Gratitude Blooming Podcast
Inspired by nature, art and gratitude, the Gratitude Blooming co-hosts Belinda Liu and Omar Brownson bring fresh and diverse perspectives to well-being. For us, heartfulness is the new mindfulness. Gratitude Blooming was inspired by the artist Arlene Kim Suda and her 100 Days of Blooming Love art project. Hear from culture keepers, creators, healers, leaders and so many others who share their emergent practices to build the beautiful world our hearts know is possible. Please rate, review and subscribe. New conversations each week. We want to hear what you're grateful for. Learn more at www.gratitudeblooming.com
Gratitude Blooming Podcast
The Power of the Collective Pause
How can a simple pause unlock the magic of co-creation and our collective superpowers?
Join us as we explore the intentions behind Arlene's latest pop-up art exhibit, "The Forgiveness Reflection Booth", and how pausing to connect with found objects in nature can bring comfort, kindness, joy and wonder to our everyday lives.
We also focus on the theme of self-care as a powerful reminder from nature of how nurturing others and our planet can serve as an extension of caring for ourselves.
Enjoy this journey of discovery, healing, and growth.
Let's bloom together! Meet us in Los Angeles for our live podcast event series with the Center for the Preservation of Democracy. Or... join us on a nature retreat this fall by emailing us at hello@gratitudeblooming.com.
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Hello Belinda.
Speaker 2:Hi, omar. It's lovely, arlene, for you to be with us today, as we are kind of just getting back into our normal lives after this amazing event in LA focusing on empathy and democracy, and it's wonderful that we got to release the actual recording from the event so our listeners could be a part of that pause that we took together collectively. And yeah, omar and Arlene, we've been talking a lot just around like how is graduate blooming, unfolding and growing and becoming, so I'd love for us to share with our listeners what is emerging in that process.
Speaker 1:It is amazing to kind of feel this coherence between the three of us and you know, in some ways embodying our artists, our poet, our land steward, you know, for each of us and then how we each have different skills and abilities around storytelling and execution and like holding space for emergence. And so it's been beautiful for us to kind of co-create in this new way and begin to sort of, through this process of co-creating, kind of be like what is our superpower, what is that thing that uniquely is possible because of how we're working together? And really I feel like we're settling in on this idea of the power of pausing and I'd love to hear from our listeners as we continue to sort of unpack it. This season feels like, in some ways, a mini documentary, you know, like we are sort of in real time sharing how graduate to blooming is evolving and growing.
Speaker 1:I think we've talked about before like the first season of our podcast was like can we get this plane off the ground? You know, the second season of the podcast was like, okay, we can turn left, we can turn right, we can go up and go down, but where are we really trying to go? And I feel like that's the question that we're holding for this third sort of season of our podcast is like, where do we want to go? And this idea of like, we want to go to places that can help people pause, because we have found that when we pause we create space for healing, we create space for emergence, you know, and whenever we hold spaces, we, you know, there's the three guiding intentions. One, your inner teacher is your best guide. So therefore, number two, there's no need to fix, save or advise anyone else. And three, silence is a participant. And how we then get to sort of co-create that space together has been beautiful.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's kind of interesting to be sharing as we are uncovering. You know Like it feels a little edgy for me, honestly, because you know I'm used to. You know like I've thought through this thing for years and now I'm going to tell the story. You know like, and this is really like real time unfolding.
Speaker 2:I mean, this morning, omar, you pose this question what is our superpowers collectively? And it's not about the product or even the podcast or the card deck or none of those things is really like at the core, we each have a superpower that's coming together, alchemyzing into like something bigger, and it's interesting to kind of track like, wow, the three of us have done a lot of things in our lives to really become blank slates, to be able to have room for emergence for ourselves and then together and then for the larger collective that we're holding space for. And, arlene, I loved how you know, in our conversation around healing and emergence, you said something about empowerment and how empowerment is not about somebody having power over you. It's about how do you step into your own personal power and how do you even know what that is or uncover that, and so love for you to kind of share a bit about that and also connecting it to the art and how you designed that whole experience for the you know forgiveness booth. I think there's a really powerful through line there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I love when you two talk about the power of the pause.
Speaker 3:I feel like that's very, it's like a, it feels very accessible, and I think what was really interesting to me through this experience of collaborating with the Democracy Center has, for this art exhibit, has been, you know, what does it mean to have a collective pause, and I think that came up in our conversation earlier today too.
