Keyword: bird

  • True Believer

    “True Believer” by Jason Kotecki. 24 x 24. Oil on canvas.
    Original is available. 🟢 Shop this art!

    Dreams always take longer than we think.

    There may be such a thing as overnight successes, but if so, they don’t stay successful for very long.

    More often than not, so-called “overnight successes” are anything but.

    One time, Kim and I spent a couple of hundred dollars on a two-day craft show. That was a big chunk of change for us at the time — about two months’ worth of groceries. We were next to a booth where a guy was selling knockoff Garfield tchotchkes. Meanwhile, we moved a grand total of $7.92 worth of greeting cards. It was rough. Then we drowned our sorrows in sirloin steaks at Outback, which made our negative profit margin even worse.

    I have a lot of stories like that from the early days. Happy times.

    Over the years, I have often felt like the sloth in this painting. Very little progress to show for a heck of a lot of effort.

    But then I think of things like that craft show, and I’m impressed and even a little surprised by how far we’ve come. There is a great sense of satisfaction in what we’ve built and the things we’ve accomplished, regardless of how much distance there is left to cover.

    Anything worth building takes time.

    More time than you think it should.

    Like way more.

    We need to hear that reminder often, because it goes for everything from dream businesses and amazing relationships to paying off Bank of America and mastering the clarinet. Thanks to the proliferation of microwave ovens and high-speed internet, progress always seems to be taking longer than it should. Then the media peddles their stories of overnight success. They catapulted to fame and fortune in one fell swoop; why can’t you?

    When the early buzz of enthusiasm wanes, discouragement is quick to settle in. It is during those seasons that we need to look for and listen to our true believers.

    I’ve been fortunate to have quite a few in my life.

    My Grandma K. made me feel like I was special, just as I was.

    My third-grade teacher, Mrs. Smith, encouraged me to take my artistic talent seriously.

    My Little League coach, Mr. Dawson, helped me believe that I was a winner.

    My high school art teacher, Mrs. Garrett, made me believe I had the talent to do this for a living.

    When I was an uncertain teenager, Deacon Vince saw me as a grown-up with valuable contributions to make.

    When Kim and I got married and launched our business, we were graced with a few true believers who saw the vision, including our parents and our best friends, Sue and Jenna. Theirs were not just empty words of encouragement. They responded with action by offering their time, money, and prayers. This signaled the proof of their belief.

    The certainty from true believers is invaluable. There will come a time when you lose faith in the vision, and you will need them to remind you that it’s real.

    Mounting failures and things taking longer than you expected take a toll. That vision, which once seemed so clear, begins to fade. You wonder if all the naysayers were right. After all, so many of them have way more experience than you, and the evidence seems to be piling up in their favor. Maybe I AM delusional? Maybe I was mistaken? Maybe the signals got crossed and I accidentally co-opted a dream that was not meant for me…

    I entertained all these thoughts at various times. It was tempting to give up.

    But then I remembered my parents. And Kim’s parents. And Sue and Jenna. I remembered that nobody pours money or time into a lost cause. Their sacrifice was tangible proof of their belief in us. It helped assure me that no, this is not a mirage. It’s real. They see it.

    Their belief bolstered my own.

    We need cheerleaders to succeed. They give us the boost we need when our dream seems late in coming.

    There are a few reasons dreams take longer than we think they should.

    One is partly for us to prove how much we want it.

    But it’s also because the most important part of a dream is who we become in the process of chasing it. That’s the real reward.

    When success doesn’t materialize as quickly as you thought it would and you’re discouraged by your dream taking too long, don’t despair. Heed the true believer cheering you on.

    Take it from the sloth. Achieving anything worthwhile is a marathon, not a sprint.

  • The Prepper

    “The Prepper” by Jason Kotecki. 16 x 16. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    When my wife told me she was pregnant with our first child, my heart filled with joy.

    Two seconds later, panic arrived at the party.

    All I could think about was how profoundly our lives were about to change and I didn’t have the slightest idea of how to prepare. I immediately began searching Amazon for the latest owner’s manual for babies.

