Storytelling – Creative Life Midwife

To Do For Them (and) To Do For Me: Your Higher Self Agrees, You Are Important, too

October 28, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife 4 Comments

Woman is making a heart in the mirror, remembering SHE is important, too. Our higher self wants us to know this!

Early this morning I sat on my bed with my phone and a couple choices to make in my hand. Samuel got off work early. He texted me at 6:30 to ask if I could come pick him up. Immediately I raced into high gear.

One Surprise Change Can Change Everything, Instantly

I shape my morning routines around his schedule.

With my car headed North on the Freeway, I noted my speed at getting out the door when my kid needed me versus when I am “only doing this for me.”

When the choice is on his behalf I’m quick, I’m focused, I’m energized and precise. “Hurry up, he is waiting! It is cold out there.”

When it is only for me, I’m sluggish, distracted sprinkled with a dash of apathetic. “As long as I have an hour for walking, its all ok.”

Haiku to the Rescue

I took a photo of an intersection for my morning haiku, a daily practice of mindfulness and creative practice. It wasn’t the most inspired imagery I have shot in the last three-hundred-plus consecutive days, but it told the story.

An intersection in Bakersfield, California inspired a haiku, one of 377 written by Julie JordanScott in 2019/2020

Haiku 307/377 — October 27, 2020

Sitting at the crossroads

dream mirrors reality

your new day is here

The intersection told me the choice of urgency for another person’s needs and sluggishness for my own isn’t cast in stone. The choice is up to me: my desires, my ambitions, my hopes are as significant as every other person on the planet – even my children and world leaders.

Now it is up to me to take this new awareness and practice it.

Remember to call upon your Higher Self for advice

After I dropped Samuel at home, I hesitated. I could just go inside, too, and forget about the walk I had planned. I wondered what my higher self would suggest before I made the best choice.

I took a walk on different than usual streets. I stayed out the same length of time – because walking is for my health and for raising my spirit, which is important for me in all the roles I play.

I’ve been a Mom for a long time so naturally I go on high gear when I think my child needs me no matter what their age is. It is time for ME to remember my value partially because I want to continue to be their Mommy for a long time to come.

Questions for Contemplation & Journaling

How well do you treat yourself in comparison to others?

What can you do to shift back into a more equitable approach?

+ = + = + = + = + =

Julie JordanScott lives in Bakersfield, California in a house too small for quarantine life. She leads discussions on Zoom and is polishing her most recent memoir and some poetry for soon-to-be publication. If you would like her to speak to your group over ZOOM until travel is available again, she would be happy to talk to you about that OR maybe you are looking for a slightly quirky, very open hearted, compassionate and tender Creative Life Coach. She would love to speak with you soon.

So Much Better than Constant Drama, Drama, Drama!

October 21, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife 2 Comments

One of the greatest gifts we can give ourselves is recognizing the extraordinary in ordinary moments.

As I write this I am listening to an audio of rainfall in a library. I am sitrting in my Bakersfield living room “in real time” but I am listening to a recording that makes my heart so happy – and it is completely ordinary.

My coaching clients will often construct a desire or even a perceived need of a life reminiscent of a perpetual retreat experience – which would be very nice and for many of us is simply not where we are every day. Unfortunately, this also sets people up to be pretty miserable most of the time.

How to Discover the Joy in the Ordinary

One of the unusual ways I learned about the joy in the ordinary was through poetry, which many people believe contains a standard context of flowery, difficult to understand, “way above me” language and meaning.

Sunday someone said to me, “I don’t consider this poetry. This is clear and easy to understand writing, it isn’t poetry.”

Why not write about coffee, then, or sunrise?

Some of my best early poems that weren’t overly flowery or angsty were written about coffee. My first poem, in fact, was printed and carried by my love at the time. He enjoyed the poem that much. He may have liked his daily cup of coffee more, but it was a lesson to me that poetry didn’t always have to be about crisis or struggle or ecstatic experience, it can be quite effective when it is everyday and relatable.

This morning I was chuckling over a poem written more than three hundred years ago by John Dunne. We was writing about sunrise saying, “Busy, old fool, unruly sun.”

He was mad that the sun was shining in his window at an ungodly hour, waking him and creating chaos in his mind. “Busy old fool, unruly sun” is such fun, simple word play it is clear all these years later. Ordinary and extraordinary.

