As autumn arrives and the sun recedes into the southern hemisphere, I notice year after year that life seems to speed up. Summer’s (supposedly) slower pace is gone. Schools start. Organizations resume their fall schedules. Leaves fall and beg to be raked. This fall, my son Chris got married to Abby in August and we had a local reception earlier this month. Then my son Matt’s wife Kelly had a baby last week, plus we are preparing to move my mother into an assisted living facility in a couple of weeks. No wonder I’m tired and overwhelmed at times.

How about you? Do you feel stretched too many directions at once? Have too many demands on your time and energy? Get impatient with your CSIGY body because it is so sensitive, so reactive? Get tired of having so much creativity that no one person could EVER carry out all your ideas?

 If so, you may appreciate our Featured Article: Seven Steps to Overcoming CSIGY Overwhelm:

Do you find yourself feeling overwhelmed when life gets hectic-and that’s much too often? Is creative expression essential to your sense of well-being? Is daily time alone crucial to your inner balance? Do you quickly get overwhelmed when there’s lots of noise and activities going on? Do others frequently say that you’re “too sensitive”? And do you sometimes feel like “a freak of nature” because of these things?

I have good news for you! Your creativity and sensitivity are gifts that the world sorely needs, not anomalies to be obliterated. It IS possible overcome your overwhelm without losing your creativity or your sensitivity. You can heal yourself from the effects of the things that overwhelm you, truly thrive instead of just survive, and yes, even achieve your creative, sensitive hopes and dreams.

The First Step to overcome your CSIGY overwhelm is to recognize what is going on. As elementary as this sounds, we often try to skip over it. It is essential to admit it when you’re overwhelmed. It’s crucial to stop pretending that you’re keeping up, doing fine, going along smoothly through life, when you’re not-and admit it as soon as possible. How bad do things have to get before you acknowledge that they’re not going well? Do you have to crash and burn, or can you allow yourself to own up to the overwhelm without owning the overwhelm itself? In other words, when you recognize the truth of your situation, you can then begin to do something to change it. You can’t do anything about feeling overwhelmed until you acknowledge it!

Step Two is to de-escalate the overwhelm–to get the body back in balance. Take some long, slow deep breaths, drink a glass or two of water, close the eyes for at least a few seconds; do one or more of these, and restore your CSIGY inner balance. This will get both of your feet back on the ground.

If you have the luxury of more time, stretch some muscles, take a restroom break, eat a small, healthy snack, walk around the block, do something playful, get in nature for a few minutes. Gratitude and humor can also be powerful to restore inner balance quickly.
Step Three is to identify the source(s) of the overwhelm. When you’re overwhelmed, it’s like your body’s circuits have overloaded, and your central nervous system has shut down some of them. And just like you do in your home when that happens, a good place to start is to check all our circuits: body, mind, soul, and spirit, to see which one(s) are overloaded. For example, you can check for too much noise, too much happening too fast, too many projects going at once, multi-tasking in too many ways, inner aches or voids, nagging doubts or worries, responsibility without authority, unrelenting stress, continual dissatisfaction with some area of your life, too much stress of any kind. It’s important to identify all the stressors that are impacting you at that particular point in time. You don’t need to do anything about them just yet; only identify them.

Step Four is to unhook from the overwhelm. Just like you do when your house circuits are overloaded, when you discover which circuit(s) are overloaded, you then search to find what can be unplugged or turned off to free up the circuits for what is essential. I have learned to ask myself, “If I could get only one thing done today, which one would it be?” I then unplug from everything else, and focus on that one thing. Other useful questions can also be: What can wait, and what cannot? What will make a difference five or ten years from now? What must be done first, before other steps can be taken?

Step Five is to identify what your life is about; what is your mission, and your vision for your life? What makes it worthwhile to get out of bed in the morning? What is your destiny? Why are you here on earth? What are your unique gifts, and how are you going to use them to benefit others? What unique challenges have you faced with creativity and aplomb, (and yes, blood, sweat and tears) and what have you learned (often at great cost in life, energy, soul & spirit), that you could bless others if you would be bold enough to share (our mistakes, of course, which leads to) what you have learned?

Step Six is to plan a pace and a way of living that builds in the essential elements that you need to live that mission and vision, AND stay out of overwhelm at the same time. It is much easier, and is often tempting to live like a rabbit, hopping here and there, setting the stage for continual overwhelm, than to plod along like a boring turtle.

Yet, turtles have lots to teach about healing, thriving, and achieving. They’ll show you how to slow to the pace of completion. They’ll show you how to pull into your shell when you need a break. They’ll show you how to give a warning snap when your boundaries are threatened. They’ll show you how to go with the ebbs and flows in life. They’ll show you how to ground yourself with gratitude, and solitude when you are disconnected from your inner self. They’ll show you that a slow, plodding (boring) pace may, in fact, be the easiest and best way to arrive at your desired (creative, sensitive) desired destination.

Step Seven is to build in borders, margins, or blank spaces in our lives. Carve out time to breathe, to reflect, to step back from the day to day grind of life and take a break. Create a change of pace. Do nothing for a little while. Experience new places and faces, and sometimes no faces at all. Take off-time, make down-time, in little bits of time, and longer, extended weeks or even (gasp)months. Balance the down times with exciting times, ‘up’ times, ‘on’ times, when you’re in flow, performing at your peak. Distinguish clearly between the on and off times.

I  have shared with you someof my thoughts about  overcoming CSIGY overwhelm. I hope that you have had your creativity jossled –do any of these ideas appeal to you? What other ideas are rumbling around in YOUR HEAD about overcoming overwhelm?  What has worked for you?

Would you please share some of your ideas about overcoming CSIGY Overwhelm with us? Thanks so much!

 If you have never thought of creativity as something that would help you cope with difficulty, you may be inspired by today’s article, “Creating Beauty from Life’s Scraps”. In it, Sharon shares the story of how creative expression helped her cope with chronic illness.  

