I want to express my deep appreciation for all of the beautiful comments and connections from my ‘garage’ blog. For me, it’s always vulnerable to share some of the ‘wacky’ things my intuition encourages me to do. I have a warehouse full of them! LOL!
In the spirit of living fully expressed I wanted to share two pieces of creative expression with you. One is a collaboration between my treasured friend, Lorraine Weiss (lorraineweiss@earthlink.net) and Hakim Bellamy (beyondpoetryink.com). Hakim is the poet laureate of Albuquerque. Hakim also has videos on YouTube and many books available through Amazon.
In the collaborative music piece, Lorraine is playing while Hakim is speaking his words. It’s a poem he wrote using the words from the people around the table at an artist’s grant group.
The second piece is a film for the New Mexico Film Board with Hakim’s words. Mabel Dodge fans…..make sure you watch the film to the very end!
I wanted to share these pieces with you to encourage and inspire you to create. CREATE anything! When you allow yourself to create anything, anyway, any how, you are inviting your truest self to come forward into your current world. You will love the feeling this brings. You will love the feeling this brings, DOUBLE, when you don’t judge, critique or give yourself a report card on what you created. Don’t hold back. This is your time.
If you would like to launch or feed your creative process. Give me a shout or join one of the upcoming workshops, CherieRay.com.
Hello Friends! What’s new in your world? I hope you’re experiencing the freshness of fall with a big dose of inspiration.
Currently, I’m in a big wave of letting things GO!I have been riding this delicious wave of ease with a driving desire to purge the heck out of my life. It’s so interesting to me how you live amongst ‘stuff’ but never use it or notice it. Then one day, BAMM, it hits. I’ve removed shrubbery, clothes, the research documents for my graduate thesis (how did I let that sit in a box for so long?), loads of photos. So many photos of places with no people and duplicates and photos that don’t have any special meaning. Gone!
Except…. this photo. This is a very special remembrance of when I was introduced to Intuitive Painting. I don’t even remember taking this photo!
I don’t know if you can tell but this is the garage of the house I was living in when I first bumped into Intuitive Painting. I had wanted to explore something creative following the sale of my last business but hadn’t found the courage to walk into a class. I found a flier advertising a painting class where there were no comments or critiques. This intrigued me AND I didn’t believe you could have an art class without comments or critiques. I knew I had no painting skills, and I also knew I didn’t need to be reminded of my lack of skills by having my work compared to the others in a class.
Long story drastically shortened… I convince the Intuitive Painting facilitator to offer me a private class. It took her a while to consider offering it privately because it just wasn’t taught privately. Luckily, she did! In hindsight, I knew I was not willing to fail in front of a group.
During the 3-hour lesson she made a casual comment to me that “there are no mistakes in creativity.” Well, that comment irritated the dickens out of me and thoroughly ticked me off. It disturbed something very deep inside me. It felt blasphemous.
The weekend following the private Intuitive Painting lesson I was still stirred up. Fuming mad! So disturbed that I walked into my garage and saw some paint and foam brushes sitting on a shelf. My inner dialogue was ranting and raving, “if there’s no mistakes”, then I’m opening that gallon of paint and going for it. I shook the paint, grabbed those foam brushes, and started painting. I painted for 2 days only stopping for a few hours sleep. All the while daring the ‘powers that be’ that they were wrong.
Well, with all my temper tantrums, rebelling, and daring, I lost the argument! I still shake my head reflecting on how strongly my conditioned mind could not accept this TRUTH. By letting myself paint freely without a plan on my garage walls I discovered for myself that there are no mistakes in creativity. As TRUTH echoed through me, I discovered the reason for my mind’s stubborn argument. If there are no mistakes in creativity and I am a product of the highest intelligence of creativity, then I must not be a mistake. Up to that moment, my mind had convinced me that I was a mistake that couldn’t be fixed. My mind was so clever and quiet with its campaign that I didn’t realize how I lived under this lie.
Well, painting on those garage walls was over 20 years ago. In those 20 years the Intuitive Painting process has awakened me to so many untruths AND it continues to do so.
