Every now and then, I get depressed about this blog. I worry that I’m trying to cover too much. I think that I’m aggravating the nerves in my hands (I have tendonitis in my forearms). I believe that I’m not as fast or prolific as other talented people we know. I ponder how I could work the same hours but get paid much more. You know the routine. I take what is a golden opportunity and start to believe that it’s nothing, that it’s worse than nothing. Darkness descends over my computer monitor. I feel a cold wind cross over my shoulders. Brrr. Ah hell, that’s enough…

No doubt you are familiar with this destructive mindset.

So I was greatly uplifted this week when I read a new book by Kenneth Schuman and Ronald Paxton, two talented life coaches, who’ve studied the life of heroic painter/sculptor Michelangelo Buonarroti and mined it for inspiring life lessons. The book is called “The Michelangelo Method: Release Your Inner Masterpiece and Create an Extraordinary Life.”

If you see living as art, and view your work in the world a creative act, you are primed for this excellent book. You get all the nuggets you’d hope to find in a conventional biography mixed in with the self-help maxims you need to achieve what the authors call “personal mastery.”

Ask yourself the question: Are you slapping paint on the wall, or are you adorning the Sistine Chapel? Then read on.

According to Giorgia Vasari, a contemporary Michelangelo biographer, middle-aged Mike was “coerced into working on the Sistine Chapel through the insidious efforts of enemies seeking to undermine his reputation.” The great artist wanted to finish up the Pope’s tomb at the time, and complete some 40 statues.

Paint on his back for years? No way. Not interested. He wasn’t even a fresco painter. But when called upon to do something important, he gathered the stamina to stand “high above the ground, his back arched in a painful curve, his vision strained, toxic paint dripping in his eyes.” He painted with his back in spasm for four years. And of course, what he finished remains one of the greatest human achievements in the history of the world.

Suffice to say that if you were to stand on the floor of the Sistine Chapel today, and look up, you could safely surmise: “Well, he really got ‘into’ it!”

So can you.

The two authors illustrate their points with case studies from their own coaching practices, which may pique your interest in finding a professional life coach or spiritual counselor, should you find you need one to give you an extra nudge.

Thank you, Ken and Ron, for lifting me up and helping me out!