Dare boldly

A blog by Louise Gallagher

Category Archives: Art and creativity


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Rejoice in ordinary things

Acrylic on Canvas 42″ x 36″ Louise Gallagher 2001

I am in summer writing mode, lazy mornings, reading, walking, re-ordering my days. I will be posting less frequently over the next two months, but on those days when I spend my time ‘othering’ I’ll share things that inspire me.

The painting above is one of the very first paintings I did when I first started painting almost 20 years ago. It continues to be one of my favourites — perhaps because in it, I see only the simple, pure joy of creation.

In the beginning, my mind was not cluttered with thoughts of ‘the right way’, or the ‘that’s not good enough way’ of creating that is a natural by-product of learning more about ‘how to paint correctly’ versus ‘how to paint for the pure joy of it’ which is the beginner’s way for me.

In the beginning, painting for the pure joy of it was natural. Now, I strive to recapture that essence. I must consciously let go of my need to ‘do it right’ versus ‘do it for the pure joy of it’ – which can be challenging because when I think about it, I am no longer in that place of natural joyful creation!

Ahh, the contradictions of life are so fascinating!

Namaste.

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Inspiring thought for the day:

Rejoicing in ordinary things is not sentimental or trite. It actually takes guts. Each time we drop our complaints and allow everyday good fortune to inspire us, we enter the warrior’s world.

– Pema Chödron

from the book “The Places That Scare You: A Guide to Fearlessness in Difficult Times”

Just Dharma Quotes

Shared from Zen Flash

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Watch out world! This womb is open!

No. 35 #ShePersisted series.
http://louisegallagher.ca/shepersisted

I am laughing at myself. Gently. But I am definitely finding myself amusing.

I am sitting in a room of 30+ women, gathered on this beautiful Sunday afternoon to plant seeds of Sisterhood. One of the facilitators takes us through a closed eye ‘womb-clearing’ process.

That’s when my inner laughter begins.

The womb is the seat of our creativity. Our power. Our essence, she tells us. Imagine…

All I can imagine is a big honkin’ concrete lid on top of my womb, keeping the whole friggin’ fecundity of my essence in check.

And in that imagining, my laughter takes hold.

Thirty years ago, after the birth of my second daughter, I had a tubal ligation. She was my fourth pregnancy, two of which had ended with ectopic ruptures (yup. That hurt). The final two resulted in C-section’s that brought the miracle of my daughters safely into this world.

I wasn’t supposed to be able to have children. My doctor suggested I might want to end at two. Not press my luck and all, he suggested. I agreed.

My ‘funny-line’ after that was, “This womb is closed.”

And that’s what brought the laughter on.

Imagine. Even though I was joking, the power of that phrase, “This womb is closed.”

If the womb represents the seat of my creativity, power, essence, then I have been inadvertently shutting it down, turning it off, putting the lid on it, ever since I spoke those words.

Aren’t I fascinating?

Don’t get me wrong. I am highly creative. Continually finding ways to express myself.

But… and there’s always that but getting in the way of my expression.

I also limit myself. I put a limit on how I set my creative expressions free in this world. Sometimes, I play a big dream and live it out as a footnote in the story of my life.

So, here’s the story today…

This womb is open for business.

Okay. Okay. Not the child-rearing kind of business of my younger years, but the fertile blossoming business of my creative expression having free reign to explode in living colour, all over the place.

Watch our world, this womb is open!


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The Writing Space

Many years ago, while I was immersed in a relationship that was killing me, I didn’t write. It was one of the many signs I ignored on that road to hell that was telling me, “You are not safe here! Run for your life!”

Ignoring the signs of my ill-being was easier if I didn’t write. Not acknowledging how sick I was becoming was vital to keeping his anger and abuse at bay.

I didn’t want to face his anger. I also didn’t want to face myself on the page.

Writing for me is about truth. The truth is those days was that I was lost, abused, terrified. I didn’t believe I had value. I didn’t believe I deserved to live.

There was no grace in that place. There was no grace to write.

One of the graces of writing is its capacity to awaken me to the story beneath the story.

On the weekend, I created a writing corner just for me. It’s beside a window that overlooks the river’s edge. I can sit and watch the water flow, hear its voice, feel its essence, be one with nature.

There is something very symbolic about my writing space, something I hadn’t connected until I started writing about writing (and not writing) this morning.

On the morning of May 21, 2003 when I was released from the hell of that relationship, we were staying at a small bed and breakfast beside a river. It wasn’t as wide or fast moving or as deep as The Bow. It gurgled through the property, laughing in the sun as it raced to the sea.

Every morning I would stand by the river’s edge and imagine I could unhook gravity’s hold on my body so that by its own volition, it would fall into the water and be washed out to sea. In its disappearance, all memory of my having been here on earth would be erased from my daughters’ minds and they would be able to continue on with their lives, free of any memory of the mother who had loved them so, and then disappeared.

See, I couldn’t take my own life. That would have made a lie of the one truth I held onto — I love my daughters. Everything else in my life had become a lie. I could not violate that one truth.

