Day 17- Are You Playing Small When There's a Giant in Your Bones?

"Are you playing small when there's a giant in your bones?" - In-Q

Welcome to DAY SEVENTEEN of our new 30-day COMMUNITY PROJECT where we make something with our hands every day in order to improve our mental health. We all realize that creativity heals...it's time to put that knowledge into action.

These episodes will exist here, marked with the days numbered, in order for you to follow along at any speed that you like. Miss a day? Doesn't matter. Just pick up right where you left off and keep making things. These episodes will give us all some accountability, but if you need more, pair up with a partner. It really does help!

Join our creative community by making something today, whether it's for five minutes or several hours—your brain will thank you. Let's do this thing together and turn all of this sh*t into something beautiful!

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Chapters

• 0:00 Goldfish (In-Q)
• 3:11 Understanding Flourishing
• 4:13 Harvard's Metrics for Flourishing
• 6:42 Creative Writing Exercise for Growth

Transcript

LeAnna: 0:00

Defining myself is like confining myself. So I undefine myself to find myself. They say a goldfish will only get as big as its bowl. But when you put it in a tank the space can change the way it grows. It needs to have the room, or its potential doesn't show. So its environment's essential for unleashing the unknown. I ponder if it knows that it could grow beyond the bowl, that it could have a pond the size of an Olympic swimming pool, that the world is so much larger than the boundaries that it's known. Somehow I empathize with this little golden soul because I too have unexplored and unexpressed goals that were suppressed by an environment I couldn't control. Am I still playing small because it's all I've ever known, when there's a giant in my bones that I'm not sure I've ever shown? I ask myself this question when I'm purposely alone, when my body grows to take up all the rooms inside my home, I expand in all directions, every single inch consumed. I'm a billion feet tall now my head over the moon.

LeAnna: 1:15

This is just a portion of In-Q's poem called Goldfish, and I found this in the book your Brain on Art how the Arts Transform Us, and it was in the chapter called Flourishing". Fun Fact: In-Q's name is Adam and he is one of my best friends from LA's ex-boyfriend. He's like a deaf poetry jam guy and he does spoken word and back in the day we used to go to the poetry lounge I think it's called Da poetry lounge in LA and we would go watch him perform and his friends and this was before Deaf Poetry Jam even became like a known thing on TV and it was so cool. But you should really check out his poetry if you like this. His lyrics to his spoken word stuff they're amazing. But the way he reads it is so good and I feel like I'm murdering his poetry right now, especially with this voice. That is still not back, but I had to read that. It's so perfect for this chapter on flourishing and talking about flourishing, because right now, getting to a point of flourishing, that's the goal. I'm beginning to see the light, finally after working on this. You know, just sifting through these things that I was allowing myself to take in the news, the social media, you name it really just shutting stuff down and getting it out of my daily life has changed things so much that I can begin to see it as okay. I want to start flourishing, not just surviving, not just getting out of this mindset, but looking towards something bigger and better.

LeAnna: 3:11

So the authors of your Brain on Art, susan and Ivy. They explain that flourishing is about living an authentic and full life. It's about feeling present and feeling alive by noticing and appreciating what you already have around you. It's about being in touch with yourself Many people refer to that as mindfulness in order to live with this sense of purpose and meaning, a moral compass and a sense of virtue. So flourishing includes caring about the welfare of others, contributing to the greater good, and when you are flourishing, they say, you are curious, you are creative, you are open to new experiences and there is a conscious commitment to fostering a positive mindset. You're nurturing your mental, physical and social health and you're appreciating the time that you have on this earth.

LeAnna: 4:11

There is an epidemiologist whose name is Tyler VanWheel that they write about. He's the head of Harvard University's Human Flourishing Program at Harvard and in 2017, he developed this base measurement of flourishing, built on five metrics. Number one metric is happiness and life satisfaction. Number two is mental and physical health. Number three meaning and purpose. Number four, character and virtue. And number five close social relationships.

LeAnna: 4:49

When I think of when the pandemic came and all of this, you know, uprising politically and throughout the world. I look at those five metrics and I think of how many of those were shut down. For me at least, it was a really traumatic time for a lot of people and I hate using the word trauma because it's overused, but it truly, truly was, and I do believe that a lot of us are still trying to claw our way out of that. There are some people who have escaped being brought into a dark place from it all. I have not escaped it. I did not escape it, and I think that focusing on something like flourishing and really checking in and paying attention how am I doing on these five metrics? Happiness and life satisfaction, mental and physical health, meaning and purpose, character and virtue and close social relationships how are those all doing? I can tell you they're not all functioning at their top for me right now. I'm working on it, but At the same time, this is a lifelong thing.

LeAnna: 6:06

This is a lifelong quest. It's not something that you're just gonna get to a great level and then leave it. It's like brushing your teeth every morning. Gotta wake up and do it again. What are the things that these studies have taught us that contribute to flourishing. They say awe, curiosity, novelty and surprise. Those help to contribute to flourishing. How can we seek out those states and bring that into our daily lives?

LeAnna: 6:35

There's one particular part in this chapter where the man at Harvard, tyler he, already determined he has some evidence-based ways to train your brain to flourish, and one is creative writing. So here's an exercise for today, and this is coming straight from Harvard. This is a creative writing exercise. What you want to write about is you sit down and you imagine your best future self and then write about your life as if it's already happened. The studies that Tyler has done have shown that a simple little habit such as this increases your optimism and life satisfaction.

LeAnna: 7:22

Flourishing is a kind of a muscle and it gets stronger when it's used and, as with anything practiced, it becomes a habit. If you keep doing it like coming back to the yoga mat or a running routine, like choosing a healthy diet, like understanding how much sleep you need each night you will begin to see patterns that foster and support a flourishing life. To see patterns that foster and support a flourishing life. Then this chapter goes on to explore six foundational attributes of flourishing. They include curiosity and wonder, awe, enriched environments, creativity, rituals, novelty and surprise. Go out and imagine your best future. Write about it as if it's already happened. You're in that life, you've lived it, feel it and then keep your eyes and ears and all your senses peeled for anything that can lead you down the path towards flourishing and keeping yourself flourishing. And until next time, stay curious.