Intentions bring meaning into our lives now, so that we can navigate our lives based on what is as opposed to what may be. They’re powerful tools that we can use to instantly direct our focus for as long as we need.
Ryder Carroll
This time last year I became intentional about therapeutically processing recurring, intrusive memories and situations that contributed to my languishing.
- My Mimi always encouraged me to “tell it like it is” — to name names and resist “candy-coating” people’s behavior. Wisdom she readily admitted was gained after decades of self-doubt and unfairly blaming herself for other people’s choices.
This time last year I knew I needed to tell [it] like it is, to name names and stop minimizing (and ignoring) the facts of strained and estranged relationships before it started reshaping my identity.
- This process started with thirty days of reframing gratitude as paying attention, and acknowledging (giving my attention to the facts of) major events and realities during my wild and precious life. ♥
Gratitude is not a passive response to something we have been given, gratitude arises from paying attention, from being awake in the presence of everything that lives within and without us.
David Whyte
I trusted myself (and my pace) through a lot of self-doubt (sorrow and anxiety) for those thirty days.
- I trusted the healing practice of right brain planning, and of keeping a notebook ala Joan Didion, mingling the private with the public part of myself.
- I did so because it was time to face the facts of what I did not cause, and what I could not have changed or done differently due to the circumstances.
- I realized exhaustion effected my judgment and prohibited me from being [fully present] amidst the daily, intense stress of my living during much of my life.
- I repeatedly ignored what I needed because of faulty beliefs about love and relationships (particularly motherhood); giving energy and attention to the needs of people I loved so dearly, sincerely hoping for their healing and well-being.
These fact are not intended to be self-deprecating — and certainly not stated from a place of blame or bitterness.
These facts were merely my vulnerable starting point for that thirty days of writing. And I share this here because compiling an honest, dated chronicle is the basis for right brain planning.
Life can feel hard, but that doesn’t mean we are doing it wrong.
We do what we must. We learn. We do better.
Reframing gratitude as [attention] was the beginning of me learning and doing better.
Right brain planning is a respite. It is also a means of expressing, envisioning and experiencing feelings and desires via jotted notes, color and layers of collage.
When Life feels hard (impossible and overwhelming) it means we are human and experiencing human limitations — but it is also an invitation to set aside time to rest and tend to what we need.
Tending to what we need begins with self-compassion, because each one of us is living the details of so-o many different stories every day — day after day after day.
Braveheart, just because Life feels hard, doesn’t mean we are doing it wrong.
When Life feels hard (impossible and overwhelming) it means we need self-kindness and to be mindful of the facts of what we are living (and have previous experienced).
- To be mindful is to [be here, now]; it is to [compassionately acknowledge] our feelings, thoughts and the way we feel in our bodies [without judgment or self-blame].
Compassionate people ask for what they need. They say no when they need to, and when they say yes, they mean it. They’re compassionate because their boundaries keep them out of resentment.
Brené Brown
Braveheart, life can get better — and we can identify what we want (and need). ♥
Right brain planning is a ritual that [begins with + fosters] self-compassion, focusing on the four essentials of our living:
Afraid to appear selfish, we lose our self. We become self-destructive. Because this self murder is something we seek passively rather than consciously act out, we are often blind to its poisonous grip on us.
Julia Cameron
Right brain planning — allowing “planning” to begin with what we need/want to express + process in our journals — facilitates an acknowledgement of our emotions and the necessary edits in our stories.
- Not as a means of losing our-selves (judging, “rejecting” or minimizing what we are feeling and experiencing) — but a self-compassionate practice of identifying (naming facts about) what we are experiencing, needing and wanting to be/do.
- Right brain planning is a means of living within appointed seasons, but also just beyond ourselves.
When you reckon with emotion, you can change your narrative. You have to acknowledge your feelings and get curious about the story behind them. Then you can challenge those confabulations and get to the truth.
Brené Brown
🔺Kaleidoscope Perspectives is the theme of the 2024 Right Brain Planner® Annual Kit. It is an invitation to live within appointed seasons, but also just beyond ourselves.
- To envision our living as an [ongoing option] for [reframing] and discovery and 🪄 imagination.
Thank you kindly for your presence here, Braveheart.
I appreciate your interest and support.
~love & good wishes~
2024 Right Brain Planner® Kit | field notes | Right Brain Planner® FAQ
2024 Right Brain Planner® Kit [Theme] Kaleidoscope Perspectives ✨ [Focus] — Noticing Beauty (within the kaleidoscope of your living: the ongoing, ever-changing “formations” of color and meaning)
❤️ 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! 🎉
- This is possible, in part, by {you} and your presence here. But also because of the support of my Ko-fi patrons and the other other member/subscriber communities I host (via their presence, input and paid subscriptions).