Entries from: February 2009
Creative Every Day Challenge Check-In: February 16th – February 22nd, 2009
February 16th, 2009, Comments (35)
Feel free to leave a comment on this post or use the "Mr. Linky" widget below to link to a post (or posts) about your creative activities during the days of 2/16/09 - 2/22/09.
The widget below is an optional method of sharing your creativity that makes it easier for others to check out what you're up to. You can use it to link to a blog post or posts during the week listed. Or if you have a bunch of posts and don't want to link to all of them, you can link to your main blog page once. Do it in a way that makes sense and is fun for you! You can also take advantage of the great CED flickr group to post your images and see what others are up to.
To find out more about the Creative Every Day Challenge check out the details here.
If you want to sign up to be a part of the challenge, leave a comment on this post or email me to let me know (a link to my email is in the sidebar.) When you contact me, please let me know how you'd like to be listed in the list of participants, which resides in the right sidebar (I can list you as your name or as a link to a blog if you have one. A blog is not required to participate!) Please email or comment to let me know you're participating before you start posting links in the Mr. Linky widget.
The totally optional theme February is Words! I'll be posting about the theme throughout the month. You can find out more about how you can use the themes here.
Happy Creating!!
"Not every thing you create will be a masterpiece, but you get out there and try. Sometimes it happens, the other times you're just stretching your soul." -Maya Angelou
**p.s. In the transition to my new server, I may have lost some of the Creative Every Day participant links. Please check to see if your blog is still listed in the right sidebar. If you don't see it, let me know and I'll add it again. Thanks!**
I love you
February 14th, 2009, Comments (20)
I've been thinking a lot about self-love lately. And with today being Valentine's Day, it seemed like a great time to bring it up.
Last week, I was listening in to a free teleclass with the lovely, Havi Brooks, and she was discussing being a "Habits Detective." During the call we were invited to take a closer look at a habit in our lives that we want to change. For me, this habit revolved around self-care and taking care of my body.
When I went inside, I realized that part of the reason I'm not taking excellent care of myself is that I fear getting obsessive about it.
About ten years ago, I got so obsessive about my body that I was weighing and measuring every morsel I ate, I barely ate any fat, and I worked out six days per week. For some people this may work beautifully, but I was absolutely miserable. All I thought about was food. If I didn't get in a workout, I would get extremely irritable. And on top of that, it was never, ever enough. Sounds like hell, right? It was. Well, eventually, I got to a point where I was looking ill and when a doctor recommended adding some fat (like peanut butter) to my diet, I went to the complete opposite extreme and ate every "bad" food in sight.
Fortunately, I'm not in that obsessive place any more. But I didn't realize how much fear of going back to that place was holding me back. I've been afraid of going back to that miserable place of "it's never good enough." And increased body awareness has a tendency to lead me to feeling bad about myself, no matter where I'm at.
I'm realizing that I need to love my body where I am in this moment and the next and the next. I know that movement and exercises is part of what keeps me feeling healthy, vital, energetic, and creative.
This week after doing some yoga, I was lying in savasana and had another realization. I've been feeling somewhat icky about "self-love." No matter what I know logically, it sounds selfish and self-absorbed. In my head, I heard the "not good enough gremlin" saying, "Who do you think you are?"
And my answer? "I am special enough to be loved."
Confidence begins in that place of knowing that you are loved, first and foremost, by yourself.
I cringe a bit around this stuff. I still feel funny about it. But I can play with the idea of self-love. I can practice it. So far the practice has made me feel wonderful. Below, is something I did spontaneously and was helpful. If you'd like to practice some self-love, give it a go!