Ordinary: 365 Times a Year, Sunrise Happens

When I wrote my first coffee poem, I hadn’t discovered Billy Collins or Mary Oliver or even William Carlos Williams who wrote so effectively about eating the plums in his refrigerator and realized his wife may have had a different plan for the plums. (For reference, that poem is “This is Just to Say.”

This reality – that I could write poetry about coffee and an infinite ways to describe the sunrise – was quite a revelation. Poems don’t need to be written about angst or discomfort or romance.

As I wrote this blog post, I found a poem I wrote in 2010.

In the poem, I write of the sun thanking me for taking the time to unwrap her. 365 or 6 times every year she reappears, most often without note. Ordinary and extraordinary all at the same time.

Write Like Jerry Seinfeld: Ordinary worked for him!

Jerry Seinfeld made a career out of joking about nothing in particular and my favorite television show of my twenties was a show about nothing (and everything) called “thirtysomething” – back then I thought they were so mature, Elliot and Nancy, Michael and Hope and their daughter named Jane.

Writing of the ordinary, extraordinary is as important a subject as one may ever have. Wrestling with the plain, the unflavored, the (what some might call) boring may become your favorite writing of all.

Perhaps you aren’t ready to believe me yet.

In that case, your writing prompts await, not unlike a romantic suitor waiting to whisk you away for an evening of revelry.

Writing Prompts: Discovery & Writing Practice Specialized for Your Form of Writing

Coffee Mugs and Coffee beans frame writing prompts for numerous niche writers: Social Media posts, poetry prompts, fiction writers and more.

Copy & Paste Texts: (Use these to copy right into your text or direct message box and send – or personalize for your situation. Surprise someone with a text message they weren’t expecting!)

It doesn’t need to be a special day for me to remind you how special you are to me!
I’m drinking my morning coffee wishing I was sharing a mug with you.
I just watched (name a TV series or movie) and it reminded me of the simple yet wonderful days we have had together!

Entrepreneurs: What is the most extraordinary (yet seemingly ordinary) quality of the product or service you provide? How can you accentuate the simplicity of it?

Social Media Posts: What you think is everyday in your life may fascinate your followers. Show your most behind-the-scenes/behind-the-scenes in an upcoming post.

Video Prompt: Project yourself back to your school days and make a video that is about a “how-to” and share something simple like tying your shoes or how to hold a pencil. Then stay very present to the reality there may be a time when people no longer hold pencils or tie shoes.

Fiction Writers: Set the stage for a regular/ordinary day in the moments before something really outrageous or unexpected happens.

Lifestyle Bloggers: The pandemic has given us a lesson in how quickly things change. Share a blog post of something that has stayed the same – and why you treasure it even more now.

Memoir/Life Writers: Take a dull scene you need to write in order for a more interesting scene to make sense and insert an interesting object to spice it up. Yes, make the object the star and see what energy that gives to the sequence.

Poets: It was a poem about coffee that helped improve ALL my writing. What is something everyday YOU will write about?

Copywriters: How would you sell and market a completely ordinary project? Write some practice copy and then think how to use it in your actual copy assignments.

Journaling Quotes & General Prompts

“I never doubted that equal rights was the right direction. Most reforms, most problems are complicated. But to me there is nothing complicated about ordinary equality.”

Alice Paul

Prompt: When people make things more complicated than they are, I wonder…..

“If we had a keen vision of all that is ordinary in human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow or the squirrel’s heart beat, and we should die of that roar which is the other side of silence.”

George Eliot

Prompt: I imagine the sound of grass grow is much like….. And that makes me feel (continue to follow the thread to see what unlikely place the sound of grass growing may take you.)

“My mother is a big believer in being responsible for your own happiness. She always talked about finding joy in small moments and insisted that we stop and take in the beauty of an ordinary day. When I stop the car to make my kids really see a sunset, I hear my mother’s voice and smile.”

Jennifer Garner

Prompt: Watch a sunset and write what you see… like the sun is giving dictation.

Find a supportive writing community via a Facebook Group:

How would your writing productivity change if you received varied, niche driven writing prompts daily – also fiction, poetry, entrepreneur, copy writing and video prompts are offered, join the Private Word-Love Writing Community on Facebook by clicking here.

We look forward to writing with you!

Miss Foley: My 1st Grade Teacher as Super Hero

October 12, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife 2 Comments

When I was a little girl. I didn’t really like cartoons. The only comic books I read were the Archies, and that was because of Betty and Veronica. I didn’t enjoy super hero type shows. I was forced into watching the shows on TV because my brothers liked them but I was always so girly.

What makes an ordinary person into SuperHero?

