Creative Life Midwife

Inspiring Artistic Rebirth

On Beginnings and Continuings… Again and Again.

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My aim today with this writing is to inspire you to #1) Explore the power of reframing your personal narrative in order to simply feel better in general and to lead a more satisfying and productive life.

 Please, join me now, as I take it on 5 minutes at a time for the next 30 days.  This morning I was being challenged – so I started with a quote I found by an unknown-to-me woman. I googled “inspiring quotes for women and this is what I got. I set my timer for 5 minutes and started to write. (If you prefer to listen, the podcast recording may be heard here.)

“A woman is the full circle. Within her is the power to create, nurture and transform.” ~ Diane Mariechild

When I have difficulties with the beginnings, I have found it challenging to go anywhere. The beginning, I have heard said and quoted and whatever… I need to begin. This morning my beginning is challenging me and I’m vacillating between punishing myself and giving up and just nurturing myself and instead I turn to free flow stream of consciousness… like this.

I googled down a Diane Mariechild path after I decided I needed a quote to push me down the writing road. Go back to it?

A woman is full circle.

I am full circle.

I have the power to create, nurture and transform. I do.

I have the power to create, nurture and transform.

This week I transformed old books into beautiful works of art. I passed that art along to young women: some of whom got it and used it as I suggested to create more unique art.

Others moved along, perhaps to pick up later and maybe never.

I do know I am full circle and that full circle calls to others and some don’t hear it at first.

Goodness knows it took me a while.

I have the power to create, nurture and transform.

I can’t find Diane Mariechild now – she has gone underground or to those spark women retreats where I would like to speak.

Maybe I could speak on live streaming or videoing or writing or spontaneous creativity or whatever maybe oh there are so many options.

I look over to the list which started this soiree down this 5 minute brain dump what is at the core of this.

What is the narrative underneath, that I haven’t paid attention to yet?

If I don’t start, I can’t fail.

If I start badly, it is ok to give up.

If I keep my mouth shut, I won’t get in trouble and people won’t hate me and desert me.

The timer goes off.

Is it saying “Bingo! Got it!” or “You are a ridiculous loser.”

My stomach growls. I think of.. I will get up after I record these to the pod cast – the last three which sit neglected.

I will take ten to go into the garage and excavate.

I will start and continue. Repeat.

= = = =

In recording the podcast, I felt the familiar tug on my throat – that almost choking place I have been wrestling with and documented in several places here on the blog.

Here (and) Here  

(and) Here

= = = =

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via #5for5BrainDump, livestream broadcasts, creativity playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session or to request she speak at your next event, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

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Oh, to Write a Decent Poem (and other Conundrums)

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This is the place where the seemingly heavy business of rewriting one’s narrative and being immersed in the present moment via stream of consciousness, free flow writing a la #5for5BrainDump intersect. What follows is the actual writing I just completed in a spell of five minutes on May 16, 2018.

All I want to do is write a decent poem. That’s it right now.

I just want to write a decent poem. And nothing is flowing.

Emma keeps looking at my fingers moving. I am able to converse with her and stare into her sure-of-herself twenty-year-old eyes as I type.

It is a talent, I suppose, which doesn’t translate into anything significant (yet) I still have more than three minutes left on the timer to write which reminds me.

“There is never enough time” is a belief I sometimes carry – oh, be real, I often carry, in the space between what I want and what I tell myself, over and over again, is unreachable.

My Pollyanna tendencies try to hush my inner pessimist who I also don’t let show very often. She is, instead cloaked in the darkness.

Don’t want to be blamed for bringing the energy down, so I just keep typing. I just keep typing and focusing and attempting to focus.

This morning I got some good intentional time stretching practice when I cleared up Monday’s whirlwind with startling efficiency and didn’t waste my time being angry at the unchangeable stuff I have no control over. Instead I got down to business and sorted what could be sorted and trashed what belonged in the trash and checked off the to-do’s with efficiency that would have made my once fifty-two-year-old mother smile.

“There is enough time, always.” The real-me says.

