creativity – Pam Grout

Happy 222! Celebrating possibility and miracles since 1993

February 22, 2023 74 Comments

“Let your broadcast of love bless the world.”—A Course in Miracles

Reading through E-Squared to update for the upcoming 10-year-anniverary edition, I was struck by the opening dedication: For Roosky. May your light forever shine.

Roosky, of course, is one of Taz’s gazillion nicknames: Taz-a-roo which led to Roosky which led to the dedication and my hope that the light and love she so clearly conveyed would bless the world. At the time, I was assuming its broadcast would continue here in the flesh.

But as Virginia Francess Sterrett said, “As long as space and time divide you from anyone you love, you simply have no choice but to go into battle with space and time and, furthermore, to win.”

That’s the goal of the Taz Grout 222 Foundation. Not so much to battle, because well, battling just keeps the crazy going, but to defy space and time by keeping alive Taz’s incredible light. Every year on February 22 (that’s today friends!), we give a gift to an innovative project or person with a big idea to change consciousness and therefore the world.

In times such as this, it’s vital to recognize that behind-the-scenes, beneath-the-news there’s a completely different story going on. There are so many of us who only want to love and serve and who really believe with our entire hearts and souls that a more beautiful world is not only possible, but is right now, as we speak, gathering breath.

As usual, the foundation got lots of great pitches for lots of worthy projects. And as always, I consulted Taz (I’m just her ground crew, after all) to finally settle on the following projects for this year’s 222 Foundation gift:

I. I have fallen in love with Bill and Pat Taylor who started the Southeast Asia Foundation to, as they say, give back to the Universe for the countless blessings they’ve enjoyed in their lives. Not only does every single penny go to their mission (all operating expenses come from their own pocket), but they show up themselves, boots on the ground, to make sure every one of their projects begins with and is guided by locals. They take their inspiration from Lao Tzu, insist on both sustainability and religious inclusion and act on the words from an oval river rock Pat once gave to Bill for his birthday: “You cannot do all the good the world needs, but the world needs all the good you can do.”

Thanks to Bill and Pat’s beautiful work (their tagline is “It takes a girl to raise a village”), the 222 Foundation has chosen to fund seven libraries in rural Siem Reap, Cambodia: four for kids, two for high schoolers, one for university students and one for the community. Taz LOVED books and worked at the Grinnell library when she was at university so having access to books, rare in rural Cambodia, is a must for promoting literacy and providing access to new possibilities.

We’re also funding a chess club and providing filters and fuel for water purification towers in Siem Reap. Mostly, we want Bill (he even shared a wonderful 222 story from when he was a 9-year-old Boy Scout) and Pat to know how much we appreciate their open hearts, generosity and unflinching belief that “it’s not merely about the money. It’s about each girl knowing that somebody some place in the world loves her and cares about her and encourages her to make something of her life.”

2. The other project Taz led me to support (isn’t she just brilliant?) is Craftroots, an artistan collective I was able to visit twice when I was in India last month. Once again, I fell in love with their mission. Yes, I fall in love A LOT!

Craftroots works with more than 17,000 artists in rural villages, keeping alive 72 ancient Indian arts and crafts. They aren’t out to scale their model or grow profits or production. Their aim is to bring a conscious shift in society by putting beauty into everything.

The artisans, mostly underprivileged women, aren’t viewed as laborers. Rather, they make up a sisterhood where each artist is genuinely respected, celebrated and encouraged to see their work as an offering to the divine—the divine in themselves and the divine in all life. Artisans pray together, read inspiring quotes each morning and focus on Truth: oneness, belonging and kinship.

Founder Anar Patel (to the right) also participated in ServiceSpace’s life-changing Gandhi 3.0 and says working with rural artisans is the greatest privilege of her life. She described it as her form of worship.

The 222 Foundation’s form of worship is looking for creative ways to burn through our culture’s prevailing trance of scarcity and lack and to provide a pinhole through which new possibilities and ways of being can shine. We are honored to support the above two projects and to remind everyone that there is light waiting for all of us to find. Happy #222!

Pam Grout is the author of 20 books including E-Squared, E-Cubed, Thank & Grow Rich and her latest, The Course in Miracles Experiment: A Starter Kit for Rewiring Your Mind (And Therefore Your World).

