Creative Life Midwife

Inspiring Artistic Rebirth

The Opposite of Boredom Is…. Welcome to Anti-Boredom Month!

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A woman in a striped shirt balances a pencil between her upper lip and her nose, fighting boredom during anti-boredom month,

Today I discovered something fascinating! July is also known as “Anti-Boredom Month” fascinated me.  For my entire life I have been in opposition to the concept of boredom. “An intelligent person is never bored!” one of my middle school teachers told me.

I decided to focus on the concept of Anti-Boredom because I have heard more people than ever complaining about being bored, especially with the disruption in what is open and what isn’t open due to Covid19.

I looked up antonyms for boredom and was surprised to find more than one place is “being entertained.”

My daughter, Emma, has a much closer to my perspective antonym for boredom as “excitement.” My thought is the opposite of boredom is “being engaged.”

I would argue strongly with what the experts see as the opposite of boredom: being entertained.

What?

Maybe it is because I never expect to be entertained that I am not one who is prone to boredom.

Maybe the call to be entertained rather than bored is true for passive observers in life, but it certainly isn’t true for those of us who are fully engaged with life.

It doesn’t surprise me to report I have decided to engage with anti-boredom all month via live-streaming, sharing anti-dotes to boredom and suggestions for people who cannot be entertained in their usual ways because of restrictions due to the pandemic and shut downs of various “non boredom” spots.

I would love to hear from you.

What is the opposite of boredom for you?

Woman writing on the front porch of a brick home,
Write wherever you find yourself.

How often are you bored?

Julie JordanScott is a Creativity Coach, Writer, Speaker and Artist-of-Life who forgot long ago what boredom means. In her continuing quest to create intentional connection, she hosts Intentional Coffee Conversations on Tuesdays and Saturdays. Starting July 7 until July 28 she is hosting a Pop Up Group to #Refresh2020 where we will explore ways to re-engage with this unusual year. To find out more and register for this unique experience, please click here.

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“I wake to listen” – How to Use Poetry to Meditate (Even if you don’t think you’re “good” at either)

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In May, we are blending poetry and meditation to create, make and activate a more mindful, art-rich life. Welcome to that experience.

May is National Meditation Month. Field of Lavender and purple reflect the poetic nature of meditation we are using here in May. Welcome back or welcome for the first time!

Many of you have said, “Meditation and poetry – I am not good at either. And you use writing as meditation? Forget it. I can’t”

Stick around for a couple days so we may wash out those thoughts. 

Here’s how this process goes for me – I invite you to try it this way and feel welcome to make modifications so it may work for you.

Whenever I read Plath, (link to the poem we meditated on today, Morning Song) I hear and feel a hush which may be why this line of her poem attracted me. This poem, “Morning Song” is about mothering a baby. Have you parented a baby?

I remember thinking when I had my son that I couldn’t have a boy. I didn’t know how to mother boys. It took me six weeks to actually agree this relationship as mom-to-boy would work and while it may still be rocky – he is an adolescent now – I know I wouldn’t trade the process for anything.

I invite you to think from your “beginner’s mind” place like I did as a new mom – with an open heart and without leaping inot judgment (like I find myself leaping more times than I would care to admit.) 

Many of you have said, “Meditation and poetry – I am not good at either. And you use writing as meditation? Forget it. I can’t”

Stick around for a couple days so we may wash out those thoughts. 

Here’s how this process goes for me – I invite you to try it this way and feel welcome to make modifications so it may work for you.

a lavender field at sunrise allows us to embrace and accept we may not be good at poetry or meditation now,. we may allow ourselves to come as a complete beginner to both. The sunrise is a metaphor for the new beginnings you may experience when you come from the beginners mindset.

1. First I read the poem to myself several times and choose one line or phrase as a centering line. On my live-streams I ask viewers to choose a line also and direct them to the Poetry Foundation website for the poems I read. All are published there and are easily accessible – which for some people makes it easier to choose a meaningful meditation line.

2. Deep breathe and sit quietly with the poem, sometimes briefly and sometimes – like this time, I meditated before sleep and  as I fell off to sleep. 

3. The next step has differed when I do it, but write for at least 5 minutes, free flow style, stream of consciousness. Sometimes before the live-streams though more often after. Sometimes I write the centering phrase over and over again. What I find it when I trust the process and breathe deeply as I write, other words begin to pop in – you may scoff at this and I invite you to try it.

