by Lorelei Low | Jun 21, 2017 | Sacred Calling, Spiritual Practices
We Can’t Do It All, and We Can Be Our Best
In an earlier post, Serving God and Money, I wrote about a nightmare, along with some physical health issues, that convinced me to revamp how I steward the time, talent, and treasure God has given me. Scripture makes it clear that time and energy are abundant but not unlimited. Therefore, I choose to devote myself toward walking humbly with my God and letting my light shine, hoping others might see God’s light shining through me and be blessed. Of course, that means I need to be the best version of myself, which means trying to be more like the person God created me to be (my True Self)! So, I am devoting myself to lots of Quiet Time as the Holy Spirit helps me launch this transformative 5 Keys to Freedom in Christ ministry. And that feels authentic and exciting.
God Directs Our Steps, Even When We Choose a Detour
I believe God has led me throughout my journey, making the best of any choices I made that weren’t exactly how God meant to lead me. It’s finally hit me. I was inspired recently by a series of dreams. Then someone asked me to write about how I transitioned from lawyer to entrepreneur. A statement by a free-motion quilting teacher, Sue Rasmussen, also struck me. She spoke about the need for intentionality behind every stitch we take. I related that to the importance of careful or Spirit-led choices in far more than a line of stitching! I finally concluded that I’m meant to be—and now am—in ministry rather than business.
My Clarified Ministry Focuses Are Now:
- In everything, being in partnership with the Spirit of God for wisdom and guidance, humbly acknowledging that my gifts (including my writing) were given to me to be used for godly purposes, helping to create solutions, joy, peace, and freedom in others’ lives;
- Seeing the manifestation of each person’s heart’s desires as essential to living out their sacred callings, honoring that aspect of us that’s in the image and likeness of the Great Creator, who endowed us with gifts and uses our creativity and experiences to accomplish the purposes for which each one is on earth;
- Offering my services as a Holy Spirit-led Spiritual Director—enhanced by my expertise on the spirituality of quilting and other practical and spiritual tools: those of a trained Creativity Coach, Spiritual Coach, Christian Healing Prayer minister, and an UNBOUND minister. The combination helps me, with the Holy Spirit, to be a catalyst for personal transformation through powerful questions and compassionate listening, as well as creativity, dreamwork, forgiveness work, healing and deliverance prayer, plus mindset work.
- My ultimate goal is to show members of the Body of Christ how they can experience the freedom Jesus intended them to have on the way to enjoying the abundance of “life to the full” here on earth.
Do You Know How You’re Meant to Serve?
Do you know what you’re on earth to do? If you, are you doing it or are you ready to make the transition to serve as called? If you don’t know, would you like to discover your calling? How about starting with the free resources we offer and then considering spiritual direction?
First, an invitation. Last weekend, our newly formed UNBOUND prayer group prayed for people who’d asked to receive prayers using the 5 Keys to Freedom in Christ. They prepared for their sessions, but God still had delightful healing surprises for them! They were indeed set free of major hurts in their pasts, the unforgiveness that had hardened their hearts, and they experienced a release of old ways of feeling and thinking, of blaming, judging, and feeling helpless. They received empowerment, peace, and a new way forward.
I was also privileged to spend many hours with the inspiring woman who coordinates an UNBOUND prayer team in another city. She shared with me how they use this model, which involves declarations of faith, forgiveness, renunciation of lies and darkness. Through this model, people are set free by the authority of Jesus, who then releases in them the blessings of the Father and the gifts of the Holy Spirit. That experience then becomes the entryway for much more healing, the use of their gifts in service, and greater intimacy with each person of the Holy Trinity. So, I’d like to invite those open to Jesus and freedom to read Neal Lozano’s book, Unbound, and to make an appointment to receive prayer through a ministry using the UNBOUND model. There’s more about this here.
There are also many things you can do in the privacy of your own home.
