Looking to make space for creativity and contemplation this year? I've got you.

An upcoming free resource to guide you in stretching your creative muscles and building mindfulness in your life

Hello!

In this time of new year’s resolutions, visioning boards and growth plans, I want to offer something rejuvenating without any of the eventual shame or obligation that comes with gym memberships or accountability groups. If new gym memberships and accountability groups are empowering for you, please go forth and be fulfilled!

But in a culture that tells us to hustle, that encourages us to constantly busy our minds, bodies and wallets, I’m wanting something else for this new year.

I’m wanting to make time for two things I have craved my whole life, two things that fall to the wayside when I get busy. The two words that keep coming to mind when I slow down long enough to ask myself what I need are contemplation and creativity.

For anyone who knows me, I need to constantly have about three creative projects on the go and about 36 unfinished projects tucked away. But sometimes, perhaps ironically, these creative projects don’t actually coincide with contemplation. Sometimes they become another burden on my to-do list. Sometimes they just hang around the corners of my mind where the spirit of Protestant Work-Ethic and Supermom-mythology and Hustle-culture find them, turn their noses at them and give me a tut-tut-tut while shaking their heads knowingly at each other.

So I’m wanting to enter the new year with an intentional pattern of thoughtful creative exercises. I’ve got a list of tricks I’ve taught creative writing students over the years that I’m wanting to implement, practise-what-you-preach style, and some new things I’m wanting try.

31 Days of Creative Contemplation

Starting in January, I’ll be posting 31 free exercises for creative contemplation. I’ll be writing prompts for 3-5 minute activities (10 if you want to go deeper with it) to draw us into mindfulness and to stretch our creative muscles. For my Substack readers who aren’t expecting daily messages from me, I’ll batch these in one-three messages per week so you don’t get sick of me.

Maybe you, like me, want to get back into a creative rhythm in your life, but don’t want to do that at the cost of your self-care time. You want the creative and the self-care to go hand-in-hand.

Maybe you’re feeling like you’ve been in a bit of an emotional fog, feeling powerless in a world that is broken and hurting and endlessly so. Taking time to reflect, to be present to your body and wandering thoughts might give you just a little more of a sense of power and presence in this short life. Finding ways of cultivating creativity can provide an outlet for resistance, for building care for yourself and others.

Maybe you’re a crafty, artsy-fartsy type who is interested in doing little creative things with other people and finding ways of doing those already-built habits more thoughtfully instead of just (as is my default) with a rerun of The Office in the background.

Maybe you’re someone who doesn’t feel very creative but would like to be more. If so, please know that creativity isn’t just a thing you’re born with. Like most things in life, some of us are naturally more inclined and some of us work at it, but all of us can grow in it.

How to do it (spoiler: however you want)

Whatever the case, I’d love for you to join me. If you’re thinking of signing up but don’t want another obligation to add to your life, please know that this is a choose-your-own-adventure approach. I won’t be sending messages guilting you into doing more, guilting you into taking courses or telling you that you can be the best version of yourself if only you _________. If you want to do a few of the prompts and not all of them, awesome. If now isn’t the time, save it for later. If you want to do everything, cool. All of this is welcome.

However you want to do it, I’m looking forward to doing this creative contemplation with you. Feel free to drop a comment below about what creativity or contemplation means to you.