This is my mom, at one of my creativity workshops, SIXTEEN YEARS AGO(!)
I remember this workshop, I put it on as a fundraiser. There were maybe 25 people there who paid $20 each so we raised $500.
I had been doing my workshops for a little while, and what I mostly remember about this one is that I felt more free and sure of myself by putting this on a fundraiser.
Like - if I'm not making money from it, then it's ok for me to do this work that lights me up. And it did light me up! I loved this workshop - and look at the smile on my mom's face!
That was 16 years ago.
I have been making my living from the work that lights me up for the last 12.5 years.
It took a lot of little baby steps to get here. But also it took really being with that part of me who felt I didn't deserve to make money in this way and figuring out how to believe in more.
For a long time, I felt like this was on me. My own self doubt. My own limiting beliefs. My own failure to heal.
As I worked my way through it I was excited to help others do the same and that’s where I focused… But after all these years of doing this work I see it more clearly now.
It was never on me.
And your “limiting beliefs” and self doubt are not on you.
It’s dominant culture.
We literally have to be so afraid of dying of poverty that we will take any job we can get, in order for our current economic system to work.
We have to be willing to work at jobs we don’t like in order to support our families and pay for our lives.
We doubt our inner truth because the world is telling us things we know aren't true, and inviting they are.
We feel wrong inside because the world is telling us to live in a way that doesn't feel right inside.
And it’s from within that system that we dream of something better.
So of course the system impacts HOW we dream.
Another facet of this system is the meritocracy. The idea that we all have what we deserve.
When one person amasses enough money to actually care for and feed the whole planet but chooses to hoard it for themselves, the system says this person is a success and deserves to just suck that much money out of the economy so it’s not available for anyone else, it’s no longer in circulation. And when another person dies of exposure on the streets, the system says that person made poor choices and deserved what they got.
And individualism. The focus on YOU as the source of your success but also as the source of your problems.
The system holds so many values that are at odds with reality and are largely unquestioned because they live in the subconscious of our culture, and in each of our minds.
When I feel doubt about my ability to make money doing what lights me up - IE when I feel that I do not DESERVE to be my actual self and live my life in a way that feels true for me - I am drawing on all of this.
This is how the system wants me to feel, because otherwise I wouldn’t participate in it and it needs our participation.
The system is white supremacist colonialist capitalism.
I’m looking back on this photo and remembering this creativity workshop I did 16 years ago and how it felt to offer my work in a way that felt fulfilling to me and how it felt like I had no way to do that as my way of living, that it could only ever be this side thing….
I’m thinking of how far I’ve come, how much freedom and space I have been able to create for myself to live my life in a way that feels true for me.
But it feels like I have just carved out this little bubble somewhere within the system, I'm still participating in it enough to support my life.
I am not actually outside the system.
So now I am thinking: what does it look like to dream from outside of the system?
To deeply understand ALL of the values of dominant culture* that have been engrained in me, to clear space to think and dream and create not at all connected to any of that.
This is very much inspired by the conversations we’ve been having in Co-Dreaming (these are the free classes I do on Mondays), and last week’s call speaking of transcendence - not just ignoring and pretending away the problems with spiritual bypass but seeing them clearly while seeing through them to the REAL truth of what human life is…
And then dreaming up new ways of living, from that place.
*This is not just about racism and capitalism. It includes the patriarchy, ableism (in terms of physical and mental health and neurodivergance and fat phobia), heteronormativity, anti-trans, and classist anti-poor values. It’s a way of not seeing all humans as human in order to justify greed and land and power grabs.
Dream Book 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.
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.
Note: This is a post about my daily practice with my Creative Dreams - in these posts I often link to the tools, courses and processes I use which are only available to Dream Book members. If you're not a member, find out more + join us here.
First of all, Working With Conflicting Feelings is a class we are doing on Sept 20! (Dream Book members, details are here)
When I plan calls, I am working with the soul of the Creative Dream Incubator and the feedback I'm getting from people about where they're at and what would be helpful.
This call just seemed helpful in these wild times, but now things have changed in my life in a way that I am consistently holding space for conflicting feelings for myself, and am so happy to be doing this in a group later on this month.
