I M Perfect lady

Tag: writing

  • Where the Heart Lives

    Tonight I am sitting with gratitude and a thankful heart to the home we have been lucky enough to live in for the past 30 years.

    This home welcomed us with our 4 children and a dog.

    We loved, lived and grew old here. We have survived some tough patches – but the majority of my memories here are good ones.

    During the tough patches it was a refuge sitting along the river with wide open fields and plenty of nature to soothe my soul.

    This place holds many memories for our children and grandchildren. Campfires, camping, fishing, and skiing, snowshoeing and kayaking. Endless wonderful things to do, right out the front door.

    How lucky were we to raise our children here.

    Our youngest was one when we moved here – and now he is returning here with his wife – becoming the third generation to call this home.

    And we are moving back to where we began as newly weds. Back to the land our children have memories of as well.

    The place on the river has steps and we couldn’t live on one level – so we felt it was best to be in a place that would welcome our old age. A place where we could live on one level and have less upkeep and less work all around.

    So we will be able to visit here and have new memories here – so it isn’t good-bye – but see you later.

    My heart will always hold this place dear. Love has lived here, and love is moving here and love will go with us to our new home.

    Home is where the heart lives.

  • A Journal to take Home

    Last week when I sat by the Detective and asked him how things were going….he said, "I have two adolescent boys (who are talking to him about their sexual abuse) and I don't have nothing to give them….I am not sure about a journal, but I do wish I had something. And I surely can't give them the ones with the Lady on the front," he said with a smile and wistfulness. I said, "Let me ponder this and see what I can do."  

    I mentioned this conversation to my brother Carl (who was abused as a young boy) and he said he thought they would use a journal…he mainly didn't want them being overlooked.  He and I both felt it would be nice if Tom had a boy journal to offer.

    I found two smaller sketch journals as well as two black lined journals that I covered.  This was a stretch for me to make "boy" looking ones….or at least non feminine looking, yet still artful….a place to put such sacred truths.

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    Above are the four I made this morning.  I wrote "Me, Mine, Love Truth, and I M Perfect" in the quilting.  I wanted to impart ownership as well as words that will reflect the essence of them speaking out.  

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    I am in awe of such young brave boys…and even if they don't choose to take one, the idea will have been planted…to write.  It gives me hope that boys are now willing to speak up so they can be healed…to shatter the secret and open themselves up to living life in full disclosure.  Even if they never write, just having the ear of Tom Rosemurgy is huge.  He is such a kind soul.  And I want to help Tom as he helps them.

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    May these journals find the right hands to hold them…and be a place to store the tragic truths of abuse.  Writing it down on paper, released the overwhelming emotions that swirled inside.  It was a place to go and talk…and cry.  A tool I used to find a clear mind.  May the children who pass through Tom's office shorten their pathway to healing…just by finding such a caring man…and a journal to take home.

  • The enemy of Lies.

    Who I was the first 46 years is totally different than who I am now.  I went from being totally submissive, compliant and eager to please, while a bit of an outspoken person, I spoke for what I then believed…as long as I stayed within the party lines.

    I never strove to make ripples in life, but rather was the one who smoothed over the waters; I took out the waves…a calming force, I was the one who would settle the ruffled feathers.

    It shocks me at times to see me being the one making waves and saying things I know will not sit well, but I say them anyway.

    At times it was hard recognizing me or even allowing the new me to be me, to let her speak and write with such forthrightness. 

    Sometimes it seems that I myself no longer have a boundary or a line that I can’t cross, whereas before there were many imaginary but firm lines.

    Now there is nothing I can’t say, as far as speaking the truth goes, there doesn’t seem to be a topic that is off limits, it is like I have discovered my own personal freedom of speech.

    I guess it helped to have my personal wounds splashed across the paper; it really left little to protect or hide…my darkest secret was broadcasted on the Radio, TV, and in the Newspaper as well as word of mouth. 

    Of course the only ones who knew, knew me, the rest it was just another sad story, a pathetic man doing obscene things…I was the story behind the story.

    My life’s details were freely handed out, talked about, discussed with bits of truths and tons of speculation sprinkled with hearsay and conjecture.

