Do What Feels Right for YOU

Digital Adventures started today! I thought I'd share the intro video with you just in case you were on the fence, or were still unclear as to what the class is about! ​

I was talking to Andrea this morning -- check out her Creative Dream Incubator, by the way; it's on my dream list of classes to take & looks like FUN! (in between bouts of panic, as every launch has​ to have some kind of issue, however small!) about class size vs. value. As in, is it better to have a big class that costs less, or a small class that costs more? 

As we chatted, I realized I'd rather teach a smaller class of invested students than a large class where I don't have time to get to know everyone. ​I love small, intimate classes -- they feel much more like parties, and everyone gets to chat and know one another and watch not only their progress during the class, but everyone else's. It's like having a team of cheerleaders. I want​ to get to know my students, and with Digital Adventures, many of the students are my friends! So I'm super excited to sit down and put together each lesson because it's really just a long-distance Skype call of me sharing what I love. Doesn't that sound like the kind of class you'd want to take?

So I've decided to do a few things: ​

• I'm going to limit the size of my live classes so I can give each person individual attention, check in with them, and help tailor the experience to their level.
• I'll then open up classes as self-study (you get the content, but don't get to join the party!)​.
• I'm going to retire some of my old classes and cycle them out as new classes are added.​

Is this scary? YES! But Andrea was wise when she said you have to go with what feels right to you​. And Wren added that you have to do what you have lasting enthusiasm for​. 

We also touched on changing exchange if the scope of a project changes. When I started Creative Warriors, I intended on it being a low-energy investment each month -- a PDF or blog entries, guided journaling, and support. Now, it includes project videos, a Facebook group (full of chatting, awesome women!), and a monthly 'zine of guidance and inspiration that contributors can get paid for (hopefully!). ​

It has evolved as the needs of its creator and group became clearer. ​

I have guest posts lined up, people to interview, and so much joy for the 'zine, I might burst. Check out these messages I've gotten so far: ​

"The zine is great. I'm delving into it now and wanted to pause for a moment to tell you you've done a great job. I really connected with what you said about living with a Shadow Life. I look forward to the next installment."

"I just finally had a chance to read through the zine [and] it's absolutely WONDERFUL. You can see so much of your heart and soul in this, dear! it's so needed right now too, it gave me such a jump start after two weeks of barely being alive with so much stress and no energy. THANK YOU for putting this out, and i hope beyond hope for you that it works out!  at least the pain means you're alive? yes, THIS. on so many levels."

​Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to squeeze in a little more art before my business trip (I know! I have another one! To SF!) later this week. Have you SEEN my to-do list? What's sleep again? I was up at 6:30 am this morning! I think I deserve a snack from Sonic, yes? With all the energy I'm putting into this, Art Journal Summer School may be the last live class I do online this year. Especially if I keep getting work from magazines & artists! 

Sleeping Through March

Oh, April is fantastic! Fabulous! All of April has been spent in good spirits, with proper sleep, less pain, and a brighter mood. And exercise! And some Peeps I have left-over...please, if any of you see me in the grocery store or any other one buying more, stop me, for the love of God​. I found 2 of those 2-pack things empty​ in my studio. And a few chocolate wrappers. 

I am soooo happy that I now have a solid reason to reflect on each month in my Smash Book art journal. Being a Creative Warrior is about so much MORE than just keeping track of your daily life....it is about the mindfullness​ of doing so, of sitting down to reflect​ in a safe, soulful community of understanding people who have been where you are​ and know how to get through it​. ​

I have them and another support group I belong to, as well as some of the most amazing, wise friends, and I KNOW I wouldn't have gotten through March without them...or the other lessons I had to learn to get to where I am now. I am hungry​ to create and share and write and create....just today, I've gotten done what would have taken me a WEEK pre-new routine. Oh, I can't wait​ for next week, when I get to film a bunch of lessons for Digital Adventures. In fact, after I finish this post and a little newsletter note, I'm going to curl up on the couch with my iPad and finish a digital page....and I get to SHARE such wonderful, downloadable goodies! This nexus where passion, art, and technology meets is just....mmmm....a sweet spot! 