My super hero would be someone who magically appears and heals wounds, often in secret. My super hero would prevent future wounds by building up the person’s confidence and esteem by not only healing the wound, but walking the person through the process – learning the cause, the impact, and embracing their personal strength so that they wouldn’t constantly be seeking other people to rescue them when challenges appear.

I remembered someone who was absolutely heroic and helped me to shift from being an invisible, unlikeable, not very smart kindergarten student to a super star first grader.

She healed the wounds left behind my Miss Wick (who I now call Miss “Ick!”)

My transformation was due to Miss Foley, my first grade teacher and undercover SuperHero!

The Legend of Mimi Foley, My Teacher

The legend of Miss Foley is one my children hold in their hearts clearly from my telling and retelling. Once we saw a young woman with long brown hair that flipped up with a curl on the ends and happened to be wearing a bright pink mini-dress, my daughter gasped and said, “Look! It’s Miss Foley!”

This is what Miss Foley’s view from inside would have looked like.

On the day I first experienced the magical Miss Foley I got to school early. I always liked getting to school early and I stood there, nose pressed against the window, wondering who would be my first grade teacher.

I was hopeful yet cautious. The moment I saw her for the first time. She was wearing the fuschia dress with big buttons across the bodice in two rows. She had brown hair, long with the flip, and brown eyes that sparkled.

I thought she was beautiful. She was almost as beautiful as my mother!

She was smitten by my enthusiasm, too, which probably helped me love her more.

A Six-Year-Old’s Dream Come True

Miss Foley's classroom circa 2014. The chalkboards and desks are no longer there, but the room itself remains the same. Smart board, tables and chairs, work stations. Excited children.

She helped me fulfill my lifelong dream, to learn to read, and also did some other distinctive actions. I am not sure if she ever realized she was doing anything special nor did she know how much these same themes would run throughout my life.

I reviewed in my mind the definition of a superhero: Someone who magically appears and heals wounds, often in secret. Miss Foley did that in these ways:

She openly liked me. She praised my abilities and gently corrected my mistakes.

She accepted my invitation My mother had a tradition of inviting teachers into our home for lunch once a school year. Linden Avenue School had an hour long lunch break and we all lived close so we went home for lunch. There was no cafeteria at our school and everyone walked.

Miss Foley walked to my home with me on that memorable day. Mom even made the special coffee cake from the recipe from the Bisquick box. To this day I still make coffee cake like that as a signal to my children how special they are.

My kindergarten teacher did not accept my invitation.

Now I know she was a hardened old woman who liked no one, but I thought it was just me she didn’t like. She assigned me to the “less smart kids” first grade class which was lucky because I was rewarded with Miss Foley as a result!

Miss Foley also received the gifts I gave her (flowers from my garden, stories I wrote at home to bring her) with much excitement. Lots of children brought flowers from home gardens and most of the teachers had desks with flowers on them: roses, daffodils, tulips carefully wrapped at the bottom with foil and a paper towel to keep it fed on the walk to school.

On the Friday before Mother’s Day as we walked out of our classroom I said (in my sweet, naive little way) “have a Happy Mother’s Day Miss Foley!” She laughed and hugged me tight and said, “Oh, I hope to have a happy mother’s day someday, when I have children!”

To be hugged and loved by Miss Foley was like being loved and hugged by God-in-person.

It’s funny to think that’s all it took to be seen as a superhero.

Being appreciated, well received and accepting, exactly as I was.

In her classroom, I never felt wounded. I always felt whole.

This makes me want to create experiences for people like that, too, no matter what I am doing.

Miss Foley didn’t wear a magic cape and gratefully, she wasn’t a fictional character on a screen or in a comic book. She was living and breathing and exactly the first-grade-teacher this little girl needed.

Did you have a special “super hero” person when you were a child, or maybe there is a super hero in your life today. Tell us about your super hero in the comments!

Tenderness, Longing & a Vulnerable Confession

October 9, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife 2 Comments

“True tenderness is silent and can’t be mistaken for anything else.”

Anna Akhmatova

I didn’t know how much I was longing for tenderness until synchronicity knocked on my door because I gave myself an assignment. I couldn’t disappoint other people, I couldn’t hide this material that poured out of me.

But the confession part, must I share that, too?

Must I share the longing?

I remember slight flickers of longing: my mother’s hand on my forehead, a nurse in the hospital after a particularly trying episode, my friend, Linda, covering me with a blanket after I fell asleep on the sofa. Well, she thought I was asleep but I was awake and fully immersed in feeling her tenderness.

