Further Update

I'm appreciating my new sense of open space and all of the discoveries that have happened for me since Thursday night!!!

FURTHER UPDATE

Since I have infused myself with big love and embraced a new experience regarding open space, I've had innumerous inspirations that I feel really excited about. Even more exciting, I've taken the first step on all the inspirations that I could!

Yesterday, I filled out my application for SLCC. I'M GOING BACK TO SCHOOL! I'm excited to be finally pursuing my dream to be a teacher and I am going for a joint degree in education and social work.

Yesterday, I discovered a LOCAL publisher who is perfect for the book I've been working on. I've written my query letter and will be submitting my manuscript today.

MY REQUEST

I'd love to enroll you in my exciting adventure. I believe focusing the energy of a large number of people creates an amazing vortex of success when it's put toward a focused intent. When you think of me, see me successfully completing school, send love and see me signing the contract with the publisher. Hold space for 17 seconds focused on loving me and seeing me as successful in these two adventures. And, for those who know me personally, I'd love to receive support and loving energy through emails or texts.

YAY! Thank you!

Hello? Earth?

WOW! Soooo THIS is what Earth looks like! WOW!

Ye-eah... it seems that I am still integrating my experience from the Creative Explosion. My words have ALL disappeared and I have found myself in a space of pure experiencing. I have sat down several times to write about my experience of the workshop and performance and... nothin'! I have sat down to blog. Nothin'. I have moved around, pondering my next Meditaiton. Nothin'. No words for any kind of writing. It is quite bizarre.

Even this post here feels like a stretch. My fingers are not finding the correct keys. My brain is on fire and, yet, the words are not coming down through the pipelines in congruent sentences. I'm writing this and the letters are spelling different words than the ones I had been able to conjur. There are letters showing up in places that there aren't supposed to be letters. I am completely baffled.

It took me TEN MINUTES to write that stuff above!!! And, if I hadn't edited the previous words I've gotten down, it would have looked something like this: ISD amda sf tyriahngi to write athieobna; dia lak asijhdbnek Islksdkii LIdkshpoadf;eiumanf corrsadfessaesct asklthis this lkenan ieksp wrknsigh asokthi people adancing and a purlelxd,m thonag a dk. Ingaierhtaign amy dka ;os k Creiat avie Eplskcosion askieign with asJakd creat;eds asnmm amziaing transdfaweormation. If eweel like aI have maddse some asHUGaskE stridewsa in asdf ...

See what I mean!

Sooooo... while I'm REALLY wanting to share with you all about MY experience of this past weekend, it's coming out in some other language - which, in and of itself is perfect for where *I* am, but doesn't do much for clarifying for you. LOL

This is what I DO know...
I am changed.
I am open.
I am witty and spontaneous.
I laugh more frequently and easily.
I now feel creative in ways different from my standard creative ways.
I am a leader and do so easily, lovingly.
I am quick and intuitive and able to follow the flow of improv surprisingly well to create magical experiences on my own and with others.
I LOVE teaching.
I am willing to try everything in the creative realm, at least once.
I am comfortable in my own space, on my own.
I have beautiful wings that are very strong.
I am observant and catch details that most people miss.
I am a genius story TELLER.
I am comfortable on stage.
I am amazing at holding space.
I have a brilliant body that communicates clearly to me.
I am surprising.
I am on earth.

(45 minutes later, I think that is legible.) omg

For more information regarding the workshop described below, please email me at angie [at] momentsofawakening.com (click on it for a larger view)

Let it Rock!

The night was every description of perfect. Amazing weather. Beautiful people. Energy that was soothing AND energizing at the same time. People showed up in droves and stayed most of the night. Everywhere I turned, there was the face of someone I loved. People loved my art and went home with their favorite piece - or pieces. It was an astounding experience.

This morning, as I prepare this update for you, I feel a curious mixture of heavy, unmovable and alert. I am experiencing myself today with the sensation of being full of cement, my body being reluctant to bend and sway. After the exhilaration of last week which showed up as the inability to sleep for several nights, I imagine that is the biggest reason why I am feeling the effect of gravity with monumental intensity.

