My LOVE - Journal Writing

Every morning I start my day off with one of my favorite self-care practices and that is writing in my journal. Journals come in various shapes and sizes. Some are elegantly designed, some are cute and pocket-sized. Some are known as “secret diaries”. I remember being about twelve years old and having one that had a lock with a special key on it so no one could read what was written inside. Heaven forbid anyone would read about my first kiss with my cute “first love”, Jon, where I ran all the way home because I was SO in love (and by the way, we never kissed again – I think we were both too embarrassed by the whole experience).

Okay, so I digress…. Back to my favorite self-care practice. My journals are very simple. I just use 3-ring spiral notebooks, the kind that you can get four for a dollar at the back-to-school sales (That’s when I stock up!) I used to do all of my journal writing on the computer, but there is just something about letting the pen move across the pages, that is so relaxing and makes me feel like I’m in a whole different space, a different world. It’s a feeling you have to experience. Just try it out!

I so look forward to this time that I have to spend with myself. As most of you know, and those of you who don’t know can read my story here, after I lost my memory, it took me several months to dive into my journals, as sporadic as they were. It was a very traumatic thing for me.

  

What I learned about the old Cathleen (this is who I refer to pre-brain injury), is that the only time I spent writing in my journals was when I was upset, angry, or was just having a bad day. So when I read the journals, all it did was help me to remember bad times. Not a fun experience. I decided from that time on that I wasn’t going to use my journal writing that way and that I was going to become an every day journal writer.

About that same time I was involved in ARTbundance Certification and Training with Marney Makridakis of Artellaland and was introduced to Julia Cameron’s “The Artist’sWay”. What a blessing. I went to her website and learned that she had a practice called “Morning Pages” What Julia says is “In order to retrieve your creativity, you need to find it. I ask you to do this by an apparently pointless process I call the morning pages.” On the website it also says this:

“Morning Pages are three pages of longhand, stream of consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning. There is no wrong way to do Morning Pages– they are not high art. They are about anything and everything that crosses your mind– and they are for your eyes only. Occasionally colorful, more often than not Morning Pages are negative, fragmented, repetitive or bland. Good!  Worrying about your job, the laundry, the weird look your friend gave you – all that stuff distracts you from your creativity. It eddies through your subconsciousness and muddies your day. Get it on the page first thing in the morning and move on with your day with a freer spirit.”

Julia does say “negative”, however I didn’t want to have to read NEGATIVE again if I ever lost my memory, and I still have trouble with my short term memory, so as I try to live JOY every day of my life, I do try to keep it more on the JOYful side. I am human, so there are times, when I do have to let off steam, and so this is a great outlet.

But then I changed this up a bit. There has been so much talk about how important it is to have a gratitude journal and how when you write and talk about gratitude, it grows. So I take the last page, the third page and write about those things that I’m grateful for. There are days, when I have so much to say that I spend 3 pages writing about other things, but then I spend the next page writing about those things that I’m grateful for. When I first started this practice, I had to think real hard about the things I was grateful for, but as I did this every day, those things grew, and grew and grew and I look forward every day to writing about all those things that make me happy, the things that bring me JOY and the things that make my life what it is today!

So what about you? Do you have some experiences with writing in journals? I’d love to hear about your experiences and what has transpired for you! Leave your comments below! And if you’ve come from the newsletter, Brain Be Happy Notables, don’t forget to go back and read the rest of the exciting info!

Many hugs,

Cathleen

Time Traveling at the Speed of Love

Eight years ago, my sweet Savannah was diagnosed with a Craniopharyngioma, a benign brain tumor, that destroyed everything in it's path. Many doctors told us there was a slim chance that she would make it through the surgery and if she did, they didn't know what the outcome would be. Hydrocephalus had already set in and things didn't look good. She was diagnosed on May 3, 2003 and her 9 hour surgery took place on May 10, 2003. They said if she did wake up after the surgery it would be several days after the surgery, however within an hour after the surgery, she was trying to sit up and wanted to know when they were going to do the surgery :-). What a blessing! Although the past 8 years have been a challenge for our family, we still have Savannah with us and that is truly a blessing!

The reason I'm writing about this, is I just read an article that brought back the memories of those days before her surgery. I wanted to share it with you all. It touched my heart and I hope it does the same for you!

