Friday, July 30, 2010

Freedom is...

When I first started on my path to healing myself emotionally and began doing emotional healing work on myself, I was overcome with the feeling of freedom I experienced in releasing the emotions that were weighing me down. I remember feeling as if I were floating on a bed of air, light and free, without a care in the world.


This journal page brought that back to me. I drew her there, floating and I knew she was my freedom girl! I wrote my feelings of freedom on her neck.
I haven't finished this page yet. I would like to add something to the background. I just don't know what yet. Probably some free writing and some doodling. I love the gold gel pen. That's glitter on her lips which in person looks delicious.

Thursday, July 29, 2010

The Language of the Eyes



I created this journal page today. I used one of the pencil drawings I did from the class with Pam Carriker and added paint to it. When I finished it I was taken with the eyes. They seemed to have depth to them and you know how much I love eyes.

I looked into the eyes and wondered what they had to say. I started writing the answer on the neck. It's amazing the truth that comes out of these journal sessions. Such power. I love it.

Wednesday, July 28, 2010

I'm Not Good Enough!

I was on one of my bi-weekly buddy calls with my amazing friend Carrie and we were talking about this visualization we had done where we were introduced to the part of ourselves called I'm Not Good Enough.




During that visualization I saw a long, skinny little girl that was all blue with big sad eyes. She was hiding under a table in the dark. I asked her what her name was and she said Sophia.



When I talked to her I discovered that she needed to be heard, she needed to be acknowledged. Even after the visualization I never went any deeper with this...still not giving her a voice I guess.



When I hung up the phone I immediately got my journal out and started drawing her as I had seen her in my visualization, hiding under the table. When I finished the drawing I began writing.



I had a little conversation with her to discover more about why she is here, why she is holding me back and I discovered that there is a safety factor. She keeps me safe. I let her rant and ramble about all the ways she isn't good enough, all the ways she sucks at life. I wrote back and forth, asking her questions. It was a fast, free writing and the final sentences I wrote to her were, "The light is here for you. It is yours to own. Let yourself out of the dark and allow yourself to bask in the warmth and the joy of the light."




That last bit of writing inspired me and I went on to create another journal page that represented this. I switched the energy and let Sophia into the light. It was fast and furious creating, I just let it flow.


After creating the image I did some positive free writing that was so inspirational to me. I encouraged her to remember that the light is always here and that it is only when we hide from it as she was, under the table, that we are cut off from it. I talked to her about fear and what a lie it is...that there is really nothing to fear. I told her that she deserves love and nurturing and that I was going to give it to her.



Now of course Sophia has been with me a long time and doing this exercise has shifted the way I think about this "negative" part of who I am. By giving her a name and having a conversation with her like she is a small child, I am not compelled to try to get rid of her. Instead of trying to kill her off, I am compelled to give her the voice she is asking for and to listen to her when she is feeling that uneasy feeling.


So the next time she was getting antsy I created this image and once again began writing. I wrote in black pen all the things she has to say...All the negative stuff, her deep dark unhappiness.

She spoke of spending her life hiding deep below the surface with no one to talk to, feeling lonely. She spoke of fear and of being stuck. She asked...no begged to be heard, to be loved and embraced.



Then I switched to a white gel pen and wrote back to her. I told her how much I appreciated her for keeping me safe and that I felt stronger now and that she could release the need to protect me. I asked her to join me and create a team because together we could be amazing.

I am sure little Sophia will have a lot more to say and I will be here to listen to her and to give her support. We have joined forces to move forward out of the darkness and into the light.










Monday, July 26, 2010

About Me

Part of Pam Carriker's Portrait Class is to create a collage that is all about you. To learn which colors and images you are drawn to. This is to help you come up with your own style. Well, this is right up my alley. I am longing to create my own style, I just don't know what it is yet so I was super psyched to do this exercise.

I didn't have a lot of collage materials or any collage images so I turned to magazines to find things that I like. I really wanted to put a peony on the page because it is one of my favorite flowers but I couldn't find one. I found a delicious purple cone flower that I LOVED though. That ended up representing beauty to me.

