Yesterday was one of those delicious days.

Jesse has lent me his laptop for the week so that while my sister is home for exams and my dad is off work, I can still work on the computer, without having to do battle for our one PC.

Oh my gosh, this whole laptop thing is delightful. So this is why people get them.

I spent all of yesterday cocooned in my room, reading blogs, writing my own blog, hanging out at the Kitchen Table and healing.

Oh so much delicious healing. It was wonderful.

Things like letting my fear write a letter to me. And realizing that my fear just loves me and just wants to protect me and that more than anything, she just wants me to love her, and hold her close and tell her that I’m never going to leave her again.

Money stuff too – I now have a money fairy! Her name is Fiona. Seriously. Okay, so you now probably think I’m a complete loser, but it’s a lot harder to be scared and icky and awkward and stuck about money if it’s actually a fairy named Fiona who totally loves you and wants to bring you truckloads of money and lives in a cottage in my garden and is guarded by an alpaca.

So take that, Poverty Fairy!

The Poverty Fairy used to live here. He was mean and tricksy and you couldn’t depend on him and he liked to mock you by sending you money and then taking it away again. You could never catch him and he was always running away from you and taking all of your money as well. Jerk.

So I politely asked him to leave and when he ignored me, I kicked him out. I’d had enough. Now Fiona lives here, in her turquoise and purple cottage full of whimsical sculptures and darling little furniture. And Fred the Alpaca guards her. Watch out for Fred, man. You mess with Fiona, he’ll spit on you.

Shame

There’s been this thing that’s been bothering me for a long time. I won’t go into details, but it was definitely a pattern, and a pattern that worried me.

Yesterday, I finally put my finger on it – shame. Like Havi, I too have a wall of shame.

It stops me from connecting with people, because I am ashamed to show my vulnerability, my underbelly as it were. There was a time in my life when I was very exposed with one individual, when I gave him my heart on a platter, and he took it and tore it apart.

I’m ashamed of ever being that vulnerable or ever letting one individual have that kind of power over me. I loved him, and I’m ashamed of that.

But now, it’s getting in the way of letting others in. However, finding out that it’s just shame, and not my intense fear of “oh my god, I’m making the same mistake all over again” is such an incredible relief that I can’t really put it into words. It’s just my shame.

Shame I can talk to, shame I can heal. Shame can be unmade again. There is hope.

London Calling

One of the exercises in week 7 of the Artist’s Way is to go through magazines, ripping out images that catch your eye and then arranging them in a collage, in an almost visual representation of your past, present and future.

It was an interesting exercise. Again and again, images of confident, beautiful, independent women came up. A large butterfly, which I’ve always kind of felt a connection to – I love the idea of freedom, transformation and metamorphosis. Pictures of green fields, with the word “Escape” pasted beneath it – definitely escaping to PEI. The word “Artist”. A naked girl, showing my vulnerability right now – she’s dreaming of the future.

A woman asleep, who looked so peaceful, smiling in her sleep. Something else I yearn for. The phrases “Reclaim the Girl You Left Behind” and “Run Proud”. Both very self explanatory and rang true for me.

Then there were pictures of my favourite pattern and an ornate marble banister – I think for me, that represented luxury and beauty, things that I often deny myself, and yet absolutely adore. Beautiful things are so important to me, not in an artificial, shallow way, but in that they are things that I love and that enrich my environment and inspire me. Note that I didn’t say expensive – just beautiful. Even if it’s just a shell I found on the shore.

But then there is one phrase that has me completely baffled.

Right in the centre, I’ve pasted the words “London Calling.” Why? I haven’t the foggiest. I didn’t even realize that I’d done it until after I’d finished and stepped back. I don’t feel any specific urging to go to London, whether the Canadian version, or the English.

But at the same time, I feel like it’s significant, like it’s trying to tell me something important and I’m just not getting it. And no matter how long I stare at it, I still can’t seem to figure it out. It’ll probably hit me across the head soon, and seem completely obvious, and I feel like I should already know what it’s talking about, but I just can’t seem to figure it out.

Got any ideas? Throw them out there.

Today so far hasn’t been quite as relaxing as yesterday, but I’m still pleased with a lot of the progress I made yesterday.

I’m feeling stronger, more together and more at peace with myself and the world. And even the Universe agrees!

Yesterday, I decided to try some online I Ching, just for a lark. I asked it “What should I do next?” and this is what it said:

Cast Hexagram:

50 – Hexagram Fifty: Ting
The Caldron

Fire rises hot and bright from the Wood beneath the sacrificial caldron:
The Superior Person positions himself correctly within the flow of Cosmic forces.

Supreme Accomplishment.

SITUATION ANALYSIS:

Your needs are coming into harmony with the requirements of the Cosmos.
Blending brilliantly with the Dance of Life, you are becoming an actual element of Cosmic Law.
Your goals will now be realized because you no longer cut against the Cosmic grain; you are no longer swimming against the flow of the Tao.
You are acquiring an intuitive sense of what can and cannot be, and aligning your efforts accordingly.

It even tells me that I’m in harmony! How creepy is that? Completely creepy, seeing as how my intention for the year is harmony.

I’m feeling hopeful. Who knows what adventures await?