Inspiration

What INSPIRES us? What is there that might give us a “kick start” to live life to the fullest?

Last Spring the New York Botanical Garden had a wonderful exhibit on Emily Dickinson, the 18th century poet. Throughout the blossoming gardens were excerpts from her poems. At the entrance to the Children’s Garden was this thought:

Be inspired. Inspired: to fill with enlivening emotion; to stimulate to action; to motivate; to breathe life into.

What fills us with “enlivening emotion”? What stimulates us to action? What motivates us? What breathes life into us? And what do we do with this inspiration? How do we take action? How does this “breath of life” manifest itself in our works, our relationships?

I get inspiration from some very familiar sources and some that are a bit atypical.

NATURE - especially my walks in the Botanical Garden, Central Park, the Bronx Zoo, and vacation trips (the Pacific Coast, the German Alps, Florence, and Death Valley, to name a few).

BOOKS - and not just spiritual books or poems, although I am big on Henri Nouwen and Anthony De Mello. I’ve discovered that even novels sometimes provide the words or phrase that set my heart spinning and my imagination soaring.

TV and MOVIES - Star Trek has some very “spiritual” episodes that have clarified real life mysteries for me in a real way and helped to deepen my faith.

PEOPLE - Throughout my life I have been blessed to know good, ordinary, and extraordinary people who have inspired me. Some older, some my age, and some much, much younger.

Inspiration has enabled me to write poetry, to paint, to design programs and projects in my work, to start a blog, to look at my relationships in a new way. The list goes on and on. And changes from year to year. As it does in each of our lives.

What INSPIRES you?

Star Trek

What a treat my 2009 Mothers Day was! Dinner at Weight Watchers’ friendly Applebee’s and a huge azalea from hubby; a box of delicious, nutritious fruit, and 2 gorgeous bouquets from my kids. And then my son-in-law treated us all to the new movie – Star Trek.

I have already confessed what a Star Trek addict I am. I’ve seen all 5 TV versions over and over again. In fact, I watched 5 episodes of TNG this week and am currently renting DS9 from Netflix for the second time around. But I never really got into the Star Trek movies; one or two I’ve never even seen.

So how happy I was to be absolutely enthralled by this new Star Trek movie about the early history of Kirk, Spock and crew. From the action packed opening blast that treated of birth and death, I was totally hooked. The villain was nasty enough, the action was non-stop, the story flowed. Even the time travel didn’t give me a headache. And this film was funny; in fact, it was great fun! Enjoyed by 3 generations in our theater row alone. I know from the reaction of my 13 year old grandson who was sitting next to me.

But what really worked in this film were the characters of Kirk and Spock. To capture their individual personalities, and then to develop their unique relationship, was a gem of filmmaking. These young actors made the old beloved characters come alive and blossom for me once more.

I loved the ending, which is the opening of the first Star Trek TV series. I hope it means much more to come. Star Trek – Live Long and Prosper.

Star Trek

I am a huge Star Trek fan. I search the cable channels for reruns. I joined netflix just to view old episodes. And not just the original - I love Star Trek the Next Generation (TNG), Deep Space Nine (DS9) and Voyager. The only series that didn't thrill me was Enterprise but I watched it all anyway.

Star Trek has helped distract me during times of stress. The writing on most episodes was so superior to what is on television today. They dealt with social issues, intolerance, and much more in a way that maybe helped some of us look at our prejudices. And Earth (if not the Federation) had actually achieve peace in the 24th century!

But the episodes I really enjoyed were the "relationship" ones. Like "Companion" in the original series where an alien being sacrifices "her" immortality to take a form that Zephraim Cochrane (the inventor of warp drive!) can love with. I guess his love wasn't as unconditional as hers. And the TNG episode where Captain Picard lives a whole other life with a wife and family on another planet that has been destroyed for 1000 years. Or when the hologram doctor in Voyager creates a family for himself and then learns what it is to lose a child. Very strong stuff!

Star Trek has also touched on some very deep spiritual issues. More about those in later blogs.