    Kim, on the other hand, seemed to calmly slide into the nesting phase that’s common to many moms in the animal kingdom. In preparation for a new life, they instinctually work to create conditions for that new life to thrive.

    In the years since I’ve seen Kim navigate this phase for all three of our kids, and I’ve realized there are parallels between mothers and artists. While not all of us get to experience motherhood, I believe that every last one of us is an artist.

    Yes, even if you can only draw stick figures.

    In essence, an artist is simply someone who brings something new and beautiful into the world with the potential to improve it in some way. It’s a one-of-a-kind gift that could not be created by anyone else.

    You could have been born at any time in any place, but you were born when and where you were born and you are alive now. You were born for a reason! As long as you’re still breathing, you have something within you the world needs.

    It might be a novel, a non-profit, a painting, or a play. Perhaps it’s a sculpture, a sonnet, or a song. It could also be that a building, a business, or a movement will be your masterpiece.

    We need to take this endeavor as seriously as a mother takes the preparations for her new baby. We need to create conditions that give our undertaking its best chance of success, and that involves three things: supplies, space, and safety.

    A serious mother collects the supplies that will be needed to help her succeed: diapers, bottles, creams, clothes, blankets, and toys. A serious artist needs supplies, too. It might be pens, pencils, paper and paint, or yarn, wood, software, or clay.

    A serious mother considers where the baby will sleep and play and she creates space for that to happen. Likewise, a serious artist also requires a dedicated space, even if it’s just a small folding table in the corner of their bedroom, or a workbench in the back of the garage.

    Finally, a serious mother makes preparations to ensure her youngster is protected and safe to grow and develop. A serious artist also needs a safe space for creativity. New ideas are especially fragile. One must not judge them too harshly at the start, for they need time to blossom into what they are to become.

    The nesting stage is fun, exciting, and imbued with the magic of anticipation, as you envision all the memories (or masterpieces) that will be made. It is a good inclination to want everything you need, and make sure it all has a place. After all, when you are in the whirlwind of caring for a newborn (or in the thick of the creative process), it’s helpful to have what you need, when you need it.

    But don’t be fooled.

    The trap that awaits both mothers and artists is the desire to have all the supplies one could corral, the most ideal space one could hope for, and the highest level of safety and comfort possible.

    All parents eventually come to discover that you are never fully prepared for a baby to arrive in your home. There will always be something you’ve forgotten, something you run out of too quickly.

    It’s ok. Eventually, you learn to make do, and from these constraints come real growth.

    One thing is certain…when it comes to parenting, Mother Nature will not be delayed. The baby is coming, ready or not.

    Alas, this is where the comparisons diverge, for the artist has no such advantage. As such, he or she may be lured into a trap that tricks them into a never-ending nesting phase of collecting all the colors and tools and tricks of the trade.

    It’s an illusion. Under the guise of being serious, the artist is now simply hiding. One must never be fooled into waiting for conditions to be perfect, because they never will be.

    If an artist is not careful, nine months of preparation can slip into nine years of procrastination, justified by not enough time, not enough space, not enough money to begin. Before you know it, nine decades of life are spent and the art your soul desired to make, the gift the world so desperately needed from you, never gets to emerge.

    Serious artists don’t let preparation turn into procrastination.

    We don’t need perfection. But we do need your art.

    That’s why we need you to take it seriously.

  • Horse & Hummingbird

    “Horse & Hummingbird” by Jason Kotecki. 30 x 30. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    I compare myself to other people all the time. Friends, colleagues, neighbors, and the people I went to high school with.

    According to the Bible, God made hummingbirds on the 5th day. He made horses on the 6th. It seems obvious that He made a horse because He wanted something different than a hummingbird. I don’t expect he chastises horses for not being able to fly or expects hummingbirds to hang their tiny heads in shame for all the times they don’t win the Kentucky Derby.

    Quite frankly it’s kind of ridiculous to compare the two. So why do we do it with one another? It’s no less ridiculous.

