I don’t care if it’s cold and I don’t care if it’s even permissible to swim there. Breaking conventions awakens creativity and stimulates the dendrites. No imagine the tree above thriving and pulsating as you swim through the water. Voila! You are out of your rut. The only limitations on what you can do are in your mind, in an organic way. people have said “mind over matter” for years but really the mind itself is matter. It, and only it, holds the key to true human freedom and possibilities.

I wrote yesterday about how the brain is a fragile instrument that must be cared for. I discussed Phineas Gage and the brain injury he suffered at the hands of an exploding metal rod. One capacity that he lost in the 15 years after the accident was his inhibition. Inhibition is simply a region of our brain. It isn’t the ten commandments or even the voice of your parents you hear saying: “Don’t lie!” Instead, it’s like a fleshy computer hard drive that organizes facts and feelings into a paradigm that controls our every move.

Step out of it to escape your rut, or funk, or whatever malady afflicts you … allow creativity to go crazy. Whether it’s an impromptu swim or grocery go-kart races … the results will amaze you like the glowing photo above. Don’t let anyone tell you you can’t do something you want to do.

What other crazy things could you do to get your creative juices flowing?

You know it isn’t often I run across a blog and instantly become a fan. That’s how it was for me a few months ago when I found It Might be Love. Of course I am a hopeless romantic so this blog appealed to me right away. It’s an unobtrusive, unassuming blog that has a post every day on the issue of love in our lives. With so many blogs focused solely on material things or building traffic, it is refreshing to find one that is a niche blog about something so visceral and universal as love! Michelle Stein is the owner and main author of this blog. So far I have enjoyed reading her blog and writing there as a guestblogger. I asked her for an interview last week and was so pleased when she accepted! The 10 question and answers are below.  I hope you enjoy it and visit her blog.  My words are italicized:

Q1: Hi Michelle, thanks for letting me interview you I think your blog is great. How did you come up with the niche and/or idea of a love blog?
I didn’t really have a plan when I bought the domain name. I was plugging in random website names to see what was available and “it might be love” was a phrase that entered my mind for some reason. The more I thought about it the more I liked it - because what is love anyway? Does anyone really know? Love can be so many things for so many different people. Everything else sort of just took off from there.

Q2: Do you hold any degrees or special training to talk about love online? If not, what is it about you that makes your contribution special?
I am glad you asked this question because I would not want anyone to ever think I’m an expert when I’m not. I don’t have any formal training or degrees in psychology, which suits me just fine. I have adopted the “Good Will Hunting” philosophy of learning, meaning you can learn anything you want to know for “”a buck fifty in late fees from the library”.

I think that is what makes It Might Be Love so unique…I’m just a “real person”…sharing what I’ve experienced and learned along the way. There is no one-size-fits-all textbook definition of love. While I genuinely respect the “experts” I think you can only understand love through your experiences. I believe we are all capable of learning more about love and teaching what we learn to others.

Q3: Do you draw from your personal experiences a lot or others?
I would say 90% of the things I write about are from my own personal experiences. The other 10% comes from various people I’ve met and the situations they’ve been in or the things they have taught me. I hopefully have a lot more in life to experience and learn, so I don’t think I’ll ever run out of things to talk about!

Q4: Would you say love takes work or are you one who sees “the one” scenario as the secret to bliss 24/7?
I think you need to be able to find “the one” you can work with. We get caught up in the idea of meeting “the one” so we are often fooled by things like romance or compatibility. I know I thought I met “the one” long before I actually met “the real one”. Staying together in my opinion is all about how well you work together, problem solve, communicate, and how much trust and respect you have for each other.

Q5: How old is the blog and how is it going in your opinion? Why do you say that?
I’ve had the site for almost 2 years - but the site you see today has only been the way it is since this March after I accidentally deleted everything that was on there before! I decided to start over completely from scratch and switched over to Wordpress. I think it’s better now than ever – and now I have an automatic back-up system for my database in place! Traffic is steadily increasing each week and I’ve received nothing but positive feedback. I’m hoping to launch a couple of contests and freebie promotions in the upcoming months so I’m excited about that as well!

Q6: That’s awesome, we will be watching for those for sure and I hope you don’t mind if i promote them on Postcards from the Funny Farm, I think your blog is GREAT! Okay, now for a personal question: What is your current relationship status and how did the two of you meet?

I am married to quite possibly the funniest guy in the world. When we got married he had me laughing so hard they actually said to me “Honey, you know this is serious, don’t you?”

I initially met my husband because he needed a Sharpie marker at the place we both worked. Nobody seemed to have one until he finally came across me. I was very skeptical about letting him borrow my marker, but he brought it back to me as promised, which really impressed me! We soon became friends and before long it only seemed natural for us to start dating.

Q7: Since it is somewhat of a how-to blog, can you tell us the secrets of a great love relationship?
A few weeks ago I wrote an article for Associated Content called the 5 C’s of a Happy Relationships wherein I wrote that happy relationships need these 5 things: Communication, Caring, Consideration, Courage, and Creativity. While I wouldn’t call that the “secret” I do think if you can learn to understand and apply those principles in your current or next relationship it’s a very good place to start towards having a happy and healthy relationship.

Q8: What is your biggest love about blogging?
The thing I like most about blogging is that I can write to my heart’s content and share what I wrote with the rest of the world if they want to read it. We always think we’re too insignificant to make a difference in anyone’s life. But if just one person finds something I write to be inspiring or enjoyable than I consider it “mission accomplished.”

Q9: What is your biggest pet peeve of blogging?
It used to be spam but since I activated Askimet I haven’t had too many problems with that lately. So I guess now it would have to be the technical side of the blog - writing html and php and getting pictures to display correctly. There have been times it takes me 4 or 5 tries to get something to look the way I want it to!

Q10: If you could give us “lovers” out there one piece of advice, apart from subscribing to your RSS and reading your blog every day, of something we can do to make our love relationship better, what would it be?
Well I definitely like the subscribe idea! One thing I think most people could do rather easily is to start giving your partner just one little thing every day. It doesn’t have to be a huge thing. It can be a hug, a joke, a half an hour of your uninterrupted attention, an offer to wash the dishes, a phone call just to say “Hi”. It doesn’t matter what you give them, just the fact that you gave them anything. I honestly believe the more you give to your relationship, the more you will get back out of it.

Thank you so much for the interview Damien! I really enjoyed answering your questions!

You are very welcome Michelle, I enjoyed asking them :) If you, my readers, are interested in reading Michelle’s blog, I highly encourage you! Here is the url: itmightbelove.com/