 You’ll learn how creative expression can diminish physical and emotional pain, release energy, and facilitate healing of mind, body , soul and spirit. We hope you enjoy it and share it with anyone you know who is in the midst of great life challenges.  

I was ready to implode from the pain

“What’s wrong with you? I’m worried about you. All you do is sleep. Are you depressed?”  My husband Gary shook me awake with these encouraging words one Sunday afternoon in the spring of 1999. The searing bone pain had finally lessened enough that I could relax and sleep, but now he was waking me up. “I’m not depressed,” I told him. “I hurt so much I hardly slept at all last night and just now got to sleep. Leave me alone and LET ME SLEEP!”

It had been months since I had had a decent night’s sleep and years since I had normal energy.  Every move felt like I was dragging an elephant behind me. My bones seemed to be on fire. Every touch felt like it would burn right through me. Every sound grated on my spine. At times, I couldn’t walk even a block or climb the stairs at home without crawling up them. My brain was often in a thick pea soup fog like Winnie the Pooh sitting on the log telling himself to “think, think, think” except that my neurotransmitters weren’t connecting.

One day when I felt like I was going to implode from the physical and emotional pain, I went into my sewing room, desperate for relief. I remembered how I used to teach others how to use their creativity to heal emotionally.  Maybe there was something I could do to help myself. I scrounged around for the ugliest, most awful fabrics I could find. Yes! One of my aunts had recently died, and I had inherited some of her fabric. I found some atrocious scraps, just like my life. Then I saw some that I liked. Hmm. My life had not always been this rotten. Maybe I could start with some good stuff and stitch the horrid fabric around it. I couldn’t cut or stitch straight lines.  No matter. My life had no straight lines, either. This piece looked quite primitive, matching my life again. But what about the brain fog? I found a layer of ugly foggy looking fabric and covered over some of the other fabric.

The worse it looked, the better I felt

The process of making ugliness and dreariness surround and eclipse beauty in the fabric just like it did in my life seemed to pull pain, fatigue and even brain fog out of me like a vacuum cleaner. I was amazed, stunned. Shivers ran up and down my back as I grasped what had happened.

Before I had gotten sick, I had used tools like this in my counseling work. I remembered when I had worked alongside my clients as I facilitated “The Quilter’s Journey,” a counseling group in which we did various kinds of creative handwork while we talked. We had experienced and appreciated many emotional and psychological benefits from making things with our hands. But physical benefits?  Perhaps I had only glimpsed the edges of the healing power of creative expression.

Meditating the physical and emotional pain out of me

In between times of working/playing with “Foggy Days and Groggy Nights”,  I would pin the piece on my design wall (a ½ inch sheet of foam insulation covered with felt).  When I was not functional enough to sew, I could at least sit or even lie on the floor and look at it.  I found that meditating on it also facilitated the flow of physical and emotional pain through and out of me.  It nourished my soul. It instructed me. As I listened with my inner ear, I heard words of wisdom. It inspired me in my search for healing. My creative handwork evolved into “contemplative handwork;” an interlocking, interwoven process that facilitated and guided my emotional healing as I also sought physical healing.

Creative and contemplative handwork is a deep creative, spiritual, emotional and psychological practice. The process of making something which demonstrates our inner state and represents our inner thought process reaches deep within us, taps into and brings out emotion and experience that cannot be found or expressed otherwise.

A conduit for releasing stagnating energy

If a picture is worth a thousand words, a picture that the self creates is worth a hundred thousand words. We create something for which we have no words; we express experience and emotion for which we have no explanation. As we contemplate what we have made, words emerge from the depths of soul.  In this way, creative and contemplative handwork became a conduit for energy that otherwise gets blocked and stagnates inside of us. When it stagnates, our bodies become a container for the energy and emotion that stops flowing.  When we have overwhelming life experiences and shut down emotionally and physically, the emotion and the bio-chemicals generated from these emotions can get blocked from exiting the body. They pool like an eddy in a river, going ’round and ’round, building up foam, froth and filth or just growing algae.  Our bodies become the container for all of this unless or until we find a way to open up the flow.

Our hands know something our frontal lobes do not

Repetitious handwork facilitates shifting into alpha brain waves, the flow of deep relaxation, creativity, and peak performance. Creative and contemplative handwork gently breaks loose what has gotten stuck inside. It reaches deep within, latching onto the blocked emotion and energy like a magnet, sliding it softly, almost imperceptibly out of us; healing what hurts and freeing up energy and creativity once more. Our hands have wisdom and skill in facilitating this process that our frontal lobes know nothing of.  We cannot plan this out in a linear, sequential fashion. We have to allow some other part of ourselves to guide and enable this process.

I was nine years old when I learned to sew. My first dress was red with large white polka dots. I loved the act of dress-making and then actually wearing it.  My best memories with my mother came while we sewed together. She was a great teacher so I knew more and sewed better than my high school Home-EC teachers. I made most of my clothes for many years until I graduated from college, got married and started working. How do you fit an impractical hobby such as sewing into a full life? I had no idea. I sewed a few things, took a stained glass class which enabled me to make a stained glass eagle for my husband Gary, lined and made a fabric lid for a large basket. But that was the extent of my creative expression for many years.

From doll-making to quilting

One day in the late 1980′s, my sister-in-law Donna came to me wearing a sheepish grin and holding a small white plastic Levi’s shopping bag in front of her.  “I was going to make a quilt for you using this stuff, but after all these years, I know that if anyone is going to make a quilt from them, it will be you, since you sew and I don’t.”  She took a stack of twenty-some quilt blocks out of the bag, each one made in 1974 by a friend, or one of my or my husband’s family. She had recruited all these people to make blocks for a quilt for me for my wedding! I was thrilled and speechless. Yes, I sewed. But make a quilt?  I had no idea how to make a quilt and creative expression was no longer even on my priority list, let alone any list. So the quilt blocks made for my wedding quilt sat hidden, stored away for years in their Levi’s bag, just waiting.