Reawaken to the Mystery

December 2, 2021 161 Comments

“There is a force within you that gives life. Seek that.”—Rumi

So I heard a story about a five-year-old at the doctor’s office. After answering all the worried mom’s questions, the doctor turned to the child and said, “And how about you? Do you have any questions?”

The child, deep in thought, stopped, nodded and pointed to the ceiling, “Have you ever wondered what a bat feels like hanging from the ceiling?”

I love this story so much because it points out that children still live in the realm of the imagination. They haven’t yet been talked out of loving the things they love–making art, for example, or singing really loud in the backseat of the car. They haven’t been talked out of loving themselves or learned all the things they need “to fix.”

I always wonder at what age we humans forfeit our innocence, turn our attention from wonder to rigidity and rules. At what age does the ever-vigilant, hypercritical ego take charge of the steering wheel?

All I know is that creating something (even if it’s just writing a blog post) is the best tool I have for seeing beyond the prescribed story. To put something out in the world that didn’t exist before is the closest I can get to the Big Kahuna.

In my now ancient TedX Talk, my big idea for changing the world was to get a spiral notebook and jot down three ideas every day.

I never know which ones will catch fire, which ones will produce oranges. But, like the kid in the doctor’s office, I like to imagine stuff that nobody else is thinking about.

Hope you’ll join me in this holy pursuit. In fact, I invite each of you that reads this post to add a new idea to the comments section below. Doesn’t have to be anything spectacular. Or even doable. It can be downright crazy–that’s my favorite kind. Just remember this is not a party for the parts of you that like to judge.

Can’t wait to hear what you come up with. #222 Forever

Pam Grout is the author of 20 books including E-Squared, E-Cubed, Thank & Grow Rich and her latest book, The Course in Miracles Experiment: A Starter Kit for Rewiring Your Mind (And Therefore Your World) that has just been turned into an app. Badass ACIM (badass-acim.com)

Why it’s time to widen the aperture

October 7, 2020 70 Comments

“Arrive curious, without the armor of certainty. Live the life that chooses you, new with every breath, every blink of your astonished eyes.”—Rebecca del Rio

Tomorrow is Tasman’s birthday. She would have been 27.

I strongly believe she came to me 27 years ago as an act of great love. I was a 37-year-old singleton who desperately needed a monster lesson in loving with my whole heart.

I was a, let’s just say, wishy-washy creator who needed a reason to fully commit to being responsible and going for my dreams.

At the time I discovered I was pregnant, I was making it (sorta) as a freelance writer. I had my moments of glory, getting a few good-paying assignments with Travel+Leisure, Modern Bride (ironic since I had always been single) and the Washington Post. I was dabbling in travel writing and more or less following my whims. Nothing wrong with whims, but it was clearly time for me to do something more substantial.

I’d struggled with commitment to one man so Taz, entering my life as a tiny human totally dependent on me, became the soul mate I so acutely desired.

Thanks to her, I buckled down on my spiritual practice. I turned my career, my parenting, my entire life over to The Dude. I’ve written before about how painfully clear it was that I needed to see things differently, to let go of all the limitations I’d placed upon myself, to well, widen my aperture.

If I was truly going to make it as a writer, the dream I’d long pursued, and if I was going to properly care for this beautiful soul who could have chosen a two-parent household, a bigger bank account, a caregiver with a more stable career, it was pretty obvious I needed to shape up.

I am forever grateful that she and her infinite love chose me anyway. She believed in me in a way I didn’t. She gave me a flesh and blood reason to become the person I always wanted to be. In short, she inspired me to completely rewire and rewrite my life.

Many in my circle, after hearing the surprising news that this gypsy was going to be a parent, encouraged me to seek a more stable profession, something with regular hours and benefits.

But to truly be a good example to my new soulmate, I felt I needed to go for the whole enchilada—to carve my own path, to follow my urgings to honor the gifts I was given. Yes, I would have to write consistently, become disciplined, but writing consistently is what I LOVE to do. Plus freelance writing gave me space and time to be there for Taz.

