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AHN NEWS: Winter 2010

This issue of AHN News is dedicated to CREATIVE VISIONING and using visual art to embolden one’s wishes for transformation. I interview Jennifer Lee, creator of The Unfolding Your Life Vision Kit about the power of visualization and collage in manifesting your dreams. Below you will also find book reviews of Visioning by Lucia Capacchione, The Vision Board by Joyce Schwarz, and Creative Awakenings by Sheri Gaynor. For those of you who would like to incorporate ritual into your visioning process, we have recorded a new podcast with Sandra Hobson on Rituals for Life's Milestones.

May this issue inspire you to make visible and tangible your dreams for healing, transformation and growth.
-Mary Daniel Hobson, Director, Arts and Healing Network

AHN INTERVIEW: Jennifer Lee

“When used as a visioning tool, art can help you gain clarity around what you want to manifest in your life. My collages and vision boards have helped me focus on and accomplish significant personal and professional goals. And, as I’ve experienced through expressive arts and the intuitive painting process, art can deepen self-awareness and personal growth.” – Jennifer Lee

Jennifer Lee is the founder of Artizen Coaching, and the creator of The Unfolding Your Life Vision Kit and The Right-Brain Business Plan. By incorporating creative elements like visualization, movement, collage and book arts, she helps people tap into their greatest potential and live their most authentic, full life. In December 2009, Mary Daniel Hobson interviewed Jennifer about the power of using visualization and collage to make your dreams real.

Mary Daniel Hobson: Tell me a little about how you first started working with the tools of visualization and collage?

Jennifer Lee: I’ve always loved art and collage. I started using them actively as personal growth tools about ten or eleven years ago in a women’s circle and with my first coach. Collage is especially effective because it’s easy, fast, focused and highly visual without requiring artistic talent or lots of skill. Simply grab images that inspire you from magazines or junk mail lying around your house, cut and paste, and voilà! you have a physical representation of your vision. When collage is coupled with visualization (both highly intuitive processes), I find that goals are easier to accomplish. Through visualization you imagine what you want as if it has already happened. The more detailed and descriptive you can be, the easier it is to picture your vision in your mind and connect with it emotionally. The visualization helps you viscerally experience your goals and dreams, and the collage gives you a visual touchstone to remind you of what you want to manifest. Some other techniques I’ve used for visioning include writing a letter to myself from the future; creating dream boxes and writing my goals and wishes on little slips of paper that go inside the box; and prototyping or mocking up ideas to make them seem more real.

Mary Daniel: Could you talk a little about the power of these tools. Why is it such a potent thing to make one's dreams visual?

Jennifer: Images, colors, big picture thinking and emotions reside in our right brain whereas logic, critical and linear thinking live in our left brain. When we use creative approaches like collage and visualization, we bypass the left-brain judging mind through visuals and emotional connection. We allow ourselves to dream big without the constraints of what’s practical and reasonable. Plus, because we are emotionally invested in our vision, we are inspired to take steps toward making it real. It’s not a “should” or “have-to.” Instead, it’s what feels good, and that’s a much more empowered place to come from.

Mary Daniel: Do you believe art and creative expression can be tools for healing and transformation?

Jennifer: I definitely believe that art and creative expression are powerful tools for change and reclaiming pieces of ourselves. When used as a visioning tool, art can help you gain clarity around what you want to manifest in your life. My collages and vision boards have helped me focus on and accomplish significant personal and professional goals. And, as I’ve experienced through expressive arts and the intuitive painting process, art can deepen self-awareness and personal growth. For example, one of my growing edges as an introverted Leo is to step more boldly into my bigness. While I’m painting, I’m face-to-face with myself. As my art started to expand across a whole wall, I had an intense experience of seeing myself as big. Art can be a mirror for your own internal process helping you to witness your personal journey.

Mary Daniel: Could you share a story of someone who was transformed by the process of working with guided visualization and collage?

