A few weeks ago I wrote my last weekly update post where I talked about how I wanted to start doing something different… less an update, more a practice.

I wasn’t 100% sure what this would be, but today I dove in to try my new idea: Friday after lunch I meet up with the heart and soul of my dream, open up my art journal and PLAY.

No agenda. No direction. Just dive in and be open to what shows up, letting the magic of creativity and imagination lead me to what I need to be led to.

(For Creative Dream Circle members: I shared more about this in the October 31 Creative Dream Sharing Circle thread.)

I can’t wait to see what happens with my dreams, with this as a regular weekly practice.

Registration for Life Book 2015 starts today.

I’m doing two classes for Life Book (both of these will not be available anywhere else in 2015):

Intuitive Healing Session in your Art Journal: You?ll create a heartfelt art journal page as you learn how to use your creativity to navigate through the intuitive healing process.

The Magic of Presence: Discover how the magic of presence can help you to develop your unique creative voice.

PLUS you’ll get classes from my personal creative hero: Chris Zydel from Creative Juices Arts.? Chris has over thirty years experience as a creativity mentor and is definitely the real deal.? Chris goes way beyond art techniques to teach intuitive process – magical insights guaranteed.

I am so thrilled to be teaching with Chris and so many other gifted teachers in LifeBook!? And for those of you who do want art technique instruction – there are? a ton of wildly inspiring art teachers in LifeBook too!

It’s a really beautiful balance of inner work and art technique instruction with a focus on healing and self-acceptance.

Click here to read more and sign up today!

It?s Mandala Week on my blog!? Every day this week I?m posting about the magic of Mandalas, in celebration of The Mandala Class, which starts on Monday, September 15.

This week I’ve been talking about how drawing Mandalas can help with intuitive development and emotional healing and transformation.

Ultimately all of this is all about making your dreams real.

Your dream is your soul calling you towards your purpose and your actual self.

Your dream is really not about the external thing, it’s about who you become in the process of making it happen.

Having your dream is about stepping up, shining your light and living your life as your actual self.? No excuses, no holding back, no fitting yourself into strange shapes to meet other people’s expectations.? Radiant authenticity and deep down soul integrity.

Most dreams are about:

• learning more about what your heart really wants
• finding the courage to let go of what doesn’t fit and go after what you want
• learning how to trust yourself
• getting creative about how you’re living your life
• being more aligned with your soul truth
• showing up more powerfully in the world

Heart. Courage. Trust. Creativity. Alignment. Power.

These are inner qualities.? But as you work with them things change in your outer world.

It’s like your world is a puzzle.? You are the puzzle piece right in the middle of the puzzle.? Other puzzle pieces can only click in to your puzzle piece if the shapes match.

So as you change your puzzle piece, through integrating the qualities of your dream like heart, courage, trust, creativity, alignment and power, the pieces around you change.

They have to!?

The old pieces that were around you have to fall away because they don’t fit anymore.

Then new puzzle pieces can come… these puzzle pieces can be different jobs, a different partner (or a new relationship with the old one), new creative projects or hobbies, entrepreneurial ventures or just a healthier outlook on like.

The new pieces might be really similar to the old ones, just lighter, happier and more at peace or they might be totally different.

Things change on the outside to reflect changes you make on the inside. This is how heart dreams come to life.

And where to Mandalas fit in this?

Mandalas are a way of working with qualities.? Looking back to the posts I wrote about how drawing Mandalas can help with intuitive development and emotional healing and transformation you see a definite theme: Mandalas are a way of focusing your inner work.

If you are a visual person, if you like to play with colour and pattern then Mandalas are a really perfect way of doing this because the more you enjoy the work the more engaged you’ll be with it.? The more engaged you are with it, the more fully you integrate the qualities of your dream and the more completely it will alter your whole world.

In The Mandala Class I’ll be sharing a process for working specifically with the energy of the qualities of your dream.? This will help make it easier to work with and integrate the qualities of your dream, so you can change your puzzle piece.

The Mandala Class happens inside the Creative Dream Circle, so when you sign up for The Mandala Class you also get all of my other classes, including the Creative Dream Incubator e-Course which is my master class in the art of bringing any dream to life.? In that class I go into loads of detail on every aspect of bringing your dream to life.

The Creative Dream Incubator e-Course will show you how it all works together.? Once you’ve got that part down, drawing Mandalas will help you stay the path.? They’re like Creative Dream Tune-Ups to keep your dream ship sailing smoothly towards the land of dreams.

We start Monday.? I hope you’ll join me for this.

