Looking Simply In by Valarie Budayr

Brightly colored flowers, leaves, mud, pinecones, tree branches, icicles, snow, stone, twigs, and thorns. All of these are the components of Andy Goldsworthy’s artwork. I recently saw the film “Rivers and Tides”. I was mesmerized by his complete connection to nature, living in the moment, and knowing that once his creation was completed that it would before too long be transitioning to another form, through another season, and into another state.

Part of the magic of creating is bringing to life something from nothing. Something which only existed in our minds eye and comes to realization through our processes.

“For me looking, touching, material, place and form are all inseparable from the resulting work. It is difficult to say where one stops and another begins. Place is found by walking, direction determined by weather and season. I take the opportunity each day offers: if it is snowing, I work in snow, at leaf-fall it will be leaves; a blown over tree becomes a source of twigs and branches.”

Click goes the camera. Upon finishing one of his pieces, Andy Goldsworthy capture’s a moment in time. Whether he perceives the work to be good or bad, it is always documented. He is aware that nature is raw and is always in a state of change. In working with natural material in natural settings creates an understanding to working with and in nature.

By working simply and in the natural settings in which the materials are found opens up and understanding of the process of life itself. As each art piece is in it’s creative state, he knows that this moment is fleeting and the life process of ebbing and flowing will continue on, it will continue to be part of the natural rhythm of life.

I found this film and Andy Goldsworthy’s art to be captivating. Enjoy !!

Valarie Budayr is the founder of Audrey Press and author of the book The Fox Diaries: The Year the Foxes Came to our Garden. She is passionate about making kid’s books come alive and you can find her doing that on her popular blog and website, Jump into a Book. When she isn’t being bookie, she is very happily the mother of three uber creative children, married to a wonderfully patient man who has come to love yarn, and caretaker of one adored cat. Other creative interests are music, travel, knitting (a bonafide yarn harlot), and gardening. She loves living a daily creative practice, where even a good cup of coffee is art

Photo-flourishing by Angel Young

Angel lives in the UK and is having fun bringing more of the things she loves into her life.

Sometimes Dreams Die by Andrea Schroeder

About 15 years ago, I was finishing University in a big busy city and dreaming of moving to a tiny quiet magical town in the mountains.

So I took a big huge crazy leap of faith and moved to that magical town.

And it was pretty much a disaster.

Well, a disaster all wrapped up in magic and big lessons and amazing adventures that I wouldn't trade for anything. It was a disaster only in that I really couldn't stay very long because there was no way for me to make money there.

And so I called my parents.

Ugh. But I was going to need a place to stay, temporarily, as I figured out what to do next. So, ugh, I went back to my parent's house. (Not that my parents aren't lovely people but I am sure you understand the ugh about going back to their house after having been on my own.)

And so there I was. In my parent's house, reading the paper every day, looking for jobs.

And I had all sorts of interviews and trial days for different design jobs and none of them felt like a fit.

And one day there was a little ad in the paper.

Fashion shop for sale.

I called. I went to meet with them. I fell in love with this idea.

The fashion shop was in this adorable little mall in an old railway building near the river. Gorgeous. I saw myself getting a latte in the mornings, and drinking it while sitting on a bench looking at the river and happily planning my day. This was one of my favourite places to hang out. I saw myself working really hard but being really happy with it all.

Given that I had just graduated with a degree in Fashion Design and a dream of one day having my own shop - this felt a big giant spark of Creative Dream Magic. Like maybe my other dream died so that this one could live?

The owners were so sweet. And the business was going well - they were just ready to retire and move, ironically, near to the little magical town in the mountains that I had just come from.

My parents were supportive and willing to loan me the money to buy this shop, if their accountant could look at the numbers and agree that this was a good idea.

I was on pins and needles. I could not believe how long it was taking... getting files, having meetings, getting more information, having more meetings. Ugh!

And in the end the accountant said yes. This was a smart move.

And my parents loaned me the money.

And I raced down to the shop, papers in hand.

And they had just sold it to someone else, 15 minutes before I got there.

I don't remember what I did next. I probably bought a coffee and went and sat on that bench overlooking the river.

I've thought about that day many times over the last 15 years.