4. Livestream first on Periscope, often a rougher version – but I enjoy picking up the twitter audience.I will share the livestream from Twitter so you may see it here as well.  I pin the poetry/meditation streams daily with a link to the poem and the graphic (whenever I create it), often afterwards. Livestream second on Instagram  live. Usually a smaller audience but often more engaged in the poem itself. 

5. Sometimes I post here, in my Creative Life Midwife blog – once I even created a second series based on what I wrote during my meditative writing and it blasted more helpful content. Whether or not I post elsewhere, I follow up with discovering the next poem. 

In this case I’ve planned ahead and will next read Kim Adonizzio.

If you have a favorite poem or poet you would like to suggest please do so in the comments. .

.

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How Will You Look Back at “Times Like These?”

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There are a lot of people who are writing poetry during National Poetry Month. This is something I do – and while I am not keeping up with producing a poem a day – it is more like a torrent of poems every few days – my reading of poetry is what is fueling me quite intensely as of late.

A tree listens in the image as does the quote from Adrienne Rich says, "Because in times like these to have you listen at all, it's necessary to talk about trees." Who is listening to you with sacred, heart opened ears?

In bringing you into my poetry sanctuary – in quarantine times especially I feel more than a bit vulnerable. Speaking that aloud first makes me feel slightly more open to share with you this unfurling process this week as you may choose to step into it, too, to gain an understanding of both yourself, your loved ones and your world.

So far this morning I livestreamed Adrienne Rich’s poem, “What Kind of Times are These” twice, on Instagram and Periscope. Each time I read this poem aloud more turns of phrase and meaning slowly or not-so-slowly rise up to greet me.

Now, it is time to consider how the words of Adrienne Rich and the prompts I am providing may rise up to greet you in your creativity, in your contemplation and in your conversations.

Consider:

Where is your sacred space to listen and to be heard?

Where is your sacred space to listen during this time of quarantine?

Who are the people who will listen to you from their own place of sacred listening?

You may contemplate these questions, discuss them with your friends or on the pages of your notebook or journal. You may also watch the replay of the livestream video on twitter:

Now, a writing prompt to take on your way, without concern for what poet Adrienne Rich had to say or not.

Consider and then reflectively write, free flowing style – to the prompt –

What kind of times are these? and/or

These are the times when…..

If you are not in the space to write, have a conversation with a friend or spend some time in contemplation.

In the future, these time will be a memory you will be asked to remember and talk about with others. These are the times you may still shape these next few weeks.

What will you do to shape these times with hope, light and inspiration?

Woman writing on the front porch of a brick home,
Write wherever you find yourself.

Julie JordanScott is the Creative Life Midwife. She inspires people to live their life as an artform and take action towards their best results. During the 2020 Pandemic she is also leading daily Virtual Coffee Dates, Facilitating Intentional Conversation so people will feel less isolated during this time of social and physical distancing. Join the conversation by registering for free by clicking this link.

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Word Lovers, Unite!

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Julie JordanScott, the Creative Life Midwife, is in her Bakersfield, California living room wishing you word-love. She invites you to participate in this week of creative writing and joy. A full book shelf is behind her and she holds a notebook in her hands.

Word-love! Two words I blended together a few years ago to express how much I love words, love their sounds, their meanings and the deep connection they create between us and among us. I write prose, most often non-fiction essays and how-to’s along with the occasional advice. I have written plays and less often I write fiction.

Many people know me as a writing teacher and a writing coach.

Julie JordanScott writing poetry at a downtown Bakersfield flower shop.

One of my favorite and most active form of writing is poetry.

I am a poet who loves to surround herself in poetry.

April is National Poetry Month.  As I often do, I find new ways to share poetry. This year I am livestreaming poetry almost daily via periscope and more often than not on Instagram Live. Usually the poems are picked in the moment as my time to broadcast arrives and I grab a poetry collection and turn to a page and read.

I have found some incredible rich poems this way from poets known and unknown to me that somehow seem to blend into an array of words that addresses exactly with what we are going through.

Yesterday I visited the Poetry Foundation website and found six different poems for next week. I decided I wanted to highlight the online home of Poetry Magazine, where people may read every single issue published since its founding in 1912.

This is poetry abundance at its best, isn’t it?

