Visit to my Dream Studio, asking about staying focused

Visit about staying in focus

Tuesday, March 18, 2003

(Note: This is a transcript of an imaginary visit to my Dream Studio, where I live and work in a beautiful studio on land bordering protected wilderness land. When I visit my Dream Studio, I'm conversing with my Older Self - who's well in her eighties. She gives me helpful guidance.)

            I enter the dream studio with pleasure. I’m already feeling happy this morning at the thought of entering the Nest to look at colors I painted yesterday. It has dawned on me that I can practice drawing and get more deeply intimate with works in progress – by drawing the works. I intend to do this every morning as a way to start work.

Cathy: I have some questions about how to stay in focus – know what to do next. How do I concentrate on one thing, and at the same time, keep my place in the larger book I’m reading? What pops to mind is a flow chart on the wall – of where I am in this current project – and maybe where I am in the progress toward my goal for the year.

Older Self: So you feel like playing organizer, hmm? That’s a game you seem to enjoy a lot.

C: I take it you’re saying it’s unnecessary?

OS: Yes.

C: So do you have any goals in mind for the year?

OS: I’ve already mentioned that it would be a good idea for you to set goals once for the whole year, and then just concentrate on watching your progress toward those goals. You seem to reset your goals practically from day to day. This isn’t a way to get anywhere. It’s like setting out on a trip and reversing direction every day. You’ll just get back to your starting point.

C: OK. Let’s assume that I’ve set my goals for the year. They’re clear, specific, vivid. How do I stay in touch with them? Watch progress? How do you do this? What brought this up was my creativity coach suggesting I use Eric Maisel’s method of putting everything up on wall boards – the next steps in my current project, the project plan, art business work, etc. And encouraging or inspiring quotations. So – what I want to know is – do you do this?

OS: Well, look around. What do you see?

C: I see a lot of artwork! By you, and by others.

OS: That’s my inspiration. That, and the trees outside, and the plants. And music. And very occasionally, something from a book. And often, something that just comes during a walk or campfire.

C: So – no flow charts? Calendar with work planned out? To-do list?

OS: When I need a list, I make one. When I do some sort of special project and need to estimate the timing, I can do that. I don’t do any of this routinely – only if I feel an inner need.

C: Anything on the wall?

OS: Only the art. I find that’s the best thing. And music in the air. And free working and analog working. You know – you already have the essential things to make your working process. You know perfectly well what to do. You’re just keeping yourself from doing them: free and analog play, empathic responses, connection with guidance and Spirit, recording all your ideas, and deep relaxation. Actually, “recording all your ideas” goes with the free and analog play. You have the four directions: East for ideas, following your attractions, results cards and nets, free and analog play; West for empathic responses and visualizing; South for deep relaxation and absorbing nature; North for moon fires, meditations for guidance, visits to me, prayers. What more could you need? You need the will to do these things – and the making of your studio into sacred space. You need your medicine wheel. You need a sense of your life as sacred, of each day as sacred.

With all this, you think you need wall charts?

C: Got it. Suddenly I feel rich. My time got thicker. It dawns on me that the more I measure things, and live in the measuring world, the thinner my time gets. Even my money gets thinner. Living in That State of Mind, I’m rich automatically.

OS: It’s up to you. You can live in either world, or go back and forth. When you come here, you’ll find a sacred world, a reenchanted world, a world of ecstasy. You can choose at any moment.

C: Thank you.

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