Thank you to my Ayurvedic Yogi friend Asrael for inviting me to write about 'writing'. It's a BLOG Tour sponsored by icpublishing and a 'big step' for me to be included. I hope you enjoy my take on the 'creative process'. Everyone is different in our perspectives and when Asrael suggested taking part - I realized that I write for quite different reasons than I was reading about. ENJOY!!
Please take the time to read the blogs on the tour - links are included on Asrael's blog page above - just click on her name!!
I remember the day I sat down to write for the very first time. It was a crispy winter day in 1988 - minus 42 degrees outside my little cabin on Gregoire Lake - 20 minutes south of Ft. McMurray. Just the day before, I had intentionally quit my job. The light was streaming in the window and prisms were dancing in the sun casting rainbows on the walls – and here I sat – with the most ‘vacated’ feeling I had ever experienced. I was all by myself with nowhere to go and nothing that I had to do. I picked up a green coil sketchbook that I had saved for a ‘special’ occasion. It was brand new and terrifying to open and look at that first blank page. It just occurred to me to start writing that day. Not that I consider myself a writer then or ever, but that was the day I put pen to paper.
I write for me to see myself - to become visible - to make something real. I wrote and wrote and wrote – every day. Like Forest Gump – I just started writing. I wrote 54 full size sketchbook journals before I slowed down. I even had a special hand tooled leather cover for them given to me by my sweet husband. It cost a fortune! And each time I start a new journal, I change to my special cover. Inside there was a warning, that I no longer need to inscribe so carefully – “if you have mistakenly opened this page – put this book down immediately – before you have to run away screaming!”
I never really thought of myself as a writer. I was more like a “purger”. Every morning I’d start my day with a “word purge”. Warm coffee in one hand – it was my chance to ask all the questions to the Universe that I didn’t have the answers to. "What am I supposed to do with my life?" " Why am I here – really" … and don’t lie to me!! I wanna know!
I rarely read the journals over – but when I did go back and look at what I had written even I was surprised. My first original green journal was the biggest surprise. “Where did those words come from? That really doesn’t sound like me at all”. There was wisdom and depth to the questions that I asked the Universe. In between there were confabulations of every emotion and situation imaginable and lots of scrawls and pictures that illustrated my dreams and visions. There were complete conversations that were quiet and enchanting and just as many observations of situations that stunned me with their anguish. I looked like a multi-personality of puzzle pieces on a game board.
I was 54 years old when I wrote my 54th journal - one for every year that I had lived. By that time, I had learned to meditate and no longer needed to write quite the same level of daily purge.
How Do You Continue Writing
Now I write because it is part of my contemplation process. I write to hear what the Universe has to say, so I can hear through the clutter of noise - a cleared path for my heart to sing. I write to hear its tune.All my deadlines are self-imposed. I write to create my life now. It’s the pathway to beginnings and endings and everything in between. I write to share and inspire. I write to experience truth and mostly I just write for pure enjoyment and to see the words dance on the page.
I am a writer because I picked up a pen, turned to a blank page and did the same thing every day for almost 30 years now. I am a writer because the process itself taught me how to write; taught me how to ask questions and wait for the answers – how to be a scribe for the Universe. I am a writer because I have a daily habit that has over time built skill through its dedication and enthusiasm to unveil the mysteries. I am a writer of a life well lived and I am a writer of a life not yet experienced – that which is still in the dream stage.
I am wrapped in a cloak of words
Inside is the butterfly
The words are her freedom
And as with all things free
They must be released
How Do You Know when You're Done
… actually …. in perfect synchronicity - I have to go change the batteries in my ‘mouse,’ which just ‘died’, as I wrote the word ‘released’.
Tips, Tools and Challenges
Bless your hearts – just pick up a pen and start!"When the Pressure is ON - just START - and the pressure will be off" Yogi Bhajan
Be STILL and LISTEN….
