Favorite Persons Janet and Catherine and Favorite Place, Catherine’s Studio

 

“I received many many gifts from staying with Catherine Anderson and teaching a Writing Down Your Soul workshop in her studio. A big gift was getting to SLEEP in her studio. Here’s my bed in one corner. What does this remind you of? Think Paris.”  Janet Conners

That is one high honor Janet Conner is mentoring the writer in many of us with our hearts aflame with purpose and divine guidance. She is SoulWriter.

Teaching us to listen to the Voice and record it on the page. I address my Voice as WHO — Whole and Holy One.

 

I am Writer – in – Residence….

…earning my AIC certification —  Ass In Chair.

Artemis, goddess of the heart sets aim on the words that come into being through us…

and Hestia…goddess of the hearth keeps us at home and creative in our writing.

My Hestia is at the loving Crone age and her fire still burns and guides…

Our Plug In For Writers Circle gathering of exquisite women feed the world and shape it into a better world for all in the books that will take seed in the near future.

 

Archangels Michael and Raphael and Angel Gabriel are present to help me during my “office hours” of creativity.

http://www.janetconner.com

 

 

Catherine Anderson of Charlotte NC  is a GRACE FIND for me. I was with her twice in her beautiful and sacred studio at her home, and traced the back yard labyrinth with my feet and the labyrinth of my writing and SoulCollage® cards with my heart and hands.

 

SoulCollage® gives wings to my words. The practice of this beautiful visual/spiritual/artistic practice was begun by Seena Frost and is world-wide now with thousands of facilitators introducing groups to the joy and wisdom building it brings.

 

I Am One Who Is….Blessed Baby.

I Am One whose Power Animal for the writer in me is the Tiger.

 

I Am One who helps you understand the difference between
crash landings and exploration.

I Am One who is grateful to be called to writing,
SoulCollage® and the quiet peace of the labyrinths
I have walked all around the world.

 

 

So Inspiring to be together, create and journal
our Wisdom within.

 

 

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#3–50-50 The Labyrinth of Our Life and Love

Photo and Book by artist and author Catherine Anderson
http://www.catherineandersonstudio.com/

“Dear Susan,

May the path of the labyrinth support and hold you in love. Blessings and Joy, Catherine 2014.”

Catherine opens her beautifully written and illustrated book with the following observation: “We are not all fortunate enough to have a labyrinth in our backyard to walk whenever we feel the call to connect with the winding path of the labyrinth. This journal can be a place to turn when you yearn for the calming path of the labyrinth.”

Actually, Catherine and I are fortunate ones to actually have a labyrinth in our own backyards. She, just outside her home art studio, where I have been blessed to both walk her labyrinth in peace and gratitude for what both prayer and artistic creativity add to my life…and I, in the backyard of the home I feel graced to have found with my loving husband Tom, to live and enjoy our golden years and our golden Michigan sunsets off our deck just above our labyrinth.

Receding winter of ’15 and the labyrinth reappears

SoulCollage Facilitator Training Weekend with Catherine, 2014

As happy as I am to have the labyrinth in our yard, I still find it challenging to explain its essence to others without going “too deep into the weeds” in way of explanation. I, myself, first found it through Canon Rev. Lauren Artress of Grace Episcopal Cathedral in San Francisco.

I was at a weekend retreat at the Dominican Weber Center in Adrian Michigan on Centering Prayer. But her little black paperback book attracted me in the bookstore, “Walking a Sacred Path.” Eventually, my sacred path led Tom and me to Grace Cathedral, where we experienced another retreat and I completed training in Labyrinth facilitation. We also walked both Chartres designed labyrinths there; one on the Cathedral interior floor, the other just out the door, on the piazza, high on top the hills of San Francisco.  Within a couple more years, we pilgrimaged, once again, to spend a week in Chartres France and attend a retreat on the labyrinth and Sacred Geometry, upon which the cathedrals of medieval times were built. We resided in the Catholic seminary housing right next to the the Chartres Cathedral, originally built in the 1300s, I believe. We walked within it and around it many, many times, photographing  ad infinitum the architecture, sculpture and stained glass phenomenon that it was.

Chartres Cathedral is famed for its stained glass windows, the largest representations of Mary in all cathedrals and its labyrinth dating back to medieval times when pilgrims traveled to it for their annual pilgrimage when they could not travel to other holy sites due to wars and dangers.

Tom and I were here in May 2000.

So what does the labyrinth have to do with our life and our love?

One simple way of explaining the labyrinth is that it is a metaphor for life…..this certainly works for me!  The circular pattern, once begun, yearns ever for the center. And you begin toward that center in wide sweeping circular paths and motions. You are free to stop anywhere along the path, for what?  A breath? A silent message sounding in your heart? A casual gaze upon the blessings of nature and people around you?  A time-out?

