Creativity and Motherhood, Spirituality and Motherhood: New Website

Hi 🙂 If you’ve landed here and would like to check out what I’m up to these days, head over to my latest creation: Wild Motherhood, a portal for creative, soulful mothers with free resources, sliding scale coaching services, and a new blog! I’m writing about subjects like being an introverted mother, the wildness inside us all, and the messy imperfection of life as a single mother creative. There’s also more information on there about my writing workshops for mothers, including Wild Motherhood workshops which combine yoga, writing and sharing circles. You can find excerpts from my upcoming book, ‘Wild Motherhood: Keeping the Creative and Soul Fires Burning‘ and join the Wild Motherhood Tribe. As a taster of the book, I am giving away a free E-book, ‘Creative Fuel for Wild Mothers’, which you can get your hands on over here.

If you want to know more about my published writing and copywriting/content creation services, check out my main writer website. 

Hope to see you there!

Free E-book for Creative Mothers

Measurable Intentions

pic by Dayawanti D'Sa

Happy New Year everyone! This is the first New Year in a while that I’ve really connected with a sense of fresh possibility and excitement – a feeling that I can break through old barriers. I don’t know whether that’s due to finally being more settled in my environment – last January I was still in-between homes – and therefore able to look outwards and onwards again, or because of the Solar Eclipse and recent Jupiter-Uranus conjunction bringing positive expansion, or because we are so close to 2012 and all that that means for our development as humans – but it feels so good!

Last year I had big dreams for myself: solid goals, like living in community, being in a loving relationship, and having completed my novel by the end of 2010. It’s wonderful to dream big but it can also put a lot of pressure on us. It would be easy to be depressed about the way those goals haven’t quite materialised, but when I look at it honestly I wasn’t consistently applying effort in those directions – I kept getting sidetracked from what I was trying to manifest, and letting life pull me every which way. It’s been an emotionally turbulent year, but I’ve come out a lot wiser. So this year I’ve decided to approach New Year’s intentions in a different way: making intentions that are totally down to me. And, just as importantly, are measurable in small steps.

My lifelong friend and fellow writer Rin Simpson blogged about approaching New Year’s Resolutions month by month – sitting down at the beginning of each month and writing down your goals for that month, rather than losing momentum halfway through the new year. I like that a lot. It’s really quite simple: I want to take small enjoyable actions, one at a time, that are related to my big dreams for myself, and that gradually narrow the gap between where I’m standing now and where I want to be. Most importantly, I want to enjoy where I am right now as much as possible: spiritually, emotionally and physically!

Something I found very helpful to do was mindmap around my ideal working day and my ideal home – I confess, I have a digital ‘vision board’ of my ideal partner too, and have a list of qualities I’m looking for in a partner that are constantly refined 😉 These mindmaps – which I plan to collage around too, because visual representations are so good at activating manifestation – were so effective at getting me fired up about my life, that it was easy to come up with concrete steps. So, here are some examples of my New Years steps:

To energise my dream of being a successful poet, novelist and short story writer, I’ve decided to, each  month, schedule in nine hours a week to write, and aim for one poetry/short story/article submission per month, as well as a poetry performance where possible.

To move me closer towards my dream of reaching lots of people with the empowering tools of Kundalini Yoga and the power of writing and journalling, I’d like to facilitate one Kundalini Yoga or writing workshop per month – my upcoming New Years Yoga workshop on 8th Jan will focus on New Year intentions and bringing in positive energy to 2011, and I’m very excited about teaching it!  I’ve also decided to keep my determination and focus and see one thing through at a time – e.g. commit to teaching a class for three months, putting my all into it, before trying something else.

I have plans to take a ‘ready, fire, aim’ approach this year and start finally using the  skills and knowledge I have to reach out to people – for example, I am planning some workshops to help give new mothers basic tools such as breathing and meditation that can be practiced in amongst the chaos. For so long it’s as if I’ve been waiting for someone to give me permission to teach what I know, and I suddenly realised that it can start now!

pic by Dayawanti D'Sa

To work on my goal of becoming more organised and efficient, I’m going to do one ‘sort out’ project each month – e.g. file bank statements, throw out old papers I don’t need etc. I’ve been doing this regularly lately and it’s great how much energy it releases, leaving me free to create new things in my life.

And motherhood of course is not exempt from self-improvement – far from it. I have re-committed to being very clear on my intentions each day, to connect with Jude and put our connection and loving relationship at the forefront of my consciousness when I’m with him. I find when I am clear in my mind about my intentions, I can re-steer my wayward thoughts and actions back towards them more quickly and easily.

To keep me connected to the spirit that sustains me through all of these things, keeping my focus on the internal rather than the ever-changing external – Yogi Bhajan taught that ‘all things come to those who are stable’ – I want to read, watch or listen to one inspiring thing every single day. It’s amazing what a difference it makes when I take the time to connect with the wisdom of teachers and writers such as Yogi Bhajan, Wayne Dyer, Abraham-Hicks and others who remind me of the greater purpose of my life beyond the roles that I carry out and the actions that I take. It eases stress and uplifts me out of the often narrow focus that can result from chasing after things.