    But it’s a great way to waste time we could be spending to improve our lives and make the world better by embracing and sharing our own unique gifts.

    Later on in the Bible, we learn that “God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well.” (Rom 12:6) You are not like anyone else. You are supposed to do what you’re made for. And no one else has the same mission as you do.

    We don’t need you to be a horse. We don’t need you to be a hummingbird. We don’t need you to be a better version of that girl you went to high school with.

    We just need you to be you.

    process

  • I Just Called to Say I Love You

    “I Just Called to Say I Loe You” by Jason Kotecki. 20 x 16. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    “I Just Called to Say I Love You” is a famous Stevie Wonder song. It’s also the title of this painting.

    One word in that title might be more important than all the others. We’ll get to that in a sec.

    When my wife Kim and I were dating, we’d spend hours and hours on the phone, talking late into the night, racking up phone bills that if bound together, would make the longest Harry Potter book look like a pamphlet. This was in the days when phones were attached to walls and the “call waiting” feature was a source of civil war for any siblings also angling for phone rights.

    My personal phone habits with Kim were the exception, not the rule. To this day, I hate being on the phone, for reasons both justified and irrational, but too numerous to bore you with. I let almost everything go straight to voicemail. I am certain the quality of my life would increase exponentially if I never had to talk on the phone ever again. 

    Of course, the phone is a handy tool for maintaining relationships, which is another weakness of mine. Fortunately, my wife helps with that, as she does the little things that help keep relationships alive for both of us. I am an introvert, a Type 5w4 on the Enneagram (if you know, you know), and as previously mentioned, hate the phone. A generous assessment is that I spend a lot of time in my own head and it’s easy to get lost in there. Which is good for allowing me to create wonderful things, but not so good for maintaining friendships.

    Either way, it’s a perfect storm for a scenario in which if Kim dies before me, I’ll end up living alone in a home that neighborhood kids will describe as haunted and invent all sorts of urban legends about the old guy who supposedly lives there.

    Part of my problem is that I overthink relationships. In our own ways, maybe we all do.

    Friendships can stall if we make them too complicated or set expectations too high. Failing to meet them finds us buried in an ever-mounting pile of “shoulds.” The more time that passes, the more time we assume is required for catching up. And of course, life rarely drops oceans of uninterrupted time into our laps, so… the relationship slowly grows stale and eventually dies.

    A recent conversation convinced me of that being a flawed approach.

    Andy Gullahorn is a songwriter in Nashville who started an interesting routine with his friend Gabe several years ago. Every week, Andy goes for a walk. Gabe, who lives a mile and a half away, does the same thing at the same time. They walk toward each other, and when they meet, they give each other a high five. Sometimes they stop to play badminton. Oftentimes, no words are exchanged, and they simply head back home.

    Kim and I had a chance to interview Andy, and he shared another routine he has with a friend who lives in Houston. Since an in-person high-five is out of the question, every Monday for six years, they simply exchange fist bump emojis. That’s it. And yet the connection has deepened to such an extent that Andy says he trusts that friend with his life.

    Andy’s advice is to start small. And ridiculous. “It doesn’t have to be dead serious to make a deep connection,” he says. “In fact, if that’s where it starts, it’s hard to maintain that. The high five is just a stupid foundation to hold real relationship.”

    Of course, not every relationship needs to be maintained for all time. Some people come into our lives for a reason or a season. But Andy’s right. Maybe we should focus on uncomplicating the friendships we want to fertilize.

    In the interview, he challenged viewers to just commit to not having a deep conversation but to just exchange winks or honk at each other as they pass one another on the road, even without saying another word. 

    That’s why maybe the most important word in Stevie’s classic song is…”just.”

    I JUST called to say I love you. That’s it. No fanfare. No guilt trips. No phone bills weighty enough to kill a small mammal.

    We don’t always need to have an hour-long conversation for our relationships to thrive. 

