Yesterday, I spent the afternoon at the Creative Action Center with my friend and fellow Lady Launcher Laura Parker.  Given the busy week I had, it was really nice to just hang out, create and connect.

Last month when I took Kimberly Wilson’s Yoga and Creativity workshop, Kimberly highlighted the yamas and niyamas.  We studied them during my yoga teacher training, but I appreciated the refresher since I have such a hard time remembering the Sanskrit words.  So, I created two pieces to stay connected to these spiritual guidelines.

Yamas are ethical observations or how we interact with our outer world.  The five yamas include:

• Ahimsa - nonviolence
• Satya - truthfulness
• Asteya - non-stealing
• Brahmacharya - moderation
• Aparigraha - greedlessness

Niyamas are self observations or how we interact with ourselves in our inner world.  The five niyamas are:

• Shaucha - cleanliness
• Santosha - contentment
• Tapas - fiery discipline
• Swadhyaya - self-study
• Ishwara-Pranidhana - devotion to the universal

This week I’ll be focusing on Santosha (being grateful for what I have) and Tapas (to keep me on track with my goals).  I invite you to pick one or two of these teachings to play with this week, too.  Namaste.

It’s been another full week and challenging for me to keep up with all the great things going on. I did make a point on Wednesday to take advantage of the gorgeous spring-like weather by practicing yoga in my backyard. With the sun shining overhead, birds chirping in the trees and the cool breeze on my skin, I was in yogi heaven! I’m amazed at how the fresh air brought me so in touch with my breath and my body - wonderful!

With another Ladies Who Launch Incubator that started last night, I’m reminded to get creative about doing more nice things for myself. After all, pampering is part of the lady launching way! So, I can’t wait for more sunny days like this to do backyard yoga ‘cuz that sure counts as a nice thing.

Today I was at It’s Yoga for another dream box workshop with a new circle of teacher trainers. It’s hard for me to believe that it was almost a year ago that I completed my yoga teacher certification. So many wonderful things have manifested since then. One being getting to lead this workshop at the studio!!!

I had fun laughing and hanging out with the group. They were a playful and engaging bunch! And I loved hearing about their dreams and seeing the unique ways they all decorated their dream boxes.

One of the students crafted her own “guru-in-a-box” with a pop-up Sri Swami Satchidananda to offer inspiration and wisdom! How cool is that?!

Our Creative Playground met at Laura’s lovely home for an afternoon of mandala making. A mandala (which means means circle or completion in Sanskrit) symbolizes wholeness. Laura explained that in Sanskrit, bindu means particle or dot and is the center point of the mandala. It’s a place of infinite capacity. We are always moving toward this point. It is a journey.

We circled around a table on Laura’s front porch while she led us through a visualization to our creative center. Then, to warm us up, she invited us to pick up oil pastels and chalks and quickly create our first mandala in 10 minutes. I loved the freedom to just intuitively let the colors flow. During the visualization I was reminded of some powerful insights I had while listening to someone from the Strozzi Institute speak about body-based coaching at SF Coaches earlier this week. The presenter led us through a centering practice to get us really grounded in our bodies. We aligned from top to bottom, lengthening while grounding. We became aware of our width, meaning how we show up in the social dimension. And then we noticed our front and back, where we’ve come from and where we are going. Throughout Laura’s visualization I imagined that energy surrounding me like a globe and that’s what I depicted in my first mandala below. This piece felt very airy and dreamy.

Once we were done with our warm-up mandala, we moved on to a more focused project. I decided to play with brighter oil pastels against a black background. I explored feeling more in my body and more grounded and bold by using the vibrant, warm colors of the lower chakras. The mandala of the yellow, red and orange blossom emerged.

Mandalas come in all types. Some are very symmetrical and others, like mine today, are very organic. What’s amazing is that mandalas show up in nature all around us. Think of the rings of a tree trunk, the spirals of a sea shell or even planets circling the sun in our solar system.

What connects you to your center or bindu? How can a mandala help you journey inward and expand out? For more ideas on creating mandalas, check out Mandala: Journey to the Center.