So today in my practice I am naming all of the feelings I am feeling:
Noticing their shape and texture and where they are in my body. Being curious about where and how they intersect.
One of the shitty things about holding space for our feelings is having to actually feel them.
This is not actually that bad in reality, but our minds make up so many stories about how awful it is to feel a feeling, that it becomes so hard to stay with it.
What if a feeling is just a feeling? What if we let it express how it wants to?
It's the HOLDING IN, especially with conflicting feelings that keep hitting up against each other inside us like a pinball, that is harmful.
Human emotion is so rich. Letting it be what it is creates space inside us for new possibilities, which helps with the work outside of us.
As I drew out my feelings in my journal and explored what they were doing in my body, everything started to feel more calm. This is emotional alchemy.
Today I am feeling:
- Hopeful: a light in my heart shining out (which can sometimes dim a lot depending on what other feelings are floating around it, but it's always there)
- Rage: sharp edges, burning hot
- A tiny spark of optimism
- A pool of sadness it feels like it might be infinitely deep
- More rage, but this rage is melting into sadness
- Excitement for the future: a star that bounces around offering healing to everything it touches
- My trust in perfect timing: just kind of floating out there
- Inspiration and creative magic: sparkling around, it's actually permeating everything when I look close enough
- My trust in emotional alchemy is a foundation to rest on
- My faith in myself and the process of life: a field of wildflowers in bloom
- Swirls of confusion: mostly swirling in my brain but flow throughout my body too
- Bits of hurt feelings: small but with sharp edges, floating around and sometimes bumping into things and causing everyone pain
Apart from the obvious external obstacles, it's not being able to be with our feelings that holds us back the most.
AND of course, it's BECAUSE of the external stuff that being with our feelings can be so hard!!!! The more childhood trauma you had, the crueler the world has been to you, the more sensitive you are, the harder it is to make space for your feelings.
I say that to say - it's not your personal failing that this work is hard. You haven't done anything wrong.
You live in a culture that makes it harder than it needs to be, to feel your feelings.
So even just thinking about this is really brave work.
Dream Book 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.
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.
Note: This is a post about my daily practice with my Creative Dreams - in these posts I often link to the tools, courses and processes I use which are only available to Dream Book members. If you're not a member, find out more + join us here.
I'm offering these live Co-Dreaming (Meditation + Journaling) calls every Monday.
I started doing these calls to help us all keep showing up no matter how messy things get because have you noticed how messy the world is right now?
And together we've turned it into this really beautiful community dreaming together. I'm so grateful for everyone who is showing up and Co-Dreaming with me. This is so special.
This week's theme: Creative Dreaming is fucking vulnerable!
In so many different ways, Creative Dreaming puts us outside of "the path" that the world puts in front of us, forces us to create our own paths and sometimes we're doing that not really knowing what direction we're in, or where our dreams might be. It's vulnerable and complicated and all we can do is keep showing up.
Dream Book 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.
Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are.
Check out the calendar of upcoming calls.
Note: This is a post about my daily practice with my Creative Dreams - I often link to the tools, courses and processes I use which are available to Dream Book members. If you're not a member, find out more + join us here.
On Fridays I do my Dream Status Report which is a series of prompts I use every week to help me have more clarity, momentum and groundedness on my path. You can do them with me (Dream Book members: come post yours in the forum!)!
I know doing the same prompts every week can be annoying sometimes but this is magically clarifying. The repetition helps you go deeper into the process and makes it easier to LEARN from your process as you go, and the apply those learnings right away.
Here are the prompts:
PART ONE: (sometimes these can stay the same for months at time, sometimes they change often)
My dream is:
I want it because:
When I have it I will feel:
PART TWO:
Invite your dream in (using the Dream Lab practice) to help you with the rest of the prompts.
PART THREE:
My goal/wish/intention for this New Moon is:
Last week’s focus was:
What happened in the last week?
What am I learning/How do I feel about this?
What do I need now?
What does my dream need now?
Taking all of this into account, my focus for the next week is:
My Dream Status Report for this week:
PART ONE:
My dream is: Being the artist + writer I want to be. Feeling really alive. I already have it AND it's an always-work-in-process... right now there is a lot shifting around how much/what kind of art I make and working on creating more nourishing/robust/lively local creative community.
