Madeleine L’Engle: Faith, Art, Freedom, Choice [SSL149]

Today, Soul School Lesson is a reading and reflection from “Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art” by Madeleine L’Engle.
• Extras for today’s episode are HERE.

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Eps 77: Guest, Srini Rao – Being Unmistakable and Recovering From Failure

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Srini Rao
Trini Rao – CEO of Unmistakable Creative Media

Show Notes

1:00
Early influences on Srini
Indian heritage and culture, moving a lot

3:00
Meeting new people is exciting

Community and solitude both play a part.

4:30
Being resilient and recovering from failure

6:30
Unmistakeable
Why Only is Better than Best
“Unmistakable: Why Only Is Better Than Best”


[ictt-tweet-inline via=””]If you are unmistakable, you don’t need a signature.[/ictt-tweet-inline]
(You can tweet this great quote. Just click the blue bird There will be others too. Keep a lookout.)

9:00
Being imitative. Finding your unmistakable thing.

Steal Like an Artist

Plagiarism vs. Research

Having patience

Taking outside advice and mistakenly learning to become dependent on it.

12:00
[ictt-tweet-inline via=””]Your bliss is different than your calling.[/ictt-tweet-inline]

There is no business to be made from certain passions.

Businesses have to be market-driven, not passion-driven.

15:00
On being fired from all his jobs.

[ictt-tweet-inline via=””]If you’re comfortable there is no reason to change–and you can be miserable and still comfortable.[/ictt-tweet-inline]

Working 7 years before he got a book deal and some of it is pure luck.

We don’t want to sell the truth, we want to sell the dream.

20:30
The reality of who succeeded.
We sell independence but we breed dependence.

David Burkus. You’re paying for access once you realize the truth and there is some community.

22:30
How the Unmistakable Brand and look evolved.

25:00
No formula for picking guests.
Hero’s journey

28:00
What’s new from Srini?

29:00
What is Unmistakable about his new book?

The link to Srini’s blog on Medium

seth’s blog

31:00
Next: A creative habits focused-book, practical

unmistakablecreative.com
facebook.com/srinirao


Thanks for listening!
Check out more. Here’s a lineup of recent episodes:


EPS 25: Best Productivity Hacks for Working from Anywhere

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BIG NEWS!
A LIVE STREAM conversation related to this episode starts at 8 PM EST this Tuesday (9/8/2015) (And hopefully EVERY Tuesday for each show).
Click this link to get your pass and it will also send a reminder to come tonight.

If you can’t make it?

• View the REPLAY here: http://katch.me/lisadelay


 

Kyle Reed

Today, I’m joined by Kyle Reed.

Kyle’s free resources like his “Hack Monday” resource and the “Task Sheet” caught my attention as I’ve tried to figure out how to make best use of my time amid all the distractions. If you’re pressed for time or just want more mental bandwidth to be at your best, you’ll love our conversation.

• You can squeeze so much more out of your day if you plan it right–See the bottom of the show notes to link to his page of free resources that will make it all much easier and faster.

SHOWNOTES:

1:50

Many of us have lots of ideas. It’s the execution that’s the problem.

Productivity is the bigger issue.

How do we defeat ourselves as creatives and hard workers.

Creativity is mainly intangible.

4:10

Planning your day. Best tips and productive routines.

15 min that can save you hours.

Writing down tasks with time-tables and timers.

Minimizing distractions

Working at home challenges.

Respecting yourself as a person doing real work at home.

Making your home office feel legit

How to stop feeling like there is always more to do right now.

10:00

Pajama power?

Treating yourself as a professional.

13;30

The prevailing  myth that working at the office is productive even in high tech companies.

17:00

Trust issues and ensuring accountability with a boss and an office.

19:00

What environments best help creativity and productivity.

19:30

Company culture and values.

20:40

Kyle’s Productivity tools.

Having 5 million Facebook fans to take care of (from music celebrity accounts) made him rethink everything!

21:30

The Task Sheet tool.

Hack Monday tool (a tool for the week, month, and year)

23:00

Social media calendar tool for promoting content and projects.

Marketing template download to help write a marketing plan.

Taking the time to organize first saves so much time.

25:30

When to outsource tasks and the tools can help.

Batching tasks.

27:00

Entrepreneurs know how to take a calculated risk for the benefits it will reap later.

28:00

The fear that stops us from finishing.

29:00

The self talk that helps us get the work get.

Doing the work when it stinks.

31:00

The importance of relationship and being in a community of “doers”.

32:00

Using what has helped him and sharing it to build a following and meeting needs.

32:30

The 20-something blogger mentoring project that turned into a 500 person community.

34:30

Giving people resources and sticking with young adults.

37:00

The paralysis of too much information.

37:20

What is meant by “Standing on (the shoulder’s of) Giants”

@kylereed follow him on TWITTER

40:00

The Spark challenge I gave Kyle.

Identifying what we need to get done and what needs to be handed-off.


Thanks for listening!

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Special End-of-Summer News and Updates Episode

Here’s a picture of me “at the office” as I write this post. I love creating episodes and posts for you, and it’s especially nice to do it outdoors…but I’m going to need a hoodie…more on that later.

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This short Sunday episode contains news and info.

I’m debuting my new microphone for you to hear. Tell me if you can hear the difference!


