Studio
One of the first things we ask new clients in both classes and coaching is “what are the things that bring you joy outside of what it is that you are turning into your primary livelihood?” At Birds Eye, we maintain a collection of “studios” where we get to play and process our client work, as well as apply the teachings of our business planning curricula. The mediums shift depending on current sources of inspiration but our reasoning is always the same: in order to keep our passion in our work we must engage the muse ourselves. We must take our own risks, pursue our own passions, and play with the vulnerable edge between creativity and market.
for the artist at the start of day
May morning be astir with the harvest of night;
Your mind quickening to the eros of a new question,
Your eyes seduced by some unintended glimpse
That cut right through the surface to a source.
May this be a morning of innocent beginning,
When the gift within you slips clear
Of the sticky web of the personal
With its hurt and its hauntings,
And fixed fortress corners,
A Morning when you become a pure vessel
For what wants to ascend from silence,
May your imagination know
The grace of perfect danger,
To reach beyond imitation,
And the wheel of repetition,
Deep into the call of all
The unfinished and unsolved
Until the veil of the unknown yields
And something original begins
To stir toward your senses
And grow stronger in your heart
In order to come to birth
In a clean line of form,
That claims from time
A rhythm not yet heard,
That calls space to
A different shape.
May it be its own force field
And dwell uniquely
Between the heart and the light
To surprise the hungry eye
By how deftly it fits
About its secret loss.
~John O’Donohue