Jen Knox's Blog, page 16
March 10, 2024
Dropping the masks
Let's drop the need for filters and masks and learn how beautiful life can be when we love ourselves fully and completely and when we feel the freedom of what it is to be who we are today.
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March 8, 2024
On buying the flowers
“The roots of all goodness lie in the soil of appreciation for goodness.”
— Dalai Lama
I appreciate you, whether I know you personally or not. I appreciate that you are investing time and attention to sit and read. Thank you for exploring the world with me through the lens of words and ideas.
And on that note, I appreciate all of the positive and influential people in my life. The teachers, family, friends, and all those who model the personal and relational leadership I hope to one day embody. I appreciate those who challenge me and urge me to question my limited ideas so that I can continue to grow—those who keep me from dogma or stagnancy.
Photo by Ryunosuke Kikuno As you well know if you read this blog or speak with me regularly, the direction of the online landscape disturbs me because I see so many humans adopting personas and rushing to be seen, piggybacking on others, copying ideas without attribution (even on a small scale), making transactional connections, and then rushing past each other in person.
So many think they’ve invented the wheel that was rolled their way and rush to show off the “creations” they are in a position to purchase.
I recently wrote an article on the call for servant leaders for my day job. It’s a bit of a dig on hierarchies in politics, academia, and beyond; but, I think in writing it I also opened up a topic I can’t quite close the lid on. At least in my own mind. While many take for granted those who are accountable, consistent, and supportive in their lives, there is great benefit to us all in recognizing these people and recognizing them loudly.
If we reframe the way we look at our lives, even just today, and we look to the places where we can express appreciation to and for other humans and identify all the people we have to be grateful for, we can pull back power from those who thrive on chaos and destruction.
The people we look up to or take for granted are often under massive pressure and need our support to remain as strong as they are. In honor of International Women’s Day, you can probably take a beat to think of a few women who gave thanklessly or whose innovations were trumpeted by someone else. Sure, we’ve framed people who give without praise in our minds as servant leaders or humble leaders; mentors or artistic innovators, but so long as they are human, they still need to be uplifted and supported.
Anyway, I say all this to say that I am consciously taking the next few days to think about and pay homage to those who have uplifted me and challenged me to be better. I invite you to do the same. Receive their gifts (and all the gifts) with open arms. Receive them without shame or the wasteful emotions that surround guilt.
But also send those you see as under-recognized unexpected thanks and, more, do so publicly. Appreciate them in loud and reverberating ways.
My call to action stems from my personal belief that the only way we will change the course of the current trends of placing the loudest few at the helm is to begin to recognize those quietly strong mentors, artists, and friends. As a friend of mine, Jackiethia Butch, recently said, “I’m not waiting till someone dies to give her flowers.”
So again, no matter what you are going through, I appreciate you, and thank you for slowing down with me once a week. Your attention and exchange is a gift I receive with open arms.
*I’ll write something about writing on the 15th.
March 2, 2024
On the unexpected
Imagine you are in a place where you do not speak the native language, riding in a cab littered with Rubik’s Cubes. They are on the ground and seat, they even bulge from the driver's seatback pocket.
You eye them for a while before picking one up, and you begin to turn the plastic squares. You have a 30-minute ride, and you’re already 10 minutes in.
At the end of the journey, the driver assesses your progress and offers an affirmative nod. He hands you a tiny replica of a Rubik’s Cube to take with you. You thank him in a language he doesn’t understand.
Problem-solving, math skills, and memory are all enhanced by the challenge of trying to figure out the Rubik’s Cube. One of my former student assistants at OSU was in the Guinness Book of World Records for being part of a Rubik’s Cube challenge, and it was at the very top of her resume. Long story short, I hired her.
And, for the record here, the scenario above was not a fever dream, nor was it me overdoing my iron supplements. It isn’t even a failed short story (though I may flesh out this scenario one day and took a liberty with with the backseat pocket description).
This happened—albeit not to me—a few days ago. My husband was the rider, and he sat amongst over a dozen Rubik’s Cubes for 10 minutes before picking one up. In the end, he did quite well, creating at least one full side of color, which didn’t come as a surprise to me.