I want it because: This is hard to answer. I just want it.
When I have it I will feel: The same as now - ALL the feelings 🙂
My new moon intention: Give myself quality time and attention.
PART TWO: Invite your dream in (using the Dream Lab practice) to help you with the rest of the prompts.
I just see all these people. Loads of colours. Everyone being their unique self. Liveliness and support.
PART THREE:
Last week’s focus was: Less stuff, more space for creativity.
What happened in the last week?
I did have less "stuff" somewhat. And I write this on Thursday mornings, and have even MORE space for creativity on Thursday and Friday.
But life has a lot of "stuff" in it right now. I feel like I entered a healing portal and the only way out is through. Stuff keeps coming at me and I keep doing my best with it AND doing my best to make space for the things I want.
Right now the big thing I want is to finish the guided journal project. It's 80 pages (!) (some are blank pages for journaling with artwork on the other side, some are 2 page journaling spreads with art on both pages) but are they complete? Do I want to do revisions to the artwork or the prompts? I don't know. I have about 15 more pages to go and then I'll start editing. The way my creative process goes, it's really hard to know what will happen next. Maybe it will turn into a 200 page journal. Or I could very well use the whole process of creating 95 pages of artwork for this to realize "Oh I want to do it differently" and start over. I am worried this will happen, and I will never finish this, but all I can do is stay in the process, be with the feelings that come up, and do my best to keep moving.
What am I learning/How do I feel about this?
Life feels SO FULL ON right now. So many good things happening and so many big, like BIG healing.... opportunities? Crises? I feel like I am learning EVERYTHING.
What do I need now?
For some reason, I went back into the Dream Lab meditation, to meet my dream to see what it said about this. (Usually I do this for the next prompt, and just ask myself this prompt)
My dream, all the people gathered, held up signs. I looked more closely and signs said LOVE.
What does my dream need now?
Back into the dream meeting, now the people all hold hands. My focus is drawn right in, two hands clasped together.
My husband and I are having a very difficult time. Interracial relationships are always hard, but settler-Indigenous relationships - during ongoing genocidal colonization which feels particularly brutal in my city right now, which is impacting my husband in ways that white people can't understand - may be impossible to maintain.
My dream focusing on the two hands clasped together feels like "keep trying right now"
Taking all of this into account, my focus for the next week is:
Looking back on my answers - it's love.
But what does that mean?
Letting love be my quality for the week. Breathing it in regularly. Asking what love would do when I'm not sure.
OK I can do that.
Dream Book members:
Come to the forum to share your Dream Status Report or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.
Get your next Dream Book lesson.
Check out the calendar of upcoming calls.
I didn't do much in my practice today, a quick check-in with my Dream Book (which I am still LOVING having it together with my planner, so I checked in with both to see how I'm doing with my plans for the week) and then I felt ready to GET TO WORK on the guided journal project.
I see the end in sight and really want to get there ASAP.
But I did keep thinking about our Co-Dreaming call on Monday and how hopeful I felt at the end, and what we can do to feel optimistic about our future - like the future of humanity.
It takes a lot of work to feel optimistic about ourselves and our own lives, but that work is necessary for any dream work to happen. So how do we translate that to the world? I did a bunch of writing about it, which is not ready to share, but it's coming 🙂
Dream Book 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.
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.
Note: This is a post about my daily practice with my Creative Dreams - in these posts I often link to the tools, courses and processes I use which are only available to Dream Book members. If you're not a member, find out more + join us here.
I wanted to draw the Marketing as a Creative + Spiritual Practice practice. The ball of light and all the things it radiates out into the world.
And I wanted to leave space to keep adding things, keep sitting with this idea/question: what is it that I am offering?
I am in LOVE with all the ways this practices has changed how I do things in my business. That I now share my daily posts openly on my blog. That I now do a free call on Mondays. I feel like I am inviting people in to the world of the Creative Dream Incubator and giving them enough so they can know if they want to come in further, I don't have to promote things.
