Whimsical Paintings and Magical Mind Tricks for Joy
A sharp stone.
A dull blade.
A longing to stay
and a need to go.
Light and dark.
Love and hate.
More than I have now,
but less I can pay late.
The world swims in mercury
pools of Duality.
Bending to our every form,
thick cold layers of silver doubt.
Thrice she knocked on my door,
and at the third rap,
I finally heard her cackle
and laughed myself at the synchronicity.
Paradox.
Duality.
Always the Trickster. [Read more…]
More and more I’m drawn to write.
I can feel it, calling to me. Tugging at my shirt hem.
A warm whisper drawing me near. A temptress that until now, only comes to call on my doorstep and rarely stays past tea.
But I desperately want to make a home in my heart for writing. I want to snuggle into its velvet love-seat and find Myself there each time.
I want to write every day and make it a practice, a ritual, an act of devotion.
But I’ve written to you so little this past year and it leaves me feeling stagnant and stifled and honestly, a little nervous to begin again.
Nervous that you won’t like what I write about, or that I’ll be a bother, or that my voice will slip away from me again, as it has these past years.
This is what happens when you get out of practice with your craft. Your biggest obstacles become the irrational doubts you whisper to yourself in the night.
But through great friends and new inspirations, I find her, the Muse, calling to me again and again.
Write! Write! Write!
Ideas swirl inside me like colorful galaxies of glitter. Pinks and emerald greens and gold. Waiting to be plucked from the stars and strewn down like watercolors on the page.
And through years of creation, I know that if I do not heed her calls, the ideas will fade and slip away from me, and I will feel empty and unexpressed. A failure of a vessel.
It’s a burning emotion that I must constantly stave off in both my painting and writing practices. And a difficult task with as little writing as I’ve finished this year.
My main fear in writing has always been that of being a burden or a bother. Of taking up space. Of sucking. And I’m just realizing as I write this, that this fear is now met with a new, paradoxical fear of not writing enough, of not being in service enough. Of not taking myself seriously. Of not doing the work I am called to do.
For my biggest fear in life is that I will get to my end, having not sought out the things in my heart. It is why I do so many things that I do and why I follow my passions with so much faith.
And it is because of all this — The inspiration. The new bellow I hear like an elk in the night. The light breeze of Time chilling my back. These tumultuous, but strangely creative times, pregnant with an uncertain future — that I must pick up my pen again, and write with more fervor than ever.
For I have wet my toes in the starlit lake and felt the cool crisp water reflecting a full moon’s gaze… And I now crave to slip below the surface and tumble in the mystery of midnight waters. Probably naked. Probably both scared for my life and exhilarated.
So I dive.
And I will start by publishing articles weekly, vs. monthly. (or bi-annually, ha!)
While this seems like a big leap in my mind, it’s not in my heart. It feels necessary, and expansive, and fun. Like a thoroughfare to a new time in my life.
I’m sharing my new goal with you to give myself some public accountability, and also to invite you to swim along with me.
If you’d like to receive my new weekly writings (or a monthly round-up) on creativity, life, love, and laughter, then I invite you to sign up for my newsletter here.
If you’re already a subscriber and would like to switch to receiving articles weekly (instead of monthly), simply update your preferences at the bottom of any of my emails.
Thank you from the bottom of my heart for following along with this journey of mine, in any way that you do. It means the world to me that you take the time to look at my art and read my words. That my truth is heard by you, and that sometimes, it makes a difference.
Much Love,
PS. I’d also like to send a special thank you to the women artists around me who’s passion, drive, and creativity inspired me to take this dive:
OG Mama Wildling and my first writing friend(!): Devon Loftus
Accountability Partner and all the crystals and kittens: Lisa Ellefson
Makes my heart squishy wide open: Cortney Kelley
Giggles and flowers and hugs: Carissa Dickson and Iana Franks
Dream-chaser, joy-seeker, and entrepreneur extraordinaire: Kristina Wunsch
And my go-to going crazy relief and passion-chaser: Holly Anderson
You guys are stars. Thank you for having the bravery to follow your dreams and do the work in your hearts. It gives me strength, inspiration, and all the warm and fuzzies to call you my friends.
Poplars awaken with the first crisp, life-giving breeze
as Spring turns to Summer.
Like winter snow, melted and racing down mountains into swollen rivers,
Poplars hold the melting winter winds.
And you can hear it.
The constant break of the ocean
As each leaf is pressed upon by the wind
Dancing and spinning in all directions
Anchored to the Earth by unyielding little fingers and wild arms.
And like great waves
crashing and thrashing upon shorelines,
The poplar glitters and vibrates.
It Pulses.
With more movement than the human eye can follow,
Like static.
Each leaf,
A wild, dancing ripple in a wave.
Together,
Vibrating in unison like the sea.
Not fighting with the winds,
But dancing with them.
A most haunting and wondrous dance.
Scanning through social media, with nothing good to see.
I keep checking it, checking it, as if I’m looking for a piece of me.
I know it isn’t here, but I keep trying to fill up,
This hole that gapes inside of me each day when I wake up.
People try filling it with shopping, drinks, or drugs.
People try filling it with people, screens, the buzz.
But slowly I’ve been learning, that this isn’t where it’s found.
You can’t fill it with externals, YOU must break the ground.
You see I recognize my soul’s craving, and it’s definitely not this.
My soul craves music, magic, bliss.
My soul wants to write. to paint. to dream.
My soul’s a huge creative river, not a passive stream.
And soul’s can’t rage, when they’re looking at a screen.
Soul’s can only shake the earth when we choose to give them heed.
So when you feel more’s coming in, than there is going out
It’s time to tip the scale, before life’s lights go out.
Because you only have this one day, this hour, this moment
To use your gifts, to bring to life, why you were put here on this planet.
♥♥♥
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Candles are lit, heat is pumping.
Things have been stewing in the blackness of nothing.
Now comes time for the breaking, burning, un-mending.
Lean in. Breathe.
Let the winds unravel you until you no longer resemble the thing that you Were.
Lean in. Breathe.
The solstice is coming.
The darkest of nights.
The solstice is coming, and bringing with it, the light.
So go deep, go dark.
Burn down to your cinders.
The world is born anew in the darkest of Winters.
