Imaginative Healing

Imagination, curiousity, creativity, playfulness… ultimately leading to noticing synchronicities, connecting to intuition, and discovering magic.. are the things missing in the all too serious and difficult healing from losses, illness, disease, and grief.

Really, Janet? You beat yourself up for not learning something new?

Ah, the limiting beliefs we own… the disempowering thoughts we can have… the hidden underlying commitments we’ve made to ourselves. As a life coach, I know all about this stuff, right?

I know how to help others notice those in their own thinking, and decide if that thinking no longer serves them and can change. Or perhaps some of those hidden commitments and beliefs do serve well and are worth not fighting against.  Yup, I know how to ask the questions, help others find those answers, be kind and compassionate to themselves in the process. And believe me, I’m quick at pointing out the disempowering thoughts. So I actually laughed outloud at myself when I realized what I’d done to me…..

A few weeks ago, I thought to myself, “What the hell have you been doing all these months? Why didn’t you use this time to learn something new?”  (I actually had registered for an online course that seemed cool, and never got to one class when it turned out I had to start chemo.)  Yup, I was beating myself up harshly. Yup, chemo brain likely contributed. “Jeez, Janet, there’s so many new things you could have been learning.” I mumbled to myself.

And I left  it at that.  No, I didn’t notice what I was doing with a laugh and a  ‘Oh look at that thought. You could let that one go.”   No, I didn’t ask myself the obvious follow up question: “What have you been learning? or being? or happy you did?”  That would have straightened things out quickly.  Instead, I clearly gave that thought some power.. because as you can see, I didn’t forget it.

Pretty cranky with myself, and I do try not to do that, because it just doesn’t feel good. (And, as much as possible, I’m working really hard at doing what feels good right now and dismissing what takes my energy away). And you, dear readers who know my journey, already know where this is going, don’t you?

Then just a few days ago, I shook my head as yet again I spent many many many many hours researching my diagnosis and treatments. Not learn something new?????  I have spent an almost unbelievable amount of hours/days/weeks.. learning everything I can about the specific cancer I was diagnosed with.  The rarity of the diagnosis, the uncertainty of the treatments. I’ve been learning every single day to manage this crisis in my life the best I can.

And I gave myself shit over this? Oy.

Shhhh, I shouldn’t be here but I’m worried about something….

I”m currently immersed in the Nanowrimo event: joining with hundreds of thousands others who have committed to writing a 50,000 word novel in the month of November. It’s a brilliant event.

I shouldn’t be here, writing this, because I really ought to be focussed on the book.

I’m in the ‘rebel’ category… because in Nano, they are nice enough to not call us cheaters. Nano is supposed to be about writing a fiction novel, starting November 1. No early starts, no previous novels, just spewing out 50 000 words of fiction.

Me? I’m taking this month to pull together my creative memoir.  It was already 85 000 words, but then I was haunted to change it and include the ‘rest of the story’ .. the part that didn’t seem to fit with the rather curious arrival of enchanted beings in my clay; the part that was rather sad, yet had a magical twist entirely different from the rest of the story.  So,  a whole rewrite was in order…. meaning a good 30 to 40 000 of those first words were going to be tossed or rewritten, and some new sections included.   The first section was finished, but the rest needed a ton of work. Nano has place for rebels not doing fiction or starting fresh and that’s what I’m doing.

My word count went up 11 000 yesterday because one original section hardly needed rewriting and I just cut and pasted it in. That’s how I get to do Nano this year.

My worry?  My worry is that people think I’m heroically writing 50 000 words while still in treatment for breast cancer. I’m worried that people might say to some other person in treatment, “I know a woman who wrote a whole novel in a month while in treatment.”  So, I’m here just clarifying something….

I actually could not have started with a blank page and written 50 000 words this month. My fingertips hurt, my nails are sensitive – both side effects of chemo. I cannot comfortably sit still for long without my weird muscle pains becoming worse. My brain cannot stay focussed for sheesh… 5 minutes, at best, before I find myself wandering to other thoughts, the kitchen, or a game on facebook.  And that’s me after the most difficult part of my treatments is over, and the current one has less side effects.

So.  I’m not heroicallly doing nanowrimo. I wouldn’t encourage anyone in treatment to tackle nano in the traditional sense. That would be crazy. I’m “just sayin’ ” so some poor soul doesn’t think she/ he should have the energy and oomph to write a novel in a month, or something similarly extensive, while in active cancer treatment.