    A high five or a fist bump emoji might just do the trick. 👊

  • Shocked Chicken

    “Shocked Chicken” by Jason Kotecki. 12 x 12. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    Thomas Edison has been attributed with saying, “If we did all the things we are capable of, we would literally astound ourselves.” 

    This is true. The potential within each one of us is enormous. 

    But I’ll go one step further. I say that we’d be astounded if we knew how good we already are. Maybe the marketing messages we’ve been bombarded with over the years have convinced us that we really aren’t good enough. Maybe we haven’t received enough positive compliments. Maybe we think the people who do compliment us are just being nice, or don’t know the real us. 

    Please…stop.

    My confidence does not rest in your resume, your highlight reel, or your dashing good looks. It rests in the divine Spirit of your Creator, which dwells within you. 

    You matter. 

    This may come as a shock to you, but you have a special brand of awesome that no one else has. 

    And this world needs it!

  • Balancing Act

    “Balancing Act” by Jason Kotecki. 16 x 20. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    How many Froot Loops can you stack on top of one another before they topple over?

    How tall would someone’s tower have to be for you to find yourself impressed?

    We often relish the opportunity to declare how many activities we’re balancing. Like a status symbol, our busyness signals our importance. We could pretend the pink ones are work responsibilities, the yellow ones are family and household chores, maybe the orange ones are volunteer commitments, and the green ones are hobbies…All hail the one with the highest stack of Froot Loops! 

    I am always in awe of people who seem to be able to operate smoothly amidst a schedule bursting at the seams. My personality type is such that I easily get overwhelmed when I’m trying to stack more than a handful of Froot Loops at a time.

    I recently added something new to my morning prayer routine. After looking back on the previous day and reflecting on what went well and what I could have done better, I try to identify the most important thing to accomplish in the day ahead. 

    And let me tell you, it’s bloody hard.

    I mean, it’s a simple question. And sometimes it’s easy because there’s a specific, obvious task that needs to be completed: Deliver this speech. Finish the manuscript for editing. Paint the ceiling. 

    But most days, it’s not so obvious. 

    Answering this question goes against my inherent desire to cram my day like a Volkswagon Beetle stuffed with seventy-six circus clowns. When I survey the day before me, I usually see a smorgasbord of Very Important Things, all seemingly equal in significance. If I happen to settle on something like “spend time in the studio,” I have to fight the urge to also write “andfinishthisandworkonthatanddontforgettotakeoutthegarbage.”

    I’m not alone, am I?

    The science is clear. We get a tiny yet thrilling dopamine hit every time we check something off our almighty to-do list – regardless of how essential the chore actually was – which encourages us to rush headlong into the abyss of productivity.

    I have to remind myself that the question “What is today’s most important thing?” is not asking for the ONLY thing I need to do that day. Or asking me to only do ONE good or worthwhile thing all day. 

    It’s merely asking me to declare the most important one.

    Because, unfortunately, despite my desire to bend reality and make my home in the multiverse, there can only be one most important thing. (See this reflection on how we magically changed the meaning of the word “priority.”)

    I have found that oftentimes in this process, my most important thing is to “be open,” because the most important thing hasn’t yet revealed itself at six-thirty in the morning. But that awareness is vital because it makes me more likely to notice it when it comes. 

    I encourage you to try this, especially if you’re having a hard time balancing all the Froot Loops. Its power comes in forcing you to pause, nudging you to slow down, reflect, and be intentional.

    Why does this matter? 

    This matters because when I don’t identify the most important thing for the day, I’m liable to rush off and accomplish a whole hell of a lot of things. Which seems good and feels great. But if the sheer volume of activity crowds out what was actually the most important thing I needed to do, my life slowly veers off track.

    It doesn’t matter how many Froot Loops you can balance if you were supposed to be paying attention to the Cheerio.

  • Spring Break

    “Spring Break” by Jason Kotecki. 12 x 12. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    “All the King’s horses and all the King’s men couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty back together again.”

    iPhone screens. Windows. Windshields. Bones. Baseball bats. Helmets. Even Humpty Dumpty.