Who, among us, doesn’t do this in real life and actually need to do this? Not I, for I need them all to feel the center in my self.  Or the lack of it.  I may know where I am going.  I may think I know where I am going. I may know that I DON’T know where I am going.  I need to feel the Presence of the ONE who does know.

The labyrinth can represent this ONE, by whatever name we call it….for it has many. God, Source, Universe, Yaweh, and so many others.

The path on the labyrinth is not a maze…. you are never blocked once you have begun the walk. no matter the difficulty, no matter the shortness or length of the path, it continues inward and to the center. You experience turns, expected, and sometime when lost interiorly as you walk, a sudden turn appears abruptly.

These are the same types of turns, expectations, interruptions I experience in my married life. Certainly, Tom’s and my union and love resulted in many, many more changes of location than I would have ever anticipated. But on we went, supporting each other, working out the difficulties, enjoying the overflowing joys, and managing many, many times of “letting go” as we journeyed.

And that is what the inward journey on the labyrinth is about…..letting go…..letting it  be……trusting……willingness…..mesmerized by watching your feet take……that one step at a time……seeing only a small part of the total bigness of the path, yet trusting that it is there for you.

Reaching the center, we feel open to receive gifts…what gifts? Any that come, receiving them in faith. For our marriage, I receive the fullness of nearly 50 years of the commitment spoken in our vows so many years ago.  And just like one step at a time,  I know it was not a “once only” commitment to  I do.  No, for us, the words once spoken to us by a priest during some of our Marriage Encounter years ring very true.  “In marriage, you do not speak the words  ‘I do’  only on your wedding day, you speak and live them every day of your married life.”

When you leave the center on your walk on the labyrinth, you walk freely, retracing the path that brought you into the center; it will likewise lead you back out to the world, bringing with you the gifts received in the center and being fully ready to share those gifts with others.  If you have walked mindfully, you are returning from the labyrinth reminded of who you truly are —  which is gift itself– and you have been gently guided back  in balance from the calming path of the labyrinth.

In truth, over the course of fifty years of marriage, there are many opportunities for just the opposite of calm and balance to exist between the partners, and that has been true for us. I have appreciated and strongly relied upon the people and experiences in my life that have built up my faith and my optimism in myself and in my partner and in our life together.  Because even with all the “rock ‘n roll” we’ve met along the way, today I can truthfully say…..

I count it all as grace and my heart overflows in gratitude for the life and love I have in Tom and family.

1969

2015

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Ash Wednesday SoulCollage®

Today’s Ash Wednesday’s 9:00 am Mass, scripture, liturgy and Father Jim’s reflection fed my soul. The selected hymns honed my attentiveness to the season…..and Jesus, the reason.

He came so that we may have life and have it more abundantly. He came and taught the largest lesson on love there has ever been. “Greater life no man hath but that he lay down his life.”  “Love one another as I have loved you.”  “I Am the Bread of Life.”

Tom and I were asked to bring up the gifts to the altar. We, parishioners, recited the Lord’s Prayer in unison…..”Give us this day, our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

And we took into our own bodies, the Presence, the Body and Blood of Christ, transformed from plain bread by the priest. We prayed for ourselves and our loved ones and the leaders of our world to be able to……do the next right thing, something Father Jim talked about.

I knew I was going to make a SoulCollage® card for this Ash Wednesday when I came home. One line  from the song Hosea stood out in my mind:

“The wilderness will lead you to your heart where I will speak.”

Over the past two weeks I’ve been reorganizing and harvesting (peeking into for themes, actions, guidance I’ve received) my journals and photographs from over at least the past twenty plus years and this line expresses perfectly the guidance I have received over and over again.

There were a great number of times in my life that I surely did not know where the path ahead would lead and I had to pick a thread of guidance to be able to do “that next right thing” or even have the courage to take the next step. There are many stories coming in Napkinwriter that will illustrate this point fairly dramatically.

So I thought my SoulCollage® card would look something like a wasteland background with some symbols of grace or “light” or something.

But the magic and beauty of SoulCollage® took over immediately and a whole new image emerged instantaneously from randomly selected stock in my materials.

It seems the grace of the Mass and the message of Lent was still in full effect when I sat down to make the card. I took to the table with me my scizzors, glue, card backing and one National Geographic magazine plus three packages of images I assembled some time in the last year.

In SoulCollage®, you don’t really “think” your way into the image. You let the image that wants to come forth do exactly that.

But I was thinking a little bit, I must admit. I thought, perhaps, the National Geographic magazine would give me a desert wilderness type background and I’d work from there.