I remember toward the end of my brother’s life he had a stroke. I brought lotion to the hospital and gave him a massage so I could feel how death was encroaching on the left side of his body. I would not be able to explain what I felt in his skin, his muscle, his sinew as I touched it, tenderly.

With my children, especially when they were small, I was tender. I remember welcoming their tears, not silencing them. I felt and expressed tenderness to the women refugees I helped as they made their way back to their families.

I wonder if some of the tenderness I express is my longing made into form through me?

I am discovering as I write. I imagine as I share this, raw and unfettered by editing and revision, a part of me will become angry for being so transparent and vulnerable, yet isn’t longing naturally clear and rough at the same time, slightly uncomfortable and on the verge of shattering experience?

Maybe it tenderness was an everyday experience, it wouldn’t feel as sacred nor would it feel as frightening.

Or perhaps, maybe, there will be a time when it becomes ordinary and I can report back to you about my findings, like a researcher on foreign soil noticing nuances unimaginable until witnessed, first hand in hushed quiet.

Maybe the first step is you, reflecting back to me your experience of tenderness as one who offers tenderness or one who offers tenderness.

-@ – @ – @

100 Days of Wonderful Words: prompts for many genre, all written uniquely for each particular audience so the writer may use similar content, sculpted accordingly. Image is mixed media art materials and words.

This blog post was conceived from a Writing Prompt I wrote as a part of the 100 Days of Wonderful Words that may only be found at the Private Word-Love Writing Community on Facebook. Join us to be inspired by seemingly ordinary words through the end of 2020 in a writing place where we hold space for vulnerability and healing from past writing hurts.

Grace: A Definition, An Experience & Your Writing Prompts

October 4, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife Leave a Comment

One night I was driving to my friend’s house when I decided ‘Grace’ would be perfect for this blog post word. “Brilliant!” my higher self, who I refer to as Julianne – whose name is a slightly fancier combination of my first and middle name, agreed with me. It was like we were two tired friends talking on the phone right at bed time, “yeah, yeah, great idea talk to you tomorrow ok… yeah bye.”

You probably won’t be surprised to know what happened next.

I fell asleep, got out of bed late and now – here I am, asking for grace for my fairly late in the day posting. It is not my style to come scrambling back here on my knees, begging to not be punished.

This would mean offering grace as a response to a form of wrong-doing, almost like forgiveness but not exactly.

Is this what we think grace means?

I realize there are many definitions and experiences of grace, from being a graceful woman – who is in my mind perpetually tall, lithe and most likely blonde – none of which describe me.

There is grace, a prayer, often spoken aloud before eating a meal.

There is grace – in the Christian tradition, that is often described as “undue favor”. Theologians will say “it is by grace we are saved, not by works.” This tenet has caused much factionalism within Christianity but I am not by any means asking for a public debate. In fact, debate in your own space, please. I am making this very simple on purpose. Grace – undue favor, a gift we are given simply because… we exist.

Prayer, Favors, Elegance and What?

There is grace, a noun, “simple elegance or refinement of movement” which snarky people may use as a nickname when someone is clumsy.

There is grace, also a noun, “courteous goodwill,” like my friend Tom’s brother, Hal, who had the grace to not mention I stepped on his toes as we danced at Tom’s wedding.”

There is grace, the verb: “do honor or credit to (someone or something) by one’s presence” which I have written on invitations. “Please grace us with your smile and RSVP”

There is also a gift or talent, an extension of time in a “grace period” and more.

Grace is, in all ways I can see, a harmonious word that may be, for some, a prickly pear.

Thank you for the Grace you offered me, in simply reading.

Right here, right now, in simply writing this – I feel filled with grace knowing these words may be read and you, the reader, may be inspired by one of these prompts to write because getting your thoughts on paper and out of your head feels good.

Maybe you will want to bookmark and use these prompts later. You may choose to join the Word-Love Writing Community on facebook (yes, it is free and the link is below to become a member) where there is a library of prompts that will fill you with this feeling of “oh my goodness, my words and thoughts are flowing and I feel so good I simply want to pass this feeling along to everyone I know.”

You may want to stow the copy and paste texts to use later. I can think of times when I wish I had thought to say these things and now, we ALL have them to use!

Your Writing Prompts for Social Media, Novel Writing, Sales, Poetry & Journaling

Copy & Paste Texts: These are to be used to surprise people or to reach out to people. You may copy, paste and send as they are or edit and morph to your situation

Thank you for extending grace when I embarrassed myself today.