    When something is cracked, we often think of it as ruined, useless, irredeemably broken.

    But when a bird’s egg cracks while in the confines of its nest, it is a sign of new life, a fresh beginning. Only moments before the first crack, the egg is pure, smooth, unbroken. Then the crack happens, disrupting the calm surface of the egg. 

    But what emerges next is something new and beautiful.

    Our business had its best year ever in 2019. Speaking in person, on live stages, was the biggest driver of revenue. Who would have predicted that such a business model could vanish so quickly? But of course, it did, thanks to the arrival of a tiny, unwelcome virus.

    Almost overnight, as speaking engagements went up in smoke, our business model cracked. Our future looked bleak. But we clung more fervently to our faith and were bolstered by the support of past clients and the merry band of Adultitis Fighters who had assembled behind us over the previous twenty years.

    We pivoted to a virtual world, developed a super secret membership community, and developed new skills that ushered in new opportunities. Not only did we survive, but we thrived, and ended up buying our dream home on the edge of Lake Michigan amidst the turmoil.

    It was an imaginable outcome twelve months earlier, but made possible thanks to an unwelcome disruption.

    A year and a half after we moved in, we countered another bad “break.” A 112-mph straight-line wind tore through our neighborhood and decimated our backyard, leaving a mess of uprooted trees and an enormous pile of debt in its wake.

    It was rough. We were safe, and it could have been worse, but we were broken. Fast forward another year and a half, and I am only now fully realizing the full scope of blessings that came forth from that challenging chapter.

    Sometimes our life cracks.

    Plans go south. Failures mount. Tragedy strikes.

    We lose the game, our health, or someone we love.

    We feel irredeemably broken.

    But that doesn’t have to be the end of the story. In fact, it might just be the start of a new and better one.

    This painting is a reminder of that first Easter morning, when something that undoubtedly felt like the end of the line miraculously turned into a glorious new beginning.

    Maybe something in your life has cracked recently.

    Is it broken, or the start of a new opportunity?

  • Angry Owl

    “Angry Owl” by Jason Kotecki. 16 x 20. Oil on canvas.
    Original is in Private Collection 🖼️ Shop this art!

    I’ve always thought owls looked angry. That perception inspired this painting, as I decided to give him something to be angry about.

    But now I wonder if maybe they’re just focused.

    After all, perpetually being on the lookout for your next meal kind of requires your undivided attention.

    Likewise, in order to achieve a dream or accomplish anything worthwhile, you have to be incredibly focused. You can’t let distractions knock you off your game. One of the biggest reasons people are not as successful as they’d like to be – regardless of their definition of success – is due to a lack of focus. They keep chasing shiny objects and fail to follow through on any one initiative.

    As Steven Pressfield writes brilliantly in his book The War of Art, “The more important a call or action is to our soul’s evolution, the more Resistance we will feel toward pursuing it.”

    Understanding this truth – and expecting it – is a great advantage for you, because then you won’t be surprised by how hard it becomes to find the time to write even one page of your next book. Or how easy it gets to find other people who are way more successful than you. Or how tantalizing that entire sleeve of Thin Mints suddenly appears on the first day of your new diet.

    During the first nine years of our business and marriage, Kim and I lived in an apartment. It was a two-bedroom place that seemed big when we started. We expected to live there two or three years, not nine. As time went on, the apartment felt like it was shrinking. We grew weary of the loud music at all hours of the night. The neighbors who smoked right outside our open windows. The occasional gun shots we heard from the gas station a block away. The time someone broke into our storage area in the basement and stole our Christmas decor, including a Santa pillow that was crocheted by my Grandma. The fact that our peers were financially further along than us, building homes and starting families. The debt we accumulated throwing spaghetti at the wall, trying to find a business model that was fueled by our talents AND paid the bills.

    It added up to a whole lot of suckage.

    And yet, it was all part of a test to see how badly we wanted it. 

    Giving up is easy. Staying focused is hard.

