A New York state of mind… Wait, not quite

Do you ever find that a change of state makes a difference in your thinking and feeling?

Just last weekend we headed north for a long weekend away from home. While we were going to an area we love and know quite well, we were staying in a different town which brought the excitement of much to explore.

And so, when I say “state” I am using every meaning possible—physical state, emotional state, and literally, in a different state or location.

Just getting away for a couple of days was the breath of fresh air that I needed to stir up a number of the questions I’ve been asking myself in disjointed ways. I had the time and space, early in the morning sitting in front of the fire all by myself with a cup of coffee, to think and feel into the changes that seem to be afoot.

What’s in your immediate future? 

Is there time and space, interest, and financial resources, to step out of your daily routine for a few days, to really shake it up and give yourself an empty canvas for creating the life/more of the life that you desire? 

I feel myself moving—literally turning as if I were an ocean liner—it’s a slow, arching turn allowing me time to weave the strands of thread/my thinking together (please pardon the mixed metaphors).

How do you envision/feel your change process? 

Certainly, I don’t use a more intuitive process for all the changes I make in my life. Sometimes change appears to happen quickly for me (though I think of Malcolm Gladwell’s book, Blink and realize that my “quick” decisions are often brewing for quite some time and are not the quick deductions that I believe them to be). Other times, I almost feel the stirring in my body—thoughts swirling in my head, sometimes just beyond reach—and feelings in my gut.

Maybe it’s also the books I’m reading and listening to:

And perhaps, the foci of the art I’m creating in workshops—ideas, questions, and musing about where I have been, where I am not am now, and how I envision the future. 

Version 4 of this labor of love.

Also, the visual I’m developing for Garnet Health Medical Center for patients facing palliative or hospice care might enter into this mix. (When I started my internship at the hospital, I was unclear about the difference between palliative care and hospice, so offered to draw a visual to be given to patients and families needing to understand these concepts and practices as they face big decisions).  

Visuals of people’s wishes and visions for their last days.

Or the visuals I’m creating with folks seeking to think through what they desire and hope for their end-of-life experiences and my visual obituary workshops… both of which are life-affirming experiences. And the ongoing work and play in VEOLI (www.veoli.net) the group of visual practitioners who have banded together for over 18 months to bring conversations about death into the light of everyday life.

All these experiences plus the joy in teaching the meditative art form of Zentangle are paving the way to a new imagining of my future… I can feel it!

What are you noticing, thinking, feeling, imagining about all of your life? Are you curious or perhaps even hungry for a shift or even a completely new direction?

If you seeking to explore your future, I’m happy to share some of the many resources I have gathered over my years of one-to-one coaching and facilitating such conversations. If you’d like a companion on the journey of transformation, let me know… it’s some of my favorite work (and play).