Yesterday we had our monthly Marketing as a Creative + Spiritual Practice call (Membership members, get the replay here) and our conversation was delicious as always.

One person shared that she feels TOO BIG to do things in some of the ways she had been doing, she felt BIGGER than some of the things that were being offered to her and she wanted to spend time re-connecting to her BIGNESS, so she could show up in a bigger way and be receiving bigger opportunities.

It can feel disorienting to be like "I felt bigger before, why did I let myself shrink and how do I re-biggify myself?"

I think everything is cyclical and nothing is constant. We grow, we shrink, we move directions, we find ourselves in new ways at different times in our lives.

That moment of noticing "I am not quite where I wanted to be" and also "I am not where I once was" can feel so discouraging.

But it is an invitation.

I'm feeling a lot of that, in different ways.

Fourteen years ago I was exploring how to set up my work/creative life to support me in the work I wanted to do. After years of exploring and refining my routines and systems - I started to take for granted that I KNOW HOW TO DO THIS.

Well, right now I don't know.

A lot of what I learned about what really works for me...  I'm just not sure it still works. I mean it works - but I want MORE.

BIGGER.

DEEPER.

I've been wanting something to change and it's been hard to identify what, exactly, it is. Or sometimes I can identify what it is, but I can't see a way to get to it.

Listening to what is calling us next is tricky work. It's a process.

But this is what I came back from the creative retreat with:

Creativity is powerful. Like WHOA POWERFUL.

And our creative genius is always bigger than the obstacles.

I know most of my obstacles right now are internal. The self doubt. The resistance. The discomfort of trying new things.

Those long-held patterns around how I show up for my creativity are hard to change... This feels especially frustrating because I set them up very intentionally and deliberately and carefully so that they would serve me.

But nothing works forever.

And I need new routines for where I am now.

It's disorienting to see what needs to change. Disappointing to see "I'm not feeling how I want to feel". Exciting to think of what could change. Exhausting to be the one who has to make the change.

So I'm just going to keep taking messy steps with this.

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

This opportunity to go away for a few days came up very suddenly this weekend. It's right when the weather turned cool and I was so excited to bake and cook. I roasted veggies to make soup and even made fresh bread to eat with it (and timed it so I had it rising in the car on the way there to bake when we got there).

It felt SO GOOD to be preparing to go away and just... retreat. Roasting squash has never been this exciting before, lol!

I have needed this.

Three days AWAY from everything in an idyllic spot that reminds me that the whole world is a miracle.

The way that shifts my perspective.

A chance to take a breath and re-group.

I started hormone replacement therapy and have had a few complications but mostly... my brain and body are starting to work like they used to.

Creative energy is stirring.

All these things I've been dreaming of... it feels like time to begin.

But like... where do I start?

Taking a step back is a good place to start.

It's a log cabin in the woods overlooking a lake. (It's a 6 minute walk down to the dock)

With a screened in hot tub!

It's a 15 minute walk over to a cafe with wifi so I can come check in but mostly I am relaxing and journaling.

I've been writing and dreaming.

Getting more clear on what I want next.

Feeling like I am filling the well with magic.

It's such a miracle to be here it feels like I manifested it.

I didn't have to pay for this trip.

The timing was PERFECT as I didn't have any calls booked, and we'll be back a few hours before the next Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership call.

But a few people from the group who had originally booked it couldn't make it and that really sucks! They were glad someone could go at the last minute who would appreciate it, but obviously it would have been better if they could have had their trip.

So, holding space for how that sucks. How this is such a gift it is to me and it came at a cost to someone else. In the manifesting community I was a part of in the past, they would have said that those people have "stinking thinking" and I am more positive so I deserve it and they don't and this is why the universe gave it to me. I think that's such a shitty shaming judgy way to look at it. We can hold the complexities of how happy I am to be here and how much it sucks that they couldn't come. And how systemic forms of privilege and oppression are usually at the crux of what makes one person more available for the magic than other, and then use that awareness to help level the playing field because we all deserve everything.

(At the same time, energies have been shifting, not just for me. I'm seeing so many good people manifest so many good things. Project Miracle is an epic manifesting program that has been bringing in epic things for people over the last few months. Membership members, get it here. Everyone else, get it here)

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

There is the part of me who believes in my dream.

And the part of me who is afraid it is impossible.

And the part of me who judges me for not already having it.

And it was feeling like these three are vying for control and the judging part was winning. Which sucked!

I drew this out a few times in a few different journals. I've just been sitting with it, not really trying to resolve it, just noticing and being with (which is a form of resolving!).

