My Creative Autobiography

1. What is the first creative moment you remember?
Designing a plate for my parents in the third grade.

2. Was anyone there to witness or appreciate it?
It was a school project so yes there was someone there to witness it. I hope my parents appreciated it. I think they did.

3. What is the best idea you’ve ever had?
Don’t know for sure. What’s coming to mind is starting this blog and starting my Law of Attraction group.

4. What made it great in your mind?
Living authentically.

5. What is the dumbest idea?
Trying to write a county and western love song when I was a teenager about a man leaving me.

6. What made it stupid?
I don’t like country and western music and I hadn’t even had a boyfriend yet. Not sure why I was even writing the song. I think I was trying to rhyme some words that were floating around in my mind and it just turned into this silly song.

7. Can you connect the dots that led you to this idea?
Not sure if it’s talking about best idea or dumbest or both. What’s coming to mind is having a desire (to live authentically) and listening to and acting on the ideas that come to me. (rhyming words and writing a song)

8. What is your creative ambition?
To live the highest vision of myself and to create the most magnificent life I can imagine.

9. What are the obstacles to this ambition?
My thinking, money, lack of motivation at times.

10. What are the vital steps to achieving this ambition?
Align my thinking with my ambition.

11. How do you begin your day?
It depends. Sometimes I begin it very deliberately, waking up early, aligning myself with my intentions for the day and other times I get up late and hit the ground running and react to things as they happen instead of creating them.

12. What are your habits? What patterns do you repeat?
Snoozing the alarm, getting up late, arriving at work late, not preparing lunch ahead of time so I end up eating out, spending a lot of time on the Internet, watching and studying Abraham workshop tapes, writing in my journal, playing with tape, questioning my actions and motivations.

13. Describe your first successful creative act?
First thing that comes to mind is writing a story when I was in elementary school. Writing came so easy for me then and I remember writing this story and realizing it was really good.

14. Describe your second successful creative act?
I remember being able to draw really well when I was little. We used to have these ceramic faces of people of different nationalities hanging on the wall and I would sit down and draw them and what would come out on the paper looked like the ceramic faces hanging on the wall. I remember wondering how that happened.

15. Compare them?
Writing & drawing. Feeling no resistance in doing them, I just wanted to do it and I could. It was easy and it felt easy.

16. What are your attitudes toward money, power, praise, rivals, work, play?
Money – you have to work hard to get it and it doesn’t come out of the blue
Power – I love personal power. I’m at my most creative and happiest when I’m in my power
Praise – it’s good to praise and look for the best aspects of someone or something
Rivals – I don’t have rivals because I am the creator of my own experience. Other people are just mirrors for me
Play – I love to play and remind myself of my own childhood when I was filled with imagination and believed in magic and wonderment

17. Which artists do you admire most?
Michael Jackson, Claude DeBussy, Vincent Van Gogh, Claude Monet, Maurice Ravel, Gertrude Stein, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Leonardo daVinci

18. Why are they your role models?
Created many things, created something new, was outspoken, had salons that stimulated conversation and new ideas, lived life in their own way on their own terms.

19. What do you and your role models have in common?
I want to live my life in my own way and don’t want to fit in to some specific role that someone has picked out for me. I want to create great things and have my life be an example of living life at your highest and best. They let their creations come forth.

20. Does anyone in your life regularly inspire you?
My nephews do because they aren’t afraid to take chances and stand out.

21. Who is your muse?
I don’t know.

22. Define muse?
A specific person or deity who inspires you to your greatness.

23. When confronted with superior intelligence or talent, how do you respond?
With awe and admiration. People like that inspire me to be more in my own life.

24. When faced with stupidity, hostility, intransigence, laziness, or indifference in others, how do you respond?
Most times it frustrates me. Sometimes it makes me angry and sometimes it makes me examine my own limiting and narrow-minded views.

25. When faced with impending success or the threat of failure, how do you respond?
It kind of scares me. I’m afraid of people noticing me.

26. When you work, do you love the process or the result?
Both

27. At what moments do you feel your reach exceeds your grasp?
When I’m imagining the highest vision of something. When I’m writing and when I’m envisioning my life the way I want it to be.

28. What is your ideal creative activity?
Imagining and daydreaming

29. What is your greatest fear?
That I don’t live out my vision for my life.

30. What is the likelihood of either of the answers to the previous two questions happening?
Very likely but it is all up to me what happens.

31. Which of your answers would you most like to change?
I don’t want to change either of them.

32. What is your idea of mastery?
Focus and deliberate thinking.

33. What is your greatest dream?
To live my own life and to be an example of what’s possible when you live your life as a deliberate creator.

