Through the Looking Glass

It wasn't until I logged into Blogger today that I realised it has been nearly two months since I posted on here. This is partly because I sometimes now post short updates on my author website here, but also because I use this blog for more personal introspection, and I feel like this year has flown by at such a break-neck exhilarating speed, that I've not always had much time to just sit and reflect on things...which I miss, as I feel one essential ingredient to achieving creativity and letting your imagination flourish, is to ensure you have time to reflect and daydream.

During the last Christmas holidays and start of 2015 I let my imagination run wild, and got thoroughly lost in daydreams as I composed a secret 'Future Dreams' board on Pinterest. I love the visual worlds you can create on Pinterest and have read a lot about the power of positive visualisation, so instead of writing a list of goals for the new year, I decided to post pictures, relating to things I wanted to achieve. One of the images had the words; 'Achieve your publishing dreams: Ready to make your dreams come true? It's Time!' And four months later that time did indeed arrive! 

I also started to post pictures of nice houses, and things relating to a new home, as I knew I was going to put my flat on the market. I just moved out of my flat last week - it was on the market for most of the year, and even although I've temporarily moved back in with my parents until I find a new place, I've taken a big step in the right direction. I'm going to enjoy adding new images to my board during the holidays and it's an enjoyable way to keep focus. 

Over a year ago I also created a 'mood board' for my book Follow Me, which made the story and characters stay present and real in my head throughout the whole submission process, and it was very useful to be able to transfer some of these images onto a new board for my cover artist to access. I printed out and laminated my 'mood boards' to show pupils during a school workshop  showing them how it can help to build on atmosphere and character when you write. 

So many new, exciting, and sometimes overwhelming, things have happened to me this year that I think it's going to take me some 'downtime' to actually absorb everything. I've called this post Through the Looking Glass because a turning point for me in my writing career was when I went through quite a transformational time in my life, and when I named this blog. I've mentioned this before in a previous post, but the name for this blog came to me when I was on a trip to Vancouver, and was standing looking in the window of a shop with lots of Alice in Wonderland paraphernalia. 

That trip was really important to me because it was the first time I had flown anywhere alone, and as I was visiting a friend who was living and working there, I spent a bit of time travelling around the city solo. It was also the first big holiday I'd taken since the break-up of my longest relationship to date, (even although I was well over it by then, I still felt I was going through a period of re-adjustment and was at the positive stage of viewing life as being a bit of an adventure, full of unwritten possibilities). I had also just turned 30. I returned home from that trip with a sense of determination and focus, and probably entered one of the most fulfilling and creative periods of my life. A lot of people have described my writing in  Follow Me as assured, and when I think back to the frame of my mind I was in when I started to write the book I think I was probably the most centered and creatively free I've ever been, which maybe carried into my writing.

Now I feel I've entered the next stage of my writing journey, and I'm looking through the glass from another perspective.  With every stage of the writing process there are re-adjustments, challenges and learning curves. There is a big part of me that would love to hire a doppelganger to manage my social media, events (and to do my day job for me!), to allow the 'real' writer me to go back to my daydreams and get my next book finished. 

But really, I do love the interaction part too. In my 'day job' as a careers adviser the aspect I enjoy the most is my attempt to motivate and inspire teenagers. So it was very rewarding to step inside a school, this time as an author, and see the enthusiasm from some fourth years at a recent workshop who constructed some very imaginative flash fiction stories. Talking to them about some of my earliest writing attempts when I was at school reminded me of the fire which has always burned inside of me to construct imaginative worlds and attempt to create a little bit of magic. I'm looking forward to hiding away for a little while over the holidays to drift off into an alternative world where the characters from my imagination get to lead my story again for a while. 

Your mountain is waiting

I've been quiet on the blogging front of late due to life taking over a bit. Many a weekend has been spent getting stuck into a long overdue clear out and I have also been contemplating a long overdue change. I find big changes quite stressful, though usually I get to the stage where I recognise they’re necessary and then start to see the positives and potential excitement. 

I was delivering some training at work last week which drew me into interesting conversations and discoveries (ones which tie in quite well with my blog post from December, 'Thinking Things Over', where I referred to a meditation class I went to). The training explored some coaching methods and techniques, and my training partner shared her experience of a recent Neuro Linguistic Programming course she had been on.

I find the idea of NLP interesting – it focuses on how we can learn to control our thoughts, and in doing so can free ourselves from negative thinking. A great book she recommended is,‘How to take charge of your life: The Users Guide to NLP’ by Richard Bandler,(the co-creator of NLP), Alessio Roberti and Owen Fitzpatrick. Some of the quotes from this really got me thinking. 

