Living a creative life, I am always sharing my story through words, art, images and experiences.  Capturing and sharing what brings me joy is an integral part of my daily practice and it both fills my well creatively and sustains my whole being personally.  Creative expression is the air I breathe, the water that flows all around me, and is the place where I dwell in every moment.  Though creating is only part of the equation.

Sharing who we are and what we create is where the real magic takes place, and in this brave offering therein lies the catalyst for everything in life… inspiration, togetherness, joy, healing, support, enlightenment, growth and so on.   After all, a song that is written and never sung aloud is just a seed of the symphony or the chorus it could be.  In everything we create with our hands, our actions, our minds there is potential, and this potential can never be realized until we send that possibility out beyond our grasp.

Often I find myself walking a fine line of keeping close to me what is most precious and private, and offering to the world what might be meaningful, enriching and touch the hearts of others (though it’s all meaningful, really).  There is a deep trust in knowing that all of the human experience is really universal.  I try to remember that what I encounter in my own life might be what helps to shake loose and tumble free happiness, discovery or validation in another.  So I create and I share and I pour myself into this virtuous circle of giving and always receiving.

Here I offer you what is written on my heart today, in this fleeting but expansive moment of every possibility.

Can you feel it?… What will you create and share?

by leonie allan

I forgot how healing creating was.
Just how much my soul needs and craves and longs for those moments I have a pen in hand, writing my heart out. Oil pastels smudging my fingertips into rainbows. Colour streaming across the canvas. Paint streaks on my legs.
In these nine months since I became a mama, I forgot.
I forgot to come home.
I forgot that making art wasn’t just that fun little hobby of mine that I could put away when I didn’t have time.

I forgot that making art was the place I healed.
Making art was the thing that let the stars in me glow.
I forgot creating was breathing. It was to embrace fully my life, my self, my soul.

I forgot.
I put it away in a cupboard.
I closed it with keys to make it baby safe.
And I said to myself, over and over:
I don’t have time now.

I was hollow and dream walking.
I wondered where on earth my dreaming juice went.
If my sparkle, my lover, had gone on holidays without me, if it had left me for good, if it ever thought of me, if it would ever come back.
I used to be the girl who turned up to parties late, usually with paint on her chin, and go home early because she had a hot date with a canvas that wasn’t going to paint itself, you know.

I used to be the girl who had a Things To Do This Life list, and she made them happen, thank you very much.

I used to be the girl who would make stuff wildly and easily. Who had creative projects up every single sleeve. Who had a studio, and a house that became a studio that we lived in.

The afternoon before I gave birth, I was finishing painting a rainbow birthing woman, and was writing & blogging away. And then an owl swooped in, and took my life. That funny, creative, misshapen life of mine. That one that was so filled with making art and making dreams. A life of my own.
And I became an abalone shell, one that existed to hold this exquisite little being.
A breastfeeding pouch. The bigger spoon. I became arms and boobs. The night sentinel, and the day sentinel too. I rushed to the toilet until I gave up on a minute of my own, and took her to the toilet with me. I took tiny showers, and ran out, shampoo in hair, everytime I heard her cry.
Life inverted from My Life That Existed To Serve Me, to The Life That Existed To Serve Another.

It wasn’t that I didn’t love her.
Oh how I did – and oh, how I do.
How could I not?
She is the brightest star in the sky.
A brave and joyful and sage soul wrapped in the tiniest of growing bodies.
She is a miracle, and is exactly the daughter I knew I would have.

I absolutely, unequivocally needed to have her. Needed to know this path.
Needed to give it all up.
And oh, how I did.
So I sit here, nine months after the Great Earthquake. Hands trembling over the words, staring out the window to yet another summer rainburst.
I gave it up – those things that made me dance – those things that made me me – until I knew I couldn’t live a life that wasn’t my own.
I did the impossible, and I began carving deep to find and get time – just for me – again.
Time to go home.
And where was home?
It started with a wild and messy imagining, fingerpainted and inked on canvas.
Twenty minutes while babe played at my feet.

And then I grew brave about asking for my sanity,
and I started disappearing across the meadow, into town and a little cafe.
Just for two hours.

