Writing my way to Freedom

Last week I came across Joanna Paterson’s blog Confident Writing. Joanna started a group writing project asking the question ‘Can writing keep us well?’ I believe the answer is yes!

The magnificent thing about being a writer, for me, is that creativity is wrapped up so closely with spirituality. When I write in connection with my spirit I feel ‘out of this world’ so to speak. I seem to disconnect from my physical body and float along peacefully, effortlessly, with my soul. And when I write from my soul the words flow with grace and purpose. It’s still me writing, but I’m writing from a place of serenity. Any issues that I may be burdened with in my life at the time slip away, for a moment, to allow the energy of creativity to flood through me.

In that way, writing is very similar to meditation. When I meditate the same thing happens – my thoughts slide away and I am left with a gentle energy that brings peace and relaxation to me. Daily meditation has long been suggested for those seeking a quiet mind and a feeling of tranquillity. I believe for a writer, writing can offer that same sense of well-being. Writing can be like breathing – essential and life-giving. Without air we fade away. Without my writing I can lose myself in pessimism or hopelessness. Writing restores me.

Being able to shift my attention away from my worries and anxieties is the true definition of freedom to me. I long for freedom so distinctly that it shapes everything I do in my life. The freedom I seek is everlasting peace and stillness, a break from my chattering mind, and writing brings me pure moments of this. That’s how writing keeps me well.

Musings on Creativity, with a little help from Elizabeth Gilbert

In the space of a week I have, quite literally, devoured two books by the wonderfully talented and inspirational writer Elizabeth Gilbert. Those of you who are familiar with the phenomenon that was Elizabeth’s memoir Eat, Pray, Love will recognise her name. She is a brilliant writer, an extraordinary woman, and someone I felt a kinship with from the very first moment I read her words. This kinship is not because we are both writers. What made me recognise my connection to Elizabeth Gilbert was the way we view the act of writing itself, the creative process, and how closely it links with divinity.

All artists, across all disciplines, often speak of an entity or thing that resides outside of themselves, a thing that helps their creative projects, that provides inspiration and, sometimes, drops the fully-formed work of art directly into their minds. Artists have described experiences whereby they feel they have become a channel through which art and creativity are manifested into our physical reality. I have felt this myself. When I am in the ‘zone’, you could say, when my writing is flowing from my mind down through my fingers and onto the page with almost lightening speed, I know that something else is working through me. Something outside of me is helping me, nudging me along.

As I’ve continued to develop both my writing and my spiritual life over the last few years, I’ve come to realise that these two aspects of life can not be separated. In fact, as Julia Cameron talks about so passionately in The Artist’s Way, art and creative pursuits are a spiritual process. Being an artist is a direct link to the divine. Artists work with the divine to create works of art. That’s the beauty of a creative life.

In a video I discovered on You Tube, Elizabeth Gilbert gives a thought-provoking speech about her belief that the artist is not a genius, rather the artist has a genius – that entity or thing that resides outside of them but who offers support and guidance during the act of creation. Elizabeth discusses this idea with reference to ancient Greece and Rome, where people believed creativity came from another source, not from human beings. “People believed that creativity was this divine attendant spirit that came to human beings from some distant and unknowable source.” The Romans called this “sort of disembodied creative spirit a genius.” The genius was the entity that provided creative inspiration to assist the artist in their work. Elizabeth goes on to say that during the Renaissance, when the human being became the centre of everything, “above all gods and mysteries”, people began to refer to specific artists as being a genius, instead of having a genius. This put a lot of pressure on one individual and “creates all these unmanageable expectations about performance.”

As a writer, I sometimes suffer from crippling self-doubt; it seems to come with the territory. I do not consider myself a genius, far from it. But I do feel pressure to write something brilliant, to prove my abilities. Yet something I have learnt of late, and something that Elizabeth Gilbert’s speech has given substance to, is that my only requirement as a writer is to turn up to the page and to write. That’s my job; to turn up, to commit to writing, and then to get out of the way. Because if any kind of creative energy is going to come through me from the divine source, the ‘genius’, that is waiting in the wings to assist me, I must be, first and foremost, open to it. When I step out of the way, stop trying so hard, stop trying to write the most perfect sentence ever constructed (which I say is an expectation placed on a lot of writers, even if only by their own egos) then a true act of creation can occur.