Speaker 3:This collective pause allows a space where storytelling you know, from voices that may not have been heard can happen, and so what has been really exciting for me is, in part, in this collaboration, is that we got I got to collaborate with a high school student and so I reached out because the invitation for us to, to you know, create this art exhibit existed. I was able to reach out to somebody who I know through a friend who you know was taking an architecture class in high school, and I saw her work and I said, well, what, if you help me dream up, you know what this forgiveness booth at the Democracy Center could look like, and so maybe I can, I could story tell, I mean, since I guess we could have had her as a guest and maybe, maybe in the future. But yeah, but I have a short story to tell through the art that she made for this, for us in this project. So here let me share my screen.
Speaker 2:I love that we're doing video now as well, so people can actually see us and see what we're looking at yeah.
Speaker 3:So can you? Can you see this Beautiful, yeah, so I mean, this was okay. Oh, whoops, here we go. So right now, this is a the first drawing that Celia her name is Celia Kan Palence made for us, and you know, I really feel like I'm I'm so glad that we asked her to create some of this art for us, because I see it like an artifact. It feels like an artifact for what we hoped the the event could be, what we can leave for somebody who might not have been able to be there, right, if there's something they can get out of this, you know that, even if they weren't able to join and then also what we hope it can be in the future. You know, I feel like that's.
Speaker 3:This is sort of the power of art, is it allows us to like move through those different phases of time. And so this first image was this was before the event existed. It might actually look like the event, but we we first we originally imagined the booths of the as these like big pops of color surrounded by living plants, and we were sort of thinking we use pictures of Christo and Jean-Claude, the artists, their collaboration, doing like umbrellas. I think in LA, right, they did that in LA, omar, yeah, so we had pictures of the their umbrellas, we had pictures of the gates that they made in Central Park and then, and also they did a valley curtain where they just installed this enormous curtain in the middle of a valley, and so really, that was where our imagination was was going to begin with. I mean, it didn't end that way, but it doesn't mean that that's not, you know, one day, possible. So this next picture is, you know, just a simple picture of one of the signs that and I think she drew this from one of the photographs that we had from the event, and the reason I I think this is kind of interesting is that we decided to use signs right to to explain what the art was, and I personally love art that doesn't, you know, that creates enigmas, right, rather than explanations, because I feel like I think it's I really like art that makes you question things.
Speaker 3:So, like I had, I wasn't sure if we should do the signs or not do the signs, but I'm glad we did. I mean, I think it made a difference. But I think there's this whole I don't know idea around how much should art explain itself versus allow users to experience, experience have their own experience and find their own explanations. I feel like that's an interesting question that we might choose to explore in a future exhibit.
Speaker 1:But also just a sign really makes you be clear on like what's your top level message, right? And so this sign empathy and democracy, reflection booths and that alone just sort of says like okay, big idea around empathy and democracy, how are we supposed to do that? And you're like, through these reflection booths. And so this hierarchy of information assigned kind of really forces you to just like simplify your message to the core parts.
Speaker 2:And I love how this is illustrated like an invitation right, like it's like a bigger blown up version of a party invite or an event invite, and literally we've been sitting with this question of like what is the invitation of gratitude blooming and the Center for Democracy. So I love that this is a visual kind of representation of, like the invitation for people to come in.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I find it fascinating what Celia chose to draw too, you know, because each of these details, you know, even that's another, you know, thing about art is, you know, like the artist is choosing what to draw, and so maybe and maybe it's just random, but or maybe it's guided by some feeling.
Speaker 3:But when I, when she delivered these like drawings, I was like it is kind of interesting this whole concept of signs and invitations. So let's see, this next one was inside the booth, and so this was a. I think she did this drawing from a photograph as well, but this was, you know, I don't know that we have talked that much about what happened when you went into the forgiveness booth. I feel like you know we've talked about the forgiveness booth and the hope and wholeness booths that we had, but I think the forgiveness booth was unique in that you had your own personal space once you walked in, and what we had chosen to do was to use this space for people to have an interaction with the plant, and this is a drawing of the plant. We used a chocolate cosmos that we found at the nursery and to me, you know, when we saw the plant, it just seemed like it was. It was very alert to me and it I felt like it was alert and willing to come into this space that we were trying to create.