Your Creative Autobiography

As many of you know, on my other blog http://illuminatedminds.blogspot.com/, I am writing about my adventures and insights with the book The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp. In the book she has a questionnaire called Your Creative Autobiography. Twyla says:

"I devised this questionnaire because it forces us to go back to our
origins, our earliest memories, our first causes. We change through life, but we cannot deny our sources, and this test is one way to recall those roots.

The better you know yourself, the more you will know when you are playing to your strengths and when you are sticking your neck out. Venturing out of your comfort zone may be dangerous, yet you do it anyway because our ability to grow is directly proportional to an ability to entertain the uncomfortable."

Twyla says "if even one answer tells you something new about yourself you are one step closer to understanding your creative DNA."

It is important to answer the questions quickly, instinctively and honestly. I was surprised by some of the things that I realized about myself as I answered the questions. I am listing the questions here in the hope that you may get one step closer to understanding your creative DNA.

Your Creative Autobiography (taken from The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp)

1. What is the first creative moment you remember?
2. Was anyone there to witness or appreciate it?
3. What is the best idea you've ever had?
4. What made it great in your mind?
5. What is the dumbest idea?
6. What made it stupid?
7. Can you connect the dots that led you to this idea?
8. What is your creative ambition?
9. What are the obstacles to this ambition?
10. What are the vital steps to achieving this ambition?
11. How do you begin your day?
12. What are your habits? What patterns do you repeat?
13. Describe your first successful creative act?
14. Describe your second successful creative act?
15. Compare them?
16. What are your attitudes toward: money, power, praise, rivals, work, play?
17. Which artists do you admire most?
18. Why are they your role models?
19. What do you and your role models have in common?
20. Does anyone in your life regularly inspire you?
21. Who is your muse?
22. Define muse.
23. When confronted with superior intelligence or talent, how do you respond?
24. When faced with stupidity, hostility, intransigence, laziness, or indifference in others, how do you respond?
25. When faced with impending success or the threat of failure, how do you respond?
26. When you work, do you love the process or the result?
27. At what moments do you feel your reach exceeds your grasp?
28. What is your ideal creative activity?
29. What is your greatest fear?
30. What is the likelihood of either of the answers to the previous two questions happening?
31. Which of your answers would you most like to change?
32. What is your idea of mastery?
33. What is your greatest dream?

I"m sitting outside. It's a beautiful day. The birds are chirping, the sun is shining; it's just a beautiful morning. It's a bit chilly but it feels good. I've got my coffee and my notebook and my boys (my dogs Simon and Joey), things are good, really good. I love this new morning routine of getting up early and spending time outside before my day really begins.

It gives me a chance to collect my thoughts, think of what I want to create today, how I want to think and what I want to do. It gives me a deliberate, happy start to my day. I like starting my day deliberately instead of reacting to whatever comes up.

I appreciate my life so much - my body for keeping me healthy, strong and energetic; my home for giving me and the boys a beautiful haven to live out our life experience; the flow of money in my life and the ease I'm now feeling about my finances; being part of a loving and supportive family; the health and well-being of my family and friends; and the inner knowing that I can be, do and have whatever I desire in my life.

Life is good!

Abraham-Hicks Quote - August 5, 2009

There is no source of evil. There is only a Stream of Well-Being, which you
are allowing, or not. But under the name of righteousness and goodness and
religion, you drop bombs on innocent children. And then you say, "it's for the
good of all of us." And we say, we don't see that. And you don't see it from
your Non-physical perspective, either. It's only in your disconnection that
those things make sense.

--- Abraham
Excerpted from the workshop in San Rafael, CA on Saturday, February 26, 2005

There is only a Stream of Well-Being, I really believe that is true. The issue is whether or not we are allowing the Well-Being to flow or whether we are pinching off the flow.

My Well-Being is flowing at a more consistent pace than ever before because I am more conscious of it. I know that it is natural for me to be happy and to have fun creating my life. I'm getting to a place now where I am expecting good things to happen instead of just hoping that it will happen.

I'm also noticing that I need to be deliberate in each segment of the day about how I want to be and what I want to experience or it becomes very easy for me to get pulled off of my center; this is where segment intending really helps. Sometimes I will stop before I make a phone call and ask myself what kind of person I want to be during this call - friendly, forceful, chatty, helpful, etc. and then I'll ask myself what my intention is for the call. Now all of this only takes a few seconds but it makes all the difference in the world in what you end up creating from the experience.

Each moment is an opportunity to practice who and what you want to be from a place of connection. There's no need to wait. Be the person you want to be right now.

