Harley King — Seeds of Hope

We live in difficult and challenging times.  Some have begun to despair that the world is coming to a violent end. I remember another moment in the late 1960's when I felt the world would end. What I have learned over the years is that the world continues.  There are always moments of hope to be found. We must choose to plant seeds of hope.

I believe that everything we do is a choice we make. We have little control over what happens to us. We have little control over the hostile world in which we live. The only thing we control is our response to what is happening. So my choice is to plant seeds of hope with my words and deeds. I choose to celebrate the spirit of love.

We also need to understand that even though we plant seeds of hope, we will not eliminate the hatred and hostility in the world.  So do not give into the false hope of changing the world overnight.  

If we choose to plant to seeds of hope, we will touch the lives of a few people. Every farmer knows, there are different types of soil and not all of it is fertile. I know that sometimes the seeds that I plant fall on stoney ground and the seeds fail to take root. I have learned that I can’t give hope to people if they are not ready to receive it. Sometimes it may take years for that seed to grow. And sometimes the seed is eaten by birds and squirrels. Have faith that some of the seeds you plant will grow and bloom.

Bernie Siegel — Hope

As a young writer, hope is one of the few things that kept me going.  I would read a story about someone who was 50 or 60 or 7o and he had just published his first novel.  After years of toiling in the salt mines of writing, he found success.  These stories inspired me to keep writing.  I had hope that one day I would be discovered and become successful.  Even today I have that sense of hope, that belief that one day I will be proved right.  Yes, I am a writer.

When we lose hope, we give up on life.  We quit.  Some days all we have is hope.  As the old saying goes: every dark cloud as a silver lining.  We just have to find it — to look at the world with new eyes.  To see the butterfly in the midst of chaos.  No matter how dark the night, there is always a sunrise.  Everyone faces challenges and difficulties.  The sad thing for me is people who see no way out of a problem but to take their own lives.  Never give up hope for a better tomorrow.

As creative thinkers, we need hope.  We need to believe in ourselves, our ideas, our art.  Have faith that you have been given a gift.  Have faith in your dreams.  Have faith that the sun will rise again.

Louis Auchincloss — The Gift of Dreams

How often do we hold ourselves back from doing the things we want to do because we are afraid? Afraid of what others will say? Afraid of failure? Afraid of success? Afraid we don't have any talent?

Louis Auchincloss wrote this statement in his first memoir, A Writer's Capital, in 1974. In his 92 years on this planet, Auchincloss was a lawyer, a novelist, a short-story writer and a historian, publishing more than 60 books. He filled his life with things he wanted to do.
Dreams are creative gifts we have been given — paths that we should walk.  When we refuse to seek our dreams and refuse to do the work that needs to be done, we are rejecting the gift. We are denying our birthright. 

Is there something you have been dreaming of doing, but have not done it? Maybe today it is time to take that first step in achieving your dreams. If you don't, no one will care. Only you care about your dreams. Only you can achieve your dreams. Only you have the power it takes to achieve your dreams.

Today I celebrate my 67th birthday. I am thankful for the gifts I have been given — the dreams that I followed and the life I have lived.

Kahlil Gibran

Hope is an essential gift we have been given as human beings. Hope is the capacity for believing that tomorrow will be better. Without hope, we are wandering through a dark, desolate world. We are at the mercy of our fears and doubts. Hope allows us to see beyond the current trouble we are experiencing. In even our worst moments, we need to remember that life will get better. There is always light at the end of the tunnel, even when we can't see it.

As artists, writers and creative leaders, we need to believe that the next painting or the next poem will be our best. Hope keeps us writing, painting and acting in the face of self-doubt and failure. If we were to quit now, we would never know what was around the next corner or what opportunities lay ahead.

As creative leaders need hope because we live in a very negative, sometimes hostile world, that often does not understand or appreciate our creative work. I have been writing seriously for almost forty years and have yet to receive acceptance and recognition for the work I have produced. Another person might have quit many years ago, but I keep plugging away.

