Summoning Up My Dream

In the last two days, a theme has repeated in my life and I've had an epiphany: I've been afraid to dream dreams--life dreams, hopes, visions--for a long time, maybe since I was a young woman. So I just stopped dreaming. I've been afraid to believe.

Then on Monday, Kate's birthday, Kate launched a giveaway for her new Safe Harbor Creativity Coaching practice. It's a huge giveaway of a month of coaching with her, and she is offering some cool specials as well. I was excited to enter. Part of the entry was to leave a comment about your creative dream, which also might be what you'd like to be coached about. I really had to think on that. I have problems and issues and am very aware of what they are--that's what I work on in therapy. But dreams--creative dreams? How long has it been since I've given myself permission to have those?

So I summoned up a dream and entered Kate's contest. I wasn't sure if it fit or not. I was surprised that I could come up with one and write it in the comment.

Then on Tuesday I was reviewing a new book by Danielle LaPorte from WhiteHotTruth.com. It hasn't come out yet (I'm reviewing an advance copy), but when it does this April, you should get it. It's called The Fire Starter Sessions. It is SO good! I was just in the introduction, and Danielle wrote about how important it is to commit to dreaming about your ideal life, to make it a regular life practice, refine it every day. I thought, "Whoa! What a difference from me? I had to think to even figure out what my dream might be! How could my life shift if I allowed myself to daily refine my dreams?"

The last tap from the Universe was Tuesday also when my therapist told me about a book she had been reading about the importance of rehearsing our dreams in our heads, suggesting that I may choose to do this. I knew for sure that this was a message I needed to incorporate into my life.

As if all of that wasn't enough, today, Wednesday, Cinner wrote a post about her dream. How our dreams can change morph as life changes us. I knew these messages were all for me.

Today I wrote my dream out. After sitting with its kernel from Kate's page for a couple of days, I expanded it a bit more and wrote:

My dream is to figure out a way to have the time, energy, and belief in myself to do the things I love as a creative career: art, writing, reading, and encouraging other people, probably as a life coach. (Note: I already am a certified life coach and have a master's degree as well, so this is a doable dream. The hardest part of this dream is the initial part!)

It took so much from me to admit this to myself. I haven't spent time dwelling on it or rehearsing it yet--more just allowing it, and letting myself dip my toe into the deep end of my imagination as I try it on for size.

What is your dream? Do you allow yourself to meditate on it daily?

Or are you already living your dream? I suspect that some of you are--I have seen this happen over and over in your lives. Please share.

For Book Lovers

Does this blow your circuits like it does mine? Almost hard to believe. I looked around the room at all of my books and wondered what life would be like in a bookless house. Or alternatively, with just a little bookshelf. It was hard to envision. Life is changing.

I have a Kindle (I got a new Kindle 3 for Christmas and LoveHubbie got my old Kindle 1) and I really enjoy digital books. I still enjoy hardcopy books too though; I just read more. Yet this is a step beyond.

What do you think?

Extreme Journaling

I recently discovered extreme journaling---which is a form of art, journaling, and extremely deep introspection---from Heather at A Creative Journal.

What is Extreme Journaling? Juliana Coles describes it here and lists supplies here.

Note that the supplies list, or the "destiny voyages packing" could be used for any type of artwork or journaling while traveling.

I am inspired by this form of art journaling, especially since I'm ready to begin Jamie Ridler's "Wreck this Journal" group on Friday. Any of you who'd want to join me would be most welcome.

Come, explore with me!

Two Unconventional Uses for Twitter

Just over a day before I leave for Hawaii, but I wanted you to see this:

One use is interactive brain surgery. Can you imagine? The other is monitoring fish catches and these fisherpeople have even devised their own compact syntax that is fascinating.

Check both of these out, but especially check them out if you can't imagine being on Twitter. It is a very creative way of being connected that is deceptively simple but as powerful as you can imagine.