I’m writing, right? It may not be brilliant as is (and maybe someday in the future I will see it as so.)

The timer sounds and as I re-read what I wrote, I feel the unmistakeable lump of a teen-aged complexion. Fabulous. 

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via #5for5BrainDump, livestream broadcasts, creativity playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session or to request she speak at your next event, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

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Purpose & Excellence and the Goal Everyone Really Wants

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Five minutes of writing: fingers to keyboard, stream of consciousness style, on a busy morning with a pile of “to-be-dones” which will still be waiting when I finish writing. I need to offer my first fruits to personal transformation. If I insist upon shift – this is the express lane to a brighter, shinier – strike that out – more real… life.  No apologies for typos and grammatical errors in the rest of this blog post. 

Setting my timer and…. write, just write, dump the thoughts on the page.

I open a notebook from October 2016 and see this:

“When I am open to purposeful/excellent, I ….stray slightly. I think…. (and now today’s writing begins.)

Did you ever notice how a-ha’s are waiting around every turn of your day, just waiting for you to notice and bite you in the butt?

No? Yes? What on earth am I talking about?

Yesterday I had a fabulous/horrible/fun/avalanche of a day at Samuel’s school. It was actually really good fodder for self-realization but for many people it might have been just another thing to check off my to-do list.

Interesting awarenesses were everywhere though, even amidst Emma calling me fake (she was right) and another lady sounding befuddled with a smidge of anger (she had every right to be) and feeling like these other ladies don’t particularly like me (why would they? Have I ever showed myself to them fully?)

Note to self: you’re improving. Until recently you would have been in a world of hurt, “They don’t like me,” and “They don’t care what I’m doing, they don’t get me, why bother? It is always no one values what I do or what I think or what I like or…. I just want to help!”

When I am open to what is purposeful and how I might express excellence, I can step outside of my childish (not childlike ego-ic self and realize fully that we are all pretty much after the same thing: connection. And if I remember consistently this is what we are after, I am a lot more willing to be purposeful with a dash of excellence than when I am sullen and thinking no one wants to be on the same team I’m on….

The thing is in this case we are truly all on team human: with all our frailties, all our fabulousness, all our marbles, crayons and the latest video games – we are all in this together.

Timer says STOP WRITING and go about that “to-be-done” stuff now.

It is Tantalizing Tuesday – time to go live the mystery!

= – = – = – =

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via #5for5BrainDump, livestream broadcasts, creativity playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session or to request she speak at your next event, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

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The Risk of Reliving and Recreating One’s Life Narrative

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I originally wrote this more than six months ago. I thought I had published it but apparently I didn’t AND I didn’t follow through so… now  is the time.

In two-and-a-half weeks I am returning to where my memory of my life narrative began, so I will be consciously prepping for that journey here: out in the open.

My inner-seventh-grader says “ewww. I am an embarrassment.”

What I’m taking on is risky. I keep thinking, “Normal people wouldn’t do this. This is a private thing, possibly embarrassing and ugly.”

Maybe it is because it is risky and has a high possibility of getting ugly that I am doing it.

I have given myself an assignment: to rewrite the narrative that has held me back from expressing my unique gifts and talents so that others may benefit and experienced transformed lives as a result.

I will be writing my way through these experiences using the #5for5BrainDump method for the next few weeks. This morning via text the idea started taking form.

The other night I had a rather distressing moment with one of my daughters and words were said and other words were not said and I could have fallen into a deep muddy mess of well-worn recordings of all my short comings.

Instead I wrote,

“Yes, I am ashamed of my behavior. I said things without thinking and no, I am not proud.”

I took several breaths before I wrote, “I am a mother who makes mistakes some of the time. I am a mother who most of the time does the best she can for her children. I am usually quite conscious with my words and actions and only want the best for not only my children but all children. I fall short from time-to-time.

“I wish I had never said those hurtful words. Unfortunately they were spoken, they were received, and they will be remembered with more electrical charge than more quiet, soft moments of every day love and guidance.