Jennifer: It’s such a treat to witness my clients making big changes through this creative process and also to hear from people around the world who’ve used my products. For example, recently a woman named Carey Ann Strelecki of Global Brainstorm emailed me to share that after starting her Right-Brain Business Plan she landed a two-week dream job, she got a free plane ticket to Africa, and now she’s developing her next creative project that will launch in the spring. She was so thrilled how the visualization and creative process opened up her mind space to dream big AND manifest her vision.

Mary Daniel: I love the book format you use in making vision boards in the Right-Brain Business Plan and also in the Unfolding Your Life Vision Kit. How did you get the idea to use the book format? Talk a little about its unique benefits.

Jennifer: When I did my coach training several years ago, I also happened to take a book binding class around the same time. During a coaching course we had an assignment to show our vision in a creative way. That’s when I got the idea to use the cool folding techniques I had just learned in my book arts class. And my first portable vision board was born! Many of my dreams in that collage book started coming true. Within six months my husband and I bought our first home (which met all the criteria I wrote down). I also started to grow my business and eventually took the leap from Corporate America into the world of entrepreneurship. That original collage book inspired my Unfolding Your Life Vision workshop and kit.

I also created my first Right-Brain Business Plan on an accordion book because it’s such a versatile format. An accordion book is small and portable, but you can still fit a lot on the pages. Plus, it can open up to display nicely on your desk. I’ve found that most people’s books start to organically tell a story about their business as the pages unfold. I also love that some people have used other creative formats for their business plans such as a leather cuff bracelet, a paper plate mobile, and a box with cutout images inside.

Mary Daniel: Your materials are so beautifully designed. Do you do that yourself, or do you work with someone else?

Jennifer: Thank you! I designed my websites myself, and I’m so fortunate that my hubby helps with the back-end technical stuff. The talented Kate Prentiss designed all of my print material including the Unfolding Your Life Vision Kit booklet and my beautiful brochure. I knew I had found the perfect creative cohort in Kate when I had my first meeting with her and Cami Walker, her business partner. We were playing with unique formats for my brochure and we all went totally ga-ga over little bits of folded paper! The Right-Brain Business Plan e-Book was another fun collaboration with Kate. I handwrote the text, and she made the darling illustrations and designed the layout. I’m grateful to have her help in making my creative ideas real and we have a blast together.

Mary Daniel: How do you spark your own creative process and feed your own muse?

Jennifer: I’ve found that having structure for my creative process helps to keep me engaged and inspired. I regularly attend an intuitive painting class, and I enjoy participating in online challenges like Art Every Day Month to keep the creative juices flowing. Plus having creative cohorts and community helps, too. The other way I feed my muse is by fiercely protecting white space on my calendar. I practice self-care Fridays where I don’t schedule any meetings except maybe with my hairstylist, a massage therapist, friends, a good book or my inner muse.

My mind likes to integrate things, so I’m constantly making connections and getting ideas to blend different things together to make something new. Perhaps that is why I like collage so much. My ideas to weave together art, coaching, and my many other passions come to me when I’m doing my own work planning for my life or business, or just having personal creative time. I find methods that work for me, and many times when I share them with others, they get inspired, too, so that’s just icing on the cake!

Mary Daniel: What are you working on right now? What excites you most about your current work?

Jennifer: I’m super excited about my latest project. I’m writing a book on the Right-Brain Business Plan that will be published in early 2011 by New World Library. For the past few years, I’ve created vision boards about becoming a published author, so I’m thrilled that this dream is coming true and that these creative concepts will get to reach a wider audience. I’m also in the midst of a year-long Expressive Arts Teacher Training program with Chris Zydel. The intuitive painting process is quite magical and I’m looking forward to seeing how I will incorporate that approach into my work.

Mary Daniel: In closing, could you share a few of your favorite resources.

