12/31/2016 0 Comments December 31st, 2016Write now, write with Passionate Presence.
What is that? Passionate - Think of love, so rich you are almost wordless. Moved by emotion and nearly indescribable intensity. Presence - seems the opposite (and it isn't). Grounded. Here now, entrenched in this precise moment. Writing while holding hands with both heaven and earth. Creating just because - not for outcomes yet knowing as we continue to stretch we attract, we connect, we combine this rawness with profound translations. We become a part of the fabric of those whose lives we touch. We write, live, love, create and reach out and in with passionate presence. Always. Whether we are working on an assembly line or singing in an opera house or making love or preparing a sack lunch for our youngest who is somehow a teenager. I realize as I look at this image there is no specific prompt, which nudged my heart to speak. "Describe it," she said. "The image, the concept of Passionate Presence. If you don't know what passionate presence means to anyone else or to you it doesn't matter, just write "passionate presence" over and over again. Call it into being in you and in the world. End this year, whatever you've thought of it, on a note branded with your forward looking name. You, Me, We in Passionate Presence. Let's write this. This first #5for5BrainDump writing from my fingers on the keyboard brought a list of writing possibilities. I haven’t numbered it. This will come in a second draft. Passionate Presence: On stage, performance. Death. On stage. Poetry performance – the first one I did with/about Tom. Everything disappears except for light, for me, for the process. Creativity. With Cameron. With Cameron. With Cameron. (Details edited out for privacy’s sake.) During fires – out in the wild and in my own fireplace, staring into candles. The poetry fire. Watching Katherine in the Sound of Music. Watching Emma, emotions. So many emotions. She bubbles with passionate presence. Ina Coolbrith Park. My meltdown. Interesting how often the intense emotions. Words – “Then follow me.” Sunsets and sunrises. Singing, often with singing. Sometimes with photos, creating photos. Catching an off-the-beaten-path or other-than-view shopping cart. Waking up after a bad headache. Holding a sunbeam in my hand on scope. In fact, Hart Park on Scope has been magical, definitely passionately present. John’s final eye contact. My Dad’s eye contact when he said thank you for being tenacious about John’s funeral. “I will do this,” the final advocacy for my brother. Denial doesn’t lead to passionate presence. Reaching goals, does. Like the day I spent crossing the monkey bars at Carteret Park. Getting all the way across the country. The way it feels to get “tubed” while body surfing.
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12/30/2016 0 Comments Anger in 3 Takes: Healing, 5 minutes at a time - The Invitation in #5for5BrainDumpI wrote three separate sessions for this topic and I still want to write more. The thing with brain dumping is it is like opening a door, or beginning a song. It is an invitation into more - which is what makes it so healing. The free flow nature allows the space for the subconscious mind to do its work. Space between writing allows that same wisdom to flow when you aren't aware of it so later, coming back to write again becomes easier.