Not that promoting, or selling, are wrong! This just feels more aligned and sustainable for me right now. And that's what approaching marketing as a creative and spiritual practice will lead you to - what is aligned and right and doable for YOU as well as what delights your people.
Can't wait for next week's Marketing as a Creative + Spiritual Practice call to keep exploring!
Dream Book 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.
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.
Note: This is a post about my daily practice with my Creative Dreams - in these posts I often link to the tools, courses and processes I use which are only available to Dream Book members. If you're not a member, find out more + join us here.
I've been working on the artwork for the guided journal project and it's such a BIG project.
I'm at a point of feeling disconnected from it, like I am focused on small details, and I lost sight of the big picture.
So I am using the Dream Lab practice to invite in the soul of my guided journal.
The field of Creative Dream Alchemy is BUZZING with energy. It feels like being in a disco ball. Healing, transformation and creativity are all turned all the way up.
I can't quite relax into it, it does feel like a disco, so I dance with it. Sitting in my meditation, I am swaying my whole body and it feels like movement is allowing new possibilities in.
Then the guided journal dances in. It's glowing and it wants to be known as the Creative Dream Playbook.
It's thick and colourful.
It's grateful for all of the explorations I have done around the artwork, for the ways it's all coming together.
It puts it's hand on my head and says "I'm fine. You need to take care of you. You feel doubt about if you're doing good enough. I promise you are."
So... into the Un-Sticking Station with the doubt.
It feels like we're connected to the disco from the Field of Creative Dream Alchemy, but we're in some kind of chill room.
Doubt is a dot on the floor. Like, it has arms and legs but it's body is a dot.
I sit down beside it.
"Ooooofff! I worked so hard on this and maybe it's all crap!"
Why do you say that?
"Because of how I feel when I look at it"
OK, I'm going to go get my tablet, let's take a look at it together.
OK yeah, a few things feel "meh" but THIS IS A DRAFT. My plan was to do all of the hand lettering with artwork, AND THEN go through it all. The "meh" stuff is all style choices that can change! But the bulk of the work - this is gorgeous.
The dot is now.. like a ball. Like the dot was deflected and now it's inflated. It's happy. It's leaving the chill room and going to the disco.
And I am getting to work on this artwork!
Update: Turns out the doubt I was feeling was ambivalence around some of the artwork part - and once I simplified my ideas for that, everything flowed again!
Dream Book 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.
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.
Note: This is a post about my daily practice with my Creative Dreams - in these posts I often link to the tools, courses and processes I use which are only available to Dream Book members. If you're not a member, find out more + join us here.
I'm offering these live Co-Dreaming (Meditation + Journaling) calls every Monday.
I started doing these calls to help us all keep showing up no matter how messy things get because have you noticed how messy the world is right now?
I'm so grateful for everyone who is showing up and Co-Dreaming with me. This is so special.
This week's theme: Hope and Transcendence
Soooo interesting how so many of us had HUGE flower themes this week, and how overall our stories lead to hope and the possibility of transcendence. It didn't feel like the "spiritual by-passy" kind of transcendence, it felt more like digging deeper into the real and deep magic that we all have inside us.
Dream Book 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.
Go the Library of Creative Dream Alchemy to find a practice that fits for where you are.
Check out the calendar of upcoming calls.
Note: This is a post about my daily practice with my Creative Dreams - I often link to the tools, courses and processes I use which are available to Dream Book members. If you're not a member, find out more + join us here.
On Fridays I do my Dream Status Report which is a series of prompts I use every week to help me have more clarity, momentum and groundedness on my path. You can do them with me (Dream Book members: come post yours in the forum!)!
I know doing the same prompts every week can be annoying sometimes but this is magically clarifying. The repetition helps you go deeper into the process and makes it easier to LEARN from your process as you go, and the apply those learnings right away.
Here are the prompts:
PART ONE: (sometimes these can stay the same for months at time, sometimes they change often)
My dream is:
I want it because:
When I have it I will feel:
PART TWO:
Invite your dream in (using the Dream Lab practice) to help you with the rest of the prompts.
PART THREE:
My goal/wish/intention for this New Moon is:
Last week’s focus was:
What happened in the last week?
