"To see a world in a grain of sand and heaven in a wild flower. Hold infinity in the palms of your hand and eternity in an hour."

-- William Blake

The artist in this video revealed a world in several hundred grains of sand during "Ukraine's Got Talent" late last year. The story she "paints" is the aerial bombing of Kiev during World War II. She's standing behind a table covered with sand and lit from beneath. An overhead camera has been placed above the table and the video is projected on a large screen behind her so the audience can watch the painting unfold.

What I found interesting watching this is that each action she makes is fueled by her knowledge of the end result. She knows where she is headed before she begins and everything she does serves that goal. And even though her art is temporary, its impact is powerful and memorable. A reminder that everything we do -- whether someone sees it or not, whether it last forever or a minute -- matters.

P.S. She won the competition!

By Liese Gardner

Oprah got it right by calling the epiphanies we experience in life "aha moments." Because if she called them what they really are -- such as "moments that rocked my world," or "ideas that made me rethink everything I know about myself" -- she'd scare off half her viewers from ever seeking change.

And yet, even that which rocks our world doesn't necessarily bring change to us overnight. The "aha moments" are really flashes of lightning that hit our hearts and minds then work their way through our entire system until real change actually occurs.

For me that lightning bolt hit on a random Tuesday night years ago when several friends took me to see Marianne Williamson speak. This was at the height of the AIDS epidemic and she had been working with people infected with HIV, holding workshops on The Course in Miracles (a method for choosing love over fear) and building a reputation not as a healer, but as a guide for people moving in that direction.

I came to the lecture with no expectations. I left reeling with thoughts and emotions. I felt alive and although I wasn't sure HOW to do it, I knew I COULD create the change in my life for which I longed. But in the end it wasn't my "life" that changed. It was me. And that one very simple thought is at the crux of Williamson's teachings.

External forces don't change. How we perceive them and react to them does. Therein lies the miracle.

I was fortunate enough to hear Wiliamson speak many more times after that up until 1994 when she moved away from Los Angeles. Each time she amazed me with her insight and her ability to start with one small idea, take it to a global, then cosmic level and finally circle back to the original thought perfectly and without notes. I have never seen a better speaker. But it wasn't her technique; it was her energy and her message.

Her message was -- and is -- extremely powerful. So much so that many people have attributed the well-known quote "Your playing small does not serve the world" to Nelson Mandela. In actuality, it is a quote from Return to Love, the first of many of Williamson's books to become a New York Times bestseller. Here is the full quote, the perfect sentiment for this time of year. An inspiration and a guide for how to refuel after we empty our minds of old thoughts and perceptions that hold us back.

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God.

Your playing small does not serve the world.

There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

 -- Marianne Williamson, Return to Love

A GIFT FOR YOU!

In the spirit of the holidays I would love to give a copy of Return to Love to a reader of Fuel: Passions That Drive Us. Just leave a comment here over the holiday season and I'll randomly draw a name from those comments on January 5. If you don't want to, or can't, leave your name with an e-mail link so I can get in touch with you, just check back on the 5th. I'll post the name of the winner then and you can get in touch with me.

Update on Tuesday, January 5, 2010 by Mecca

A Return to Love Giveway Results

A random drawing of names this morning decided the results of the giveaway... Desiree Patterson was the winner of a copy of Return to Love. Congratulations!

Thank you to everyone for your wonderful comments and for reading Fuel.

Have a wonderful, warm, inspired and passionate New Year!

Liese

 

By Liese Gardner

We all draw from our nature, but few of us explore our nature through drawing and art. We are blessed by people who can do this -- who express the passion and beauty that is within and around us. These are people who see the world differently -- who can translate even the most everyday occurrences into something that touches our collective souls be it a sculpture, a painting, a poem or a photograph. People such as Michele Ogilvie.

When I first met her years ago, she was creating intricate multi-media sculptures that exquisitely expressed emotions and inner worlds rich in layers of meaning. Each revealed the passion within Michele to understand her interior world and how it related to the exterior world.

Throughout the years Michele's passion for art, nature, yoga and philosophy have transformed (and of course, continue to transform) not only who she is but what her art is to her and what it says to us, the viewers.

"About three years ago," she says," I felt the need to simplify my work. I put away my torches, hammers and nails and picked up a pen and sketchbook. The decision was liberating and it brought me closer to the understanding that the act of creating is a dance between meditation, dreaming, surrendering and intention. This was the catalyst for Burst (more about Burst below)."

WHAT INSPIRES YOU?

"The short answer is that I'm inspired to create when I'm moved by an experience, sensation, thought or idea that bursts out of my head and heart and onto canvas. It's an explosion of gratitude and it comes from a place of acknowledging that the mind, body, and soul connect and tie our world together on an intimate as well as global scale"

"The piece of art is sort of like confetti at the end of a celebration."

WHAT FUELS YOU?

"Simple things. It doesn't take much to get me amped. I'm in awe of nature -- watching roses grow, diving through waves in the ocean and walking without an umbrella in the rain. A lot of my imagery is taken from things like this. I am fueled by the invisible essence of people, places and things -- that which we don't really see but can feel and intuit. The soul that generates our lives and experiences. It seems to me that when we get to the center of this, we can meet the truth of who we really are and have real conversions about our likenesses and differences from a place of respect, compassion and creativity.

"Essentially, I am fueled by life and living."

BURSTING

This past year Michele truly Burst forth with a new website and several blogs that allow her to explore the same themes yet also to share her art and passion more freely and allow a great number of people to own them and enjoy the work in their own environments.