I’m very grateful for finding this photo which captures a pivotal moment in my life. I’m also grateful for the intelligence that offers up inspiration to let the old GO to allow the NEW in!
Are you feeling any new inspirations? I’d love to hear about them. Let’s connect!
A few weekends ago, I did a public yoga retreat at Moody Gardens in Galveston, Texas. It was so much fun to be in a room with lots of yoginis and yogis, live and in-person; in a spacious room with beautiful views.
I appreciated Doug’s teaching style and philosophy. A teacher who promotes there should never be injuries in yoga is my kind of teacher. Here’s a link to his website if you’re interested: https://www.doyoga.com/index.html
Recently I visited a Presidential library where I watched an autobiographical movie about this president’s life. It played for about 30 minutes in a cool comfortable theater with velvety seats. In the movie this president spoke in the first person sharing what were his life’s passions. He credited his love of contribution and service to his parents, who were both very strong people with high integrity. He presented his parents as people who lived true to what mattered to them and that he had done the same.
As I watched this video, it struck me how this president shared who he was, in his own words, and from his own perceptions, about his time on this earth.This video plays on a loop all day long in the museum, every day the museum is open. So, for everyday it’s played, for all time, he controls the narrative of who he was. This struck a chord in me.
In politics – and in everyday life – there are so many stories being produced and shared. Rarely, if ever, do two people see someone the same. People argue for their perceptions and especially in politics, try to persuade you to see the story through their eyes, hoping to convince you their story is the accurate one.
I noticed how many people were sitting in this theater and how each person in the audience had their own production of who this man was in their minds. This production could be influenced by whether they wore a red or blue tie, did they know this person, how they knew this person; was he a friend, politician, lover, employer, etc.?
What impacted me was the simple reality that each of us has the right and the option to produce our own story and live in it.
Often, I hear the stories my clients are living under. These self-told stories are mental disfigurements carried forward in the storage spaces of their minds.
I know for too many decades, I carried stories about myself as well. I lived under these stories that weren’t consciously created by me. I didn’t know that being human came with idiosyncrasies. We all have them, and they are not imperfections to overcome. They are just part of being human.
My story suggested I was inherently flawed, when in reality, I was inherently human.
I think part of ‘waking up’ in our spiritual lives is ‘waking up’ to the falsities we’ve innocently believed about ourselves. The freedom we seek is not from outside sources but from the mental bondage we’ve innocently put ourselves in.
My invitation to you is to consciously produce who you are and then live in it. You know your heart. Live in it. Rest in it. Love from it.
I love a good bottom line. So, what’s my point? Well, there’s a few:
The production you live in dictates your behaviors.
This production is between you and YOU.
The story we produce about ourselves, in our minds, is completely subjective.
Your story is up for grabs, if you don’t produce it, others will.
Live your story of choice. NOT what you were told or carried in your mind up to this point.
The past is past. Leave it there.
You were born whole and complete. Bring that version of you into today’s version of you, settle for nothing less.
I wish I had seen this TRUTH decades ago. I would have loved nothing more than to lighten my load of not-enoughness a long time ago. I lived way too long in a story I didn’t consciously create or produce. Guess what? Not any more!
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I hope you’re having a wonderful summer! It is plenty toasty in Houston, Texas these days. Could we share some of it with you? LOL! Stay cool out there. I have lots of fun things for you to enjoy from the comfort of your own air-conditioned home! I hope you’ll join in.
The pace of this new year is offering many opportunities to reflect on how you’re spending your time, along with the opportunity to reflect on what you want to give your energy to. Taking stock – or checking in on – how I’m spending my time and discerning what I give my energy to, is on the forefront of my mind.
This gift of time and energy is one of the richest commodities we have to offer to the world and the ones we love. It’s so clear now, that I have a choice to move with what has the highest resonance. For me, it’s a tool for waking up to old habits or ways of doing things that previously had looked as if they were required by life. How funny is that? My mind had cleverly convinced me how life works, which is laughable. It doesn’t know what’s going to happen in the next moment or the next year!