Try this: Get in a comfortable position. Savasana (copse pose in yoga) works well, but you could find a cozy spot in your favorite chair, prop yourself with pillows in bed, or just ground yourself whereever you are right now. Imagine a tree root growing from the base of your spine. Imagine its roots stretching through the floors of wherever you are into the deep, dark earth beneath. These roots are grounding you. Now consciously relax every part of your body, starting at the tips of your toes, to your feet, your ankles, your legs, your pelvis, your stomach, your chest, your arms, your hands, your neck, your back, your jaw, your face, your scalp. Let your whole body melt into the floor, chair, or bed. When you are completely relaxed, imagine your body being filled with the light of your own love. Let it start small and grow. Let that love expand to include every cell of your body and then let it grow to fill the room you're in, then perhaps your neighborhood, your town, your state, your country, the world. Then if you're able, say to yourself, "I love you, I love you, I love you."
p.s.
- - The art above was my Valentine's Day card to the Hubster. I was inspired by the Inspire Me Thursday theme of "fold" and it also fits so nicely with this months word theme for the Creative Every Day Challenge!
- - Speaking of art and words, The Creative Type scrapbooking blog is hosting a special Valentine's Day prompt of "Love Letters" and I'm sponsoring it! You can submit your own layout before March 1st and the winner will receive one of my Subway Stories prints! Check out all the details here.
- - Make your own candy heart like the one above at ACME Heart Maker. I don't know about you, but I think those candies taste awful. But they sure are cute.
Creative Muses, Magic, and Synchronicities
February 12th, 2009, Comments (23)
I absolutely loved the TED talk given by Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love, in which she discusses where creative inspiration comes from. I heard Gilbert speak at a small Boston bookstore a couple years ago and she's super funny and personable.
During the bookstore talk, Gilbert talked about her experiences with synchronicity and asking for signs. I could relate to her stories as I refer to my own experiences with synchronicity as "winks from the Universe." Walking back to my car after the talk, my mind was all abuzz with thoughts about synchronicity and the meaning of signs. Just then I looked up and saw a huge fabric sign pinned the building across the street that said,
It's a sign!
Ha! Well, the Universe seems to have a sense of humor. Or I'm totally bonkers. Or both.
In the TED talk, Gilbert talked about how in ancient Greece, people believed that creative genius came from a source outside the artist, something like a daemon or Muse that would provide the artist or writer with their material. She was playing with the idea of returning to this ideal as a way of taking the pressure off of artists (as in, "It's not my fault this book sucks. My daemon is lame-o!") and also lessens the artist's ego (as in, "I can't take full credit for this piece, my Muse gave me the idea.) Now, this may sound far-fetched or odd, but I can understand it to a degree.
I often don't know the meaning behind my artwork and its symbology until much later. I say that it comes from my intuition, my higher self, or my subconscious. So, why not call it a Muse? Would that help take any of the pressure off? I'm not sure, but it's an interesting idea. It reminded me of parts of The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron, which talks about being a conduit or a channel.
Yesterday, I was musing on Twitter about whether or not these ways of getting ourselves creating are just trickery, but then I came back to this: Does it matter? Whatever works! As skeptical, cynical, or cautious as I may be, when it comes down to it, I'm also open to the possibility of all the things in the world that I can't explain or understand. I'm open to the possibility of signs, intuition, and synchronicity. It certainly makes life more interesting. And who couldn't use a little more magic in their life?
What would happen if you were open to the possibility of synchronicity, signs, and intuition in your creativity? What if you just played with the concept of it? What sort of expression might that lead you to?
No matter what your feelings about where creative inspiration comes from, it is helpful to take the pressure off ourselves (which is why I love to give myself permission to make "bad" art. It helps!) In her TED talk, Gilbert encourages us to forge ahead:
"Just do your job. Continue to show up for your piece of it. If your job is to dance, then do your dance. If the divine, cockeyed genius assigned to your case decides to let some sort of wonderment be glimpsed for just one moment for your efforts, then Ole. And if not, do your dance anyhow. Ole to you, nonetheless, just for having the sheer human love and stubbornness to keep showing up."