~Photo by LoveHubbie Mark

The Ice Hotel

Well with all this snow, imagine this, the Number 1 Vacation Spot in Sweden:

The Ice Hotel, a hotel made of ice in which you "dress in warm thermal underwear, put on a hat" and then lie down on your sculpted ice bed. "You sleep in a thermal sleeping bag on a special bed built of snow and ice, on reindeer skins."

Who has been there? Not I, nor will I anytime soon. I have more than enough snow, ice, and cold here to satisfy me!

I am grateful for my warm house and warm cozy bed.

~Photo from the Ice Hotel Website

Today, This Made My Day

What can I do for someone else today? Here is a story about someone who made a difference.

Wellness Wednesday: Making A Difference

I wanted to share with everyone an opportunity to make a difference that I found out about from yertle. Part of being healthy is contributing to others' lives, and though I know we all do this in various ways, this way in particular was especially rewarding to me today.

The opportunity is called DonorsChoose.org and the way it works is that public school teachers put requests into the database for certain supplies, or trips, or visitors, or basically any materials or whatever that they think their students really need, but that they cannot afford. You can review all of the projects and search based on many different criteria. Then you give any amount of money, whatever you can afford, towards a project that appeals to you.

So tonight LoveHubbie and I donated to a school in rural West Virginia that desperately needed dictionaries. Desperately. They had been waiting since May and received nothing until tonight. The requesting teacher was a previous student who had gone to college and come back to teach at the same public school she had attended. This really impressed me. I was so happy! I could just imagine how excited everyone would be, getting something so incidental for a well-funded school---some dictionaries---but actually very huge for their little school. They were all sharing several worn out paperback dictionaries that were 7 years old, falling apart, and actually had chunks missing so that the students never knew if they would be able to look up the words they wanted.

I would have been happy just for the thrill of donating, but the students then send thank you notes. This really is a brilliant idea. Everyone wins.

You can even buy gift cards for a specific amount of money and then give the card to someone who can then pick out which project they wish to donate to. How cool is that?

Check it out, it's such a positive and creative way to help young people!

~Photo via Cute Overload

An Opportunity to Give Today

I want to do my part in spreading the news about this wonderful opportunity to give. We are many, and can make a huge difference with very little effort in this. Kate I writes about it here, and it's only for today, so bop over now, please. The rest of the story and the place to donate is on Jen Lemen's blog here. Thanks, gals and guys :)



~The photo is from Pomai at The Tasty Island and is a Hawaiian hibiscus; here are more stunning pictures from a recent post of his.

Today I Got Two New Toys

Well, today was a red letter day. In preparation for NaNoWriMo (in which you write every day to complete a novel in a month) in November I ordered an Alphasmart Neo. I am unable to use laptop computers (the keyboards give me carpal tunnel) and the Alphasmart has a full size keyboard, which means I can write remotely. At last! Type remotely, that is...as in type quickly and do word counts, upload and download to a computer. In coffeeshops...outside...anywhere! Those of you with laptops may take this for granted, but I'm new to this so it opens a whole new world up to me.

The Neo is a sturdy word processor for people who want to do volume writing without a lot of editing; you're really supposed to do that on a regular computer where you can see the whole screen. It does autosaves of every word, is light like a calculator, and goes 700 hours on 3 AA batteries! If you purposely do not want to edit your writing and just produce---quickly and easily---and you don't want to spend a lot of money, the Neo is something you might enjoy.

I found out about it by reading Chris Baty's "No Plot? No Problem!: A Low-Stress, High-Velocity Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days" a book I highly recommend for NaNoWriMo participants.

I made a deal with LoveHubbie that if I complete NaNoWriMo, he'll pay for the Neo, but if I fail to complete it, I'll have to pay for the Neo. More support for me in actually doing this :) I love this deal.

Then..then...Amazon sent me an email offering me a free...as in totally FREE...Flip Camcorder in order to do video reviews for them. I thought it was a joke at first. At last those 1433 reviews (as of today) I've done on Amazon are starting to pay off :) I'm intrigued by all of the creative possibilities of doing video reviews.