Do you have faith in your creative ideas? Your poems? Your stories? Your paintings? Your ability to become another person on stage? Do you have dark days when you want to quit and live a normal life? Hope keeps us going even when everything and everybody around us are telling us to give up — that we have no talent, no gift.

What keeps you going during those darkest of hours? Why do you believe in your ideas? Where does your hope come from? Don't give up. Keep dreaming. Keep hoping. Keep believing. In every winter you will find the flowers of spring.

Helen Keller

During the first 35 years of my life I was more of a pessimist than an optimist.  I saw the glass as half empty, not half full.  I saw problems instead of opportunities.  I've had to learn the power of optimism and the need to see the glass as half full.  I had to learn how to discover the silver lining in the dark cloud.  

Even now as the second 35 years of my life draws to a close, I still struggle some days to see the glass as half full.  Often my first reaction is that something can not be done.  I have learned that I need to believe in myself before I can accomplish anything.  I need to find hope in a negative world.

Being a pessimist is much easier than being an optimist.  In almost any situation, it is easier to find the reasons something can not be done than to find the reasons that it can.  It is easier to be a negative person than a positive one.  

Pessimists believe that they are the realists and that optimists have their heads in the clouds.  The truth is that it is much harder to believe something can be achieved than it is to find fault with an idea.  It is much harder to be an optimist.  And research shows that optimists usually achieve more than pessimists.

As creative leaders, we need to have faith that what we create has value.  We need to believe in our ability to create something that can benefit others.  We need to have the faith to keep working when there appears to be no light at the end of the tunnel.  

Is your glass half full or half empty?

"Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement.  

Nothing can be done without hope and confidence."

— Helen Keller

Recommended Reading:  

Learned Optimism: How To Change Your Mind and Your Life 

by Martin E.P. Seligman

Harley King

There are hundreds of reasons that we should believe in our talents.  As creative leaders, we should celebrate our unique visions of the worlds we inhabit.  We should be proud of our accomplishments and our victories.

Yet, many of us are plagued by self-doubt and a lack of confidence.  We feel we are not good enough.  Even when we are successful, we are afraid that others will discover that we are frauds.  We race through life hoping that the truth will not be revealed and that we can escape embarrassment and shame.

We fail to realize that we have many reasons to love ourselves.  We are so busy focusing on our mistakes and weaknesses that we don't ever discover the truth.  We see only our faults and failures.

Open your eyes and see beyond your mistakes.  Take a moment and give thanks for who you are and what you have been able to accomplish.  Count all the reasons you should love yourself.  Then accept the gift of talent that you have been given and appreciate your strengths.  Be confident.  Be strong.  Love yourself.

Harley King

Commentary
Life's journey is full of experiences from which we can and should learn wisdom. Sometimes these experiences will knock us to the ground and force us to reconsider our beliefs and values. Sometimes we will have to learn the lesson multiple times before we gain the wisdom to move on to better opportunities and new lessons.  Sometimes we fail to gain the wisdom and will repeat the same mistakes again and again.

Wisdom comes not from simply living in the moment, but from deep reflection and introspection.  Wisdom comes from questioning what we do and analyzing why we behave in the manner in which we do.  Life gives us many opportunities to grow in wisdom and understanding.  Each life lesson teaches us to become better individuals and to open our hearts to the wisdom that is given.

Sometimes the lessons that life throws our way will force us to lose our faith and push us toward giving up.  We become discouraged and depressed.  We enter a world of darkness and unhappiness.  We must keep to the path and not lose sight of the goal.  We must not let the pessimism of others defeat us.  We must keep going despite how we feel.  Keep in mind that on cloudy days the sun still shines.  We must learn to fly above the clouds and experience the joy of the sun's rays.

May you seek the wisdom that comes from experience and the faith that restores the heart.