Now, it’s so simple. In a new moment there’s a new opportunity. I can check in to see: Is this a conscious choice or am I moving with a habit? Easy-peasy. Moving with what has the highest energy moves your life in a fresh way. The struggle falls away. You show up with a fresh presence and full heart. The people around you will feel it.
What do we want for ourselves and others?
To feel satisfied and happy in life.
I hope this summer offers you many opportunities to move in the direction of what resonates with you. It’s a fun game to play!
I love supporting my clients, individually or in workshops, in eliminating struggle and opening to life. I’d love to share time with you. I have great workshops coming up at the Jung Center of Houston and from my own studio.
In a time when people seem to be more polarized and non-caring, with more bad news than good news reported, something like this happens.
Steve Hartman is a journalist with CBS news. He travels across the country meeting people and telling their stories. His stories are guaranteed to plump your heart and fill your eyes with tears of awe.
If he knew of this story, he’d be sharing it , just like me.
My mother passed away last year, and while clearing out her belongings, my sister and I came across her wedding dress. The dress was worn in 1950 and the years had made changes to the fabric. At this stage of packing up someone’s life, emotions are right at the surface and every item is precious.
We both looked at each other with eyes wide open asking, “What do we do with this?”
After a few moments, my sister had a flash of an idea. She recalled a woman in a town nearby who makes gowns from vintage wedding dresses for “babies born sleeping” for their funerals. Always prone to immediate action, she tracks the woman down and offers her the dress. The woman was delighted at the offer and we were relieved as she accepted our heirloom (in less than perfect condition) for her cause.
Fast forward to the present. The gown maker, Verna, reaches out to my sister and has something she wants to give us. Perplexed, my sister meets up with Verna to see what it could possibly be.
Verna shared that she was inspired to make Christmas ornaments from some of the fabric of the dress.
Now, this is something she had never done and had no clue how to do it. So, what did Verna do? Like the rest of us, she went to YouTube! She washed the discolored satin gown in her washing machine and….
It came through the wash perfectly!
Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought the dress would survive a machine wash much less look as good as new! She used some of the fabric, the buttons, and the beading, to create these pieces:
I’m in awe!
’m in awe of the kindness that resides in Verna’s heart and her willingness to follow her inspiration when moved to do something she’s never done before.
I believe in the center of every human heart there is a space of warmth, kindness, and a desire to contribute. I’m incredibly grateful to be the recipient of Verna’s inspiration and generous heart. We will treasure these gifts that are symbols of the union we came from.
How would you like to offer your talents to the world?
What’s been on my mind lately isnoticing how the world keeps changing and noticing how my mind reacts to these changes. It’s as simple a fact of life that the sky is habitually blue that change is a constant in life. We hear it, we read it, we experience it, but all the while it’s a known fact, our minds still react to change. The reaction might be anxiety, agitation, overwhelm, excitement, disappointment,
agreement, disagreement, or any other mental assessment of what’s happening right in front of us.
If we fully accept that change is going to happen, how can we live more peacefully with this fundamental truth?
The obvious first step is realizing the mind is going to have a judgment about change, so what? Human minds are going to have an opinion on everything. Have you noticed it’s always offering you a report card on how you’re measuring up, in its opinion?
Another option is realizing you have choice. Choice to keep your attention on these judgments/assessments or let it/them go by. Not always easy, but each time you let an assessment go by, you strengthen your ability to let them move on through. You also have a choice to react or not react, to take action or take a breath, to the mind’s assessment. Woohoo! How liberating is that?You don’t have to follow where the mind is trying to send you. It’s rarely a pleasant adventure. Typically, into fear-land.
Becoming acquainted with these options helps you to see new possibilities. Your relationship to change will start to take on a smoother ride. Each time you notice you have a choice, you will definitely start to live in less anxiety, agitation, and overwhelm.
Next stop? Taking it all in stride…
I would love to hear how this lands with you. Drop me a line. I would l enjoy connecting with you.