The most significant change required was for me to surrender old paradigms and ways of seeing the world. I had to rely completely and humbly, not on my own smarts or talent, but on the bigger force that continuously whispers to me, the force that wants to guide, bless and interact with all of us.

Every day, I repeated this affirmation:

Into my will, let there pour strength.

Into my feeling, let there flow warmth,

Into my thinking, let there shine light

That I may nurture this child, Tasman McKay Grout,

With enlightened purpose,

Caring with heart’s love

and bringing wisdom to all things.

In a week, it will be two years since Taz joined the cosmic love team or what we often call the “other side.” I’m still getting my equilibrium after this shattering loss. But this I can say with complete certainty:

My gorgeous, brilliant daughter who was always the wisest person in any room still lives within my every thought, my every breath, my every heartbeat.

So thank you, Taz, for choosing me, for overlooking my shortcomings and for inspiring me to be a better person. I feel it in my bones that this lifetime was one of many we’ve experienced together.

I will love you forever. I’m excited about the upcoming 222 Foundation award and for the day we meet up again, unencumbered by the illusion of these fallible bodies. Happy magical birthday, my love. #222 Forever.

222 Forever: Celebrating Taz with 3 New Projects

February 22, 2020 26 Comments

“Let us not look for you only in memory. You would want us to find you in presence, beside us when beauty brightens, when kindness glows and music echoes eternal tones.”– John O’Donohue

Yes, my friends, it’s here. The auspicious date for announcing the 2020 recipients of Taz Grout’s 222 Foundation. Every year, to honor my radiant, brilliant daughter, Tasman McKay Grout, the 222 Foundation gives a grant to an imaginative project with the chutzpah to radically change the consciousness of the planet.

I’m a sharp P on the Myers-Briggs scale which indicates I tend toward being flexible, spontaneous and open-minded. Good qualities, right?

Except when you need to narrow down options, to make decisions. So receiving 100 applications for this year’s grant was well, way outside my comfort zone. I wanted to fund them all.

Thanks to some assistance from my “board” (that is to say a coffee consultation with my friend, Never-Say-No-to-Fun Rhonda), I finally picked these three:

1. A Taz Grout forest of 2222 trees in southern India. The tree planting idea started when someone nominated climate activist Greta Thunberg. I love that she’s young, brutally honest and 100 percent committed.

Plus what could be more imperative right now than changing our climate story? Particularly, the story that humankind is separate from the natural world, that material possessions are more important than our planet’s air, water, soil and trees. This home of ours is alive, sentient and we must do everything we can to exit the feedback loops that tell us we are lord and master.

Greta made this wonderful video detailing a natural climate solution. This magical tool sucks carbon out of the air, costs very little and has the ability to repair our natural environment.

The Taz Grout 222 Foundation will plant 2222 trees this year through Project GreenHands, a grassroots ecological initiative established by the Isha Foundation. I chose GreenHands because it was started by the illustrious Sadhguru (check him out if you haven’t already) and because Taz’s forest will be in India near some of her ashes and last year’s 222 project.

2. A Taz Grout school library in the Annapurna region of Nepal. Taz was an avid reader, maybe because I started reading to her when she was still in the womb. She kept lists of all the books she read each year. In college, she worked at the library. So supporting literacy for girls in rural and impoverished Nepal is the perfect fit for the 222 Foundation.

I fell in love with Hands in Nepal from the moment I opened the email from director, Jan Sprague. HANDS (it stands for Humanitarian Acts in Nepal Developing Schools) does amazing, heartfelt work. Everyone in the organization is a volunteer.

Jan, like me, lost a child and doesn’t belief in death. She knows our children will always be with us, here and now. It was her other son, Danny, who actually started this wonderful nonprofit that builds schools and libraries. My plans are to go to Nepal later this year for the installation of the plaque honoring Taz. I look forward to extending Taz’s family into the rural Himalayas. This video is the perfect primer of this outstanding organization.

3. Last project honors Taz’s commitment to relentless creativity. If you read my books, you know Taz and I had a thing about anonymously gifting small bills and leaving encouraging notes about the wildly abundant universe. Kimmy Rhoades, a kindergarten teacher in Snohomish, Washington, applied for the 222 grant with her visionary Random Acts of Money project.