Today I was at It’s Yoga again leading the dream box workshop for the weekend teacher trainers. Cozying up with crafts and some cool jazz was the perfect antidote to the pouring rain outside. I can’t believe that I get to say this is my “work!” - it’s so much fun and I love helping people tap into their inner teacher and creative wisdom.

The snapshot above is of one of the student’s dream boxes. She wants to create a green yoga studio in her community to bring together yogis in a beautiful, peaceful and sustainable environment. I want to come visit!

Now that I’m home, I realized I needed to do my art for today. So, I decided to do the final steps of my dream box that I created yesterday. In my workshops, I have participants write their dream on a lavender card (honoring Larry Schultz’s lavender dream pillow). So, I wrote my dream of bringing a new approach called Art Visioning or Expressive Arts Coaching to the coaching profession at large (including writing a book and offering training on how to use creativity to manifest your vision and dreams).

I then used small cards in the colors of the chakras to write down strengths I see in myself. That way, if I’m ever doubting my dream, I can pull out a strength card and remember that I call on this quality to keep me moving forward. I had fun doodling some images to go with the words.

What strengths can you draw on in yourself to keep you connected to your dream? If you’re having trouble thinking of any strengths, ask someone close to you for their insights. Often times others are able to see things we don’t see in ourselves.

[tags]National Blog Posting Month, NaBloPoMo, Art Every Day Month, It’s Yoga, Law of Attraction, dream box, art visioning, expressive arts coaching[/tags]

I have two back-to-back dream box workshops at It’s Yoga. Just got back from the one today with the 28-day Teacher Trainers and had such a blast with them. Each group has it’s own energy and this one felt gentle, inviting and playful. I loved hearing about all their different dreams including opening up a retreat center in the woods, singing opera and much more!

I dove right in, too, and made my own dream box this time. This new box is about being a leader in Expressive Arts Coaching. Participating in the Art Every Day Month challenge has been a great way to really get my creative juices flowing and I’m so excited about where this new direction is taking me in the coaching community.

Back to the yoga studio tomorrow for the weekend warriors!

[tags]National Blog Posting Month, NaBloPoMo, Art Every Day Month, It’s Yoga Teacher Training, dream box, Law of Attraction, Expressive Arts Coaching, art visioning[/tags]

Yesterday morning, I reconnected with my blessings box which sits on a little altar in my meditation/yoga room/coaching office. Whenever I’m moved, I’ll write what I’m grateful for on a handmade “I am blessed” card and place it in my blessings box.

Reading my cards filled me with deep appreciation and joy as I was reminded of how grateful I am of my supportive and loving husband, the beautiful area in which we live, my wonderful circle of friends and family, living my dreams and so many other amazing things!

Coming from a place of gratitude created a lovely flow synchronicity throughout the day:

• A kind, young man walking in the BART station held a parking spot for me in the otherwise filled lot.
• I met some colleagues for a meeting in the financial district and then when I was done, I decided to visit my husband at his last day at work at his current company (moving on to bigger and better things!). I looked up his office address and realized, it was in the same exact building, just four floors up! I walked in just in time to join the “good-bye” ice-cream run with his team.
• Brian and I had a spontaneous dinner date in the city.
• And when I went to the SF Coaches meeting later that evening, I was thrilled to see my dear friend Julie Daley. And we continued our wonderful connection as she graciously drove me back to the BART station to my car.

What are you grateful for? I’d love to hear! Or take a moment to write it down and tuck it away in a special, sacred space. And as you appreciate what’s positive and wonderful right now, notice how you open yourself to serendipity - even in the simplest forms. It’s amazing what the universe will serve up when we’re ready to receive!

[tags]Blessings Box, Law of Attraction, Synchronicity[/tags]

Last Friday through Sunday Brighid and I co-led the third retreat of the 2007 Cheryl’s Dreaming Big leadership program in Indiana. Our retreat kicked-off with some intense storming (literally - lots of thunder, wind and rain; and figuratively - lots of group tension and unresolved issues). I must say it was pretty exhausting and challenging to hold the space for this natural, yet difficult, phase in team development.

