Women, Stay

On supporting women

I’m still learning to support myself as a woman. Which means as a woman I’m still learning to support women around me.

We are the result of women who fought for us. This is a world where we can vote and they couldn’t. We are in a world where women’s innate abilities aren’t burned at the stake. We aren’t in a world where our lack of “abilities” force us into the mental hospital. So there is nothing but uncertainty for our generation of women.

We are still learning to trust our own thoughts and feelings. We are learning to respect all the simple and complex parts of ourselves society deems unworthy. And we’re going to keep learning and unfolding as time goes on.

Stay encouraged. Stay rising. Most importantly, stay learning yourself.

Creative Freedom

In detachment lies the wisdom of uncertainty.

..in the wisdom of uncertainty lies the freedom from our past, from the known, which is the prison of past conditioning. And in our willingness to step into the unknown, the field of all possibilities, we surrender ourselves to the creative mind that orchestrates the dance of the universe.

— Deepak Chopra

I Came To Thrive and Prosper

A world where women are safe and free.

Where they have freedoms that include “Freedom of speech · Freedom of worship · Freedom from want · Freedom from fear.” 

Where they can set goals and reach for their aspirations authentically and still have enough to care for herself at the end of the week.

Where they choose motherhood or not.

Where they seek and find and seek and find

until they find peace and rest

The Mantra that Worked Today

So I am getting ready for an event tomorrow. We were picking up a few food items and I got a little anxious in the snack aisle because that’s how I get when I’m trying to pick out snacks for other humans. Finally, I gave up and called my husband who guided me. At this moment, I’m relieved to have everything we needed. And then it was time to pay. No worries, we have enough. I give my daughter my wallet and go to take a moment to myself. When I get back, she says the card wasn’t in there. My head spins. I have no idea where my card is. I’m on the edge of tears. Can’t think straight. I’m so lost, I call the grocery store in Mass where we last used the card. Half way home, I take a deep breath and say, “Everything is going to be ok.” And I looked over to my mom and convinced her. She didn’t need the convincing, I needed it. Saying those words a few times outloud and to myself helped me become calm enough to remember exactly where I left it.

Moral of the story, use your mantras not for luck or some ritualistic reason. Use them to calm yourself enough to think things through with a clear head.

Heart Song

I admire her persistence

and oh, how her howling soothes

like the thumping inside my womb

those vibrating drums birthed from her mouth

I admire her persistence

how these beats stretch across her howl

The night twinkles

bare, bare, bare, with dull blood

Dance in her womb, crawl on your knees, eyes shut

A mighty hand guides you to the unknown

-Saschia Johnson

Create Rich Experiences

When writing with others, I think it’s important to make sure we are appreciating both aspects in our writing communities; our differences and our commonality

For most of us writers, we’re all doing our own thing, writing our own way, living our own individual writer’s life the best way we know how. We focus on our own genres. We have our own habits and routines and superstitions.

It’s funny, in my fantasy world we all understand each other and if we don’t, we patiently take time to understand each other. We laugh, we listen, we research to fill in the gaps. We find soul, or symbols or our own spiritualities in our words. In reality, that’s not how everyone writes. I used to amp myself up before a writing event to find out that my writing beliefs, writing habits, and writing behaviors are not in the majority.

At first, this was hard for me to understand. I didn’t understand that there was any other good reason to write outside of my beliefs. But over time I learned to listen to people to understand where they were. I stopped listening to find commonality. I wanted to learn to listen to the interesting details in their craft that may be different or outside of my own thought processes.

All of our writing journeys are different and that’s what’s important to remember when gathering with other writers. But I also think it’s important to appreciate that you’re battling the same blank page. Writer’s block doesn’t make you special, most writers get it. Writer’s flow doesn’t make you special, most if not all have experienced it. But, not all humans are writers, not all humans have battled writers block, and so that means not all humans have experienced writers flow. These are things that writers have in common.

That’s why I think it’s important to intentionally take time to appreciate both our commonality and our differences. It creates a feeling of connectedness as well as individuality. It makes for a rich writing experience. And what can be better than a life full of rich experiences?