Speaker 3:We also filled the space with these nature, you know, objects from nature and I think it's really interesting that, salih, you know, in the strong sheet there's three of five I think we had in there and the ones that she chose to include in this drawing were we had a comfort stone, we had a kindness feather and we had a wonder pine cone, and there were. There was also a curiosity stick and I'm trying to remember the last one, oh, unbroken, this shell. Yes, yes, and you know, intentionally, you know I chose these objects in part because they're all found objects, things that I just found, you know, out in nature on a walk, and I wanted people to have this experience of you know, finding their own, like, you know, you can find your own comfort stone, you know, if you, you know, want some help dealing with difficult emotions, you know you could find a stone and ask it to help you, you know. And so I really kind of wanted this experience of people to have an experience of. I guess it's finding camaraderie and friendship in nature.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, just, I think I love that you really were inspired by this idea of everyday found objects, right, Like you didn't need to go to a store, you didn't need to order something online, like to just sort of look in your sort of area and be like, hey, I'm going to find meaning in this stone or in this pine cone, and and honestly, like we've been, you know, cleaning up the house in part to have you guys here, and I found these shells, which normally I would just hand to one of my daughters who loves these things and put it around. But I ended up putting the shell in our bathroom, these two beautiful sort of like one was, I think it's like an oyster shell and another, you know, maybe an abalone shell and then a small rock, and I put it in our bathroom because inspired by this sort of idea, and I was like, oh, okay, I'm going to just invite this into our bathroom as a as a reminder of just like comfort, kindness and wonder.
Speaker 2:I love this, yeah, and it's kind of interesting. What comes up for me is, you know, in our retreat center this is very much what people are doing. They're leaving their kind of urban lifestyles oftentimes to take a pause, a long pause in nature to reset. And, arlene, you very much created that natural sanctuary in the booth for people so that they could actually see their lives in a different way through these reminders from nature. And I have to admit I was a little overwhelmed being in LA, especially that area. It's like so many people's noises that I'm not used to. You know, I'm like a bear coming out of hibernation, it almost felt like it, so it was really overstimulating in many ways. And yet there were these moments of calm and peace through these reflection booths that the two of you created.
Speaker 1:That was very healing in this place and on top of it there was a KCRW music concert happening in the midst of it all. So not only did you have little Tokyo jumping off with probably lots of tourists, you know you had an event and yet it was amazing how just creating this little bit of a space allowed you to pause even the midst of kind of a lot of noise. And, Arlene, maybe tell us a little bit about the booth itself, because, like I, was inspired by these ideas of voting booths and like how to transform them, this like space that we're in some way very familiar but like we've sort of become blind to you in a way. And then you sort of took it to a whole nother direction. And what were some of the initial kind of inspirations for the kind of booth that you created?
Speaker 3:Well, you know, I had to have to say I started with this idea of designing it like a voting booth and yeah, so and I think you know goes back to what I was saying about the signs I was kind of trying to trying to give the feeling of a voting booth without calling it a voting booth, you know, because I wanted it really to be just open to you know, anything that came up for whoever showed up. So I think that was why I did start with a seed of designing this as a voting booth. I mean, I think, if you saw all our preparation for this, it's like, you know, I've got like a board of, like a mood board, but it's, you know, like a visual digital board and like it's all, like it's all made up of voting booths. So the shape of it there was, yeah, so there was this idea and that's the last picture actually was. You know, we did ask people to, after having the experience in the, in this forgiveness booth, and I think the specific steps were we asked people to come in and pause, and then the second step was really to start a conversation on forgiveness with the plant right. So in some weird ways, that was a little like the confessional that you're confessing to the plant as opposed to the, but I also didn't necessarily think of it as a confessional booth, but a gentler version, I think, of a confessional booth.
Speaker 3:And then the third step was, you know, to like, notice your emotions that are coming up. And you know, it was this idea of you know even the uncomfortable, uncomfortable emotions that might come up, to notice, to notice them in a way that you realize that they move, they come and they go, and so it's not, they're not stuck in you, they're not part of you, right, they are just things that like come and go. And then the final step was to, after having that experience, was to dare to dream again. Right, so, from that space, after, after you know, noticing the emotion and maybe letting it go, I feel like that's that moment, that's that you know, opening, where you can access your personal power or empowerment is the way I think of it. And so you know, after going through that, from that empowerment place, dare to dream again. And that was.
Speaker 3:And then we did get this idea from I think it's a Japanese tradition to it was. It's like a fortune telling tradition. Where it's it's more prescriptive, I think you actually get a fortune and then you tie it on, but we this was more interactive, or active, I should say where you know we had people to write, you know, their dream on a piece of paper. That was. You know, I think it's compostable, it has. It's been infused with wildflower seeds and you know that we intend to plant. I want everyone to know that it's not. You know, these are not going to be public. We are going to plant them in the earth and and see what emerges.