Poems to Make Your Heart Sing
February 11th, 2009, Comments (15)
Poetry is much like painting with words. It stirs in me a sense of wonder and sparks my imagination. Sometimes I have trouble sitting still long enough to linger in it, but when I do, I'm almost always happy that I did.
Today, my painting "Dreaming of the Seven Sisters" is featured in the sidebar of Breathing Poetry, a blog that features wonderful poems from a variety of poets.
What poems make your heart sing? We can all play with words and turn out poetry. It may not be perfect or beautiful, it may not rhyme or fit a particular style, but it will be your own unique expression.
I recently discovered the work of Billy Collins. Delicious use of words. Check out his Introduction to Poetry or you can listen to him read some of his poems here. Rumi is another eternal favorite and then there's Pablo Neruda, Mary Oliver, and Margaret Atwood.
I've used poems as the source of inspiration for artwork, sometimes just a line of poetry will spark a painting idea (in the piece above the line became a main feature.) There are so many ways art and poetry can blend together.
Has poetry impacted your work? If you're a poet, do you ever use your poetry in other mediums? Is there a way you can incorporate poetry into your creative life this month? Or could you use a poem as the jumping off point for your next creation?
I'll close with a bit of Rumi to inspire you today:
The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you.
Don't go back to sleep.
You must ask for what you really want
Don't go back to sleep.
People are going back and forth across the doorsill
where the two worlds touch.
The door is round and open.
Don't go back to sleep.
Needing Your Words
February 11th, 2009, Comments (15)
Hello All,
I'm working on a magazine article and I need your help! I need some feedback or testimonials about your experience with the Creative Every Day Challenge (either this year or last year). Any details about what the project has meant to you, what you've been working on, what you've learned, etc...
Of course, I'd love to hear any feedback you have any time, but for this project, I need the info as soon as possible! You can leave a comment on this post or email me at leah0776 at gmail dot com.
Thank you in advance!!
The Cat Craziness Continues
February 10th, 2009, Comments (8)
I can't help myself. These cute kitty videos just kill me! The one above gave me a good laugh (don't you wish you knew what they were thinking sometimes?) And then the animated feature below is basically a snapshot of my husband's life. I saw it on Jamie's blog yesterday and sent it immediately to the hubster. We both got a good kick out of it. 
Full Snow Moon
February 9th, 2009, Comments (12)
full snow moon
I have this funny habit of painting the moon right around the time of the full moon (without realizing the timing of it until after the fact.) Something in me seems to be quite tuned in to the moon's cycles.
When I sat down to paint this image late last night, I wasn't intending it to have the moon in it, but it came out anyways. Today, I read that tonight is the Full Snow Moon. Something about the name just tickles me. It sounds soft and romantic and makes me think of rabbits hopping across icy moonlit fields.
What I'd sat down to paint originally was the tree-like formations within the lungs of a woman with a bird nesting in them. I'd had this image come to mind while I was lying in savasana one afternoon last week. I'd like to paint this image in a few different formats.
In another bit of synchronicity, it turns out that today is the Jewish holiday, Tu B'Shvat, also known as the Birthday of the Trees, which falls on the fifteenth full moon of the Jewish month of Shvat. What a cool holiday! I just learned about Tu B'Shvat last year when I was going to a gym that was part of a Jewish recreational center. They had signs up about the holiday, but I also took a Nia class that day and the teacher talked it and had us moving like trees in the wind. I was just thrilled knowing that trees have their own special celebration.
It's interesting what will bubble up from our subconscious mind when we allow it to create. I love that my subconscious brought up the trees and moon images today.
Jamie Ridler hosts a Dreamboard challenge on her blog at every full moon. The dreamboards are a collection of images and words of something you want to manifest in your life. What a lovely practice to have around the full moon and a wonderful way to play with words!
The image above was made with acrylic and ink on a 6"x6" Aquaboard (clayboard with a texture similar to watercolor paper) and I'm calling it "Full Snow Moon."