But if I could unhook gravity…

I sit by the river this morning, writing.

I no longer want to unhook gravity’s hold.

I no longer live ‘the lie’.

I am blessed.

 

 


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Do you know what is on the other side of fear?

“The Mighty Bow” Acrylic on Wood Panel – 60″ x 40″ – 2018 Louise Gallagher

I was feeling discombobulated. Anxious. Confused.

A situation at work had been playing on my peace of mind, disrupting my flow. I felt like I had no control. That old stories were being triggered by events in the here and now, and I was at risk of collapsing, helpless, into the past.

I had to find a different perspective, a better point of view.

Since beginning the process last October of buying a new home, getting our old home ready to be sold, renovating this home and living in rental accommodations for three months, I have not spent much time immersed in my creative essence.

Without my studio set up, I had nowhere to create. Or so I told myself.

Immersed in my fear  of being stuck in a victim-role, I didn’t realize that the voice inside my head telling me I had no space to create was the same voice of self-defense that had been triggered by the unsettling happenings in my work. It’s nattering at me to dive deep, take cover, hunker down! was also keeping me from seeing the path to letting go of my victim’s voice is always through my creative self-expression.

“PHLOW”
Acrylic on canvas
20″ x 18″
2018 Louise Gallagher

Last week, I stepped back. I took a few days for myself and decided to create space to dive into my creative essence, regardless of not having the drywall up in my studio, or the boxes unpacked, or the right lighting or the other host of excuses I’d been employing to keep me from letting go of my fears.

It was the most healing thing I could have done for myself.

Over three days I created a work space in the middle of the room by pushing boxes to the edges of the room, setting up a table to work on, unpacking essential materials and setting myself up for ‘success’.

I began to paint and in the process of dipping into colour and my creative self, I found myself once again on solid ground. I found myself breathing freely, moving slowly, feeling alive.

Fear lifted. My heart expanded. Grace embraced me.

“It’s okay,” the voice of wisdom within whispered softly. “The river never runs backwards. This too shall pass. Breathe deeply into being present in the gifts of this moment, right now. Let go of fearing the past is now and will be so forever. Open your heart to the gift of Love that flows endlessly in and through you. Breathe.”

And so, I breathed and found myself on the other side of fear in that sacred space where Love flows freely. Heart wide open, I found myself immersed in the knowing that no matter what is going on in the world around me, I am safe in the embrace of Divine Creation.

Namaste.

 

 

 


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Do you want to change your whole world?

 

Years ago, when I took up painting, I did it not because I wanted to prove I actually could paint, but rather, because I wanted to do something with my then 14 year old eldest daughter who loved to paint. One day, even though I’d told myself all my adult life that I was a writer, not an artist, I decided to pick up a paint brush and paint with her.

And my whole world changed.

I discovered a ‘truth’ I’d told myself about myself was actually just a limiting belief that I’d never tested. If I’d kept living by that limiting belief, my world would not have changed.

Sure, not having tested that belief I would not have known what I was missing and thus, not know I was missing out on doing something I truly love and feel passionate about — creative expression through the arts.

Having tested that limiting belief by changing what I normally did when my daughter wanted to paint, meant that I got to experience something I never could have imagined would bring me such joy and satisfaction.

Eleven years ago, a friend (thanks Mark Kolke of Musings and other writings!) suggested I start a blog. At the time, blogging was not ‘the thing’ it is today. I knew nothing about it, but, I was curious so I decided to check it out.

On March 7th, 2007 I posted my first scribblings at Recover Your Joy.

Eleven years ago when I first began I didn’t really think I’d be able to keep it up! Ha! Fooled me!  That first post has turned into over 3,258 posts published between the two blogs.

LOL! That’s a lot of words.

When I began, I thought I had to know what I was going to write about before my fingers touched the keyboard. Gradually, as I began to move into the flow of writing every morning, my thinking changed about ‘the right and the wrong way to blog’ as I began to realized that a) there is no right or wrong way, there’s only the way I chose as best for me; and b) I am not writing ‘for my readers’. I am writing for me and if what I write resonates with my readers, that is a beautiful ripple and a lovely gift that adds depth and colour to my world. And, c) Writing every day and hearing from readers has taught me that we are all connected. As my words resonate with your heart and thoughts, I feel that truth shimmering deeper and deeper within me every day.

See, I started blogging because I thought it was something to do to keep my writing practice moving forward. Over time, I’ve discovered that writing here each morning is my way of creating value from all things happening in my life, and my way to create space in my world for gratitude and joy to arise with me every morning.

It was not intentional — the writing almost every morning for 11 years. It happened because my intent has always been to add value to the world through writing about the things that stir my heart, awaken my creativity and create beauty and joy all around.

I love to write. I love to create.  Through art-making and morning writings, I find myself coming back, again and again, to the core of who I am and the joy that comes from living on purpose and in the flow of life, or as my friend John McMahon calls it, being in the PHLOW:

Power  (I also like to think of this one as Purpose)
Harmony
Love
Order
Wisdom

In that space, I become all that I am when I stop listening to my limiting beliefs about all I can’t do or be in this great big world of wonder.

