Okay… I get that this will sound a bit random to many of you, but I never saw the movie, The Karate Kid, which was released in 1984, until 20 years later.
There are reasons for this, beyond the fact that I’m not a huge fan of the film genre known as “kick butt” movies.
I spent the 80’s as a seriously broke single mom. And, for most of those years, I was a seriously broke full-time student single mom. Four college degrees in 10 years cuts down on the movies a whole lot! (Though Dave and I did make it to E.T. !!!)
In fact, I didn’t see The Karate Kid until my hypnosis guru sent a whole bunch of us for homework. That was when I was beginning to put together the puzzle pieces of auditory, visual, and kinesthetic learning.
To be specific, “Wax on. Wax off.” It’s all three of those processing paths in one!
Oddly, Mr. Miyagi seems to have taken up residence in my head again this week. Then, as I closed my book one night, and reached to turn off the light, I figured it out.
It’s the buttons!!!
Many, many buttons, as you may have noticed. It goes like this:
Choose a button of the right size for the space. Make a blob of glue. Put button on blob. All the while, focusing on the message of the Muse-in-progress.
Admittedly, “Wax on. Wax off.” is tidier. It really kind of works the same way, though. The visual choice of the button and the place to put it on the canvas. The auditory/digital repetition of the message. The tactile movement of placing the button. And, the internalizing of the process which is, in and of itself, creating change.
It will be a while longer before she’s ready for viewing. A few more buttons. Some dandelions to paint. (Really!) Lots of honoring and tending which, in the land of Intentional Creativity ®, basically means cleaning up rough edges, bringing some things forward and some back, and, especially if I’m the artist, about seven more coats of lipstick.
I’ll get the hang of mouths one of these days!
She’ll also need some more prayer dots. This time for the victims of the shooting in west Texas over the weekend.
For this moment, though, the internet is back on and Bill has dinner in the oven. Exhausted beasties, just home from Camp, are napped out, each in their personal favorite traffic pattern. Leaping over them hurts a bit less. And my girls had a good first week in school. All of which means more dots. These, for gratitude.