I found a picture of the earth which represents my love of travel and culture. The hand just spoke to me. I didn't really know why but later when I was writing, the words connection and love just magically appeared on the page. So cool.

I love eyes! I've always loved eyes. It is the one part of my body that no matter how much I weigh or how sick I feel always looks good. I've had lots of compliments on my eyes and I still remember the first time my husband looked into my eyes. He seemed to get a bit lost in there and then shook his head and said, "Wow, you have really pretty eyes." Sent my heart a little pitter patter. Of course the eyes are the window to the soul so that is what they represented here.

I am drawn to warm colors, red, orange, gold, and a touch of pink and that love emerged in the color palette for this piece. I love swirls and spirals and dots and doodles so I had to add those in. What great fun this was and I feel like I am a bit closer to uncovering my style.

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Another New Style

I signed up for a portrait class with Pam Carriker. She has a beautiful style and while I don't think it will end up being much like my style I want to learn her techniques and incorporate them into finding my own style...whatever that might end up being. :o)

Here is a sketch done in graphite using her techniques. It was interesting to learn how she shades and how she lays out the face to get the proper proportions. I am excited to do more and more and more!

I also did a practice page of eyes, noses and mouths just to try the different styles. So fun! This art journal thing is so freeing. I can do whatever I want and not have to worry about it "turning out." I love it!

Thursday, July 22, 2010

Trying a New Style





















Browsing the Internet looking for inspiration is such fun and when I found Teesha Moore I was intrigued with the bright colors and the graphic look of her work. I watched some of her videos and thought I would give it a try for myself.

This piece is all about food. I cut out pictures of all the foods I once loved and can no longer eat due to allergies and pasted them around the edge. I created a cupcake out of magazine and put some mouths on the page and then had fun doodling.

I really loved the look of it until I started writing on the left page. What a hot mess! Oh well, it meant a lot to me to explore my relationship with food and taking care of my body and despite the messy test on the left, it looks pretty good. Not sure I want to copy her style so closely but it was a fun experiment.

The title 86 comes from my background in the restaurant business. Whenever we would run out of a product we would 86 it. No more fresh fish...86 the fish. We're out of the special...86 the special. I don't actually know why we used that term...I was just a kid but I figured since I am not eating these foods anymore they are 86'd for me.

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Take Two...Never Quite as Good


Drawing from the success of my first painting I decided to do it again only this time I would use an old canvas I had stuffed in the back of my closet. I headed out the screen room and just started painting. I started off the session by eating a fig so I decided I would go with purple and yellow for the color palatte.
Somewhere along the way things went wrong and I didn't know what to do. I mean, it's OK but it's a bit flat and my 17 year old asked me if I was painting a simpson. Ha ha. That's pretty funny. Oh well, it was fun!

Sunday, July 18, 2010

The Beginning of My Art Journey...Again


So welcome to my new blog. I am excited to be able to get started in the art community again. I've dabbled on and off for years since I was a kid. Drawing was my favorite thing to do and I drew all the time. When I hit high school I struggled until I got to take art classes. I was in love.

Somewhere during those classes I began to notice that there were some kids who had this amazing natural ability and I got the idea that I probably would never be good at art so I gave it up. I've recently learned that I have perfectionist tendencies. I know, you would think I would know that about myself but it was hidden. You can read all about it on my health coaching blog if you want. The thing is that if I wasn't going to be perfect, there was no sense doing it at all.

Over the years I would be overcome by a creativity bug. I would feel drawn to create something. I started scrapbooking, took the odd course here and there and was actually a mosaic artist for a few years. But, it never seemed to work. I always had that nagging feeling that I wasn't good enough and I would quit.

So I've been doing lots of healing work on myself and I was reintroduced to the world of art journalling. How fabulous! I could be free to create whatever I wanted without worrying how it looks. It could be complete crap and that's OK cuz it's just a journal. Amazing!



The photos in this post and in the header of the blog are photos of my first painting in my journal. I was quite pleased with the entire process. I went out into my screen room early in the morning and just started painting. I didn't know what was going to come out of it and I was pleasantly surprised by it.