Speaker 1:Beautiful that these simple instructions, these four steps of like acknowledging this plan, to like notice the emotions, to really, you know, dare to dream and really have this inner dialogue. And then I think, as you said, how do we move from that inner dialogue to this collective dialogue and this collective pause and and I feel like this is just the beautiful emergence that is happening through creating these moments, these spaces, to just reflect in a different way and and and people really sort of were attracted to that and I think that's what I loved about it was that it was simple enough, like how do we focus, you know, in the words of the Zen master, normal, long ways and means right, like it's not about building new institutions, but how do we help people create the ways and means for them to be present, to heal and to like have hope for the future?
Speaker 1:And the artwork by Celia is just incredible, you know, to see how she just captured the essence and these like little vignettes of the moment. So please give her a big thank you for us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and for our listeners who aren't seeing the example, I just am fixated on this one example that she illustrated, which is for remember joy, and it's like on a piece of paper and you can kind of see it really in front of you and I just love that that the plant and the natural objects help someone go into forgiveness and transmute that into joy. So that's such a beautiful example.
Speaker 1:So should we pick a gratitude blooming card for us to reflect on, and then we'll pick a card for our listeners to reflect on for the week?
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and I'm curious, Omar or Arlene, if there a inquiry just around this idea of the pause or what we are becoming together. What is emergent as a question?
Speaker 1:So I wrote this poem that was inspired by you guys coming to hopefully stay at our house, which unfortunately my wife got COVID, so you weren't able to stay here. But I had room set up for each of you and I know that each of you love different card decks, and so for Arlene's room I had the Quan Yin card deck. For Belinda's room I had this animal card deck, and so I pulled the cards for you and I think you know, as they're setting in the intention, like part of this idea is about returning home. So I'm going to read the poem. But it's really this idea of like returning home. Quan Yin her joy overcomes gravity, dancing with the buffalo of history of future unknown Trust. Joy, like a salmon returns home. No need to navigate. You know your way home, when your bones will be told by the breathing of the trees for centuries. For joy overcomes time and space. Wow.
Speaker 2:That could not have been even more perfect. I mean, there's that literally slip of paper that says remember joy, and then you're telling the story not knowing what Celia had drawn. That is about that energy.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love synchronicity. So if, arlene, you want to pick a card, oh, you're going to say something.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I almost want to hear it again, but I know that you know that's probably not good for podcasts, but I do want to hear it again. I'll hear it again on the. When I listen to the audio, it's beautiful, omar, and yeah, just very moving.
Speaker 2:So I'll frame the intention based on that beautiful poem, I think it's. It feels like. It's like how do we find our way home for ourselves, individually and together? I mean that is just so powerful.
Speaker 1:Arlene, any numbers coming to you.
Speaker 3:Oh, so much pressure. I feel like home, feels like even numbers. So maybe two even numbers or two odd numbers adding up to an even number.
Speaker 1:You can go four, four. That's like a. It's a box. Box is a home. It's a confession booth.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Hmm, Number 10, Aalien Triquettrum self care. What can you do today and every day to nurture love for yourself? As you look at this card, this prompt, the art, how does this help remind us of coming home?
Speaker 2:Well, it's wild that the word self is very present here and it's one solo plant that almost is looking at itself, with the leaf coming, stemming out. And so it's almost like how can you find the home within you and externally around you by taking care of yourself? You know, like Omar, your story of putting the shells delicately in your bathroom as a reminder that is you connecting with home, with yourself as well, and so it feels like if we don't take the time to nurture ourselves through, like the pause or the reverence and the awe or the moments of joy, like it's hard to navigate life with ease.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm feeling, you know this sometimes with the cards, I feel like there's sometimes like a hard. It's like a harder, there's a harder lesson with some of them than others. You know, some are just, they feel easier. But when this showed up I thought, oh, it's hard. But I think I think it's meant to be hard.
Speaker 3:And I think of when I see this card in the context of what we're talking about today. It's like so much about that empowerment, like finding your own personal power. Again is about this self care, right, like you have to take care of yourself to be, to come from that place of your own personal power, and not your personal power that you will use to dominate over others. But you're, it's that empowerment and I feel like that is the true home within ourselves, is that seed of personal power, because that's where we can start. You know what we often are talking about, this poetic imagination. It's like that's where it resides in you. So like having a inquiry around, how do we find our way home? And having this card in a weird way feels like the like the card for, you know, finding that place of empowerment.