I write. I doodle without tiny hands reaching up to help my paper disintegrate.
I fill out my own workbook. I start dreaming again. Writing out who I am, what I am grateful for and what I want in aqua, fuscia, lime green, purple.
I have my Folder of Leonie. I keep adding to it. Rainbow tabs.
I do my soul’s work.
And I find myself again.
I struggled that I was being selfish.
I struggled that I wasn’t a mama who was totally and completely filled just with the purpose of being a mama.
I struggled that that wasn’t my idea of The Perfect Mama.
But what I have learned?
This particular constellation of cells – the one they call Leonie – well, she needs and craves her art and creating.
She gets healed by it.
She finds herself again.
She is better for it.
And most of all – she needs herself and her art. The world needs her art too.
So I found the beat of my own step again.
One tripping tune at a time.
One step here, one fumble, one rearrange.
That sparkle inside me? My long lost lover?
I see it sneaking back in.
Little fireflies in my soul.
I’m rewriting my story.
I’m rewriting what it is to be a mama – THIS mama.
I’m telling it again and again.
I nearly lost myself in that great battle, that initiation of becoming a mother.
But I made my way back.
With a pen in hand, writing my heart out. Oil pastels smudging my fingertips into rainbows. Colour streaming across the canvas. Paint streaks on my legs.
All pointing the way home.
Making stars in my soul.
Here. Here is where I am.
You know, in all these years. Years of teaching other goddesses about the magic of creating.
Well, now… now I REALLY get it.
We women – we need our art. We need to dream.
Something magic happens there, in the space between pen and paper, between paint and canvas…
Souls glow, and come alive.
We awaken.
We remember who we are.
We breathe in magic, we breath out joy.
The world becomes glad again.
Whatever it is, however it works, I do not know.
I only know that it does.
And I am grateful.

It’s time my love.
Time for me to close this lid, finish this writing, send you all the love, grace and kindness you could possibly need, and complete and unconditional permission to give you what you crave and need and sigh for
Time for me to watch the palm trees wave like tall tango dancers with luminous lime afros.
The world is awakening.
And so am I.

Goddess Leonie is the creator of the online Goddess Circle & the upcoming Business Goddess e-course. You can find her at www.GoddessGuidebook.com

by michelle ensminger

I’ve been thinking about what I want to say in my column this month about National Poetry Month, and I decided I want to share a little bit of my poetry story.  You see I haven’t always loved poetry.  Wait, that’s not quite true.  I have loved poetry for as long as I can remember, but I haven’t always thought that poetry was for me.  I remember writing poems when I was a kid and then ripping them up because I was so embarrassed by how bad they were, and I was ashamed that the words didn’t convey the depth of feeling and emotion I wanted them to convey.  I spent all of my teenage years living vicariously through different friends who wrote poetry.  I’d let them write the poems and then read them aloud to me, yet I never considered writing a poem myself.  I just didn’t think I had it in me.  Poetry just wasn’t my thing.  After all, I’d sat through English class with a blank look on my face when the teacher asked us to interpret a poem we’d just read.  Even when she broke it down to just interpreting one line of a poem I’d still have a dazed, empty look on my face.  At some point I decided me and poetry just weren’t meant to be.

And then one day, in my mid-twenties, a magical thing happened.  Well, it was actually two magical things.  The first bit of magic occurred when I discovered Mary Oliver. I was reading a book a friend had let me borrow called Ten Poems to Change Your Life.  Right there in those beautiful pages was Mary Oliver’s poem The Journey.  It was like my chest cracked open exposing my heart, and rays of light shone upon it from heaven above.  In other words something just clicked, and I realized it’s not that poetry wasn’t for me; it was that I had spent years reading poetry that wasn’t right for me.

The second bit of magic happened when my supervisor at the time gave me a homework assignment.  For our next weekly meeting I had to bring a poem I’d written to share with him.  He even gave me several prompts to get me moving in the right direction.  Those first few poems were rough (and I admit I’m a little embarrassed by them now), but it was the exact encouragement I needed.  Once I started writing, I couldn’t stop.  I discovered everything was a poem.  My days, my life, the world around me were filled with poems.  And more importantly I discovered poetry wasn’t something “out there”, something outside of me and my life to be grasped and wrestled with.  I discovered I.AM.A.POEM.

