Tend the Sparks Consulting

practice & moments that bounce off each other

I now cohabitate with a puppy who—I am not exaggerating—yawns like a baby dragon. It’s heartbreakingly cute. He cracks me up, even when he sasses me, and appears to have given me his baby dragon heart, which I endeavor to keep deserving. “Ball” is becoming a thing, and teenage phase is imminent. Pray for me.

Fractals of resilience felt like the thing to do in light of the times and puppy-mom brain. The first time I published fractals of resilience was in March when I was mid-move. Now, I am mid…something. TBD. This little dog and I are figuring it out together.

As a refresher: by “fractals,” I mean the tiny things that interact and determine how larger things emerge. For us humans, fractals are moments, choices, and interactions that make up a day, and ultimately, a life. These moments bounce off each other to form our relationships, organizations, movements, and cultures. I love how adrienne maree brown puts it: how we are at the small scale is how we are at the large.¹

Resilient people are particularly good at seeing and calling upon the fractals that fill them with awe and make them smile when things get tough (hence fractals of resilience).² It’s easier to pause and notice, then respond (rather than react), even rebuild, when we’re feeling more in touch with both the grit and goodness of being a human. We’re at our most creative, kind, and powerful when we act from that place. 

Some days, I find it annoying that resilience is a lifelong practice rather than an acquired skill. Fractals and poetry help. When I get over myself, fractals of resilience are like the little rainbows that beam out of prisms: they can land anywhere and soften whatever they touch. They could also be called gratitude. I’ll take a rainbow as a source any day. A few of the shiniest fractals from an Oregon summer full of rapid change. I’d love to hear y’all’s!

• Laughing so hard while tubing that I could barely hold on
• Picking up my puppy, Blaze, and him riding shotgun with his chin on my hand
• The (now) 5 of us Coxons walking around the ranch and cramming into the house, dog 1 stoically ignoring dog 2 wherever possible
• Meeting my sister’s horse
• Camping with Blaze in my dad’s favorite place on the way back home
• Blueberry season
• Celebrating 24 years of my yoga studio and exchanging actual words with people I’ve spent hundreds of silent hours practicing with
• The end of a rigorous PCC-level coach training program; the beginning of a new phase of learning as a coach
• Rediscovering a great Ethiopian place with a favorite human
• Photo updates from an adventuring sister
• Windows down, radio up weather
• That tomato plant smell that sticks to you when you brush by
• Much silliness camping on a special stretch of coast
• A cricket outside my window
• Reconnecting with an old friend
• The mariachi opera, Cruzar la Cara de la Luna, from a green grass seat (SO GOOD)

-Cheyenne

photo: Blaze. I hear, “His EARS!,” a lot 🙂

1. *chef’s kiss. from Fractals in Emergent Strategy. I’ve never met an adrienne maree brown book I didn’t like. ↩︎
2. There’s a big difference between resilience and spiritual bypassing or positivity as a platitude. One acknowledges, without minimization, that people and life sometimes suck and practice staying connected to each other and deep wellsprings of resilience anyway (on the whole). The other minimizes suffering and difference (our own and others’) in the name of things that might look pretty on the outside (and are true) but can be consciously and unconsciously used to avoid feelings and responsibility. They also often ignore the importance of context and nuance. Examples of truths commonly abused in this way: “we are interconnected and interdependent in the grand scheme of things,” and “love is the long and short of being alive (i.e., nothing else matters much in comparison).” ↩︎