Speaker 1:Whenever we pull this card, the, the art itself, with the single kind of stem with sort of a craggly set of leaves on top, and then the leaf kind of shooting out, it always reminds me of a faucet. So, like this is, like you know, you can actually turn on and off self care. But as you guys were talking, you know, I also started to think about sometimes self care comes from caring for others. Right Like giving is can actually make you feel better. Right to like actually be of service, like volunteering and helping other people.
Speaker 1:And then then I also just sort of like expanded the idea of self to be our planet, like how do we take care of our planet? Like our planet is our, is us. And so, you know, sometimes self care is at an individual level, but self care can also be at a collective level. And how do we sort of take time to remember this is our home, this planet is our home. And you know, how do we take care of our home is, you know, I think, a really important reminder, because our home takes care of us, you know it gives us a place to rest and find joy and celebrate and fail and try again, you know, and so I'm really just appreciating the both and of self care as individual but also collective.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's almost like creating the world we want to live in starts with the spaces that we have, you know, to connect with every single day, and it is I'm always struck, when people come on sabbatical in Mount Shasta with us, how much as they're preparing to transition back home. It is about what are they going to do to their physical space to create that moment of pause or create that comfort that they need to navigate life and the hecticness and the chaos of that, and so it is interesting, and then from there it ripples to everyone else, and so I love that we're making that connection to the story of our own selves together and for this collective larger world that we're a part of.
Speaker 1:And I have to say this is you know, having been through tons of different leadership trainings and workshops, from like circles of trust and Parker Palmer to healing circles and common wheel and all these different sort of methodologies, and then having built a gratitude app with like daily practices and moments, and I feel like what we're starting to do is just sort of recognize, like, how do we create space for all of those things right, like so, whether you're using the gratitude blooming cards to help you journal or to set an intention for each day, and then we're creating these events, that kind of like help pop and remind us, that sort of like a collective level, and then your retreat center and, you know, hopefully we're going to have a gratitude blooming retreat series.
Speaker 1:So then it's like, okay, sometimes we need to take a deep pause and seven days away, you know, and really kind of ground ourselves in nature, sometimes we just need a daily practice, right, those small baby steps that just helps us sort of the day to day kind of movement through things. And then sometimes we need like events you know that are these sort of periodic reminders and, you know, moments to maybe sometimes celebrate or like dive deeper and and even this podcast, you know, which we try to sort of release on a weekly basis plus or minus. You know is like these different touch points of like there's lots of different ways to pause and sometimes we need to go deeper and slower and sometimes we just need sort of simpler and practical. And it's okay to like, mix and match the menu as you need it.
Speaker 2:That's what I love about collaborating with the two of you. It's like we're alchemists and artists and nature is our muse. You know like that's beautiful. So, as we close, I love that we're this season. We're also picking two cards, because I think the two cards tell a story as well of like self and each and collective, and I'm actually inspired to go bottom up to the fourth row. And then the fourth card. I don't know if it's the same card or not, but I'm curious. I don't think it's the same card, did not?
Speaker 1:be the same card.
Speaker 2:So, from the top to the bottom, it's the same the four seven rows.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:One, two, three, four, and then one, two, three, four.
Speaker 3:That makes sense. Yeah, seven rows.
Speaker 2:Wow, do you feel like we should pick another card?
Speaker 1:Hey, let's just take this as an exclamation. You know that we invite folks. Number 10, alien trequetrum self care. Remember, arlene? You asked me to reread the poem. Oh the emphasis is, so maybe I'll take the occasion to reread the poem is like the exclamation mark on self care.
Speaker 3:And I like this added dimension that it's how does self care relate to you or to the collective right? So, because it is, it is both.
Speaker 1:So here we go, quan Yin. Joy overcomes gravity, dancing with the buffalo of history, a future unknown Trust. Joy, like a salmon, returns home. No need to navigate, you know your way home. Even your bones will be told by the breathing of the trees for centuries. For joy overcomes time and space. Well, we wish you this week Time and space for joy, and hopefully that joy helps you overcome whatever gravity may be holding you, but also kind of recognize that gravity keeps us here on this earth right, and that gravity can feel heavy, but sometimes that heaviness is necessary to just keep us grounded and to find that lightness where we can.
Speaker 2:And yeah, we would love to meet more of you if it's helpful and supportive. So you know, our next event in LA is October 21st. You can find out more about that gathering. We have a Vance notice to come and meet us in LA and then Omar and I are scheming maybe a retreat coming up in the fall around the equinox in September. So if you're interested in that, just email us at hello at gratitudebloomingcom to say hey, I want to find out more. Tell me more as it unfolds.
Speaker 1:Wishing you all well, cheers, cheers.
