What Is Your Deepest Wish

It’s Wishcasting Wednesday. There is power in wishing – putting your wishes out there sets mighty forces into action…

What Is Your Deepest Wish?

My deepest wish is that I am able to express my gifts in the most fulfilling and powerful way possible every day – my gifts of joy, laughter, life, friendship, love, passion as well as my ‘saleable’ gifts of writing, coaching, mentoring, inspiring, believing. My deepest wish is that I am able to live full out in every aspect of my life, never fearing to be fully who I am, never fearing that my needs will not be met as I do so, never worrying about money, never worrying about ‘success’, just enjoying being completely in love with my life, fulfilling my purpose, following my passion and having fun!

Get involved on Jamie’s blog, or leave a comment here about YOUR deepest wish. As you wish for yourself, I wish for you also.

Love

Donna.x

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Accessing Your Intuition

So, a couple of weeks ago I asked you to share with me the ways you access your inner wisdom, and promised to share the final list. Some of these are direct ways to access your inner voice, some are indirect, helping you to get quiet enough to hear that voice.

1. Visualisation
- Future self
- Wise man in a cave
- Wise woman in a cottage
- Board of advisors
2. Meditation
3. Writing
- Journal prompts
- ‘free’ writing eg morning pages
- Write to your business/intuition/future self/God, asking and answering questions
4. Brainstorming
- Mind maps
- Group brainstorm
5. Prayer
6. Silence
7. Yoga
8. Exercise
9. Nature
10. Singing
11. Masterminding
12. Reading/listening to/watching inspiring material
13. Like-minded people
14. Talking to clients
15. Dancing
16. Art
17. Ask a specific question, then get quiet so you can hear the answer
- What is my gut feeling?
- What does my heart say?
- What does my soul say?
- Go to sleep on the question and let your dreams answer (keep a pad and pen by the bed to capture the answer)
18. Driving
19. crafts
20. Doing what you love
21. Staring at the stars
22. Body awareness (noticing how you feel when you think of a particular option/idea)
23. Take a bubble bath or shower
24. Doing mindless tasks like housework
25. Get someone to ask quick-fire questions, and don’t think, just answer

If you open the channel to your inner wisdom, it will keep talking to you – you just need to listen! Over the coming weeks and months, I will blog some more about some of these ideas – if there are any you particularly want to hear more about, please leave me a comment and I’ll address them first. And of course, if you have any more ideas to add to the list, leave a comment below with the ways you access your intuition.

Love

Donna.x

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Your Creative Joy

As you will know if you follow this blog closely (and if you do, I thank you!), on a Wednesday I answer a journal prompt from Jamie Ridler of Jamie Ridler Studios. I also listen to Jamie’s weekly podcast on creative living. Jamie is my favourite resource for awakening creativity, and since I came across her site sometime last year, I have steadily been letting out the reins on my own creativity.

I’ve been blogging for years now, so I’m quite happy with the written word as a creative pursuit, but other avenues have been pretty much closed as “I’m no good at” them. Jamie is helping me to remember that it’s not about getting it right, but about expressing your creativity and having fun with it. Many of us were shut down as kids when we tried something and someone else said it was rubbish. So we stopped doing it, even though we had fun. What a shame. Not only that we stopped having fun, but that we bottled up our creativity.

Many people believe they are not creative at all in any way, which I think is just bullshit. Everyone has a spark of creativity in them. Maybe you can’t paint like Picasso, or make music like Mozart, or write like William Shakespeare – but you can be creative in your own way. And I bet that there is some creativity in you that is crying out to be expressed. Expressing creativity is not about creating a masterpiece, it’s just about allowing your creative energy a chance to come out, to dance, to be joyously allowed.

Allowing your creativity a space to be expressed has several benefits. Firstly it’s FUN – remember that thing you used to do as a kid, just because it was fun? When did ‘because it’s fun’ stop being a good reason to do something in your life? Remind yourself of the joy of living by doing something JUST because it’s fun! Secondly, when you start to allow your creative energy to express, it gets stronger and you become MORE creative. And creativity is useful not just for finger painting or making pottery, but in business and in life – the more creative you are, the more easily you will find solutions for any problems you come across.

Thirdly, letting your creativity out makes you feel better – you feel less ‘stoppered up’ and choked, and you feel more free. Fourth, your creativity is part of YOU. Keeping it bottled up means that you are not fully being yourself. Letting it out allows you to be more of you. I’m not saying you have to have an art exhibition or do a music tour or make craftwork your new job. But maybe you want to think about the creative things you loved to do as a child and start doing them again. Not to ‘create art’ but just to express your creativity, have some fun, become more creative, feel good and be yourself.

