Creating in the Summer

Good morning beautiful interneters!

I thought it was time for Just Tasteful Musings to get a digital facelift. :) What do you think?

WOW IT'S FINALLY SUMMER. For those of you still struggling to scale the wall of final exams before school ends, I salute you and wish you good luck. For the rest of you, CELEBRATE! 

Source

With summer comes the lack of school (or work) pushing you to be productive each day. The strange thing is, I've realized that not feeling obligated to be productive makes me a lot more productive than I would be otherwise. 

Like, if I try to force myself to do work, I will actively procrastinate and actually do less than I do on a day without a to-do list. It's kind of messed up. 

But it also kind of makes sense. This summer, try challenging yourself to try new things without feeling like it's necessary to fulfill a certain productivity quota. You just might surprise yourself. 

Also; after letting myself be productively unproductive for a few days, I realized the key to getting that self-satisfied feeling of actually having done something useful after you manage to not slack off. You know, that feeling of hey-I-haven't-wasted-today-maybe-there's-hope-for-me-after-all. 

^That comes from the habit of creating. First of all, if you can establish a good habit and do it at least more than once in a row, you'll start feeling good, whether it's doing five minutes of yoga or writing a page of the first thing that comes to mind. Also, create. Create something new every day, and you will continue to live purposefully. Write a poem, build a watering can out of a plastic bottle, or sing a new song. It's up to you, and that's why it's so fun. 

Source

If you don't know where to start, here's a list of

Ways to Get Your Creative Juices Flowing This Summer:

-go on a bike ride to a different part of your neighborhood or street or city

-write in the morning-- blast some Pandora and get some words on a notebook or in a computer before your even eat breakfast (maybe even before you're dressed)

-plant something. Or replant something you found in a field. Just get your hands in the dirt and nurture something living

-try something relaxing that you've never tried before. Knit. Do yoga. Meditate.

-hit the library and browse a shelf you've never looked at before. Used to young adult? Try the adult section. Browse magazines. 

I hope you guys all find your own ways to be creative and have fun this summer. Go out there a get that feeling of accomplishment. :)

Enjoy loveliness and remember to muse!

On Chunky Sweater Chrysalises and Being Happy

Hello my dear digital friends. :)

HAPPY SPRING! Springtime is just the best time. Aside from the pops of color in your neighbors' yards and the flowering trees that make every car ride seem like a hippie music video, even the things-that-ought-to-be-green-but-have-been-dead-all-winter are this beautiful tender shade of aliveness that's just not the same as summer's tired, dusty emerald. Plus there are no mosquitoes.

Being a citizen of the Atlanta area, I'm obliged to mention the astronomical pollen count that is about eight times what's considered to be severely hazardous. It rained today, and the gutters literally turned the color of Peeps.
It was kinda cool.

Source:

Oh and guess what it's spring break. YAYYYYY I'm so not getting done all those things I wrote down in my planner a Friday ago. 

Hello downward-spiraling toilet of procrastination! 

But times are still good; just looking out the window is an affirmation of this fact. 

ACTUALLY JK there's a huge thunderstorm going on right now. But you get me, yeah?

The start of a new season is a pretty exhilarating feeling, especially when that season is youthful, bright-faced spring. I almost feel like the weather is empowering me to shed a dusty chrysalis of chunky sweaters and emerge into the sunshine with freshly painted toes and a flowy skirt. 

You know? 

Oh and by the way, chrysalises are some of nature's finest creations. I went to Callaway Gardens yesterday, where they have a butterfly house with a chrysalis display. 

  

Source

Source 2 (green)

Look at those things. THEY'RE MESMERIZING. 

Anywho. I feel like a shift in the world around you, seeing everything you're surrounded with on a daily basis begin to shift every-so-slightly until the entire world looks completely different, is one of the best ways to get some perspective. 

Life is BIG. It's bigger than the minuscule problems we obsess over in our worrisome, nitpicky lives. It's not easy to do, and I myself am a culprit of hypocrisy by preaching this to you all, but we all need to learn to live our lives WITH the world we're in and not just, I dunno, ON it. 

We need to try to do more than exist. Don't shun the outdoors to finish some crazy last-minute assignment. If that's a spot you're in, take time to notice the (sucky) feeling of staying up to ungodly hours. It may seem crazy and pointless and stupid, but it's important. 

Notice yourself. Write poetry. Meditate. Take time to give time away freely to whatever whims happen to bob across your imagination. 

And somehow, you will find a way to be happy no matter what sticky situation you've put on hold to follow the instructions of a strange blogger girl. 

Go look up some chrysalises and notice the small things. :)

Enjoy loveliness and remember to muse!

Frustration and Flexibility

Source



I feel like February is an inevitably bad month. It's still cold, spring break is light years away, and life appears to be record-breakingly stagnant. Or overwhelmingly busy. One of the two, but not anywhere in between.