So, this is what I’m trying to say…if you have also felt like poetry isn’t for you, I encourage you to keep reading until you find the poetry that fits you.  If a certain book of poetry isn’t making your heart sing or causing your knees to buckle, then put it down and grab another one.  The world is full of poetry and poets with varying styles and voices, and there is poetry out there for you.  Or even better yet, write your own.  Write the poetry that you want to read.  If you don’t know how, start the way I did—with a prompt.  Start with a word or phrase and let it flow from there.  Set the timer for 20-30 minutes and just write.  Some of my favorite prompts that I use over and over are the following:

• Sometimes
• Today
• Just because
• Today I hold
• I want to tell you about

If you don’t like the prompts I’ve provided, create your own.  Or start with a list.  I have a new project I’ll tell you about in the next month or so I’m calling List Poems, and they are simply that—a list I’ve made into a poem.  You can even sign up for weekly writing prompts at Poets & Writers.

Find your own way to celebrate national poetry month.  But whatever you do, banish the idea that poetry isn’t for you.  Instead find the poetry that moves you.  Write the poetry that leaves you breathless.  Because YOU.ARE.A.POEM.

by jen lee

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*and don’t forget to enter jen’s generous giveaway, below!

What’s the next best thing to sitting side-by-side on a sofa with sips of something warm and a long stretch of time in which to speak of the ways we seek to hear ourselves and to be heard? Something written in my own hand and spoken with my own voice, ready to inhabit your kitchen, your car and that sacred place beside your bed. Something that arrives in your mailbox like a gift from me to you, sealed with a blessing.

What’s the most transformational way to interact with stories, to play with new ideas and step into new perspectives like look-out spots with a view you’ve never seen before? Going at your own pace makes a difference, getting words off the computer screen and into your physical life surely helps, and having the company of kindreds is priceless.

The first in a brand-new series, this resource brings material previously only available at in-person workshops and retreats right to your door. It arrives ready to enjoy a long life as a companion and guide–in your bag, on your kitchen table, working its magic through your hands into your heart.

This Multimedia Course includes:

An Audio Learning Program, recorded in a professional sound studio, including the stories and insights shared in my Finding Your Voice workshop (CD, 52 minutes)

An Interactive Workbook in a resilient 3-ring binder with a full-color cover and over 100 pages of course material, black and white photographs, and countless exercises to walk you through powerful shifts and breakthroughs. Blank pages in the back give you the freedom to create more room to write wherever you need it.

A Handwritten Blessing from me to you on the workbook’s front page.

Private Access to a course-specific discussion board on jenlee.net, where you can enjoy the company of friends who are on this journey with you.

***want to win your own Finding Your Voice multimedia package? here’s a wonderful opportunity especially from from jen: simply leave a comment on this post along with your email address, and you’ll be entered to win!  one random winner will be chosen and announced here on 4/21 ~ good luck.

and for more details, FAQ’s, and to purchase your own FYV package, please visit here.

***and the winner is… sheila, of tea and toast!!! please email me with your info to claim you prize!***

by jennifer ackerman haywood

When Mindy asked me to be part of The Necklace Project, I wasn’t sure what kind of charm I would make. I’m not a jewelry designer, so I had some fleeting anxiety about contributing. But then I decided to just go for it.

And then life got busy. When the necklace arrived on my porch several months later, I didn’t open it right away. I was in the midst of distributing the second issue of CraftSanity Magazine and was as sick as a dog. The effects of overcommitment were weighing down and I was eyeing the necklace package with a twinge of regret. How was I going to keep all the plates in my life spinning and still pull off my contribution?

When the continuous coughing jags finally ended I opened the package and was immediately reminded why I said “yes” to this opportunity. Inside the padded mailer was a pink notebook and box containing the necklace that had traveled hundreds of miles to get to me. It was worn by a dozen women before me, each who made a charm to attach. This was a rare opportunity.

I tried the necklace on right way in my kitchen and felt like I had joined a community of creative women. There was no red carpet or fancy dress involved, but I felt like I was part of something very special.