Living INSPIRED! If you’re in my circle of newsletter connections, you know I’m all about living an inspired and free life.
This week I had the opportunity to work with a client who is a professional performer. They came to see me because they had lost their mojo. They wanted to live in inspiration and create new material from a full tank. None of that was happening.
As we explored more, inside them existed a full tank of grief, heart break, and loss. There was no available space for inspiration to move in.
Fast forward to this Sunday’s CBS Sunday Morning show. In this week’s show they interviewed Jon Baptiste and his wife, Suleika Jaouad. In this interview, Jon and Suleika articulate many points they came up in my client’s session earlier this week.
● Find your way
● To express the unendurable
● Triumph over adversity
● Turn on the Light
● Focus on the Light
In my opinion creativity is life and creative expression is the verb of creativity, creating. Both are essential to living an inspired life.
● Everyone needs to exercise and experience free creative expression
● Allowing this movement of energy, which needs an outlet, a vehicle to carry the expression. Creative expression allows it to move through, not settle in and make camp!
● To express beyond the mind’s definition of what needs to be expressed, free of interpretation.
● The healing/gifts are in the act of creating, not in the production of a product.
This doesn’t occur by painting well; it occurs by painting (or whatever you are drawn to do).
If you’re a living human being, you have been presented with many uninvited pains. What are you going to do with yours? Let them silently kill the spark in your life? I surely hope not. I invite you to “find your way” to make creative expression a conscious part of your life. If you need support, contact me. I’ll be your tour guide to living fully expressed and free.
Here we are in the full swing of Summer 2022. I hope you are full of enthusiasm for how you will spend your time.
I just returned from facilitating an Intuitive Painting workshop at Esalen Institute (esalen.org) in Big Sur, CA. Esalen has a very long history for supporting holistic education. We had a group of 36 people who took time off to explore what Intuitive Painting has to offer. The people who participated walked into the workshop from around the globe! This included people from the Netherlands to Massachusetts, from all professions. As the workshop was ending, we loaded all of the pages of paintings (26”x30”) on 2 tables for sorting. There were over 400 sheets of paper where these wonderful people explored the limitless nature of creating and the limited nature of their mind-set. What I saw on their faces at the end of the workshop was a fresh brightness.
I credit their bright faces to the experience of having a richer connection to their true self and a spaciousness they are taking into their lives to live more authentically and freely. Thank you to everyone who came.
Share the spaciousness and freedom (a real friends with benefits moment of these participants) and embrace your summer. I have several fun events available for you this summer. I hope you will join in! They are listed below on this email and a complete list can be found on my website, Cherieray.com.
How are you? Are you busy with graduations, weddings, or other big life events? I hope this email finds you well and smiling with new hope for what’s ahead.
I just returned from Taos, New Mexico where a group of incredible human beings took a giant leap exploring their creative process. During the 9 days we spent together, I was very inspired by their courage for moving into the unknown and their desire to be free from their limiting mental restrictions.
As is always the case, the brightness of their eyes starts to shine when they grant themselves permission to paint what comes naturally. The bright eyes are also fueled by the surprise of what happens when they get out of our own way.
Isn’t that true for all of us? When we get out of our own way, we connect to a vibrant aliveness that resides inside us. Who doesn’t want to experience that more? Nothing is impossible from that connection.
My intention for the workshop was for it to be “Life-Giving.” At the end of the workshop, each person was shining in their own brilliance. When I see this happen, I know the problems this world faces will be solved by people, just like these.
Who doesn’t need a good news story these days? Here’s one for you. Kids creating and being fearless or creating in spite of fear.
For many years, I have volunteered at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo (rodeohouston.com) serving on their Horticulture committee. I love working on this committee because I get to work closely with the kiddos as they compete for scholarship monies.
Participants register for both individual and partner events from floral design to landscape design and planting. Each competition has strict rules and guidelines that must be adhered to in order to be judged.