Photo by Klim Musalimov I love this story. But the protagonist, to me, is not my husband (sorry, Chris). It is the man who drives a cab full of Rubik’s Cubes.
“Tell me more about the driver,” I said to him, but he explained that most of the drive was dedicated to the puzzle itself, so he didn’t have much more to share.
The driver may or may not have been a good person, but his affinity for Rubik’s Cubes and desire to share this passion interests me.
There is nothing quite like the unexpected encounters with people who offer us a healthy dose of curious confusion. Those who jostle us from our reality with an offering—usually strange—that reminds us of some truth.
I like to imagine this man as a teacher, even hero of sorts, who works hard not to roll his eyes when riders Google “the best way to solve a Rubik’s Cube,” and instead offers them grace but no gift. The kind who keeps a stock of tiny Rubik’s replicas as a metaphor for the offerings of a world full of mystery that begs us to slow down and examine the patterns in a way that doesn’t look for shortcuts.
This driver was on a mission to reward those who take the time to figure things out, rather than rushing to the end. Or, maybe he just wanted to give people something to do on the ride.
Either way, his choice of activities was generous and oddly insistent. After all, he might’ve had a single Cube and a magazine, along with a few packets of salted peanuts back there to keep riders sufficiently busy.
To ride with a cab full of Cubes, my friends, is a special kind of offering to the world. The kind worth exploring in our art/writing.
Prompt: Write or reflect on a person (imagined or real) who hoisted upon you an unexpected lesson or perspective, who reminded you of something you’d forgotten, or who persistently suggested you slow down and reexamine the patterns.
Let me know how it goes.
February 23, 2024
On nonsense
I won’t go on about how good of a time I had in San Miguel de Allende because I’m already annoying people. It’s almost as bad as the time I went on a falconing walk and didn’t stop talking about it for two weeks. The world was full of birds then. People were just there to listen.
Today, my world is full of beauty and mythology, poetry, good weather, and cobblestone streets. But also, it’s full of nonsense.
So at the risk of being slightly annoying, especially to any of you who follow me on social, I’ll say it one more time: hot damn did I have a good time! Here’s a pic of me looking off into the distance, probably at nothing at all.
Me, full of nonsense & tacos (Image credit: Elizabeth Powell)It wasn’t just being in a beautiful city and meeting new friends, nor was it exploring the near-hidden shops and eating well-seasoned food (salt and pepper is not spice, Ohio). It wasn’t even the readings and workshops or the fact that I got to do it for free. It was the fact that I had fun. Fun! I had fun because I had no agenda, and I didn’t take myself seriously in the least.
I wandered till my feet hurt and explored a shop that didn’t bother with the typical displays (see below).
This was only a third of the store.I dropped a credit card down a street vent in the first few hours I was there and got a little embarrassed, then “built a bridge,” as my mother would say, “and got over it.” I learned how to use a digital wallet, and how to shamelessly explain my situation in Spanish before asking ¿Aceptas tarjetas digitales?
I happened upon an improv class, and I wandered with nowhere to go. I dreamed. I dreamed a lot. I dreamed and listened and laughed and was misinterpreted. I cheered on writers and performers and listened to conversations in Spanish, appreciating only the cadence. And I didn’t try to analyze or achieve. I just let go. I was not there to network. I was not there to sell books. I was just there.
I’m not sure if it’s a right of passage or happenstance or increased confidence/decreased self-consciousness, but lately, I’ve been feeling more in tune with the energy I remember feeling as a child. The child archetype, if you will.
As much as I can ride this out, I’m inviting wonder to lead me through my days. I remember as a child being so interested in every nuance of every person I met. I’d interview adults until they grew tired of my questions, and I didn’t ask them about the world (why is the sky blue?) but about them. Who were they? Why did they do what they did? Where had they traveled and what made them laugh? I remember dreaming about going on adventures with my elementary school bus driver, Mrs. Jackson, who drove too fast and had an impressive Jheri curl. For a full year, I waited for the day she’d decide we kids had more interesting places to go than school and take us all on an adventure to somewhere full of magic and intrigue.