Wordles
February 9th, 2009, Comments (8)
My bestest bud, Judean, sent me a bunch of fun sites that focus on word-play. Goodness gracious, there are so many ways to create with words! On the Wordle website, you can enter your blog address (or any web page) and it will pull words from it to create word art. You can then change the font, the color scheme, and the arrangement style to your liking. In the one above, I thought it looked a bit like a dress if I turned it on its side. Here a few more creations from the site:
Good fun! Judean also sent me links to a Random word generator and an incredibly cool site which helps you create your own fonts. I'm definitely going to try out that font creator.
Creative Every Day Challenge: February 9th – February 15th, 2009
February 9th, 2009, Comments (32)
Feel free to leave a comment on this post or use the "Mr. Linky" widget below to link to a post (or posts) about your creative activities during the days of 2/9/09 - 2/15/09.
The use of this widget is not required. It's an optional method of sharing your creativity that makes it easier for others to check out what you're up to. You can use it to link to a blog post or posts during the week listed. Or if you have a bunch of posts and don't want to link to all of them, you can link to your main blog page once. Do it in a way that makes sense and is fun for you! You can also take advantage of the great CED flickr group to post your images and see what others are up to.
To find out more about the Creative Every Day Challenge check out the details here. And then if you want to sign up, leave a comment on this post or email me to let me know (a link to my email is in the upper left sidebar.) When you contact me, please let me know how you'd like to be listed in the list of participants, which resides in the right sidebar (I can list you as your name or as a link to a blog if you have one. A blog is not required to participate!) Please email or comment to let me know you're participating before you start posting links in the Mr. Linky widget.
The totally optional theme February is Words! I'll be posting about the theme throughout the month. You can find out more about how you can use the themes here.
Happy Creating!!
“An artist paints, dances, draws, writes, designs, or acts at the expanding edge of consciousness. We press into the unknown rather than the known. This makes life lovely and lively.” — Julia Cameron
**p.s. In the transition to my new server, I may have lost some of the Creative Every Day participant links. Please check to see if your blog is still listed in the right sidebar. If you don't see it, let me know and I'll add it again. Thanks!**
Art and Word Collaboration
February 6th, 2009, Comments (13)
Lighthouse
I love the many ways there are out there on the internet for collaborating between art and writing! Nancy, of Every Photo Tells a Story, contacted me recently to see if I'd be interested in submitting my art for her site. Another instance of perfect timing, considering the (totally optional) theme of words this month for the Creative Every Day Challenge!
The purpose of Every Photo Tells a Story is to provide photography or artwork as a prompt for writing (or other creative explorations.) You could use it to inspire a bit of fiction, poetry, or even another piece of artwork! The piece on Nancy chose for her site today is "Lighthouse" (one of my favorites), and while the original has sold, there are still prints available here.
I use a lot of material with words on it in my mixed-media artwork. Sometimes it's my own hand-writing, like I did in parts of Memory Cycles and sometimes printed material. Sometimes it has meaning related to the piece I'm working on and sometimes I'm just using it because I like the texture.
I love the way simple drawings look on an antique book page. Altering an old book is a great way to play with words. You could pick out words from the page that stand out to you, circle them, and paint out the rest. You could make your own pop-up book within the pages, cut windows into one page that leads to the next, cut out individual words from the pages to use in art (like my friend Jes does in some of her jewelry pieces), or paint a thin glaze over the page so that the words show through just slightly. Flea markets are a great place to hunt for old books that are just crying out for new life. Or you could re-purpose something like an old calendar like Rosa did!
p.s. I've been experiencing loads of synchronicity in the last 24 hours. I love it when that happens!
And I've got a link for you! The lovely Jennifer Lee is hosting a giveaway of the book, The Vision Board: The Secret to an Extraordinary Life on her blog! All you have to do is leave a comment sharing "What do you love about you?" It looks like a great book. I know I'll be entering the giveaway!