A few Episodes are already in the queue, but after those air, you will hear a much richer and higher quality sound demonstrated in this short episode! Many thanks for your kind response to my need for financial support. I still need to buy more monthly space at the audio hosting site, but it is a landmark accomplishment to upgrade my mic and I had to share my joy, gratitude, (and the new and improved sound) with you!

 

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In September, I will launch a Slack Community just for us!

Slack allows you to connect and collaborate much like Facebook but without all the ads and baloney.

At the Spark for Creatives community, we will be able to share, talk about the podcast topic of the week, connect, collaborate, communication, trade notes, and encourage each other in our communication and creative endeavors.

If you’re calling involves creating or communicating, welcome to your tribe!

(If you feel like reading political, religious, or societal rants, seeing posts from only about 12 people, being inundating with horrible news stories, seeing animated GIFs, playing Pet Saga, or looking at adverts from the places you just visited online, you will still have Facebook to turn to.)

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REPLAY of the LIVE class (on Periscope)! with notes!

I was a sweaty, nervous wreck on my first periscope.

It’s comical…did anyone ever see Broadcast News (the movie)?
I needed two tissues for my sympathetic nervous system.

(Some technical difficulties threw me just before broadcast and I talked SO VERY fast.)

If you didn’t get to see it here you go!
(Twitter pulled the plug on this feature – sorry everyone)

 

 

NOTES:

THE #1 Myth about the SOUL…

is that we have one.

But first….we should get on the same page…

WHAT IS A SOUL?

(what are we talking about?)

This is how I’m describing it:

Titanic-style…

In the Old Testament the Hebrew word for soul is nephesh. We might use it this way, “1,517 souls were lost in the Titanic disaster.”

SOUL ≠ dead BUGS BUNNY …like a floating ghost and that sort of stuff.

Not a faint rendering of bugs bunny leaving his body to play a harp on a cloud with Porky Pig. Not something that is ghosty and haunting a house or helping Demi Moore on a Pottery Wheel. (Patrick Swayze-style..google it, young people.)

 

Ancients thought of the mind and heart differently (the will and the emotions)…

Maybe these verses come to mind…but you’ve been thinking about them in your own context instead of the ancient context from which they were written.

 

Remember this one?

The heart is deceitful and wicked above all things JER 17:9

(Guard your heart for it is the wellspring of life)

or Proverbs 4:23 

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.

….The writers of these scriptures were not talking about emotions and feelings when they said “heart” (like we associate the heart today…they were talking about the HEART as one’s will and control center of a person…(the thing we now associate with the mind.)

For them, the emotions (the heart for us in our context) were associated, instead, with the bowels. Perhaps a bit gross..but there is some

MEDICAL TRUTH/correlation : anxiety and stress are closely associated with disease and problem that happen in the intestines…like….ulcerated colon, Irritable Bowel Syndrome (bloating, constipation, gas, and other fun things), digestion issues, food sensitivities and problems in that part of the body. These are extremely related to one’s emotions and levels of stress.


The GEM MODEL of the Soul (my version)

 

Think of the SOUL as a gem and the facets are ways to see the soul.

You can go as far as saying other things beyond these are facets:

family of origin, social economic situation, skin color (if that has been a defining factor in your life)

education, the country you live in,

Even Christianity is a facet. A worldview is a facet that we can gain a kind of look at who we are.

Grace is central to Christianity, for instance. We can look at our soul through the facet of grace.

When light is added to a stone you can see its flaws and imperfections and you can see its quality (color, cut, clarity, caret)

UGLY soul? Is that possible? what do you think?

In his book Care of Souls, David Benner writes, “We can define soul care as the support and restoration of the well-being of persons in their depth and totality, with particular concern for their inner life. Soul care is done in the context of community.”

The vantage point of Soul Care views struggle or failings not as fatal flaws or illness to be “cured”. Not therapy or self-help. 

It’s a sustaining endeavor for our interior lives and our relationships, like water and food is for the body. Incidentally, caring for the body falls within the bounds of Soul Care.

Ten Signs that You Need the Renewal of Soul Care 

1. Fruitlessness. Are there observable deficits in the enacted your Fruit of the Spirit? That means, is there any lack or slack in the

 

areas of love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, gentleness, and self-control? (If not, I think E.T. went home without you. Phone again. You might want to text, and retweet as well.)

2. You find yourself perceiving things others say as personally offensive, or as direct attacks. 

3. You are “venting” more in person or online.
4. You feel unloved.
5.You feel increased frustration, restlessness, or desolation.

6.Your fears and anxiety are more prevalent.

7.You have increased tension in relationships.

8. You struggle with one or more of the “seven deadly 

sins”: wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust, envy, and gluttony. 

 

9. You have problems sleeping or bad dreams.


10. You’re in a creative slump. 

RECAP:

THE #1 myth about the soul is that…. you have one. You don’t have a soul you are a Soul. You have a body. George MacDonald, in 1892 (C.S. Lewis quotes him and the quote is mistakenly attributed to him sometimes)

Think of the Soul as “the real you” the essence of you. contained in a body, yes, but made up of everything about you in a pure sense.

Some might say the soul gets extinguished or goes to paradise or gets absorbed into the great Life Force (God) …but in terms of what you need…you always need Soul Care, because you are a soul and that include both the visible and the invisible.

All this more and much more is available in my book. Shame-filled plug.