Reviewing books, kitchen appliances, music, tea, movies, electronic items, bedding, and pretty much everything else I've ever bought on Amazon or elsewhere is my #3 hobby, behind reading and walking. So I'm so thrilled to have this opportunity. I've never had a video recorder or camcorder before, so it's pretty, pretty cool.



~Pictures by LoveHubbie Mark from Lahaina, Maui

Are You A Word Nerd?

Brad Shorr defines a "word nerd" as:

• Someone who enjoys learning new words.
• Someone who, when confronted by an unfamiliar word while reading, looks up the definition.
• Someone who may keep a list of favorite words.
• Someone who is fascinated by the nuances of language, especially the history of words and the shades of difference in meaning between similar words.

Umm...yes, that's definitely me. So if it's you, mosey on over to his site, Word Sell, Inc. and grab a free badge if you're so inclined. He has another site that I really love, called Scrambled Toast, that is all about humor, fun, and words, and it truly appeals to word nerds. Subscribe to either, or both, and HAVE FUN!

Creative Every Day For A Month

So Karen is working on an experiment, committing herself to creativity for a month. She has been joined so far by Jessie and Leah. All of these gals are from my previous Finding Water community. I'm thinking about doing this also.

What it means is that participants commit themselves to doing something creative each day. Jessie is going to do a painting each day. Leah is going to create a piece of art each day...and be relaxed about it, which really appeals to me. Karen is going to post her art, and include creative writing.

Ok, so now I've talked myself into it. I'm...willing...to do something creative every day. However, I want to be flexible about what it is. I want to think out of the box and learn to be creative in new and different ways, especially when I "don't have time". I want to explore creativity! And then share my results here.

I also want to be relaxed about it. I'll be going from not making time to do anything intentionally creative to being creative daily, which seems like quite a distance. I want to avoid pressure and struggle. But still make the commitment, and then rely on inner guidance to show me what to do that day.



~Picture by LoveHubbie Mark, a photo of one man's creative dream, the Ali'i Kula Lavender Farm in upcountry Maui

Amazon's Movers & Shakers

I wanted to share with everyone how to reach Amazon "Movers & Shakers". These are the items that have increased the greatest in sales rank at Amazon over the past 24 hours. The list is updated hourly. Why should you care? Two main reasons:

1 - People are buying more of these items because they are being promoted on television, radio, or have been just released. They are popular and often timely.

2 - People are buying more of these items because they are on sale at Amazon and are a fantastic value.

Movers & Shakers are available not only for books, but for all other Amazon categories. These other categories are apparel, automotive, baby, beauty, camera & photo, cell phones & service, computers & PC hardware, DVD, electronics, gourmet food (yes, really!), grocery (I do much of my grocery shopping via Amazon Prime and thus pay no shipping), health & personal care, home & garden, industrial & scientific, jewelry & watches, kitchen & housewares (lots of sales here), magazines, music, musical instruments, office products, outdoor living, software, sports & outdoors, tools & hardware, toys, video, and video games. Find out what's hot and where the sales are.

To get to Movers & Shakers, you cannot navigate via Amazon's navigation system. You must use a special link:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/new-for-you/movers-and-shakers/-/books

This will take you to the Books page, but the other Movers & Shakers can be accessed via the links on the left. I had to write to Amazon three times to get this link, as I could locate nothing on their web site, and have had it bookmarked for years. I'd thought there would be an easier way, but apparently there isn't.

Kind Blog

Today I found out about kind blogs from Chookooloonks...oh yea, this is so in line with my values and what I want for my blog...for my life in general.



A Kind Blog is a blog that subscribes to the following:

By posting this badge, I'm declaring that in addition to humour, intelligence, wit, sadness, snarkiness, passion, exuberance, peace, stillness, excitability, anger or any other emotion you may witness on my site:

1) I will never intentionally hurt other people, whether I know them or not, whether they blog or not, whether they're celebrities or not, either through my words or my images. It's just not my style; and

2) I hope that by the time you've clicked away from my site, I've helped in some way to make your day just a little bit better.

Signed,

Me

Thank you, Chookooloonks! Visit Chookooloonks on a regular basis for some beautiful photography as well as for the great kind blog idea.