Author Archives: Susan L Hart

Create, and change the world

I’m a firm believer that one of the easiest ways we change the world is by simply employing the creativity we were born with. You’re not creative, you say? Pshaw! I’m not buying it for a second! Think outside of the box of “painter, writer, musician”, etc. These are the artistic pursuits that we easily think of as creative, but creative is not just talent in any certain area. It is a way of being, an approach to life that can add color and vitality to anything and everything we touch. Creativity brings life alive.

Look inside yourself. There is at least one thing at which you are naturally adept, and there are likely many. You didn’t really have to learn it; you were just immediately good when you tried it. The best part is, it makes your heart happy when you do that thing.

The joy that you feel when you honor yourself vibrates outward and brings great joy to others. It also inspires them to do the same. I do believe that is a big part of life’s purpose, to express those special talents and abilities that we each carry inside of us. Create, build, and play!

You’ll be making the make the world a brighter place while you’re at it. 🙂

“Stop acting so small. You are the universe in ecstatic motion.” (Rumi)


Inspirational Creativity Quotes:

“We have to continually be jumping off cliffs and developing our wings on the way down.” ~ Kurt Vonnegut,

“Creativity is intelligence having fun.” ~ Albert Einstein

“Creativity takes courage. ” ~ Henri Matisse

“To be creative means to be in love with life. You can be creative only if you love life enough that you want to enhance its beauty, you want to bring a little more music to it, a little more poetry to it, a little more dance to it.” ~ Osho

“The painter has the Universe in his mind and hands.” ~ Leonardo da Vinci


© Susan L Hart, SusanLHart.com / Subscribe for my newsletter

River

I just read a post by my friend Alegria here on WordPress. I loved it so much I’m sharing a link to it in this post, along with two writings of my own on the theme of “river”. Because it all intertwines, you see. Alegria and I are friends, also writers, and part of the bigger river called humanity. We’re two tributaries intertwined in a gargantuan collective flow of thought, love, and learning.

Humanity is expanding right now. Can you feel it? We are all starting to realize that life is much bigger and more exciting than the small existence that the system tries to sell us. Life is, in fact, a soul journey. Alegria and I both feel that soul journey, so I wanted to share this post with her. And you. 🙂


I Am Ocean (Susan L Hart)

Snowflakes
falling softly
tentatively
pure, white
innocent
new life.

I Am one.

Earth
cold hard
dormant
I land here.
I am ice, I am lost.
I wait.

Spring comes
warm sun,
I melt into
playing, trickling
tiny Rivulet.

I am born.

Playful riffles
gently learning
to flow
to maneuver
to be Stream.

Time passing,
stream is good
but I want more,
then suddenly  –
rushing, roaring,
swirling, foaming

I become River.

Sometimes sunlight
flowing smoothly,
other times storms,
rocks, gashing
hard, struggling.

Learning
to be with rocks,
trees, sky,
other rivulets,
and streams.

I Am more.

Time passing,
waiting and
wanting,
with a deep
hunger inside
for vast.

And finally,
I let go
of myself
and transform,
to endless, infinite
water ocean.

I die.
I am born.
I Am One.


Both poems are from Soul Journey: The Poetry of Life, © Susan L Hart


Photo courtesy “Life Folk”, Pexels.com

River Tubing on the Layou Dominica Like the Flow of Life

And to continue the metaphor of life as a river, please take time for Alegria’s post River Tubing on the Layou Dominica Like the Flow of Life. I told her when I read it, even though I’m pretty fearless about the bigger picture of life, those nature adventures that could lead to danger scare me more than a little. That’s because I’ve had some frightening unexpected mishaps involving nature during my travels. Alegria’a adventure begins:

“The gentle nudge into open waters reminds me of the birthing process.  I’m not sure if children choose to be born, but they are pushed out into this wild world without a paddle or a rubber tube. At least I had each of those on my river tubing adventure down the Layou River in Dominica. Read “River Tubing on the Layou Dominica Like the Flow of Life” here.

Hope you enjoyed this read, and I’m sending good wishes that the river of life is taking you in directions that make you feel happy and fulfilled. 🙂

~ Susan L Hart, SusanLHart.com

Feeling Crazy

The level of craze
in the world these days, highlights
what’s still out of sight.