    You have to stay the course even when things aren’t going according to plan, when the haters are shooting their slings and arrows, or when an ice cream cone falls on your head. Most so-called “overnight successes” are anything but. There are miles and miles of unpaved, rocky roads behind them that we often don’t see.

    Achieving a dream is not quick and easy, like winning the lottery. It’s messy, difficult, and exhausting.

    Understand it. Accept it. Own it.

    If your dream is worth it, just keep going.

    Take it from the owl: Staying focused is wise – keep your eye on the prize!

  • Angry Eagle

    “Angry Eagle” by Jason Kotecki. 16 x 20. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    How do we make sense of the hateful violence, terror, and chaos we observe all around us?

    Perhaps reflecting a bit upon fairy tales will help. 

    Star Wars and Harry Potter and The Lord of The Rings are the fairy tales of our age. They resonate with young and old alike, but why? 

    Simple.

    It’s because they are true.

    It might seem silly to claim stories of lightsabers and magic wands and Wookies and Hobbits as true. Those elements are what make them fairy tales, but that doesn’t mean they’re not true.

    What they say about friendship and sacrifice and hope is quite real. Fairy tales also remind us that there is such a thing as evil. They tell us, as G.K. Chesterton wrote, “These limitless terrors had a limit, that these shapeless enemies have enemies in the knights of God, that there is something in the universe more mystical than darkness, and stronger than strong fear.”

    This is not a battle between Republicans and Democrats; it’s bigger than politics. Rather, we are in the midst of a spiritual war between good and evil. Our modern culture pushes to erase this notion, while regarding things like mystery and enchantment as charming superstition from a less sophisticated age.

    It often remains invisible, but every once in a while, the mask slips and evil shows itself. And every once in a while, we observe something unmistakably good that defies explanation.

    The state of world affairs makes no sense without this frame. Without it, we have little to cling to besides despair, and are forced to concoct outlandish conspiracy theories to explain the chaos we see all around us. Once you accept the premise that the battle we are embroiled in is a spiritual one, everything comes into focus. 

    The reason we resonate so deeply with fairy tales is that despite the fantastical elements, we inherently know they are true. 

    What’s also important to understand, as the more complex fairy tales often show us, is that human begins cannot be reduced to one-dimensional “good guys” and “bad guys.” In fact, the forces of evil profit when we become convinced that people different than us are the bad guys. A look back over the course of human history shows how many different ways this has played out.

    The truth is that there is light and darkness within each of us, and we are constantly pulled in both directions. 

    Our choices dictate our destiny. 

    Those choices do not exist in a vacuum. They affect the lives of others, for better or worse. 

    In the original Star Wars (Episode IV for my fellow nerds), Darth Vader is presented as the epitome of pure evil. But as the story plays out in subsequent movies, the truth is more complicated. We learn that Darth Vader is actually a human being named Anakin Skywalker. He began life as a poor boy, honest, brave, and filled with goodness. He grows into a powerful warrior, fighting on the light side. But over the course of his life, he experiences hardship, pain and grief. Through a series of choices, he slowly succumbs to fear, anger, and hatred, gradually drifting to the dark side, transforming into an agent of evil.

    The wise old Jedi master Yoda may have been a figment of George Lucas’ imagination, but his description of Anakin’s progression rings true: “Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”

    As Kim and I try to teach our kids: hurt people hurt people. 

    The way forward is not to keep hurting one another. 

    It’s ok to be angry. A righteous anger can instill in us the courage to rise up and fight the powers of darkness. But suffering awaits us if we allow it to feed our emotions of fear and hatred, pulling us deeper and deeper into the darkness.

    Eventually, even though most regarded him as more machine than man, Anakin Skywalker is redeemed by his own son, who refuses to relinquish the belief that there is still some good in him.

    So it is with us. No matter how far toward the darkness we have drifted, there is still good within us. We can still be redeemed.

    But the choosing is up to us. Every day we make choices that pull us closer to either the light or the darkness. And make no mistake, each of those choices comes with a cost. 

    Choosing to stand for the light can cost us our life. 