Will you please say grace at the meeting next Wednesday?

You were so filled with grace when we met up with ______ today! I would never have been able to pull that off!

Copywriters: Tell a story of a moment of grace your client extended to one of their customers. Show compassion, show joy and show hope for the future.

Entrepreneurs: Write about a time when someone unexpectedly extended grace to you in the beginning of your career. Use this in an upcoming speech, presentation or blog post.

Social Media Posts: Write a post seeking engagement that asks about people’s definition of gracefulness – and how to improve upon their own gracefulness.

Fiction Writers: Write a scene about one of your older characters teaching about grace to the younger characters, using any of the definitions.

Lifestyle Bloggers: Write about a grace prayer – and how your audience would either appreciate, or not appreciate, the custom.

Memoir/Life Writers: Write about a time of giving and receiving grace. Be sure to build the story to a higher note at the end rather than one that may be perceived as negative.

Poets: Use grace as a metaphor. For extra fun, write ridiculous metaphors. (I found one of those in our quotes today look below for what I mean!)

Quotes & General Prompts for Journaling and more.

“Beauty without grace is the hook without the bait.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Prompt: When I read metaphors that make no sense to me, I wonder if it means…. (when out of steam, connect with “and” “or” and continue writing).

“I wish grace and healing were more abracadabra kind of things. Also, that delicate silver bells would ring to announce grace’s arrival. But no, it’s clog and slog and scootch, on the floor, in the silence, in the dark.”

― Anne Lamott

Prompt: If grace and healing were easier to understand, we would….

“You deserve to be soaked to the bone with love every day of your life. The miracle of grace is that you can give what you’ve never gotten.”

Glennon Doyle

Prompt: Being soaked to the bone with love feels like……

Soaking _____ to the bone with love felt/feels like……

Be sure to write for at least five minutes on this prompt. You may have some brilliance right away AND trust me, if you write longer, thoughts will emerge from the process.

If you would like accountability, write in the comments which prompt you plan to use. If one of them speaks to you directly, tell me in the comments, too.

Thank you for reading all the way through!

Julie JordanScott, the Creative Life Midwife, is a writer, a poet performer, a Creativity Coach, A Social Media Whiz and a Mother of three. One of her greatest joys include loving people into their greatness they haven’t quite realized yet.

Julie is also the Creative Director of the Word Love Writing Community. Join us now to invigorate your writing – no matter what it is you are writing – social media posts, journaling, fiction, memoir – there will be prompts and other people there to support you. Right now, we are finishing out 2020 with 100 Days of Wonderful Words. We look forward to seeing you there.

Portland Treasures: Beverly Cleary & Powell Books

July 29, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife 2 Comments

Julie JordanScott standing with the sculpture of Ramona Quimby, beloved character created by Beverly Cleary who lived near Grant Park in Portland when she was a child.

Five years ago I spent an afternoon out with Ramona Quimby and a bunch of other (human and sculpture garden) friends in Grant Park in Portland. I managed to gather people from online friendships and Bakersfield Ex-Pats to this park to enjoy a bit of Literary Granny history.

Sometimes I am amazed people are willing to follow my whims and other times I say “Naturally they do!”

Why wouldn’t they? I tend to seek out quirky places other people hadn’t thought to explore yet, especially the artists and adventurers I am most attracted to. Little known secret: I had a conversation with Beverly Cleary more than thirty-five years ago at a convention for English teachers when I was working for a textbook publisher.

She was sitting at a table and no one else was there. She appeared to be fabulously ordinary which I found incredible inspiring. I wish I knew she had said this, “I was a great reader of fairy tales. I tried to read the entire fairy tale section of the library.”

If I had known she had said this I could tell her I was the same way when I was a little girl. I loved hearing my mother’s voice when she read aloud. I would close my eyes and wish for once she would read “The Snow Queen” which I loved but was longer than the time my busy mother had for reading aloud. “The Princess and the Pea” was two pages long and I almost memorized it.

Julie JordanScott with a book sculpture outside Portland's Powell Books, a local and national treasure.

Beverly Cleary is a national and Portland treasure, like Powell’s books and a culture that made me feel at home as soon as I arrived. It continues to call to me today. Hearing of the unrest there made me want to road trip there again and lend my body and my voice to the protection of freedom of speech, but pandemic times and my health being what it is – I offer my memory and my love and admiration.

May we continue to honor and praise each other’s voices with an energy like Ramona Quimby’s.

What character from your childhood continues to speak to you today?