I think my lifelong habit of veering into denial rather than any form of pain makes this more challenging than it may be to some. I'll keep coming back to it. Anger Part I I’ve mever been a good one at handling anger. I see anger, I get scared. I run from it. When I feel anger, I eat. I literally stuff it. I allow myself to feel sad, but rarely very rarely, mad. When people say “we need to talk” I assume an angry outburst directed at me. Delay, deport, distrus with all your might. (My, my, my how much ego can one paragraph hold? It would be more constructive to own my anger. To honor it, thank it see its purpose and practice detaching from it. Depression = rage. Overweight = anger, anger, anger. I learned to mollify anger (or the possibility of anger) with food. Stuff your mouth so no evil beasts would spew forth, Above all don’t risk people not liking me. If people decide to suddenly not like me, there is the ever present risk of not liking, abandoning and disowning me. Part 2 When I get angry I retreat (not in a good way).I ruminate alone. I eat. I write, sometimes I write! Onomatopoeia works well when angry. Words that have P’s and hard K sounds – sometimes actually C’s but cut or cackle or crawdaddy. I’m pretty adept at not getting angry. A lifetime of denial, avoidance, “It takes too much energy to hate,” ground into me like a flour mill, baked into my Julie cake, bread, mixed up in salt and baking soda, stirred into our instant breakfast. Its not that I want to hate but some healthy disgust or abhorrence might just be a good thing. I can’t muster much when denial is served in heaping trays (no wonder Mom overfed us!) Eeeeep. I would rather have learned and intuited my way through healthy anger than have zero ability to translate. I’ve gotten much better with sad, grief, disappointment, but volatility eludes me completely. The Next Day – Part 3: Volatility eludes me completely. My magic cape is in the dry cleaner, my magic wand is in the shop. Denial has a power all its own, a simple to mix elixir. (“That’s the way, honey, that’s the way.”) Those spurts and blurts and scratchy throated confessions cause others to look at you weirdly. “Thous shalt not appear unconventional (odd, unique, quirky, weird, original, different, weirdo) because we all know those attributes are contagious. Volatility smells like gunsmoke, black, grey smudgy. Makes a mess. Forget about it. Pretend it away. Forgive the intrusion. Don’t aim that here. No looking at mirrors, no sharing information or you’ll get into trouble. Stupid together, unsafe. Words, don’t write them down. Make no promises. People will expect you to fail. Stop it now.
Today's writing was by hand in my notebook, so the entry is shorter than some others have been. Also, note the section with plus marks utilizes an Emily Dickinson technique. When she was writing, if she thought of other words that might work as well as the one she initially chose, she didn't allow her inner editor to spend time laboring over which word to choose, she just put a plus sign and wrote another word possibility there. I did the same thing, and the words weren't synonomous, they simply were different (and sometimes fun to consider) options.
Prompt: Where do I need to be more compassionate, kind and caring with myself?
Today, I will be gentle, kind and caring with myself like this…. I will pursue curiosity lovingly, not like an interrogation. I won’t make myself feel like I am in a dressing gown with my ass hanging out in front of everyone I’ve never wanted to see. I will be lovingly, compassionately curious with myself. “Oh, interesting!” I will say to myself as I watch myself. This is walking into new territory, perhaps mushy + rocky + languid + unwieldy + boring +untrustable + exhilarating + scary + forceful + wet + blatantly-other-than-me terrain. I will be my gentle by not having to be right or forget a path or find a way. I will allow a way (or ways) to find and continue start and continue love deeply often and well and I will receive love well. Very well. Smiles. I will see and often receive love over and kindly and very, very well.
Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world. She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon! To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session, call or text her at 661.444.2735.
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing. Please stay in touch: Follow me on Twitter: @JulieJordanScot and on Periscope Be sure to "Like" WritingCampwithJJS on Facebook. (Thank you!) Follow on Instagram And naturally, on Pinterest, too! © 2016
Once again, I didn't follow the prompt exactly. (When do I ever?) Hopefully this gives you permission to be with the prompt's heart rather than being held by some sort of self imposed legality of the prompt.
Here goes. My ears are often the first to pick up messages. Something in my hearing, my “not quite audible hearing” of the sixth sense, perhaps, causes my chin to lift up my eyes to follow without question. I hear, “Look,” and I do. Sometimes I hear “Speak,” and when I forget to be afraid, I speak, my own voice at times surprising me. The other day, I heard to “for goodness sakes, go follow the imagery. It won’t last,” and off I went, ignoring the tyranny of the should and “but your to-do list!” etc etc etc rained over the giddy my heart knew was to come. This used to be a daily thing, when I listened consistently and my heart was dialed in. My hands drop from the keyboard, feeling scolded. I have made being scolded a bad thing. Is it, though, really? Scolding. No, not a bad thing just a thing. So when I went “off course” from my to-do list I experienced a brand of bliss that sang Julie-ness. I wandered toward the call of flow, even in absence. I stepped into and beyond my fear first when I couldn’t locate my keys, second when I smelled methamphetamine, third when I had to climb down the slope into the river, the slope I wasn’t sure could hold me. I didn’t know if it was firm or just appeared firm. I commanded it, “Hold me” and it did. Suddenly, here typing, I think whether or not it was truly solid or firm it would have held me. That is a joyful realization. (These things happen most when we move beyond the scolding.) Applause tells me five minutes are gone, even if I haven’t come to a conclusion, I am complete. For this moment, anyway.