    Siding with the darkness will cost us our soul.

    We are in the midst of a great spiritual battle. A refusal to see it, like it, or believe it doesn’t make it not true. 

    But what can one person do? The fight is so big, the stakes are so high, and the challenge feels so insurmountable. I feel like I’m in a war with giants, with nothing but a cardboard sword. But then I remind myself that “there is something in the universe more mystical than darkness, and stronger than strong fear.”

    I am emboldened by the words of St. John Henry Cardinal Newman, who said, “God knows me and calls me by my name. God has created me to do Him some definite service; He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another.”

    You and I, we each have a role to play in this war. Yours will look different than mine, but our particular gifts are the assets we are called to contribute. It’s not our job to win the war, but join the battle we must. 

    My aim, although I am not always successful, is to strive toward truth, beauty, and goodness in all my daily choices. To treat with charity and kindness those I disagree with. And to do my best to bring a small measure of light into this dark world. 

    These days, it’s easy to lose hope. It often seems like darkness is on the verge of extinguishing the light once and for all. 

    Still, I cling to the truth embedded in fairy tales like Star Wars, Harry Potter, and The Lord of the Rings.

    In the end, good wins. 

    Neil Gaiman paraphrased Chesterton when he wrote, “Fairy tales are more than true – not because they tell us dragons exist, but because they tell us dragons can be beaten.”

    May The Force be with us.

  • Like a Boss

    “Like a Boss” by Jason Kotecki. 16 x 20. Oil on canvas.
    Original is SOLD 🔴 Shop this art!

    Life can feel like a high-wire act. You’re doing your best to juggle everything on your plate: your job, your family, your finances, and just when you think everything is going pretty well, you glance down and see someone whose yard looks way better than yours. How do they get those flowers to flourish like that?

    Or someone’s kids who are in way more activities than yours. Will my kids be less attractive to colleges? 

    Or someone who just drove up in their new car. Should I be thinking about getting a better job?

    For instance, my neighbor cuts his grass every six minutes. Okay, maybe it only seems like that. It’s probably more like sixteen. The point is, a perfect lawn is apparently important to him. I’m not here to judge, except I often do judge…myself. 

    Our lawn usually looks pretty shaggy compared to his, especially if it’s been more than a week since we cut our grass. And the fact that we hire that out makes me self-conscious. Does he think I’m less of a man because I don’t cut my own grass? Does he think we think we’re better than him because we hire someone to do it for us? Do the neighbors see our weak landscaping game and think our house is bringing down the home values in the neighborhood? It’s kind of embarrassing to say all this out loud, because I have no reason at all to think anyone is thinking any of this, but it does pop into my head when I lose focus on what matters to me.

    I appreciate a nice lawn, but I value the extra time to spend with my family. One of the reasons I work so hard on my business is so I can spend more time doing what I love and pay someone else to do the things I hate.

    Please understand that I’m not saying my way is the best one. After all, my neighbor friend is retired with kids who are grown. He has a lot more time to spend on keeping up his lawn. For all I know, it might be a therapeutic escape for him. It’s like comparing apples and mangosteens. Which is completely my point.

    Television and magazines are filled with examples of people who seem to have it all together. They gracefully glide through life as the perfect mom, perfect wife, and perfect employee.

    It’s all a facade. We don’t ever know the whole story, whether it’s the celebrity with the flawless teeth or the neighbor right next door. We all have different priorities and are fighting different battles (which often stay hidden from the camera’s lens or our surface-level observations).

    I’m not here to tell you what’s important to you. I’m just here to remind you that it can’t ALL be. 

    The people who are running around like chickens with their heads cut off, trying to keep up with an impossible standard of balancing everything perfectly, are making a huge mistake. Not only is such a standard impossible to attain, but they’re also allowing the busyness to distract them from what’s most important. 

    The people who are doing life right are the ones who are mindful of what kind of life they want to live and are focused on that.

    How do you tackle life like a boss? 

    Stay focused on what’s most important to you. Ignore the rest.