That part of me who judges me for not already having it... that's so cruel. It's a harsh inner critic who is not helpful in any way. She wants me to have it already because not having it feels, to her, like evidence that I don't deserve it and she can't tolerate the discomfort of that.

The part of me who believes in my dream is like... honey, you don't need to be all tangled up like that. Straighten yourself out. There is no part of me who is undeserving of this AND there is no reason to feel pressure to have it already.

The part of me who is afraid my dream is impossible is too scared to speak up. But is going underground to sabotage any progress because that's less painful than giving it my all, and then failing.

I need to keep the part of me who believes in my dreams FIRMLY in the leadership role. This vying for control thing is brutal.

What helps with that? DREAM WORK.

Specifically (for Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members):

• Dream Lab practice
• Dream Self practice
• Daily time with Dream Book - either go to the next thing on the checklist or look through your Dream Book, re-read pages, add stuff, etc.
• Any of the Dream Work practices or classes

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

This is the mantra I got in this week’s Dream Book journaling + alchemy kit: I am brave with my dreams

Use the meditation for the weekly mantras to dig in deeper to the mantra, or put your hands on your heart and take five deep slow breaths and repeat to yourself:

I am brave with my dreams.

Notice where this lands in your body, what thoughts and feelings get sparked.

There is no right or wrong way to react. But your actual thoughts and feelings can tell you something about what you need right now.

How it lands for me: I feel so proud of how brave I have been.

I writing this the day after a therapy session where my therapist was affirming how much I've grown and how brave I've been with my divorce and sorting through what I want next.

I am feeling so much OPENING UP which still feels disorienting because I hadn't been feeling CLOSED DOWN before and yet, in comparison... it's just really nice to feel this open.

My heart feels open. I feel safe enough to feel excited about being braver.

I am going to repeat this one to myself a lot this week, it feels really good.

If you want to work on this with me:

If I am brave with my dreams feels good and encouraging, hold it with you today. Look at problems, questions, stucks and obstacles through this lens and see what ideas it brings.

If it brings up some discomfort - that’s your stuff to work on today. To do that work, in the Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership we’ve got the un-sticking station and the library of inner work practices. If you’re not sure what practice to use, you can email me, or post in our forum, let me know what’s going on and I will make some suggestions for tools you can use.

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

This is the mantra I got in this week’s Dream Book journaling + alchemy kit: I welcome more joy + magic into my life

Use the meditation for the weekly mantras to dig in deeper to the mantra, or put your hands on your heart and take five deep slow breaths and repeat to yourself:

I welcome more joy + magic into my life.

Notice where this lands in your body, what thoughts and feelings get sparked.

There is no right or wrong way to react. But your actual thoughts and feelings can tell you something about what you need right now.

How it lands for me: a big YAAAAAASSSSSS.

Like seriously YES. I NEED THIS.

I can feel all the doors inside being flung open to let ALL the joy + magic in.

I feel the things that have been hard just... not mattering as much. And also the parts of me who are holding onto the hard stuff also feel softened by joy and magic.

It's this feeling/energy that's been growing over the last few months. I am ready to be in the BIG SHINY MAGIC. I don't think I've seen much of that since 2020. Like - bits here and there. Magic and healing and possibility are always with us... AND... now it feels like time for MORE.

And under that I think of all the things I can do to INVITE this in.

What are good habits, for welcoming more joy + magic into my life?

A lot of them are the same as good habits for my mental and physical health, good self care... but I think there's more to explore there, too.

If you want to work on this with me:

If I welcome more joy + magic into my life feels good and encouraging, hold it with you today. Look at problems, questions, stucks and obstacles through this lens and see what ideas it brings.

If it brings up some discomfort - that’s your stuff to work on today. To do that work, in the Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership we’ve got the un-sticking station and the library of inner work practices. If you’re not sure what practice to use, you can email me, or post in our forum, let me know what’s going on and I will make some suggestions for tools you can use.

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

This is the mantra I got in this week’s Dream Book journaling + alchemy kit: I am determined to succeed

Use the meditation for the weekly mantras to dig in deeper to the mantra, or put your hands on your heart and take five deep slow breaths and repeat to yourself:

I am determined to succeed

Notice where this lands in your body, what thoughts and feelings get sparked.

There is no right or wrong way to react. But your actual thoughts and feelings can tell you something about what you need right now.

How it lands for me: a flickering in my belly.

There's a lot there, determination YES and confidence YES and also... the fears.

This dovetails so nicely with my current explorations about MOTIVATION.

Being told by my doctor that a lack of motivation is a perimenopause symptom, and a common one that goes with my particular cluster of symptoms, noticing all the different things that can and do motivate...

