Are you still accepting challenges, someone asked me earlier this week, which I acknowledged? But he then formulated a challenge I would never be able to meet in the three months I normally reserve to do them. He then confessed he came up with idea just for the sake of finding out whether or not I could pull it off in that impossible time frame.
At that point it was clear I needed to be clearer, much clearer about the idea behind the "connect to anyone" challenges. This blog post looks to address exactly that.

You know those shows on TV where people get a number of challenges like drink raw eggs, sit on ice blocks or break into a museum and spend the night there undetected, etc? It’s a sort I-dare-you-kind-of-a-thing that says quite a lot about the creative potential of the production team as well as the desperate need for their 15 minutes of fame on the participants’ side, in my humble opinion.

I mean, surely streaking through the local police office and spending the night in a morgue do indeed qualify as challenges, it’s just not the kind I’m looking to take on. Pinching the Ostrich isn't about taking mindless risks, it is about pursuing meaningful purpose.

In fact, reaching a challenges’ actual goal isn’t half as important as consciously live the process it invites you to experience. Take Cynthia Morris’ challenge for instance: “Create a painting that you love.” The reason why I love this assignment so much is that it invites me to experience what creating art could do for and with me. It doesn’t matter if someone else likes the final result, it doesn’t matter whether an art gallery would want to sell it or a museum that would like to have it on display. In fact there’s even no one else but me who can honestly assess whether I made it or not.

This doens't make Cynthia’s challenge a journey towards success in the conventional way. It makes her assignment a journey towards self-acceptance, a search for a kind of potential in myself I never even wondered about, let alone lost a minute of sleep over. I am now! :-)
And in doing so, I just might be allowed a look behind the scenes of the ‘real’ artist and live the doubt, the trial and error, the love-hate relationship one might develop with ones’ own work. And that’s exactly what I would consider a meaningful challenge. In fact that’s what makes it a perfect translation of what the “connect to anyone” principle seeks to establish. I thought It would be useful to shed some light on that.

Still, if eating an octopus’ arse is your idea of a daring feat, please, by all means, be my guest.

Take care,
Karl

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