Here are Some of the Spiritual Practices that Work for Me
Journaling (writing “morning pages”) is a practice I’ve followed since The Artist’s Way came out in the ’90s. It’s where I pose my questions to God and often receive answers. It’s how I plan my day and vent when necessary. It’s where I take notes of things I won’t want to forget. It’s where I start poems and blog posts! I write down the scriptures that struck a cord with me.
The Word of God is God’s gift to us for learning, guidance, encouragement, inspiration, and more. It’s a great way to start every day, to get a pick-me-up in mid-afternoon, or to prepare for bed.
Our Heart’s Desire is as relevant to God as it is to us! So by all means, be aware of it and honor it, as the Holy Spirit guides you. When we serve in alignment with our heart’s desire, then we serve joyfully!
The Open Doors Prayer is a favorite of mine. “Lord, open the doors you want opened to keep me (or someone I’m praying for) in the center of your perfect will and close the doors that will not lead me (or the other person) to truth.” Then watch and heed the opened and closed doors!
Quiet Time and Creativity are essential for me! That includes time with Scripture, contemplation, meditation, or centering prayer, and Spirit + Creativity—what I call “spiritivity”—activities like quilting when I can “be still and know” that God is God. During those times, it’s important to enter into them in a state of openness to receive communications from the Divine.
Soul Companions have been a vital part of my journey, and I urge those who don’t have a soul companion or spiritual director to find one. There’s more about spiritual direction here.
The Image at the top Provides Some Words to Ponder, to Ask the Holy Spirit About, or to Journal!
Please feel free to share this or to comment. It is Post #5 in a series which began with a post on Sharing the Messiness of Our Stories. If you’d like me to expand on anything I mentioned here, also please let me know. Thank you and God bless you!
by Lorelei Low | Jun 20, 2017 | Creative Expression, Empowering and Freeing Choices, Encouragement and Inspiration, Holy Spirit, Overcoming Obstacles, Pentecost Experiences, Transformational Breakthroughs
I was the oldest of five siblings and responsibility was so impressed upon me that my shoulders became a luggage rack. Try as I might — and occasionally do — I can’t shirk responsibility. Still, I know that this weight of the world isn’t really mine to bear alone. I can ask for help from family and friends or even get online assistance. I can also yoke myself to Jesus who promises to take burdens upon himself and lighten my load [Mt. 11:30]. I can turn to the Serenity Prayer and wisely accept things I cannot change, putting down some burdens as a result. But what difference does our attitude toward responsibility make when it comes to creativity? For one thing, putting down or sharing burdens frees up time and energy that could be put to creative use.
Also, whether you already carry huge responsibility or you chronically avoid it, the fear of responsibility can sometimes subconsciously sabotage your creativity or productivity. If you fear responsibility, you may avoid completing goals through procrastination (another way fear rears its head). Or you may repeatedly quit when you’re ahead but not yet at the finish line.
Let’s say you have a big creative idea, a vision you’d like to see manifested. If you’re typically very responsible, you may plan or start but then set aside your big creative vision as you handle a series of smaller responsibilities you “must” attend to, telling yourself you “can’t” put in the time or effort to move forward on the big creative idea. Or you may think you already have so many responsibilities on your plate that you can’t take on one more thing (not wanting to admit that perhaps you need to let go of something else).
Indeed, responsibility can be both an outright block in the form of excuses for attending to lower priorities as well as a fear that impedes your creative progress. I must admit that I’m easily caught in the former, and that there may be less conscious component of the latter . . . because how could a responsible person like I’ve been all my life fear the responsibility that might come with creative success?