Transparency alert: I've been working on new programs and keep hitting walls of belief. This prompt was valuable for many on this morning's broadcast WHICH IS GREAT because it felt more than slightly selfish as I created it. Here's what I came up with in my writing. At the bottom is an embedded tweet so you may experience (and write along with) the broadcast. Also, please leave links to writing and images in the comments. They encourage me to continue this work.
Now *gulp* my writing. I’m taking back my power to create revenue from what I create. I’m taking back my power to prove my worthiness and value in a variety of ways. Being paid in praise is remarkable. Being paid in praise and green energy is even better. I have to say it, I have to say it, I believe it. I believe it is even better to be paid in more than praise. I believe it is better to be paid in green energy, ever flowing. I believe it is better to be paid in green energy ever flowing overflowing and I’m taking back my power to create revenue from what I create. I’m taking back my power to advocate for myself as well as for others and creating revenue with my creative processes is part of that, one aspect of that, I shall continue to create, continue to manifest, continue to flow. For yonder breaks, a new and glorious morn. I am taking back my power to see, to feel, to hear, to smell. To take a moment to watch the egret, to use the time I elect to use to follow the flow into the moment, the sacred. To smell the odd smells and not be afraid. To see the beauty that would remain unseen and undocumented. I’m taking back my power to show up, look up, translate. Repeat and yes, create revenue from the process. It’s getting real in a marvelous, abundant, truly and heartfully there space. I just realized something rather significant – YES! It is the night… and the morning.. and manifesting diamonds. Last night I read a poem about diamonds in the air. I chose it as “today’s poem”. I dated it. I wrote the prompt, ‘does this explain why?” This morning, circumstances had me seeing diamonds and creating in the moment with diamonds without having barriers of “its too cold” or “I’m not ready” or “I don’t have enough time” get in my way. I’m taking back my power. I’m taking BACK my power. I’m taking back my POWER!
My 5 minute story from today - we will broadcast with this prompt between 8:30 AM and 9 am Pacific time. I hope you'll join us!
What will you create within today – I don’t mean hustling, hurrying up or “should-ing yourself.” Seeing what you haven’t noticed before: the sacred sound of leaves falling, the sumptuous smell, the delight felt when lying on a quilt of soft yellow with brown edges, returning to the earth as my mood does so simultaneously. This is nature, right outside my front door. This is a moment, captured and let go of rather than lamented and upset. This is giving space for ta-da’s within the relentless drum of to-do’s. I can’t opt into that drumming, that “must, fail, must, disappoint” because I don’t believe in it. I don’t believe in failing and disappointing AND there are times I unfortunately find myself buying in. For too long, too long, too long. How long has it been since I have rested on this ordinary beauty? How long has it been since I have taken a break to be enamored with last year’s leaves giving way into tomorrow’s flowers? How long has it been since I have loved myself into the moment instead of worrying about the plethora of “wrong” I weave through my thoughts? I look so much more festive with a garland of flowers in my hair than a tangle of you-are-wrong-vines in my thoughts, in my precious mind. Yesterday reminded me of what I was born knowing. Moments like these give birth to more beauty than I can fathom when I rush, when I push, when I hustle day in, day out, day in, day out. When I leave space for the ordinary beautiful, whatever I thought I needed to push for floats into place with grace I couldn’t plan or foresee. Applause comes, my timer whispers, “Take a deep breath. Move when ready. You are loved.”