Rediscovering their presence created an opening for creativity in my life. Suddenly I was thinking about the quilt and looking for opportunities. When I read Clarissa Pinkola Estes’ account of her clients making things with their hands that represented and facilitated their inner work in her book, Women Who Run With The Wolves, it struck a familiar chord in me. I soon began looking for a way to incorporate creative handwork in my counseling work with clients.

One day, I attended a professional meeting featuring a presentation on Journey of the Doll, a class taught by Lesli Verdi, LCSW. I knew instantly that this was what I was looking for. For ten months, I made a variety of craft items, including a life-size doll, listened to stories, participated in a group process and learned how to include creative expression in both my personal life and therapeutic work.

As I completed the Journey of the Doll, I decided to facilitate a counseling group similar to this, but using quilting as the primary media rather than doll making. I put the word out and a few women signed up to start it. But I didn’t know how to quilt. When I found a class, I thought I’d finally complete the wedding quilt that had been waiting to be made for so many years.  But no, it didn’t meet the criteria for the class project. We were given a choice of one of four patterns to use.  It seemed fitting that I chose the Hourglass quilt pattern for this quilt that was so timely. For fabric, I used a stack of fabric samples from the 1970′s, that my mother had reclaimed from a second-hand shop. Everything in the quilt, including the borders and backing, were made from these scraps. It also seemed fitting to use scraps to make a quilt that taught me the basic quilting skills I needed so I could help others transform the scraps of their lives into something beautiful and beneficial.

We often teach what we most need to know

Iyanla Vanzant says we can only teach what we most need to know. Little did I know that I was soon going to need this knowledge and these tools to transform the scraps of my own life.  What an absurd idea: when we’re in the midst of trouble and adversity — loss, illness or tragedy — these circumstances can be a catalyst for great good in our lives! It comes off sounding almost alien or even offensive. Yet it’s a widely held idea. Napoleon Hill’s most famous saying is “In every adversity is the seed of equal or greater benefit.” Saint Paul said, “We know that God will make everything that happens to us come out to our eventual good, as long as we trust Him and remain true to the purpose for which He called us.” But how do we access this seed of greater benefit?  How do we hang in there until the “eventual good” comes?  And then, how do we tap into it?

With creative and contemplative handwork, I stumbled upon a tool that can provide both the means and the pathway of transforming life’s scraps into something not only beneficial, but even beautiful.

If you liked this article and would like a printable version, click here. 

The calendar year is winding down and a new one is quickly creeping up. We may find ourselves thinking about where our lives are compared to where we wanted them to be by now. Many people do this; what’s different for CSIGY’s?  CSIGY’s are likely to set the bar so high that it’s never reachable.  We’re not satisfied with our accomplishments, even when others are. We also may have higher levels of concern and anxiety for the future, based on our broader, deeper awareness of issues and their implications.

December may also be a time of reckoning in terms of relationships. How are our relationships doing? What relationships, some of us may say? We may be acutely aware of the research that shows how much healthier people are who are part of a community. But community can be especially difficult for CSIGY’s. We’re highly sensitive introverts – so taking time and having the energy for interpersonal relationships is very difficult, if not impossible at times. It’s easy for CSIGY’s to feel like misfits.  We may have been, and felt like outsiders since we were children, so we may have concluded that we didn’t belong and couldn’t fit in.

Like the legendary reindeer Rudolph, we may have tried to hide or camouflage our gifts so we would fit in and be accepted. As is often the case, the coping mechanisms we developed in childhood to survive, no longer serve us as adults. It’s time to recognize that the conclusions we made when we were young — that as CSIGY’s we are total misfits and therefore we don’t belong, don’t deserve and can’t have the good that we want — is not accurate.

When we were young, these conclusions may have helped us make sense of  our differences and difficulties. Now they imprison us. And yet they feel so necessary. In fact, there seems to be an inverse relationship here. The more crucial they were to our survival as children, the more essential they seem AND the more they mess us up now. Our differences are real. Our emotions are real.  Here’s the kicker: the conclusions we drew about them, and their meaning is not real. Just because we feel stupid or small or helpless, does not mean that we are. Just because we feel inferior, inadequate or like we don’t belong, does not mean it’s true. After all, we drew these conclusions when we were very young, usually by the age of 3-5. We don’t have to let a four year old run our lives now; yet we do when we live by the decisions we made back then.

Like Rudolph, we can transform our differences into assets by our recognizing our unique gifts, and using them to make a positive contribution. In the legend, Rudolph saved the day by leading the way for Santa to deliver his gifts. The very characteristic that got him ostracized became his entree’ into acceptance.  His nemesis became his greatest asset.

Also like Rudolph, you can stop ignoring your pain; you can stop hiding your gifts so you can maximize them to save your life and the lives of others. What bright red nose is shining in your life? What difference are you trying to hide? What bright red alarm signal in your life are you trying to ignore? What in your life has made you feel like a misfit? That is your goldmine. That is where to look for your gift. This is what you can transform and activate to make a significant difference in the lives of others.

How do we overcome the Holiday Blues and December’s depression?  By befriending — no — embracing the previously feared darkness within that we overcome this darkness and let in the Light. What do I mean by going into the darkness to find the light? On a practical level, one example would be washing out a wound. Several years ago, I fell while riding my bike and landed on one knee. I washed it out, but in my high sensitivity, I didn’t have the ‘stomach’ for the pain involved, so I didn’t scrub it out deeply. I kept telling myself, “tomorrow  it will hurt less, and I’ll do it,” but it didn’t stop hurting until well, until after it healed, with the dirt still embedded in the skin on that knee where it is to this day. I apparently cleansed the dirt in my washing it, as it never got infected. I went partially into the dark, but not all of the way, so I still carry some of that darkness within me.

