While I Was Working-can you make spreadsheets beautiful?

Can you make spreadsheets beautiful?

The word in which I am living into this year is 
BEAUTY
The goal is to create something beautiful every day.
I did not realize-when taking on this word-that there would be many days when I went to bed at night never having created something beautiful.  
The recognition of this often hit me as I was laying my head on the pillow after having spent the entire day working.  
Now…instead of taking the road of complaining-where I mention that the type of work in which I earn a paycheck is not the type of work I want to spend most of the hours of my life doing (sounds like I may have taken that complaining road a little bit ;-) but instead taking the road of how I am going to create the type of work that I want to spend most of the hours of my life doing and that provides an amazing paycheck!  

How amazing would it be if all of us could live off of our passions literally :-)

As part of this endeavor I have done some research on how to recognize what stops me-whether it be fear (mostly of losing something I already have or not succeeding at something that is really important to me), time, money, family responsibilities, self-doubt (this is a big one), being wrong (this is a big one too), not having control, having to start again at the beginning, not being good enough or important enough-as a way of avoiding hearing the word "no".  
Recognition seems to be the access into turning it around.

Now that I know what it is that stops me-I can apply a simple statement to each reason and watch them disappear
The statement that I am drawn to is 
"What will you do with this one wild and precious life" ~Mary Oliver
It reminds me  that life is temporary -one go round- and because life is temporary why not live it wildly?  Perhaps not reckless abandon wildly…although that might be fun every once in a while  ;-)  but without so much constraint, contemplation and conformity.  I am also reminded of how precious life is and how important to enjoy it while it lasts.

Mary Oliver also said 
"Instructions for living a life.
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.
Pay attention-be present -this is a mantra that I repeat daily in my quest to live a year of beauty.  Simply to show up and be present-that isn't hard and yet it is astonishingly transformative.  In fact in typing that last sentence I realized that perhaps the days in which I thought that I had not created anything beautiful wasn't true at all.  Perhaps it was those days that I experienced beauty the most-in being present with one of my co-workers or my children or my husband or a stranger and really listening to them -connecting…
 or being present with nature-noticing a flower that I hadn't seen before or feeling the cool February wind on my face as I walked down to the local food store for lunch..or holding my face up toward the sun (Colorado has actually been very warm for this time of year) and really allowing myself to be enveloped by the warmth and the light (sounds corny but it does take something to be present in today's world-I find it especially so when I am at work).  After all-this is beautiful too isn't it?  

It occurs to me that once I have consciously made the things that stop me disappear-all there is left is action-because there is nothing in my way.
A friend of mine recently suggested that I read the book The Happiness Project.  I trust her and her insight so I downloaded the kindle sample and after reading it -went ahead and purchased the book.  Mind you-I am not even five chapters into it yet but one of the things from the book that struck me was the author saying "when the student is ready the teacher will come".   I took this to mean that once I have allowed myself to be free of my constraints and to truly see what it is I want to do with my one wild and precious life (btw: really delving into and getting at what it is you really want is another step in embarking on the life of your dreams-The Happiness Project and a lot of  the research I did on finding out what stops me addresses this as well) then the universe will open up and opportunity will find me-opportunity being the teacher.  This also took away one of my most daunting questions- "but how do I do it?"  
The how will be obvious... all I need to do is step into action.  

One final thought keeps creeping into my conscious as I write this -that is not to undermine the life that I have or to suggest that it isn't enough or isn't what dreams are made of…after all I am a very fortunate person with much to be grateful for and much to live for and much that is already a life of dreams.
Rather….to say that living the life of my dreams is finding the balance-between time and love of family and friends; between service to others and time to myself; between travel and home ...in melding my work life and earning life into what really lights me up and doing it all in beautifully decorated spaces ;-)  

Sorry for the long winded post.

If you are so inclined I would love to hear how you will spend your one wild and 
precious life….
(G-rated only please ;-)