I pride myself on living in the present moment and have been known to shout in my heart if not from memory aloud Mark Twain’s words “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
Prompt: I remember (in 2016) when I seized the moment… Did I? Did I ever seize it? I realized in the last week I’ve been not in my best plane this year. I’ve been lonely more than I’ve been fulfilled and surrounded by dear friends. I’ve been scared and restless more than I’ve felt safe and secure. I’ve disappointed myself more than I’ve felt proud or even slightly satisfied. What’s up with that? I might blame it on the speeding ticket in mid-January. I might blame it on the no traveling thing from me, such a wanderluster. I might blame it on “not the world’s best choices” and give some ra-ra speech about how I’ll do it for the gipper next time boss. What did I do? I started #5for5BrainDump when didn’t know what the heck I was doing and almost cancelled it the first time but the excitement from people who never even participated in it made me go on. I could have stopped at any point but I haven’t. I could have kept better track of engagements. I could have finished more stuff. I remember Sunday when I was so present, I watched the cashier’s fingers with such love and now it just sounds psycho and creepy but. I don’t even trust my fingers on the keyboard right now. And if I was any of you, I would say, “Honey. What is true about you underneath the grey smudgy exterior?” Did you love well? I don’t think I did, actually. Can you change that in the future and in the now? I have been working on it, focused no it. Can you change what was of 2016? No, but I may change my relationship with it. I did get some bits and pieces of my house prettified. Long procrastinated projects getting finished. I forgot that, probably because I’ve been critiquing the unfinished. So, I have a couple weeks to finish. To greet my children with that smile when they walk through the door. To plan what’s important to end out this MoFo year and start again. Clean, white canvas daily.
I thought I had written enough about quirky love AND In the spirit of all things #5for5BrainDump decided I needed to write anyway. Here's what was born. Made me laugh... in several places... especially where spell check attempted to protect me from myself.
And now, my writing....
I confess – I delight in the every day ramblings and lives of literary grannies – the ladies who wrote before me and paved the way so that I, dear one-and-only-Julie, might sit and write all these years (or months or days) later. Their lives were more complex than mine in some ways. Louisa, Louey – with her absentee and quirky dad, her gaggle of sisters and her gift. So she wrote what she didn’t want to write in order to support their lifestyle which was less than extravagant. She sat by her bedroom window in her Concord home, writing, writing, scratching scribbling forging not knowing her home would one day be a tourist attraction and the one next door, part of a national park. Years later. She just did what she must for her family, she wrote. No matter that she ached and hurt and wished it was different it wasn’t it was what… it was. How much we could all learn from that and her: it is what it is so just write, loves and it will feel better. Maybe your quirkly love is vintage pajamas or a variety of mascaras or antique house keys or shopping carts like mine no matter no matter no matter – write it, be with it, embrace it and proudly shout out “I love…… collecting coffee mugs from independent bookstores!” I am so quirky I have a quirkly niche. I know, I know, I know – that is beyond extreme and here I go trying to out quirky quirky and I know that is impolite and unlady like, just like broadcasting before I brush my hair and proclaiming I am wearing grey from head to toe – no prettificiation here. Today, I love grey. The sky is grey, my leggings are grey, my sweater with the tattered and pulled thread right underneath my left book is grey. Or gray, depending. And my five minute applause is here. My mom would be disappointed it wasn’t before I wrote the word BOOB which I typoed BOOK. Or the spell check protected me, because I have misspelled too much today. Already.
Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world. She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon! To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session, call or text her at 661.444.2735.