Love and hugs,
Cathleen

Time Traveling at the Speed of Love
by Marney K. Makridakis

I usually write the article for the Artellagram newsletter right before it goes out, but this time I'm writing and queuing it's send-out a week in advance. Typically, this probably wouldn't seem so odd…for most of us, it's a pretty safe bet that anything we write right now will still be true a week from now. In our everyday lives, the gap between the present and the immediate future seems small and imperceptibly insignificant. We're used to this fluidity from present to future; it comforts us, and protects us from being too fearful of change.

My two-year-old son Kai will be having major surgery in a few days, a total cranial reconstruction to rebuild his skull so his brain can grow properly. So, in this particular moment, the juxtaposition between the present and future seems at once both blurry and sharply jagged, like a young child's drawing of a ferocious and absurd dinosaur. By the time you read this message, the surgery will be complete, so writing this message right now feels a bit surreal, as I'm looking straight into the blinding light of the future's fragile unknown.

And yet, is this moment any different from ANY other moment, really? Physical science dictates that we can see everyday objects because of the light that is reflected onto them. If we look directly into the light source itself, our vision is distorted, and all we see are vague shapes, shadows, and outlines.

It's the same thing with time. Of course, we actually never know what the next moment will bring; the future can never be more than an outline. We don’t know what might happen that could change everything in an instant. When we can wrap our heads around this, we slowly come to realize that as much time as we spend worrying about it, the future really isn’t what truly matters most of all. In fact, what matters by far over anything else, is living for and living in these moments around us.

While making plans for the future certainly has its place, it is when we begin to stare longingly into the future's light, instead of looking lovingly at what's right in front of us, that we begin to take life for granted. I know I have often struggled with this myself, and the best way I know to avoid this and to keep focused on the beauty of what today offers, is to focus on love. For me, especially these days with his big surgery days away, it’s my love for Kai that instantly brings me back to these sparkly, shimmering moments at hand. But we don’t need an urgent health matter to do this all the time. You can have simple sweet love for a favorite pen you use to write in your journal, or a favorite place to walk, or even the smell of the air right before and after it rains.

A few evenings ago, after Kai was asleep, I was reading an essay about time and perception, and I read a line that said, "The measurement of time depends on the speed at which you move." Well, I mis-read it, and thought it said, "The measurement of time depends on the speed at which you love." I laughed to myself, closed the book, and pulled Kai's baby monitor close to my ear, and did nothing but listen to him breathe. Now, if the measurement of time did in fact depend on the ‘speed’ at which I was loving him just then, then there’s a good chance the clocks went haywire, and I’m actually writing this letter to you from a point far off in the future.

Hopefully back on earth in 2010, you too can travel at the speed of love for those dearest to you, and fly to the ends of the universe in your own cozy time machine :-)

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Marney K. Makridakis is the founder of ArtellaLand.com and the inventor of the ARTbundance Philosophy, which usesARTsignments™ to change lives through the power of creativity.   If you are intrigued by the idea of exploring a new vision for yourself in which you apply the ARTbundance™ philosophy andARTsignments™ to your own professional dreams and goals, you are invited to apply for the next ARTbundance™ Certification Training (ACT), beginning in April 2011.

Wonder Woman Super Powers

Wednesday night I attended a teleconference sponsored/given by Marney Makridakis, founder/creator of Artellaland.

It was a really awesome class! One thing that Marney told us was that as she was doing her research, putting this class together, she found that Wonder Woman's power's (from the old comic books) came from "Love" and her lasso was powered by "truth". Isn't that awesome?

I love finding out little trivia tidbits out like that. I know it might be useless, but hey, maybe it just makes me feel good, and I look for anything in this world to make me feel good.

The main idea of this class was we should use LOVE to get things done (doing more of what we love, loving more of what we do). It was pretty awesome. Marney is pretty awesome! And no, I'm not getting paid to say this... She gave an example of doing daily things, like laundry. How can we put "love" into doing laundry. Well, if I think about how nice the clean clothes will feel on my husband and my daughter and how nice they will look with clean fresh clothes, I'm doing this "chore" with love instead of another "have to" place that I usually come from. It puts a whole new spin on things.

So, what are some things that you do every day that you don't really like to do but they still have to get done? How can you put "love" into the equation and make those chores more painless? I hope this helps. It's definitely helped me to see a brighter side, one more time :-)...