This generous soul loves giving money away to strangers, proving that old school financial assumptions, traditions and habits block the more accurate truth that freedom is available for everyone. She drops bills of all denominations–on hiking trails, biking paths, in parking lots and stores. Often in the form of origami fish or paper airplanes, her money bombs blast, as she says, the ridiculous notion of scarcity right out of the water.

With the help of a 222 grant, her kindergartners’ natural creativity and the love notes she plans to attach, her secret mission will seed 222 messages of hope for all.

This video isn’t Kimmy’s project, but you get the idea:

Let’s build a brand new table

January 21, 2018 12 Comments

“You are a creative genius who came here to express yourself.”—Esther Hicks

1e2

I mentioned in yesterday’s blog my intention for everyone (no exceptions) to get a seat at the table.

But I decided an even better intention is to build a whole new table. Which sorta leads to Lesson 21: I am determined to see things differently.

The old table is like that old gum I also mentioned yesterday. It’s old news. Its juice has been sucked out, it’s basically been-there-done-that-no-thanks.

The old table is reductionist, judgmental, a know-it-all. And it’s likely to have the same number of seats, just different players.

At the new table, we attend to the bigger, non-visible world. We trust that it’s every bit as alive as the material world. We have faith that the new story, the inclusive, everyone belongs story is really just a matter of re-engineering reality.

And we know that we have the power to do it. We know we can envision a different reality.

It doesn’t even have to be hard. Unless we choose to see it that way.

I herby resolve to quit staring at the old reality, to quit treating it as if it’s a circus freak show.

It’s only there because I and a lot of other people on Planet Earth have put our attention upon it. When we resist and oppose and throw our hands in the air, we basically give our energy to the old gum. We say to the universe “more please.”

I want my new table to be expansive, to recognize unlimited possibilities and ongoing creation.

We are here, you guys, to expand, to create. Not just art, but all the time. In all ways. As the subtitle on my latest book suggests, we are here to ignite our daring, audacious, creative side.

Today, as we are determined to see things differently, let us know that true creation, new creation is why we’re here.

P.S. Whoever drew this cute little illustration of E-Squared, thank you–I absolutely LOVE IT!!!

Pam Grout is the author of 19 books including E-Squared, E-Cubed, Thank & Grow Rich and her new book, Art & Soul,Reloaded: A Year-Long Apprenticeship to Summon the Muses and Ignite Your Daring, Audacious, Creative Side.

Do your art. No matter what. No matter where.

December 11, 2017 14 Comments

“Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven’s sake. Sing in the shower. Dance to the radio. Tell stories. Write a poem to a friend, even a lousy poem. Do it as well as you possible can. You will get an enormous reward. You will have created something.”—Kurt Vonnegut

Creative capital is my jam. I wrote about it in Thank & Grow Rich. My latest book, Art and Soul, covers nothing else.

Unlike financial capital, creative capital is virtually unlimited. It has no floor, no ceiling. And every last one of us has total access.

We don’t need money to get started, or certain conditions to be in place. We access our creative capital because it’s there, because it’s who we are.

I read a cool story about James Franco yesterday. He hosted Saturday Night Live last week, was just nominated for a Golden Globe for his new movie, The Disaster Artist. It’s about filmmaker, Tommy Wiseau, who is willing to do whatever it takes to access his creative capital.

Like the filmmaker in the movie, Franco let nothing stop him from pursuing his art. It didn’t matter that he had no money, no acting roles, no degree. He didn’t even have a car when he moved to Los Angeles to attend a hole-in-the-wall acting school. And, because he’d been fired from two previous jobs, he couldn’t even get a job waiting tables. That didn’t stop him. He was determined to follow his dream.

He finally landed a job at the one McDonald’s near the ratty apartment he shared with two friends.

And guess what? He practiced his art there.

“I was given the late shift drive-thru position. I wore a purple visor and purple polo shirts and took orders over a headset,” he says. “But soon I started putting on fake accents with the customers to practice for scenes in acting class.”

He tried Italian, British, Irish, Russian, Southern.

“People actually found them persuasive. I was asked to give Italian lessons to a cute young woman who thought I was from Pisa,” he says. “And I went on several dates as a thick-tongued kid from Bed-Stuy, even though my only brush with the actual place had been through watching “Do the Right Thing.”