I feel so blessed to have created this breathtaking experience for myself and those who chose in to experiencing it with me. I had people show up that were friends of friends, that I had never met before. I had blogging friends show up (Hi, Lynn!) that I had no idea would be in attendance and felt so excited to meet. I had many of my ALC buddies there and they stayed for the bulk of the night, adding laughter and connection to the event. My local, immediate family members were all there. And, how cool is this???! Three different people I knew from high school and haven't seen since, showed up simply because they had seen my information on facebook and felt excited to support me! Two of my beautiful friends (Hi, Liz and Nichol!) showed up first thing and stayed all the way through, offering me a home base where I could touch down and regroup every now and then. My former husband, his wife and his architectural designer friends came and, a little later, one of his employee's and his wife and step daughter did too. My lifetimes-long soul connection (Love you!) also offered his presence and strength, warming my heart and holding me up with his smile.

By the end of the night, my emotions were running so full, I was overflowing. There were no words. I could only cry. The love and the appreciations bubbled out of me in tears as people hugged me good night. I felt kerfuffled and, yet, peaceful. It was the most complete I have felt in a long while and I created it all! The feedback I received from practically everyone was, "You are radiating love and glowing. You are absolutely beautiful."

My mentors, Megan and Annabeth, as they were leaving both hugged me close. I could feel their appreciation and, knowing how much they have witnessed of my journey, I knew they could feel what I was experiencing. Annabeth could only say over and over, "This is SO big! I'm so proud of you! I love you!"

Megan stood in front of me and asked, "How do you feel?"

There were no words, however. So I showed her. She gets my body-movement language and I showed her what I was feeling as tears ran down my face. She smiled and said, "Draw that, Ang! Create that image. That is your million dollar piece of art!"

Indeed it is! Talk about a night of continual chivels!!!

I've said it before and I'm gonna say it again now... LIFE IS GOOD!

Bound and Rebound

At the beginning of one of the Disney Pixar movies released within the last couple years, there was a "short" called Boundin' and that tale keeps running through my head today. I simply adore the cute little lamb in this movie and I love how he goes from prideful about his beauty to feeling naked and vulnerable and unable to do anything he used to do and then, back up to understanding himself. All with the help of a jackalope.

I feel like that little lamb. I am in that space where I am naked and vulnerable and feeling unable to do anything that I have done in the past. I feel like I am standing on the edge of a cliff, looking down into a ravine that seemingly has no bottom. I imagine, though, that the bottom is jaggedy and dangerous and that, were I to leap from this cliff I would surely be smashed to smithereens against the solid foundation far below. I have been to this cliff before. Maybe not the very same cliff, but one that felt strikingly familiar to the cliff on which I stand now. I have stood at that edge so many times, dangling my toes over the precipice, wondering when the moment was going to come that I actually trust myself to fly.

See, I always fly. I have never plummeted to my death. I haven't even so much as fallen at all. When I have taken that first step that is required of me, I have discovered, much to my delight, that either my wings sprout or there is a hidden bridge that I could not see before. I know this. I know it. I know that I it only takes a breath and some faith on my part and I will be okay. I will be safe.

Thing is, when I am feeling all vulnerable and raw and naked, it feels difficult to me to stretch out any further to fly. I feel scared that I will be shot down. I feel confused by the next step required of me. I feel trapped, actually. All of this beautiful stuff is coming through me - some of which was began in a partnership - and now I feel like I can't do anything with it because I am experiencing that partnership as being at a stand-still.

As talking about that with a friend today, she said, "I'm wondering, Angie, if you are looking at being stuck in your partnership as a way to avoid what you are being called to do. I'm wondering... are you maybe supposed to launch that art all by yourself or with someone all together different?"

Sooooo... I'm breathing and I am tapping my foot, building up the energy to bound and rebound. I have done it before. I will do it again. It just takes courage. And... sigh... it takes me believing in ME. Perhaps that is where I am stuck right now. It doesn't matter who is going with me or not. It doesn't matter if it looks like I thought it was supposed to look. All that matters is that I am going with me.

Oh... okay... I got it. It is about me getting behind me, supporting me.

*sigh*

Shit. I was hoping I could blame it on someone else. I can't.

Okay... thanks for listening (reading). I feel better now and my feet are a-tapping. I can feel the energy growing and the sky seems to be coming closer. I love it when I get myself stuck and then get myself unstuck again.

Now in this world of ups and downs…So nice to know there are jackalopes around.

Sing!

Go ahead! Press that little play button! Ya know you want to! :)

(if you click anywhere other than the play button, it will take you to the website where I created this player.)