I have to trust that what happened was for the best. I have to trust that my dream didn't die - just that one path to it was blocked off. That there are other paths and other opportunities and that I would find a way.

And then - a lot happened.

A lot has happened in the last 15 years and now here I am. In a place that is better than what I had imagined for myself back then.

And things are going really well for me and my business. All sorts of great things happened and one Monday morning last Spring, I wanted to celebrate.

Monday mornings I had been going to this sweet little coffee shop near a park, to sit by the window and look at the park while making my plans for the week. (Patiently waiting for spring to come so that I could actually sit in the park)

This Monday morning it was sunny and warm and spring was finally here and I wanted to do something special and celebratory and be outside so I went down to that spot by the river. I got a coffee and an ooey gooey fresh baked cinnamon bun and found that sunny bench.

And I thought about the fashion shop that I missed out on by 15 minutes. I thought about how my life would be totally different had I just gotten there earlier.

And I thought about how happy I am with how things turned out.

Your dreams don't die

Certain paths will end. Obstacles will come in from nowhere. Sometimes you have to start over on a new path but the dream does not ever die.

It's always there, waiting for you to find your way to it.

With a paintbrush in one hand & a glitter-gun in the other, Andrea Schroeder lovingly mentors men & women who want to lead creatively abundant lives — and do ‘impossible’ things, with ease & joy. Express the greatest parts of who YOU are, at www.CreativeMagicAcademy.com.

To Blossom, To Bloom, To Flourish by Amy Palko

Flowers don't worry about how they're going to bloom. They just open up and turn toward the light and that makes them beautiful. ~ Jim Carrey

A true lover of stories, Amy Palko spends her days reading, writing, knitting and dreaming… well, that is when she's not being kept busy home-educating her three kids! She is the creatrix of Virgins & Lovers: Ancient Wisdom for the Modern Goddess, exploring goddess myths and moon cycles through story, journalling, visualisation and creative exercise.

Is That REALLY Fear? by Meghan Genge

"Love bravely, live bravely, be courageous, there's really nothing to lose." - Jewel

A powerful shift happened before I had even gotten out of my pyjamas this morning.

My cells feel scrambled and the world looks different than it did 20 minutes ago.

I started the day listening to the last Circe's Tribe call recording. In the opening meditation, Jamie had us visualise something that included a colour and an emotion associated with it. The colour that I saw was pink, and when she said emotion, I thought that I felt panic. I have been feeling that feeling off an on for a few months now and I have been swallowing that feeling down, giving myself heartache in the process.

I almost stopped listening, but then a question came into my head: "Is that actually panic that I am feeling? Is it really fear or could it be another energy? Could it be power? Excitement? Passion? The colour was pink after all?!"

The question stopped me cold. In that moment I realised that I have the same reaction to all of the great big strong emotions. Afraid of their bigness, I call them all the same thing: fear. Being afraid of them meant that I stopped knowing what they really were.

That realisation brought on the most incredible feeling of expansion.

Then anxiousness.

Then excitement.

Big excitement.

And then I wrote this in my journal:

"Q: What do I focus on next?

I commit to meeting my emotions, naming and allowing them; letting them be as big as they need to be and expanding myself so that I am big enough and brave enough to hold them."

"Q: What do I do next?

I commit to meeting my emotions, naming and allowing them; letting them be as big as they need to be and expanding myself so that I am big enough and brave enough to hold them."

There's that feeling again, but I am going to walk over and meet it face-to-face.

yes.

Megg is a writer, a seeker, and a believer in magic.

Flourishing by Alli Vainshtein

This is the time of my life when I am able to flourish. I am a late bloomer, like the ugly duckling.

Once upon a time, there was a family of ducks. They had a daughter that was uglier than all the other ducks. She was clumsy, she didn't fit in, she was not the same color as the other ducks. The ducks were very frustrated with her. She finally gave up trying to fit in and moved away to the big city.

There she found a family of ostriches. she didn't fit in with them very well, but they were sympathetic because they were all ugly. They taught her that beauty was not everything. After a while, she realized that the ostriches' wisdom was not enough. She moved to another city and found some green herons.