I’m feeling a bit tired and run down this morning and I know the reason why. I have been putting off making a phone call that I fear might cause me some stress and so I just haven’t called. Funny, no phone call has been made but I’m still feeling stress; I guess that decision didn't work out to well for me.

Actually I was “waiting” to get to a better feeling place before I made the call but then didn't end up doing anything to get me feeling better about the situation which just caused the stress and fear to continue. Oh, how I love the Law of Attraction, no vibration goes unmatched. You can’t fool the Universe.

It’s time for me to “take out the garbage” that’s causing me to feel fear and stress about making this call. By taking out the garbage I mean putting down on paper everything that I’m afraid might happen. Just the act of putting it on paper feels so good to me because it gets those fearful thoughts out of my mind and out on the paper and from there it becomes easy for me to pivot to better feeling thoughts. When I think good feeling thoughts that bring me a feeling of relief the Universe matches that with more things to feel good about.

I’ll let you know how it turns out.

UPDATE: I got myself to a good feeling place emotionally and then made the call. Initially things were going well until I felt the need to justify my decision. I realized that I didn't get clear about my intention for making the call in the first place and that made it easy for me to be pulled off track. I started to feel some negative emotion so I knew that whatever I was thinking/doing was taking me in the opposite direction of where I wanted to go. I ended the call very politely and said I would call the person back. I knew I needed to take a few minutes and get clear about what I was doing. What was happening in the phone conversation was a perfect match for how I was thinking. I had not really aligned with my decision and the person was just demonstrating that for me. Once I made my decision and lined up with it I called the person back. I stated exactly what I wanted with no hesitation and got it. All is well!

Romancing the Ordinary-A Year of Simple Splendor by Sarah Ban Breathnach

I just finished reading "Romancing the Ordinary-A Year of Simple Splendor" by Sarah Ban Breathnach. I loved this book. This is definitely one I want for my personal library. It's all about falling in love with yourself and your life, how great is that!

The book is divided into sections for each month of the year and has some of the best suggestions I've found for nurturing yourself and finding passion in your life. I love books that get me all jazzed up and excited about living my life and this book definitely did that.

There are so many wonderful ideas and suggestions in this book and they are all self-empowering. This book will get you deliberately savoring "the sensual experiences of daily life" whether that be through cooking, decorating, gardening, rituals, fashion, etc. A couple of my favorites are:

Becoming Your Own Courtesan - page 78.
"There's much to be said for the revival of courtesan grooming for women of all ages. Not to woo the world, but to seduce yourself."

"What have you always wanted to do or understand? Make a list. What social situations do you avoid because you feel awkward. Make up your mind that you're going to dismantle your fear with information."

"Do you have any idea how thrilling it is to actually enjoy your own company? It's like having a numbered account in Switzerland. Something you can always bank on. Begin to think of this year as your cosmic charm course. Become your own courtesan and watch the world begin to court you."

Being Home - page 195
"Inside your home, you keep mementos of your past that help or hinder your movement into the future. Which are you doing?"

"Come home to a house that shelters your body and soul."

"The size of your house is not related to the size of your soul, but the condition of your dwelling does present a picture of the condition of your being - body, mind and spirit."

I found myself making notes about the different books she mentions, recipes to try and fun ways to do your housework. I encourage all of you to check out this delightful book and begin to discover ways to live your life more passionately than ever before.

Abraham Daily Quote - May 21, 2009

"You are killing more of each other every day over your quarrels over religion than all other things put together because you cannot even come to an agreement about what you think God says, or wants for you. On one side of the world God wants something different than the other. On one side of the room, in one side of your mind, God want something different than on the other. The power is within you. You are extensions of this powerful Source Energy. You are literally God expressing in this physical body. And so, as you are standing in a thought, or in a word, or in an action that feels good to you as you are standing there -- then you are fully open and allowing all of that Divine Energy to flow through you. And in that moment you are all that you said you would be when you decided to come forth into this body. You are the extension of pure positive energy. You are in your full creative power. You are thriving. You are clear-minded. You are joyful. You are filled with love. You are who you are -- you are allowing that which you really are." - Abraham

Excerpted from the workshop in Syracuse, NY on Saturday, September 30th, 2000

As I reading today's quote these words stood out to me:
"As you are standing in a thought, or in a word, or in an action that feels good to you as you are standing there -- then you are fully open and allowing all of that Divine Energy to flow through you. And in that moment you are all that you said you would be when you decided to come forth into this body."

This quote got me thinking about making deliberate choices to be happy and to feel good. I asked myself the following questions:

Do I really care about feeling good?

Do I purposefully think thoughts that feel good?