The first thing I opened to in the National Geographic was the full card size crucified Christ image.  Not the first place I would choose to look for such an image. I knew that was my card; but what else to collage to it?

From one of the three packs of images I had with me, I chose one. On the very top of probably over one hundred images was the image of the inter-twining hands. I knew they went on the card; right below them were images of the loaf of bread and the wheat.  And right beneath those were the people walking on the beach.

All I had to do was sense where they were to be on my card. I composed it and it will be with me in all my Lenten reflections and prayer times.

It is not hard to fall in love with your own SoulCollage® cards. I am in deep, deep gratitude to founder  Seena Frost, and my teacher mentors and SoulCollage friends, Catherine Anderson, Karen Mann, Deborah Storts, Ginger,  Neltje Brawer, Kayle Rice, Dorothy, Mary Russell, and Sara Houseman for sharing and shining our souls.

I AM the Bread of Life.

I AM the One who is Sanctuary.

“I AM the One who is Souljourner.

I AM the One who is your birth mother.

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Light Danced with Shadow in Catherine’s Yard

Every artist knows the importance of light and shadow in their visual compositions, paintings, photographs and drawings. The subject of shadow is an important component of SoulCollage(R) also, as originated and taught by Seena B. Frost. Discussions about it came up in the recent weekend  Facilitator Training I took with eleven other inspiring women and our leader, creat-ress, artist, photographer and author, Catherine Anderson in Charlotte North Carolina.

The Light shines on Catherine Anderson

“We recognize that for human life to thrive…it is best lived in a community that is supportive and compassionate…a community that is able to listen to and understand and tolerate many points of view…a community that is creative and imaginative as well as smart.”  Seena Frost

That is exactly how I experienced our facilitator and group of soon-to-be certified SoulCollage(R) facilitators. (Pardon the (R), my Alt 0147 approach as taught, has not yet worked for me.)

By Sunday morning, we arrived in high spirits of time well-spent together.

Ginger and Margaret break out in song.

From our introductory Friday evening session, embraced in Catherine’s beautiful and bountiful studio setting, we knew something great was on the horizon. We settled in.

Discoveries of just the perfect image waiting for us.

Our group was not entirely new to the process of making the cards, yet we reviewed the basics and important techniques. We enjoyed seeing many of the SoulCollage(R) cards brought by each woman. We learned the very, very valuable experience of being Reader, Witness, Facilitator and Recorder. Our inner artists were awakened and alert.

And all the while we were totally involved in creating, sharing, listening, meditating and appreciating, there was something going on outside in Catherine’s yard.

Light was forever playing with shadow! Everywhere you looked, there was the marvelous, breathtaking mixture of light and shadow. It was like nature knew and applauded that an artist of high order lived there.  Light and shadow gloriously embraced all that surrounded Catherine’s home.

An Artist’s Retreat

Each morning we arrived, Catherine had “made something”, (a personal value of hers) reminding me of the scripture that announces, “Behold, I am a new creation.” And each day of training, we were.

Our luncheons and ongoing refreshments available for “whenever” filled our cup to overflowing in nutrition and appreciation.

We were so “One with the many” that even the deer joined us for lunch, coming right up to the sun porch.

And the light continued to play with them and throughout the yard.

The light was not only bright, it was very, very hot in a humid setting and so Catherine protected us from that throughout the weekend. But the closing ceremony took place with the light shining upon our cards and upon the receipt of our SoulCollage(R) Facilitator Certificates.  Joy radiated in our hearts and travelled in light speed around the path of the labyrinth as we received recognition from the heart and hands of Catherine Anderson.

One by one, Catherine called us forward and with the handing of the certificate to each of us, SoulCollage(R) becomes 12 time richer with exponential expansion possibilities to many varied communities who will be served from these leaders.

Gabriella

Something important is happening here. We take the trust with us. This matters to our world.  We are keepers of the keys.

Catherine unlocks the doors with honor, humility and hope.

Seeing the future with a firm step forward on a path that promises peace.

Light is not the only energy present. Enthusiasm and purpose abound. We go forth. We leave this place. We are aware of light and shadow in our world.

But there is balance at the center.

and the light still plays with Seena.

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Art is Life. WWAM!

Art is life. And Dorothy Randall Gray is WWAM. And so…..

Dorothy Randall Gray AND Amejo Amyot  together are WWAM  WWAM!!

In my joyful and fun 70th year on this planet Earth, I have been intimately united with my own parallel universe! It was great from the start. My extended family joined around me for a surprise breakfast/brunch buffet with brothers and sisters and cousins awaiting me after I’d celebrated the Sunday liturgy and Mass with my daughters, sons-in-law and wondrous three grandchildren. We had brought the gifts to the altar and I prayed in thanksgiving for the sixty-nine years granted me and opened my heart and arms to the possibilities that lay within each day of this new year.