One thing that helped me get through it was walking through the labyrinth at the retreat center. Before entering the path, you can hold an intention or inquiry. For me it was around how can I stay with the mess of the storming phase. With every twist and turn, I questioned, “How much longer? When will this end? Where is this going?!” And then I relaxed into it and trusted that I would find my way to the center. I leaned into this insight throughout the weekend. Labyrinths are a great meditative and focusing tool. There’s this really cool portable labyrinth that I imagine would have a similar effect.

The other take-away I had from the retreat was remembering that the program we created is a great laboratory for learning and practicing leadership, not only for the participants, but for myself as a co-leader as well. Brighid kept reminding me of the lessons from an insightful book called Leadership and Self-Deception. This powerful parable reminds us to relate to people as people with hopes, dreams, needs, wants instead of objects or obstacles that our in our way. By shifting my perspective to being “out of the box” I was able to rise above the muck of the storming and group dynamics and reconnect to who these wonderful people are and what they have to offer. The other thing I kept coming back to was the idea that from the crap of group storming comes the fertilizer which nourishes the ground for a beautiful garden to grow. It’s a natural cycle.

How are you with conflict and tension? What are some ways that you move through the storming in your life? How has going through the muck helped new opportunities to blossom for you?

[tags]labyrinth, leadership, leadership and self-deception[/tags]

The past several days I’ve woken up with a tense jaw. Ever since returning from vacation, I’ve been going non-stop. It’s all good stuff - signed on several new clients last week, visited with friends, am working on cool opportunities, etc. I’ve been more focused on other people or external things and I haven’t regularly taken time to truly be quiet and still. Sure, I’ve done my morning yoga practice to varying degrees, however my body is clearly telling me I’m needing something more to fully recharge.

I’ve never considered myself religious, yet I do believe in some form of a higher power. One of my previous coaches was a spiritual coach. Our work started me on my journey to exploring more about my own higher self and how it’s connected to everything around me. In addition to helping me take the leap to pursue my dreams, she also guided me in developing a regular practice of quieting, journaling and tapping into my inner peace and knowing.

My grandparents were Buddhist. As a kid, I thought their chanting and incense were just a little too weird. Now, I wish that I had learned more about it from them. Especially, the meditative art of shodo that my grandpa used to practice daily (the image is a portion of one of his calligraphy scrolls that hangs in our house).

More recently, probably since my yoga training, I’m noticing that Buddhism has been showing up in different parts of my life. My friend Brighid studies Buddhism, especially the practice of the Middle Way, and often times shares her learnings with me. This past weekend, Brian and I watched the inspiring movie “Peaceful Warrior.” Many of the film’s messages (especially of “taking out the trash” - the mental garbage that clutters our minds and prevents us from fully living in the present moment) are inspired by Buddhist teachings and also remind me a lot about what life coaching is about.

What I’m learning about Buddhism is that it’s more of a philosophy, a way of being or a practice. The concepts naturally resonate with me. I even think back to how many times friends and colleagues have commented on how “Zen” I am.

As I read “The Zen of Creativity” in bed last night, I shared with Brian how I’ve noticed these theme of Zen and Buddhism lately. I even mentioned that the last book I read happened to be written by a local spiritual teacher who has a Zen center in Oakland which I’m considering checking out. Brian joked that it should be called a “Zenter.” Anyway, that term grew on me. As I laid awake not able to sleep at the crack of dawn this morning, I thought to myself that in the midst of my stress and clutter, I’m finding my own “Zenter.” I’m cultivating my own practice of quieting down, emptying my mind and letting creativity flow from there. I’ve even been incorporating these ideas into the new branding for my coaching business.

So, speaking of quiet, creative time, I’m planning on spending the rest of the afternoon clearing my head and then creating from that.

[tags]Zen, Buddhism, spirituality, shodo[/tags]