podcast 4

 hello this is robin norgren thanks for joining me over at creativity montessori and the meaning of life you can find me over on instagram at josie's art school or on my website josiesartschool.com that's j-o-s-e-y a-r-t-s-c-h-o-o-l

and then i also run a company called bright child montessori where i take my expertise as a montessori primary teacher and i create daily lesson plans to take the overwhelm out of being a montessori teacher on a daily basis let's get started with today's segment on your creative peace finding and deepening your creative voice while connecting with god

so in 19 in uh in 2009 i wrote down my top 10 time wasters is what i called them of the reality shows i was watching at the time number one was project runway i would sit and wonder how you could get that proficient with a sewing machine and who designs their clothes and why wouldn't you just go to the store but i loved it number two is top chef basically the only ingredient i was familiar with um they that they used was chicken but i loved watching that one too number three was america's best uh next top model i would watch this and root for the plus size model who was a size 10. number four was hell's kitchen okay i would have to sneak and watch this one because my husband hated it he said he had flashbacks of being a cook at marie callender's restaurant chain in the u.s on mother's day and that is why we do not go to restaurants on that day number five was a another food network show a chefology i'd love to hear um that either paula dean or rachel ray actually never went to culinary school but it did not make me want to cook any more than i normally would number six was the next food network star okay is this the fourth cooking show i mentioned i promise i do not like to cook number seven was top design an interior design show that was a bit over the top and not as witty as most shows in this genre but hey it was replaying on bravo so i watched it number eight nine and ten okay this is kind of embarrassing it was all forms of the real housewives orange county atlanta new york um yeah anyway so that's my list i'd love to see yours i was still clearly in a place where i felt stranded in my own life i was not adjusting well to full-time motherhood and add to that single motherhood since my husband was deployed for long periods of time i wanted to be a stay-at-home mom and yet i felt trapped there we lived in a small apartment so i felt i had to constantly be on the go so i would not go stir crazy yet we were on an incredibly tight budget weekends were the worst i was lonely now that i had begun to crochet i would sit and watch television and crochet the problem was i created the same things over and over again scarves and hats muted colors muted life until i went to my local craft store and they were clearing out novelty yarns they were different colors and textures of yarns that might give these projects of mine a little bit of a pop i did not know what to do with them but the practical side of me could not pass up the sail these are the same yarns that later generated the tote that i dreamed about here's a quote from e e cummings suppose life is an old man carrying flowers on his head

slowly i began to move forward but i was still feeling boxed in i did not know that a change was coming here's some questions for you to ponder describe a time when you felt something you created was truly inspired prompted by something within or outside of yourself what has god begun to show you about your creative life are you sensing some immediate changes that you need to make with your time energy commitments

what are your thoughts about art as therapy

and where do you find inspiration

what do you think about that e e cummings quote suppose that life is an old man wearing flowers on his head

are you finding a rhythm to your creative journey

i felt like my life moving on this continuum between wanting a more creative life and yet not feeling like this was a valid identity for me i still do not understand got understand god's orchestration behind it up to this point the vision for the tote bag still felt a bit odd the idea of a muse as some people call it or inspiration as others called it did not feel like it pertained to my situation it felt like a fluke like i imagined the whole thing i had never considered myself to be creative i was feeling like i was mimicking my mom's hobby

i did not necessarily love the act of crocheting i loved the meditative aspect of it i loved having something to show for my efforts i seem to be more settled than i was many months ago but i felt like i had no outlet

but i kept this outlet a secret for the most part afraid of what people would say about this new obsessive behavior of mine but i did feel like god was closer to me and that somehow this act was making me quote okay again on the inside

around the same time i reconnected with a friend who has an art degree and we began to get together and allow our creative activities to be the focal point for our gatherings creating in community what an interesting idea little did i know that this is an idea that's been around for centuries this decision felt like a good next step for me my friend was honing her skills in bookmaking and was soon turning out stunning handmade journals i began to talk to her about this site i heard about called etsy her products seemed like a gorgeous fit i loved watching as she prepared to take the leap to have her own online craft business description writing photographs pricing dreaming researching encouraging i loved every minute of watching her business come together

have there ever been any activities that you have truly disliked after trying them was there anything that you see god teaching you through that very act of trying did it somehow lead you to something else you ended up enjoying

are there thoughts words pictures that are coming together as you work through this prompt called declare peace

are you finding connection between your inner life and your art

are you finding a particular creative medium that you especially find more beneficial in calming your anxiety doubt and fears

so i have definitely looked at my life over the last i guess 10 years now since this book was written and i see that there is a lot of pieces to a puzzle that are coming together even as i sit here this morning i'm on my way to do a sub job at a school in my neighborhood and i'm still amazed by how i got into teaching many of the reasons why i'm in teaching now is because i started working on this creative outlet of mine 10 years ago and it has caused me to be able to be brave enough to do some amazing things but just like any new thing there's there's a there's a sense of terror with it what if this is the time you fail or you're found out as a fraud

and you have to be willing to still move forward even in that fear because that fear has a way of producing either the best in you or the worst in you

and you got to choose so

as i prepare to walk into this new next step for me i invite you to think about

what has creativity meant to you in your life

the montessori piece in all this is being willing to have your whole person come into a new endeavor

many times we want to put ourselves in a box and if we have children we tell them not to be in a box and yet we show them that it's safer to stay in a box

so i challenge you today as you think about these questions that i've posed and i invite you to go back to the other

previous episodes so you can see the chain of events coming together that you really start to think about what is it that you're trying to find out about yourself

thanks so much for stopping by