Another example of going into the darkness to find the light would be exploring our resistance to something we say we want to do. I want to exercise every day, or that’s what I tell myself. But when it comes down to it, it’s too cold outside (or too hot in the summer), I don’t want to stop other things I’m doing (or they take longer than I had anticipated, and I don’t want to stop until I’m finished) so I can go to bed earlier so I can get up earlier so I can exercise before I go to work.  What is that glass ceiling in my life between what I say I want and what I want ENOUGH to give up the other things I will have to give up in order to achieve them?  I can only find out what it is by exploring the dark recesses of my life, by digging and scrubbing deep enough to ferret out the depths of what is going on inside me.

And how can that be done? There are many ways, probably as many ways as there are people. Journaling, praying, meditating, talking things over with a friend or family member, reading stories, essays and books that others have written about the area we are struggling with, the list could go on and on.  You may have noticed that one of my favorite ways to dig deeper in my inner life is to combine several approaches in one. I make something that metaphorically represents some aspect of my dilemma, and follow that artistically and imaginatively until it takes me to a new place. In that new place, I have new awareness, new insight, and new energy to take back to my life and apply to my dilemma. Also, as I pursue creative projects, sometimes a symbolic or metaphorical connection with some issue in my life becomes apparent as I work on it. I have shared a number of these in previous newsletters.

I also like to walk in nature and meditate on what I see and hear and consider what lessons it has for me and the dilemmas I am facing. Another of my favorites is stream-of-consciousness journaling, where I write every thought that enters my head, and I do it for a designated number of pages or amount of time. That can take my thought process deeper or broader, or make new connections, and in an uncanny way, transport me to a new mental/emotional/spiritual place.

I’m wondering what YOUR favorite ways are to “enter the darkness in order to find the light”.  If you’re willing to share a few words about this, please post here by clicking on the link below that reads Be the first to comment.

Do you dread the holidays? Eagerly anticipate them? Do both at once? Here’s CSIGY (Creative, Sensitive, Introverted, Gifted) Tips and Tools to Stay Balanced Through the Holidays:

Hollywood’s images of perfect family holidays set up unrealistic expectations that can never be met. Let’s face it, we can’t possibly measure up to the Norman Rockwell or “It’s a Wonderful Life” ideal. So why not take the pressure off to be perfect and enjoy the season? If your well-being has become the last priority in your life, it’s time to learn how to EEEK your way through the holidays.”

EEEK stands for Experience it, Explore it, learn to Embrace it, and Kreate something with it to heal our lives. These are the mind-body-spirit skills that will enable you to heal yourself. Doing Creative Handwork like quilting, bead work, whittling, metalwork or knitting helps you to “download” your emotions; and by turning it into what I call Contemplative Handwork, you experience its power to heal your life. This is hands-on Play Therapy for Adults.

Many CSIGY’s eagerly anticipate the holidays and dread them at the same time. They have high expectations of themselves or others that are impossible to meet. There is too much to do, and it all seems important. Creative, Sensitive, Introverted and/or Gifted people also want to DO it all, yet feel torn because they need solitude and quiet to connect with the deep spirituality and soulfulness of the holidays – and they may feel empty and the holidays may be void of meaning without this deep spiritual connection.

Winter is deepening, and with it may come an instinct to hibernate, which also conflicts with keeping up with holiday events and responsibilities. With the waning light may come awareness of inner darkness as well. Grief and loss can loom large as others celebrate. Need I say more?

Would you like some Tips and Tools for staying balanced through the holidays?

I am providing a Mini-Playshop for those in the Denver area to provide them.

Those who attend will learn:

• Ten Ways to Maximize Your Holiday Happiness
• Seven Ways to Manage Your Holiday Expectations
• How to Activate Your Creativity to heal your life-even during the holidays
• Navigating Tangled Family Connections and Expectations
• Coping With Grief During the Season to Be Jolly

Click here to learn more so you can stay balanced through the holidays this year!

Not in the Denver area? Click here to get our free report, Holiday Stress Tip Sheet

Please post your concerns here by clicking on the link below that reads Be the first to comment.

Before we consider that, another question begs asking: What’s a CSGY? CSGY is an acronym for Creative, (Highly) Sensitive, Gifted people. It can be further specified with CSIGY and CSEGY, for introverts or extroverts.  I like to pronounce it Csiggy or Cseggy. Someone has suggested Ziggy or Zeggy.

To address the issue of getting unstuck, I’d like to share some life lessons that are currently showing up for me. My present Creative & Contemplative Handwork project, Unraveling Chaos, includes satin stitching. Satin stitching is a zigzag stitch with a very short distance between stitches. It’s supposed to be so smooth that it looks like satin, hence the name. I’ve been having trouble with some of these stitches getting stuck and piling up on top of each other. What a mess!

When something like this happens, my first inclination is to take the stitches out and start over. But since this art piece is also a metaphor for life, I’ve refrained myself. In life I can’t stop, back up and start over, so I’ve limited my options here to those available on this planet. I’ve then had a choice to make: give up on the project or find a way to get unstuck and resume normal stitching. Metaphor for life? Yes, indeed. My commitment to reality has also meant that I’ve had to face my frustration, anger, guilt, fear and shame about its many imperfections.

Like many CSGY’s, I want what I do to be perfect. No, I NEED it to be perfect. If what I do isn’t perfect, then I’m not perfect, and I’m supposed to be flawless. Oh, I know that’s not logical, but what is? I know in my frontal lobes that no one is perfect, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling like I’m supposed to be perfect. It also doesn’t change the fact that I am aware of many things that others aren’t. This leads to others thinking that what I’ve done is perfect (and telling me so) when I know it’s far from it.

Getting unstuck first requires me to identify when the stitches are piling on top of each other.  When I don’t recognize that stitches are piling up, they pile higher, deeper and wider. The quicker I know that I’m getting stuck, the quicker I can get unstuck. This requires me to overcome perfectionism and see things the way they are rather than the way I want them to be or think they ought to be.