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

Julie is also one of the Founders of Bridge to the New Year. Join us now in 2020 in #Refresh2020 in Bridge to the New Year to reflect, connect, intend and taking passionate action to create a truly remarkable rest of 2020.

Let’s Share the Good of 2020: Visiting Family #Refresh2020

July 7, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife Leave a Comment

Last year I repeatedly said I was going to visit my parents in Flagstaff. I was going to go to Flagstaff alone and it was going to be wonderful.

In April 2019, I was so burned out from care-taking and worrying and self-imposed pressure I decided I would go right after Samuel’s high school graduation. But then my volunteer activism continued to be heated and then the budget dried up and then…

There were a couple trips to Las Vegas to get Samuel to orientation and then to move him to school. His needs came first.

And then I almost died in October. No traveling then.

I considered somehow squishing it in post Thanksgiving but I really wasn’t feeling well enough for that much driving. And then there was the family adventure to the East Coast for Christmas which was excellent but completely stretched my post-illness abilities and budget restraints again.

In 2019, I never went to visit my parents in Flagstaff.

On our last night visiting with Katherine, my daughter, and Donald, her husband in December, we played a game which focuses on resolutions and goals, mission and vision (sounds like my ideal game, doesn’t it) where vulnerability and sharing stories are a given.

I stated again, “This year, I am going to visit my parents. Around my birthday, I am going to visit my parents. I can’t keep putting it off.”

My birthday is at the end of January.

January came and my birthday left and in February, something that felt like a miracle occurred. Emma and I drove to Flagstaff. She originally wasn’t going to come with me, but I decided it would be good for her to visit with my parents, too, so off we went.

Two older people and their twenty-year-old granddaughter visit at the
kitchen table, happy to see each other.

It was truly a fantastic experience. Having Emma with me helped me in numerous ways, but I especially loved hearing my Dad talk to her with his usual enthusiasm. No other grandkids there to compete, just her.

We didn’t rush around like we usually do, we simply visited and talked, talked and visited. Emma and I had a motel room and explored downtown Flagstaff with its vibe so aligned to us. We woke up one morning to snow and thoroughly enjoyed the Lowell observatory, just like we had when Emma was a little girl.

We made plans for our next visit, which we planned to make after picking up Samuel after Spring semester at UNLV but that didn’t happen because of Covid19. My mother was hospitalized in the Spring and there was no way I would put my parents at risk by visiting them as much as I would feel reassured if I saw them.

I am so grateful I finally took the road trip, that I took it with Emma, and that no matter what I will hold this memory close to my heart. For that, I am so grateful.

What is one (or more) experiences you are grateful for so far in 2020? Bonus: after you create a list, write about at least one of them for five minutes or more, like I wrote about one of my experiences of gratitude in this blog post.

Our #Refresh2020 prompt on July 7 requests we make a list of 5 experiences in 2020

This blog post was inspired by a prompt from #Refresh2020 – a 3 week initiative during July 2020 to intentionally explore our experiences of 2020 so that we may continue the year with purpose and passion, even and especially if chaotic circumstances continue to erupt around us.

We will be holding space for the unknowing and aiming for our best, even if we don’t know what that best is. If that compels you, consider spending the next month or so with us. Click the image below to connect or ask me any questions yo

Refresh 2020 is a Three Week Pop Up experience to address experiencing 2020 from a fresh perspective. Flowers are the frame, showing optimism amidst the primary unpleasantness that has been indicative of much of 2020.

Join the conversation in our private Bridge to the New Year Facebook Group

How to Build Your Castle (and Live Your Truth)

May 18, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife 4 Comments

Build Your Castle. Live Your Truth! A sky at sunset with clouds in the air echo sentiments from Henry David Thoreau. This title graphic also suggests a fun introduction of living with vision through knowing your beliefs and gracefully taking aligned action as a result.

This week I am doing something radical, or at least feels radical.

I am taking a week off to regroup: to rekindle my love affair with the work I do (creative life coaching, facilitating groups on topics ranging from soul development to writing masterminds to social media how-to’s, speaking and writing). As I habitually do, I rose to the occasion when the pandemic came and people needed support – and I had what was needed – a zoom room, creative thinking and a deep desire to make a difference.

I created context and off we ran, meeting seven days a week at first. Then six days a week.

I was running out of sizzle and self-care so with my son’s return from college a perfect segue, I opted out of work-related activity for this week so that I may put my vision in place, like Henry David Thoreau said, “If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.”

This week is about building the foundations for my castles.