I love that she called it "Burst." The word is perfect for all that she wants to convey.

"It says it all in so many ways," she says. "To give way to extreme emotion -- as in my heart will burst; to emerge or spring suddenly -- to burst onto the scene; and to be filled to the breaking point -- to burst with excitement."

A POP-UP online GALLERY ON FUEL!

A "showing" of Michele's recent burstings -- beautiful Giclee** prints -- and her thoughts on them.

AXIS MUNDI

"The tree series called Axis Mundi captures the essence of how energy moves through and around nature. I chose to focus on the tree because it represents an axis that not only grounds itself to the earth but also reaches to the sky."

"It's a symbol that depicts the potential of our lives. It gets tangled, bends, curves and sometimes breaks, yet it is always resilient and continues to grow and branch toward the light."

ZERO POINT FIELD

"This is a series that I created in the spirit of personal and universal healing. On one level the paintings are abstract and expressionistic. On a deeper level they are meditation tools, or Yantras. A Yantra is the visual equivalent of a sound mantra, such as Aum. They are used to support an intention to turn inward, balance the mind and focus spiritual interconnectness."

These prints and more are available for sale at www.burstdesigns.com

*GREAT IDEA*  Michele's prints are gorgeous, reasonably priced and make great gifts for the holidays or anytime!

**Giclee is a cutting-edge, professional museum quality 8- to 12-color (as opposed to the four-color process you see in magazines) printing process that takes the place of the outdated Iris and offset CYMK four-color printing. The process uses a highly refined ink jet print head that has thousands of tiny nozzles that spray very fine, overlapping layers of archival pigment onto 100 percent rag archival acid-free paper. This technique is being recognized more and more by internationally known artists and prestigious galleries worldwide.

-- LG

Even in yoga, which is a peaceful practice, there exists a warrior pose. It's important because it symbolically helps us do battle with ourselves in to order to achieve self awareness.

Self awareness is tricky. I've heard it said that the last thing we know about ourselves is how others perceive us. And yet how they perceive us depends on how well we know ourselves. Catch 22? A little but that is where our inner warrior does its work.

At my first job I had an image in my mind of what a professional person should be. I was one person during the day and another in my personal life. But as I inevitably became friends with people in the industry in which I worked this compartmentalization of self became complicated. And yet I remained guarded until I realized that I wasn't having a very rich or rewarding relationship with anyone. It wasn't easy, but I began to open up. Every time I did my warrior did battle with that part of myself that wanted to remain in the shadows for fear of being hurt.

Today, the warrior within us is important for another type of survival -- that of our businesses.

In another Eastern philosophy called the "Thick Black Theory" (a Chinese plan for mental toughness written in 1911) it is argued there can be no enlightenment without a full concept of the darkness. It's a theory that author Ching Ning Chu took up again in a book she wrote in 1995, Thick Face, Black Heart. She wrote about achieving success in our professional and personal lives by creating a "thick face" and using it as a shield to protect, not deflect. And the black heart? She asserts it is necessary in order to develop a noble type of ruthlessness that allows one to succeed without compromise.

"One must thicken one's face to protect his self esteem from the opinions of others," she writes. "The person adept at Thick Face creates his positive self image despite criticism from others. The thick-faced person instills confidence in others through his self-confidence."

The image of a thick face supports that of the warrior who is able to face the world without fear. But what of the black heart? Certainly we've seen the downside of self-centered ruthlessness today in business. But can the ability to take decisive action without regard for the consequences be an asset? Yes, Chu writes, "A black heart is ruthless but not necessarily evil," and she gives the example of a surgeon, general or business owner who does what has to be done.

While I understand that the warrior needs a black heart on the battlefield and the surgeon during an operation, and that there are important lessons to take from the darkness that exists, it's no way to live and work all the time.

For me, I'll take the image of the thick-faced spiritual warrior to be my internal guide for business in 2010 as I set my intentions to ... Make smart, noble choices. Act with less hesitation. Remain facing forward, firmly grounded, and sure footed. Have the hard conversations. Look for points of connection rather than departure. And ultimately, hold steady and breathe into my warrior pose as it reveals new truths, insights and awareness.

Angela Roberts is fueled by a passion for food and art. "I go back and forth between my paint studio and my kitchen, designing and developing something beautiful to look at, or something delicious to eat," she writes on her food blog, Spinach Tiger. She's even named one of the faux wall treatments she creates (during her "day" job) "wasabi." And it is any wonder the artist in her likes to explore Italian cuisine?

I came across her blog last week when she artfully blended food, emotion and color to commemorate December 1, World AIDS Day. I was impressed with how she took her own passion to inspire others to turn up the heat for a cause.

"I felt compelled to cook for this event and asked my fellow food bloggers to cook along with me," Angela writes in her blog. "I called it Red to Remember. Fellow bloggers joined these efforts from all over the world, baking and cooking in Germany, Australia, Ireland, Spain, Canada and the United States."

"Some shared their own loss," she continues. "Some have never been touched by the disease, but were moved to participate. Some helped to educate us.  All moved me in one way or another and I am deeply grateful for the participation. Hopefully, next year we can do this on a larger scale."

Here are a few photos of what these bloggers created. Go to www.spinachtiger.com to see them all.

From Spanish Recipes, Barcelona Spain, Mushroom and Artichoke Timbale with Poached Egg and Piquillos Sauce

From Sippity Sup, USA, Oysters with Red Mignonette

From The Daily Spud, Ireland, Tomatoes in a Bloody Mary Sauce

From Spinach Tiger, USA, Rainbow Shard Torte