There’s a statue of three monkeys in my office: “See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil.” Maybe it was as prominent in your childhood as it was in mine.  Maybe not. It can be useful in teaching children to stay safe and in preventing gossip and negativity. On the other hand, it can hold us in Fantasy-Land. When this happens, we also need another set of Monkeys that allows us to connect with reality. This new set of monkeys brings this message:

Monkey Magic

• See what you see.
• Hear what you hear.
• Feel what you feel.
• Know what you know.
• Think your own thoughts.
• Say what you need to say.
• Do what you need to do.
• Be where you are.
• Be who you (really) are.

When these new monkeys set the tone for our lives, we can catch on when things are off kilter much more quickly than we do when we’re out of touch with reality. These Nine Magical Monkeys give us permission to open up to all of life.  Welcoming them is the first step in getting unstuck. Click here to get a FREE printable file of Monkey Magic.

On a practical level, how can we embrace these nine magical monkeys? It starts with tuning in to what is going on inside of us and around us.  There’s a skill to this, just as there is with anything new with music, we practice scales and chords. With physical strength, we can do push-ups and sit-ups or lift weights. Here, we ask ourselves, “What’s happening?” and “How am I feeling?” Feelings include body sensations and emotions.  Just as with musical skill and physical development, it helps to practice daily.

It takes less than ten minutes a day to develop a habit of openness and awareness.  It’s done best when we use a consistent time of day. Many CSGY’s find that writing down their discoveries reinforces the habit, involves both the kinesthetic and visual brains, and paves the way to return to it later, review what’s recorded and identify trends or patterns.  To make this easier, I’ve developed a “Daily Tune-in Tool” that many CSGY’s have found helpful in developing the awareness habit. Click here to get your FREE printable file.

Our next edition will share other CSGY Tips and Tools for Getting Unstuck, that are also emerging from my encounter with Unraveling Chaos.

To leave a comment, please click on the link below that reads Be the first to comment.

The next moment, I was listening with my memory. I heard:

“Hands on myself.
What have I here?
This is my hatracker, my mother dear.
Hatracker, hatracker,
Micky, Micky, Micky moo.
That’s what we learned in the school.”

Suddenly I was seven years old again, sitting in the back seat of a red and white 1957 Ford Fairlane station wagon. I was on the road to first grade, and my eleven year old brother Glenn, sitting beside me in the back seat, was on the road to fifth grade. We lived in Appleton, Wisconsin, and my mother drove us thirty miles to Green Bay every day to get us to the church school she and my father had chosen for us.

Glenn, being the older, first-arrived one, had the preferred seat, behind the driver.  He had the same view as the driver, or so I thought. He could see the oncoming cars better than I could. But I could see the fields and the road signs better. Small compensation, the action was on the road, not in the fields. Between us on the back seat was a box with binoculars, toys and games. Anything to keep us occupied and prevent our bickering: “Don’t touch me!” “Don’t look at me!” “Get off my side of the car!”

Our proper preacher’s wife of a mother had a great variety of weapons in her arsenal to combat anarchy in the back seat. She taught us silly songs she learned as a summer camp counselor in her college days, long before we came on the scene.  She got us singing mostly when it was dark, (which was much of the time, during the northern Wisconsin winter). The songs ranged from “Jesus Loves Me” and “99 Bottles of root beer on the wall”  to “The Bear Went Over the Mountain,” and “Herman the Frog” (who sat on the bump on the log near the hole in the bottom of the sea) to finally, “The Hatracker Song”.

We also took turns telling stories. One person started it, then one by one we each added a sentence. Each person had to repeat the whole story and then make their addition. We kept it going until it got too ridiculous to follow or we got sick of that story. I didn’t like the story game much because I was usually the first one out by messing it up. After that, we started a new story or sang about Herman on his log or the Hatracker’s version of school.

In the daylight, Mom started games of Zit, counting horses we saw in the countryside.  We called out “Zit!” each time we saw a horse. The first one to call “Zit!” claimed that horse. If you called “Zitter-zit” you claimed all the horses you could see at once. Anyone who saw a cemetery and called it out ended the game, as that buried everyone’s horses. Whoever had the most horses  when the cemetery was found won the game. Then Mom started an Alphabet game: completing the alphabet-in order, of course-from letters we saw on signs and other cars.  Or she said, “Oh, look, there’s a rabbit!” and pointed to a cloud, asking us what we saw. To this day, we both look in the sky “to see what we can see”.

We also counted makes and models of cars we saw on the four-lane highway.  Glenn took the Fords, and I the Chevy’s, or vice versa.  As a result, I could – and still can – identify makes and models of cars better than most guys. That’s an important skill for a girl to have; you never know when you’ll need it. The winner would be the one who had the highest count, with no cheating. (I never questioned who would know if we cheated). We played I-Spy, hiding our imaginary selves in places visible from the car, or at night, inside the car with the others guessing where we had hidden. Our turn would last as long as no one could find us.  Why did Mom always get the longest turns? It wasn’t fair!

What an odd thing reflection is.  It leads us along bunny trails into the deep dark woods of memory and sometimes ends in hidden treasure. It led me to the key of this quilt’s meaning, and at the same time, to the roots of lessons I needed to relearn now that I had originally learned on that road to first grade.

If I had been driving my kids thirty miles each way to and from school, I’d probably have been grumpy and complained about it.  But Mom never did, at least not when I was around. She made it fun for us, and kept her own sanity at the same time. Did she know that she was showing us how to open our eyes and look, really see, not just stare past or through things?

Did she know that she was teaching us to see with the eyes of an artist?  She commented on shades of light, colors, shapes, and textures. She taught us to notice what was happening around us, and to see what was different today than it had been yesterday. She taught us to look beyond the surface of things and see what others did not see. She taught us that what we saw was valid, even and especially if no one else saw it.  She taught us to multi-task without multi-tasking, develop our imaginations, exercise our memories, learn how to tell one make and model of a car from another and do it all in the guise of having fun.