I am starting a page in my Dream Book (that Dream Book lesson comes out around month 9 so you might not have access to it yet) about motivation: where does it come from, where do I want it to come from, what might help with that, what other thoughts come to mind about motivation... just get it all out on one page and see what's needed.

If you want to work on this with me:

If I am determined to succeed feels good and encouraging, hold it with you today. Look at problems, questions, stucks and obstacles through this lens and see what ideas it brings.

If it brings up some discomfort - that’s your stuff to work on today. To do that work, in the Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership we’ve got the un-sticking station and the library of inner work practices. If you’re not sure what practice to use, you can email me, or post in our forum, let me know what’s going on and I will make some suggestions for tools you can use.

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

I had decided not to share this, lol. And then I decided to share this because I see other people breaking up or contemplating it, and I see people with dreams that fall apart and they're in the place where they don't know how to put anything back together and I was remembering how that felt and I wanted to share this story from the other side of all of that.

This year has been intense!

I have maybe learned more about myself this year, than any other year of my life and that is really saying something!

So I wanted to mark this anniversary. That morning I rode my bike downtown for my favourite breakfast treat, the Everything Bagel Doughnut, and ate it in the park with my journals, but didn’t feel like journaling. It was a gorgeous morning and I just sat there, appreciating EVERYTHING.

Then I meal prepped roast veggie salads for the week, cleaned up the loft, got my art supplies organized because my dreams told me to MAKE MORE ART this week, and did laundry including washing my bedding. 

That night I was going to a potluck + bonfire at my friend's farm and I wanted to come home to a tidy place, a fridge full of nutrient dense yummies (seeing mason jar salads in the fridge make my heart happy, and the lettuce stays crisp all week that way) and fresh clean sheets on the bed.

I did tell my friends that it was the anniversary.

They were supportive. They listened to what I wanted to say about it.

Lots of "you're better off"s. No shade to my ex, but everyone is better off not being with someone who would just walk out on them like that.

In the car, once we were on our way home, my friend asked "So how was it for you?" and I was like "How was what?" and she said "The anniversary" and I had forgotten all about it.

That's a moment I wish I could have sent to myself-from-a-year-ago.

I love the way I treat myself now.

All the ways I had been pouring into my marriage, I now pour into just me. And it’s awesome.

All the things I wanted my husband to give me, now I give to me, and it’s awesome.

Including the things I didn’t even realize I was wanting from him, until sorting through my feelings in the breakup! Which is part of the miracle of this last year, it feels like so many things that I wanted actually came to me, but in completely different form from what I was expecting.

I’m not saying divorce is easy. But I am truly appreciating where I am now.

In a lot of ways, it is an opportunity to have a whole new life. 

And in my situation, my outer life didn't change all that much. I didn't move. I didn't change jobs, or suddenly have to get a job. I do have some financial pressure that wasn't there before. And my goals shifted a little. But I know that I was lucky to have a LOT of stability during my divorce that not everyone has.

AND STILL it feels like a whole new life.

It seems so small to say it this way but it's huge.

Really BEING IN the wreckage of things falling apart is a transformative experience.

I see it all the time with people and their dreams - things fall apart in a HUGE way, and it's so painful and terrifying. Like a dream falling apart really can be an existential crisis.

But when we can BE WITH the immensity and depth of of that moment, we are transformed by it.

So, I woke up the next morning, in my freshly washed bed in my tidy home.

I could smell the fire on my clothes from the night before.

My heart felt so light.

Fuck yeah! I love my life.

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

I actually just had a few days of feeling really good and sure. I’ve got this head cold so I am not moving as fast as I’d like to, but I didn’t feel stuck…

Until today, when I have time and space to take these next steps with the creative work and my mind just goes blank.

It’s a familiar blank. Like a haze that sets in when it’s time to be brave and sure of myself.

Bringing the haze into the Un-Sticking Station.

Hi haze.

Haze is a summer day, hot and muggy and let’s just lay around and read novels.

Yeah I am totally down to lay around and read novels! That’s awesome. AND this project is awesome too. It’s not actually muggy in here, it’s air conditioned and comfortable and I really could get to work for a bit…. what do you think?

Haze doesn’t want to think.

OK, I respect that. Can you tell me why you’re here?

It’s summer.

Yeah, but why are you in my head, right here right now when I want to get to work?

Oh! To stop you.

I see that. Why do you want to stop me?

I have something better for you.

Is it rest?

Yup!