Do I make decisions based on how it feels?

If I have things that I feel I must do and I don't feel good about it, do I find ways to line up with my decision to do it and then find ways to feel good about it?

It's all about making a conscious decision to feel good. Feeling good is the key because when we feel good we are in a state of allowing and when we are in a state of allowing, all of our desires flow easily and effortlessly into our experience.

Start thinking good feeling thoughts on purpose and watch your life transform before your eyes.

17 Seconds

Could you hold a thought for 17 seconds without contradicting it? I bet you could do it, I bet most of us could do it, especially if we were deliberately intending to hold the thought. But what about a typical day where we aren't intending to feel good or even to feel bad. We just coast through our day and react to whatever happens to come into our experience. How many of us could hold a good feeling thought for 17 seconds without contradicting it in that situation?

Abraham talks about the power of 17 seconds. If any of you are not familiar with Abraham's 17 Seconds process or you might know it as 68 Seconds process I would like to share it with you here.

"If you can hold a thought for 17 seconds without contradicting it, by law of attraction another thought like it will come to you. At precisely the 17 second point, these two thoughts will join one another, they coalesce and when they do there is an energy that is expended, like a combustion point. When these two thoughts join and combust, you can feel a measure of enthusiasm bubbling within you. And in that moment of 17 seconds, these two thoughts that were same become one bigger, more evolved, faster vibrating thought.

If you can stay focused on this subject that you have chosen for another 17 seconds, at the moment that you cross the 34 second mark, that is just two times 17, this now more evolved thought will attract unto it. At the 34 second mark these two more evolved thoughts do the same thing, they coalesce and there is another combustion point. If you keep doing this as you cross the 68 seconds mark, you will have a combustion big enough to affect physical manifestation.

17 seconds doesn't sound like much, but Abraham says most of us start offering contradictory vibrations at about 8 seconds. Most of us don't make it through a whole sentence before we start contradicting the vibration of our desires." I was intrigued with this concept and wanted to see how I would do so I conducted a little experiment with myself.

I noticed that when I was deliberate about feeling good and had a positive intention for my day it was easy to hold a positive thought for way longer than 17 seconds or even 68 seconds without contradicting it. It wasn't that I didn't have any negative thoughts, I did. As I went through my day my thoughts would often drift off to something that wasn't quite so positive and definitely didn't feel good but I was able to redirect my thoughts in a matter of seconds (less than 17) because I was aware of the negative feeling that accompanied the negative thought. From there I found that I could get back to a good feeling vibration with relative ease by choosing a better thought than the one I had just been thinking.

When I had no deliberate intent for my day and just coasted along and allowed myself to react to things instead of pre-paving them it was more difficult to stay uplifted and in a good feeling place. I noticed that I wasn't as aware of the first indications of negative emotion and as a result spent much more of my day feeling uneasy, worried, defensive instead of the way I like to feel which is happy, carefree, abundant and empowered.

I realized that it was much easier for me to hold a negative thought without contradicting it than it was to hold a positive thought. That's why it's so helpful to be deliberate about what you're thinking throughout the day. And that's where the 17 seconds process is so helpful. 17 seconds is not a very long time. It's manageable and it leads you step by step to thoughts that match your desires. And when you are a vibrational match to your desires, your desires must come to you. It's law.

I find this to be a very fun and easy process. I like to set the timer on my cell phone for 68 seconds and then talk out loud about my desires - how I feel, how I look, what my day is like, how I interact with people, etc. I did this a few times during the day today and finally had to shut the timer off because I wanted to keep going after the buzzer went off; it just felt so good to do it. I encourage you to try it and see how it works for you.

Abraham Daily Quote - March 2, 2009

In the same way that there is not an instant wanted thing manifesting in your experience, there is not instant unwanted thing happening in your experience. It takes some adapting to vibrations. If you've managed to hold anything, wanted or unwanted, for 17 seconds -- there is a coalescing of thought that takes you a little closer to the vibration of whatever you are turning your attention to. Those 17 second increments, are not discernable. And that's why, when you get into that place, it feels like instant manifestation. Just like when you get into that negative place, it feels like instant manifestation. It's like, "Where did that come from? Seemed like it just sort of snuck up on me," instead of snuck up over a long time.
--- Abraham

Excerpted from the workshop in Tallahassee, FL on Saturday, December 1st, 2001

So what does this mean to me?

It means that when it looks like the things I desire aren't manifesting that doesn't mean that things aren't happening behind the scenes. Each good feeling thought is bringing me closer and closer to the things I desire in my life. Trusting the way I feel will guide me in closing the vibrational gap between what I desire and its manifestation.