I’m thinking starting as of January One, and the new year 2008 …I’ll do an “Art Piece of the Month”. I am thinking I will take suggestions from the community of friends that I have made through www.Twitter.com, and through my various shows and clubs that I am involved in.

My customers, friends and family always have great Ideas, so why not bring those Ideas to reality through an “Art Piece of the Month” or turning of the month.

Hey, sounds like a good idea to me, in fact I will donate 10% of any sold pieces to my charitable interest,”Homes for Pet’s Homes for People” found in my first blog post and currently being created by me and my company. My first piece in January is going to be a bit of a surprise! I am creating a theme piece for my buddy J.C. Hutchins who has a podcast at www.jchutchins.net. JC is a killer author who writes Sci-Fi, and my first “Piece of the Month” will be inspired by his book(s) trilogy 7th son. I totally recommend his podcast to anyone that loves great writing. Maybe J.C. will use this piece to help promote his podcast and promote the charity…..we’ll see!!!

The “Art Piece of the month” will be posted at www.flickr.com/keithburtis, and possibly will also get posted at www.etsy.com. I am currently looking into and researching a store front at Etsy….so any of you artists that might have some history or experience with etsy I’d love to hear how it went or how it is going. Thanks Guys!!! Comments as always very welcomed!

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GTD stands for getting things done! As Marina Martin of www.sufficientthrust.com would say…”The best way to start off a New Year on the right foot is to already be standing on the right foot in the first place!” She’s half genius and half practitioner and I thank her for all of the support she has given my unorganized ass!

I can’t say that I have ever been one to get motivated by a date, especially January 1^st of any year. I honestly can’t think of a worse day to try and start something being all hung over, and for the mere fact that everyone else is doing the same thing! As you might be able to tell, or maybe not, I have never been one to “Follow the Crowd”

This year however seems to be a bit different. As my business is beginning to grow, and I seem to have my thoughts in line with my goals, and in line with my actions, I am thinking this is going to be a pretty good year. Most people I believe statistically will be turning their shiny new treadmills into expensive clothes hangers by the middle of February at the latest. However, statistics aside of all of those people who fall off the cart by January 15^th and are back to eating like crap and smoking cancer sticks…. that I can assure will not be me. I already eat well, I don’t smoke, and I feel like I have no real vices that I need to overcome, so instead of overcoming and thriving…I’ll just take the path to thriving.

Hey, don’t read into this. I’m no angel, and I have my share of faults like everyone else, but I truly believe that what you think about will come about. I am thinking about thriving. I plan to take decisive action when action is called for and I plan to recharge the batteries whenever my body is pleading me to do so. As an artist, the phrase “Starving Artist” comes up a lot. I don’t plan to starve, I plan to thrive! The world is your oyster they say….and I’m not really sure what that means but if I have anything to say about it I’ll be pushing out pearls all year long and taking each step of the ladder as it presents itself to me.

This year I will grow my customer list to at least 40 regular retail outlets for my bottle stoppers and artwork.

This year my website and charitible contributions will grow!

This year I will get married to my love Michelle (Of course she doesn’t know this yet!)

This year will be the best year so far!!!

Make this year your best year so far!!! If your not pushing forward you’re dying. Don’t stand in that puddle so long that you grow webbed feet!

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The other day I had a question posed to me, and that question was “What exactly is your goal?” I guess the goal for me is basically what I outlined in my latter blog post, but the question was followed by…”Do you want to build a community, or do you want to produce art?” My answer was Both of course, and I guess this brings up the issue that many of us deal with in our daily lives whether or not we are artists, parents, business people, teachers, or whatever we might do. The issue of time, and time management, and how to maximize our output in all of the pools that we have a toe dipped into.

I love my art, I love my family, I love the outdoors, I love a lot of things, and I find it is not easy to make the quality time that is needed to accomplish everything that we feel we need to accomplish even if that just means catching a favorite television show and vegging out for a bit. So the question remains …ow do we find balance in our professional and personal lives? How do we “prioritize” our lives? And, should we prioritize our lives?

I’d love to hear if any of you have figured this out, especially the creative types. I would love to hear any comments that you might have to make an easy to follow system if there is such a thing. I tend to think that organization, scheduling, and sticking to a plan no matter what happens seems to be almost hereditary, or at least something that is passed down from parents to children.

What do you think? Can I change from the spontaneous, spur of the moment, creative artist type to the organized, strict scheduler, disciplined type? Should I even be trying? For me a blend of the two seems to be the right formula. It also seems to me that it is almost a necessity if I wish to make my dreams of becoming a full time artist, author, father, and successful marketer all come true.

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A few days ago, I sat in a Wendy’s eating a chicken sandwich, and decided I wasn’t going to read, and I wasn’t going to do anything really except think. No pen, no pencil, no nothing. I decided I would just get quiet, and listen to my inner self.

As an artist, I do this quite frequently as your subconscious tends to answer questions, provide creativity, and blast artist block. This particular “getting Quiet” session provided me clarity that I had been looking for ..for quite some time now and I would like to share that with you.

I have always, always, always been creative. I have always been entrepreneurial, and I have always been a giver by nature. I had been kicking around some ideas in my head and this is the result of my session:

I will be releasing my website to the world www.magicwoodworks.com and I am hoping to be able to utilize itto leave a bit of a legacy behind. We come into this world with nothing, and we leave the world with nothing….all we can leave is knowledge, and a sense of having given back.

My recent moment of clarity has provided me with the how to. My website will be featuring a new initiative that I will be starting called Homes for Pets & Homes for People. I will donate a percentage of sales from all of my art and craft work online and off to a soon to be announced no kill animal shelter, and a small percentage will also be given to the local Habitat for Humanity. I will have a link on the site that will offer a transparent view of how much was raised on a monthly basis as well as the running total.

Also, I will use iJustin Tv or a similar service to do weekly woodturning demonstrations where I will create a piece, interact with the followers, and auction that piece off at the end. These weekly Videocasts will generate a higher percentage for the charity…I’m thinking 30 - 40% will be donated to the initiative.

Finally, but I’m sure not the last idea is to hold a live turning marathon once a year where I will turn for some obscene amount of hours, maybe even get some guest turners, and generate more high percentage items for the charitable initiative. Auction off all of the items turned and donate 30-40% off all of the monies to the charity.

This was my thaughts…my moment of clarity…I feel this is what I will be able to leave behind in my wake. If any of you know me you know that I am not self serving….I truely love to give back and I hope that this transparent initiative will spawn many others like it.

I would love any comments, suggestions, or feelings that you might have. Thanks…………..

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