Coming back to my current reality, I looked at my almost-finished quilt, and I realized that back on the road to first grade, Mom also showed us how to take whatever path we’re on in life and  make it enjoyable, or better yet, even fun.  Through music, humor, art and games she turned a long, dull ride into an adventure.  This quilt started as many tiny scraps cut from a small remnant of fabric.  Now they were transformed into a work of art. I made this quilt as a thank-you gift. Making it was fun, lowered my stress, developed my creativity, nourished and healed my soul like water in a desert. I hadn’t known until now that I was multi-tasking without multi-tasking, too.

Goose bumps traveled up and down my spine and my breath got stuck in my throat as it hit me. Ironically, until now, in spite of her many paintings and things she sewed, Mom’s legacy was less visible to me than Dad’s. My mother’s artistic creativity is as much a part of my life and my work as my father’s deep thinking and focus on emotional and spiritual healing. This must be what the Celestine Prophecy is referring to when it says that a part of every person’s mission in life is to synthesize the distinct missions of both parents. The combined lessons and skills from both of my parents are the essence of what my life and my work is about.  And I learned these things not in first grade, not in graduate school, but on the road to first grade.

As I see it, here’s the lessons I learned on the road to first grade:

• If it has to be done, make it fun.
• Look everywhere and see all there is to see, even if no one else sees it.
• See life through the eyes of an artist.
• Look for life’s colors, shapes, textures, and shades of light and dark.
• Don’t shut down when you face problems; open up to ALL of life’s experiences.
• Learn the same thing as often as necessary until you know it by heart.
• Multi-task without multi-tasking, make what you do accomplish several things at once.
• Take whatever comes to you in life and transform it into a beautiful adventure.

“Micky, Micky, Micky moo.
That’s what we learned in the school.”

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An hourglass quilt block I had made from scraps contained too many mistakes to use, so I pitched it. The triangles didn’t have points; I could have done better when I was nine years old. The parallel lines weren’t parallel–they would have made a good class project for “Perspective in Art.” In one place, the fabric ran out before it reached the edge of the block. Yes indeed, it was beyond repair. Toss it, I must. Before garbage pick-up day, I needed a piece of fabric to practice on, and I didn’t want to waste new fabric. I had just the thing! I retrieved the square I had thrown away, thinking, “I can’t make it any worse than it is”.

I plopped blotches of color here and there, with no rhyme or reason, except that I purposely covered up a few of its errors. After continuing to use it for several practice sessions, Idubbed it Chaos: it looked chaotic and it matched my life. I was recovering from chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia. At least, I hoped I was. I was better than I had been, but still not well enough to work more than a few hours a week. I couldn’t anticipate if I’d have energy on any given day. I felt like I was stuck on a teeter-totter, going up and down in the same place, with no predictability. Some days I’d have energy and be able to do a few things. Then I’d crash and be too tired to do anything but lie on the couch for days at a time.

Yes, this was better than taking all day to do one load of laundry. But having my stamina return and then vanish in the blink of an eye was maddening, frightening, and oh, so chaotic. It left my head spinning. Would my strength come back this time? If so, how long would it take? What would I miss out on or who would I let down in the mean time? Would it ever come back to stay? Would I ever have a normal life again?

In the midst of this turmoil, I was having great fun. I could sew on this rehearsal block on good days and crash days, since there was no pressure to do it right. I practiced fusible appliqué, machine free-motion embroidery with metallic threads, and then machine free-motion quilting, also with metallic threads. My machine purred on happily for weeks, then months. As I stitched, it was as if I entered another realm, where all was peace and light; where space and time longer existed. Pain, fatigue, fear, and worry were far behind.

Each time I finished sewing, I’d pin Chaos on my design wall. As it hung there, one day I noticed that the dreadful blunders no longer glared at me. Sometimes I couldn’t even find them. Then it hit me—I couldn’t throw this away! It was too beautiful to discard. In fact, it would make a great center block for a medallion quilt. I could see it now: four borders, the same colors as the flowers I had appliquéd and embroidered. Yes! I got excited as I visualized the finished wall hanging.Eventually, it was time to add the borders. But wait! It needed something else first. The metallic threads didn’t stand out enough. I finally found some over-sized gold moire´ piping, and placed it around my reclaimed centerpiece. Then I could attach the borders that matched the flowers. But it still didn’t feel right, so I added another layer of three dimensional borders on top of the cotton ones. I wanted something soft and comforting, so these were made of chiffon and georgette. (I could hear the quilt judges now: “Inappropriate use of fabrics”)!

Finally I quilted and bound my reclaimed throw-away block. While I worked on it, it seemed to talk to me. It spoke of those awful things in my life that hovered in the air space around me …

• Humiliating, abysmal failures,like not being well enough to work more than a few hours a week
• Chicken Little times when I had held back in fear for no reason
• Missed deadlines due to inattention, over-ambition or procrastination
• Botched, dropped or neglected opportunities
• Worries about my health and if my life was worth living like this
• Miserable hurts I’d received.
• And yes, horrid ones I’d given, too

I saw that these issues in my life were all like this textile square I had gotten rid of. As I sewed on it and listened with my inner ear, I heard that this throw-away block, and my life, too–could be reclaimed, with some creativity, work (sometimes spelled P-L-A-Y) and time.

Grace showed up, too-in the form of what looked like an angel to me. There she was, a scrap of embroidered cloth nestled in the upper chamber of the metaphoric hourglass. How fitting! I’ve struggled with time all my life. My internal clock, if there is one, runs at half the speed (or less) than everyone else’s. I’m in tune with chairos, or seasonal time, not chronos, or clock time. My Scrap Angel said to let go of trying to control and even of having to know the timing of events in my life. She suggested that I trust, relax and enjoy the ride.

That quiet voice of inner wisdom continued to speak softly as I stitched and also as I gazed at the altered threads pinned to my design wall. A whisper urged me that all was not lost in my life, just as all had not been lost for my hideous quilt block. This fabric piece has recovered from significant setbacks. Yes, I had, too.

