Creating Our World
Art journaling is supporting me more deeply than regular journaling these days. It’s a form of quiet contemplation, a way of expressing myself separate of words. It’s also a welcome relief for this predominantly left-brained girl. You know the saying, ‘how you do anything is how you do everything,’ right? It’s evidence that we’ve sometimes got to do different things to get different results.
The art in my journals has mostly been images and symbols that mean nothing, inherently. They don’t even ‘go together’ but I like they way they look together. It makes me think how much life is like that, how seemingly random events string together to create a cohesive story, because how could it not? Our precious human lives are random, yet they make sense in the context of the whole.
Art journaling is calming; it brings me peace, happiness and contentment. Looking at completed spreads make me feel productive, though western society wouldn’t necessarily call art productive. I see my life’s unfoldment through my journals (and now art journals).
Creation is our birthright; it is a gift from God. Born in his image and likeness, it’s what we are called to do as human beings on this earth. We create by procreating, in the most primal sense. Then we create family structure and cohesion. We create our homes. We create our processes – how we do anything. We even create our work, whether we work for someone else or for ourselves. Everything on this earth is ultimately God’s creation because WE are God’s creation.
And creation makes me think of my mom … I used to think there was such a void in my life with nothing from my mom left behind for me. Now I see that’s not entirely true. Yes, I wanted her words. I wanted journals to devour when she passed. I wanted her thoughts. I wanted to know how she felt. But that wasn’t her way. These days, as I create, I see I get my need to create from my mom. While she wasn’t a writer or journaler, she did, in fact create. She made jewelry; she knitted, cross stitched, learned to play the dobro. Yes, creation was very much in her and that realization is very settling to me.
Soul fabric started as a personal blog, just for me, then it turned into a resource for others … yoga, writing, embodiment, journaling. Those things will continue, but I’m noticing a huge pull inward too. Personal creation. I’ve read the statement, “write for yourself” too many times to count, so I’m taking heed. This is my process. This is my life. Unfolding. As it should be. I am grateful.