Kay, that’s off my chest. Now back to the book. Or the kitchen. Oh wait, is that snow outside?

My Mind is like a Fridge. (a creative rambling)

My mind is a refrigerator full of stuff.

The tomatoes in the back ought to be thrown out.

But I don’t remember they are there.

If I can’t see it, it does not exist.

That line stumps me. Stops me. I don’t believe that.

But it’s true of the fridge.

Wouldn’t it be good if what I can’t see does not exist if it’s not good for me?

What if I can’t see good things that exist?

Do they then not exist?

The fridge is a mix of so much stuff:

Good for you.

More good for you.

Unless its rotten.

But I don’t necessarily like those good for you things.

Vegies are fine if someone puts them in front of my face.

I have to work at noticing them otherwise.

In the fridge, where are the healing, super healing, balancing, clarity giving things?

In the fridge, where’s the fun?

I’m wondering if cleaning my fridge would be inspiring today.

From Complete Frustration to Magic: A Timely Reminder

        “Shit,” she barked, as the props securing the old fence gave way, causing it to fall awkwardly into the alley.  Walking inside, she acknowledged the grinding metal on metal drone of her furnace with a “Shut up. Just shut up.” The endless cycle of broken things, dust, and dog hair surrounding her were sucking the life right out of her. Aimlessly she paced the house, landing smack into her collection of paint.
        And so she immersed herself in senseless paint blotches and strokes and tantrums on paper.  She watched the paint flow, tilting and messing, and scowling at mud colours forming but mumbling, ”let it go” for, of course, the transition from pouty cranky fences, to bills that refused to fly to the neighbours, to dishes that have never been nor will ever be all clean at the same time…  and into the space where passion, and colours transport her to where she becomes an observer… admiring what her hands are producing but certain they are not her hands, in awe of the concepts and theories and wisdom that flow through her mind…

~ Came across this as I work on my book during nanowrimo. It was written a few years ago. A good reminder now to ‘just go paint’ sometimes~

“Beyond All Imaginings” Nanowrimo, be the Muse I need you to be!

You’ve heard whispers of my novel in progress, perhap? Yes, for quite some time. This month I’m a rebel in the Nanowrimo .(write 50 000 words in a month) You’re allowed to break rules there, because getting novels done whatever way that works is what Nano is all about. Trust me, they ‘get’ writers and have the humour, the ability to debunk the myths, and the tools and the community to keep you going. Like that crazy little wordcounter on the side of this page that makes me feel like I better have something to show there! Ha!
I’m breaking the rules by continuing a novel in progress.  And it’s a creative autobiography, not a fictional novel. They have forums for us rebels.
The book was already completed once.  But it sat, because the stories I don’t tell were screaming to be told. Now, it’s been like combining two novels in one.  I love section one, but the other 200 pages?  Total rewrite needed. So for Nano, I am starting section two over…calling the current 200 pages a really extravagant outline…. and going for 50 000 words to complete!  Whoot whoot! (I won’t be putting section one in the word count.)

So here’s a bit about the Novel.. with a current working title of:  “Beyond All Imaginings”

Synopsis   Imagine “Close Encounters of the Third Kind’ and you’ll get a feel of what happened to me when faeries started show up in my clay. Running parallel in my life though was a period of brutal grief and a very different, yet amazing, kind of magic. It began 20 years ago, and now the whole story wants to be told.

Excerpt   Intro

This is the story of magic and altering time and dogs that fly and people who died and beings who introduced themselves as faeries… and this is a story of pottery.

It’s about smashed fingers, smashed dreams, smashed faeries and the value of throwing up your arms and saying “whatever.”  It’s about impossible things being possible and “Rolling Stones” playing on unplugged radios.

It’s about walking through walls and it’s about faerie sex. (That chapter nearly stopped me in my writing tracks.)

This is the true story of my life: The tragic loss of loved ones; the magic of faerie-like beings showing up in my clay, on my pages, and in my home – which they did, by the way, very much to my dismay – at least at first.  And now, the faeries insist they will simply keep blowing themselves up in the kiln until I tell our story.

This is the story that blurs your boundaries between reality and fantasy and leaves you wishing you could find your way into my world, albeit without the tragedies.  As you can imagine, this has not been a simple story to write. Hell, if it were fantasy it would have been easy… but this is my life.

It’s been a novel in progress for quite some time, because seriously, how does one tell a story of magic and faeries and people who died? How does one tell the stories I don’t tell, when one knows they have to be here?

One begins. That’s all, I suppose…