joyful pause

The Art of the Pause

Posted by Barbara Techel

Mid-summer I began dabbling in mixed media collage. It’s a whole new way for me to embrace pausing in yet a different way. Like writing, when I’m in the flow, nothing else can enter my brain. I’m finding when choosing different layers to collage (papers, paint, and images) I’m not really thinking of anything, but just being with what is.

Yesterday I finished this collage on canvas to support the fact I recently renamed my writing cottage to Joyful Pause Cottage. This 10 x 12 space — a ‘room of my own’ and separate from my house —sits off the southeast corner of our deck. It was built in 2009 as a labor of love by my hubby as a place I could come to as I began my journey of writing two children’s books, three memoirs, and I don’t know how many blog posts I’ve written to date. But let’s just say LOTS!

But it’s become so much more than where I write, that I had been feeling this inner nudge to change its name for quite some time. Joyful pause is also about the joyful paws that have been part of my tribe in helping me evolve over the years — especially three special needs dachshunds. And if you look at the bottom of the collage you’ll see a paw print image to represent each one of them — Frankie, Joie, and Gidget. All three of their sweet and loving spirits remain here in this space with me.

Joyful Pause is now the space in which I collage, write, provide oracle readings via Zoom with clients and for my Youtube channel, meditate, dream of possibilities, and take joyful pause moments to glance out my windows to be inspired by my gardens or connect with the birds, bunnies, turkey, deer, or squirrels that I’ve been blessed to see here in my yard often.

xo,

Barbara

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Happy New Year – Tuning into the Messages of My Winged Friends

Posted by Barbara Techel
Happy New Year – Tuning into the Messages of My Winged Friends
A Winged Friend Waits for Daybreak

I took this photo of this sweet, little bird yesterday about a half hour before the sun came up.

Today as I think about the New Year just a few hours away, resolutions are the furthest thing from my mind. They usually are. I don’t set them any longer.

But I did give thought about how I want my life to look like going forward. And I want to live more like my winged friends — the birds, butterflies and dragonflies.

I want to be more open to the flow of life — and not hanging on so tight to things and circumstances I don’t have control over.

A few weeks ago, a friend booked a private SoulCollage® workshop with me. She wanted to set her intentions for the New Year.

As we sat in my new Joyful Pause studio in the lower level of my home, I invited her to think about how she wants to feel in 2016.

While I think it’s great to set goals and intentions, I believe what’s really at the core of those intentions, is how we want to feel.

While she worked on her SoulCollage® card, I intuitively worked on mine without setting an intention really, but instead giving thought to how I want to feel.

As we perused the many images I have set up on tables, an image of a yellow butterfly tugged at my heart. I knew I needed to work with her in creating my card.

And this is my completed card below after working with several images before it felt right and I glued them down.

After my friend and I created our cards, we journaled with them also. This is what my card had to say to me:

I am one who wants to flow with ease along the path of faith and trust in what spirit has in store for me. I want to allow my path to unfold more organically, learning to let go of trying to control outcomes. By doing so, I will feel as light and free as a butterfly, enjoying the ride, and all the gifts that come with expanding my wings.

And that’s it really, I want to feel lighter in letting go of worries and accepting life as it is presented to me.

So while I don’t have resolutions really, I am making a mental note to myself, with my SoulCollage® card I call Freedom Butterfly as my visual reminder of how I want to feel starting right this moment…and gently and softly fly into the New Year.

I shall stop now and then to perch upon a safe place to land, and sit silence as a way of reminding myself to keep my wings open to what Spirit has in store for me.

Wishing you all the best in 2016 and may your heart fill to the top with all that makes your life meaningful for you!

—

graphicI’m really excited about facilitating a SoulCollage® workshop on January 16th in my new studio, Joyful Pause. I hope to encourage others to give thought to how they want to feel in the New Year, too.

If you are interested in joining me for this creative and fun workshop, please check out the details here or click on purple graphic on the left.

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My Joyful Pause Moments: Weekly Recap

Posted by Barbara Techel

One of the reasons I came up with my daily “joyful pause moment” is so that I will hopefully encourage you to look for your own joyful moment in each day. We can get so caught up in our busy lives and tend to have blinders on to all the beauty around us. Often times it only takes a moment to notice something that makes us smile and brings us joy. Mine are easily triggered by my dogs, animals and nature.

With that said, I must say I got caught up in my busy life this week and forgot to look for some of those moments. And you know what? I feel a difference in myself. Though for the most part I’m a pretty happy person, I realize how much happier I am when I take that moment to take in something that makes me smile. So I shall work on doing better this week!

But here is my recap for this week:

windchime 1200These windchimes have hung on a hook off my deck railing for a few years now. But all of a sudden I had a whim that I should hang them from the tree next to my writing cottage. So I followed the impulse and took great joy in placing them hanging from a branch, standing back, and admiring them.

myspaceMySpace.calm sign has hung above my writing cottage window ever since my husband built this 10 x 12 room for me about seven years ago. While doing yoga and in pigeon pose the other morning, it really called out to me. I sat in my pose for a few moments longer and felt this overwhelming gratefulness for this space of my own and the love and support of my husband who understands me (he dubbed my cottage, MySpace.calm).

10325732_10203068284321241_2715664139533545665_nI love this quote. It was the perfect quote to read on the day our “True Self” class started up again and will run for the next seven weeks.

10344361_10203080415824521_1038293599471040872_oOne of my favorite places for lunch in our small town – Off the Rail. Also a perfect place to meet for a cup of tea, which I did with a friend this week. I admit I didn’t take this photo, though I love it. The steam engine came through as a special event a few years ago. While this is a rare sight, we now have working trains coming through again when for years we didn’t. I LOVE to hear the whistle of the train when it does. Such nostalgia!

g and me having a cup of tea 12Me and G having a cup of tea. Well, okay, G does not drink tea, but I do! Also this was my attempt to sit in stillness for five minutes each day as is our “assignment” for the week from our True Self class. You know what I realized? One cannot sit still with a wiggly dachshund in their lap!