I don't talk much about inspiration. Heck, it's a good day when I don't talk about something that's dark and depressing.
The main reason I don't is two fold: 1) It takes a fair amount of emotional energy to even write things in a blog and 2) the things that I find inspirational and uplifting aren't usually the same things as many others. After all, I find evolution emotionally comforting. We came from somewhere; we're going somewhere; it's up to us and no one else. What's not to find comforting?
Which brings us to Matt Harding, who has nothing to do with evolution. You can see Matt Harding's website here. He'll tell his story better than I can.
For whatever reason, Matt started traveling a number of years ago. At one point, his friend took a video of him doing a silly little dance in Hanoi. The video was posted on the internet and was very popular. Stride gum approached him and said go around the world and do the silly dance in interesting places. He made another video and posted it on YouTube. Matt then went to Stride, after receiving many emails in response to the YouTube video, and said one silly guy isn't so interesting. Let's do a video where there are lots of silly people dancing. Another YouTube video.
That's the one I saw.
And I was quite moved. I'm not much of a traveller. But now I'd like to be. What's interesting about all of his videos is how little Matt is actually in them. Matt's there, of course. He's dancing his little silly dance. But the subject matter of the video uses Matt's silly dance as a means to show amazing places.
The place we live is an amazing place. The people who live on this earth are amazing people.
I was so impressed that I put together a Places to Go page on my own website. It has links to all of Matt's YouTube videos as well as a list of places shown in the films where I'd like to go. Someday. Any day.
So: Don't listen to me. Go to the website and videos (use my website or others. I don't care.) and watch. Then take his video as inspiration and just go!
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Links of Interest
Man Made Flying Saucer
3-D Illusions
Life in Lava. Cold Lava. And Fossils.
Clovis Live
Lopsided Voyager 2
The main reason I don't is two fold: 1) It takes a fair amount of emotional energy to even write things in a blog and 2) the things that I find inspirational and uplifting aren't usually the same things as many others. After all, I find evolution emotionally comforting. We came from somewhere; we're going somewhere; it's up to us and no one else. What's not to find comforting?
Which brings us to Matt Harding, who has nothing to do with evolution. You can see Matt Harding's website here. He'll tell his story better than I can.
For whatever reason, Matt started traveling a number of years ago. At one point, his friend took a video of him doing a silly little dance in Hanoi. The video was posted on the internet and was very popular. Stride gum approached him and said go around the world and do the silly dance in interesting places. He made another video and posted it on YouTube. Matt then went to Stride, after receiving many emails in response to the YouTube video, and said one silly guy isn't so interesting. Let's do a video where there are lots of silly people dancing. Another YouTube video.
That's the one I saw.
And I was quite moved. I'm not much of a traveller. But now I'd like to be. What's interesting about all of his videos is how little Matt is actually in them. Matt's there, of course. He's dancing his little silly dance. But the subject matter of the video uses Matt's silly dance as a means to show amazing places.
The place we live is an amazing place. The people who live on this earth are amazing people.
I was so impressed that I put together a Places to Go page on my own website. It has links to all of Matt's YouTube videos as well as a list of places shown in the films where I'd like to go. Someday. Any day.
So: Don't listen to me. Go to the website and videos (use my website or others. I don't care.) and watch. Then take his video as inspiration and just go!
-------------------------------------------
Links of Interest
Man Made Flying Saucer
3-D Illusions
Life in Lava. Cold Lava. And Fossils.
Clovis Live
Lopsided Voyager 2
TED Talks
Stephen Hawking at Zero GJennifer Lin improvs on the piano
Ben Zander on Music
Posts
Hi--I found your blog via readercon> cambridge sf workshop> your website> your blog. Whew. Long trip to get here. I'm actually very interested in the workshop and was wondering if you have any openings and if I could apply.
ReplyDeleteI've just finished my 4th novel and feel like I need to push my writing to the next level.
I'm a local Boston area writer and an experienced critiquer. I've participated extensively in online critique through several private groups on the Forward Motion for Writers site and I am the head moderator for an online poetry workshop. (Wildpoetryforum.com)--a member board of the IBPC the Interboard Poetry Community)
Sorry to leave a comment here, but there was no email address that I could find on the workshop site, your website, or the blog.
I know--this is actually a test. LOL.
Best regards,
Lisa Cohen
ljcblue at gmail dot com
www.ljcohen.net