These lessons for life and storytelling from Shadow Spinner:
1. [Begin with a simple question, to prepare us for the quest:] What's going to become of you?
2. Keep your mind out of the mist...Be practical --- look to your own survival!...[Not spinning shadows]...But...Look at Shahrazad. Telling stories can be very practical...Stories can save your life.
3. Wishing has power. When you wish for something you are concentrating on it. And when you concentrate on a thing, you help to bring it about. You must be very careful what you wish for.
4. Chew your words seven times before letting them out. If you let words go buzzing out of your mouth like bees, they will come back and sting you. Silence holds power too.
5. Don't give up.
6. Some stories you don't tell out loud. Tell them to yourself until you don't need them anymore. Those are the ones where you like to "see them sweat".
7. You can re-tell old stories of ancient wisdom or tell them like the spider who caught the dream in her threaded web.
8. When you hear a story, you sometimes get a new idea of what's possible in the world --- for you to do, especially when you're scared and you read about heroes.
9. Learn how to pick a ripe mellon. Look for sunken scars that indicate it's good and sweet.
10. Pay for your life with stories, but never in advance. Always hold something back to live another day.
11. Tell stories about justice and people getting what they deserve.
12. Wrap morsels of truth in a confection of tales, hoping that those truths won't seem mutinous anymore --- just true.
13. Life under the wing of a fly is better than the sleep of the grave.
14. People take what they need from te stories they hear. The tale is often wiser than the teller.
15. If we don't share our stories --- trading them across our borders as freely as spices and ebony and silk --- we will all be strangers forever.
16. If you want to send a message with a pidgeon, here is what to do:...Be gentle!
17. There's more to disguise than changing your clothes. The best disguise can be just a look.
18. Could it be that, by choosing certain stories, you draw to yourself the happenings inside them? So that your life begins to echo your stories?
19. Often, the the old tales, the humblest creatures turn out to be more powerful than you ever would expect...Sometimes it really does happen.
20. There's more than one way to be crippled...You forget what it's like not to ache. You forget that you're aching at all.
21. You should always try to remember your dreams. Because you can learn from your dreams, though you may not see how at first.
22. Words are how the powerless can have power.
23. What seems like an ending is a beginning in disguise.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Conviction of the Heart and Lord of the Rings
Below are the words to Kenny Loggins song, "Conviction of the Heart." They are enhanced tremendously when read in the context of a video that combines the music with scenes from Lord of the Rings. Checck this out and let me know what you think.
Where are the dreams that we once had?
This is the time to bring them back.
What were the promises caught on the tips of our tongues?
Do we forget or forgive?
There's a whole other life waiting to be lived when...
One day we're brave enough
To talk with conviction of the heart.
And down your streets I've walked alone,
As if my feet were not my own
Such is the path I chose, doors I have opened and closed
I'm tired of living this life,
Fooling myself, believing were right, when...
I've never given love
With any conviction of the heart
One with the earth, with the sky
One with everything in life
I believe well survive
If we only try...
How long must we wait to change
This world bound in chains that we live in
To know what it is to forgive,
And be forgiven?
It's been too many years of taking now.
Isn't it time to stop somehow?
Air thats too angry to breathe, water our children can't drink
You've heard it hundreds of times
You say your aware, believe, and you care, but...
Do you care enough
To talk with conviction of the heart?
Where are the dreams that we once had?
This is the time to bring them back.
What were the promises caught on the tips of our tongues?
Do we forget or forgive?
There's a whole other life waiting to be lived when...
One day we're brave enough
To talk with conviction of the heart.
And down your streets I've walked alone,
As if my feet were not my own
Such is the path I chose, doors I have opened and closed
I'm tired of living this life,
Fooling myself, believing were right, when...
I've never given love
With any conviction of the heart
One with the earth, with the sky
One with everything in life
I believe well survive
If we only try...
How long must we wait to change
This world bound in chains that we live in
To know what it is to forgive,
And be forgiven?
It's been too many years of taking now.
Isn't it time to stop somehow?
Air thats too angry to breathe, water our children can't drink
You've heard it hundreds of times
You say your aware, believe, and you care, but...
Do you care enough
To talk with conviction of the heart?