Within a few months, Franco’s determination to mine his creative capital won him a commercial for Pizza Hut. He has been working in the business ever since.

The point is, there really is NO EXCUSE for not answering the door when the muses say, “Knock. knock.” You don’t need money. You don’t need the right equipment. You don’t even need talent, as Franco’s character Wiseau clearing demonstrated with his movie, Room.

Creativity is the province of all of us.

So roll up your sleeves. Get started today.

Pam Grout is the author of 19 books including E-Squared: 9 Do-it-Yourself Energy Experiments that Prove Your Thoughts Create Your Reality and the just-released, Art & Soul,Reloaded: A Year-Long Apprenticeship to Summon the Muses and Ignite Your Daring, Audacious, Creative Side.

Create like a kid with a pail of Legos

October 16, 2017 7 Comments

“Children see magic because they look for it.” ―Christopher Moore
lego
When it comes to creativity, all you have to do is channel your inner four-year-old.

Preschoolers don’t sit in front of a pail of legos thinking, “Nah! Not feeling it today.” They don’t wonder if they’re talented enough. They don’t question their ability, worry what someone will think.

They plunge in, unhindered, free, happy.

My friend Carla told a wonderful story about her granddaughter who was dancing with great abandon. A well-meaning adult who was watching said, “Wow! I’m impressed. Are you going to be a dancer someday?”

Carla’s granddaughter, without missing a beat, retorted, “I already am!”

All of us–even squeamish, frightened grownups–already are dancers, painters and writers.

Shall we begin?

The best parenting advice. Ever.

October 10, 2017 18 Comments

Children are remarkable for their intelligence, for their curiosity, their intolerance of shams, the clarity and ruthlessness of their vision.”–Aldous Huxley

Along with potty training and socialization, most parents want to give their children some kind of spiritual training, some kind of guidance into the higher dimensions.

Sadly, the most popular spiritual training involves a list of rules and no-no’s, a set of 10 commandments and a lot of reining in of natural impulses. Not to mention forcing them to get up early the one day they hope to sleep in.

Here’s what I suggest instead:

Make it clear to your children that the very best way to connect with their spiritual nature is to follow their joy. Those impulses of bliss and joy are God communicating. Any child (even grown-up children like myself) who follow that path will know God (or what I call the field of potentiality) in a very real way. There will never be any doubt about what to do next or which path to follow.

Because we’re taught just the opposite (you need to do this, you need to get good grades, you need to forget about running around and whooping like a wild banshee), most of us spend our lives wondering “What does God want from me?, “What am I supposed to do with my life?” It’s all there in living color.

If we only follow our “beeps.”

It’s time to spin love out of the threads of chaos.

October 2, 2017 60 Comments

“We all collapse a little; may it be toward each other.” — Richard Kenney unknown

I was going to blog this morning. Instead I went for a walk to look for God. I decided instead to run this excerpt from my new book.

Every time there’s a new mass shooting, I want to run to the bathroom, to vomit, to beat my fists against something hard and unyielding.

How could my country, the one I pledged allegiance to every morning for six years of grade school, have come to this?

Even though there is life to be lived today—this book to write, cookies to order for my finals-taking daughter—I feel drawn to these tragedies. I’m temped to sit comatose by the television set, watch the horror, and shake my head.

Yet, the squirrels still scamper up the tree to their nests, dutifully gathering acorns for the coming winter. They gather as loud humans barge in and out the door that’s only feet from their measly food supply. They gather even though a huge storm last year sent their nest crashing to the ground below. They gather even though death is imminent and life can be cruel.

A part of me wants to hide, to take my daughter and flee to New Zealand, where her dad owns a winery and, presumably, a more peaceful existence.
But it’s not a time to run away or to sit numb, helplessly devouring all the details.

It’s a time to act, a time to create. A time for making peace out of chaos, a time for spinning love out of the threads of incomprehension.

It’s easy for me to think, How can I, one insignificant person from Kansas, stop a groundswell?

But that’s me forgetting who I am.

I am a creator, made in the image and likeness of the Great Creator.
And I am not insignificant.