I get two new years in two days, as my birthday falls on January 2nd, just as the partiers are reviving from their New Year’s Eve excesses.

Rejoice! This is the day the Lord has made. I will rejoice and be glad!

So, in a parallel universe, time is not linear I have found, and it is now heading into the autumn month of September. I have just returned from a precious trip to Charlotte North Carolina where I trained with Catherine Anderson for SoulCollage Facilitator. Totally inspiring and over one hundred fifty photos from that weekend. My year also included an invitation from a best friend forever to join her on an all-paid first class trip through the European Alps and five countries along the way. This all speaks of parallel universe to me.

But the words, memories and images on my mind  tonight are from my mystic, magical, meditative and magnificent experience I had attending the May weekend of Women Writers and Artists Matrix in Saratoga Springs New York.

What happened there? Magnificent, MUSE-i-cal women in community, minute by minute artistic expression and learning. Quiet, honorable time and chant in the early morning quiet. Waves of prayer carried out into the ethers by the sound of the drum beat above and around us and within our heart. Lunch time sisterhood sharing that drew in even the chef who prepared special dishes for us and hung out at our group table because he didn’t particularly want to be anywhere else at the moment.

Painted poems, paper book specialities, movement, dance and exclamation! “Seeds” respected and collected that have given rise to new prose and poetry by this time because they came home in journal pages with us. The campus of Skidmore College, with IWWG (International Women Writers Guild) roots for many of us, welcomed us as we strolled throughout the Quad area and by the old dorms and buildings. I revisited the grounds I put my newly created prayer sticks many years ago from Amejo’s meditation group. Old friendships renewed, new friendships gained. That’s what happened there.

This, indeed, is my parallel universe and I’ve known it for a long time. It keeps inviting me in. I cannot stay back. When I committed to both the WWAM weekend and the SoulCollage training, I did not know where or how the funds would come. It was my calling to say yes. The funds manifested and everything worked out for me to have an abundant experience on the least possible amount of dollars I could spend.

I even got author and WWAM workshop presenter, Suzi Banks Baum, for a room mate at the Inn of Saratoga. Plus, she offered to pick me up at the airport, which saved a $50 fare, while Amejo drove me back to the airport on Monday morning.

Suzi

Suzi taught many techniques for one type of folding book, and had examples of oh so many other types. In her work, she values the mission and honor of motherhood. It is a precious work.

Suzi invited us into our own gardens to see what we would see and hear there. My garden had a beautiful brass gazebo entrance.

And in my garden, I found the very same sunflower girl awaiting me that I had on my 2013 Intention Mandala on my wall back home. Now how could that happen?

Magical? Mysterious? Mystical? Definitely Magnificent.

My Year of Joy and Fun beating on my mandala and in my heart at WWAM.

And just WHO did we think we were, Dorothy asked us and warned us there were to be no timid responses.

And we did our best…..not to disappoint.

 

I told her, “I am God in a pod”, but I don’t have a “selfie” photo of me saying it.

This artist led me into a most lovely movement exercise and a painted poem creation that left me surprised and amazed. She also gave me the wondrous experience of Wabi Sabi that is a treasure in my daily living. Nothing I read on paper could have matched the gem of her inviting it into my life as a spiritual, practical wisdom practice.

She spoke of the importance of space in art and in life. I will remember that. Also she encouraged laughter. Always.

Dear Amejo, she holds a torch of womanhood in her hands, of woman’s connection to the essential, and is the treasure holder of the transference of women’s wisdom held sacred within our hearts and passed on to others. She is a Shaman among us. A Blessing as she walks the Earth.  Namaste.

Sisters, one and all.

Writers, artists, friends….who have withstood much, loved much, lived fruitfully.

Given an assignment by Dorothy,   “How many ways……”

My camera didn’t focus correctly on this. Her life went out of focus with a serious, severe stroke. All weekend, she revealed the hard realities of her soon to be full recovery, starting from well before the “start line.” Her opening sentence in her book is,  “The first time I died……” I am buying the book when it comes out.

My question posed in my Garden book.

I suppose I got like this because once upon a time……..(like fairy tales begin)

I met Dorothy and Amejo

and then……

I just became

like this.