Oops! Time to hit the gym! I can read and listen to music and get a work out (though I'm there to tire out my body so I can get to sleep!). I have an awesome essay to share with you about what I learned the last time I was there...now, to find time to format and post it already! ​

(And if you're in Creative Warriors, the videos are UP for this lesson! Woohoo!)​

Magic Manifest

Launching Digital Adventures on Wednesday was a LOT of work, and I've been diving into physical mediums since to kind of balance everything out. I've been working on class content and think I'm spending too much time with my iPad, so yeah...paint on my fingers, please! ​

I'm trying to adjust to new medication that has me up half the night, so my drawings are coming through thin skin, nerves close to the surface, nearly exposed. No filter, just doodles as I use art to cope and use the time wisely (watching marathons of TV shows on Netflix feels like such a waste of time, if I'm to be awake until 5am!). You can see my notes scrawled in the corner of one of the pages. The other is a drawing done on thick paper, ready for paint, as soon as I settle on a color palette. ​

Spent the day filming March's journal spread for Creative Warriors, playing with new colors, experimenting with tools, palettes, and ideas. ​Nature, animals, totems, guides. What are we hiding behind and what do we wear outside? Tonight I am working with the imagery of a gazelle, though I would love to do more masks, or maybe simply focus on faces. 

How do you like the unicorn girl's 80's blazer with shoulder pads? Sometimes, you have to go with the mistakes and roll them into beauty instead of fighting with them. ​

Loosen up. Play. Add details. Tell stories with imagery instead of words. Dive into your own magic wardrobe and show me what your forest looks like. Who would I meet upon arriving? What does the landscape look like? How does magic manifest? ​

Two lessons learned today...

There is a bug in my living room, so I'm typing this on my iPad across the room. ​

(I don't like bugs. At all.)​

Self-Care Finds a Way

I slept wonderfully last night, but my legs were on fire when I woke up. This is a Usual Side Effect of having your period and FMS at the same time; your pain levels grow and grow and make you wish pain medication worked instantaneously. ​

Bug has moved. I am back in my comfy chair. ​

I got dressed and put on my makeup and pretty new earrings and got in the car to head to a client's to shoot some video. As I drove, my hips weren't happy, but I am committed to ​this particular, lovely woman, and had to reschedule from the day before because of dismal sleep. 

She texted me while I was curving into Phoenix and needed more time. ​

I went home and napped. We'll be shooting on Monday. Sometimes, things work out. ​

Where We Think We Are & Where We Really Are

I haven't been able to work at my studio table for a little while due to health issues that have decided to jump at me. I think painting last week took it all out of me, meaning I've been working out of my ​Couch Box for the past week or so. It's been hard, trying to capture the same colors and ideas when limited by supplies. I love my paints. I love my palette. And while journaling from the couch is lovely, I want those long hours at my desk, not long hours in my bed reading and working on my iPad.

This week, I shared my painting with my women's circle, ​which was, for some reason, more frightening than sharing the thing on the entire Internet! But it was an example of higher vibrations, when you are using something to cheer yourself up but unaware you're creating something beautiful at the same time. 

​Like the journal spread below. Born from a need to distract myself, struggled through without the colors I saw in my head (and had on my desk), and finished with some help and creative solutions, I suddenly found myself liking it. 

It is a reminder that you don't need fancy supplies, everything you think you need, or all you're used to in order to make art. You just need the will, the childlike spirit, and an open mind. 

You don't even need water.​

Pages in Progress...

Ever since I started playing in my journals daily (for long periods of time!), I've been full of inspiration and bouncing around! I spent most of this week getting my body all back to normal after that medication fiasco, as well as working on a beautiful new painting I'll be introducing you to tomorrow! Here are some of my pages-in-progress, like a mini brain dump. Some will change a lot, and others, not very much....but I want to show you all more in-progress work so you can see the evolution of things. Finished pages are great, but they don't help you figure out how they were made much, do they? 

