Equanimity

As promised, a follow-up on my morning pages journaling that I began on November 5th. So I am almost a month in, after making a pact with myself, a promise, to further my emotional and spiritual maturity. I felt that I needed this to continue to grow in the way that I have become accustomed in the past few years.

The catalyst of my liver disease has been an undeniable positive in my overall growth, one that I definitely did not see coming. Who would think that liver disease would be the reason that I have become a grown woman, finally? One who has also learned to play again, at that?

What "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron and her philosophy and morning pages journaling has brought me is a return to candor each and every day in my inner voice. I don't always find it easy to speak without censoring myself, that is certain. I am usually bound to finding the best way to say things. In my journaling, my goal is to just let it flow. I have found an undercurrent of anger and displeasure in myself a theme in this "uncovering". I am learning to look at anger and displeasure as not an emotion to avoid, rather they are signs that something is amiss, and needs to be addressed, and that I must dig deeper. One of the main reasons that I wanted to do this, was I found myself blocked after releasing the book, and "achieving my ultimate goals". Interesting, isn't it? I thought so. I found myself in a self-sabatoge mode in many ways. Then two weeks ago, I also became ill, and the negativity hit me like a freight train, right in the midst of one of the most joyful moments in my life, the birth of a new granddaughter. Why would I be in such a negative headspace at a time like that?

Rather than answer that question, I will say that it is definitely something I am exploring and finding my answers to. They make absolute sense, in reality. When we work SO hard to overcome a major obstacle, it's like you are the star in your own little play, every win is celebrated, cheers arise from the seats, standing ovations and bows abound. When you are done...now what? What do I do next that will bring me such joy and accomplishment? And what have I overlooked in the process. Nothing is perfect, by the way. Even in all that has been done, there are always side projects that may have gone overlooked.

One of the big things for me was how affected I realized I was by negative, or what I perceived as...negative feedback. I have posted about that a few times. And in my reading I realized I needed to find a way to be more "collected" emotionally. I came across the word "equanimity" and it struck me as the answer to my questions...how I would like to be as a person. The freedom that comes from not taking so many things personally, is quite profound. and I found that one of the things that blocked me as a person, an artist, an author, was fear of failure, or of a negative opinion. It can freeze me in place, pencil in hand, poised above the paper afraid to make that first mark.

So in a round-about way, what this practice is giving me, is a very personal freedom of expression, my way of letting go of all the fears that arise in the wee hours of the morning, which I now address with an observers eye and heart, rather than in my own judgmental self-talk which we all know is not optimal for a healthy soul.

So my thought on this practice is I like it very much, and I hate it very much. The very days that I least wish to write are the very days that I find I needed it the most. I highly recommend it, and if not in THIS book, just journaling freely in the early morning before you have let the noise of the world take you away.

Love, Sue

#healprydeliver #theartistsway #juliacamerin #reversingcirrhosis