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The Conversation Begins…..I Am One Who

I am in love with the process of SoulCollage(R) and I have my bags packed to visit Catherine Anderson in Charlotte North Carolina to attend her weekend workshop in SoulCollage(R) facilitator training. I hope to begin to bring the joy of this practice to many more people in the Kalamazoo area and beyond.

http://www.soulcollage.com/

http://www.catherineandersonstudio.com/soulcollage.html

Catherine explains this as “a gentle, playful and often joyful way of exploring your life and your deep self.  Using images from magazines, individuals create their own unique deck of cards, where each card represents a different aspect of themselves. There is a deeper level of knowing that is accessed through images.  The process combines image, words, intuition, and synchronicity into a unique creative and artistic process that anyone can do.  It requires no special skills, but can often produce images and insights that are surprising and full of depth and meaning.  SoulCollage® works directly with the language of symbols, images and archetypes and is an insightful process of self-discovery.”

“I am One who places high value on Fitness and Health.”

What Catherine says, in a neat little nutshell, is most certainly true. Since I attended her Introduction to SoulCollage(R) workshop last year, I have been gaining in the stack of my SoulCollage(R) cards, which arise spontaneously and intuitively.

And they certainly speak volumes to me. That is the neat thing about SoulCollage(R). No one else interprets your cards. You, alone, listen to and attend the “speakers” in the card. They are incredibly wise, and I get the sense that even though I think I am hearing the message for the first time, some part of me has “always known” their message to be the truth of me.

“I am the One who jumps in and knows I can do this!”

Seena B. Frost planted the seed for SoulCollage(R) some time ago back in the 1980s. Even though these cards and this process can serve on the deepest level of psychotherapy, and do that, she convinced millions that  anyone could do this creative process with a good pair of scissors, pre-cut mat board cards and images you can find anywhere, and glue!

Author of SoulCollage(R) and SoulCollage(R) Evolving, Seena has a world-wide website and a facilitator training process working around the world as this practice expands exponentially.

           Seena Frost
http://www.soulcollage.com/

I engaged with Karen Mann, of Australia, in an 8 week fascinating and very instructive course of a combination of SoulCollage(R) and FasterEFT, Emotional Freedom Technique of Tapping. What a way of bringing SoulCollage(R) home and attaching it to body memory! Thank you, Karen.  (And learning to think and speak like an Australian was great fun).

Karen Mann

Catherine Anderson is a most gracious woman-artist who has walked her path of creating a life filled with what she loves to do and be…..and that would be creator, artist, photographer, writer, woman leader and inspirer, and author of her award winning book, “The Creative Photographer”.

http://www.amazon.com/Creative-Photographer-Catherine-Anderson/dp/1600597165/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1375814650&sr=1-1&keywords=the+creative+photographer

 Catherine Anderson

(Note: I am amazed! I just saw this on special on Amazon.com for $9.87, which has to be the bargain of the century. The wealth of knowledge, creativity and image in this book is worth much more than ten times that, so be like a phantom and treat yourself to a “steal”)

Catherine has brought SoulCollage(R) facilitator training to South Africa, India and is teaching art inspiration in Italy, being a global ambassador for the wonders wrought through soul with imagination, camera, images, lines, circles and squares. The world provides the sacred canvas for creation.

Long before I knew about SoulCollage(R), I had met and come to love Jan Phillips. I also have had her CD “All the Way to Heaven” for many years. I love every song on that and it’s hard to say I have a favorite, but “The Artist’s Creed” and “The Conversation” are right up there at the top. I play them both for my own enjoyment and contemplation and for many groups I facilitate in spirituality and holistic health.

Jan Phillips is out front of the WomanSpirit wave of life occurring now. Jan calls out loudly, but lovingly, for the Life Artist in us all, to move forward in a new form of activism that invites others to make a difference and create the change we want to be and see.  She is a force for Wisdom and Truth in our lives and in our world. She does not believe in little. She wants us to live our BIG Selves. And we do that, as one of the lyrics of her songs says, “take the hand of everyone you’re walking with!”  She is creator, artist extradinaire, teacher, author, friend and priestess. This summer, she created the first summer symposium on the campus of Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs New York, “Women(s) Voices for a Change”.

Jan Phillips

http://www.janphillips.com/giftshop.html

Jan’s “The Conversation” seems to me now, to be the perfect spokesperson for SoulCollage(R). In it, a person asks some very meaningful questions, and begins to hear back truthful, soul-opening answers to her queries. That is exactly what happens in SoulCollage(R).

“I Am your Wise Woman within. I Am with you always.”

The Conversation: (Jan Phillips)

“You are my spirit and I call on you to help me remember what I know… You are the flame that lights the path I walk, the guide I need that leads me home..”.

“I am Dave, your big brother, on his journey down Alzheimer’s waters.”

(The Conversation continues:)

“I am the one whose hand is in your hand, I will lead you down which ever path you choose…I am your guardian, I’m your deepest friend, I’m your deepest intuition, I’m your muse…..I am the VOICE that calls you to the light, the TRUEST of the voices that you hear.”