What am I learning/How do I feel about this?
What do I need now?
What does my dream need now?
Taking all of this into account, my focus for the next week is:
My Dream Status Report for this week:
PART ONE:
My dream is: Being the artist + writer I want to be. Feeling really alive. I already have it AND it's an always-work-in-process like a touchstone.
I want it because: This is hard to answer. I just want it.
When I have it I will feel: The same as now - ALL the feelings 🙂
My new moon intention: Give myself quality time and attention.
PART TWO: Invite your dream in (using the Dream Lab practice) to help you with the rest of the prompts.
My dream shows up as me - just a little bigger and she's sparkly. She says "You've got this"
PART THREE:
Last week’s focus was: Feeling full of possibility, power and magic as a practice. Meditate on it. Journal on it. Make art on it.
What happened in the last week?
I did start with possibility, power and magic as a practice but this lead to much deeper Inner Work.
I am SO HAPPY to be busing a planner consistently again, to have my Dream Book and planner all in one - it feels like my life is more cohesive! I kept on top of things, and FELT on top of things AND gave my inner work exploration the space it needed, as it kept demanding MORE.
What am I learning/How do I feel about this?
I am in an extremely generative time. All the things that fell apart in the last three years and being re-built and I am coming back to life - not as I was but in this new way. I AM feeling full of possibility, magic and power.
What do I need now?
My dream holds my hands and says "You already have it"
What does my dream need now?
Same as last week - I just feel it pouring into me, not asking for anything from me.
Taking all of this into account, my focus for the next week is:
Remember that I already have it. And this week had a lot of STUFF in it, I want next week to have less stuff, more space for creativity.
Dream Book members:
Come to the forum to share your Dream Status Report or start a conversation about whatever you're working with.
Get your next Dream Book lesson.
Check out the calendar of upcoming calls.
Last weekend I was in an Un-Sticking Station meditation and couldn’t find the thing to focus on/invite in.
There was too much happening inside me to be able to focus on any one thing.
So I did my best to just stay with all of the sensations in my mind and body and then I felt it:
There is a tidal wave of healing coming at me.
This last month it feels like SO MANY PIECES fell into place. The ways I’ve been healing and recovering from how the early pandemic experience flattened me, and all the ways I have explored all the things that got stirred up in that process…
All of that somehow came together and I’ve been feeling renewed. So excited about my life. Like things are opening up. My creative, work and self care routines feel so solid and nourishing.
It’s like I stepped up, and this stepping up unleashed a tidal wave.
I don’t understand it.
I’m just trying to be with it.
So today I am meeting the tidal wave in the Un-Sticking Station.
It’s huge. It could absolutely destroy me.
I’m just standing here, looking up at it, undefended. Kind of curious about how “undefended” is how I feel.
The total wave speaks: “There is no way to defend yourself from me. I’m here. I’m unimaginably huge. There is no where to escape.”
And yet, right here in this moment, I don’t feel in immediate danger from the wave. It’s frozen in front of me.
So I sit down. Spread out a picnic. Offer it a cup of tea. It accepts, and these little arms come out of the wave, to pour little sips of tea into it.
“Oh that’s nice, Earl Grey?”
“Yes, I’ve been putting a bit of my homemade lavender syrup in it.”
“So good”
“So, is this the practice? To practice being undefended in the face of you? To offer you tea?”
“I”m still coming for you. It’s not an attack, it’s just a happening.”
“But as I sit here, you don’t seem as ominous or scary. It seems almost purposeful? And I remember how UNDEFENDED is the term that came to mind about how I feel and that seems like it’s about how there is nowhere to hide, and no way to impact what is coming…”
Which makes me think of the ways I (and all of us!) can avoid inner work even while doing inner work. The places where we won’t go. The parts we don’t see.
A tidal wave implies the loss of the ability to do that. Scary but also - "next level" in a good way.
I offer the wave the rest of my cookies and let it know I’ll be back to visit tomorrow, if it’s still here.
Dream Book 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.
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.
Note: This is a post about my daily practice with my Creative Dreams - in these posts I often link to the tools, courses and processes I use which are only available to Dream Book members. If you're not a member, find out more + join us here.