Again, the poems selected were a mix of synchronistic finds and others very intentional. Elizabeth Bishop’s “One Art” was a definite yes. I tried to pick a poem that refused to be copied so I went deeper and discovered a new-to-me poets, Emily Jungmin Yoon and Joanne Klink.

This week in my blog I will take a line from each poem I share that day and write an essay from it. I will post prompts for you to use to write, make or share in creative conversations with your friends or family or with yourself in your journal.

A pink circle surrounded by starts contains the words of Emily Dickinson, "The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience."

My hope is you may fall in love or deeper in love with words. If you have not been a poetry fan, maybe you will open yourself to the beauty and love of poetry – it isn’t something to be misunderstood or understood like one of your teachers might have told you.

It is something to be loved, to be enjoyed, to be experienced like a fine glass of wine or a sunset or a long remembered and cherished birthday party.

Whether or not you visit here in the coming week, I invite you to experience this coming week as a time of joy, regardless of what is swirling around you.

A notebook on a table with an art journal with a variety of small paper works of art. One is a queenly figure, another is a triangle with a square that reads, "You are essential joy" from a poem by Hildegard de Bingen

As Hildegard de Bingen told us in a poem hundreds of years ago, “You are essential joy.” It is our choice to live those words even when we may not feel them initially.

Thank you for reading.

Julie JordanScott creates content to inspire creative people to lead more satisfying lives even during this pandemic. Walking and sitting at the Panorama Bluffs helps her feel centered.

Julie JordanScott is the Creative Life Midwife. She inspires people to live their life as an artform and take action towards their best results. During the 2020 Pandemic she is also leading daily Virtual Coffee Dates, Facilitating Intentional Conversation so people will feel less isolated during this time of social and physical distancing. Join the conversation by registering for free by clicking this link.

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Stop What Doesn’t Work & Restart What Does

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A woman raised her hand in the usual "stop" sign that some call "Talk to the hand." In this case, it is more "Take a rest, take a break" and then continue again.

This morning I sat in my writing chair, a befuddled sense of non-direction came over me. I had misplaced my phone and I let it stay misplaced. I didn’t want to use find my iphone and wake my daughter. I knew I would find it soon enough.

I sat, still and silent and non-contemplative. I noticed how the sun was piercing into my space in a not so comfortable, slanted sort of way.

“This is how it stops,” I said to myself after a while. “This is how depression or inaction or a funk starts for me and this is how everything else stops.”

I had an impulse I hadn’t followed in a while to re-read my work-in-progress vision plan aloud to myself.

As always, reading it and hearing it energized me.

I went to my blog to read recent content because one of my shortcomings due to my high level of creative output is truly odd. I write so much, I forget what I wrote – even and especially the really quality writing dense with insights.

I saw the last date on my blog was April 7. Tuesday. Somehow it was Friday and I hadn’t blogged since Tuesday during this month I was supposed to be blogging every day.

Somehow in a matter of days I had swept aside my love for sharing my life with others in the pile of stuff on my calendar that isn’t nearly as fulfilling to me. I had fallen off course.

The echo of “this is how it stops” arose in me.

And this is how it restarts, now.

I begin again, re-start< with the knowledge I spent two days doing less of what compels me because I fell into a bit of a cloudy funk. This is natural considering we are in the midst of a first-time-for-any of us pandemic we don’t know when or how it will end. We are mostly sitting in our homes, waiting, attempting to create some feeling of normalcy amidst this unnerving unknown.

I did things during the last few days, but I neglected what I love the most because of duty primarily to other people. It happens, especially to those of us who tend toward people pleasing.

I didn’t nurture my tender spots, I didn’t reach into the audience who reads my words, who looks forward to them. Their words and comments and smiles in response to what I write brings me another layer of nurturing.

Today I may be behind schedule, but neither my heart nor my vision is lost.

I am re-claiming, re-starting and re-storing what fills me up the most.

If you are feeling befuddled or in a funky malaise, this period of time of quarantine and “uncertain times” as I have heard this called eophemistically – is finite – even though we don’t know when it will be over for us or what the outcomes will be. Even in a casual search for quotes about embracing the unknown comes up empty: everything sounds trite and rehearsed in this time when we haven’t rehearsed any of it.

I certainly didn’t want to experience any of this.