“Every time you call on me, I’m there for you.”

My 3rd Chakra Third Eye – Far Seeing Totem Animal

Questions and Answers from “The Conversation”  Jan Phillips.

“Do you have the answers that I’m looking for?”
All the answers that you seek, you have inside. “

“How will I know if I have chosen right?
If you’ve chosen out of love, love will abide.”

I Am the One with Healing Hands. My gift to you is Peace.

“How am I to know what I am here to do?
Just be who you are , the doing will get done.”

In The Conversation, the answer given to the question posed about knowing “I am of the Light”  is to

“Take the hand of everyone you’re walking with
and the love you feel will spread that light around.”

So I have taken the hands of Catherine, Jan and Seena and Karen and through SoulCollage(R), I will spread the that love and light around.

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Just Picture the Soul

Playful, often joyful, and gentle way of inner exploration! Those words describe the process of SoulCollage. For me, it is a visual of my prayer time, a spiritually fun or serious — or both– way of taking an imaginary snapshot of my real self.

SoulCollage then gives a microphone to my visual and invites “me” to speak. I write down her/his words to me. It seems like I’m making this up — but I know I am not.

What I am hearing and seeing is an intuitive message, at any given time, soon after I have created the card (or the card has actually created itself before me). Then, later on I visit the card and, in the moment of silence I offer, the card begins anew and continues a conversation I am grateful to have.

The process of SoulCollage was founded by Seena B. Frost, M.Div. M.A., Marriage and Family Therapist, in the 1980s, after study with Jean Houston. It is a simple, creative process using work and play with images, imagination and intuition to gather insights about one’s personal and unique Soul and about how to become transformative  agents in the world.

There is now a vital community of thousands of Facilitators, teaching this process world-wide. I experienced my first SoulCollage workshop with Catherine Anderson in Charlotte NC. I will return to her gracious studio to train as a SoulCollage Facilitator to be able to enlarge this work/play in the world.

This is my soul collage card that “breathes my heart”. I made it in Catherine’s workshop. It tells of the voyage I’ve had with my “big brother,” Dave who is now travelling in the misty paths of Alzheimers.

Dave is on the twilight journey of the canoe paddler, (or perhaps it is the dawning of a new morning experience of life). He is alone but not alone. There is the dandelion whiffs of memory within me of Dave holding his little sister secure in the flower of life, pulling the wagon with little sis in it, establishing a fulfilling brother-sister relationship through personal letter writing.

Toward the top of the card, the message  of the card is”heard and read” by me in the silence of completing the card.

The message I hear internally is that a candle will light his way now and the flame of my love accompanies him. I add a little chocolate for sweetness on the cobblestone path he walks within the disease. There will be peace within each of us as we give way to the path that is before us and that is ours alone to walk. But truly not alone. That is a message I needed to hear. It has shone light upon my path and it acknowledges for me that Dave’s path is blessed.

This soul card has given me great comfort as the distance between us grows and I look for the grace in aging. It is there. I must agree and sit within it. All is well in this world.

Catherine Anderson

http://www.catherineandersonstudio.com/soulcollage.html

Catherine trained as a SoulCollage facilitator in 2004, offers trainings in Charlotte, and has trained facilitators in South Africa and India. “It never fails to amaze me at the discoveries that participants have when they allow themselves to follow their intuition and let images speak to them,” she says.

SoulCollage is an excellent process for people who think of themselves as “non-artists”.  Also for people who just “don’t get” meditation.

Engaging in this visual, quiet, respectful process and sitting in a respectful community of other person souls, the gift of the personal card appears before each one. It is then honored and celebrated at the completion of the project.

I am taking a 4 class on-line SoulCollage and FasterEFT course with Australian Karen Mann, who joyfully enlarges the practice of both of these systems.

https://www.facebook.com/MsKarenMann/about

Between the first and second class, we students were to create our Soul Collage Cards from the Career/Business and Health/Fitness sections from her Wheel of Life.

The following are mine:

Health & Fitness

Answering: “Who are you?”

“I AM THE ONE who flies freely within you, an endless supply of joy. I am the One within the butterfly chrysalis who emerges on butterfly wings.  I AM THE ONE in grace and balance, freedom and beauty.  I AM the ONE who is the Truth of you. I AM THE ONE who is your rest and your big dreams. I AM THE ONE who gives birth to your creativity. I AM THE ONE within you who defies gravity. I AM THE ONE of sleekness and non-judgment.  I AM THE ONE who answers only to Joy and Love and Compassion. I AM THE ONE WHO fills you with those. I AM THE ONE who is whole and healthy and I AM THE ONE who celebrates that with deep gratitude.