What Elizabeth Gilbert is saying in her speech was informed by the situation she found herself in, after the monumental success of Eat, Pray, Love, as she was trying to write her next work, with a world’s expectations on her shoulders. Would she ever write something good again? Could she ever top that success? And that’s when she realised; to have “the sheer human love and stubbornness to keep showing up”, to continue to write was all she could do. Writers live a creative life; we must turn up to the page. But creativity itself is not something that comes from the self, from the individual. Creativity is larger, grander, than mere human existence. Creativity is spiritual, it comes from the divine.

If you feel so inclined, and have a spare twenty minutes, watch Elizabeth’s speech –

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86x-u-tz0MA&feature=related

The Creator in Me

May proved to be a very inspirational month for me, both in my writing and my spiritual life. It began with the Reiki training I completed over two weekends to become a Reiki Master/Teacher. Not only was this a blessed gathering of five beautiful and inspiring women, it was the realisation of a goal I set for myself some two years ago, not long after I’d studied Reiki 2. For those reasons, it was a powerful experience – I was surrounded by love and unwavering support from my fellow students and my amazing teacher, and I was fulfilling a dream. What a blessing!

But the blessings didn’t stop there. In fact, as is always the case with Reiki – the course is only the beginning. The real journey is what follows, as the energy body shifts to release old blocks and stale patterns that only hold us back. Since finishing the course I have felt much more connected to the creator in me – the artistic, creative person that resides deep in my heart. She’s probably that same little girl I once was who loved to spend time drawing or writing or playing the piano. I’ve managed to hold onto the writing well into adulthood, but admittedly the others have fallen away. And yet she’s still inside me, the little artist, and now I’ve opened myself up to commune with her again. Through strengthening my connection to Reiki, my connection to my true self has pushed to the forefront. I’m ready to embrace the artist in me!

Once I’d put this intention out into the universe it should have come as no surprise – as of course it didn’t – that opportunities would present themselves and I would be guided to shake the cobwebs from my artist self and get proactive. So now I find myself out of writer’s block and in to free flowing creative expression. It’s a wonder I can keep the smile off my face, as any writer knows - overcoming the debilitating writer’s block, whether self-imposed or not, is like seeing the sun shining after a long dull winter. There is no better feeling for any artist than the act of creation, in whatever medium. For me, it gives me not only a focus, a direction and a sense of purpose, it also allows me to feel as free as I can be. When I’m creating, I just work better – physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. That elusive equilibrium I wrote about in my last post seems entirely within my grasp. In fact, I’m living in balance every single day, so long as I don’t deny the artist in me. She’s got a loud voice, and she must be heard.

I am also nurturing my artist self in two new ways, things that have been in my life’s periphery for many, many months, and which I have now both the courage and opportunity to attempt. In two weeks I will be starting a weekly drawing class to encourage the little artistic girl I once was to make an appearance in this adult me. And I am also setting up a collaboration blog with my wonderfully talented sister who is a photographer. She’ll take pictures and I’ll write some flash fiction. Two artists coming together to create. Wow, another blessing!

And so the inspirational month ended, in a small village during a trip to Yorkshire; I visited what was once the home of the Brontë family. I knew the Brontë sisters to have been authors, but on the walls of their home I saw fabulous art works by Charlotte – she was a creative entity, a true artist whose creative expression, it would seem, was her purpose in life. As I stood staring at her accomplished drawings I knew I owed it to all those magnificent, inspirational, artistic women who have gone before me, to not let fear hold me back from self-expression.

I am an artist, after all. The creator in me sings proud and true.

"I'm just going to write because I cannot help it."
- Charlotte Brontë

Ebb and Flow

The only constant in my life, it would seem, is my total lack of consistent equilibrium. I find myself swaying from peace to fear, and back again, quite regularly. Here I’m not talking only of the emotions that play out in my life, but the deeper state of being that influences how I experience everything around me. When I’m living from a state of peace everything flows smoothly and I am awash with joy. Conversely, when I’m living from a state of fear everything seems harder and my self-confidence is a little shaky.

I know swinging back and forth between extremes is no way to live life, so I’ve spent a lot of time and energy over the years trying to maintain balance. I’ve used various methods – writing, meditation, Reiki, travelling, and just plain old fun – to help me tap into that deep peace that I know resides within me. I’ve felt the peace intensely at times. I can identify it, when it happens, in an instant. But developing a way to hold onto that peacefulness has eluded me. The fear always seems to creep back in eventually and it’s usually around this time that I start to berate myself for still not having found that treasured balance. And once I turn against myself, the fear takes a firmer grip.