    I had thought in the beginning that many people would be asking me details and wanting to know this or that, but ironically no one speaks of this. 

    “It is a hard subject to bring up,” my husband once said.

    “It is a hard subject to live through,” I told him.

    I blog about my thoughts and feelings, about what I feel and how different aspects have felt to me, how people connected acted or didn’t act and how too that felt to me.

    It is like the blog became the friend or tireless family member who would always sit and listen and bounce back ideas that rolled around in my head…we straightened things on the blog.  It is like a very intimate trusting friend.

    Now, lately my blog has been getting tons of strangers watching me talk and engage with this friend, they get to be voyeurs into my consciousness.  Witnesses to my thoughts, beliefs and how I see the world and others…

    Lately I feel that there is momentum brewing, sacred connections are joining and creating an even bigger circle encompassing and reaching further and creating a stir…

    It is like it was meant to be that my story get written, my truths be told, my life be this open book in order for it to dovetail with a family just beginning this process.

    Its purpose was always beyond me.

    For often times, the most difficult things to write seemed always to be the most important to put down…and ones I couldn't not write. 

    Those were the things that others needed to read; those are the crucial signposts along this journey, the game changers, the deal breakers, the key. 

    There always seemed to be a bigger purpose than just me that I was tugging and pulling on pieces of others stories, that by me figuring out apiece here and there, others would see and shift with me. 

    And at times even those who passed prior were cheering for me as I righted another wrong belief…we seemed to shift in knowingness. 

    It seemed some were leading and others were following me. 

    Follow me to their own truths, not my truth.

    To see that this journey I took is possible and that you will never walk alone, you will have angels of all kinds showing you the way forward.

    Angels of lies kept me from going backwards.

    Angels of truth wrote books that led me forward.

    It isn’t my intention to hurt anyone with my truths, but the old adage is there, “truth hurts”.

    It hurts the illusion.  It hurts the life built upon lies. If it hurts enough, it will propel you to change, to grow, to expand, to raise your consciousness.

    Truth arrives to change you, to be your spiritual friend. Truth is only the enemy of lies.

     

  • With me.

    In Chapter 8, Recovering a Sense of Strength (in The Artist’s Way, by Julia Cameron), she writes.

     

    “One of the most difficult tasks an artist must face is the primal one; Artistic Survival. All artist must learn the art of surviving loss; loss of hope, loss of face, loss of money, loss of self- belief.  In addition to our many gains, we inevitably suffer these losses in an artistic career.  They are the hazards of the road and, in many ways, its signposts.  Artistic losses can be turned into artistic gains and strengths – but not in the isolation of the beleaguered artist’s brain.”

     

    “ As mental-health experts are quick to point out, in order to move through loss and beyond it, we must acknowledge it and share it.  Because artistic losses are seldom openly acknowledged or mourned, they become artistic scar tissue that blocks artistic growth.  Deemed too painful, too silly, too humiliating, to share and so to heal, they become , instead, secret losses.”

     

    “If artistic creations are our brainchild, artistic losses are our miscarriages. Women often suffer terribly, and privately from losing a child who doesn’t come to full term. And as artist we suffer terrible losses when the book doesn’t sell, the film doesn’t get picked up, the juried show doesn’t take our paintings, the best pot shatters, the poems are not accepted, the ankle injury sidelines us for an entire dance season.”

     

    “We must remember that our artist is a child and that what we can handle intellectually far outstrips what we can handle emotionally.  We must be alert to flag and mourn our losses.”    Julia Cameron

     

    What I love about this first page of the chapter is how we have to learn how to survive loss.

     

    In life it seems we are so focused on other things, no one teaches us how to mourn the little things, so when the huge ones arrive, we too can use the same techniques.

     

    And I love how what we don’t mourn becomes our scar tissue, the bumps and bruises we did not sit with and honor their presence in our lives….don’t really disappear, but ride along gathering a thick skin…scar tissue.

     

    It will literally feel like we are tearing off the scab to now deal with loss from long past. To even sit with a self that was robbed of being so…all the little ways I failed to hold on to me.