Hmmmm

How can you and I work together on this thing? Like, I am open to this not looking or feeling like work… I notice that I’ve been doing A LOT of creative work in that journal and you aren’t wanting to stop me from that.

No, that’s awesome! I love that project.

OK, so how do we make this project just as fun?

Well for starters, you are trying to TYPE this project, and that project is painting and drawing.

But that’s not even true, a huge part of this project is drawing - just on the tablet, not in a journal.

No, you’re PLANNING OUT the drawing by TYPING on the keyboard. It’s all too… uck. Plan. Type. Boring.

So if I draw and paint the exact same thing in my journal, then it would be ok with you?

That, and - make a cup of iced tea. And sit at the art table to do this.

OK. Iced tea. Art Table. Drawing/painting these ideas into a journal instead of typing them on a laptop. And that would make this project work for you? No haze then?

And put your headphones on with meditation music.

OK let’s go try this…

++++

(Yes, it worked)

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

This is the mantra I got in this week’s Dream Book journaling + alchemy kit: Life is on my side

Use the meditation for the weekly mantras to dig in deeper to the mantra, or put your hands on your heart and take five deep slow breaths and repeat to yourself:

Life is on my side.

Notice where this lands in your body, what thoughts and feelings get sparked.

There is no right or wrong way to react. But your actual thoughts and feelings can tell you something about what you need right now.

How it lands for me: first a spark of discomfort and then my body opens up and accepts this deep unconditional support.

The discomfort is that I don't think we can think about this without the lens of privilege and intersectionality. When I say LIFE I mean THE UNIVERSE which is a mystery. But when we think LIFE we often think of THE WORLD and the culture we live in and that life is only on your side to the extent that you conform to dominant culture.

Like: are you white, male, straight, cis, never been sick a day in your life, will never be disabled and were born into a nice family that had a lot of generational wealth? Then sure it's easy to say that life is on your side because it IS.

As a straight white cis woman who has been lucky about her health until perimenopause although is likely neurodivergent and masking has taken a LOT of energy of the years, who wasn't born into a lot of money but did have a stable home life in my childhood, life is on my side in ways that it's not for a lot of other people. And I want to be aware of that and use my privilege mindfully.

And that's not what this is.

LIFE as in the universe is on your side because it is you.

That's how this feels.

I don't have words for any of this, it's not cognitive.

But it feels like freedom.

And it feels like... life is so POWERFUL and dominant culture and all the obstacles it puts between us and our dreams feel so tiny and powerless in comparison.

And I can draw on that power.

I am alive and I am a part of life. Life wants me to grow, life is always cheering for life.

If you want to work on this with me:

If Life is on my side feels good and encouraging, hold it with you today. Look at problems, questions, stucks and obstacles through this lens and see what ideas it brings.

If it brings up some discomfort - that’s your stuff to work on today. To do that work, in the Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership we’ve got the un-sticking station and the library of inner work practices. If you’re not sure what practice to use, you can email me, or post in our forum, let me know what’s going on and I will make some suggestions for tools you can use.

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.

This is aside from all of the complexities of creative dreaming… It’s really complicated and exhausting just to take good care of ourselves!

Especially if you're sensitive. And especially as we get older. And especially for people with chronic illness or neurodivergence. And especially if you have other people you are taking care of... there are so many ways that this is just complicated and exhausting.

Sometimes it’s hard to be in the moment AND know how to best take care of ourselves.

This is why noticing patterns and building routines around self care is so helpful for me.

Being in peri-menopuase, everything I knew about how to take good care of myself at various stages of my cycle has been obliterated.

Now it’s like - oh wow I am so worn out and overwhelmed by everything today. What does this mean? What do I need?

AND THEN I have to figure it out with my most overwhelmed brain.

Not fun.

But creative dreaming can’t really happen when we can’t take good care of ourselves as we are.

Self care and creative dreaming will always be linked.

So, for me, for today, figuring how the fuck to take of myself when I am SO overwhelmed and tired and crabby and have no freaking clue what I want - this IS my dream work.

What I am saying with this post is: Those days when all you can do is try to take care of yourself - you’re not failing!

This work serves your dreams, too.

We can be SO FAST to discount this work but it’s VITAL.

You need a solid foundation to dream from.

Giving yourself this solid foundation may take more time/work than you want it to. But it is VITAL for your dreams, and yourself today.

Creative Dream Incubator Coaching Membership members:

Come to the forum to share your thoughts or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.

Get your next Dream Book lesson or get a weekly journaling + alchemy kit.

Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are or use the Dream Lab if you're not sure where to start.

Check out the calendar of upcoming calls. Make a plan to join us live or catch a replay.