This morning I chose to SING as my ten minutes of creativity simply for the sake of creativity. It seemed appropriate that I chose the Carpenters to accompany me. I have delicious memories of being a young child and dancing in front of our mammoth stereo that was taller than me and ran almost the entire length of our living room wall. I remember standing in front of the speakers that were lattice-work with nubby material behind them and feeling the vibration of the music. The louder, the better, of course. My mom would put that record on and I would dance and sing. Absolute pure joy.

Those feelings came back to me today as I turned up the stereo really loud and danced and sang. I was all of a sudden a little girl again and everything seemed right with the world. I had no worries about how I was going to pay my bills next week. There was no sorrow or fear. There was only me, in my jammies, little and carefree.

ps... that cool little music player was found at http://muzicons.com/

Creativity for Creativity's Sake

On Friday, I had the honor of doing a professional exchange with one of my mentors. She and I did back to back sessions - first, me as the client, then her. It was an amazingly powerful three hours!

During my turn as client, she recommended that I commit to being creative just for the sake of being creative and have it be something non-intellectual. Rather than resorting to ten minutes of creative writing, for instance, she suggested that I do ten minutes of silly dancing or spend that time making new sounds and face gestures.

I tried it this morning and, by the end of the ten minutes, I felt more energized than I have in a very long time. The idea behind this creativity for creativity's sake is to get the flood gates open to the universal flow of creative energy. I have learned about myself that, at very early age, my inborn, natural sense of creative curiosity was shamed. I have spent the rest of my life unable to truly play, be creative and be exploratory because my cells have carried the memory of "curiosity is B-A-A-A-A-A-A-A-D!"

I will be honest. As I began the play this morning, I heard my head thinking This is stupid! This is a waste of time! You look like an idiot! You could be getting STUFF DONE right now instead of this pointless process. I listened to the voice and the words before contorting my body into an exaggeration of the words I was speaking to myself. I scrunched up my face in a foul grimace and stiffened my hands into horrendous claws. I slumped over and began grumbling and stomping around the living room in the largest expression of "ugly stupid" I could muster up.

Within moments, I was laughing hysterically. I felt so much better.

I realized that my brain is my own worst enemy. More often than not, it will tear me apart before it even stops to think that it could support me. The human brain is an amazing tool. I would like to reprogram mine to work for me, rather than against me. And they say that awareness is the first step toward change.

Creativity First

With this mentoring program I am doing, there was an invitation set forth to the group which brought some fear and happiness to me all at the same time. That combo of feelings is so curious, by the way!

Gay suggested we make a commitment to put our creativity first. He gave us a suggestion about how the commitment could be worded and then asked it to make it fit ourselves. I came up with:

I commit to actively being in my creativity every day prior to doing my ordinary tasks.

There was such liberation in the moment that I landed that commitment. I felt excited and as though I had infinite possibilities. Then, I felt scared... what if I can't do it? What if there is just not enough time in the day to get everything else I need to also get done? I am already so busy, how am I going to find the time to do that?

I know, though, that it is possible.

I also realized one very important thing...

I am my creativity. It is my essence. Commiting to be in my essence before anything else each day puts myself first. I know that, when I do that, my life flows more smoothly and I am able to accomplish so much more than I thought I could do.

Creativity Practice

I have joined a mentoring program with Gay Hendricks. I am SO stoked about it! By the end of the program, I will be a published author! I am beyond excited.

They talk about the "Creative Practice" and that this is something that can be done for 10 minutes each day. I used to have a creative practice while I was working. It was this here blog! Thing is, I rarely wrote for a mere 10 minutes. I used it as a way to escape my life drama. The life drama I was so excellent at creating and feeding.

Now that I am out of that unending spiral of drama - thank God(dess) for that! - I have ran into things that have halted that daily practice. First and foremost, for most of the time I have been away from my job, I have not had internet access readily available. That makes it difficult to post to a blog. I am also so busy with my own businesses that, by the time I get to internet access I am ready to work and get things done. I have made blogging a secondary issue.

While pondering the idea of a creative practice, I have realized that I have creativity flowing through me every day, now - almost every moment of every day. What I am understanding though, is that this is a focused period of time set aside SPECIFICALLY to practice creativity in new ways. Blogging is not a new way, but it is something I love. I commit to picking up that process again and adding it into the mix of my focused creative practice.

I love my life!