None of my blunders mattered any more. What mattered was my ability to use my creativity to transform this adversity into advantage. I had seen the metamorphosis of this worthless piece-of-junk into a shining, vibrant, work-of-art right before my eyes. What’s more, my hands had guided the cloth as my ancient relic of a sewing machine stitched along. I began to believe that if I could reclaim this hopeless wreck through my own playful work, I could retrieve my life, too. All I had to do was to follow the same process. Oh, no. What was that process? It was …

• Retrieving my horrid work from the rubbish
• Tossing out the rules about what could or couldn’t, should or shouldn’t be done, or how it could or should be done.
• Playing with it; having fun while doing what interested and intrigued me
• Listening with my inner ear: opening up enough to receive guidance–and follow it.
• Risking enough to transfer this counsel to my life.

One day it occurred to me to write down what I was hearing. The result? Now I have instruction and inspiration as I continue to make mistakes, meet challenges and encounter unexpected reverses in life. Here’s the messages that I caught as I created, and later as I contemplated my creation:

• Don’t throw it away just because it’s not perfect.
• Lighten up; have some fun and take some risks with it.
• Build on its tedious, yet essential structure.
• Transform the multitude of mistakes with loveliness.
• Include glowing images of things you love.
• Discover its vibrant themes and develop them.
• Add shimmer and sparkle until your eyes shine.
• Surround it with strong, broad borders.
• Create a cuddly, cozy container for the chaos.
• Make it elegant and regal, fit for a queen or king, despite its randomness and imperfection.
• Let the angel in the hourglass reveal that time is in her hands.
• Enter her timeless place often, and she’ll guide you peacefully through life’s chaos.
• Open your heart to the healing power of
• Love, Beauty,Wisdom and Grace.

I hope my Scrap Angel inspires you to reclaim some of your creative projects, and reclaim your life while you’re at it. May you face your cumulative errors and misfortunes, knowing that no matter how chaotic and imperfect things begin, they can end beautifully.

Would you be willing to share some of your stories and creative results? Let’s encourage and inspire each other as we reclaim our creative mistakes and our lives. Please comment using the link below.

I hate Mother’s Day. Awful though it sounds, I’ve hated mother’s day for a very long time.  I’ve felt guilty about it. I also know it’s not politically correct, so I’ve not said out loud. But it’s time to admit it. I hate Mother’s Day.

I first hated it when I was in my twenties. I felt hurt and angry at my mother for the many things that she had done or not done that had hurt me. The more I looked, the more I saw of this. I didn’t want to be a hypocrite, so it was hard to say all the sweet, sappy things on the greeting cards.  How could I be dishonest and say things I didn’t feel?

What I know now is that I was mostly angry with my mother for not being the perfect archetypal mother. She did not fill the shoes of the Fairy Godmother or the Mother of God or the Great Goddess. She was just human, dang-it. She made mistakes, she had weaknesses. I was appalled. She had great gaps in who she was and what she could accomplish and do for me  and be for me. And I resented it. I wanted her to be the Virgin Mary, the Fairy Godmother and the Great Goddess all wrapped into one.

I have also hated Mothers Day because I was angry at my mother’s mother. She was rigid and perfectionistic, judgmental and grumpy and I couldn’t and didn’t want to live up to her standards. I also was afraid that I would become like her. Horror of horrors, I saw myself in her. We  had similar temperaments and personality styles. She was introverted and perfectionistic, and whenever she learned or discovered something, she thought it applied to everyone around her.  She wanted them to follow it, too. She had a strange sense of humor that could be hurtful to others when she wasn’t aware of it, and apparently didn’t intend it. Oh, shoot. I AM just like that-all of it. I was afraid that I would embody her weaknesses, and none of her strengths. I didn’t know what her strengths were. All I could see were her glaring weaknesses. Somehow I missed that she was also a voracious reader, intelligent, thoughtful, caring, creative and sensitive. Hmm. Somehow she passed those traits along to me, too.

I also have hated Mother’s Day because I was afraid that I’d make some of the same mistakes my father’s mother made. She married someone who seemed rough, loud, angry a lot and scary to me when I visited them as a young child. She had lived in poverty much of her life. She died young – in her sixties. She passed on huge issues to her seven daughters and three sons about sexuality and women’s roles and low self esteem and I didn’t want any of these gross flaws. Mother’s Day brought all of this to my attention.

Then there was my mother’s sister. I was also afraid that I’d be like her and struggle with depression and low self esteem, and live on the low side of life like she did. I didn’t want to have the dysfunctional attitudes and practices about money that she had, or the emotional and physical sensitivities and  trouble in relationships that she did.

When I had children of my own, I hated Mothers Day even more. I knew I didn’t live up to what I needed to be as a mother. I knew I made huge mistakes. I could see where I’d missed the mark. I have huge gaps in who I am.  I know I’ve not been there for my kids in ways that has negatively affected their development. I have passed on to them many of the family issues that have horrified me. In many of my attempts to not make the same mistakes as my parents made, I flipped the coin over and made the opposite ones.  Most of the time, these thoughts could stay on the periphery, but Mother’s Day would pull all of this smack into my consciousness, front and center.

I have hated Mother’s Day also because all I ever wanted for Mother’s Day was a day off. I didn’t want one more bouquet of flowers or another family dinner. It wasn’t that I didn’t like them. It was that I wanted a day or (if I was thinking big) a weekend off, to myself – all by myself. I never had solitude when my kids were little. That’s what I longed for more than anything. And I didn’t know how to get it.

Now that my kids are grown, Mother’s Day is really complicated. There’s three or four generations and kids with spouses to balance schedules and emotional needs. This is something that is common to all families; how can it be so hard?  Why can’t we just gather together and celebrate life and love and motherhood and the mystery that life continues in spite of our mistakes, bumbling,  ignorance, immaturity, and shortcomings?