We humans invent,
on “progress” we’re bent, believing
stories we’re weaving.

But we turn our backs
on what it all lacks, the lies
and how the world cries.

If only we’d see
it’s Humanity, the All,
do we feel the call?

Together we’d heal
and we wouldn’t feel – crazy,
but only maybe.

We ALL must decide
in sane we’ll reside, make peace
will be the release –

from crazy.



Feeling Crazy @ 2025 Susan L Hart, SusanLHart.com

Finding Light in the Shadows

I am posting these poems today for some people close to me who have suddenly lost a longtime beloved friend. They are devastated. These losses rip through us, and how to find solace and meaning in it? In the case of “Loss Unveils the Masterpiece”, the creation of Michelangelo’s David is a metaphor for the beauty of our souls, chiseled to perfection over lifetimes by our loves lost.

These poems are dedicated to Peter Anthony Lubka. Thank you for the joy you gave to us in your time here, the lessons in your leaving, and may your soul now be dancing on the wind, on its way to the next adventure. We’ll be watching for you.


Loss Unveils the Masterpiece

Michelangelo knew …

A most powerful
tool of the Master Sculptor,
Loss is.
It was the taking
away that unveiled
breathtaking David
to the world.

“I saw the angel
in the stone and
set him free.”
Inside every raw
slab of marble
a masterpiece waits
to be revealed.

We are all
magnificent works
of art in progress,
and losing a beloved
is perhaps the
greatest Master
chisel of all.

We gasp, clasping
our hearts when
our loved one dies
or leaves us.
How will we ever
risk to love again?
And yet, we do.

For in our loss
we learn to cherish
the value of love.
We understand
the power and
importance of “now”,
and we grow.

Love is the fine grit
that hones the
rough broken edges
to a polished glow.
The answer to our
growth lies within
the problem itself.

Michelangelo, you said
God guided your hand,
and in the taking away,
you revealed
astonishing beauty.
David is your work of love,
and a lesson for us all.



Message in a Bottle

Chisel not my name
onto elegant stone,
so you that I love
might become slave
to a time and place
that no longer holds
my soul, to which you
could become tied,
lost in sorrow and
life’s limitations.

Rather, joyfully cast
my dust to the wind, so
I may dance on the breeze,
and one day as the leaves
rustle gently overhead,
you will feel me there,
riding a ray of sunshine
kissing your face, and
I’ll whisper in your ear,
“Remember to live free.”



Eternal Rhythm

The golden leaves fall,
fearing not the decay of
a coming winter.

Death is essential
to the renewal of life –
All will spring again.

If each in nature
can feel this simple rhythm,
so can humans too.

Why do we resist?
Our fears overshadow the
truth of our being.

But the fall leaves know,
they show us that we too will
green the tree anew.


All poems are excerpts from Soul Journey: The Poetry of Life. For this weekend I am offering this ebook free as a gift to readers of this post. Download here.

© Susan L Hart 2025 / SusanLHart.com

Terminus Happiness

You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.” ~ Albert Camus

Albert Camus said we shouldn’t analyze happiness or the meaning of life too much, otherwise they elude us. Socrates, on the other hand, apparently said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”


Terminus

Destined for HAPPY,
“Am I?” Always up ahead,
“Maybe tomorrow!”


My impression is that many people are searching for these two important things, and they are often deeply intertwined. Personally I think that finding happiness and meaning in life requires some courage and taking risk. Henry David Thoreau may have agreed with me. He said, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” (I interpret this as, afraid to take the leap to find their own fulfillment and happiness, but that is just my take on it.)

Confused yet? Perhaps the real point here is that the source of happiness and meaning in any person’s life is extremely personal to them, so let’s “live and let live”.

Reverence for life and respect for others is (I think) an important part of the journey, and therein may lie the seed of an answer. When we get out of ourselves (and therefore out of our own way), and when we focus more on what we can do for others, we begin to find happiness and meaning. So Albert may have been right all along…

Or, as the people at Nike would say, “Just do it”. Because the day you focus on where you will find happiness, is a day you are not really living.


© Susan L Hart 2025, HartInspirations.com / Subscribe


A related recent post on my Humanity’s Future Substack site: Doubling Down on Our Smiling