hunger.

"Trusting ourselves means being willing to hunger - for food, for intimacy,
for comfort, for self-expression.
It is the denial, not the acknowledgement, of hunger that destroys us.
We are all hungry for something." - Geneen Roth

I haven't been. I haven't been consciously hungry for anything for a long time. I have wanted things. I have hoped for things. I have tried to 'manifest' things. I have cried for things. I have eaten things because they were there. I have dreamed about being a published writer. I have been lonely for friends and family. I have felt not good enough as is. I have been afraid of things. I have absolutely longed for things. But I have not been HUNGRY for things.

For me, hungry means wanting something so much that you do anything in order to have it. For me, hungry means that you ignore all rational and conscious thought because you are so determined. Hungry means that there is a real gnawing hunger that needs satiating. For a long, long time that has not been me. I have not listened to my hungers.

I have been eating. I have been watching television. I have been sleeping in. I have been making mess after mess in my house that I need to clean up. I have been emailing, surfing, reading, and generally farting around. I have been wasting precious precious time waiting. Waiting for what? I don't know. I'm embarrassed to say.

Many people (including me) have said that life would be so much easier if we wanted to be ordinary. But I think that on some level I haven't really wanted to be a creative either. I have so many preconceived notions of what that means. I am so scared of so much of it I couldn't begin to list all of the things I am afraid of. Mostly I am afraid to want it too much, or put too much work in, in case it doesn't happen.

In January I declared a theme for 2007. I have decided that starting on Sunday I am going to declare a new theme for the foreseeable future. And it's going to be HUNGRY. I'm going to listen to what I am hungry for and do something about it. That's it. There is no more time to waste. None.

Wish me luck!

Powerful.

"Being powerful is giving yourself permission to feel good. Being powerful is allowing yourself to be as creative, outrageous, honest, sensual and demanding as you are. Being powerful is realizing that you don't have to hide anything from anyone." - Geneen Roth

I am home sick today. My stomach told me that it has had enough excitement and it needed a break. On my way past the bookshelf this morning, I picked up the very first book I put my finger on. It was one by the amazing Geneen Roth. As it turns out, it was one of the books that I have marked as I read it before. So today I was able to read messages from myself - to see what passages have resonated before - and to see how much I have changed since the first read.

Today I found this passage and I loved - loved - loved it. As I am preparing for my mojo-ritual on Sunday, I thought it was perfect timing! I wanted to share it with you:

"Ask yourself - now - what would happen if you were to become as powerful as you are?

Who would be frightened?
How would your life change?
How would you eat?
What would you wear?
What kinds of things would upset you?
How would you walk, talk?
What kind of work would you do?
Who would be your friends?
Does you life, the way it is now, support you in becoming powerful?
Do one powerful thing today.
Tomorrow, when you wake up, dress as if you were expressing your power. Then walk through the day as a powerful woman would.
Treat yourself as if you were already enough."

- Geneen Roth

on beauty in two different ways

I am working on three projects right now! That's right - THREE! I am on page 90 in my book, I am working on our website and I got two amazing idea flashes in the last week or so. One of them I am going to shelve for a little while (after letting the Universe know that I accept it of course!) and one left me tingling so much that I think I might get started on it.

I have a real issue with all of this inspiration. I have a lot of trouble visualizing. I can sense my projects but I can't see them. My book has been easy because I am just writing it. It will be a novel-of-sorts. (It's sort of a grown up woman's fairy tale.) But the other two require some artwork or photographs or SOMETHING and I just can't do it. I have a whole non-fiction 'self-help/ inspirational' book written - WRITTEN - and it's just sitting on my computer waiting for me to go back and revise and edit and visually make it the thing I want it to be. But I can't do that bit. I can't get the beauty out of my head and onto the page. And I don't feel like I can send it to a publisher without the beauty. I know that they would get an amazing illustrator/ artist to do the images but I don't want my words to be rejected because I can't illustrate what they mean to someone. The beauty is instrumental.

So I continue to sit down and write the books and the pieces and then I leave them in files where no one reads them. My latest idea could be incredible. It involves a book and a website and helping people to create concrete evidence of who they are and how they got there. It could be a cool workshop as well... sigh. I have some artistic ability, but the link between brain and output just isn't there. I can't SEE what I want it to be, I can only SENSE what it already is. Does that make any sense at all??

