I've been very busy with family birthday celebrations this month which haven't left as much time for creativity as usual. But to be truthful, I could fill that "I've been busy with....." {some excuse} every week/month - so really my problem was that I had fallen out of good habits of creating in the spaces between the busy. We all have challenges about finding time to create - I forgot to be actively creating in the 5-15 minutes chunks of time I do have. I explain the theory of micro-movements in full HERE, but the essential point is that you use every 5-15 minutes you have to do just one step - gather your materials, arrange your work space, thread your machine, add a layer of paint, add a layer of collage, find the mask/stencil, add another layer of paint, cut out found words....The effect of the micro-movements idea is 2-fold. Firstly, 5 minutes here and there can quickly build to 1/2-1 hour in a day, which is 7 hours in a week....Secondly, if I feel in a bit of a creative slump, I can trick myself by saying "I'll only do this for 5 minutes" - often after that 5 minutes, I'm sucked in :-) Once you light the flame, it's going.
This was a lesson from Effy's Moonshine class and was built up by layers.
Once I remembered micro-movements, I was able to move forward a layer at a time and then walk away to my next "busy" while that dried. I've taken process photos - none of the steps took very long in themselves, so imagine them as the 15 minute bursts I've described over a few days.
You were made for joy ♥
You can sign up for this and other classes with Effy Wild HERE. See my Flickr album of all art work inspired by Effy's classes HERE.
This was a BOD lesson from Session 1 earlier in the year. Effy shared her original artwork and the speed-painting version of this during her blog-along in April, so you can be inspired HERE. I love Effy's Bee, but I am more inspired by Butterflies and this quote is particularly meaningful to me at present "If nothing every changed there'd be no butterflies". Butterflies are a lovely symbol of transformation ♥ Rather than detailed thoughts this time, I'm just going to share a series of process photos. You can click on any to see them larger.
You can sign up for this and other classes with Effy Wild HERE. See my Flickr album of all art work inspired by Effy's classes HERE. Hope you are having a lovely week
I shared my new Inner Work Part 3 journal in January and now it's all finished. The end of the journal coincided with the end of July so I'm also sharing my new Part 4 journal here ♥ Whilst my Shine journal was very pretty and I love seeing all the taped edges, when I was thinking about what to use for Part 4 I came across an old hard cover journal with thickish pages already numbered. It's a bit grungy/worn down the spine, and the edges of the pages are a bit inky so I'm going to keep this one a bit more un-touched and leave the edges as they are
I began with the cover and decided to keep it simple by recycling a lovely birthday card - I love the sentiment and it's perfect for what I'm trying to do with these journals
Some of the pages inside had already been removed, and what remains look a good length to see me through to the end of the year. As I did in my previous journal, I attached a current photo of me to start and I also wanted an envelope for tucking useful things - again I used a recycled card featuring my word SHINE which is also key to guiding my Inner Work.
I taped over the rough edge where pages had been removed and added the Contents heading from an old magazine. I like to keeping a tally of my main subjects - doesn't have to be in alphabetical order, just a record to look back on.
And now for my review of the month past. July has been awesome despite some dreary winter weather - 2 weeks of school holidays, lots of creative projects completed, lots of jobs ticked off my list, seeing definite progress on my healthy journey, celebrated my 8th bloggiversary, and helped our eldest son buy his first car!
As usual, I kept a visual list of what I've been watching and reading - a lot more watching because of school holidays and seeing movies as a family ♥
This was my list of intentions for July now updated :
and here's how I've set up for August (click on the photo to read more clearly) :
As you can see, I'm focusing on "Presence" this month. And you can see some of the notes we got from Effy's Moonshine class where this is the topic for August. Her words beautifully articulate what I feel about presence, gratitude, shining, energy and magic ♥ She also shared some thoughts about Grief which are profoundly aligned with what I have been feeling but not put into words....Effy always posts with our monthly readings that "If you aren't reading the PDFs, you are missing about 85% of the class content" and I am getting so much out of this class even if I don't complete my own art from the project lessons (I watch every demonstration though). I am currently grateful for my writing practice, for my increasing self-knowledge, for my family, for my creativity, for where I am right now. I am also really enjoying this book :
Check out the intro via Amazon HERE. I relate to Lisa Congdon who says "Every year that passes, I become braver, and stronger, and freer. Getting older....{is a} gratifying and liberating process...Aging has led me to myself"
Written journaling also reveals me to myself. If you don't already have some kind of written journaling practice I really encourage you to start one. Check out all my posts about my Inner Work Journals HERE.
You can write whatever you like - brain dump, planning, frustrations, celebrations, capturing images/writings that inspire you - I have grown so much with my journals since beginning last year. It is great to feel intentional about the direction my life is going. Wishing you an August of love and laughter...and some written journaling xo