I realize now I used to worry about something like this pandemic happening after I died, leaving my children to figure it out without me. It isn’t as if I have all the answers or volumes of wisdom on the subject, but I didn’t like thinking of them suffering without me, suffering too.

I’ll say it, I am re-claiming, re-starting and re-storing what fills me up the most and as a result, others will be filled up, too.

Julie JordanScott typing a love poem on the edge of a foothill of the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
Julie JordanScott typing a love poem on
the edge of a foothill of the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

Julie JordanScott is the Creative Life Midwife. She inspires people to live their life as an artform and take action towards their best results. During the 2020 Pandemic she is also leading daily Virtual Coffee Dates, Facilitating Intentional Conversation so people will feel less isolated during this time of social and physical distancing. Join the conversation by registering for free by clicking this link.

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Laughter, Tears, Anger: All In a Days Work/Play

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Young girl running around a park as the sun starts to set. She is feeling the freedom of transformation, even during troubling times and letting herself feel transformation in every step she takes.

Yesterday I laughed myself silly while I walked around a local park in a rather strange outfit posing for my camera that was propped up on a tripod sitting on top of an unoccupied park bench. At first I wondered why people were looking at me so funny. What was unusual about… and then I remembered. It isn’t every day a normal middle aged woman is walking around a park carrying a “magic wand” as if it was a saber, wrapped up in a scarf-as-close-to-Katniss as I could manage with a basket full of goodies including collagen powder, “Start with Why” by Simon Sinek and not one but two journals.

Woman dressed in a costume for some playfulness during quarantine. Part Katniss Everdeen, part Easter-Fairy, part weird aunt the artist, all in good fun.

I am blessed by creative friends who come up with multiple ways to express themselves creatively and invite others along for the fun of it. Most recently my friend Jessica created a Quarantine Scavenger Hunt.

Right now I am a free agent player: I didn’t want the pressure of being on a team because of my lifelong worry of letting my teammates down, failing them with my inability to achieve perfect gameplay.

My “perfect gameplay” is cavorting in public places being silly so this I could do.

It didn’t even matter that I was alone in this, I laughed and played and left “being normal” somewhere on the other side of town. What happened next fascinated me though.

Magic wand as a saber, a middle aged woman does some improvisational cosplay in a part while exercising during quarantine.

I had so much fun with my soul play that I came home and wrote. I didn’t just write, I dove into my words and my meanings and felt as if I was tumbling into the magical, mystical, unexplainable mysterious realm and that is not necessarily a place one wants to go without a companion or at least a flashlight.

I wanted all the noise in my mind to stop and I knew the best way to calm it and myself was to continue writing and continue fishing up images from my history so I could make sense of them, even if it felt dangerous.

Even if it felt unwieldy and even if I tore my clothes, opened up my scars and had to ugly cry alone through it all I knew I would get through it.

And then I got angry. Angrier than I have been in months, maybe in years. I was so angry, so over the top out of control angry I felt like I would burst. All of this happened silently.

.It’s true – it was all via text and in my notebook the rage fumed and it felt so good. I haven’t allowed myself much anger in small spurts so when it arrives it is a torrential downpour. I don’t believe in tarnishing other people’s experiences so my daughter who was in the same room may have had hints from my breath patterns, but she didn’t say anything.

Over text message, my friend Heather gave me a text blessing to let it all out and let it all go so I did exactly that I let it all out and I tuned into a youtube meditation about letting go which helped me get to sleep.

I woke up transformed.

I am not angry this morning, I am content. I am moving forward. I am grateful I was able to be as angry as I was and not pollute other people’s experiences. Maybe this is one of those positives of quarantine life, I am able to experience extreme anger but not show it on the outside and not let it destroy me on the inside which used to be an unconscious habit.

Now I am able to process creatively through conversation and making so that I engage my friend and they know what is happening with me (rather than retreating) and my art becomes even more layered and interesting.

I finished two poems yesterday I never would have had the courage to write if I hadn’t allowed myself the luxury of consciously expressed anger.

I am not suggesting knee-jerk, unconscious anger – I am offering an alternative to people pleasing, stepping aside, “I’ve got this under control” covered up anger and “blurting” anger with conscious, constructive, transformative anger.

Since we started experiencing limitations due to the pandemic reaching into the lives of Californians, I have suggested we give ourselves permission to feel whatever we need to feel.

