The Fun Theory

I don't know if this will work but, I'm trying it. In the spirit of promoting fun and not being too much of a perfectionist to try things here is a link. I don't know why it isn't blue. Somebody sent me this email called Piano Steps:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lXh2n0aPyw

The Fun Theory is a project thing Volkswagen is doing. The idea is that you can get people to do things if they think they are more fun. It really does look like it would be fun to go up and down those piano steps.

I wonder what kind of ideas I could come up with to make things more fun and make me what to do stuff that I don't want to do?

I remember working with someone on a boring job. We were hand-writing addresses on envelopes for a business (they employed us because they wanted to give the personal touch to a sale they were having). This person I was working with encouraged us to have races to see who could get the most done in a certain amount of time. It did make the time go by faster (and we got more done). We had thousands of names to go through. After a while it did get pretty tedious. He was good to work around because he also had a good sense of humor as well.

I used to not like washing dishes and now I don't mind it. In fact it is one thing I seem to get done regularly. I do them by hand because the dish washer is broken. I don't know how much fun it is for me, however. Maybe I like doing it because I like having it done. But I really don't mind it. I've heard many people who say they hate to hand wash stuff, they only want dishes and pans they can put in a dishwasher, and to use the dishwasher for everything no matter how many loads it takes. I wonder why. Maybe it is fun for me! I know I feel satisfied when it is done.

I also know people who hate to do hand sewing. Hand sewing is something I enjoy.

I also like peeling vegetables. I wouldn't want to have mountains of potatoes to peel like in those old army movies, but I don't mind doing enough to make a meal for myself or others. I find it relaxing.

During a period in my life when I was feeling stressed out a woman who I just had started to get to know was giving me a ride with her to Curves (a workout place for women). She was a neighbor who I just had waved hello to in the past. She suggested we go to the Dollar Store (a generic term) after our workout. In the store she went to the greeting card section, noticed some cards out of order, and she started putting them in their right places. She said she found that relaxing. Hehe! I thought I was the only one who did stuff like that!

But I have been having trouble with my quilting because of perfectionism, and I'm not sure what else. And quilting is fun. I think the most fun part is picking the colors and designing. I haven't gotten into a groove about quilting. Maybe I need to just do it.

Churchill liked to lay bricks and painting for fun. I think he enjoyed writing. I think he also enjoyed writing speeches (which seems like a distinct kind of writing). I enjoy writing. I have done painting in the past and have enjoyed it.

I've been reading about Churchill as I've said in previous posts. I haven't gotten very far in the first book I was reading, I got interested in Churchill more than the book written by him, and ended up getting into a library book about him. (I had gotten two actually but I took one back. The book I took back was by Churchill's granddaughter and seems like it would be worth trying again later. It was about lessons in leadership we could learn from Churchill.) The one I've kept is The Last Lion, Vol. 2: Alone 1932-1940, which were years during which everyone had dismissed and mocked Churchill as a man who had failed to live up to his potential and a reactionary not to be taken seriously. That would make another post.

Learning to Knit

I'm learning to knit. I was inspired by a blogger who knits and does a lot of other cool things like making soap and bread. I knew a lady in my quilt guild is a knitter and I asked her if she could help me get started.

I don't think I could have figured it out without her patient help. I seemed to me that it would be easy enough, right, just wind some yarn around some needles, learn the shorthand that is used for the patterns and go. But like many things that I have thought looked it easy and really are easy once you get the hang of it, it wasn't quite that easy.

Like riding a bike, that took me a really long to time to learn. My poor Dad! Some kids learn in a day, I've heard. I think after quite awhile Dad decided to give up the first time and bought me training wheels. I don't remember how long it eventually took. But I did learn to ride a bike.

And then there was learning to swim. It looked easy. I went to for lessons at the local high school. They had an excellent program that allowed high school students to teach primary school children. All the new kids were assembled at one end of the pool. We were asked how many already knew how to swim. I raised my hand. We were asked to demonstrate our abilities, one by one, by jumping in and swimming across the pool. My turn came, I jumped in and nearly drowned. After that occasion they stopped taking it for granted that kids who said they knew how to swim actually did.

There was me learning to drive! Oh my! My Dad, a driving instruction class at the high school and private lessons, some how managed to get me a driver's license. The roads were still not exactly safe. Not once, but twice, I turned on to the wrong side of a divided highway, I forgot to put on might lights constantly. I managed to drive around for several years without any accidents by some miracle. I didn't drive for many years and then a very patient friend helped me, really taught me finally to be a safe driver.

And then there was me learning to type.

I don't think I could have ever been a secretary (which I was for many years), if it wasn't for computers. How did they do it in the days of typewriters? It was quite a learning curve for me learning to type. That was what I was thinking about after my first lesson in knitting. I did learn how to type, eventually.

They say that learning something new helps keep your brain healthy. And I don't think knitting could be too dangerous!

On being imperfect

I was supposed to have done a reading at my quilt guild meeting yesterday. I had intentions of doing so. I suddenly remembered it in the afternoon and started looking for something to read. I considered one choice, rejected it and then was looking at the following on the subject of mistakes. Well talk about being imperfect; then I wandered off and forgot all about the meeting!

I think this is really a good excerpt from an essay in a 1999 quilt magazine.

"If I could, I would give all of us the gift of eyes that can see the creative spark that moved a quilter to begin her project; eyes that can trace the eddies of joy that propelled the quilter through the tedium of matching seams (for better or worse), of basting, of squaring, and binding; eyes that can see the quilter's effort to improve, her attention to detail, and her wish to be recognized. I wish for all of us to develop the capacity to leave judging to the judges, and to continue making quilts that are authentic expressions of who we are.

Every quilter should keep in mind one special quilt, maybe even one we made ourselves, that sang to us when we saw it, one that made it difficult to see its failure to conform to the standards ... Closer inspection makes visible the 'flaws' our enchanted eyes failed to notice at first, but by then we don't care.

Mistakes we made daily and not just in quilting. They are the surest way to learn. The fear of making an error means we stay just as we are and never improve, either as quilters or as people."

If we expect ourselves to be perfect we are expecting too much of ourselves. Only God is perfect! We should expect that of Him! (But do we?)

I have heard somewhere recently that we have 60,000 thoughts in a day. I don't know how anyone could figure that out, but it certainly would be a lot. I must have had about 10,000 thoughts about what I might say in my blog today! I guess saying that reveals one of my flaws, well several, like obsessiveness and worrying too much about what people think of me. It is risky opening my life like this. I have considered that I could talk about very safe subjects. But that would be boring and not nearly as interesting (she says redundantly). So here's to daring to be imperfect and exposed.