     

    I now am gathering to me all the parts that I gave away, and bringing them back to my center, my attention and my awareness.

     

    I love that loss must be acknowledged and shared…for that is how we can not only see our wound but let other see it, so we all can acknowledge it, honor it…and it will then fade away.

     

    Who knew that it was the ‘hiding’ and keeping our hurts secret that we suffer the most?  It seems airing our loss is where our strengths will be found.

     

    I know that this blog has been a great show and tell for me and I am grateful and humbled by those who read and witness it with me.  This sacred place is more healing where two or more are gathered in truth. Thanks for being here with me.

     

  • Shield of Pretending.

    If you look at the way positive or negative feedbacks travel, they are exactly the same, leaving a person and landing within you, the only difference is the content or is the only difference from where it comes?
    Or is it the real affect, you.
    Can you change a positive to a negative by how you hear it?
    Is it possible our state of being had more to do with the incoming message than the message itself?
    How about our expectations of the person and the difference in what they are saying compared to what we believe they should be saying, that our forecast is failing us?
    I have a feeling that our inner reception area is very much filled with expectations and needs and desires, leaving little room for incoming truths to show up as themselves, we have demands and commands for them.
    Is it possible there are no negative messages, just messages to show us the way? And a negative becomes a positive if you lay its truthfulness against your life.
    It is my belief that there are truthful positive feedbacks, and then there are pretend positive feedbacks.
    Pretend ones are much more common than truthful feedbacks…and way easy to give. Words that won’t hurt another’s pretend life…for you don’t want to be the one to shatter their world with a truth.
    I have great respect and admiration for the folks who tell you what you don’t want to hear, compared to the ones who just are parrots to you.
    Mostly when folks get what they call a negative comment, they never stick around long enough to ask why; it is the story behind the remark that’s important.
    The one instance that I stuck around to ask why, I was shocked to find, that this person cared about Art as deeply as I did, and he was able to tell me why. I had watered down the art with craft like ideas, and when explained, it made perfect sense to me. That if I had aspirations of being an Artist, there were guidelines, however subtle that kept art from being a craft, and I had crossed the line.
    His truthfulness kept me on track, he didn’t pretend positive feedback to spare my feelings, for sparing me would have hurt my art.
    This is true in all of life…sparing our feelings hurt them in the long run, for we are led to believe that which isn’t true.
    My most positive influences in my life have been folks who have been brutally honest, not caring about hurting my feelings; rather they say what they have to say in order for me stop hurting myself by pretending that which isn’t true.
    Isn’t a false positive really a negative in disguise?
    I also believe we need huge amounts of false positives to keep our lives of pretend working; we need others to shield us from ourselves. But, if you are standing in your own truth, you don’t need anyone’s feedback to keep your life going, your life just goes.
    You are as you are, there isn’t this thirst for others to keep your life going, and you are able to be self-sustaining.
    You seek out any part of your own life that isn’t truthful, wanting to uncover instead of cover up the pretend places.
    Living authentically is to live outside the covers, to crawl out yourself and not pretend even to make others feel okay.
    It seems this false positive can go either way, flowing from us as well as into us. It is up to us to put up a filter that can discern fact from fiction, both coming and going.
    Art and writing seem to be the process of building this filter, of facing yourself for the first time without the shield of pretending.

  • Same Piece.

    Last night I viewed lots of different Art, and it seemed each Artist had a message or feeling of energy that came through the piece.

     

    The art piece said more about the artist than the art.

     

    It is like the art is an inner imprint of how the artist feels; a coded message from within.

     

    Some artists are so exact in realistic portrayals; their perfection is displayed as judgment or even a God like imitation, their gift is replicating, being able to mirror the landscapes.

     

    There was Art that made you stop and think, wondering about the message or dichotomy it presented…a confused thinker sorting out his thoughts, making you pause and wonder.

     

    Perhaps our attraction to Art equals the way we are attracted to certain people, and repelled away from others.

     

    Somehow I separated the Artist from the Art not really believing that the Art told the truth about the Artist’s life.  I believed you could paint a pretty picture while having a tortured soul.