Rabindranath Tagore

"Faith is the bird that feels the light 
and sings when the dawn is still dark."

— Rabindranath Tagore

Bengali Poet, Novelist, Musician, Painter, Playwright

1861 - 1941

Commentary

Do you believe in your artistic talent?  Do you have faith in your creativity?  Do you let your creative light shine or do you hide it under a bushel basket and refuse to share it with the world?  

Creative leaders need to have the faith that they are on the right path.  Even in those darkest hours before the dawn, you need to understand the sun will rise again — that your creative work is important.  

Don't give up on yourself.  Don't give up on the work you do.  You are unique and special.  No one else can create the paintings, the poems or the novels that you can create.  If you don't use your creative gift to produce art, the world will have lost much.  So pick up your pen and write.  Pick up your brush and paint.  Pick up your guitar and sing.

Biography
Tagore was the youngest of thirteen surviving children born to Debendranath Tagore and Sarada Devi.  The original family name was Banerjee but was eventually anglicised to Tagore.  His paternal grandfather visited Queen Victoria and other English royalty.  Tagore 

Tagore was raised mostly by servants because his father traveled a lot and his mother died when he was young.  He was raised mostly by servants.  His home was the social center for the arts including music, theater and literature.  His oldest brother was a poet and a philosopher.  Another brother was a composer, musician and a playwright.  His sister was a novelist.  Tagore shunned schools and formal education preferring to be tutored and to read books.  His father sent him to England to study law but he did not like it and instead studied Shakespeare.  He married Mrinalini Devi in 1883 and had five children.

Known mostly for his poetry, Tagore also wrote novels, essays, short stories and thousands of songs.  He composed over 2,000 songs.  He wrote 8 novels and 4 novellas.  He also took up painting at age 60 and had several exhibitions of his work.

In 1913, Tagore won the Nobel Prize in Literature.  In 1915 the British Crown granted him knighthood which he renounced in 1919 after the Jallianwala Bagh massacre.

Poetry
Here is a poem by Tagore:

My Song

by Rabindranath Tagore

This song of mine will wind its music around you,

my child, like the fond arms of love.

The song of mine will touch your forehead

like a kiss of blessing.

When you are alone it will sit by your side and

whisper in your ear, when you are in the crowd

it will fence you about with aloofness.

My song will be like a pair of wings to your dreams,

it will transport your heart to the verge of the unknown.

It will be like the faithful star overhead

when dark night is over your road.

My song will sit in the pupils of your eyes,

and will carry your sight into the heart of things.

And when my voice is silenced in death,

my song will speak in your living heart.

C. S. Lewis

"Faith is the art of holding on to things in spite of your changing moods and circumstances."

— C. S. Lewis

Irish Writer & Novelist

1898 - 1963

Commentary

Creative leaders need a lot of faith because they live in a very negative, sometimes hostile world, that often does not understand or appreciate their work.  I have been writing seriously for almost forty years and have yet to receive acceptance and recognition for the work I have produced.  Another person might have quit many years ago, but I keep plugging away.

Do you have faith in your creative ideas?  Your poems?  Your stories?  Your paintings?  Your ability to become another person on stage?  Do you have dark days when you want to quit and live a normal life?  Faith keeps us going even everything and everybody around us are telling us to give up — that we have no talent, no gift.

Where does your faith come from?  What keeps you going during those darkest of hours?  Why do you believe in your ideas?  

Creative Practice

This week think about what faith means to your artistic endeavors.  Why is faith in yourself and your creative work important?  Why must you believe in yourself?  Write for ten minutes on the importance of faith.  Or paint a picture of what faith means to you.

Biography

Clive Staples Lewis was born in Belfast, Ireland to Albert James Lewis and Florence Augusta Hamilton Lewis.  When he was four, his dog, Jacksie, was killed and he began calling himself Jacksie and would not answer to any other name.  He was known as Jack to his family and friends the rest of his life.

