“It feels messy, overwhelming, or hard because that’s how it works: it is always going to feel this way when you’re trying something new, making a change, or building something.” -Stephanie Harrison
My plans for June and July kept changing. (Read: plans to be away from home and do other fun 🤸🏻♂️ stuff were cancelled due to medical appointments). And my August has had to be “rescheduled” (reluctantly, but of course, it is what I need to do right now).
So-o, because I am on ✅ Day 71/100 of my second 100-Day Project (theme: Benevolence, Wonder and Meaning) I decided to apply those themes: ➡️ benevolently 🦒 looking up ⬆️ with wonder, and over to 🪄 new possibilities for meaning.
Of course that is what I did. 🤭 I am a right brain planner, so I always have options. 😎
💖 I also had some creative inspiration from Suleika Jaouad (whose medical realities are much more complicated that mine). ➡️ She shared an invite for a “month-long Artist Residency for beginners, dabblers, and the creatively curious”—so, yes! Of course! I’m in! 😎
“The consistency of the process is where the magic is.” -Emily McDowell
✅ The “official” start of Right Brain Planner was during my first cancer recovery. It was a creative diversion of sorts.
✅ A simple way to incorporate jotted notes, doodles and collage into dated entries. Most importantly, a way to express 📝 myself … to free myself. 🥳
✅ Right brain chronicles (jotted notes, 🌈 color vents, ✂️📐 collage and 🖊️ doodles of our 💭 ponderings and 🗓️ dated mental wanderings) are the data + a map of our living, serving as a tangible record of:
- questions and 🪄 wishes
- keywords and phrases 📝
- daydreams and nighttime dreams 💤💭💤
- what we feel and think 🙃😐😣😜
- what we want to experience ❤️
- what we need to foster our well-being ♻️
- what we want to discover and learn about 🧠🤓
- sky meditations + phases 🌙 (everything cycles)
✅ Right brain chronicles can become a sacred 📿 space for 🌀 processing what we need and desire—space where we 🔎 observe and process the data of Life; and to ♻️ empower us to make 📊 choices (and prioritize) what matters most to us. ❤️
My early summer sojourn was everything I needed it to be—and I completed all 61 ICAD cards, along with 🦩 embracing possibility with “ugly pages.” 🌈✂️🪄📝🗃️🥳
Daily art became my path through the complicated 🎢 details of cancer, surgery and therapies for osteoporosis. And this will continue to serve me through the month’s radiation treatments.
Years ago, I adopted this bit of Lynda Barry’s wisdom: “Let the thing you are doing be nothing…just keeping your hands in motion, putting one thing down and then the next thing down and sometimes 😢 crying in between.” This focus has served me well! ❤️
For August, I will be continuing a daily creative practice by adding to my right brain planning booklet (using the Ko-fi downloads)—and making art cards* ➡️ using playing cards, collage and Washi tape! ✂️📐
- 😊😉 *For the record, I have been considering making a new deck of art cards using playing cards. Seeing [this post] sealed the deal! 😎 (Love, love that card!)
- One more detail for my August pages … Because I will be beginning (resuming) using template pages I will be using [this download]* to review/access the past two months. ❤️
- *It is free, if you are in need a beginning and/or restart. ♻️📝❤️
Thank you kindly for your presence here, Braveheart. 💗
I appreciate your interest and support.
~love & good wishes~
⭐️ I am an artist and curator; I am one who communicates with color, found words and collage, inky marks and doodles as I cycle like the moon (as my calendar), chronicling oracles and abiding with the sky as a meditation.
⭐️ I host creative communities, safe spaces for gathering and sharing. I choose love and creativity for coping with the ongoing challenges of this world and I go to work—not because everything is fine but because I believe art heals.
❤️ Braveheart, as the Creator/Artist of Right Brain Planner I am ever-grateful to have the opportunity to share my creative work online + support other creators! 🎉 For almost 20 years I have had the privilege of sharing my art and writing about right brain planning while also hosting kindred 👭🏽💞👭 communities. ✨ I consider it an absolute 🤸 delight to continue this portion of my creative 📝🖌️✂️🫧 work (even as I retire from full-time work).
- This is possible, in part, by {you} and your presence here. (Thank you!) 💗 But also because of the support of my Ko-fi patrons and the other member/subscriber communities I host (via their presence, input and paid subscriptions). 🫶
- 💁🏻♀️ Other ways to support my work: ❤️ continue to read this blog + follow me on Instagram. 📲
If you already have your own system of creative journal-planning, but are interested in financially supporting my creative work, you may do so by making a donation:
- Artist’s Statement 😊
- Make a one-time contribution in any amount via [this link]. (Thank you!) ❤️