I am all about creating a life you love, and creativity is a HUGE part of that. And there are so many creative endeavours that I am sure you can find something that captures your attention. Painting, drawing, knitting, sewing, crocheting, writing, sculpture, collage, photography, graphic design, pottery, jewelry-making, singing, dancing, playing an instrument, writing a song, acting… the list could go on for hours. By the way, do not make this hard for yourself. Don’t decide that you can’t do something because you don’t have the right equipment – be creative and do what you can with what you already have.

Leave me a comment and let me know what creative endeavour you’re going to try this week.

Love

Donna.x

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All Wrote Out

Nanowrimo finished on Monday (national novel writing month), so I’ve been taking a break from writing out of sheer creative exhaustion! The challenge was to write 50000 words in a month. The idea being that when you’ve got 50000 words, you have the bones at least of your novel. Most people feel they have a novel in them, but most of them don’t ever write.

Nanowrimo gives them a reason to do it. So, is my ‘novel’ close to done? Nope. What I wrote SUCKS! The story wandered off in a different direction from the one I had in mind, the plot was lost within the first week, and because I didn’t keep a note of salient details about my characters, there are more inconsistencies than words. Well, almost! I seriously doubt that even with some rigorous editing this project will ever see the light of day.

So did I fail? Absolutely not. I now know 100 things I did not know before. I have a better idea of where my writing strengths (and weaknesses) lie. I ‘won’ in Nanowrimo terms – getting 50000 words done. It is an exercise in pure output that I have never done before, and that was an interesting experiment for me. Yeah, what I wrote sucks, but my first attempt at walking when I was little was embarrasingly bad too.

So was my first attempt at riding a bike, and don’t even speak to me about my first attempt at ice-skating! (Actually, I never got any better at that!) The trouble with so many of us is that we’re not prepared to fuck up. So we don’t even try. Guaranteeing failure. There are those who think I ‘wasted my time’ – they are sadly mistaken. I learned HEAPS! And I had fun. And I did it. So I’m really proud of myself for sticking at something even when I didn’t think it was working.

Every great novel started as a first draft that was probably rubbish, comparitavely. And who knows, once I have edited and polished my story, the plot may be found again, the inconsistensies corrected, the genius resurfaced (RAOFL). But even if not, did I waste my time? No. I grew. I challenged myself. I wrote myself hoarse. I’d rather grow and fuck-up than do nothing and watch my soul die.

Love

Donna.x

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Writing and The Work

A note from Donna
I was telling a friend about this insight a couple of weeks ago, and she suggested that it would make an interesting article. This is based on ‘The Work’, a four-step process used by Byron Katie (see recommendation) – the premise is that you explore a stressful thought through these four questions and the turnaround. On this particular day, I was exploring why I wasn’t writing, which surfaced the most beautiful belief: If I only write when I want to, I’ll never write.

Writing and The Work
If I only write when I want to, I’ll never write. Question 1: Is this True? No. (Question 2 is ‘Can I know for sure that this is true?’ – irrelevant in this case as it is not true in the first place!)

Question 3: How do I react when I believe this thought “if I only write when I want to, I’ll never write”? I get p***ed off. I compare myself unfavourably to other writers who force the process to get themselves flowing. I get mardy because I don’t want to do that at all. I love writing, but this takes the joy out of it for me. I don’t want to write when I believe this thought!

Question 4: Who would I be without this thought? Oh wow, I feel light, free, happy, I’m looking forward to writing, I’m excited about creating more fabulous stuff. I know that I create well when I am inspired so I feel really proud (in advance) of what I will create.

Turnarounds:
If I only write when I want to, I’ll always write. This feels so much more true – I’ve been writing regularly now for 6 years and I am always having ideas and inspirations…and I love writing. So if I don’t ruin it for myself and make it a chore, I will always want to do it.
If I never write when I want to I’ll never write. Yes! Very true – if I’m always trying to ‘make’ myself do it, I’ll kill the desire to do it!
If I only write when I don’t want to, I’ll never write. Yes! This is exactly what’s been happening.

This exploration helped me to realise something – I have never wanted to create in a formulaic way, to me it kills the creativity. And yet here I have been, trying to force structure around something that isn’t structured. And that forcing has actually been slowing down my writing. So, now I am back to writing when I want to…and LOVING it!

Something to play with
Check out www.thework.com for instructions about doing the work, or buy the book, and then start to explore your stressful thoughts – you may find, as I did, that your stressful thought is a load of b***cks!

Want to share your thoughts on this article? Leave me a comment below.

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The Power of Write

Have you recently utilised the therapeutic power of writing? Have you connected with your inner guidance by recording your thoughts? Have you given your creative self free rein by writing your ideas and passions?

If not, and you like to write, you may be denying yourself a wonderful pleasure! (If you hate writing, please ignore this blog post – I don’t want you to do something you don’t like to do!) I love to write – I write blogs, books, newsletters, courses, diaries, gratitude journals, letters…and the more I write, the more I realise that writing has a power.

The written word has the power to change your world, to transport you to a new world, and even to change the world of the reader. Wow.

So are you using the power of write?

Love

Donna.x

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