Walking in this world - week 1: Discovering a Sense of Origin
I just finished The Artist’s Way, and about halfway through I thought, “I should be documenting this experience in some way”. If you have been here long, you know that I have been reading The Complete Artist’s Way, which is a compilation of 3 of Julia Cameron’s books on creativity as a spiritual practice.
Since the purpose of this blog is to document my own journey in creativity, spirituality, and life in general, I decided to start a blog series for the second book in the collection called Walking In This World. I just completed Week 1, and here are my takeaways:
Tools
Week 1 of this book asks you to carry over some tools from the previous books:
1. Morning Pages - 3 pages of stream-of-consciousness writing in longhand first thing in the morning.
2. The Artist’s Date - once a week, you go out on a solo expedition doing something creative for at least an hour. This one I have not been great about in the past and have vowed to improve upon it as I continue through the series.
3. Weekly Walks - taking a walk for at least 20 minutes at least once a week. Since I already go on morning walks daily, I am going to try to change the location of my walks to be more in touch with nature at least once a week.
Tasks
Like The Artist’s Way, Walking In This World is divided into 12 weeks, with a reading and tasks for each week. Week 1 focused on initiating your creative pilgrimage and meeting yourself where you are to discover yourself and your originality. The task for the week was to “Do Nothing,” which is described specifically as lying down for 15 minutes, listening to music that is both calming and expansive while repeating the mantra, “I am enough.”
As someone who meditates daily, my first reaction was to skip this task. I already do a version of this daily, if not multiple times a day. However, as the week went on and I worked through my morning pages and meditations, I decided to try to be more committed this time around. While reading The Artist’s Way, I found myself frequently “opting out” of tasks, feeling that I had already surpassed the level of self-discovery in my creative endeavors or finding tasks to be something or a form of something I was already doing. So this time, I am making an effort to complete each task, whether it feels repetitive or not.
While nothing truly profound happened while lying there in stillness, I found comfort in the repetition of the mantra and returned to it multiple times throughout the day. Also, much like when I am meditating, time seemed to move at an irregular pace. The 15 minutes of relaxation and repetition felt like only a few minutes and several hours all at the same time.
Artist’s Date
For this week’s artist’s date, I made a simple choice to go to a place I sadly haven’t been in years. I want to attempt to keep my artist’s dates as budget friendly as possible, I did afterall quit my job to embark on this journey. So I headed to the public library to immerse myself in all they had to offer. I do love the library: the smell, the quiet, everyone trying to respect one another’s time and space. Feels almost like a distant, far-off land. While there, I perused books on art, photography, spirituality, and even health-related books. It was a nice, quiet break from the world, and I will definitely be going back on future dates.
Weekly Walk
For this week’s walk, I went to a local hiking spot that I frequent, but instead of hiking to the top of the mountain as I usually do, I stayed on the lower, less difficult trail. My morning walks are more of a walking meditation, so I wanted to keep a more relaxing pace. While on my walk, I encountered a few fellow hikers, beautiful views, and some wildlife. At one point, a coyote crossed my path, and while at first I was in awe of the creature also out on his morning walk, I found myself overcome with fear.
This sent me into a bit of a tailspin. Why was I feeling this? I know that coyotes are more afraid of humans than we are (or should be) of them, but rational thinking was not working. As I headed back to my car, I continued to ponder where this was all coming from. I recalled reading somewhere that our fears point us to the parts of ourselves that we are hiding or suppressing. My fear seemed to be stemming from the wild itself. I began thinking about my childhood and how I used to be what some might call a “wild child”. Not in terms of getting into trouble or taking risks, but more literally. I recall unbrushed hair and dirty fingernails, but not from lack of being properly cared for. My memories of play included walking barefoot through the creek catching crawdads, climbing trees in the woods behind our house, and exploring new territory through country roads and fields.
Somewhere along the way, I changed. I became the girl who had to have the perfect outfit and her makeup on and hair done just to leave the house. The girl who worried about what others thought and if she was keeping up with the standards of beauty and fashion. I was hiding from my wild self. I began to think that I had started cracking something open. Over the last few years, I’ve been searching for something that I’ve been unable to define. I have been feeling like a stranger in my own skin and lost in my own world. Perhaps this is the start of finding what I’m looking for or at least a peek into something I’ve been missing.
So I’m taking time to focus on what I need, what the little wild child in me needs to feel safe to come out and play.
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