​These are pages in my Moleskine. Most work done in this journal is "dry," that is, without acrylic paint, and focuses on collage, color, and thoughts. I work in here at the beginning of my day, right after I've woken up and my dreams are beginning to fade. 

My new favorite colors -- teal, fluorescent pink, and black.​

​This isn't a journal page, per se, but it was​ a mandala I doodled over a gelli print! I spent the better part of a day carving this monster from a block, and just love the thing! I may have to make more! 

Now I need your​ help! I am not a huge fan of spreads (I haven't done one this size for years!), but was so inspired by Tam's Free Falling journal page video that I jumped in and started one....except now I don't know what to do with the right-hand side of the spread! So, what ideas do you​ have? What should I do? I was thinking of drawing another face, like Tam does in the video, but there are things over there I like! So help me out -- give me some ideas so I can a. try something new, and b. finish this spread! 

We're all elders in training, keeping adventure journals

​There are times when I get an idea in my head and I just can't shake it....it will bug me and bug me and won't let me BE until I go and do it​. Since starting my daily practice of collage and mark-making, I've only found myself coming up with more​ ideas, not digging deeper to find inspiration. You know, those frustrating days when you sit down to work in your journal and can't come up with anything. Nope. Haven't had that. It drives me a bit crazy at times, but now that I'm writing things down, I no longer worry that I'll forget all these possibly-wonderful ideas!

​Things have been...difficult...for a little bit around here. After weeks of declining health and energy (remember all that fatigue I was feeling?), I finally found out I was having a negative reaction to some medication. Did you know generics differ from each-other and the original medication by 15%? Yeah, neither did I! Thankfully, I've been detoxing from it, and am feeling soooo much better (hence blog post; I have four of them slated and half-finished for next week!). I swear, I lost my mind for a little bit! 

One of the things that helped me see clearly once again was a women's circle I found out about when I went on an adventure to see some live music at a friend's house (live music is magical; if you can ever see it, even if it's a small group or music you *might* not like, do it anyway). I was able to drag myself out on Tuesday night in what I call Studio Chic, aka paint-covered yoga clothes, and found myself diving into the conversation and practice in this circle of women. Most know one another through their Kundalini yoga practice at a local studio and ashram; I've been interested in it ever since learning Carissa is actually a non-teaching yoga teacher in the same tradition! ​

​Seated on the floor, we went through basic breathing and movement exercises to warm up, and I found myself able to focus for the first time in weeks. We followed with a vocal meditation -- and in the space of moments in the Present, an hour-and-a-half had passed. 

The line in the doodle above stood out to me (as well as the woman leading the activity) -- that we are elders, just in training. That when we meditate and pray today, we're sometimes sending those messages we needed in the past. Or maybe today, we're praying for the Us of tomorrow. But we always have a line to the elder we will become, a way to connect to the Self that has the answers we so desperately seek in the present. ​

​No, time is not a straight line (though if you're a Doctor Who fan like me, you're already aware of this fact!). 

I began my letter skeptically, then remembered -- I had gotten a message from a future me while writing my daily pages a few days previous, being told about the Artist in me (something I will need another blog post to expand upon!). She told me what I should​ be focusing my attention on, working through, and that the Work is what matters. 

My Moleskine sketchbook has become my Adventure Journal; I work in it daily, and carry it with me wherever I go, pulling it out to record where I am, what I'm experiencing. It's a lot like a memory device; I can better recall an event if I was drawing/doodling at the same time. And the cover is quickly being taken over by stickers from the indie bands I've seen in the last month (as well as an art sticker of my own!). ​

​I doodled while the Love Leighs played Thursday evening, on my friend's front porch. Dawn recently posted her own scribbles and said: "I’ve realized that if I do them in a more scribbly way, the form is more forgiving and I’m not so worried about making them “perfect”." By doodling and scribbling, I feel like I captured their movement, their melodies, their words, the way the faerie lights made them glow, how two of them weren't wearing any shoes. I journaled a bit about how music in such intimate surroundings feels like a connection through the years, back to an earlier time, before the internet and YouTube and downloading CDs. When people would gather and sing and play and share life. 