The green herons are one of the few birds that can use tools. They are highly intelligent. They taught her many things and she was educated. She moved away and came to a city of songbirds. She learned to sing beautiful songs. Songs that brought joy, songs that soothed pain, songs that told stories. She became very skilled at making music. Then she moved again, always looking for something new. She came to a city of swans. This was where she fit in. She realized that she was a swan, but because she had spent so much time among other birds, she was able to share with the swans and teach them about the world.

I am that swan. I feel that I have remade myself over and over again, in the process of trying to find myself. I may even be a phoenix. The beautiful thing is that even though I have been through many painful years where everything didn't make sense, I learned from my experiences, and now I am able to teach others about the world.

Flourishing to me means that I enjoy my life. Every moment is exciting and fun. I am able to look beyond my physical pain and ailments to see what really matters in life. I am aware of the beauty around me. I enjoy the scents of the world. I hear the beautiful songs of the trees. I taste the delicious fruit of the earth. I can feel the earth beneath me.

Knowing myself is a key to my flourishing. Understanding my strengths helps me to use them to solve the problems in my life. Appreciating my talents helps me to develop them. Listening to myself helps me to understand my own stories.

I am thankful to the universe for bringing me to this point where I can flourish and enjoy the world, enjoy life, enjoy everyone I meet. There is so much beauty and love in the world. Find your own beauty. Find yourself and you will learn to flourish.



Alli Vainshtein is a flexibly stubborn intellectual dreamer, aspiring to be a midwife of creativity.

One Word a Year by Valarie Budayr

What happens after all this creativity in motion actually spawns a successful business? The lifestyle you always dreamed of?

I think I imagined it a little differently. That somehow with success all the worry and time crunching would just vanish because once one is successful it’s suppose to get easier right? Aren’t I suppose to have more time to create? More time to hang out with family and friends? More of everything but less of the negative stuff.

I find myself at the beginning of this new year in such a position. After working over the last year on starting a children’s publishing house and releasing our first book, I’m feeling a little overwhelmed and blind sided by success. It feels often-times like I’m on a treadmill at top speed and full incline.

So one day while I was actually on the treadmill I got to thinking about how I was going to cope with my dreams, and that’s when it hit me. I have to plan for success and it’s aftermath. Just like everything else in my business has a plan, success has a plan too.

To continue to flourish in my creative life I decided that I would assign one word a year which would be my focus. Anything that couldn’t be represented by that word probably didn’t need to be in my year. All within reason mind you. There are those things we have no control over.

The word a year idea gives focus and clarity to a myriad of ideas running through my mind. This year’s word is PLAN. Over the first few weeks of the year I’ve found myself writing down everything I do in a day and seeing where patterns repeat. I ask myself this question all the time, “Do I really need to do that or could I get someone to help me with that?”

Another question I’ve asked myself is “What’s really important to me?” These would be the items on my list that I’m not willing to get help for. The parts of my job and life that I cherish whole heartedly and love doing.

By dividing these areas of my life into little planned compartments has taken away the anxiety and jumble. Once I gave away some of my duties I was able to schedule weekly creative time. New ideas came into my mind and have flourished because of the mental house cleaning I’ve done at the beginning of the year.

As the days, weeks, and months, continue on throughout the year, I am writing down all of the responsibilities and things that need getting done on a mind-map. From our “Plan” I can easily assign things as needed to a variety of people. After installing this year’s word “Plan”, the anxiety and reactive life I was living has subsided and I am now fully enjoying the journey. As much as you plan and try different approaches to your creative life and creative business don’t forget that one day you will arrive at the success you have envisioned. What does success look like to you? Does it have a plan?
Here’s wishing you many wonderful creative moments and much success.

Valarie Budayr is the founder of Audrey Press and author of the book The Fox Diaries: The Year the Foxes Came to our Garden. She is passionate about making kid’s books come alive and you can find her doing that on her popular blog and website, Jump into a Book. When she isn’t being bookie, she is very happily the mother of three uber creative children, married to a wonderfully patient man who has come to love yarn, and caretaker of one adored cat. Other creative interests are music, travel, knitting (a bonafide yarn harlot), and gardening. She loves living a daily creative practice, where even a good cup of coffee is art.