If nothing else, I can write about what these massacres mean to me. I know nothing about Sandy Hook, really. Other than a short stint at a breathing program in nearby Washington, Connecticut, I have no real ties to this little town.

Yet, the story is also about me. It’s about my anger, the many times I wanted revenge when someone rejected me. It’s about the times I lashed out when someone said good-bye or you’re not what I’m looking for.

It’s about the unhealed places in all our hearts, those wounds that make us want to hit someone back.

Why do we want to strike out? Because we feel powerless. Because we have forgotten who we are. We have forgotten that the life force of the Creator thrums through our very veins.

It’s easy to forget in this culture of convenience. No longer do we make our own bread, sing our own songs, dance our own jigs. No longer do we create much of anything. Too often we even forget that we can. The very thing that joins us to our Creator lies dormant.

And in this forgetting, we lose our footing. Picasso said that when he realized painting was a way to give form to his terrors and his desires, he knew he had found his way.

The boy who killed at Sandy Hook had not yet found his way. He conned himself into believing he was insignificant. He didn’t know that the life force of the entire universe pulsed through his body. He hadn’t yet come to appreciate the sacredness of each moment.

He didn’t know he could have screamed his rage and rejection into a song. He
didn’t know he could have danced his anger into a profound acceptance.
If only he had known.

It’s too late for him. But it’s not too late for us, all just as guilty of anger and rage as the killers we point fingers at.

You are powerful. You can create the answers to the horrors that confront our country, those things that make us want to throw up our hands, flee to foreign countries.

Inside you is a stage play that will inspire someone to forgive. Inside you is a painting or a story that can turn fear into hope, horror into peace. Even if it’s peace in one person’s heart, it is enough.

As Henry Miller once asked, “Where in this broad land is the holy of holies hidden?”

It’s in the squirrels still gathering their acorns. It’s in you.

Interesting jobs are the ones you make up

September 28, 2017 17 Comments

“Without you, the rest of us are without a source of many wonderful things.”—Leo Buscaglia

I heard an interview yesterday with Muhammad Yunus, the Bangladeshi Nobel prize winner who founded Grameen Bank.

Like me, he’s on a mission to overturn the dominant paradigm. The current economic model suggests that ambitious, talented people should go to college and then look for a job. With degree in hand, they should find a slot to fill within the existing structure.

But as Yunus whose bank gives out microloans points out, squeezing yourself into a slot is a limited ambition. By virtue of being human, you are innately creative. It’s in your DNA to be a go-getter, a problem solver. Fitting into a big machine will never be as interesting and satisfying as creating your own job.

Our culture, in case you haven’t noticed, is in the process of being rearranged. Thanks to the democratization of digital technology, anyone who wants to can create their own job. The tools are now available for all of us to be innovators, artists, inventors, entrepreneurs.

We live in a time when one person writing at the coffee shop can reach millions. We live in an era when anyone who wants can gain leverage and create a platform.

As Yusuf says, “All people are smart people. Being from a special business school doesn’t make you any smarter than anyone else.”

Right now, without securing another degree or taking another workshop, you have all the tools, all the resources you could ever need to create an insanely meaningful, productive and prosperous life.

Because here’s the thing. The world as we know it is toast. Nearly everything we counted on, invested in, believed in is, for all practical purposes, grinding to a halt. That’s why we’re seeing such dysfunction in the political realm. People who benefited from the old model are trying desperately to hang on in our rapidly changing world.

The old life plan (go to college, get a job) worked for a long time. It created jobs and wealth and lifted people out of poverty. But turns out, the American Dream, a term coined by Fannie Mae to convince two-income, post-World War II families to take out mortgages, has a Dr. Jekyll lurking in the back closet.

The only way to keep the old system chugging along is rampant consumerism. And besides, working really hard at someone else’s agenda will never satisfy our deepest needs.

But giving of our gifts will.

Any donkey can tear down a barn. But how many of us are willing to build a new barn, create a new world, an entrepreneurial world that works for all of us?

To echo the quote from Leo Buscaglia with which I began this post, your visions, your gifts, your creativity is sorely needed. I beg of you, please don’t deprive the rest of us of your unique vision.