I read the notebook in which all the women who wore the necklace before me had written about their charms and was moved by their stories and respect for this necklace as a symbol of connection and strength.

After looking over the necklace, I decided to add what I call “soft bling.” I love to crochet little motifs, so it seemed appropriate for me to add a crocheted heart. The red heart is symbol to remind us to find our passion in life and do what we love. I hope it’s also a reminder to do what we can to enable others to do what they love, too. I feel very strongly that empowering people from all walks of life to do what brings them joy is one of the greatest gifts you can give.

I realize it’s not possible to do what we love 100 percent of the time, but I believe that everyone on the planet deserves the chance to experience how wonderful it feels to be doing exactly what they believe they were born to do. Whether it’s to dance or sing or make an amazing piece of art or something else, this is my wish for everyone. We all deserve a chance to do what we love.

I decided to tie my charm to the chain because attaching a jump ring to the heart didn’t seem right for this piece. I secured the heart with a couple knots and then a bow. And then I made a wish.

After I returned the necklace to the box, I realized that I wasn’t quite ready to send it on. So I unpacked it again and tried it on one more time and had my 5-year-old daughter snap a few photos. And then I was ready to send it on.

by christine mason miller

by jenica mckenzie

we are all creative beings.  even as infants we longed to create: stacking wooden blocks to create towers and tearing them down just for the cheer joy of it.  seeing a beautiful meal placed before us and then painting with it, moving the textures in our hands, mashing it to bits and dumping it all over ourselves… creating yet another piece of art. ;-D have you ever given a baby a piece of paper?  this is what happens! when did we stop enjoying the simplicity of life unaltered?

so come back to a child-like abandon. being creative is part of your intuition, passed down through your very DNA. we are born to create.  and somewhere along the way, we allow voices of criticism (from those that lost their childhood openess) beat us down and tell us that living with our eyes and arms wide open to the joy of this world is something impossible.  and we put down the blocks and the crayons and we shelved our desire to create.  we told ourselves that it mattered whether or not someone liked what we made with our hands, forgetting entirely the joy that comes from making a mess on a table.  for one reason or not, we stopped playing in the dirt.  we allowed ourselves to believe that making mud pies was something dirty and not something that filled our afternoon agenda.

creativity doesn’t come in one box.  i am creative therefore i paint.  but that’s not all.  i’m creative because i can come up with a meal for seven people in 30 minutes.  i’m creative because i currently have six different types of milk in my fridge.  i’m creative because when i get dressed i can fashionably pair colors and patterns to create an edgy, yet comfortable wardrobe for myself.  i’m creative because when i look at the sky i take note of all the birds and wildlife in my view.

why are you creative?  can you balance budgets? do you have the ability to create spreadsheets in the blink of an eye? is your house spotlessly cleaned and organized? do you speak more than one language?  do you like pirates?  how about video games?  can you stitch a dress or maybe you stitch up a patients hand? do you bake yummy things? do you rock out in your car to the radio when you think no one is looking? whatever your niche is, it requires creativity.  you, yes YOU are a creative being.  and what you create matters.  it matters because it releases your stress, it melts away your tension, and it allows you to meditate on the things that are perplexing you.  this creativity strengthens you because it’s something you’re good at, it’s something that comes naturally, it’s a secret garden where we’re allowed to be completely and wholly ourselves.

so how do we transcend?  how do we embrace our inner messy creative selves?

i get it, we have to be responsible adults.  we have mortgages and car payments, we have to pay for our food and enjoyment.  and it’s hard to remember why we used to play, we can’t remember the emotional payoff from when we were children.  my daughter took a marker to herself today, up and down her legs, all over the walls and cabinets, in her armpits, even on her precious unicorn pillowpet.  i was so disappointed and angry. she ruined a lot of stuff!  i could only see it from my perspective in that moment, but i get it now.  because as i stand over a canvas i feel humbled to hold a pen to it, to see it take off and transform into a work of art. as she held the marker in her tiny hands she simply wanted to see what she could create.  how she could alter something that exists and make it her own.  so we make a comprimise, “you’re allowed to draw whenever you like, but it has to be on paper, and i will ALWAYS have paper on hand for you.”