That may mean soul play and hours later, transformative soul creativity and then transformative soul anger and back again.

This is a messy, confusing, first time for all of us experience.

While we may not enjoy every step of it, I urge you to stay with it keeping your eyes wide open. As best as you can, keep your sense of humor intact.

My fun moments of soul play unleashed the anger that needed to be expressed. Today, I am ready to dive in, unglued, again.

Thank you for visiting. Please tell me in the comments how things are going for you.

Julie JordanScott is the Creative Life Midwife. She inspires people to live their life as an artform and take action towards their best results. During the 2020 Pandemic she is also leading daily Virtual Coffee Dates, Facilitating Intentional Conversation so people will feel less isolated during this time of social and physical distancing. Join the conversation by registering for free by clicking this link.

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What Creative Activity is Calling You While You Social Distance?

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An invitation to creative practice while you are experiencing quarantine or social distancing.

I woke up this morning and knew my notebook was calling me so I chose not to putter, look at my instagram feed, check the latest news or otherwise distract myself, I sat down to write. I set my timer for an hour full of creative process.

I stumbled into a thread of Thoreau writing about lives of quiet desperation and Tagore writing about bird song… and I might as well have been on a writing retreat in a tucked away North Carolina cabin.

It felt so good to pay attention to the light.

It felt so good to honor the call to creativity.

It felt so good to take action instead of thinking about and talking about and considering writing – instead I wrote.

Did I write the start of the best American novel? Definitely not. Did I write a poem that will be quoted for a generation and then some like my beloved Mary Oliver? Not in the least, not even a rough rough draft of such a poem. Make that not even a triple rough draft.

Did I write sales copy for my next creative coaching program that will bring people from everywhere to enjoy the journey with me? Nope – although I did do a bit of business processing writing.

Did I write a screenplay, an inspirational essay, a thank you note, a something tangible that would make people like and appreciate me more?

No, I did not.

What I did was enjoy my process. I literally sat at my art table as the sun was coming up and enjoyed the dance of her rays hitting my page. I made a short video and noticed for the first time how my pen actually creates its own vacuum when the letters I swirl magnetize their message (that will be on my Instagram story later today.)

I planted some trees on my focus app which always makes me happy – silly and true.

Because I was sitting at my table instead of squirreled away in my room, Emma could pronounce to me she saw an opossum in our backyard! Hooray for opossums!

Before I went to sleep last night, I knew writing would be the best way to start my day. I have known this for years. Today, I took action. I smiled as I wrote and I wrote as my coffee perked and I wrote as I lived fully despite being “stuck” in my home for who knows how long because the world and the people in it deserves my cooperation.

Next up is my morning walk, which I am now calling a haiku walk.

Later today I will attend my friend Paula’s art zoom and then host the Coffee and Connected Conversation Zoom I’ve been hosting and will continue to host for friends – some of whom I have never met “in real life” and some I have.

What is calling you into connection today?

How will you honor that call?

To be inspired by joining a group of people in a Zoom “Coffee Date” you may join us at 1:30 pm today (we meet daily, you may pop in whenever you’re available.) Click this link to register now.

Julie JordanScott is a creative life coach, writer, poet, Mama extraordinaire and mixed media artist whose greatest joys include loving people into their greatness they just aren’t quite able to realize yet. To set up a complimentary exploratory session, please visit here.

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3 Easy Ways to Be More Creative Now

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Are you stumped to find a way to express yourself creatively?

Today in this post and in the video above, we will talk about easy ways, such simple ways to get into the creative flow.

We all get stumped and stuck with stuff from time to time. We get so busy living our lives that we never seem to have any leftover – any down time where we are able to finally get to that task of starting a blog or having our own podcast or making that video.

That’s why it is so important to honor your call to be creative – even when feel like you are too busy to do so.

  1. Learn how to create in small chunks of time.

I have been writing and publishing content since my children were babies. I would write everywhere. In hot Bakersfield summers we would go to the Fast Food places not for the food, but for the indoor playland. I would buy one soda, a milk and some French fries and my kids were happy AND COOL and I would scribble articles and outlines on the back of the tray liner.

I would carry a small notebook in my purse, though now I often use my phone for this same purpose. One of my tactics is to listen to other people’s conversations and write them down, verbatim, so I learn how people actually talk so that when I wrote dialogue, it sounds like people talking not like a writer writing like she thinks people talk.