As I reflect on it, I now see that I have received much from my mother and all of my foremothers. In spite of their unmistakable faults, they have passed on many wonderful things, too. My mother’s mother, together with her husband, founded a clinic that’s now a hospital in Juliaca, Peru, on the shores of Lake Titicaca. She was a risk-taker who took her six month old daughter from southern California to the high Andes. She paid a huge price in her own health, and also in the loss of an infant son who was born and died while she lived there. She and my grandfather both had major health problems while living there, and so returned after just one term of service, leaving the work they had started for others to carry on. She had a love of risk-taking, a passion for service, for pioneering new ways of helping and serving others that I now carry within me and live out.

My other grandmother? She had wanted to attend college, but became pregnant before she had a chance to go. She soon became pregnant again and again; she bore ten children, and took another one in to raise as her own.  What did she do when her goals were thwarted?  She kept her great love of learning, and passed it on.  It still burns bright in her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Most of her children attended college; several of them have advanced degrees. Her children have been all over the globe as teachers and missionaries. She didn’t live through them, but she taught them and encouraged them. I also remember her letters that came regularly when I was a child. They would describe the flowers growing in her garden, the birds and what they were doing, and what was happening with the other family members. Her love of nature and of gardening was picked up by my father, and passed on to me.

I have trudged along, carrying all this baggage, bumping into it every Mother’s Day. I’ve not wanted to acknowledge it. I was embarrassed and ashamed to have it. I also hadn’t known what to do with it. Now that I’ve dug around in it, I’ve discovered that there’s more than meets the eye. In looking past the surface of the imperfections of my foremothers and myself as a mother, I’ve found great blessings, and deep roots of love, creativity, intelligence, and sensitivity.

I find that my foremothers lived lives of service and blessed others even though their lives didn’t proceed as they had originally planned. They had the ability to see great possibilities, but they were able to let go of achieving their great and grand ambitions, and be content with what they could actually do in this life. Not that they accomplished nothing, but they relinquished their perfectionistic tendencies enough to do what they could, even if that was less than they desired to do. They dug deep enough to tap into Life itself and pass it on. That’s something to remember, celebrate and emulate.  With this understanding, I no longer need to hate it; from now on, I can say I Love Mother’s Day.

When we are willing to open our minds and hearts, we can follow the flow of our thoughts and feelings until they reach a resolution.  It is only when we dig deep enough to debride and cleanse our inner wounds that we find the buried treasure essential to heal our lives, feed our souls, and fund our dreams.

When you’re personally involved in any life-threatening event, you experience direct trauma. Vicarious traumatization can occur when you read about it or see it on TV.  If you’re highly sensitive, creative, and/or gifted, you experience both direct and vicarious traumatization more easily and deeply than other people do.  So what can you do to minimize the effects of trauma, and to heal from it?

According to quantum physics, chaos theory and string theory, everything in the universe including your body, is energy. In this context, minimizing the effects of trauma and healing from it come at least partially from how you direct or channel the flow of energy within your body. But in this culture, you likely have learned to stop the flow of your feelings, both body sensations and emotions.  Maybe you’ve been told, “Don’t be angry. Don’t be sad. Don’t be afraid. Don’t cry. Don’t yell. Don’t, don’t, don’t.” If so, before long, you can’t. And you may not be aware that you’re stifling your normal, healthy responses, and hindering the flow of energy in your body.

Instead, you could benefit from accepting, feeling your feelings, and allowing them to flow through you. Feelings are a lot like ocean waves. Ocean waves come and go without your permission. Feelings come and go-also without your permission. Waves are always there, whether you like them or not. Feelings are also always there, like it or not. Waves respond to the magnetic pull of the moon, the weather, and events around you.  Feelings respond to invisible forces of nature, and to events within and outside of you. If there’s an earthquake on the floor of the ocean, it can cause a tsumani on the other side of the earth. If there’s an earthquake in your life, that can release a tsunami size flood of feeling within you. It may help you to know that these ‘abnormal’ feelings are normal in response to your abnormal circumstances.

Here’s three things you can DO that will help you as a creative, sensitive, gifted person facilitate the flow of feelings within you:

1. Talk it. Talking about what has happened, what distressed young womanyou saw, what you heard, what you felt and are still feeling is critical. Talk about it with everyone who will listen. This is why support groups are so valuable.  People come together who have experienced similar things, and who understand each other. You each help each other to heal as you have an opportunity to tell your stories and to listen to each other. Remembering past traumas can also be important, as it builds hope that you again can heal, grow and recover from hard times, like you have done in the past.
2. Walk it. Trauma triggers the flight-or-fight woman runnign with dogresponse in the body, which releases a flood of biochemicals into our blood stream.  These need to be used up; exercise is a great way to do this. In addition, it’s important to find natural ways to switch the body into the Relaxation Response, rather than relying completely on things like drugs and alcohol. Progressive relaxation, deep breathing, yoga, tai chi, chi gong, muscle stretching exercises, prayer and medication are some healthy ways to promote the Relaxation Response.
3. Chalk it. Get creative, Make something with your creative hands hands that represents  your traumatic experience. This brings the process out of your head and into your body. Making something that shows what you are feeling, physically and emotionally also pulls the physical and emotional feelings through and out of your body and into the object you are making. This facilitates the flow of energy in your body and in your life.

This is somewhat like opening a floodgate at the side of a dam,  releasing water in a controlled manner. This keeps an uncontrolled flood of water from overflowing the dam or demolishing it, which would then destroy everything downstream from it. Releasing small amounts of emotion frequently in a structured, controlled way can also prevent huge uncontrolled floods from occurring.

A key to minimizing trauma and healing from it is to remember this: In abnormal circumstances, abnormal feelings are normal. It’s OK to feel whatever you are feeling. Feel it, and release it. Get moving physically.  Express it verbally and creatively. Get professional help if these aren’t enough.  You’ll soon be on your way to recovery.

For my full article, “How to Cope With Trauma”, click here.

My article, “Tips for Helping Gifted Kids and Teens Cope With Trauma,” was just published in the SENGifted.org Newsletter. To read it, click here.