WHAT I GIVE YOU is creative possibility and unquenchable Joy. I plant deep within you the sunflower seeds of light and the grace of flying to the moon with your grace and agility. I give you the acceptance of what is and the courage to heal and transform suffering and physical challenge. I teach you balance and enhance your awareness and intuition.

I WANT YOU TO REMEMBER all the ways in which you’ve nourished the essence of fitness and health within you. I WANT YOU TO APPRECIATE and CELEBRATE the courage you’ve built within yourself to continue to choose wisely and change in order to realize your health and shine your light of Truth and Creativity in your life. I WANT YOU TO ENJOY your good health  and TO BE OPEN to conscious expansion to become Universal Humanity”

Career/Business

When I came to making my business SoulCollage card, I feared the image of the businesswoman suit showing up. Instead, what came was the whirling, young red-headed girl in the dress I love. She was on a card I had begun in Catherine’s class, but knew I had not completed.

When I found her again in my SoulCollage box, I knew it was time to complete her. The candles that light her way were already there, and she was headed into the Cosmos, which excited me.  The waterfall, looked a bit odd to me at the right hand corner but it nourished me and I had also already had that glued on the card.

The only thing I added was the logo from three of my work activities now: Souljourner at-Large, coming right from her heart area on her dress, my Prayer and Care Companion lotus, and the hands surrounding the heart from my Gentle Woman Reiki business card. The labyrinth turns of life was already embedded in my card and I acknowledge its wisdom and grace in my life’s landscape.

These are the activities and services that beat my heart and my breath. These are my business. These are my career and no business suit is required.

This is what my card spoke to me:

“I am the One in you who is Joy! I am One who leads you in a circular path of life and you can trust it. I am one with you who is your passion and purpose. I am the One who fuels your dreams and fulfills your desires. I am one who beats deep within you. I am One who IS yes to life and love.

I WANT YOU TO REMEMBER I am the One within you who is looking out into the Cosmos and yet serving people on Earth with love and compassion. I WANT YOU TO KNOW you are trustworthy of  the gifts and talents within you and that financial abundance lies within your willingness to serve as Souljourner at-Large…I WANT YOU TO CONTINUE offering this service in playful actions and not worry about the results. I want you to give up doubts and swirl with me into your future.

THE MESSAGE I HAVE FOR YOU TODAY is to enhance your inspiration by PLAYING rather than working your way through life.”

My SoulCollage cards are like instant self-help books. I see a life novel emerging from them.

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Visions and Messages from the Soul

Catherine Anderson’s First Class of SoulCollage Facilitators
in South Africa in 2012.

I am so excited to be taking SoulCollage Facilitator training from marvelous and inspirational artist extraordinaire, Catherine Anderson in Charlotte, NC in early August this year.

I completed my initial training with Catherine last year in a wondrous visit to her charming and spiritually energetic studio, filled to the brim with image and word resources, plus her own abiding Presence.

I look forward to incorporating this SoulCollage practice into my own personal life and into the life of Souljourner at-Large LLC programs and retreats. It is all coming into view and purpose for me.

I say yes to it all.

This is my soul collage card that “breathes my heart”. I made it in Catherine’s workshop. It tells of the voyage I’ve had with my “big brother,” Dave who is now travelling in the misty paths of Alzheimers.

Dave is on the twilight journey of the canoe paddler, (or perhaps it is the dawning of a new morning experience of life). He is alone but not alone. There is the dandelion whiffs of memory within me of Dave holding his little sister secure in the flower of life, pulling the wagon with little sis in it, establishing a fulfilling brother-sister relationship through personal letter writing.

Toward the top of the card, the message  of the card is”heard and read” by me in the silence of completing the card.

The message I hear internally is that a candle will light his way now and the flame of my love accompanies him. I add a little chocolate for sweetness on the cobblestone path he walks within the disease. There will be peace within each of us as we give way to the path that is before us and that is ours alone to walk. But truly not alone. That is a message I needed to hear. It has shone light upon my path and it acknowledges for me that Dave’s path is blessed.

This soul card has given me great comfort as the distance between us grows and I look for the grace in aging. It is there. I must agree and sit within it. All is well in this world.

SoulCollage Cards from Catherine Anderson’s
Facilitator Training in March 2013 at her Charlotte NC Studio

Seena Frost is the founder of SoulCollage. She puts forth a great question to us:

Seena Frost, SoulCollage Founder

SEENA’S CORNER

Most people still have the hierarchical world view that views real change as coming primarily from the top and seldom from down where “we” live; so, we vote, then sit, watch the news, and feel helpless. What if this belief could shift? What if more and more people begin to feel and know themselves as being deeply interconnected with the whole fabric of the planet? …Could doing SoulCollage® help people develop, at a Soul level, this perspective of interconnection?