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing. Please stay in touch: Follow me on Twitter: @JulieJordanScot Be sure to "Like" WritingCampwithJJS on Facebook. (Thank you!) Follow on Instagram And naturally, on Pinterest, too! © 2016 How may I be more consistent? Fingers on the keyboard, 5 minutes at a time. Fingers wrapped around a pencil, a loving hug, 5 minutes at a time. Pausing. Not rushing. Not holding out for perfection but leap frogging into the mess and laughing when the mud gets into my hair and even when it goes (slightly) up my nose. This morning, for example. The woman at Hometown Buffet, making change, became a sacred moment because I held her in the sacred. The question about pure joy, my response about babies faces, delighting in the return. My choice to see every person as a baby, seen upon return. “She’s back, she’s here,” really seeing her as she sorted the bills from the coins and prepared to lift her eyes. She didn’t see mine fill with tears, the recognition that I was seeing her before she knew pain (or rather before she held onto pain as meaning anything wrong. Babies know pain and relief from pain. They know this face that comes back to them -wide-eyed – and smiling – is any face attached to any one, not a specific someone savior but that collective heart… waiting to be reunited. Seeing the other faces. The guy online waiting to pay at the grocery store who initially scared me though it would be so politically incorrect to admit it aloud. I saw him and felt “ugh oh no” in my chest and then remembered he, too, as a baby, was a doughy faces, smiling toothless wonder, so happy to be looked at and smiled into and picked up and chuckled with not for doing anything momentous except for breathing – except for returning the detached smile, the smile for smiles sake the joyful energy that says “YES! You are alive and I see you being alive and what a precious gift your little aliveness is.” My five minutes of writing is over. Applause from the on-line timer. The guitar, playing “sleep in heavenly peace” and that becomes my prayer for the woman-baby sorting my change or the man who frightened me until I allowed him to morph back into who he always is – nothing scary, just a face attached to a person – waiting to be seen and appreciated and valued just because. Just because. (My writing play while I sat with my breakfast, asking myself and moodling around the question "What are 100 ways to kneel and kiss the ground?" inspired by... Rumi, naturally.) Julie Jordan Scott inspires people to experience artistic rebirth via her programs, playshops, books, performances and simply being herself out in the world. She is a writer, creative life coach, speaker, performance poet, Mommy-extraordinaire and mixed-media artist whose Writing Camps and Writing Playgrounds permanently transform people's creative lives. Watch for the announcement of new programs coming in soon! To contact Julie to schedule a Writing or Creative Life Coaching Session, call or text her at 661.444.2735.
Check out the links below to follow her on a bunch of different social media channels, especially if you find the idea of a Word-Love Party bus particularly enticing. Please stay in touch: Follow me on Twitter: @JulieJordanScot Be sure to "Like" WritingCampwithJJS on Facebook. (Thank you!) Follow on Instagram And naturally, on Pinterest, too! © 2016 12/9/2016 0 Comments Rules for Writing: Slightly to the Left of Ecstatic or.... #5fo5BrainDump 12/9/2016I smile when I think of: (Remembering Priceless moments of 2016)
I smile when I remember:
Samuel at homecoming. Waiting and waiting and recording and wondering why I wasn’t crying and realizing what I realized that I still don’t feel like talking about it. No can’t publish that. Can’t publish disappointments or anything slightly to the left of ecstatic. I thought I was over that need, that compulsion to sugar coat or layer after layer of sticky mod podge or whatever so that the grit wouldn’t be able to push through. I breathe into my shoulder, the right one this time, the blade sitting right in the place where I would most like to cradle my or any heating pad not “my” since I don’t own it own one. I smile when I remember I wrote a poem today. I smile when I remember the moment of recognition, “Are you that slightly-famous-to-me-poet” only to recollect later yeah and more than that this is a famous kindred and I’m betting he dyes his hair. I would never guess he has a Mexican or any other Latina mother and I wonder if he knows who Emmy Bridgewater is since he appears to be THAT smart and more. I wonder what it feels like to be that smart? I remember the leaf, falling on my windshield, bright yellow, as I waited for just the right light to snap the photo. The light was just right and the photo was even more just right. And I smile remembering and a bucket of laughter rises in spite of me. I remember New Years Day, Amanda’s feet getting cold and me getting pissed, “How can her feet be cold she’s from Boston and we are in California stand in awe of this huge tree for just the tiniest bit more, please!” I remember recently laughing really hard with Julia but I don’t know why. I remember smiling when talking to Fabian. And playing with SnapChat with Cameron’s students. And hearing the applause right now as I write. Thank you, oh recorded hands, for making me smile. Here’s to more of that in 2017. Recorded. Not recorded. Live, Belly laughs, small smiles, all of it.
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Julie Jordan Scottis the founder and creator of 5For5BrainDump. She has been inspiring artistic rebirth since 1999. Archives
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