Like many kids, I let curiosity lead my life. I was a relentless dreamer, an innocent. Then life revealed its anger and concerns, sicknesses and threats, and I lost that dreaminess for a while. For more than a decade, in fact.
A few years ago, I was in a lovely discussion group with my friend Jim Coe about Jungian psychology and Joseph Campbell’s theories of archetypes. It got me thinking about the cycles we all go through. The freedom of childhood (innocent) leads to the wreckage of first fears (orphan), which requires resiliency and fight (warrior), and so on. Carol Pearson’s book, Awakening the Heroes Within, outlines the way we embody all archetypes to varying degrees, but we often find ourselves in a phase in which one is dominant.
The child self is easy to neglect but crucial to our ability to create fully, and I believe the only way to rekindle our relationship with that part of self is to surrender to play. But so many adults don’t know how. They think play is drinking a glass of sauvignon blanc. (It’s not.)
So how can we experiment with this child self if it feels too distant, and especially if we don’t have the time or opportunity to travel right now?
Jungian psychologist Dr. Rachel Newsome shared with me an excellent activity to coax adults into play. It begins by reading Lewis Caroll’s “Jaberwocky,” which toys with language and meaning and . . . well . . . makes no sense.
Newsome suggests following Caroll’s lead and writing a nonsense poem as a way to rekindle the sense of play. While the initial response to this exercise was a cringe, when I finally broke down and tried it, it was quite fun. And is perhaps more so if done in a group. I wanted to share the exercise with you (which, of course, I’ve altered a bit).
It begins like this:
List words that you used as a kid or words your kids used that weren’t true words (think “psghetti”)
List words you love and combine them into new words (joy and plate could be “jlate”)
Come up with at least ten (10) nonsense words
From there, the exercise is to integrate each nonsense word into a line of poetry or prose that you don’t plan to submit or monetize.
Just play.
Give it ten minutes of your life. Five minutes even. Make it an exercise in release. Allow yourself to be vulnerable, to speak a new language, to let go, to dream and act silly. Try it with a friend or friends. You might be surprised where it leads.
But just as likely (perhaps more so), it won’t lead anywhere. Knowing the latter makes it a little more fun and calls for a little more wonder.
February 18, 2024
On creative confidence
Creative confidence is a mirror image of our dedication, fortitude, and self-belief. I want to speak about this topic because I think it is imperative right now. Many writers I know are discouraged for various reasons.
It’s understandable.
"On the one side were techno-optimists who foresaw a utopian future. AI would eliminate workplace drudgery, diagnose diseases more effectively than doctors could, and save humanity from one of its most loathed burdens: paying writers for anything, ever." —Brian Phillips
Our age and experience, the era, overstimulation, and even the available clock time we have to create and release what we take in: all of it contributes to our feelings about what we create and its relative value.
Some of us feel we should be creating more, others wonder if writing even matters in a time of automation and shameless plagiarism. Then there’s time. Those with little time, or who try to do things quickly often produce works that contain a sort of fever pitch. They can only produce in fits and spurts.
But all of this can work to the benefit of the outcome of our writing. The seeming lack of IP forces us to adopt the “write for myself” mindset. Lack of time might add momentum if it is not forced. But we have to believe in ourselves and our messages like never before. And when we start to put pressure on ourselves (or feel external pressure) for no reason or try to copy/replicate to meet unrealistic timelines or compete with others, it seems the work itself responds with rebellion.
“As any classically trained singer or actor can tell you, trying to make your voice sound like someone else’s can do all manner of damage to it.”
—Lauren Elkin
So here we are.
The absence of motivation or quality time to write often comes with a certain heavy feeling that you may relate to. This heaviness is the sheer absence of the creative process in our lives. Meanwhile, I am a firm believer that we all need to ride the waves of what comes and release the emotion around what doesn’t.
Individually, we can’t change larger trends and many don’t have the luxury to create more time, but we can change our mindset about the whole deal. Easy to say, I know. But this is why fostering creative confidence is the order of the day.
I’ll be honest that what follows hints at a sort of creative destiny that I buy into. You don’t have to, of course, but I find more grace in reminding myself of the call to authenticity over the pressure to strive. Sure, we are in an environment that tells us otherwise, that tells us our worth is in some paper or accolade or number. We are in a time that pressurizes artists and tries to diminish contributions by replicating them en masse. Got it, got it! but! Here’s my message.