Jack loved animals as a child and read the Beatrix Potter's stories.  He wrote and illustrated his own animal stories as a child.  His mother died from cancer when he was ten.  Jack developed a love of Norse, Greek and Irish mythology.  At the age of 18 he was awarded a scholarship to University College, Oxford and a year later dropped out to join the British Army during World War I.  He resumed his studies when the war was over.

Lewis became an atheist at 15 and it took many years to restore his faith in God.  He converted in Christianity at 33.  

C. S. Lewis was a prolific writer of both fiction and non-fiction.  His close friends included J. R. R. Tolkien.  His Chronicles of Narnia (seven fantasy novels for children) is a classic of children's literature.  The series has sold over 100 million copies and has been translated into 41 languages.

Charles Kettering

"The only time you can't afford to fail is the last time you try."

— Charles Kettering

American Inventor

1876 - 1958

Many people give up too soon.  When something knocks you down, you need to pick yourself up and keep going.  Being knocked down is not failure.  Staying down is failure.  Don't give up.  Keep rising again and again.  

What projects have you given upon?  Have you been knocked down lately and want to quit?  It it time to give yourself a pep talk and pick yourself up.

Paul Simon

"A song I was writing is left undone.  I don't know why I spend my time writing songs I can't believe."

— Paul Simon

American Musician

1941 -

As I write this I am listening to the songs of Simon and Garfunkel, one of my favorite groups.  Like many people, I was disappointed when they broke up.  I loved their songs which defined the world for me when I was a teenager.  I loved the lyrics.  I stopped following either musician after they broke up.  I probably should have followed Simon since he was the creative genius behind the group.  The above lyrics come from Kathy's Song, which he wrote in 1965 while in England.

Do you have any creative work left unfinished?  A painting?  A poem?  A novel?  I do.  I have a novel I spent 4 years writing, but never finished.  I also have several short stories.  These days I tend to write my poems in one sitting with little or no rewriting.

Do you believe in what you create or do you like Simon in these lyrics doubt what you have created?  Have you lost faith in your creative skills?  

Here is Simon and Garfunkel singing Kathy's Song.  Enjoy.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Roosevelt speaking
at the United Nations
July 1947

"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams."

— Eleanor Roosevelt

American Speaker, Author

1884 - 1962

Do you believe in your dreams?  Do you believe in the opportunities that can and will come into your life?  Each of us makes our own future by believing in our dreams.  When we give up on our dreams, we die a slow waking death.  Never give up on your dreams.  What you believe in you can achieve.  What you doubt will be cast aside and forgotten.  The dreams that you have been given are yours to achieve.  Nothing is impossible if you believe.

Meredith Monk

"At a certain point, you have to go to the edge of the cliff and jump — put your ideas into a form, share that form with others."

— Meredith Monk

American Composer

1942 -

Artistic folks are often perfectionists who are slow to let their work out into the larger world.  We need to learn to take a leap of faith — to believe enough in our work to let others experience it.  Sure, the work will find critics and those who don't understand and maybe even controversy, but that is okay.  The work must see the light of day.  So take the leap and jump off the cliff.  Share your work with others.

Here is Meredith Monk performing Lost Wind.

Wilson Mizner

"I respect faith but doubt is what gets you an education."

— Wilson Mizner

American Playwright

1876 - 1933

I am a doubting Thomas.  Faith does not come easy for me.  I question almost everything.  Yet I feel my doubts have made a better and stronger person.  Others might not agree, but then they can not look inside my heart.  As creative leaders, I believe it is part of our role in society to question and not to take everything at face value.  I think that the more we are able to question the better our art will be.

Thomas Edison

"Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up."

— Thomas Edison

American Inventor

1847 - 1931

Since we don't know the future, we often give up on our goals before we should.  Sometimes the closer we come to achieving our goals, the more discouraged we become.  To us the night appears to be darkest before the dawn.  So the key is not to give up on your dreams.  Hold fast to your dreams.  