Unhappy month or not, sometimes it can be incredibly easy to get frustrated and be volcanically angry at small things (and it being February doesn't make it better. Trust me, it's personal).
You know, when someone does something really stupid, like maybe leaving the door wide open in the winter and then not hearing you the fourth time you try to explain to them to close it and then somehow mishearing "NEVERMIND" as "Oh wait you don't have to close the door ever". LIKE REALLY SIR WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM.

I mean, if that hypothetically happened to someone, you know.

When something stupid and aggravating like that happens, it's hard not to let it ruin your day (or at least the period of time right after you get mad). Anger just totally messes with any fleeting senses of calm that you have during a busy day. And it's not worth it. It's not worth spending so much energy on, trying to calm yourself down while trying to figure out how to not be mad again in the future.

The thing is, frustrated moments in your life are going to be abundant. There's no way to track down every problem to its source and try to shield yourself from internal explosion.


Life is volatile, and the best way to life in harmony with it, and with yourself, is to change yourself instead of the circumstances.

I learned this lesson the hard way, and let's just say....experience has its merits. Don't waste your energy beating a boulder when you can just go around it.
Be flexible! If you don't focus neurotically on driving everything into the ground, you won't feel a need to make everything right in the world whether you are capable of doing that or not.
^uh that didn't make sense.

Basically, if I had relaxed and just closed the door myself, I wouldn't have had to rant to an invisible internet audience about a stale frustration. I could have let it go. I could have gotten someone else to explain to the uncomprehending sir that "SCREW EVERYTHING" does not mean "Oh let me just do that exact opposite of what you want."

Okay, I'm still bitter.

But be flexible! There are so many options besides being angry, and you just have to choose them.


......freaking language barriers.

See you guys soon; don't get mad and be flexible and enjoy lovliness and remember to muse. :)

Thought Provoker #5 and the benefits of night

Hello traveler of cyberspace. Welcome to my blog.

I think it's about time for another thought provoker! Which, if you are unaware, is a concise statement or even a picture, if I'm feeling adventurous, that leaves room for something to be said. Thought provokers are meant to provoke thought.
I'm sure you can tell I'm efficient with my words.

Something I've been noticing, now that school has started and I'm adopting an infinitesimally shrinking sleep schedule, is the way the sky changes at night. I mean, it gets darker, yes. But that's not the point.

Think about the moon. On an ordinary night, what does the moon look like?

http://www.planetsforkids.org/upload/-moon-a.jpg



The moon is bright, right?
~It's a light in the night, right?
~~"I do not like green eggs and ham. I do not like them, Sam I am."

OKAYOKAY I'm getting back on topic now. Basically, the moon turns really, abnormally bright around 1 or 2 am. It literally brightens to the point where it can just illuminate a driveway and actually cast shadows into a darkened house. 
Pretty spectacular, really.


It's one of those hidden gems in life. Staying up nights seems hardly worth anything-- those are undeniably the lowest points of any day or week. But if you challenge yourself to step outside the confines of your desk and room and explore in the dark, even if it means staring out the window at a moonlit street, you might be surprised what's in store for you.

With that said, let your thought provoker be this:

What is an emblem of mystery to you?

Is it the moon, an impenetrable night, a child's dreams, a tiny smile?



Think about it. Write about it. Create something wonderful with the thoughts inside your head, because that's what we humans were made to do.

Enjoy loveliness and remember to muse :)

Surprise Hope

Happy evening-time to you all, intereneters.
Oh, and happy super bowl day too. If I said I watched the game it would be a falsity as well as a surprise considering the fashion in which this sentence is progressing.
I'm weird.

I want to share with you all a healthy little dose of perspective I got over the weekend. I was carpooling with this family, a really nice dad and his son. And the dad was just telling me about how it's nice that his kid is involved in all these activities, because as an adult life can get kind of boring and it's fun to take interest in the kids' activities. And he said that the sky is just beautiful today.

And somehow that just changed it for me.
Put simply, I was living in a sort of doldrums. You know, when your internal monologue is consistently like this:

Gah my life is a mess. What am I even doing?
No. It's okay. Don't think like that.
Well, what do I think like? I can't avoid these problems forever.
I have no purpose.
I am stupid. 
Everything is annoying. 
I have no friends. 
I'm fat.
I'm skinny.
I'm hopeless.

Gah no it's okay, life is tough. 
This time in my life is just a learning experience.
Yeah, a learning experience. 
I'm toughening up because the future is harder. 

Photo by Scott Kadlek
http://www.beautifulworldphotos.com/img/s10/v17/p1010947731-3.jpg



If you find yourself thinking like that, you are not by any stretch of the imagination alone. And the thing is, although your thinking may be self-justifying, it's not entirely true.