Do you get that distinction?

On to our next easy tip to find your way back to your creativity.

2.Learn how to create in small chunks of time..

For you writers: You may believe you must do your writing in one specific place. The truth is, that is a block you have created for yourself – another way to measure up to an ideal.

Waiting for your child to get out of their gymnastics lessons, sitting in any waiting room, riding on the train from station to station – pull out your phone on the notes section and put your thoughts down. Use where you are to stir those creative juices.

You may find you get so creative “out and about” that this will become a NEW ideal – but the most valuable thing you can do is train yourself to be right and be able to create – wherever you are.

Letting go of perfectionism will help you let go of doing it in any one specific way and instead, do it where and how and whenever you find yourself.

3. Find a creative accountability buddy either short term or long term.

This is a person you will reach out to and say something like, “Hey, I am about to start my art-journaling (or writing or video making or blogging or painting or whatever it is.) and I will check in with you when I am done.”

This helps in an infinite number of ways. You will be heard, you will be encouraged and you will get more done.

How to find such a person? Seek assistance in the communities you are already a part of, for example a facebook group.

How to find your buddy?

Ask around the communities you are in right now – perhaps you are in a facebook group.

You may make your ask like this:

“Who else is struggling creatively? I would love to have an accountability buddy to check in with today.”

I know, this feels very vulnerable. That’s the thing – creativity itself is vulnerable. The better we get at being vulnerable, the better we will be as creatives. The two go hand in hand, heart to heart, soul to soul. How exciting that you will finally make what you have wanted to make and be who you have always wanted to be.

Are you ready to commit to passionate action now?

What are you going to commit to TODAY to make your creative life take shape?

Julie JordanScott typing a love poem on the edge of a foothill of the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
Julie JordanScott typing a love poem on the edge of a foothill of the Sierra Nevada Mountains.

Julie JordanScott is the Creative Life Midwife. A writer, speaker, life coach and multi-creative who “walks her talk” she provides the world fuel for creativity, intentional connection and purposeful passion in order to eradicate loneliness and the symptoms of anxiety and depression.

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Truth or…. Consequences? Better Writing? Freedom? Vulnerability?

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What truth am I ready to tell?

I feel increased frustration. Why did I write this prompt?

Why did I decide to write from it first instead of offering it to other people first?

How am I supposed to even begin talking (or) writing (or) be willing to be vulnerable enough to take this one in any decent narrative?

Right in that moment I wanted to shut down completely, but something jostled me so I finally stop worrying about narrative or getting it right or anything except filling the five minutes with the tapping on the keyboard.

Five minutes on the timer and… write. I started with something easy to address, something obvious.

I am ready to tell the truth… I am happier with my hair colored than when I was attempting to grow it into its natural state.

Maybe if I hadn’t gotten sick I would be rushing back to going grey/white again but I simply feel more bright spirited with my hair the color it is now – I actually feel more freedom to experiment with it again.

In all honesty, the only thing I liked about my grey adventure was the whitest part of my hair and the purple streak Jolie painted into my hair every time I visited her.

Other than that, I felt pretty hideous about my appearance most if not all of the time. I stopped looking at myself in mirrors. It certainly didn’t help with the overall malaise I was feeling.

I am not ready to tell the full truth of my near-death experience in October. Recently I found myself quite willing to tell one friend more details than normal. That was a surprise and actually felt optimistic and eye-opening.

I am ready to tell the truth of my anger about some of what I observe in special education. I am ready to tell the truth (with some changed names) in the book I am finally editing – again.

Again, more truth tumbles out: when I reviewed the last edits, I will tell you the truth that version of me had it a lot of it wrong. J Sometimes when editing, our true writing voice gets sucked dry. That’s not what this book is about, especially.

This book is messy and tired and frustrated and ebullient.

I am ready to tell the truth – and grow in my ability to share what I feel and know and think – without fear of retribution and abandonment.

Truthfully, I am stronger to face both of those because I have experienced both abandonment and retribution and discovered through the process I am bolder and more resilient than I could have ever known without them.

Five minutes later – time is up and I feel infinitely better than I did when I sat down to write.

What a joy!