I ended my night drinking the remainder of a friend's bottle of wine straight from the bottle (and shared it with the band's upright bass player). As my conversation ebbed and flowed outside the front door, the players changing as the night wained, I found myself peeling off the label and slapping it in my journal. On-the-spot journaling, indeed! ​

Of course, I had to share my doodle with the band. It's not my best, but they were still touched. And I'm feeling more and more alive as I bring together art and adventure and a body that's no longer fighting against me. ​

Dreamcatcher Journal Spread

I am in love with the transformative powers of art journaling. I've posted a new video lesson for my Creative Warriors about my struggles with insomnia and chronic fatigue. 

As you can see, I've transformed my old Smash Book into my diary for this year's journey...it seemed fitting since the book wasn't even half finished and just sitting on a shelf. I tore out the other pages and started over!

Happy Happy Mark Making!

I have been trying to write this blog post all day. 

Whenever I’m in a Flare-Zone (flare up, day/s of pain, etc), I try to stay off the internet and not write anything. Pain turns me into a big, fire-breathing dragon guarding whatever tatters of sanity are left, with a quick temper that roars when I get overstimulated. The moment I step into my apartment and the door closes behind me after running even the easiest of errands, I break down and start sobbing from holding everything in for so long. And I get overstimulated waaay too easily. 

This all combines into a Cloud of Negativity that only spreads onto the internet, in Facebook statuses that I regret a couple of hours later when pain meds have mellowed things out to a controllable, I-can-do-art-now level. Ugh. Have you ever sent an email you wished you could just snatch up from the air and grab back? 

Today is a better day than yesterday, and I’m hoping tomorrow is even better than today. Though the girl at the office (where I had to use the fax machine, since mine isn’t working…grr!) told me it’s supposed to start raining come Wednesday…can a girl get a break? Anyway, I spent last night watching Once Upon a Time & Revenge while doodling and finishing up these pages in my larger journal, and as soon as I finished my cotton candy girl, I was like, “Oh my goodness, I am in love with this page!” I wanted to snuggle it close and marveled at the fact that I made it! 

It started all layered and collage-y and with tons of neon….I am SO helplessly in love with neon! The page on the right was done with charcoal and at first, I thought she looked like an alien…I think she still does, but adding hair did help. And then merry, happy marks.

I really want to make a video or class around happy mark-making. Working on the iPad has so loosened me up, and I no longer feel like I have to cover every bit of the page…well, I already talked about that, but it continues on. 

I now switch between my bigger journal and my Moleskine sketchbook. More paint and marks and neon oil pastels. The face on the right is a graphite portrait I did last year that I recently unearthed when cleaning. I made a smaller copy and just pasted it into my journal with some washi tape accents. Journaling is really opening up to me in a new way…after eight years, it continues to surprise and save me, which is why I keep doing it! 

I’ve found a way to use my ever-growing washi collection (we did a SWAP on Friday that was genius!)…I put it down the center of my journal spreads to keep stuff from leaking through. I’m not a huge fan of doing two page spreads, so it breaks it up into pages while adding texture and color. I can jump off from there.

Tonight, I’ll be playing in my journal some more. It’s a wonderful distraction, and can be done anywhere! 

What new things have you tried lately? 

Any new colors, materials, or techniques? 

Are you drawing more, loosening up, expressing yourself?

 Materials used: a lot! MS paint, neon oil pastels, washi tape, collage materials, Prismacolor Colored Pencils, paint pens, markers, graphite, charcoal