So, want to change your whole world?

Do something you think you can’t
let what happens next be your inspiration
for what happens next…


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In need of balance.

In my post yesterday on A Grandmother’s Code, I mentioned in one of my comments that I was feeling unsettled without access to my studio.

It was packed up on December 12th and is not likely to get set up again for at least a couple of more months. We are still in the throes of renovating our new home, and my studio will be the last piece in the puzzle of putting our home together.

As I lay in bed this morning thinking about not having a place to create with abandon (because that’s what the studio gives me — a place to paint without worrying about splashing, spills or slip-ups), I realized I need to come up with an alternative plan. A way to create without a studio.

People do it all the time. What am I waiting for?

Fundamentally, my studio represents more than a creating space. It is my home base. My sanctuary. My centering place.

Without it, I have been letting myself off the hook of being committed to my practice of centering, meditating and finding balance.

I have been slacking off.

And that’s not good for me.

Even my meditation practice has been impacted by this move. I am erratic in creating space for meditation and even when I do, I find myself wandering both mentally and physically.

All of which are signs of my inner imbalance.

Moving is not easy. And when the move takes three months, it becomes more about learning to live in transition than just being in transition.

I have not done a great job of learning to live in this new order of things. No matter how transitory, I am in it and need to be conscious of how I go through it.

So, today, I commit to starting a new awareness for myself of what it means to live in transition — while keeping myself balanced and centered with grace and ease.

To begin, I created a ‘path’ for myself to ensure I give myself room for assessment, alignment and action. My steps, as they currently appear in first blush are:

  1. Be conscious of where I’m at — physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually.
  2. Make an assessment of my ‘Balance wheel’.
  3. Decide on the priority areas to address.
  4. Make a commitment to do 1 – 3 things within each area to bring myself back into balance.
  5. Identify the 1 – 3 things for each.
  6. Commit to beginning and when necessary, begin again.
  7. Be gentle with myself.

It’s a new beginning, a new space, a new attitude.

I wonder what I can create?

 

 


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In times of angst, what do you do to change the world?

I played in the studio yesterday. I intentionally sat at my art table without a plan, without a real vision and simply experimented.

It was freeing. Calming. Peace-making.

And, fun!

I didn’t know what else to do. In a world seemingly turned mad with natural and man made disasters, I was feeling the angst of too much binge watching on CNN, tracking hurricanes and wildfires and flooding, earthquakes and what the United Nations is calling ethnic cleansing in Myanmar.

My heart was heavy. My mind foggy with sadness and sorrow.

I needed to clear it out. To remind myself that in the midst of madness, I have a choice in what I create in my world.

My inspired play-time started with an hour of drying flowers from the garden. With three trays full of delicate leaves and flower petals, I carried them down to the studio thinking I’d make some cards and affix them to the card stock.

My muse had other ideas.

I started with making a background with watercolour pens but wasn’t finding my groove.

While the secret of play-time is to never get trapped in judging the outcome, it’s also important to not get too stuck on the medium I’m using either. If something isn’t really grabbing my imagination, it’s okay to switch!

I decided to switch to alcohol inks.

I could tell it had been awhile since using the inks. Several of the tops were stuck and needed to be coaxed open under hot water.

As the watercolour card stock is not conducive to the free-flowing nature of the inks, I wondered what would happen if I applied a coat or two of matte medium.

A perfect surface for experimentation is what happened!

The beauty of inks is that while they are not very forgiving, they layer easily. They’re also beautifully transparent and once put down on paper, offer a short window to blend them and move them around with alcohol (and no, I don’t mean the alcohol you imbibe! I mean the alcohol you apply to the inks to get them to disperse!).

Staying in the flow of creative expression requires a willingness to give up judgement and give into the art of creating freed of mental chatter.

In these seemingly madcap times in which we live, it is vital to take time to create beauty for no other reason than, in the act of creation, we remind ourselves of our human capacity to create love not war, peace not anger, hope not fear.

I gave myself the gift of an afternoon of play yesterday and in that space, found myself flowing once again into the art of living with peace, hope, love and joy filling my heart.

The world out there has not changed. Fierce winds continue to blow, fires continue to burn, and guns continue to fire. There is little I can do to change those things except donate where I can and send prayers of love and healing into the world.

The best way I know to do that is to ensure my ripple is not filled with angst and unease. After an afternoon of play and creative expression, my space in the world is calmer, more at ease. And from that space, I can go out into my day and create the more of what I want to have in the world knowing that my angst will not be adding to the angst around me.

I not powerful enough to stop winds from blowing, fires advancing or guns blasting.

I do have the power to stop contributing to the angst and anger, the fear and horror by creating oases of calm and beauty within and all around me.

We all have that kind of power.

Namaste.

PS. As to the dried flowers… when the cold arctic air swoops in, I’m sure they will inspire me to create signs of spring in my studio, and my heart. 🙂