On that note, here are some quotes I’ve found on my web trawls recently that I found inspiring and uplifting, that deal with creating and manifesting in one’s life:

Walking with faith tends to turn out better than just having a “concrete” plan. A flexible planwith faith creates miracles! ~Mastin Kipp TDL

Recognize that you have the courage within you to fulfill the purpose of your birth. Summon forth the power of your inner courage and live the life of your dreams. ~Gurumayi Chidvilasananda

Life is a handful of short stories, pretending to be a novel.-~~Anonymous
If we fill our short stories with love a beautiful novel has the opportunity to transpire!~~~Margery@Angelhealingwaters

Finally, I leave you with an affirmation I like: “I am open to beneficial change’ (vs ‘I wanna stay the way I am!’) (from ‘Simplify, Simplify, Simplify’ on Facebook). Really, all we can do is be open to the flow of change in our lives, and co-operate with it rather than running away. Bring on 2011!

Dark/Light

First off, apologies for my silence of late. I have decided to write shorter but hopefully more frequent posts, which many of you will probably be glad to hear! I realised I’d been feeling the pressure to produce nothing but erudite reflections, but sometimes I think it’s important to just shut up and write, as Natalie Goldberg says. My writer friend Lou-Ice’s (Louise Halvardsson) blog is an excellent example of tracking one’s life as a writer (or whatever it is you do), illustrating with well-chosen photographs (taken by herself usually) and inspiring others with the way you bring creativity into life. When I’ve got to grips with my new camera phone I’ll be adding some of my own creations!

As Winter Solstice approaches with the reflections on dark and light that it brings, I wanted to share a beautiful event I was lucky enough to be part of last week: the Mothers Uncovered ‘Night of Splendour‘ party and cabaret to celebrate three years of this amazing supportive network for mothers, which one participant remarked ‘ does more for the psychological well-being of mums than the health profession does throughout pregnancy and beyond.‘ The cabaret featured extracts from ‘The Naked Truth’ monologues and ‘Your Stories’. I have to admit I was in tears at several points of the evening as women bravely shared their (and others’) experiences of the light and dark sides of motherhood and every shade in between.

The very hip band ‘YuMammaMeeMamma‘ had me in stitches in the second half as they sang songs interspersed by hilarious mother-to-mother dialogue that was instantly recognisable – and skirting the edges of provocative at times – and got us all to join in singing ‘We Rock the Pants of Motherhood’ (in harmonies!) at the end. It was so exhilirating to experience motherhood as something to be proud of, something to celebrate and recognise. Instead of an aspect of life that is very much stuck at the margins of society (although of course, I didn’t notice any non-mothers, or indeed non-women, at the event, other than the organiser’s husband).

I read my poems ‘Three Month Mark’, ‘Untitled’, and ‘The Idea of an Aeroplane’ – all stage debuts. (Thanks Lou-Ice and Bernadette Cremin for valuable feedback during the draft stage of ‘The Idea of an Aeroplane’). It was an excellent opportunity to narrow the gap between my creative life and te day to day reality of motherhood. The poems represent three different ‘stages’  of my motherhood journey thus far (all three years of it!), and I’d like to share them. The first one, rather obviously, was written when I was pregnant; the second, when Jude was two, and the last one very recently. So, here goes!

Three month mark (okay, so the picture is of my full term bump!)

Tomorrow

is the three month mark of our baby’s conception

when our blind cells joined, oblivious.

We drank vodka cocktails,

spilt sex conversations

until my breasts ached walking

down the stairs for the thirteenth pee,

and I nearly hit you in a hormonal rage.

Now my Buddha belly grows rotund

with this creature

we created accidentally-on-purpose.

Friends tell me stories

of three-month-point abortions

and miscarried twins

In six months I will meet you

I don’t know what you will look like

or how I will love you

If you will have imperfections

grown in the womb

or pre-destined by genetics

If I will still love you, then.

You are my consolation in the form of a bump

barely visible,

a secret I stroke and hold with a smile

at odd moments of the day,

when work dulls my shiny joy

and the pointless commute wears me down.

The shiver along my scalp

like a bolt out of nowhere.

As you, angel not yet incarnate,

unfurl your blameless wings inside me.

(Untitled)

Holding my boy & he’s breathing.

Something the Victorians wouldn’t take for granted.

But I’m thinking of deadlines on essays

and time running short,

The refuse workers strike

& how rubbish is piling up in the streets.

I’m holding my son,

his warm cheek under my armpit

how little space he takes up,

so new on this planet.

But his footprint will grow

with him, & soon he’ll use more

resources than 10 Guatamalans.

It’s strange how,

when he’s asleep, lying on the pink-

crayon-streaked sheet beside me,

I miss him.

Even as his breath descends

into his chest: rise, fall, rise, fall.

And his feet do that last twitch

before I can do a stealth

manoeuvre & escape.

I wait, like a clock with a stiff second arm,

for the day to release me into my private self:

The self that knows words

like ‘aver’, who guards her evening from the warp

of days given over to chilly playgrounds

and overheated libraries

where today, he ran away from me,

& panic stilled my blood.

Now emptiness rises in my throat to

catch me:

you must live, you must stay,

you must stay

mine.

The Idea of An Aeroplane

photo by Thoursie http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1323798

An aeroplane streaks blue sky above,

Leaving only trails of white.

I know inside it will be stuffy

With plastic food,

But still there is the longing to

Go

Forwards, to Thailand

With its spices and space,

Or backwards to South Africa,

Strangely comforting

With its barren air of possibility

Every time I hear that

Distant thrum of a plane’s engine,

I look up and am temporarily gone.

Even if I am walking on green earth

And birdsong is caressing my ears

With fresh sound.

Even though I’m walking with your

Hand clasped in mine

And even though the russet gold leaves

Are crunching decisively under each step

And even though I feel

As vast as the remembered sky,

And know that I am alive,

And here, and real

Still

The idea of an aeroplane

Can turn my head

Away.