The competitions I enjoy the most are the floral design events. Why? Because each scholar is given the exact same materials to create with. While every scholar gets the same materials, no creation looks the same. I find this fascinating. Each creation is unique. Just like every human on the planet!
The scholars range from 10-18 years of age, both female and male. This year we had 113 participants. Each event is timed with a specific assignment. The scholars are brought into this huge ballroom, given an apron and a creating station, while they wait for the announcements. Some tower over their table, some barely reach the table. Some look cool as cucumbers, some look like it’s a high stakes game.
As soon as the rules are announced, the timer begins and off they go. Each participant’s process is unique to them. Some start by sorting their followers, getting organized. Others just grab stems and go for it. One of the more precious sites is watching a 10-year-old boy creating a bridal bouquet! He gives it his all. HI hands are barely large enough to hold the bouquet.
With lots of monitoring eyes and cameras capturing the action, they always beat the timer and submit a creation. What entertains me so, is the amount of focus and engagement they give these events. I admire each one for getting in the game to play with life.
Being in a room with 113 creatives creating is a fun energy to be in. I just soak it up. The energy is so intense as they sit in their anticipation and subsides when to buzzer goes off. I love the idea of kids creating with their hands, freely, with no one telling them what to do and with something alive. I believe it brings them an opportunity to get grounded and connected. When kids have the opportunity to draw from within, they GET that they have what it takes. Who doesn’t need to be reminded of that?
What have you been up to? I’d love to hear from you.
I wanted to take the opportunity to wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving! My wish is for you to relax, enjoy, and savor all the flavors the season offers. I’m giggling because in these ‘flavors’ I’m including all of the flavors of humanity that will cross your path. Without those who are so different from us, we would live in a soup with much less texture, color, and flavor.
I’m hoping this season will hold more compassion for our differences and to see the differences as complimentary instead of problematic. Entering into the holidays standing on the truth that each person sees a world that is unique to them, we can create space at the table for everyone.
Thank you very much for being a part of this community. It has been a gift and a pleasure to share fun times with you.
How’s it going? I wonder if you’re as surprised as I am that we are well into the month of November and staring right into the face of the holidays? Well, it’s true. Here we are. As we enter the holiday season (and any moment) I think this writing from Hafiz could support us all. I hope you enjoy it. This poem inspired me to resume my private dance lessons. I’m so glad I did!
If this writing wakes something up in you, I’d love to hear about it. Lemme’ know!
Hello! How have you been? I hope you’re doing well. How are you doing with all the change, unclear information, and the way life is unfolding for you?
Since March of 2020 does it feel like the world has been shifting under your feet? During this time, I’m sure you’ve had your fair share of loss, disappointment, and unmet expectations. What are you doing with it all? I hope you’re not looking for new places to stuff it.
With what feels like truckloads of LDE (loss, disappointment, expectation) lately in my world, I got really curious about how to NOT be permanently changed by these occurrences. It looks to me like life is going to do what it’s going to do, and people are going to do what they’re going to do. I decided I want to flow better with these changes’ vs creating a story and living inside my story about what’s happening around me? LDE certainly appears to be part of the nature of life and part of the human experience.
When I got curious, what sounds like seconds but felt like years, out of the blue, an insight dropped in, “I don’t want to be a pickle.” What? A pickle? I had to laugh. My intuition has a profound sense of humor!
As I considered this insight, a pickle lives inside a rigid container steeped in bitter vinegar. Well, there’s nothing about feeling confined or living with an internal environment of bitterness that interests me. So, I got curious about how to NOT be a pickle. At this moment in time, I’m seeing I have some free will in this game.
So, I exercised my free will and put my pin on the map about how I desire to feel in my day-to-day life with the unpredictable nature of life. With a curious desire to see something fresh, on NOT being a pickle, I’ve gotten some very helpful insights on how to live in more peace and joy while the world does what it’s going to do.
This same process can work for you.
I’d love to hear from you! Let’s have a conversation. The focus of my work is to teach you how to eliminate struggle from your life and to live in peace-filled joy with what you can’t change.
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