“It’s about connection with others.  And it’s also about staying connected with  yourself. As to why you’re doing this.  Why are you writing? Why are you drawing? What are your motivations?  And try to keep attentive to that. And so, by extension, you need to listen to yourself and you need to listen to others.” —Liza Donnelly. When I work with clients on speaking out and having a voice, I usually mean it literally. In this wonderful video, New Yorker cartoonist, Liza Donnelly, reminds us that self-expression is both vital and infinitely creative. Liza draws as she speaks, so we witness…Read on.

I follow the work of New Yorker cartoonist, Liza Donnelly, and have been watching her drawings of tiny, quotidian moments in the lives of New Yorkers. This drawing arrested me with both its simplicity and its detail: the tilt of the dog’s head, paying attention to Liza as she draws, the man, eating a sandwich. She writes:

“To me, life is about the small things, the individuals. New York City is made up of so many wonderful individuals, in fact it’s what makes the city.”

The other day when I was trying to meditate, instead of letting my thoughts float by, I was caught by a deep longing to have work like Liza’s, work that demands that I simply stay still and pay attention—to be absorbed by others, by the poignant beauty that makes us human. Then I thought, but of course it does! Everyone is allowed to, invited to, pay attention to the world around us. My work is all about connecting with others. How can we possibly connect with others if we don’t take them in?

Read on for more on paying attention…we are all invited to witness our world with wonder.