Jennifer: It’s so hard to pick just a few! One of my favorite web sites is wishstudio, which is an inspiring and supportive hub for creative souls.

Some of my favorite books are:

• The Creative Entrepreneur by Lisa Sonora Beam
• Hip Tranquil Chick by Kimberly Wilson
• A Whole New Mind by Daniel Pink
• Juicy Pens Thirsty Paper by SARK
• Nine Modern Day Muses (and a Bodyguard) by Jill Badonsky
• Refuse to Choose by Barbara Sher

*****

Several of the people mentioned by Jennifer Lee have been interviewed in the past by the Arts & Healing Network. Click on a name below to find their interview:

• Cami Walker of 29gifts.org
• Lisa Sonora Beam, author of The Creative Entrepreneur
• Chris Zydel of Creative Juices
  
• SARK, author of Juicy Pen, Thirsty Paper

To learn more about Jennifer Lee, please visit her web sites:

• www.artizencoaching.com
• www.unfoldingyourlifevision.com/
• www.rightbrainbusinessplan.com/

FEATURED BOOK:

Visioning: Ten Steps to Designing the Life of Your Dreams

By Lucia Capacchione

Reviewed by Mary Daniel Hobson

“Visioning is purposeful daydreaming applied to everyday life. It is about thinking with your heart and allowing your true wishes to become reality. A Visionary’s language is images and words from the heart.” – Lucia Capacchione

This book is for anyone who has a wish and wants to translate that wish into reality. Lucia Capacchione walks you through the various stages of visioning from naming your dream to articulating it with collage and then working with the collage to encourage the vision to manifest. The book contains many thought-provoking questions to help you identify your dream as well as clear instructions on how to assemble and create your vision board. Lucia advises keeping a journal and offers many exercises to inspire the journaling process such as writing with the nondominant hand to access inner wisdom. I really appreciated the attention she gives to ways of working with the collage once it has been created. For example, she suggests interacting with it regularly, sharing it with those supportive of your vision, and using writing exercises to help access the collage’s guidance. Lucia also explains the importance of balancing taking action toward your dream and also allowing the magic to simply unfold.

At the end of the book, she recounts many success stories of people who have used this process to find romantic partners, their dream home, abundance, a new career, and healing from an illness. With each topic Lucia shares advice about how to use visioning tools to create the desired outcome. For example, in working with healing illness and pain, she suggests the following:

“Written dialogues serve us well in the case of acute or chronic illness or pain. One can dialogue with the entire body, with a body part, a system of the body (such as digestion), or with specific pain (headache). Again the voice of the self writes with the dominant hand and the body (or body part or pain) writes with the nondominant hand. If you are dealing with illness or negative body image, dialogue with the body as it is now, then create a picture-of-health collage portraying what health looks like…. Allowing the healthy body image that was pictured in your health and well-being collage to speak through a monologue in your journal can also be extremely helpful. Write in the present tense to reinforce the reality of your desired state.”

Lucia makes this resource accessible to anyone – no prior visualization or art experience is necessary. Overall, she has created a very compassionate and inspiring guide for using artmaking to shapeshift one’s life.

Published in 2000 by Tarcher Putnam, this soft-cover book has 256 pages. Click here to order through Amazon.com.

FEATURED BOOK:

The Vision Board: The Secret to an Extraordinary Way of Life

By Joyce Schwarz

Reviewed by Tristy Taylor

In this lively and colorful book, author and coach Joyce Schwarz shares a very detailed, step-by-step guide to creating your own vision boards as well as sharing many other creative tools to manifest “the life of your dreams.” Both a how-to guide and a visual art book, this publication is filled with over 100 full color images of a variety of actual vision boards, many of which use different mediums, from basic collage to quilting to painting to sculpture. It is also chock-full of inspirational quotes from artists, philosophers and thinkers on almost every page.  As a bonus, there is a detailed resource section at the back of the book, so if you resonate with a particular vision board or story, you can find out more about the artist who created it by visiting their own personal website or blog.