This vicious cycle, I’m realising, is the product of my insatiable need for perfection. I suppose I’ve always been a perfectionist, but I found my desire for this ideal (where it relates directly to me) increased once I began my spiritual journey. It was as though once I became aware of my divine essence and connected to that sublime peaceful feeling, anything less was a monumental failure. If I wasn’t living in peace and joy and happiness and all those wonderful things, I felt I was failing at what I perceived to be my divine purpose – living in a constant state of bliss. The fear state became the quintessential negative, a trait I felt had to be squashed and overcome completely if I was ever to find peace. If I felt, for no apparent reason, afraid or angry or sad I figured I had been swept to the negative ‘dark side.’

Fortunately, over the last few days I’ve had some powerful insights aided by a Crystal Healing course I attended (taught by a wonderful friend of mine) and my reading, and completion, of the thirteen temple initiations I’ve been working through in the book 'The Temples of Light' by Danielle Rama Hoffman. These insights are helping me greatly right now.

On the crystal healing course, during a very deep meditation, I was reminded that it is ok for me to be my shadow self just as much as my light self. I am a well-rounded entity and self-acceptance means embracing both the yin and yang of me. They are not necessarily ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ traits, more like two various aspects of me, differences that when embraced as one give me a solid grounding in life. I don’t need to release, or squash, my shadow (fear), rather I need to merge with my shadow and know that its place within me is just as valid as the light. Every part of me has an opposing part that complements and strengthens the whole. One is not ‘bad’ and the other ‘good’, instead they simply are.

Danielle Rama Hoffman’s words added to this. She talks about the expansion and contraction of life, the ebb and flow of energy –

“Energy is most often described in a wave form: a peak and a valley, a crest and a fall, sun and moon, low and high tide; energy expanding and contracting. You probably recognise this flow in your own life; there are times when you feel your life expanding and others when you feel your life contracting.”

On further introspection I realised that I had a pattern, an ebb and flow of energy, occurring in my life. When I’ve connected intensely to my divinity, essentially expanding my energy, its opposing contraction has always inevitably followed. Until now, I’ve viewed this contracting force as failure; as soon as I felt my energies shifting towards fear I considered my spirituality to be abandoning me. But now I realise that the contraction of energy is necessary – just as both high and low tide are necessary in nature. Energy moves in waves and just like life it is never static. That is the beauty of life, after all. Things are always shifting, seasons change and life blooms anew. People learn and experience and grow.

That’s the perfection of life; the all-encompassing ideal I’ve been searching for. I am whole. The light and the dark. The ebb and the flow. If I was static I wouldn’t even be alive. Now there’s a revelation!

To live in peace and bliss is a conscious choice. I now recognise it is possible to find a joyful equilibrium in life, but not until I’ve embraced my shadow and accepted its valid place within me. Whenever I feel my energy contracting I know not to berate myself. Instead I’ll work on acknowledging the wonderful ebb of life.

To ebb is not to fail.

Maintaining Integrity in a Critical World

Despite the burgeoning global awareness, criticism and separateness still abound. Spiritual awakening is a process we, as a unified whole, are all going through at this time. However, spiritual growth is simultaneously a very individual pursuit. We each move along our spiritual path at a pace that is fitting to our own needs and circumstances. We can not force people to be where we are, or expect them to agree with our every move. Compassion, love and respect for ourselves and others is necessary as the world moves into a higher, unity, consciousness.

But sometimes you come face to face with a person in your life who does not understand your spirituality. A person who is stuck in separate consciousness. A person whose criticism is hard to swallow.

It’s even more difficult when this person is someone close to you.

Being ‘different’ and standing up for what you believe in, what you know to be true for you, takes courage. This week my courage was tested. Someone close to me passed judgement on my way of life, the choices I have made and my priorities.

I allowed the criticism and negativity of this person to derail me. I allowed myself to be knocked off course. My writing suffered and I stopped meditating. I went from feeling joyful and bursting with love one minute, to questioning everything I’ve come to believe in the next. As you can guess, this person has always been a big influence in my life. I wasn’t able to take their words with a pinch of salt. Instead, they seemed to bore deep into my heart and soul, and bring forth a number of personal issues I had yet to process.

One of these issues was my ability to stand up for myself, to maintain my integrity, to speak my truth. I faltered under the weight of this person’s criticism and it was a big warning sign that my personal power was still on shaky ground. I fell into despair. I wept. And I felt completely lost.

Thankfully, after a few days of self-pity and regret, my determination fought its way back to the surface. I wrote out how I was feeling, the ugly truth of it all, my fears and failings. And through that came the spark of inspiration. I went back to my meditations and connected once again to my divine essence that had been lingering in the background, waiting for me to push through this very physical, ego-driven crisis.

