Staying with Your Dream When It's Hard by Andrea Schroeder

I am in the middle of a lot of different transitions.

• I sold my dear sweet creative cocoon of a house
• I am waiting for my new loft to be built, and living with my parents in the meantime
• I started making and using my new website, Creative Magic Academy, but keep running into problems with it and haven't been able to fully move in
• I have new ideas and projects in the works, getting ready for the next stage of my creative business but I don't have a lot of space to work in, or the kind of space to work in that I am used to

All these things in process.

With all sorts of different emotional ummm things happening around each one.

It's not easy and some days I wish I could hide in my tent all day each nacho chips, or give it all up and get some stupid job and stop thinking about creative dreams.

And I can't do either of those things.

I don't want to give up my dreams.

It's just that it's really hard right now.

It's hard to be in any kind of transition and hold on to progress on a dream.

It feels easier to just put the dream aside until the transition is done and then come back to the dream.

(You can substitute "transition" for a lot of things)

But putting a dream aside is like a Cardinal Sin of Creative Dreamers.

You've got to find a way to make space for the dream amongst the chaos or uncertainty or lack of space or whatever it is you are facing.

And that is my job today.

Making space for my dream.

On one hand this feels silly as my dream is alive and well but as soon as I look closer I can see that it's cramped and crowded.

I need new systems and practices for staying present with my dream:

Systems and practices that help me to keep breathing new life into my dream.

Systems and practices that help me to focus less on the cramped and crowded and more on the tiny bubbles of space I can find, until those tiny bubbles feel huge.

Systems and practices that provide for extra self-care and nourishment to help me move through all of these transitions with ease.

I started last night with my clothes. I've been here at my parent's place for 2 weeks and had not put my clothes away yet (!) I just didn't know where to put them, so I had them sprawled out in the rec room in the basement with the hangy stuff in the nice cedar closet.

So now my clothes have homes. And I cleared off a space on my mom's sewing desk to put my laptop and daytimer.

And I made an art station in the rec room. (And posted a photo of my first creative journal page I made in it) It's on the floor by the fire place which will be awesome as it starts to cool off.

I'll keep working on creating my space physically.

And experimenting with creating creative systems and practices for all of those other things. My ideas to start with are:

• Adding morning yoga to my routine (have been doing it at night, under the stars, which is beautiful but I think more is needed)
• Getting Havi's Shina Nata App and creating a Shiva Nata practice that fits my new life
• Going for daily hour long walks
• Daily journal in the park picnics (there is a perfect park just down the street with a picnic table right by the river - my parents live in a beautiful neighbourhood)
• Daily or weekly scheduled time for creating new systems for my business - I know what these are, I know what I need I'm just not doing it and I know that doing it will make me happier
• Using the Magic Potions!
• Really fully appreciating the beautiful golden sunlight of fall

In short really - fill my life up with routines that support me in being more present and intentional.

Ahhhhhh.

Sigh of relief.

I can feel the chaos and overwhelm calming down.

I can feel the bubbles of space floating in already.

I'm excited to start experimenting to see what kind of life I can create for myself within all of these transitions.

I'll let you know how I do with this.

Andrea Schroeder is a Creativity + Meditation Teacher, Healer Artist + Magic Maker. You can find her in the Creative Magic Academy.