All of the artists featured in the book share insights and healing they received through practicing this process. In the chapter on “Visioning,” one of the artists shared that making her vision board

“…showed me that I’m too into my stuff. I picked out pictures of expensive glassware and a watch decorated in diamonds but when I really looked at the images, I realized I wanted more self-esteem and in the past I’ve turned to acquiring possessions. What I really want now is inner peace and a sense of who I can be – like the rest of the pictures that showed butterflies nestled into a flower bed and a sunrise that gave me a sense that I have only just begun, even though I’m fifty years old.”

Thanks to the author and publisher, we are able to share the rest of this chapter with you – just click here to read the first chapter of the book, called “Visioning”.

Other chapters in the book include “Relationships,” “Wealth & Well-Being,” and “Gratitude.” I was very happy to see gratitude included in this process. I think it is a vital aspect to creating and manifesting healing and abundance in our lives and in the world. [You could learn more about art and healing and gratitude in the Fall 2009 issue of AHN News]. 

The Vision Board is a wonderful resource to create positive change in your life. The freedom this process encourages is a valuable and welcome invitation to all people seeking healing and/or a more whole life.

Originally published in November 2008 by Collins Design, this book was republished in December 2009 as a paperback with 208 pages. Click here to purchase through Amazon. To learn more about the author, please visit her web site at www.ihaveavision.org.

FEATURED BOOK:

Creative Awakenings: Envisioning the Life of Your Dreams

By Sheri Gaynor

Reviewed by Mary Daniel Hobson

“Images are there to empower us. They arrive to share stories in a way words cannot. Images speak to our right brain, the receptive half, that holds the key to our creative essence.” – Sheri Gaynor

In this book, Sheri Gaynor shares wisdom gained from teaching workshops on the EnVision Process. This three-step process involves “EnVision Dreamtime” in which you use journaling and quiet reflective time to articulate your vision; “Creating the Art of Intention” in which you make an art piece that anchors your vision; and “Reflections” in which you respond to the artwork with writing and possible additions to the art over time.

The first part of the book sets the stage. Sheri shares the story of her own creative journey, instructions on the EnVision Process, a suggested materials list, and a whimsical exercise called “The Creative Awakenings Visa” in which you make a visual commitment to explore uncharted creative terrain. Then the book divides into a month-by-month format for 12 months – each month featuring a different artist who practiced Sheri’s EnVision Process. Artists such as Deborah Koff Chapin, Claudine Hellmuth and others share their EnVision artwork, journal excerpts, and instructions on specific techniques they use in their own artwork such as “Layering with a Transparency” or “Painting by Touch.” Also in this section, Sheri has re-printed blog entries about the unfolding process of working with these artists and creating the book. The last part of the book includes additional resources such as a deck of Transformation Cards to tear out and shuffle for additional guidance as your vision develops.

This book is a nice complement to the other two reviewed here in that it delves into the personal creative life of 12 artists and how they each work in a unique way with the visioning process. I was really struck how much the experiences of worry, fear, anxiety, or doubt plague most of the artists, and in the end, seem to be necessary demons to work through in order to get to the shear joy of creating. Also this book is in full color – not only are there many illustrations, but even the text-only pages are on colored, patterned backgrounds. The book offers several different creative techniques to create your vision art – not just the traditional cut-and-paste collage method most often employed in doing this kind of intentioning work. All in all, this is a book that will appeal to creative people who are looking not only to articulate their dreams in a visual form, but also looking for inspiration and insight about the creative path.

Published in 2009 by North Light Books, this large soft-cover book has 144 pages. Click here to order this book through Amazon.com. To learn more about the author, please visit www.sherigaynor.com.

READERS RESPOND

We would love to hear from you! Please send us your thoughts and feedback about this issue of AHN News. Please click here to send your comments, ideas, and feedback.

Thank you.

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