When we speak from our cards, we often are surprised and excited by the synchronicities and connections that show up. We begin to awaken to the reality that, deep down, we are as interconnected as the millions of cells in a physical body.

~ Seena Frost
Founder of SoulCollage®
(April 2011 Neter Letter)

Do you have a big pile of images you have saved in the closet or under the bed that you have been waiting to figure out what to do with?

Find a Labyrinth of Messages coming forth from your Cards.

I am eager to find ourselves sitting together, creating the images that will touch the deep wisdom within us. It will also give the SoulCollage creator a resource available to them at any time to “go within” and hear how the image speaks to them over and over again.

I will be able to help you do this in a short while. In the meantime, start collecting images that attract you for no apparent reason at all and ones that you just know belong to you. They give you a little jolt inside, they brighten up your attitude, they draw forth awe and respect for you, or they feel happy, joyous and free.

Just begin building the pile.  You will be fascinated how they create your cards “instantaneously” and with deep purpose.

This is just plain fun. And after that, you get the bonus of knowing these cards have always belonged to you.

Thank you, Catherine, for the great introduction of SoulCollage to Napkinwriter, as a glorious new way of writing.

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SoulCollage® Evolving – Going Global

Catherine Anderson

SoulCollage® Evolving – Going Global 

through Catherine Anderson

Napkinwriter shares this message from Catherine Anderson, artist, photographer, author and evolutionary leader with you of her work in South Africa. When I took her SoulCollage course in Charlotte, NC a few months ago, she shared with me all the blockages, doubts, and just plain physical travel circumstances she had to overcome to stay true to her commitment to give of herself on this level.

This is worthy for you to know.

“How each of us nurtures, heals, and explores Soul will have impact on the vast cultural changes beginning to manifest.”   Seena Frost

Dreaming into Being: Bringing SoulCollage® to South Africa

by Catherine Anderson

 

Everything we do begins with a dream. In 2005 I offered the first SoulCollage® workshop in South Africa and I sensed that the process would be a wonderful tool to be used in healing and reconciliation work in the country. I knew that people working directly with the communities were needed for SoulCollage® to be most effective. And this year my dream became a reality when I held the first SoulCollage® Facilitator Training on the continent of Africa in Durban, located in the Province of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. I think there is some magic that takes place when we, through our thoughts, put a dream out into the universe. It is almost as if we dream our vision into being.

                                Enjoy Catherine’s video of the new South African Facilitators.

 New Facilitator Alan Hofland, who works with the non-profit community care and support center, Woza Moya Project, held his first workshop with their staff members two weeks after his Training. This workshop is a pilot to work out any cultural nuances that might arise before he shares SoulCollage® further in the rural community. Alan will be sharing with people whose first language is Zulu, who have had limited educational opportunities, and who live in a rural area where there is no running water or electricity.
Annabel Morgan, a “humanitarian clown” working with Clowns Without Borders South Africa, also trained as a Facilitator and will be taking SoulCollage® into the rural areas of South Africa and Swaziland. Annabel has already shared SoulCollage® with a group of her fellow clowns who do not have English as their first language and who live in rural areas. She reported that one of the clowns even used his images to generate ideas for a new clown routine! Annabel felt that the SoulCollage® session also contributed a new depth and honesty to the interactions of the group during their week of training together.

 

I’ve also learned about the concept of “ubuntu” from these African communities. Ubuntu is a way of living that acknowledges that we are all interconnected, that I am who I am because of everyone else who touches my life. Archbishop Desmond Tutu describes it like this: “A person with ubuntu is open and available to others, affirming of others, does not feel threatened that others are able and good, for he or she has a proper self-assurance that comes from knowing that he or she belongs in a greater whole and is diminished when others are humiliated or diminished, when others are tortured or oppressed.”

 

Many times it is those with the least that can teach us the most. I know that the time I have spent with the people of Woza Moya has taught me gratitude and a deep appreciation for the people who make a difference in the lives of others. I also believe that our own self-discovery through the process of SoulCollage® can bring us closer to living with a sense of “ubuntu.”

Catherine Anderson is a SoulCollage® Facilitator and Trainer in Charlotte, NC. She is the author of “The Creative Photographer” and in addition to SoulCollage® offers photography, visual art journaling and creativity workshops. Email Catherine.

Woza Moya Welcome

 

Visit www.soulcollage.com to learn more about SoulCollage® and experience a personal card reading.

   Train as a SoulCollage® Facilitator with Seena Frost in Santa Cruz, CA (a few spaces still available) on September 7-9.

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