I suppose things don’t “officially” kick off until tomorrow, but I have been deep cleaning, setting up systems and digging deep into my memories as I write, reflect, write and reflect. Tonight I am on laundry detail. I have been using my timer to keep track of “clean now, create next. Create now, clean next” and so far, I am seeing results.

My personal dreams have been on-hold for a long time. For me the quarantine and stay-at-home orders didn’t feel all that unfamiliar: I was used to not being able to do what I want to do. I would do whatever it took for my children to collect successes while I cheered them on, but my place was to step aside making sacrifices and rearranging my plans repeatedly.

Even though we are still staying-in-place, my heart is flying even now because I have gained so much clarity about what my gifts are, what my beliefs are and what my fears, blocks and barriers are that I am more excited than a child awaiting her birthday might feel.

The life shifting conversations started last week and became this video:

What “name” would you like to claim for yourself, like I claimed philanthropist and visionary and others proclaimed oracle, artist, creative and more?

What do you need to believe about yourself in order to fulfill on proclaiming that truth about yourself, loud and proud and sure… and how will you act in alignment with your truth and beliefs?

These are not small questions to answer, so please take your time – and if you would like to talk to me more about these subjects (or others) please don’t hesitate to send me an email or text or call me.

This graphic shares contact information in order to discuss the questions asked in the video and in the article itself. To call or text it is 661.444.2735. EMail is juliejordanscott@gmail.com

Julie JordanScott has been writing since before she was literate by dictating her thoughts to her mother and then copying in thick crayons onto construction paper. She was a pioneer in epublishing and continues to reach readers through her blog, bestselling books, greeting cards and her essays and poems in anthologies. Next week’s theme of Aware of Abundance #5for5BrainDump program will focus on using writing as meditation to focus and release blocks or an upcoming writing circle or writing for social media programs.

What We Can Do: Grief in this Present Moment

April 19, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife 3 Comments

Woman sitting on a high pole, contemplating the ocean in front of her. Questions: Shall we name this unnameable presence? Who is brave enough to speak, write and be with it?

“Grief seems to create losses within us that reach beyond our awareness–we feel as if we’re missing something that was invisible and unknown to us while we had it, but now painfully gone.”

Brene Brown

Have you had this feeling lately?

You aren’t quite able to name what is wrong, what is missing, what is causing you to feel wobbly energetically, but you know there is something you can’t quite name there.

We can’t quite put our finger on what it is and in not being able to name it, this feeling, this missing substance and form hovers invisibly yet obviously causing emotional bleeding inside. It was only several weeks ago experts recognized grief as a factor for most of us: grieving the “small” losses of convenience, everyday expectations, “normal” life as well as the larger experiential losses. Students reaching toward graduation unable to participate in ceremonies and celebrations. Separation from family and friends, the pain of not being able to ease another’s suffering with physical presence.

PROMPT FOR CONVERSATION, CONTEMPLATION AND CREATIVITY

Water color image with a prompt based on Brene Brown quote and the Elizabeth Bishop Poem, "One Art" The Prompt says "Consider a moment in time when you didn't have a name for something that is now familiar. Write about coming to know the name. Begin getting to know your currently nameable. Write more.

I notice now as I paused to write and name the unnameable I haven’t even mentioned death. The constant, the numbers of deaths on the rise due to Covid19 some feel more comfortable ignoring – even as the reality is the virus we are fighting is highly contagious. Like cancer, it isn’t always lethal yet its lethal nature is a possibility continues to exist.

We are living in a grief and loss container of unknown depth and length. We have no time-line and we are all inexperienced at living in and through a pandemic.

There are no currently living experts who have “been through this before” to show us the way.

Maybe our first grief to practice is simply letting go of the need to define, to have or create a definitive timeline, to be able to set exactly the goal you would most like to set that has any variable outside your home.

PROMPT FOR CONVERSATION, CONTEMPLATION AND CREATIVITY:

Water color image with a Prompt to start a list of "Small losses" you have experienced during the last few weeks. Free writing about three of them, specifically to ease the pain.

There is no container for us to pour our grief into, no knowing exactly when this will end or what the new normal will look like.

The only slightly similar experience I have had personally is the cycle I experienced in earlier adulthood of longing for pregnancy, experiencing pregnancy only to experience death and then longing even more for pregnancy, waiting during pregnancy with a finite yet unknowable experiential path – and willingly putting myself through this cycle four more times.

