Roots and Branches

It’s wild out there.

For those of you know who me personally or have followed my work closely for a while, you know it’s wild in my own world too: A time of transition for myself, alongside pretty much everyone else on the planet, alongside all our systems and structures we’re used to (for better or for worse).

What’s the way through the chaos? Desire. Pleasure. Seeking what we want and following that.

There are plenty of opportunities to logic our way through problems and there is a place for that. But some solutions have to start where logic can’t go.

To our energy. To our inner wisdom. To the things we know feel right but we don’t have the words for yet.

Desire is the pathway that both anchors us into how we’re feeling now and opens the door to show us where we want to go from here.

When I led Deepest Desires late last year, everyone came in with practical desires (e.g. making more money, career success, etc.) But what came through was that these were more surface level: What people actually desired wasn’t money for the sake of it, but the kind of wealth that would allow them to live a life with ease, peace, and some financial cushion.

Or career success that meant doing fulfilling work and getting share that with people, rather than checking boxes and climbing ladders just for the sake of it.

You can access that class recording at this link, or join me for Symbiosis (where you get Deepest Desires and many other classes I offer for free): we go even deeper into this energetic, playful, desire-filled journey over 9 months.

We officially start next month, but this month everyone received some practices to help kick start their path to finding their deepest desires, in their creative work and lives.

Here are two of those practices: Give them a try and let me know what you think!

Teaching yourself that big scary dreams can feel safe to have: a journaling practice

Write down something about your creative life or future that scares you (for example, I want to lead creative retreats from a rural farm in Ireland: Which scares me because it feels out of reach). 

Write down what scares you, to the extent you wish to, then next to each thing, write “I’m safe to be seen because …” or “I am going to experience this because …” 

It’s easy to feel unsafe right now, and very understandable, so what we’re doing here is reorienting away from our fears and towards our desires, while also reminding ourselves of the bubbles of safety, however large or small, that we DO have. 

Drop in, check in: A meditation and breathwork practice

This is simply 2 short meditations as part of your ritual (if you don’t have a ritual or have no idea what I’m talking about, that’s ok: we cover rituals later, but this practice helps get you aligned to that practice). 

The first, at the start of your creative time, is to drop in to your creative headspace. Think meditation that incorporates some sort of expansion, momentum, raising energy, or preparing to create. I often visualize opening myself to receive and share my ideas.

The second, at the end of creative time, is for checking in with yourself and grounding, and feeling gratitude for yourself for showing up to the work.

If you have a yoga practice and have done meditation at the beginning, and shavasana and gratitude at the end, this is a similar kind of flow.

These do not have to be long to be effective. A handful of deep breaths and even 20-30 seconds of visualization or body scanning can have vast impacts.

This could look like:

-Breathwork: Take a few deep breaths, close your eyes, and scan your body, dropping in to notice where you feel tension and ease, inviting in the energy of creativity and relaxation.

-Meditation: Listen to favorite guided meditation tracks, or engage in your own energizing and grounding meditation practices.

-Visualization: Visualize yourself creating from your power and peace, or being in your flow. At the end, visualize yourself experiencing the outcome you desire from this work (For example: presenting a conference paper confidently, receiving applause, then going out to celebrate. Or attending your book launch or gallery opening to rave reviews). 

Keep reading for 40% off symbiosis and all my brand new class bundles!