After not collaging or writing much in late fall, I wondered where my creativity was going. I actually asked myself this while spackling and painting my new healing space. I somehow forgot I was pouring my art and soul into an 11' x 11' x 11' room.
Need is the mother of invention. Months ago I left a rented office situation and didn't want yet another office that didn't feel like me. It finally dawned on me to transform the junky guest room into my new healing space. A tarot reader who knew nothing about my work expressed great urgency about home improvements, work environment, and finances. Doh!
My creative process over time went like this:
dissatisfaction, desire, visioning
incubating
research, investing, gathering materials
deconstruction, recycling
prep, painting, installation, decoration
test-driving, feedback, aesthetic fine-tuning.
Most of this is in collaboration with my husband, who has the can-do to complement my vision. It's contagious. I'm ridiculously proud that I installed the dimmer switch all by myself without burning the house down. I tell all my clients. I'm still in fine-tuning - I am a dimmer switch! Yet in a relatively short time - VOILA - I am sitting in a beautiful new space, ready to receive and happy to serve an abundant flow of clients.
The feng shui people are onto something. My new healing space is in the life path/career part of my house. How could we have let it get all junky?!? What's sad is that this is the very last room in our flat that we've upgraded to be all nice and beautiful. I'd been putting my livelihood last, a refugee without a proper home. For my work and my husband's the more beauty, grounding, comfort, quiet, warmth, the better. I'm grateful we know how to make an inviting beautiful space and that my healing work with clients finally, finally, finally has a room of its own.
*I'm leading collage workshops starting 1/31. Check out www.wildimagination.org/calendar.htm
Showing posts with label transform. Show all posts
Showing posts with label transform. Show all posts
Monday, January 12, 2009
Thursday, October 23, 2008
S is for Showing Up
I'm going to help a friend pack up for a move this weekend. This is part of my m.o., showing up at a significant turning point after a long absence. Maybe it's a dramatic gesture to be just as important as the everyday reliable friends. Or it may be the healer in me responding to a cry for help. Whatever the case, I can show up for my friend it that way.
My teacher Angeles Arrien holds that Showing Up is the essential power of the Warrior, the Leader in each of us. I try to gauge how well I show up and make myself available to life. Where is it easy and where is it more of a challenge for me to be present? This year I've learned about what I prioritize based on what's been easy to commit to and where I say YES. Writing, my family, my home, certain deep friends, a new training make me say YES. And I see where it's harder to show up fully in certain aspects of my work practice and exercise routine.
The hardest thing is how often we don't show up for ourselves. Our feelings of abandonment are transformed when we can just be present and meet ourselves consciously. No fixing or healing, just meeting. I've had the great experience of being received by my own compassion in Focusing. I've felt a necessary connection made by hearing my own words and stories read to me. I've known the back and forth of therapeutic touch. My body-mind is beginning to remember how to stay rather than run off. And it feels good.
It's a lifelong process, this business of showing up. What allows you to show up - in your relationships, at work, with your creativity, with yourself?
My teacher Angeles Arrien holds that Showing Up is the essential power of the Warrior, the Leader in each of us. I try to gauge how well I show up and make myself available to life. Where is it easy and where is it more of a challenge for me to be present? This year I've learned about what I prioritize based on what's been easy to commit to and where I say YES. Writing, my family, my home, certain deep friends, a new training make me say YES. And I see where it's harder to show up fully in certain aspects of my work practice and exercise routine.
The hardest thing is how often we don't show up for ourselves. Our feelings of abandonment are transformed when we can just be present and meet ourselves consciously. No fixing or healing, just meeting. I've had the great experience of being received by my own compassion in Focusing. I've felt a necessary connection made by hearing my own words and stories read to me. I've known the back and forth of therapeutic touch. My body-mind is beginning to remember how to stay rather than run off. And it feels good.
It's a lifelong process, this business of showing up. What allows you to show up - in your relationships, at work, with your creativity, with yourself?
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