You see, life isn't all pain. It's not all about fall and hurting yourself so you'll be some calloused, tough fighter for the future. Sure, that's a part of it. But that's not the point.

Don't accept the suffering you face. You as an individual on the face of this beautiful earth have the power to control your own happiness, whether you find that easy to believe or not. You have to tell yourself, to will your mind to believe that there is something greater and brighter waiting for you. Look ahead, because it's easy to try to protect yourself by admitting that life is all pain.

It's not. It's not all pain. 

And it probably doesn't make sense to you why carpooling with two people helped me to realize that, and at this point it isn't making much sense to me either. But I think hearing the dad say that, that he finds happiness in his children, helped me to realize that, well, lasting sources of happiness do exist. Happiness itself actually exists. Because at certain points in your life, even though it seems obvious, you may find yourself denying even that.


I'm sorry this post sounds oddly depressed and kind of hypocritical and preachy.
Promise I'll be more fun in the next post. :)

Enjoy loveliness and remember to muse! <3

Perspective

Greetings earthlings!

I haven't posted in such an obscenely long amount of time that I'm not even sure how to apologize for it....SORRY SORRY SORRY! I've been negligent and careless and lazy.
But I haven't stopped writing.

Winter has brought the closest to an absolute tempest of emotion that I've ever experienced in my insubstantial life. Simply put, I hit what I think was my metaphorical rock bottom. Which is probably completely and thoroughly false and I will later scoff at my pathetic youthful self who thought one winter break gave enough wisdom for a lifetime.

Anyhow. 

I know something we all experience all too often, something I've mentioned before, is the downward-spiraling toilet of antiproductivity.

You get distracted. 

You get pulled in by your distraction.

You have no desire whatsoever to return to what you should be doing while subconciously hating yourself. 

http://us.cdn4.123rf.com/168nwm/cole123rf/cole123rf0803/cole123rf080300061/2650306-young-child-being-flushed-down-the-toilet--bad-behaviour--vector.jpg



Guess what? The downward-spiraling toilet of despair has a catalyst.
Yup, there's a convenient (ha actually really INconvenient) flush handle that, once identified, can be made to be pressed less and less often.

I'm sorry, I like metaphors.

While you read this, please attempt to dispose properly of all cynicism and preconjured disbelief.
The handle that starts the toilet spiraling downward is the harmless act of indulging in a distraction at all. 

It sounds like an empty, "Gee, thanks for THAT" answer, but it's not. Trust me. The incredibly easy act of starting yourself on a path to distraction begins with simply one video view, one Tumblr browse, one cookie. The thing is, distractions are ADDICTING. After that first shot of exhilarating mindlessness, you own brain will turn against you by formulating new excuses to continue. Once you're against yourself, there's no turning back.
It's stringent, but it's the truth; true productivity comes from not letting yourself indulge in guilty pleasures AT ALL. 
Of course, there's still room for breaks and such. PRODUCTIVE breaks, aka, not distractions. Exercise is honestly the only almost-foolproof form of resting your brain between bouts of productive assault that I can think of.

Well. That's all I have for you today. Go out there and assault your fear, interneters.


Oh, one more thing.
I have discovered the most unique brand of genius in a humble 20th century poet by the name of Charles Bukowski. I'm obsessed. Infatuated.

Read this: http://hellopoetry.com/poem/i-met-a-genius/

And this: http://hellopoetry.com/poem/air-and-light-and-time-and-space/

Just soak it in. Reading his poetry is a significant experience.
Okay okay, I'm done. Peace ya'll.

Keep on keepin' on

Ay yo interneters.

Just wanted to bring you a little bit of cheer on this lovely Friday night. Well technically it's Saturday morning. May the brain-dead-ness begin.

I just wanted to remind you that, when hardship strikes, don't resort to that curl-into-the-fetal-position-and-hope-to-disintegrate type of feeling. Because after a few weeks of constant stress, that will be what you want to do most.
Just remember that hardships define who you are. Anyone can remain cool and composed and benevolent and lovely when their life is all smiles. It's those people who can be all those things even when their lives are hell; that's what defines someone as strong. Don't you wanna be strong?

And also, don't let your mind betray you. Yeah, it does that.
It's so incredibly easy to delve into a well of self-pity when it's 1:36 am and you just start to study for your third test. Don't. Self-pity is the mother of despair. Don't bother trying to think happy thought; at that point, it will just be frustrating and difficult. Instead, just make your mind as blank as possible for a few moments, collect yourself, and return to whatever you're doing. Hey, it'll refresh you, and when the number of sleep you get each night is less than the number of pounds you're gaining, nothing is way better than whatever your mind wants to come up with.

I'm sorry. I'm moody.

Anyway, here's a little something to cheer up your weekend.

http://iwastesomuchtime.com/on/?i=53487



You rock it, interneter. You rock those hardships. :)

Enjoy loveliness and remember to muse!