It’s Mandala Week on my blog!? Every day this week I’m posting about the magic of Mandalas, in celebration of The Mandala Class, which starts next Monday, September 15.

Drawing mandalas helps you be more intuitive in two ways: they make it easier to access intuitive wisdom in the moment and they help with developing and deepening your intuitive gifts over time.

Intuition is simply being able to access inner wisdom. It’s something everyone can do.

Wisdom is a soul quality. Each of us has equal and infinite access to soul qualities.

Though just because everyone has access, does not mean everyone is connected to their inner wisdom.? The beliefs you live from, your habits and practices and your level of consciousness is going to determine how blocked or open the channel is.

The more you get in touch with your self and your soul, the more intuitive you’re going to be because you’ll be living closer to your inner wisdom.

Your intuition is not a crystal ball.

For example, you usually can’t use it to divine winning lottery numbers.

Remember that listening to your intuition is about connecting to the soul quality of wisdom.? Infinite wisdom is wise!? Wiser than we usually are.

Infinite wisdom sees the bigger picture, we tend to see the smaller picture.

We see how we really do NEED to win the lottery in order to make our dream real because how the hell else are you going to make this happen?

Infinite wisdom sees how the journey to the dream is where you develop the qualities you need to live the dream.? Infinite wisdom sees that the lottery is a shortcut, and shortchanges you on growing in the ways your dream is calling on you to grow.

Infinite wisdom sees that winning the lottery isn’t going to make you as happy as you think it will.

Infinite wisdom always has your best interests at heart.

Infinite wisdom loves you.

So of course, if winning the lottery is actually the right path for you of course your intuition will nudge you to buy a ticket and supply you with the right numbers.

Soul qualities are connected.

So your infinite wisdom is coming out of a well of infinite love, infinite joy, infinite creativity, infinite possibility, infinite peace.

Intuitive development is about connecting with the part of you who is connected.

When you learn how to do this it changes everything. It means you can make decisions from a larger part of you, which means you get to live from a larger part of you. You have access to more power, creativity, love, joy and inspiration,

This is not a small thing.

I took classes in intuitive development for years before I was able to reliably use my intuition to navigate through life.? Though I don’t think it necessarily has to take years.

Ultimately, creative people are going to be able to connect to their intuitive voice most effectively through their creativity.

This is something I wished I had known sooner – it’s a bit of a shortcut.

Creating Mandalas as a way of experimenting with how to listen to your intuitive voice makes it easier to get the hang of it.

Learning to access your intuitive wisdom is a bit like learning a new language – a language based more on feelings and sensations than on words.? Art is a language that is also based more on feelings and sensations than words.

Art comes from inspiration which is a soul quality.? All soul qualities are connected.? You’re already dipping into the well for inspiration, so it’s easier to pick up some wisdom while you’re there.

And that is how drawing Mandalas helps you be more intuitive.? It’s all in the way you approach your Mandala practice.

You actually draw your way into connecting with your inner wisdom.

This is what we’ll be doing in The Mandala Class, which starts next Monday, September 15.

And tomorrow and Friday I’ll be blogging about working with Mandalas for healing and bringing your dreams to life.? Of course, this is all connected to using Mandalas for intuitive development.? Really it’s all about using your creativity and imagination to connect more fully with your soul qualities.

Mandalas have been a part of my creativespiritual practice for the last fifteen years.? When I first started doing creativity workshops almost 10 years ago I often used mandalas as tools for healing and transformation.

Back then, I did less drawing, more painting and collaging.

Last summer I challenged myself to draw every day, which quickly evolved into drawing mandalas every day which has become a favourite way to slip into my creative flow, open up my intuitive connection while simultaneously calming me down and filling me up.

And I want to share the magic of it with you.

So I’m going to be posting here every day this week, sharing the magic of mandalas and how they can help you develop your intuitive voice and bring your dreams to life.

Tomorrow I’ve got something super special: a Mandala blog hop!

I wanted to make sure to include other Mandala artists and teachers in Mandala Week, to share different perspectives and stories about the magic of Mandalas.

So tomorrow we’ll hop around the web to read their stories and drool over their mandalas.

.

Wednesday I’m blogging about Mandalas and intuition.
Thursday I’m blogging about Mandalas and healing.
Friday I’m blogging about a Mandalas and bringing your dreams to life.

This is all, of course, in celebration of The Mandala Class which starts next Monday, September 15, where you’ll learn to create mandalas you’ll fall in LOVE with.

If you’re wondering what Mandalas even ARE, check out my easy-peasy Mandala tutorial.

