For the past couple of years I have taken part in the #30dayjournal projects offered by Lisa Sonora. They are a wonderful free gift that Lisa gives to the online community and she puts a lot of effort into providing the daily inspirational quotes and writing prompts that land in my inbox for 30 days in a row. I have found them to be a great kick-start to the New Year, or a way of unblocking when I feel stuck.

Each time I participate the journey gets easier and flows more freely, and this time I have really been feeling on ‘fire’ with ideas and creativity. ‘Fire’, coincidentally, also happens to be the title of this 30-day project. My writing around the prompts and the pages I have produced has been posted on the group Facebook page, but I thought it would be good to document some of the more thought provoking pieces here in my blog. So this is a selection of pages and the accompanying writing that went along with them…

Day 6 – I suffer terribly from shyness and when meeting new people or attending workshops I am the classic wallflower, keeping to myself and keeping my head down. But I know I miss a lot of opportunities to connect with like-minded folks this way. I have started to mention that a I am shy in scary circumstances and it definitely helps release some of the tension and opens the door for kind people to give me the opportunity to participate more?

Days 11 and 12 – Wow, I was definitely feeling the FIRE this morning! I got up bright and early and dived headfirst into the journal, where I stayed for 2 hours, and drank 3 cups of tea! I found the prompts for Days 11 and 12 very powerful, and especially loved the quotes from May Sarton’s ‘Journal of Solitude’. Whilst thinking about daring to be myself I felt compelled to seek out the pile of old childhood photos my mother gifted to me some time ago. They sit in a plastic bag in my dining room – ‘waiting’? I love how serendipity just presents us with the perfect thing when we need it.

And when Day 12’s prompt mentioned a lantern, I knew there was a reason I had felt the need to order a rubber stamp of an old street lamp some time ago, but had yet to find a use for it!! I am really pleased with my pages today, but the trouble is I now feel completely exhausted from all the ‘soul work’ and now have to motivate myself to do some (real) money earning activities :). Also I feel very bad about the fact that it is 9.40am and I am still in my dressing gown – but hey ho, I have to listen to my whispers and they said ‘do your journal, girl’! Have a great day x

Day 13 – I was intrigued by the idea of today’s quote and wanted to see if I could express with paint how it would be to have the light of the moon glowing through my skin. It was a really powerful exercise actually and as I was slowly moving the paint around on the page, trying to capture the essence of the idea, I could absolutely feel the creative energy coursing through me, but with a serene vitality if that makes sense?

Day 14 – ‘I love these ordinary things…’ The thing I love about participating in these 30 day journal projects is that 30 days is not too long a time to commit to doing something daily, but yet the pace and intensity of having to show up in the journal each day and produce (or write) something can be truly revealing. Because there is no time to ponder and worry and pontificate, I just hand over the task to my higher self and trust the guidance I am given as to what should go on my page. Sometimes I sift through my collection of ready cutout images, or go to the computer and print an image that comes to mind, or feel the need to move paint around on the page. This morning I just started typing a list of all the simple things I treasure during my day. I probably could have kept on going but decided to stop at the things that came straight to mind with ease. I set them against a backdrop of pots on a shelf because I had this idea of how pottery is an ordinary everyday item that most of us have in our homes, and yet in the form of a vase it becomes somehow precious, often a container for sacred items.  Pottery also offers us a timeline though history, particularly to date civilizations. And yet thousands of years later we still have the humble clay pot in common with those ancient people, who probably enjoyed the same simple daily pleasures that I do – I love that!