“Today, I am choosing to remember moments of love and focus on creating more of them.”

Later in the night after our argument, I walked into my daughters room and put my hand on her back to feel her breathing. It is a ritual I’ve lived through with each of my children – each of my children who lived.

Today I am choosing to remember moments of love and focus on creating more of them.

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and  mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session or to request she speak at your next event, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

 

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Move from Destabilizing Fear into Sweet, Sweet Freedom

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Consider with me now the ways you have walked through being scared and then into courage.

Consider how this has made a difference in your life, drastic or small – and how you are getting more and more ready to step into increased courage now.

I can’t remember specific times but I can remember the specific feeling.

I do know I am grateful for the way simple questions manage to lead me into deeper transformation and how that transformation leads me into passionate action.

Let’s talk about that for a moment.

My therapist asked me a question, “What were you the most afraid of” or “When did you feel the worst” or something like that and I was immediately, viscerally catapulted into a state of panic so deep I couldn’t speak.

It got so bad, I thought I would suffocate.

Then I thought it was quite possible I might die.

The fear and panic was so visceral there were no tears attached. Tears, after all, were human, and this experience was different-than-human and definitely not divine.

Now, months later and quite removed, this whole episode seems ridiculous and I am embarrassed to talk about it except for how the memory of choking coupled with loss of voice and breath leads to lack of follow through, lack of success and my deep seated fear of asking for help.

I feel piles of shame for being in this condition.

I certainly have never seen anyone else fall into such a pitiful, downright ridiculous place.

To shift from the judgment, critical, self-loathing voice I turn to the strongest energy there is: the life force of love and gratitude.
Gratitude invites me to say, “I am open to courage now.”

I am open to look at this moment of what felt like imminent suffocation from a space of love and in this space of love, I am open to courage now.

I am grateful for the time I spent with this therapist, even though I don’t see her any more, and I am open to courage now.

I am grateful for the passion that flows through me and ignites my creative fire and at times, throws me into rather deep vats of fear and anxiousness.

In love, I am open to courage now.

In this week to come, I am grateful for the strengthening of my courage muscle. I am grateful for the actions I’ve taken and the even more bold actions I will continue to take as I step into the life I am creating for now and the future.

I am open to courage now, in love.  <– note to self: use as often as necessary. This is an affirmative lifeline.

I was reminded of choking: how my fear of dying (or if not actual death, feeling like I am about to die) and take away my voice.

Literally, my breath, my spirit.

I have been afraid of success – long story I am bored of telling, tired of hearing.

Trauma. Even writing about it – pain in my chest.

What am I willing, ready and able to do, to be to transform this fear? This is the question I am beginning to live.

I have made some false starts in getting to the outside of the “fear boundaries” and I’m continuing to move forward. It feels powerful. I feel powerful. Yes, there is still the thought….

Now I’ve done the unthinkable. I have been completely vulnerable and open about an exceptionally tender part of me. Now? I’ll continue to move, mindfully. I know there are people in many places similar to this who know.

 

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Today, I am choosing peace. What will you choose?

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Today I choose to be at peace.

I have had too much anxiety flowing through my blood lately. I cannot do that anymore. Today I choose to be at peace.

I am no longer willing to allow self-destructive thought patterns to get in the way of my serenity.

Today I choose to be at peace.

I remember visiting Canyon de Chelly with my children: a favorite place for spiritual reawakening and profound joy, a place I have not visited nearly enough.

Today, I choose to be at peace.

When I revisited photos from our visit, I don’t look very peaceful and I wonder what was happening in my heart at the time. Perhaps my love of travel and my children was overshadowing the fear that is sometimes a companion when I am traveling as the lone adult, being the responsible one, being the guide the Sherpa, the tour guide, the doctor, the negotiator the solid rock – that is a lot, agreeably so when it is looked at and examined.

And the trip, though rocky in moments, was a success – filled with primarily positive memories.
Today, I choose to be at peace.

I hear a train whistle in the distance, I feel my heart warm in my chest. Today, I choose to be at peace.