Thomas Edison held over a thousand U.S. Patents in his lifetime.  He invented the phonograph, the motion picture camera, a stock ticker, a vote recorder and the light bulb.  In 1914 the phonograph factory of Thomas Edison burnt to the ground.  Over night he lost more than 3 million dollars.  The next day when Edison was walking through this burnt out factory, his son came over to console him.  Thomas Edison turned to his son and said:  "There is great value in disaster.  It burns up all our mistakes.  Thank God we can start anew."  Within three months, he went out and build a new factory, redesigned the phonograph and gave the world a brand new phonograph.

Harley King

"May you wait patiently for your success with the belief and confidence that it will come."

— Harley King

American Speaker/Poet

1949 -

Many of us are impatient.  We can't wait.  We are in a hurry.  Yet success has its own timetable.  You can't hurry it.  So develop patience and have faith that when the time is right you will receive your moment in the sun.  Enjoy the moment.  Enjoy the present.  Don't worry about tomorrow.

Here are three of my short poems written in 2011.

What color

are your dreams,

my friend?

Bright blue?

Midnight red?

A thin pink?

I gather my fears in my hands.

###

I've grown old

with doubt,

a finger of time

between clouds

of darkness.

I open my mouth

and swallow the wind.

###

I am

the moon,

a faded light,

a distant dream.

Hold me

in your arms

that I may be free.

Garrison Keillor

"What keeps our faith cheerful is the extreme persistence of gentleness and humor."

— Garrison Keillor

American Writer

1942 -

Do you have faith in your creativity?  Do you believe in yourself and your work?  Do you wake up cheerful each day eager to begin creating?  Gentleness and humor go a long way to making the day joyful.  Cultivate humor in your life and heart.  Be gentle in your criticism of yourself, your work and your friends.  We all need a little more faith to help us through the challenges we face.

Here is Garrison Keillor at work.

Amy Tan

"We dream to give ourselves hope.  To stop dreaming — well, that's like saying you can never change your fate."

— Amy Tan

American Novelist

1952 -

What do you do when your dreams don't happen the way you imagined?  Do you stop dreaming?  Or do you change the dream?  Or do you reframe your expectations to match the reality?  Dreams are all that many of us have left to hold onto.  If we give up our dreams, our lifes might as well be over.  Even if we never achieve our dreams, we need the hope they inspire in us.  We always need hope until that moment arrives when we take our last breath.  Hope keeps us alive.  

Here is Amy Tan discussing how she found meaning through writing.

Lucille Ball

"One of the things I learned the hard way was that it doesn't pay to get discouraged.  Keeping busy and making optimism a way of life can restore your faith in yourself."

— Lucille Ball

American Actress

1911 - 1989

It is very easy for creative leaders to become discouraged and depressed when their ideas don't work out.  Yet what good does it do to wallow in self-pity and discouragement?  We become less productive and might even stop creating all together.  The challenge is to find ways to keep our chin up and to keep moving forward.  Having spent the first 35 years of my life as a pessimist, I know it takes work to become an optimist.  And it is easy to backslide.  Being down on ourselves does us no good.  We need to keep the faith.  We need to believe in ourselves.

Here's part one of a documentary of Lucille Ball's life.

Margaret Atwood

"Writing is an act of faith: I believe it's also an act of hope, the hope that things can get better than they are."

— Margaret Atwood
Canadian Writer
1939 - 

Does your creative work give you hope?  Does your painting give you hope that your life will improve?  Does your writing give you hope about the progress of the human race?  I believe creative leaders have to have lots of hope.  Why else would they struggle for years with no prospect of success?  Every time a writer sends his short stories, poetry and novels to a publisher he is full of hope that this time it will be accepted.  A painter may paint for years and never sell a painting, always hoping that the next one will sell.  Never give up.  There is always tomorrow.  Have faith.  You will succeed.