And now it is your turn to write:

  • What truth are you ready to tell right now?
  • TIPS:
  • Start with an “easy” truth if you have any hesitation, like I did with my grey hair. You might start with “I don’t like broccoli” or “I love watching the Bachelor.
  • Keep writing until the five minutes are up.
  • Allow yourself to follow the flow of the pencil (or pen or fingers on the keyboard). They will take the writing where it needs to go.

Julie JordanScott, the Creative Life Midwife, is committed to Eradicate Loneliness through intentional connection, passionate purpose and creative expression. Sign up now to stay connected with the movement and receive inspirational emails to insure you will minimize loneliness for yourself and those you love. Visit EradicateLoneliness now to sign up for free.

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Visionary Goal: The 10 Year Plan for More Standing-Room-Only Audiences

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My ten-year-vision is a living, breathing, ever-present experience every day of my life. I have 10 specific vision-goals I write in my journal or notebook daily. At least three days a week I am writing more on each of the vision goals to deepen and enrich the future and now experience.

Here is the Vision/Goal:

There is standing-room-only at my public appearances.

I am blessed to report I know what it is like to have standing room only crowds at my public appearances and it is less than a month since I started working this ten-year-vision-plan.

I have had standing room only audiences at poetry performances and sell-out crowds in theater productions I’ve been in.

If you have a goal where you have no prior experience, one way to catch a view-experience for it is to attend an event where it is expected to be standing-room-only or may be close to sold out when you purchase tickets. When you are there, imagine yourself on stage instead of in the audience.

Allow the buzz from the crowd to fill you. Record their responses with your phone and refer back to your recordings. Write about the actual experience and then write/envision/visualize yourself in place of whoever is speaking or performing.

I have not had standing room only in places where I have had speaking engagements, book signings or in webinars I have hosted.

For the first time in a long time, I feel excited as I note where I have yet to be successful.

A-ha! The daily review of the ten-year-vision-plan is sinking into my bloodstream. It is powerful because I can remember the energy of the standing=room-only crowds. I can feel into my memory to recall how energizing it was to accept applause and attentive response from  the standing ovation, sold-out show crowds.

Next is what action to take – what goals with measureable results may I bring into place in order to make this vision a reality.

  1. I have been working on my email list. I was on a live chat that got disconnected on Wednesday and on Thursday I joined an email list that does exactly what I want mine to do. This is an example of the energy following the vision. On Wednesday I would not have been able to clearly communicate what I want to customer service. Now, I can communicate clearly by sharing the images I’ve gathered. The more people on my list, the more I may expand and attract audiences. This is exciting!
  2. While this may sound odd, I ordered a new Tri-Pod selfie stick to use in making videos. One of the weaknesses of my old selfie stick was It was perpectually sliding down while I was recording. This new one has a device with a solid clip at various height levels to keep everything stationary. This one change immediately makes me more excited to get back into making videos. Videos build connections. Connections build audiences.
  3. I bought a new domain name that is addressing “my heart’s why” why a-la Simon Sinek and “Start with Why.” My programs, classes and even this article do that, but this new domain carries the name in a perfectly clear sense. (I will share it once it is built which will be soon!)

I am excited to get the site up and running with a welcome video and yes, an email list attached. Because the website is the most direct connection between my why and my message, I can see my audience growing exponentially which leads to – bigger crowds wherever I go.

I have to say these final words to connect back to my past, my present and my future vision: at my second book signing ever, a man came to me with shaking hands and asked me to sign his copy of “Chicken Soup for the Soul of America.” He had been a longtime fan of mine and so believed in my message and my voice that he thought all my books would be sold out when I was there and I would be mobbed by people who would be shaking, like he was.

This man has no idea how inspiring he continues to be for me.

No one from my extended family showed up – and that hurt me – but Paul did, even as nervous as he was to meet me. I didn’t even realize people might be excited to meet me.

My final confession for today is this: I was definitely NOT feeling it as I sat down to write this afternoon. I’m in a mid-afternoon slump. I tucked my naysayer mind off and started to type.

I chose to move forward, with love, and my hope and intention you will as well.

The more you connect with your vision, the more purposeful you will feel and the more passionate action you will be driven to take.

Have you started working on your ten-year-vision yet?

If you haven’t, what is stopping you? If you aren’t comfortable commenting, drop me an email at juliejordanscott at gmail dot com. Let’s have an honest conversation about how your why and what you are up too in this world is too important for you to ignore for a moment longer.

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