My “after stillbirth” pregnancy was with Katherine. I remember holding the pregnancy test – absolutely positive – with a slight moment of inexplicable joy followed by ferocious anger and terror as I threw the test against the bathroom wall.

“What have I done?” I shouted to the emptiness.

My only personal experience with pregnancy prior to this was death and more pain than I knew was possible. There was no happy ending to smile into, to point to, no evidence that “everything would be ok.”

Today there are similarities.

There is no red bow to tie this story up with, no package or moral to this story. The closest to a gift I may offer you is this:

Inhale. Exhale. Repeat. Move forward with love. Inhale. Exhale. Repeat. Move forward with love. Inhale. Exhale. Repeat. Move forward with Love.

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.

Lessons from the Psych Unit

April 19, 2020 by jjscreativelifemidwife 7 Comments

A hospital hallway, in a psychiatric unit, is especially stark and dreary. It can be mysterious for people who have never been there.

I can still feel it, the cold on my bottom, the slight pain from sitting on the linoleum floor at the psych unit at our county hospital. I was visiting a client, a conservatee, someone who had been deemed by the court “gravely disabled”. Gravely disabled is a legal term which meant they were granted me as a Deputy Conservator after a court process that repeatedly proven the individual needs substantial help for their care and treatment and they were unable to voluntarily accept help. The legal mandate may have changed int he last two decades, but then – when I sat on that linoleum floor – I was the person who was delegated to make choices regarding where certain people with mental illness would live, what medications they would have to take, what doctors they would see and what case managers would be responsible for their mental health treatment.

In this situation, the woman I was visiting was a favorite woman of mine – one I felt a certain kinship with even though she often had select mutism and didn’t do much talking. Sometimes she also refused to eat the food that was offered her, which was why she found herself lying in a hospital bed with me silently sitting on the floor beside her.

Maybe I could understand this because sometimes I had a difficult time responding when people asked me questions I didn’t want to answer. Maybe having a brother who was for the most part non-verbal had something to do with it. I wasn’t sure, but I knew there was nowhere else in the world I wanted to be on that afternoon.

It might sound completely contrary: sitting cross-legged on the floor next to her bed in a locked psychiatric unit is not a particularly happy place to be, especially with nothing being said.

She knew I was there. I knew she knew and still we sat, silently.

I thought if I just sat without nagging her incessantly she might open up to me.

Which is exactly what she did.

She brought forward numerous stories about numerous people in her history. I agreed with all of it because who was I not to? I didn’t know what happened in Little Italy in 1960. I wasn’t born yet.

We bonded that afternoon like no one else who worked for the county ever had. Thenext time I went to a meeting about her care, I told a case manager and a supervisor if they didn’t stop their bickering about my client’s care and treatment I would find someone else who would do the job instead.

No one had heard a Deputy Conservator talk that way before. I was over the pettiness and I wanted better for this woman and together, we did get better.

Why?

Because I sat on the floor next to her bed and didn’t expect anything from her. I just sat there, my willingness to listen reflected in my cold bottom and my extreme, quiet tenacity.

Ever since that day I have longed for someone to do the same for me.

Who do I know who will sit on their ass on a linoleum floor without nagging me, just being with me?

I realize as I re-read this that I wrote yesterday, my time in the hospital showed me people who would sit with me. They oftentimes talked more than I thought necessary but that’s because most people who show up at a hospital are there out of kindness and want to make things better.

Most people think better includes talking. To me, better means being present without talking.

I also found other people who would sit with me after I got out of the hospital.

All people who visited me and sat with me are treasured.

I share gratitude for them all, even those who wanted to visit and couldn’t due to schedules or discomfort or many other factors.

When my brother John was in the process of dying, I would visit him in the hospital for hours at a time. He literally could not speak because he was intubated. He was not very verbal ever in his life so we had a very quiet, reflective relationship.

I loved sitting beside him silently. It was more than enough to be there, honoring him.

It is more than enough to bravely tell people we don’t know what to say or what to do and we want to be present for them, to listen without advice, to silently be there – presence being the ultimate purpose.

I saw my client’s obituary in the local newspaper several years after I stopped working at the county. I cried as I read it. As I finished writing this article, I listened to my memory to remember her name. I knew her first name and could easily bring up other women with her same first name, even one client who I worked with nearly forty years ago.

My brain brought her surname to life and I spoke her name aloud, a smile and a laugh following. She is still alive in my memory for the lessons she taught me and so much more. Some of the secret stories she shared I have never spoken to anyone else.

They will always be safe with me, my friend. I waited until you were ready and then I heard you.