What would Sherlock do?

This Halloween I transformed into one of my literary heroes. It didn’t take much to make myself over in his familiar image – a deerstalker hat and a pipe purchased online and a wonderful vintage Donegal tweed cloak.

The inside, though: that’s the real magic.

I’m not nearly as smart as Sherlock but I do share his tendency to observe and to notice. Like him, I play music when I’m moody, and I love puzzles, trains, and climbing hills. What I love best about him is the joy he takes in inquiry and in his utter conviction that there is always an explanation and that he will do his utmost to find it.

Sherlock energy, to my mind, includes a robust and pleasurable grappling with problems, a purposeful direction and expenditure of energy, and the thrill of being on the hunt and exercising your creative and intellectual powers for a good end.

This is an energy I call upon when I’m flagging, when I’m confronted by a conundrum that appears overwhelming, or when I need a dose of sly humor with a good heart.

I don’t need to wear a costume to call upon Sherlockian energy. Nor do you. We can summon instant help, instant inspiration, instant clarity, instant joie de vivre, if we’re willing to play this little imaginative game and ask:

What would Sherlock do?

What would Nelson Mandela do?

What would Paul McCartney do?

What would Julia Child do?

What would Joy Harjo do?

What would a fox do?

What would fire do?

What would kindness do?

The possibilities are endless.

Deerstalker, pipe, and vintage cloak: optional. But when the game is afoot – INVALUABLE!