My friend and fellow blogger, Lori, with her great post on Finding a New Creative Outlet and Finding Your Passion After 50 reminded me I wanted to share my new creative adventure with you.

While I believe what Lori shared in that trying something creative may help guide us to our passion, I also believe creativity opens channels of awareness and can bring about a new perspective we’d not have considered. If that leads to a purpose, that is wonderful. But if it also helps us to pause and learn more about ourselves for the sake of gaining strength in who we are, or wish to be, then how cool is this?

I really can’t explain it, but about two months ago I felt this calling to play with art journaling. It began when I came across something called blackout poetry.

I love words and the first time I tried blackout poetry I was surprised what came from it. It definitely was a way in which to put words and sentences together I’d not thought to do. I also believe what I wrote was speaking to a part of myself that had insight to offer. This is when the idea of art journaling entered the picture as I wanted to combine what I’d written through blackout poetry with collage, which led to opening to the idea of art journaling.

I also like the idea of art journaling, because it oftentimes combines collage with other mixed media such as paint, paper, stencils, you name it, it can be put on an art journal page. I enjoy putting different images together, which often speak to the subconscious parts of myself. This is something I stumbled upon during a time of seeking and then felt called to become trained in a process called SoulCollage® in 2014. Collaging on 5 x 8 cards, my SoulCollage® cards have definitely helped me along my life’s path, often serving as an insightful guide as I’ve worked through different transitional times in my life. My love of using oracle cards as a self-discovery tool, no doubt plays a part in this also.

So many of us sense life in a visual way and art journaling, SoulCollage®, oracle cards, etc. can guide us to see our stories in motion and how it is playing out, and how we can best move forward when we are feeling challenged or stuck. And it helps to strengthen our intuition muscle.

Combining my love of all of this and writing too, well, art journaling feels like a natural fit for me right now. It’s helping me step out of my comfort zone in working with paints, inks, etc. When I made this first page I’m sharing with you today, it was two hours later, and a half hour past Gidget’s dinner time, that I hadn’t even realized how much time had gone by. I was in another world and my soul was full of abundance! And luckily, Gidget forgave me for her late supper.  🙂

The quote that came through the blackout poetry I wrote is meaningful for me as it speaks of letting Spirit do its work through me, but in partnership with, so that I may remember the importance of inner work as necessary to free my heart when I feel fear or overwhelmed, and expressing it, whether through my writing or some other creative outlet such as art journaling.

Do you do art journaling? If so, I’d love to hear about resources that have inspired you, or if you wish to share a page from your art journal, I’d love to see it. I’ve been addicted to watching videos on others doing the process of art journaling also – so meditative!

Here’s to creativity for opening us in beautiful ways,

XO

Barbara