Once again my spiritual practices brought me back to life, back into balance with all that is love and joyful in this world. I knew then that my path is true for me, no matter what anyone else has to say. I realised that this person’s criticism and lack of understanding is more a projection of their own fears, rather than any direct attack on my choices in life.

It was a hard lesson to learn, but I see now that this person’s critical words came at just the right time in my life, as everything seems to do. I needed to be reminded that my strength comes from within, and that to maintain my integrity in this often narrow-minded world calls for my deep inner reserves of bravery.

I am courageous and brave. I am strong and powerful. My spiritual song comes forth straight from my heart and I’m excited to be a part of this world as we raise our awareness and awaken to our divinity. I can speak my truth and live my own existence from the realms of higher, unity, consciousness.

As the Louise Hay affirmation says - “I now go beyond other people’s fears and limitations.”

My journey to Reiki and beyond

Reiki came into my life, like all good things, because I listened to my intuition. I’d heard of Reiki but knew next to nothing about it or how it could possibly help me. I was going through a time of change in my life, everything was new, and I had no idea which path to choose or what to do next. And then one day, like a single snowflake falling from the sky, the word ‘Reiki’ came into my mind. I found a local Reiki Master and booked myself in for a session. I didn’t know what to expect, but I trusted that it was the right place for me.

As it turned out, my Reiki Master noticed something in me that day, something that I was not even aware of myself – a desire to study this healing art. So by the end of that first session I’d signed up to do the Reiki First Degree course. The energy had a plan for me, it would seem, and I was grateful to be along for the ride.

I often think that my attunement to the Reiki energy during my First Degree course was really my attunement to life. Not that I wasn’t alive before, but I was living a sort of half-life. A life devoid of real awareness. Reiki became my initiation into the spiritual world. I began to view things differently – with love rather than fear. I began to write - something I’d talked about doing for years. I connected to my creativity. And I began to read - devouring spiritual and New Age books. I felt my mind expanding. I was desperate to know more, to feel more, to live more. I started meditating. I started tuning into my chakras. I bought crystals. My path had become illuminated.

Reiki is energy healing but it is also a spiritual path of self-development. Working with ‘invisible’ energy, feeling and seeing its healing power, had a transformational effect on me. I felt a shift in my consciousness, as though a door had opened. Through that door was the world of unlimited potential, the place where I could connect to my infinite divine essence. A place where love and joy abound. I’ve never looked back.

Since that initial burst of spiritual awareness, I’ve continued to develop regular practices – meditation, chakra balancing, and of course writing – to maintain my connection to the divine. Reiki has become a consistent part of my life; I completed Reiki II in 2008 and later this year will do my Reiki III Master/Teacher course. I continue to move deeper on my own journey within, the journey of my soul. And Reiki is the light that guides me.

Meditation for Survival

We breathe, and eat, and drink, and sleep every single day to ensure our survival. Without food or air or rest our bodies would shut down and our time here on Planet Earth would cease. We know this. We do it all without question because it is an absolute necessity.

But what if our lives depended on another daily necessity? What if to make sure you lived to see tomorrow, you were required to find a quiet spot, calm your mind and focus your attention on your breathing for thirty minutes out of your day?

What if our existence relied on essential meditation? What kind of world would we be living in then?
I'd hasten to guess that we would have never known war or poverty or murder or deceit. We would honour one another, have respect for each other, live our lives from the state of unconditional love. If meditation was a daily practice for all, just as eating and breathing and sleeping are, everybody would be tapped into their own divinity and our world would reflect this magnificence.

The world around us, right now, is magnificent; it always has been. But the majority of us have lost our way. We aren’t aware of how brilliant we shine. We walk around in a daze, focussed on our individual achievements. We are separated from one another in competition. We are so tied to our physical existence that food and air are consumed without a second thought, without awareness, often without gratitude.

Those of us who have experienced the benefits of meditation have committed to a regular practice because it allows us to transcend negativity, anxiety and fear. Meditation gives us peace of mind. Meditation helps us tap into our strength. Meditation brings us closer to ourselves, so we may know our heart’s desire with clarity, so we may commune with our soul and align ourselves with our true divine essence.

In this time of change, as humanity evolves to live in a higher consciousness, spiritual practices like meditation are becoming as necessary as breathing. We are all searching for something more, trying to find our way, looking for answers.

Those answers can be found with meditation. By putting aside some time to quiet our minds and focus solely on our breathing, we learn to look within and trust our intuition. We re-mind ourselves of our true Self.

The something we are searching for, those answers we desire, already reside within us. We just need to remember them.