Because we were all divinely meant to be creative in some way, each of us has the responsibility to carry out our mission. Christians have just celebrated Pentecost, reminding us that we are summoned to live all our lives “in the Spirit” [Rom. 8:9, Gal. 5:16,25]. We are to get out of the fear that keeps us waiting in the Upper Room; we are to get out there and live big and bold, doing what God’s called us to do. We are to get up and act without fear, not to push off onto others what we can do and are called to do, and not to leave our light hidden away where no one can see it [Mt. 17:7, Mt. 5:15]. So yes, sometimes doing our creative thing means responsibility. In this post-Pentecost time, how about praying for the Spirit’s guidance and the power of the Spirit to do what you’re being called to do, relying on gifts and fruits of the Spirit like fortitude and perserverance.
It also means using our personal gifts and talents and our unique circumstances that add meaning and beauty, serve and uplift the world. When that comes from the heart, it feels more like play and joy than like work and burden. So we need to get over the notion that creative success means increased responsibility and stop sabotaging creativity to protect our so-called freedom from increased responsibility. When we prioritize our writing, music, art, crafts, dance, performance, hospitality, entrepreneurship, leadership, ministry or service — whatever our calling involves — the creative triumphs we experience will lighten the weight we may perceive responsibility to be. And there’s tremendous freedom in knowing you’re doing what you are here to do!
Awareness is very powerful. Just realizing what your attitudes are towards responsibilities, big and small, informs your decision making, giving you the power to decide from a place that is more conscious, more considered, more intentional. It creates momentum and it empowers you to walk out your purposes.
Visualize feeling lightness and relaxation and creative success all together — even if just for a few seconds or just a tiny bit more than you usually do. Invite Jesus and the Holy Spirit to be present as you close your eyes and breathe with that visualization. Pray to experience the combination of lightness and relaxation, joy and creative success. And then during your creative process lighten up as needed for breaks and self-care. Perhaps add some uplifting music in the background as you work or create. Give thanks as you use your “bodyguard energy” to resist excuses to back away from your creativity, even or especially when the alternative activities come justified in your mind as “handling other responsibilities.” As you do that, you grow your ability to be responsible not just for the quotidian obligations of your household or job but, more than that, for creative causes ordained by the Great Creator and entrusted to you for completion. This is highly spiritual and transformative, which is good for you and for others.
Each successful step you take along a spiritually blessed creative path will encourage and uplift you and others and will be worth the responsibility taken to move forward. If you’d like help in overcoming obstacles and journeying on the spiritual path, perhaps you might pray about and consider signing up for an Unbound prayer session and then getting some spiritual direction.
by Lorelei Low | May 28, 2017 | Encouragement and Inspiration, Holy Boldness, Overcoming Obstacles, Unbound
Let’s talk about setting goals, failing to achieve them, and a spiritual coaching tool that can help!
Following the lead of Michael S. Hyatt, I reviewed 2016 and set goals for 2017 that, if achieved, would likely make me feel that I’d had the Best Year Ever. Believing I should, I set a fitness goal based on my intellectual understanding that, although I’m active, trim, and healthy, I had to exercise X times per week for cardiovascular conditioning, regulating blood-sugar, and strength training. At the end of the first quarter, I’d utterly failed to get near the goal and I sought input to help me get on track. I rejected all the suggestions because they didn’t excite me.
I realized I had a limiting belief—that I don’t like to exercise unless it’s just for fun like tennis or snorkeling. I’d built in flexibility and triggers to remind me, and I’d brainstormed ways to try to make it more fun. But the goal didn’t excite me—even fulfilling it sounded more like discipline than enjoyment, let alone elation about it being the best year. I was stuck. My heart didn’t buy into it. In prayer, the Holy Spirit + Creativity led me to know what would excite me. The solution: I revised my goal accordingly and have now been happily meeting my new fitness goal: Get endorphins going for at least 20 minutes of vigorous movement X times a week so I start to love that feeling!
Have you got any goals that need reframing?
Not surprisingly, my physical-psychological challenge tied into what’s been happening in my family and spiritual challenges.
