Latest / Healing Her Story with Riva Jean-Paul / Creating in Cycles: The Feminine Way to Make Art & Live Fully (Part 1)

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Creating in Cycles: The Feminine Way to Make Art & Live Fully (Part 1) · Healing Her Story with Riva Jean-Paul

• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to today's episode of the Healing Her Story Podcast.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: Today we are going to be continuing our conversation on creativity.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: This is a conversation that I've been inviting us to have over the course of Leo season.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: And right now we are about halfway.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: If you haven't had the chance to listen to our episode with our guest, Leah Morris, I highly recommend going back and giving that a listen.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: Leah, so courageously and vulnerability, vulnerably, excuse me, shares her story around what it was like to come out of the closet as a creative.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I believe that we all have this innate ability and desire to create.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I think sometimes we think that if we aren't drawing or painting or doing something that is explicitly creative, then we might not consider ourselves to be a creative person.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: But I find that creativity comes in many forms.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, of course, through specific artistic modalities.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I also find that my creativity is expressed through my cooking.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: It's expressed through the way I dress.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's expressed through the way I write in my journal.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I find it can also be expressed in the way that I create my life.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: And as I've really allowed myself to explore my creativity more deeply and to express my creativity more fully, I've begun to really approach my creativity in a way that allows me to see my entire life as a work of art.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_00: And the way that I am spending my days, the way that I am spending my free time, the way that I am consciously crafting the friendships that I have and the relationships that I have and the food that I eat and the things that I buy and the places I go, it's all part of this big sort of tapestry that makes up my life that I consider to be a work of art.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_00: And so when you look at your creativity in that way, there is this sort of opening and expansion that comes in and allows us to play with our creativity in new ways, in ways that we maybe otherwise wouldn't see as being creative.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I hope that that is something that feels like is something you can explore as we continue to move through Leo season.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: And to support you in that process, I want to talk a little bit more about how our creativity is also cyclical.
• 5:17
  SPEAKER_00: If you've been here a while, then you probably know that the moon is cyclical, the seasons are cyclical, the female body is cyclical, and really all bodies are cyclical.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: We all have a circadian rhythm and uh rhythm of the nervous system.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm curious if you've ever thought as your creativity being cyclical too.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: I know that I have really found it to be.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: As I've grown to embody and optimize each phase of my menstrual cycle, I first started syncing workouts and then nutrition, self-care, and then healing modalities.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: I then started doing it with my art.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm about a year into the experiment and I've learned so much about myself and the creation process through that.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: What it's helped me most with is this concept of trust.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: Knowing that each cycle comes with a period of pause, action, illumination, and maturation.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: As we're in Leo season when this episode is airing, I thought this would be a potent conversation to have again, as Leo is associated with creativity and self-expression.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: Perhaps you've accepted my invitation with the cycle check-in that we had at the start of Leo season to begin a new creative project.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: And if you did this time around the full moon, as this is being aired, you may find yourself in a moment of culmination and celebration.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: For example, a one-on-one client of mine is closing out a theater production this weekend.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: And I myself am putting on some final touches on a portrait that I made for my mom.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: And what's really interesting about this is that it none of this is planned.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: It all seems to just align in this perfectly divine and magical way.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I have found that I, as I have devoted myself to living uh cyclically, that it's been very much like that.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: And the more that I work with the natural rhythms and cycles that are already happening inside me and around me, the more that it begins to work with me.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: And as that happens, we can again begin to create our lives and our art in a way that is more sustainable, in a way that is more true and authentic to an organic rhythm.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: Again, that is already happening.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: So today I'm going to break the creative cycle down for you.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_00: And along the way, I'll share some of my personal insights and experiences.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: And we're going to be breaking this episode into two parts.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: So today we'll go through the first two phases, and then next week we'll go through the second two phases.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Before we begin, I do want to acknowledge that your creative cycles may or may not align with the moon or your menstrual cycle.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: And that's okay.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_00: You might find that you move through these cycles in a single day, maybe over the course of a few weeks, or maybe over the course of a few months, like a big project that I've been working on that I'll share a little bit more about today.
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I've been working on this project since spring, and it's about halfway through summer and it's uh it's still going.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: As always, I encourage you to take what you need from today's conversation, leave the rest behind, and I really encourage you to explore these cycles for yourself in order to develop your own lived experience and understanding of what these mean for you.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_00: So let's begin.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: The start of the creative cycle begins with a pause.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: This time is associated with the new moon phase or the menstruation phase or the season of winter.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: This is a time of nothingness.
• 9:45
  SPEAKER_00: I find for me that creativity needs space.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: Anytime I'm calling in a new idea, starting a new project, I'm always trying to create space first.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: If I'm booked and busy, rushing through life and that go, go, go energy, it makes it really hard for ideas and inspiration to come through.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: This also might be a time to rest and recharge before beginning something new or before continuing on with a project.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_00: For example, I've got a pause phase coming up on my mural project that I've been working on since spring.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: And that pause is going to be happening next week.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: Even though I still have quite a bit of work to do, I know that taking this time away will help me to come back with fresh eyes.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: I will spend this time nourishing myself and creating space.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: And this will allow my energy to rebuild.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: This will give room for new ideas to come through.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: I already had some ideas beginning to come through last night as I was creating space for myself then.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: And this also might be a time of brainstorming, of dreaming up ideas, or perhaps maybe simply setting an intention to begin something before actually taking action.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: This is very much how my mural project started earlier this spring.