What do you choose to be today? Practice engaging with your choice by writing for 5 minutes, first, repeating your choice as I did here, and allowing your pen or pencil or fingers on the keyboard to create word flow for that tiny slice of time.

Miracles live there – in your 5 minutes of writing flow, the #5for5BrainDump.

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via #5for5BrainDump, livestream broadcasts, creativity playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session or to request she speak at your next event, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

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Tell Your Stories: The World is Waiting…..

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This was originally written as a #5for5BrainDump style piece of writing. As often happens when we allow free flow to have its way, some powerful words flooded through. I did not edit so please excuse grammatical and spelling errors. Around here we stand by “process is the new perfection.” (polishing comes, later).

I was feeling nervous and overwhelmed by the process of re-orientation after a whirlwind out-of-town trip. Writing centered me.

Timer set and…. the writing begins.

I could so easily get overwhelmed and I am not going to. I am staying present. I am writing. I am remembering. I am writing as I am remembering and staying present.

This is where I find the gold dust and the stories that are most important to be told find their way to the forefront and because I am taking a mere five minutes to write, the words find their way through my fingers onto the page and I grow in trust.

Right here, right now and you are witnessing it.

The world is waiting for your stories. Right now in Paducah, Poughkeepsie and Paris there are women sitting at their computers feeling slightly asleep and your exact story is the light they have been looking for even though neither of you know it.

Last week my new friend Belen said to me, “Whenever I talk to a person who is down I think, ‘I need to introduce this person to Julie. Julie would make this person feel better…. Because every time I am with you I feel better.”

This was like a symphony playing in my ears personally for me. Belen was just speaking from her heart and she gave me such a gift in reflecting back to me what my stories have created for her. Feeling better. Me, showing up, telling my stories via a writing workshop and paving the way for her to tell her stories first on the page and then… beyond – makes her feel better, makes her world better and echoes out… everywhere she goes because….

I took the time out to tell my story. I got vulnerable and offered myself via a writing workshop. Why? Because I knew someone out there was calling me. In that case, it was someone named Belen. Next, it may be someone named… YOU who is writing or speaking or livestreaming or blogging… for someone specific to you that you don’t even know yet.

The world is waiting for you. Take action. 5 minutes. That’s all it takes. 5 minutes + you = miracles.

And the timer goes off and I sign off….

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via #5for5BrainDump, livestream broadcasts, creativity playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session or to request she speak at your next event, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

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What Does Gratitude have to Do with It? #ThankfulThursday & Beyond

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This morning I was playing with my art journal and gratitude. I gave myself a five minute chunk of time and Emma needed my attention to get to her Philosophy of Religion class. I held her impatience by incorporating her into my art journal page on this Thankful Thursday.

“What are you grateful for?” I asked her.

True to form, Emma was able to start lobbing out gratitudes. Friends, Family, TV shows and the like. “What TV shows?” I asked. “Lots,” she answered, and I interjected, “I’m grateful for Law and Order SVU and even though it wasn’t on last night, there is a trending GIF from last week’s episode. That makes me happy and grateful.”

A sanitary napkin popped out of my purse. “I’m grateful for pads,” I said, “That I have one if I need it.” She countered back with, “I’m grateful I don’t live in a third world country where I couldn’t go to school if I was on my period, I’m grateful I’m not homeless, think of what homeless women have to go through when they’re on their period!”

My kid is smart and liberal and still relentlessly optimistic not unlike her mother albeit she is a bit more cynical.
Gratitude, combined with love, is truly among the highest forces for good on the planet.

Share gratitude for people individually or corporately and watch them blush and shine and continue to be inspired to take action, positive action.

Gratitude doesn’t cost anything.

Gratitude feels good.

My five minutes of writing are up as my timer starts to ring.

What does Gratitude have to do with it?

You tell me. What are you grateful for? Share in the comments – and check out my Instagram Feed and story – which are both filled with Gratitude on Thankful Thursday and beyond.