     

    Yet you can tell a lot about a person in their Art, which is why I feel many are unable to do art, for they fear displaying their self.

     

    The same goes for writing 3 pages a day, the deeper unconscious fear keeps them safe behind the excuses of no time, nothing to write, I know me, done the work, am okay with who I am.

     

    It’s the voices of fear to be seen in public without the layers and layers of coverings… like a painting draped with cloth so the picture lies hidden underneath.

     

    To drop the cloth and stand exposed seems it would be fearful and it is actually the opposite, with nothing to hide, you have nothing to hide, and you are free to be.

     

    Perhaps the fear lies in not matching another painting nearby or being as colorful or as dramatic or as calm and serene. 

     

    Yet imagine a gallery  with walls and walls all displaying the exact same piece.

     

     

  • Reconstruction on the Outside.

    I was surprised at how at ease I felt writing and even how peaceful I was inside, how comfortable I wrote my thoughts as they drifted by, as I looked upon this day, as I just seemed to write effortlessly.
    Six years later the me that is doing The Artist’s Way is completely different inside than the last time…I have a hard time recollecting the old me.
    She was a compilation of her parents, built upon their patterns and beliefs, structured to fulfill their needs, a woman with very little sense of self.
    Now my insides are bursting with me, my knowing and fully comprehending who I am, where I came from, how I made the choices I made etc. A woman with her History pretty much figured out, but a woman with an open slate and a big world to explore.
    The other thing missing inside is the fear of changing, the dread of trying something new and even appearing silly or a beginner…all my sense of pride is gone, with nothing left to lose, I can only gain.
    It is astonishing to me how different I am, the years slipped by and tiny layers of confidence grew on me, so that I am in a much better spot to now add accessories to the new me.
    Just as a woman adds to her outfit, I will add to the strong core of who I am, colorful and exciting things, my bling.
    I have never been a person to wear wild clothes or trends, to dress with flair and be fancy, but I can feel that I am standing here, in need of a bit of that.
    Perhaps The Artist’s Way will change my outward appearance to match my insides…or at least begin the reconstruction on the outside.
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    The journal cover I made for myself yesterday!

  • The Artist Way.

    December 1, 2004, I began writing Morning Pages, a tool in the book, “The Artist Way,” A Course in Discovering and Recovering your Creative Self, by Julia Cameron.

    Here Julia explains the Morning Pages.

    “There is no wrong way to do Morning Pages. These daily meanderings are not meant to be Art. Or even writing. I stress that point to reassure the nonwriters working with this book. Writing is simply one of the tools. Pages are meant to be, simply, the act of moving the hand across the page and writing whatever comes to mind. Nothing is too petty, too silly, too stupid, or too weird to be included.”

    “The Morning Pages are not supposed to sound smart – although sometimes they might. Most times they won’t and nobody will ever know except you. Nobody is allowed to read your morning pages except you. And you shouldn’t even read them yourself for the first eight weeks or so. Just write three pages, and stick them into an envelope. Or write three pages in a spiral notebook and don’t leaf back through. Just write three pages and three more the next day.”

    “Although occasionally colorful, the morning pages are often negative, frequently fragmented, often self-pitying, repetitive, stilted or babyish, angry or bland – even silly sounding. Good!”

    “All that angry, whiny, petty stuff that you write down stands between you and your creativity. Worrying about the job, the laundry, the funny knock in the car, the weird look in your lover’s eye – this stuff eddies through your consciousness and muddies our days. Get it on the page.”
    Julia Cameron

    Six and a half years later I read my first Morning Pages, and she is absolutely correct, they are rambling, fragmented, petty and all over the board, but I recall enjoying them.

    Sitting down with a notepad, a bunch of well sharpened pencils and writing three pages worth. Let me tell you, you do have to scratch and sift to find three pages worth.

    It is amazing what pours out of you once you begin, “Good Morning Pages….”

    I had a problem calling them pages I kept calling them papers. Nonetheless, I wrote. I wrote mindless chitchat for three days, and then it was discovered that my father was a pedophile on Dec 4th and there shows a break of about a week and a half and then I picked up a pencil and wrote again.