• 11:27
  SPEAKER_00: There was a period of pause where I wasn't exactly sure what big project I would do this year.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: I always like to do one really big creative project.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I was allowing myself to be inspired by the classes that I was taking and the people that I was meeting and the conversations that I was having.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I found myself feeling really excited and curious to explore murals and doing murals with children specifically.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: And so earlier this spring I planted a seed with no real expectations around it taking any root or sprouting.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I mentioned it to one of my colleagues at the organization that I work with here in Sacramento.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: And within a few weeks, she had reached out and wanted to pursue the project.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: And that then brought the project into the next phase.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: And that phase is action.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: And this is associated with the waxing moon phase and the follicular phase of the menstrual cycle and the season of spring.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: This is a time of initiation, a wave of fresh energy where you may begin doing research, sketching out ideas and concepts, maybe meeting with mentors, guides, or friends.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: I know as I brought my mural into this next phase, I was sketching out a lot of different concepts.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: I was having meetings with the leadership at the organization.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: And I was also having more conversations with people in my art classes and my peers.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I was starting to build momentum for this project.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: And not specifically for this project, but for other projects that I've done, some of my smaller projects that I worked on through my visual arts classes over this last year, completing my prerequisites for my master's program.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: I found that I had to be really careful about which mentors and guides and friends that I invited in during this time.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I find this is due to it being a transitional energy where we're moving from this more yin energy into this more yang energy.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: And things can be a bit unstable here.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: I find myself still sort of quote unquote figuring things out in this phase.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I found that if I invited someone in who was too critical or too judgmental, that it sort of squashed the ideas before they had chance to take root and sprout.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: So I would encourage you, if you are feeling like you want to bring in support during this phase, to be mindful and making sure that it's the right kind of support.
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_00: This phase is a young phase.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: This is where new growth is happening and it invites in this very childlike curiosity and wonder where you can explore and just see where things take you again without any of those expectations.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: And as you show up and do that consistently, it starts to create momentum.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: And then it will move into the next phase, which again we'll talk about more in our next episode.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: In the meantime, I again invite you to get curious about how these cycles are already showing up in your creative process.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you are in a moment of pause where you haven't been allowing yourself to explore your creativity, either in new ways or perhaps in ways that you enjoyed when you were a little one.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: And perhaps, maybe, as we're also moving through the Lions Gate portal, and there is a sort of amplification around the energy of creativity during this time.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe there is a little part of you inside that is wanting to be more creative.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_00: I see this a lot in the women I work with.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_00: They often have these parts of themselves that want to write, that want to sing, that want to dance, that want to paint, that want to draw.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: And there's something so sacred and beautiful about that.
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_00: I know for me, it's so easy to get caught up in the busyness of life and the to-dos and all of the other things that we've either been conditioned to believe or more important, or perhaps there's pressure from the outside world, or maybe from the inside world, to put more energy into the things that have been deemed as important, but maybe aren't as important to us, or perhaps they are important to us, but our creativity is is equally important.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_00: And if this resonates with you, I'm curious what it would look like to create more space for your creativity.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: And not necessarily coming from a place of it being about skill or needing to be in a show or put it up in a gallery or creating just for the sake of creating, just because it feels good.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: And there is something so therapeutic and healing about that too.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: Art is so magical in that way.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: It brings us into the present moment and it connects us with our subconscious parts, and it begins to give voice and expression to some of the things inside that we sometimes aren't able to put to words.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes words aren't enough, and that's where creativity can come in.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: And there was one quote from my children and art professor that really stuck out to me last semester.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: And she said, Teaching art is giving people the freedom back to express themselves.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: I think in our early phases of life where we're in more of this sort of young spring-like energy, sometimes our creativity gets squashed because we do a drawing and someone tells us it's not good enough because it doesn't look photorealistic, or we are singing and someone tells us our voice isn't good, or perhaps we go to a dance class and we have a terrible experience, and that's where our creativity already starts to get stifled and stuffed down.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: And as we get older and as we begin to have these creative parts want to be expressed more, we sometimes have to unravel a lot of those ideas and programming and beliefs that have made us believe that our creativity is important, or that if it's not associated with being paid or being good, that it it somehow doesn't have value.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_00: The arts are also deeply connected to the feminine, and as our mission here on this show is about amplifying and strengthening and nourishing that feminine frequency, both within ourselves and in our collective creativity and supporting the arts is such a beautiful way to do that.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_00: And even if you aren't feeling like this is something that you are ready to explore, you can always support the arts by going to shows and museums.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: And I find that for myself, there's something healing about witnessing art as well.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_00: We will continue our conversation on all of these things and more specifically the creative cycle in next week's episode.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that I've left you with some things to ponder and explore over the rest of Leo season, and very much look forward to connecting with you next week.