Stop wasting time trying to become what and who you already are.
You are where you need to be. You are creating what you are supposed to be creating and creating it at the perfect pace and in a way that will allow the result to find its ideal timeline and audience—be that small or large, be that what you think will meet your current expectations or not. Despite what you sometimes think, you are on the right track, and it matters, and it matters in the way it should. Share your messages in the way you are sharing them, not from a place of pressure or guilt or fear or competition or even urgency. Share what you are called to share and nothing more.
Again, stop wasting time trying to become what and who you already are.
This is a bit of self-talk, but I thought I’d share it here with the intuition that it might resonate with a few of you. Yes, our voices matter, but perhaps the more important message is that we will say exactly what we need to say and release what we observe in our own time. All we have to remember is not to get in our own way or psyche ourselves out.
The dystopic art narrative is just that, after all—another story.
February 10, 2024
On Pain
After the Latin word poena, which means punishment, pain is something that upends our experience and changes how we encounter time. It arrives in all our lives and all forms. And to think that others do not feel it is wrong.
But what does pain offer us, if anything?
Photo by Thanos Pal I wanted to broach this subject in response to a comment on another platform because while I will never wish pain on anyone, including myself, I do feel it can be worked with and explored, even if temporarily. And I believe that everyone would benefit from trying. While pain is an inherently limiting experience, keeping us from certain foods or lifestyle choices—even from certain loved ones or physical activities—it also pulls the attention within like nothing else.
From the time I was fourteen, I would find myself intermittently doubled over in pain due to recurring pelvic pain and, later, accompanying migraines. Some alt-med folks say the pelvic bowl and cranium are connected, but that is something to explore another day. It wasn’t “normal” pain, nor was it bearable. It was the kind of pain that only more intense pain could distract from. So I learned to take scalding hot baths to distract my mind or try to push my body to exercise even though I could barely move. It would work for minutes, maybe only seconds, then the pain I was trying to avoid would return.
And while I didn’t know the Latin roots of the word when I was younger, I did believe my pain to be a punishment for something—for being the walking recessive gene I was born as (red hair, short, etc) or for not living up to my potential while I had the chance. The whole “Why me?” mantra (that does no one any good in any scenario) looped in my mind.
“We cannot be more sensitive to pleasure without being more sensitive to pain.” —Alan Watts
I no longer believe I am unlucky, nor that I need to figure out the why. Instead, my current practice—when I cannot prevent the pain, of course—is to listen to it. And when I am able, I try to express it.
Pain contains information. It is disharmony within the body or the mind. It is rarely avoidable and almost always isolating. But it can force us to listen like nothing else. It can show us environments that are costing us more than they pay us. It can show us where things are out of balance. It can show us when we’re not listening to our instincts (if only it were more subtle). Mostly though, it can force us to go within and realize how miraculous it is that the body can maintain equilibrium at other times. Even if the pain is chronic, it ebbs and flows, and when it’s relaxed even a little … wow. Yet, if we have not recently felt pain, we easily forget.
Recently, I had a migraine that kept me up through 2 a.m. I couldn’t concentrate on anything but the pain, and so I watched it pulse and move and swell and recede. It was like standing on the beach and losing my footing again and again. I tried to connect to its chaotic rhythm. It was doing the work of telling me something. Tension, dehydration, exhaustion ... something bigger? I listened.
Instead of thinking “Why me?” I got my message. It wasn’t a shocking message, but it was one I may have otherwise ignored. Didion writes beautifully about the perspective her migraine offered her.
“For when the pain recedes, ten or twelve hours later, everything goes with it, all the hidden resentments, all the vain anxieties. The migraine has acted as a circuit breaker, and the fuses have emerged intact. There is a pleasant convalescent euphoria. I open the windows and feel the air, eat gratefully, sleep well. I notice the particular nature of a flower in a glass on the stair landing.”
—Joan Didion, from “On Bed,” The White Album
I like to think of pain now as a way to remind me how chaotic the pattern of life is in general and where my compassion has been lacking for others who suffer or where convenience is stalling my growth. Most often though, it shows me where I lack compassion for myself. It slows me down and tells me what I need to hear, not what’s convenient.