This is the number one question I’ve been getting lately.? It’s something that is hard to explain in words, because it’s not something you can understand with just your head – it’s something you need to experience in order to understand.

Drawing mandalas is not like other kinds of drawing, because drawing mandalas isn’t actually about drawing, drawing mandalas is about wholeness and connection.

Drawing mandalas is less an artistic style and more a framework for connecting with the wholeness within: with your inner wisdom and intuitive voice.

In other words: drawing mandalas is magic because YOU are magic.

When you learn how to draw mandalas through focusing on what’s happening inside of you instead of focusing on what’s happening on the page, you learn how to tap into your inner wisdom.? (Yes – this is what I’m teaching in The Mandala Class)

A lot of spiritual teachings are paradoxes – like you’ll find the answer when you stop looking for it.

Mandalas are like that.? You’re drawing, but it’s totally not about the drawing.? You’re only using the drawing as a tool for focusing your energy and attention.

The paradox is that as long as you are successfully using the drawing to focus your energy and attention you’re likely to end up drawing Mandalas that you love.? But if you focus on drawing a “nice” Mandala not only is there a good chance you won’t really adore your artwork, you also won’t get any intuitive messages from it.

And if you focus on “doing it right” you’re likely to miss the whole point.

But if you focus on what’s happening inside of you, drawing mandalas is like having creative magic and intuitive wisdom on tap, so you can turn it on any time you need some.

The framework you work with while drawing mandalas supports this beautifully.

The circle represents wholeness.

Drawing rounds around rounds, and having the circle grow on your page, represents expansion.

Repeating lines and shapes as you draw creates patterns – patterns which shift and change and come together in new ways.? Which shows you new perspectives on YOUR patterns and helps you shift the less-helpful patterns into more-helpful patterns.

As you go round and round, creating, shifting and re-creating patterns, and all the while focusing on the inner process – you journey to somewhere new in your inner world.

There is so much magic inside you and THAT is what makes drawing mandalas so amazing.

Mandala Resources:

I’ve got a pretty fantastic (and easy even for beginners)How To Draw Mandalas Tutorial.

And I’m teaching The Mandala Class online starting on September 15.

This particular Monday morning I woke up with a sense of trepidation.

I have a lot of questions without answers and tangles to smooth.? More unknowns than knows tends to make me anxious.? Even though dreaming, my chosen profession, is all about bravely facing the unknown instead of staying stuck in the known (aka status quo).

This is why I invented Creative Genius Planning Sessions: less for creative planning, more for magic, miracles & healing.

Creativity.? Play. Heart. Truth. Deep Intuitive Connection.? In volumes high enough to propel you onto the path that leads to where you really want to be.

I took my trepidation, my worry about too many things to do and my fear that I can’t pull this off and I sat down with my Creative Genius Planning Sessions Kit

The beauty of having this all ready for you as a kit is that you do NOT have to ALREADY feel smart/together/awake/confident/creative in order START.

Hint: waiting until you feel ready is FORFEITING ON YOUR DREAMS.

Having creative planning kits like this makes it easier to start before you feel ready.

I know some days I DO feel ready and some days I DON’T.? I also know that my dreams need me to show up EVERY day.

So I actually created the Creative Genius Planning Sessions Kit for me, because I need it.?

Because I know my dreams can’t afford for me to get a slow start on the day because I’m feeling anxious about something.? My dreams can’t afford for me to not believe in myself enough to take the risk that needs to be taken.? My dreams can’t afford for me to not stay in the game.

So, this morning I took my trepidation and slowly growing anxiety and I got out my Creative Genius Planning Session Kit.? And it took me a little longer than usual to get through it, but that’s ok.

Creativity.? Play. Heart. Truth. Deep Intuitive Connection.? In volumes high enough to propel you onto the path that leads to where you really want to be.

Creative Planning doesn’t just help you get your shit together.

It’s not about making to-do lists and then forcing yourself to do the work.? Or figuring out the right steps that guarantee success.

It’s about staying in the flow.? Remembering your power.? Accessing your genius.

This morning my trepidation and anxiety melted by the time I finished the Creative Genius Planning Sessions Kit.? Now I feel sure and excited and inspired about what I want to create in my world this week.

Plus I have a clear plan that makes my heart dance around a little in my chest.

THIS is the fuel that brings dreams to life.

Want to play?

You get my Creative Genius Planning Sessions kit inside the Creative Dream Circle – along with TONS of other kits, courses and resources for finding the magic even on the days when you’re NOT feeling it.