we’re not going to be quiting our jobs to stay home all day and color pictures.  but we do need a safe place to cultivate that side of us again.  a place to get messy.  to me this is the heart and soul of Random Art Workshops.  being childlike makes us very vulnerable, being creative creates vulnerability, we’re leaving ourselves open to attack and outside criticism.  no wonder we don’t nurture this side of ourselves!  it’s SCARY!!!  so why not create a space where it’s entirely ok to get messy? in fact, that’s the motto: just get messy.  opening your home and your heart to others that are ready to nurture their creativity.  all of us in different circumstances with different abilities, but united in the promise to put that down for an evening, once a month at first.  dedicate that time to yourself.

but we also have to be accountable for that time.  we need the reminder to do it or we will procrastinate our own peace.  and this is where RAW bridges the gap.  having a group of people ready to walk forward together, a promise to allow this vulnerability to move each person, to share your life and your hearts as you create with your hands.  linking our minds and our hearts in one evening.  when you’re in that space with common intentions, the conversation will flow (and ebb, mind you) and you’ll realize it feels really good to tell the whole truth of yourself.  without relying on talking about anyone else to keep conversation going, but simply sharing your own truths.  because your truth deserves to be shared and heard.

but be prepared, because as you let down your guard, the troops of kindness will envelope you.  in this safe place where the paint is spilling or the knitting needles are clanking, something will happen.  real conversation, real worries, real life, real talk, real art.  the point isn’t to have a showing of your work, the point isn’t to create the mona lisa, the point is to nurture the child that is yearning to just CREATE something.

join our faceboook group to find and connect with other
RAW women in your area!

by nina gilbert

with the onset of longer springlike days, i’m constantly searching for ways to get out and live life with my three little ones in tow. for my kids, it’s not so much about where we go or how long we’re there for, it’s more about the fact that we’re out of the house. new environment, new adventures, new things to appreciate (and/or destroy, depending on which bean you’re talking about).

my partner-in-crime husband has stopped laughing at me and what he calls my “snack packs”. there was a time years back when he would chuckle before all our outings, jokingly asking if i packed enough snacks (and spare outfits, and emergency bad-weather gear) for the world. but now he knows the power of the snack packs. now we’ll be in the car and he’ll look over at me all hungry and thank me for always having the goods at the ready. now i don’t leave home without the good ole’ snack packs. but now i like to call it “zen in a basket”.

zen in a basket is easy, and i think it really works. take three kids (in my case at least…or even if you’re flying solo…the zen basket still has powers!) that have been cooped up. take one mama desperate to turn off the television and get away from the phone and be outdoors. my zen basket is a good two and a half feet by one foot- quite a substantial space to pack some serious snacks and fun. inside? you ask….i put lots of fruit leathers, a butterfly and tree identification book, a “field journal” for my daughter to scribble in, a camera, some bubbles, sippy cups filled with non-curdling beverages over ice, little baggies of munchable stuff, some wipes (peeing in the forest? a cinch. a blown out diaper? no problem.), flash cards, a collection bucket or some collection cups, all-natural bug spray, some water for the adults, various nuts and berries. the zen basket can be modified any number of ways- when i’m traveling solo i like to fill it up with random journals or volumes of poetry that i haven’t read in a while, a flask of the strong stuff (just kidding), some inspirational quotes and my 35mm camera.

the reason it’s zen? because i can be anywhere- the forest, the back of my cluttered van,or a mosquito-covered field, and i have my security basket of zen. i tell myself  “it’s ok. we can eat fruit leather and we can identify any tree around us. i can wipe a drippy bum that passes me by!” and life just seems better. it’s my mama security blanket.

disclaimer: the only thing is that you have to be ok enough with your hipmama-self to be toting around a huge-as-hell basket. and you can get into tricky basket-carrying situations if one or two (or more) of your children suddenly need to be carried out of said forest…but that’s another story for another day, isn’t it? carry the basket on your head and breathe in the zen.

let’s hear it for the basket of zen!

(originally posted may 1, 2007)

by connie hozvicka

Last month, my beloved Hansel handed me my very own camera.  Not just any camera.  An actual Big Girl Camera with lenses and fancy dial thingys.  He put it in my hand and showed me a little of this and something of that.  And now my life has not been the same ever since.