Pain is not a gentle teacher, but its seeming chaos is not without a call to rhythm.
If this resonates, here’s a short practice for supporters (for whenever you need a reminder).
February 5, 2024
On memory & the muse
“What matters in life is not what happens to you but what you remember and how you remember it.” ― Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Creativity became my spirituality when I was somewhere around twenty. Maybe because I grew up with it, disowned it, then reclaimed it. Maybe because I needed its medicine. Either way, it felt otherworldly to express curiosity, joy and pain in ways I couldn’t allow to surface off the page.
The paper in my journal felt, if not safe, urgent. It offered me a different perspective, a new vista of the past, and a reminder of the magic I believed in when I was a small child. The magic I saw in others, in nature, and myself.
At first, it felt as though this urgency was coming from nowhere, as though a muse had arrived and that was that. But I now think of my muse as a perfect mixture of attention and memory. It is only with the ripening of certain memories, after all, and a willful attention to life today that we can find the desire to invent (and reinvent).
Memories that are inaccessible on the surface are still quite present in our lives. They can be tapped for our creative efforts, but it’s not always easy or predictable. The problem of repressed memories—beyond fallibility and emotional trickiness—is that they often materialize with force and present an unwanted, ill-timed obstacle course that pushes us to mental extremes. If explored, however, the memory may feed something unexpected and beautiful.
I'm learning it's not that easy though. When writing to tap memory or because a memory arises, it is necessary to slow down the process and truly approach it with tenderness and care.
It was shared with me by a brilliant woman I recently met that to offset the onslaught of media and hyperspeeds of the world, the best practice is to revisit familiar spaces and notice the subtle changes. In other words, walk the same block you always do with ease and attention. Walk it again and ask yourself what’s changed.
To do so—to repeat—soothes the creative mind and allows us to get to the space we need to be to go to the deeper places that only dedicated writers know. The place I called spiritual earlier, which could also be called flow.
Here, we can journey safely, but not without reawakening the emotions of times past. The joyous memories warm us when we feel frozen by inaction and remind us how temporary and beautiful the cycles of life are. The difficult ones test us and nudge us toward our deeper selves.
If memories are a struggle to capture, there’s always a sensation to act as our portal. This is the ultimate foundational writing advice: note the smell or sound we remember, the temperature of the room and the texture of the hardwood floors, or the busy-patterned carpet we sat on as a child. If the memories are still stubborn, walk the path again. Explore the same paragraph, the same textures and scents, and joys and pains. Write that paragraph over and over, until it becomes something more like a door that you can walk through and into the creative depths.
Creative prompt: Describe a place where you were exposed to a new idea, through a book or conversation. How can this memory of place intermingle with where you are right now?
February 1, 2024
Quick fix practice
Take a few minutes to melt stress and reset your energy. This is an excellent SOS meditation and one that you can repeat for more enduring stressors in your life. It includes visualization and simple mindful attention.
Photo by Elena Mozhvilo on Unsplash
On the equidistance
Hi, friends. It’s Imbolc, the midpoint between the winter solstice and the spring equinox. For those of us in the northern hemisphere, this is a brilliant day indeed. I walked my dogs at 4:30 a.m., and a deer began to follow us. It was healthy and interested in our early-morning purpose. The dogs wanted to play with it, and then we saw an entire family of deer looking on ahead. It felt like a true taste of the spring energy to come. I, for one, am ready.
That said, winter lingers. We lost power for a short time last week when it was bitterly cold, but this too was a call to gratitude for the warmth I so often take for granted. I wrote what follows in the present tense to capture something that felt urgent, and I thought I’d share . . . I’ll keep this one to paid subscribers because I might publish some tweaked version of it down the line.
🔆 Wishing you all warmth. Blessed Imbolc. ( ᴗ͈ˬᴗ͈)ഒ🔆
Photo by Laila Gebhard
January 29, 2024
Following the Pain
This is a sample of a 2-day course I have at Insight Timer. I hope some of you find it useful as it is needed. As usual, I am sharing what has helped me at times.
“You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very thin…
