Engaging with the creative impulse can enrich both your personal and professional lives. It’s more than thinking outside the box. It’s moving forward as if there never was a box at all.
Instinctive Meditation® is one of the ways to attune to your creative instincts. Engaging with the senses, sharpening your internal and external perceptions, and dropping more readily into a state of relaxed awareness all come into play.
In what ways might you explore creativity in the coming days?
As so often happens, I was looking for something completely different when I came across an old notebook. I think it was from an expressive arts conference I’d attended years ago.
I turned the page and this phrase was glowing off the page : Breath as an art material. Everything stopped as those words carried me away on a mind journey.
The way breath gives voice to poetry and stories.
The collective inhale of a concert band before playing the first note.
Blowing on a dandelion and sending off little white skirts as gifts to sky faeries.
Shaping molten glass, or inflating two slabs of clay into a pillow.
A deep grounding inhale and exhale before stepping onto stage and dancing.
The play of rhythm between lovers.
How breath informs our senses. The sense of smell in cooking. More subtly reaching our instincts, sniffing out adventure, or danger, or a potential mate. Communicating emotions when words don’t suffice.
I began to wonder about using breath in other ways in art, such as using a straw to blow watered down paint on a surface.
What would it be like to receive a breath, and use the energy of releasing it through a paintbrush, in movement, or in whatever other way one might imagine? How does how you vary your breath affect the quality of lines, colours, textures, or gestures? What would the flow of creative practice be like while intentionally incorporating breath as one of the art materials?
I invite you to set some time for your favourite creative practice, and intentionally incorporate breath into your process. I’d love to hear what your experience is!
The other day I was talking with a friend, and they mentioned another friend who was holding on to ways of being that were no longer serving them and weighing them down. I gently told my friend that some of what they were dealing with was beyond the scope of friendship (i.e. a good time to bring in a mental health professional), and at times the best we can do is be a witness to someone else’s journey. And then I said:
“It’s like they have a bunch of rocks in their pocket! It’s like they’ve collected all these rocks of experience and habits over the years, put them in their pocket, and won’t get rid of them.”
We went on to talk about how sometimes it’s so challenging to release habits and ways of thinking that really aren’t doing us any good. Rocks in a pocket is a good analogy. Some are pretty and nice to take out to look at now and then, some get annoying and poke us, and others bunch together and take up space we could use for something else, weighing us down and slowing our journey.
I suggested it could be an interesting exercise to go out on a walk, collect rocks, or find some near a lakeshore or creek edge. Hold each rock, name what it represents, say what you’re making room for, and send the rock sailing into the water (being mindful of any nearby living things). Water is so purifying, and it would be satisfying to watch the ripples as the water settled back into calm.
My friend said it could be cool to do it on a hike and throw rocks into a canyon, to which I replied… you’d want to be sure no one was down below so you don’t bonk someone on the head with your troubles (i.e. transfer your burdens on to someone else).
If you’re not able to get somewhere to empty your pocket of rocks, I suppose you could write things on paper and burn them (be safe!), or as an acquaintance did years ago, put on some goggles and smash garage sale dishes in your basement, naming what each item represented. That person ended up making mosaics with all the broken bits! Some cities have rage rooms, where for a fee you can go smash stuff.
But there’s nothing quite so satisfying as flinging a rock with all your might, and watching it disappear into the water.
I can’t clear my mind.
Focusing on my breath is boring.
I can’t sit still.
Sitting cross-legged on the floor is too uncomfortable.
I’m worried that it’s against my religious affiliation.
These are all things I’ve heard recently from people about meditation. Thing is, you simply might have not found the right meditation practice for YOU.
I specialize in the practice of Instinctive Meditation®. This practice holds that meditation is an innate instinct in all of us, just like eating or sleeping. The relaxation response is just as natural as the stress response. Our modern lives often call on us to push aside relaxing and regenerating, which can result in a number of things such as stress, poor sleep, boredom, etc.