In my job I work with clients who sometimes hold themselves back with limiting beliefs, and really I think we’re all guilty of that to some extent. I know how many opportunities I’ve missed out on due to self-doubt and it’s something I still struggle with in some aspects of my life. 

A couple of my favourite quotes from the book were: 

Believe that you can achieve what you want, and you will set yourself free to achieve it

And:

Our biggest limit is not in what we want and cannot do; it is in what we have never considered that we can do 

On my way home on the train on Monday I looked up at one of the stops and noticed a poster on the railings, (which I think was part of an art project). I didn’t have time to absorb the full picture but what I caught was an image of the word ‘Worry’ on the left hand side, changing into the words ‘Things got Better’ and underneath it said something along the lines of, ‘Take control of your thoughts and change your world.’ It was strange noticing this the day after I just finished the NLP book but there’s a theory that our brains also seek out what we want to find. So maybe these are all messages I need to hear just now, and at the end of the NLP book the authors encourage anyone who reads it to share their messages, which I guess is partly why I’m posting about this, because maybe these are things you need to hear too. 

The title of my post is inspired by a Dr Seuss book, ‘Oh, the places you’ll go.’ Twice in the past week I’ve seen a reference to this book and it’s one I personally love. A work colleague once gave it to me as a parting gift many years ago and I think it’s very uplifting and inspiring. 

I’ll leave you with Dr S’s parting words: ‘Your mountain is waiting, So…get on your way!'

Another few 50 things...

It's been a while since I've posted about my '50 Things' list. I received my list of tasks at the end of March last year, and originally I thought I'd give myself a year to work my way through them (though there were no rules about a time frame when I signed up for the task). I'm going to extend the time , because the whole point of me signing up to it in the first place was to hopefully experience new things, maybe challenge myself a bit, and step outside my comfort zone. All of which I think I've achieved so far to some extent, and would like to continue working on.

I've obviously not dedicated a blog post to all of the tasks either, so here's a quick run down of some other things I've completed: (besides the ones I already blogged about, 10 Photos, Challenging my Creativity, Climbing a Mountain) -

~ Spend a night star gazing -  I had just visited the Observatory in Paisley a couple of weeks before the list came in so I guess I cheated a bit and ticked this off straight away. I think I should go back again sometime soon

 ~ Have a conversation with a stranger -I've attended quite a lot of events this year both at work and socially, and have probably managed to strike up a conversation with a stranger at each one. What tends to happen to me a lot is that we discover a mutual connection somewhere along the line. Strangers also often strike up conversation with me on public transport and in supermarket queues, so it makes a task like this farily easy to achieve.

~ Plan an overseas trip - since signing up for this list I've been to New York and Barcelona and am heading off to Paris in April

~ Do something spontaneous - All of the above trips turned out to be fairly spontaneous plans. As a whole, I think over the past several months I've been a lot more spontaneous than I usually am

~ Appreciate the small things - This was something I'd already been making a conscious effort to do in general and I think this gets easier the more of life you experience and you begin to realise what's really important.

~ Show your friends and family love and support - I hope this is something I've always done anyway, but it's always nice to have a reminder and I think even small gestures are important

~ Believe in yourself -What does that really mean? I think it's about having a strong enough sense of self that you can get to where you need to be, and even if you don't, then you can recognise that everything is still going to be okay. And I think it's about not being afraid of putting yourself out there - that last part is the challenge, but I'm getting better at it

~ Go to an art exhibition and talk to the artist - Last year I went to a celebration of a new artist's 1 year gallery anniversary and bought her art work. I find it's rare you get to speak to the artist at their exhibition, unless you're lucky enough to go to an opening night. I also emailed an artist whose work I had seen at the Lighthouse to let her know how much I enjoyed her exhibition.

~ Spend a morning people watching - I often go to cafes by myself and sit by the window watching the world go by. When I was completing my small stones task I became more conscious of watching people everywhere. It's amazing what you notice when you keep your eyes and ears open. Often I've been wondering, how much of the world do we miss because we're being told to focus on the wrong things?

~ Break your worst habit - This has to be snacking. I think I broke it for a couple of weeks last summer and then again after Christmas for a couple of weeks but it didn't last! Bad habits are hard to break...

~ Ask more questions -  I always ask lots of questions anyway. This is quite a vague one but I guess what I take from this is don't stop learning and reading and trying to find out about new things.

~ Write a list of 10 things you love about yourself - Not an easy task as we're so great in the West of Scotland at putting ourselves down. I'm not telling you what I wrote!!

~ Rid your life of the things you don't need - I'm gradually clearing out junk from my flat, I have no problem walking away from people who are only bringing negative things to my life, but I guess in a general sense I still hold on to far too many things I don't really need (like that bar of chocolate in the fridge...)