(I meant this post to be about something entirely different today but the post took on a life of its own. Michelle put a link to a site on her blog and I went there. Please read Michelle's instructions and her fabulous post about it and then go to this website. It's absolutely incredible. You will be amazed.)

craving some "divine mojo!"

"Autumn... asks that we prepare for the future - that we be wise in the ways of garnering and keeping. But it also asks that we learn to let go - to acknowledge the beauty of sparseness." - B.W. Overstreet

I have an invitation for you. I would like you to join me in a spirit-lightening, mojo-boosting ritual!

For many people the year begins on January 1rst. At the beginning of a new year we write resolutions and make promises to ourselves. We look at the things we need to change and we hope that by the end of the year we will have everything we ever wanted. For me it has always made much more sense to have those sorts of thoughts in the autumn. With school starting and summer ending, it always seemed to me that the year started fresh in September. I've written about this before here.

But here I am, sitting in the middle of August, feeling a little cramped by parts of my life that don't quite fit anymore. I read other blogs and feel the same thing from all of you. We vow to do differently than we do now over and over again. It's exhausting. I am feeling ready to relax the reins a bit. I feel ready to take a breath.

Yesterday I was feeling in need of inspiration so I closed my eyes, took a deep breath and opened the first book I touched. This is what I read:

"...create your own rituals - whatever you like, and for any reason whatsoever, as long as they really mean something to you and have some divine weight, some honest tang. Your rituals can be shaped around almost anything at all - like a job promotion or a breakup - or just because you're really craving some divine mojo." - Sera Beak - The Red Book

That's me alright - craving some divine mojo! So I decided to create my own autumnal ritual. And inspired by Jamie's Dance Party, I decided to ask if you would do it with me!

So you are invited to participate in a mojo-boosting autumn new-year ritual!

When: September the 2nd at 6pm GMT. You'll have to do your own math to figure out what time this will be for you where you are! (it should really be September 1rst but I figured more people will be home on Sunday to do it!)

What: a new you ritual. You can be as big or as small as you like. It's about stopping and taking stock, taking a deep breath, releasing some old gunk, and stepping into the rest of the year revived. "Some rituals are enacted simply to mark a special time, to focus a desire, break a nasty habit, encourage a healthier you, or celebrate a traditional event. There is much to be explored in the betwixt. There is much fun to be had in the between." - Sera Beak.

How: you choose what you do that would be meaningful to you. You could have a bath, light some candles, write yourself some vows, burn something (carefully), sip some tea or some wine or some champagne, get a tattoo, write poetry, marry yourself, burn some sage or incense, bake bread, meditate, or anything else that will help you feel different when you are finished. Participate at the same time and offer a small wish at the end to the other people who are doing it with you. Then blog about it if you like.

Who: Everyone is invited (even non-bloggers!) I believe that the more people do it, the more powerful it will be.

Please join me - and we can all breathe deeply and move lightly into autumn together!

xo

I need your advice!!

Okay peeps, I have a question for you!! (All of you - even the lurkers - I wanna know what you think too!!)

Mark and I are about to embark on weddingness. Since we got engaged people have been asking us what we are doing and when we are doing it. We have no idea when or what or how. We are going to sit down and start talking about it soon but everything I look at about weddings is SCARY!! It all seems to involve lists and things that we must do. There doesn't seem to be anything anywhere about how to make up a beautiful, meaningful, simple, elegant, memorable day.

So what I would love is if you would give me some advice. What did you do that worked? What have you seen done at weddings that you thought was lovely? What wouldn't you have done? What would be your dream wedding? What advice/ inspiration/ tips/ wisdom can you give me? Our facts are: two countries, small budget, and enormous family in Canada.

So can you help?

P.S. Karen - the Pimms & Nibbles are for you!!

possessed.

"Writing is the only thing that, when I do it, I don't feel I should be doing something else." - Glorian Steinem

I am finding it increasingly difficult to remain in the real world. I have just finished reading the final Harry Potter book and I am having difficulty climbing out of it. Plenty of books have come and gone in my life that have left no impact. I can remember most of them, but they did not come to be a part of me. There have been books, however, that left me reeling. This feeling does not necessarily come from a heavy or intense story, but usually from the sense of being fully immersed in its world. When I finish a book that has claimed me, it is often like coming up for air. Part of me wants to be out, to be done, to be back on firm ground and part of me is longing to be back deep inside.