    The Morning Pages became journals and the journals changed into a blog, but the writing continued, the exploration and discovery and recovery deepened…

    This tool literally saved me as I walked into deep waters of life, however, I feel I want to go back and pick up where I left off, doing The Artist Way. Reading the book and doing the Twelve Week Exercises.

    As I begin again, I have invited a bunch of Lady Friends to join me…and I am excited I do have a few takers! Anyone can join…there is room for everyone!

    I am excited to begin again, as I was back then, for I felt I was idling along in life on pause or repeat perhaps and was feeling like I needed to open myself up wider…to grow or stretch, to expand my life to include more artist like things, classes or outings etc…and I feel that again.

    I am once again stepping it up a level or kicking it up a notch, expanding my horizons, using this one life and experiencing more that it has to offer, adding to me some new and different things.

    I will go back to handwriting the three pages each morning. I can’t wait to see what happens. I have missed the sharpened pencils and the exercise of writing without a thought…and even more excited to have Lady Friends who will join me on The Artist Way.

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  • Willing to Hear.

    Two years ago on Easter Sunday I began this blog. At the time, I felt that I would have something to say to help other women who found themselves lost in their own lives, and instead I have found it was all for me.

    The amount of clarity that I have gotten from asking questions with an open mind, willing to explore and delve into thoughts and beliefs is beyond what I could have imagined.

    The blog seems like a very trusting confidant and yet the key in keeping it real is that it is wide open for all to read.

    Writing to me has become another Art form and something that I believe will now be part of who I am…an Author who helps me be me.

    The truth arises when you are willing to not know the answers…but willing to hear.

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  • A field with no rules.

    Rewrite, Rewrite, Rewrite were the last words spoken in our final writing class for the year, they echoed and bounced around in my head, unsure if this was encouragement or a reprimand.

    We had just sat though an hour and a half of listening to the words the students had written. Words of emotion, of defeat, of growing up, of unique perspectives, of finding their way, and to me there was no need to rewrite a thing.

    They had given me pieces of their lives told with feelings and said out loud in fear or with great bravado, with pride and with youthful expression, to me it seemed they were perfectly perfect fitting into their life experience.

    Where they were in life fit perfectly in how they wrote. I am not sure rewriting is the answer, it seems that if you say, rewrite you are rejecting what they wrote.

    Rewrite, redo, and reword it…

    The juxtaposition between the enthusiastic teacher, her encouraging voice, and her caring eyes, and the words, Rewrite struck me with contradiction…like a smile with a slap.

    I then wondered how often I had done this, ‘rejecting the project’ while trying to teach technique.

    I began an Art Quilt group, and my intentions were to be with ladies who enjoy creating quilts without patterns, to let go of the ‘rules’ of quilting and just play with the fabrics and even mix metaphors and jumble up what those who came before us defined as perfect quilting.

    Rebels, daring to not follow the well-trodden path.

    When I began quilting, my Aunt told me that I could do anything I wanted, that I didn’t have to follow or adhere to any quilt rule or pattern, that quilting was making a sandwich, putting fabric batting fabric, and I was the creator.

    She taught me without teaching me rules.

    I wonder if you can do the same with writing, if you could just use the same writing instruments; words, paper, pencil and then allow writing to come what may.

    Let the writer go free, allow the writer to follow what feels right for him, to not make him bend and twist into a forgone conclusion of what writing needs to be.

    Whether it be writing, quilting or living life, we seem to neglect the person for the skill, toss out the personality, the Spirit, the essence in trying so hard to get to perfect.

    Maybe it isn’t the writing or the quilt or life but it’s getting to Perfect.

    Is there a way to teach without spoiling it with perfect?

    I guess what we all fear in life is not being able to measure up to perfect.

    I say, once again, kill perfect, declare it a swear word…

    Imperfect has to replace it; it will free so many from the fear of failing. Whether you are writing or creating art, if you let go of perfect you will set free in wide-open fields with unlimited possibilities.

    Lets all play in the field of pure potential as the wise masters say…a field with no rules.