*This blog post was written #5for5BrainDump style. 5 minutes of free writing – no editing, no forethought, no judgement and prompted only by the title.*

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed-media artist  whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session or to request she speak at your next event, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

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Open the Gift of Your Future in Your Present Moment, Today

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This week I want to be aware of those moments that may seem to be wrapped in insignificance and yet when the gift of the moment is unwrapped, we discover a nugget of gold that continues to radiate and shine long into the future.

This awareness started with a question, “What if that conversation didn’t happen?”

I was reading a note I started to write yesterday. A note I never completed. A note that just sat here in my unpolished gem file – waiting for me to take action (or not) with it.

I wrote once again about the most important conversation I had in 2017.

It was a completely random conversation with a stranger. It clearly didn’t happen within a context of deep personal history and connection. It happened because I was being fully myself in a moment of time when an unsuspecting stranger didn’t realize he needed exactly the medicine my “fully-myself-ness” offered.

His words and actions allowed me to see myself differently.

“I want to hear what you’re saying,” he said, and turned off the radio so he wouldn’t be distracted.

I’m accustomed to going about my day, taking care of my kids, showing up for my friends as best as I can, making contributions as best I can and my perception of myself is often one of invisibility.

That one conversation has lifted me up countless times since that day and provides me the exact medicine I need when I am feeling discouraged.

Thankfully the conversation happened and I continue to receive its afterglow of grace and self-love.

Instead of worrying about “what if it didn’t happen” I am choosing to shift my focus to receiving the continuing gifts from the fact it did happen. Every conversation, every connection is a gift.

Every conversation is a gift.

Every connection is a gift.

Now, receive the gift.

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed-media artist  whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

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Once Upon a Time…. The Magical Writing Prompt + You

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All writing, all books, all movies – start with a letters, words and most of the time a single sentence.

“Once upon a time” was perhaps the favorite sentence of my childhood. Having my mother’s undivided attention while she read aloud to me was perhaps one of the singular greatest joys of my childhood.

Perhaps that is why I became a storyteller?

Once upon a time reminds me of a spell, a musical note that says “Listen, you will enjoy this (and I do, over and over again.)
It is also invaluable for those of us who are aiming to rewrite, reframe and recraft our narrative.

That sounds so simple – and yet, I know it isn’t always so – which is why I suggest we start with the less significant moments in time, the everyday experiences and learn to get to know those fully with words prior to diving into the deep end of our emotional narrative.

Let’s try that today: take any scene from the movie of your life and replay it, starting with the words, “Once upon a time” and then let the words flow.

If you would feel better narrowing down your writing choices, look at the last week and make a list of the things that happened in your life and start there.

In your mind’s eye, project that moment in time on your mind’s movie screen and narrate back what is happening as if you are telling it to someone who can not see.

Here’s what I wrote in a description of this prompt on Instagram:

Once upon a time there was a woman named Julie who enjoyed sitting in her recliner, writing for 5 short minutes at a time. Little did she know those five minutes a day would not only change her life, those five minutes a day would change many lives the world over.

(That made me laugh… a bit of levity always feels good.)

And now it is your turn:

All writing starts with words, a phrase and finally a sentence.

Take 5 minutes now and see where in your life you revisit first.

The image to the right could be a moment in time about going to the movies, being at the movies, it might be about being IN the movies. It might be about an academy awards party (that’s where we were) it might be about wining a prize (Emma’s hand is actually in the prize box.)

My writing might begin: “Once upon a time I tried, once again, to make sure Emma enjoyed herself at a time I wish I could have been some place else. Isn’t that an important part of motherhood?”

Or it might begin, “Once upon a time, I walked through the doors of a movie theater and had the experience of seeing myself projected on the screen, larger than life, and praying not so secretly I hoped no one made a fuss but hoping truly that people would make a fuss.”

To practice, start with last week or even this morning, like the section above when I was in my recliner writing. A week later, I am once again in my recliner writing. 

Timer set for five minutes? Start writing, now.

Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world.  She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed-media artist  whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people’s creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon!

To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session, call or text her at 661.444.2735.

 

 

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