A Shredder’s Lair, as you all know, is where people shred. And by shred, I mean, create, and by create I mean whatever. A Shredder’s Lair is the realm of no rules, no bedtimes, no limits and I think maybe it was invented by Radioactive sewer turtle marital arts experts or skater kids or both.
I got the keys to my Shredder’s Lair yesterday and immediately started moving in. I’m using it as my studio space for two months while I finish writing my record. I have been dreaming of a fort for some time and the opportunity arose to get one so I took it.
Here’s the thing. You gotta take it seriously and then also hold it very lightly. It’s time to have fun and work and have fun so that your work is on point. People forget. I forget that work and fun are more closely related than we think. One powers the other. One generates freedom of thought that informs the other. There are solutions and ideas hiding inside of fun and play. It’s not the Mr. Banks yelling at Mary Poppins way of work. It’s all Burt. It’s all Chimneysweep and street artist and everything in between type work so leave your briefcase in your car cuz you won’t need it.
I didn’t sleep well last night. I I was too busy turning flips in my head to rest. I was too busy thinking about plants and a counter and spray painting, “Hey, That’s My Bike” on a bedsheet to hang on the wall. I’m in a seventy five day cleanse where all I eat are carbs and quesadillas and I expand my capacity for holding life inside my skin. (It’s a different kind of cleanse…). My shredder’s lair is part of it. I’ve been working on taking up space for years and now I have a literal brick and mortar space to take up.
And you know what I did yesterday? I was all tip-toey and quiet and wanting to be a good neighbor by not making any racket. There I go being smallness again!! Come on, Dunbar.
Taking up space is what the shredder’s lair is about. Big enough for ping pong, indoor bikes, couches, remote control car races. Think that time John Ralphio and Tom went in on that ridiculous office space where Detlef Schrempf was hired to shoot free throws all day long. No limits. Even dumb ones. No limits.
You can’t work up to what you’ve always dreamed of (and by ‘you’ I mean ‘me’) just to put limitations on it all over again. It’s a sign to notice that we naturally put up walls and barriers even if we walk into a dream scenario. I notice I’m being cautious. I notice I’m not trusting myself. I notice I’m not feeling the green light of the Shredder’s heart to be as expansive and creative as I imagined I would be getting my dreams to come true. How interesting. Isn’t that interesting?
Then I remember how I coached one of my clients yesterday. Presence is a tool we can use to overcome bullshit. (I said it nicer than that kinda). Presence means being in the moment. Soaking it in. Allowing this moment to be your true reality that is a gift and in invite to bigger things. I want bigger things. I got bigger things. I am now being asked to expand my definition of big and presence and taking up space to include this too. So of course there’ll be resistance and of course the old voices of doubt and fear wil come up.
What do we do? We do what shredder’s do. We take it to eleven. We turn it up on purpose. We make some noise, ride around on douchey segways and race each other down the hall just because we can. Basically. I’m my own A&R development firm. I am my one client and I’ve been offered a contract to write a killer record. Who cares if the bathroom doesn’t have a sink? I can make a camp sink. Done it a million times.
The Eleven Lounge. Where we turn it up to eleven. And you can too. High five.