The july note.

Hey, hi, hello,

I hope everyone who’s experiencing this winter season in Australia is enjoying it, or staying rugged up at least. On top of that I sincerely wish June has been good to you!

* * *

Recently, I’ve found that things have slowed, but my mind still is in tangles. Thoughts sticking like fettuccine pasta fr! Until one morning this month I was browsing youtube, and stumbled happily upon a person explaining the different uses for their various notebooks. One was for quotes, spontaneous thoughts and other lines of inspiration, there was a second which I've now forgotten… then the third purposeful notebook, was my saviour, the book for morning pages. The overall idea was that each notebook freed up space in the mind, to allow more room to experience the day at play, but lets focus in on Morning Pages.

What are morning pages you ask? An article by The Guardian mentions the first major introduction of the process was in a book titled The Artists Way in 1992. The writing task asks that participants use three whole pages of paper to express the thoughts that linger, during the first moments of the morning. There are only two rules to this process that must be followed (even I find a little tricky); 1.) writing first thing in the morning and 2.) filling three whole pages. The great thing about this task is if you cannot think of anything you may simply write about nothing, eventually something will come up… Burkeman (2014, not a scholarly dude, but a journo) explains that the blurry eyed morning writing sessions are closely associated with creativity; with the part of your brain that would usually hold you back, still warming up. So this is the perfect time to write about events that are bothering you, achievements and paths for big plans or even annoyances. 

 When I completed morning pages for the first time it was easy, because I had so much on my mind that I needed to reconcile. Once I wrote about those topics I was free from them, for the rest of the day I didn’t think about the things that had been written about other than the fact that I hadn't thought about them all day. Admittedly, after the first few times it became more difficult to write about things that were in my conscious thoughts, because the previous morning pages had ridded me of the burden. Also, I'm not perfect, making this a habit is going to be a feat in itself for me, so if you try it, don’t be discouraged by inconsistency at the start. 

Just keep in mind that only good can come from trying and trying again. 

Yours Truly,