~ Watch the film 'The Edge of Heaven' - This relates to the task below as it was a foreign film, shot in Turkey and Germany.  I just watched this film today and I liked the element of interconnecting lives. It tackled some big issues of asylum seeking and freedom, but for me it didn't explore some characters enough.

~ Watch more foreign films - Recently I've watched 'Rust and Bone' and the Spanish film 'The Secret is in Their Eyes'. I enjoyed them both, particularly the Spanish one as a powerful a scene near the end really stuck in my head. Running through the film was the sense that the past had consumed and haunted many of the characters for years. I liked a quote from it, 'You'll have a thousand pasts and no future.' A warning to one character that he needed to stop letting his memories dominate his life. I really loved watching the French tv series 'The Returned' when it was on last year. There's something about listening to a story being told in a foreign language which makes the plot seem more philosophical and deep.

~ Embark on a creative project - I always have a couple of writing projects on the go, and I think I'm going to sign myself up to take part in the sketchbook project again this year. And putting together a Memory Book for a friend was a big creative project I completed too!

~ Give a friend a spontaneous gift - Thinking back over the past few months, I have achieved this a couple of times, without really consciously thinking about it

~ Set yourself 3 significant goals for the year - 1. Dedicate more time to writing 2. Send more work out 3. Don't sweat the small stuff  All on track, so far, with dips along the way

~ Go on a roadtrip - This depends on your definition of  a roadtrip. Can going on a trip somewhere in a car with friends, if you have snacks and fun, count as a roadtrip even if it's just to a writing event in Stirling for the day? All of my longer trips have involved trains and planes.

~ Try something off the menu you wouldn't usually order - At the weekend I tried Cranachan for dessert, not something I would usually go for. And I soon realised why...

~ Write a Dream Journal for a week - I'm not sure I've managed this for a full consistent week but I've certainly made an effort to record more dreams. I often have very detailed and vivid dreams, that play out like a long weird film, often leaving me feeling quite exhausted when I wake up.

~ Research Natural Phenomenons - I'm going to dedicate my next blog post around this as I came across a few interesting things, and it also sparked off a bit of creativity

Not a bad attempt so far I think. The ones I'm REALLY putting off are the baking/drink making related ones (they make up another 6 or 7 on the list), so I may enlist the help of friends for those. I am also going to have to really set aside the time to spend a day completely without technology and a day in complete silence (it would make sense to do those on the same day). Wish me luck!

A selection of 'small stones'

Last month you might remember I decided to try a January writing challenge, to write 'small stones' throughout the month. The idea being:
~ Notice one thing each day
~ Give your whole awareness to it
~ Write it down

Last year I already started to write an 'inspiration' type journal, capturing observations, snippets of everyday life, ideas, thoughts and so on. I used this challenge to form shorter, more poetic/creative type observations and it has definitely been a good way to kick start my creativity for the year.

In the past week I've written some new flash fiction pieces (or returned to old ones to edit). Something else which helped, was reading the opening pages of my Mslexia Writing Diary (which my Mum very kindly gave me - thanks Mum!). The article 'Your Creative Journey' encouraged me to consider my writing ambitions, reflect on what I accomplished last year, and set myself new goals for this year.

Goals can sometimes be restrictive if you make them too specific, so I decided to set quite broad ones such as 'Let go of the fear and just write' and 'Have self belief and keep submitting'. The first one was quite important as lately I've been over analysing my new book too much, worrying if it's good enough, where is it heading and so on. So the decision to return to writing shorter forms for a while, just freeing my mind and seeing what words landed on the page, has definitely banished that fear and allowed me to re-discover the fun of writing!

Here's a selection of my 'small stones' from January below. Did anyone else take up the challenge or set themselves writing goals for the year?

*Note - the first small stone was inspired by a film, just in case you're wondering what kinds of things I was 'noticing' throughout Jan! 

A tender caress soaked in ruby red; danger, scorpion sting, passion, blood. Tainting the innocent hope of love, trapped by destiny. 

Winter Trees: Spindly, rigid branches like old men frozen in time, reaching for the stars, waiting for the kiss of Spring to awaken their rotting frame.

A face which wears its worry. Every hurt, fear and disappointment her son inflicted, is etched into her lines, tarnishing her own forgotten youth.

Pink balloons tied to a red gate, blowing in the wind. The house looks deserted, lights out, silent, as if the balloons belong to a forgotten party.

Train flashes past yellow fields – a glimmer of light awakening this dark winter morning.

Heart shaped tangerine peel abandoned on the top step. Layers peeled back, the best bit consumed, now the rest…left to rot.

Local girl climbing a lamppost, one trainer clad foot balancing on the handlebars of her scooter. ‘Just try me,’ a look of defiance stretching across her face as she reigns above her ginger haired follower.