Meditation can be as simple as gazing out across the horizon at the beach, merging with your favourite music while dancing, looking at a piece of art, journaling, cooking, taking a nap.. and so many other things. You’ve probably been meditation already, and just didn’t know it!
Potential benefits of meditation can include entering a state of relaxed awareness more easily, decreased stress, enhanced communication skills, better sleep, easier access to your creativity, and a richer engagement with life in general.
I would love to meet with you and help craft a practice that is right for you, and support you on your meditation journey.
Right now you can experience one on one meditation coaching for free via Zoom as part of my practicum for my advanced meditation teacher certification. Send me a message, and let’s get started!
I also need two of these participants willing to be recorded on Zoom. One person once, and one person twice. The recordings will only be used internally as part of my completion portfolio, and you’ll need to sign a waiver.
Can’t wait to play in the land of meditation with you!
The open door caught my attention first as I walked by. With curiosity, I slowed down, and then to a stop. Sunlight streamed in and highlighted the kiln, which gave off a sense of heat. Stacks of pottery in organized chaos were laid out on a board nearby. In the back of the studio, behind a counter was a person working on a pot, The way their work light illuminated them, and the way they were wearing their knitted hat, took the whole scene out of time, if it weren’t for the modern kiln. I had come across a living chiaroscuro painting. It felt like magic.
The artist sensed me, and a hesitation came across their face. I moved on, glad I hadn’t followed my reflex to take out my phone and take a picture. Back before there were cameras in portable phones, I rarely took pictures. For me, it felt like I could either have the experience, or be an observers and document what was going on, but not feel like part of what was going on.
A few moments later, and down the road, a silver flash revealed someone sitting on their porch, playing the banjo. The person’s face had an expression of relaxed absorption in the moment. I walked down the sidewalk a ways, took out my phone, pointed it to the sidewalk and away from the person to record the sound, and they stopped playing. Right away I hoped they were simply pausing and that I hadn’t interrupted them, even with the distance. Porches are made for sitting on and playing music.
Sitting here now, I’m amazed how much detail my mind caught of the potter’s studio. The lighting, the colour palette, the whole energy of the scene. I credit it in part to the ease of my meditative practice. I find more and more how quickly I can enter a state of relaxed awareness and more fully experience where I am, or what I am doing. Or being. I’m so grateful to have found a way to more deeply connect my inner and outer worlds in a way that doesn’t require anything of me other that being open to follow where the essence of life leads.
The open door caught my attention first as I walked by. With human curiosity I slowed down, and then to a stop. Sunlight streamed in and highlighted the kiln, which gave off a sense of heat. Stacks of pottery in organized chaos were laid out on a board nearby. In the back of the studio, behind a counter was a person working on a pot, The way their work light illuminated them, and the way they were wearing their knitted hat, took the whole scene out of time, if it weren’t for the modern kiln. I had come across a living chiaroscuro painting.
The artist sensed me, and a hesitation came across their face. I moved on, glad I hadn’t followed my reflex to take out my phone and take a picture.
A few moments later, and down the road, a silver flash revealed someone sitting on their porch, playing the banjo. The person’s face had an expression of relaxed absorption in the moment. I walked down the sidewalk a ways, took out my phone, pointed it to the sidewalk and away from the person to record the sound, and they stopped playing. Right away I hoped they were simply pausing and that I hadn’t interrupted them, even with the distance. Porches are made for sitting on and playing music.
Sitting here now, I’m amazed how much detail my mind caught of the potter’s studio. The lighting, the colour palette, the whole energy of the scene. I credit it in part to the ease of my meditative practice. I find more and more how quickly I can enter a state of relaxed awareness and more fully experience where I am, or what I am doing. Or being. I’m so grateful to have found a way to more deeply connect my inner and outer worlds in a way that doesn’t require anything of me other that being open to follow where the essence of life leads.
And how now I have an intriguing potter’s studio I can visit at any time in my mind. I have found a way to both experience and document the world around me in a way that has opened me up to all sorts of possibilities and adventures.
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