But the strangest thing has happened to me this week. I have been inhabiting two books at the same time. One was Harry Potter and the other was my own manuscript. The characters in one of the books were bringing me along with them as I read about their lives, and the characters in the other have been taking up residence in my head. I don't feel like it is me writing this book. I feel like it is being whispered to me. When I am not writing it whole scenes appear before me, and sentences, paragraphs and snippets of dialogue swim by in quick succession. When I am writing it I don't always know what is going to come out until it is there on the page. If you watched me reading it back you would see me shaking my head in surprise.

So the result of all of this is that my head is a bit full of fiction. There is scarcely time or space for anything else. There was simply no question of stopping reading or writing so the rest of my life has suffered. I find myself being angry at my 'real' life because it gets in the way. I missed a wonderful bit of conversation the other day because I was dealing with something at work and I couldn't stop to write the words down as the came to me. I've said before that I needed to stop writing so that I could get by in my daily life. That's still true! But now I want to give up the daily life to make room for the writing. Oh, to be able to sit down and focus on one thing at a time!

Reading this back it sounds quite negative and that is not how I mean it to sound. I am deeply, passionately in love with my book. I was deeply involved in reading Harry Potter. I am happiest and most in 'the flow' when involved in such relationships with books. It is just overwhelming sometimes. I have never felt like this about a piece of my own writing before. I have had wonderful feedback from a few friends who have read it and from Mark (he's even asked me what was going to happen next a few times - a very good sign as it is a VERY woman-y book!) I know that I am going to have to come up for air sooner or later, but in the meantime, you'll have to forgive me for any absence. I've returned from Hogwarts, but that was only part of me. I'm still not fully here. I'm afraid I've become lost in another book, and this one is going to be much more difficult to leave behind.

The Universe is kicking my butt!

(When we were in Exeter with my parents we walked by this amazing door and of course my Dad needed to see what was on the other side so he pushed it open. Turns out it was another door!!) (Deep eh?!)

For the last little while I have been doing a lot of thinking about all of the ways that I DON'T do the things that I want for myself. But when I started doing that today I could actually hear Dr. Phil in my head saying, "How's that working for ya?" So I decided to stop and think about the ways that I DO work towards my dreams. "Enough of this defeatist bullshit," I thought. Clearly I do more good than bad or I would not be living the life I do.

This week I have been up by 6:30am every morning and I have written my book. It's been my sacred date. I have pushed past my blockage (I had three characters sitting in a van for ages. Two wanted to be in the book, but I didn't know what to do with them,) and I am now bustling towards the 60 page mark - yippee yahoo!

This morning I found this quote:

Again and again in history some people wake up. They have no ground in the crowd and they move to broader, deeper laws. They carry strange customs with them and demand room for bold and audacious action. The future speaks ruthlessly through them. They change the world. -- Rainer Maria Rilke

It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. I hope that in some small way by the end of my life, I have done something that changes the world - even if it is just for one person.

And then today I got this message from the Universe:

Live your dreams now, Meghan, to any degree that you can. With every purchase. Every decision. Every hello and goodbye. Every assignment. Every conversation. Every meal. Every morning, afternoon and evening. And never, ever, ever look back.

Reframe every thought, word, and deed from the perspective of the person you've always dreamed you'd be, as if your life was already as you've always dreamed it would be. Die to yesterday's illusions and be reborn to the truth of your vision.

And let's just see if you can handle the onslaught of treasures I send your way.

Your greatest admirer, biggest fan, and truest friend -
The Universe

And it kicked my ass. I would like to report my friends that I am BACK ON TRACK!!

Some days it is easy to move toward your dreams and some days it is hard. Some days I can pay attention to the good things I've done and some days I can only eat my weight in sugar. Some days I am strong and some days I need to be quiet and still. Sometimes I feel inspiring and other days I need inspiration. I am so glad that when it is needed most, inspiration seems to come - even if it needs to come from inside, from the outside, or from the universe.

xo