All of a sudden everything around me is in need of deep exploration.

I can’t look at a flower or a crack on the street without seeing its amazing beauty staring right back at me.  I want to pick it apart.  I want to get smack in the middle of it–up close and in between everything.  I want to see all the tiny pieces that make up the molecular structure of this Creative Juicy Life–that form my inner and outer landscape–that are the material DNA to my own actual being.

All of a sudden, I don’t want to miss a freaking thing.

But where was I before?   Why didn’t I notice?  How could this one little piece of technology change the course of who I am and how I relate to this big, beautiful world?  How could a click of a shutter create an earthquake in my soul?

Seriously–How could I have been sleepwalking through life for so long?

I want to know. I want. to. know!

But that’s the thing about creativity.  The thing about being an Artist.  The thing about the Creative Juicy Life.  And the thing about being human too.

We have no idea what’s in store.  We have no idea–as we dream of this–and wait for that–that we are actually silently preparing ourselves for something unexpected to come along and wow us to our core.

Maybe it is a camera.

Or maybe it’s a book you just couldn’t put down.

Maybe the way a poem makes you whisper softer or simply the feel of silk rubbing up against your skin.

But there are always things coming our way to help us remember again and again how very fortunate we all are–simply to be alive.

Simply to have a body to live in.

by helen stead

Hello! I’m Helen, the author of The Creative Diarist. Before I begin, I’d first like to thank Mindy for the amazing opportunity to guest write a post for Wish Studio.

To some myself up in three words I would call myself an artist, writer & a collector.

Today I’d like to share with you my top three ways of gathering creative materials to help provide inspiration, use as part of your work and also for making your studio space feel as lovely as possible. (Considering this is where I’m sure most of you spend the majority of your time!)

As a full time art student I ‘m always on the lookout for ways of gathering materials that are either very cheap, or even free if I’m lucky! In this post I will outline my top three favourite ways of gathering creative materials and I hope you will find them useful!

1. One Man’s Trash is Another Man’s Treasure
I am by nature a hoarder and a magpie for other people’s unwanted items. As a mixed media artist, I love to collect things and use them in my work or as a source of inspiration. One of my favourite ways of gathering creative materials is by scouring junk shops, estate sales, skips and car boot sales. Not only are they a brilliant way to bag a good bargain, it’s also a wonderfully creative exercise to think outside the box and to find a use for what other people would consider junk. An example of someone who does this brilliantly is Rose Holman from So Resourceful, she is currently completing 111 projects in 2011 where she reuses and recycles junk to create new and inspiring pieces.

2. Your Local Hardware Shop
A seemingly uninspiring place where you would go to pick up a few nails or a tin of paint, but a closer look will reveal that your local hardware shop is full of freebies that can be used for a variety of creative ways! Paint swatches and free décor catalogues can be used to create mood boards for inspiration on redesigning a room and free wallpaper samples can be an excellent (and cheap way) of decorating plain sketchbooks or journals. You could even purchase a cheap piece of MDF and revamp it into an inspiration board which can be used to pin up work, inspiring photographs, timetables and to do lists.

3. Your Own Home!
Totally silly right, you probably know your own home like the back of your hand and any creative materials you already have stored up in your studio space or placed away nicely ready to be used when you’re working. But sometimes it’s good to look around your home with a fresh pair of eyes and find ways of creating new materials with what you already have readily available. Old jam jars can be washed out and be used for storing lace, buttons, etc. Old photo albums can be dug out and used for the basis of a collage and washing line pegs and some string can be used in your studio to hang up inspiring images and your own work. One of my favourite artists Ruth Rae even redecorated an old ladder to use for hanging her collected fabric and dyed papers!

The idea of this post is to motivate you to think outside the box when you are searching for ways of gathering creative materials and to see the beauty in what other people are willing to dismiss or throw away. By doing this, you will not only save yourself tons of money, but it’s also lots of fun and a brilliant way to embrace your creativity even when you’re not working!

I’ve hoped you’ve enjoyed and thanks again for having me Mindy, it’s been a pleasure!