It’s about not trying to put a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment or into a vintage quilt, because the patch will pull away from the old cloth, resulting in a worse tear. It’s about not putting new wine into old wineskins or they’ll burst, the wine will pour out, and the wineskins will get ruined. [See Matthew 9:16-17.] We need to put new wine into fresh wineskins—new ideas, reframes, revised expectations, and a new way of living out our calling—all are asking for new containers, new constructs, and fresh viewpoints. The “same old” just doesn’t work. “Because we’ve always done it that way” isn’t wise reasoning.
Parenting an almost teen, like our grandson who’ll be 13 in October, requires our daughter (his mom) to use a different approach than when her son was younger. How we relate to her has had to change accordingly.
Our other daughter (in the overalls above) earned a Masters in Art and Ecology this month, right after we went to see her interactive thesis exhibition in which family members shared outdoor experiences (on April 30th with snow that morning in Albuquerque). One experience (shown here) involved hiking into a wildlife preserve with a unique backpack our daughter made (along with other models) and washing each other’s hands, which was symbolic and moving, then later sharing a meal carried in another of her special backpacks. Definitely new and different art and experiences.
Also this Spring I presented a Lenten Day of Reflection on the 5 Keys to Freedom in Christ, base on Unbound healing and deliverance prayer ministry. It’s a brand new ministry in the San Francisco area, though it’s been growing in other states and countries. The Holy Spirit orchestrated that opening, and from it, we now have a dedicated team of trained women as well as priests referring people to us and lay people eager to know more and come to us for prayer and more training. The ministry (that is, God, through a certain prayer model) heals and transforms people in a way that takes them out of their old skins of discouragement, hopelessness or depression, bad habits, the bitterness of unforgiveness, and so forth, so they can experience the new skins of freedom and life to the full that Christ intended. I’m very involved in ongoing team development and feeling invigorated and enthusiastic.
Extending the metaphor, even my latest 2017 quilt was inspired by a something old (a vintage quilt), but changed enough so I now consider it as a new wine in a new skin! The original was a small mostly handstitched crazy quilt (left or top) and mine is a bed-sized machine-stitched rendition.
Are there areas of your life where it seems the old wineskins aren’t ready for the new wine of your life? Take stock and take heart. Remember to sow holy boldness into the art of your daily living and your goals! Also, try taking absolutely everything to prayer. And maybe, like me, it would help to break your goals into small actions that are challenging, doable with effort, and exciting to your heart and soul!
However, if you’re really stuck, consider if there is a spiritual reason, maybe even a subtle tactic or scheme of Satan, that’s keeping you where you are. If so, 5 Keys to Freedom in Christ prayer ministry, or just reading Unbound by Neal Lozano could be your Get Out of Jail Free card!
by Lorelei Low | Apr 7, 2017 | Alignment with Values, Creative Expression, Encouragement and Inspiration, Life Stories, Transformational Breakthroughs, Unbound
Pondering Priorities and Piercing Perfectionism Turned the Tide
When I learned to sew, my mother instilled in me excessive concern about how each garment would look inside out. My seam ripper became the most used tool in my sewing kit. I’d rip and re-do a seam or a line of topstitching almost as often as it took to make the right side and wrong side perfect.
But this week I completed a 76” x 76” quilt and entered it into a show even though it was far from perfection. And I’m as happy with its imperfections as I am with how it’s re-ignited my passion for quilting, which had smoldered for a few years.
With this very time-consuming quilt, From Nora’s to the Crash Pad, I designed and sometimes cut or sewed in peaceful silence (part of my Reap As You Sew approach to spiritual quiltmaking). Because this was a LONG project, I also listened to some audiobooks while I did the more repetitive tasks (such as pressing yards of pre-washed fabrics, adding a slow decorative stitch over certain “ditches” between borders, and hand-stitching the binding and hanging sleeve). Among the audiobooks was The Road Back to You, a book about the Enneagram, a personality assessment tool I’ve benefitted from since 1989 and utilized extensively in my training as a spiritual director. The Enneagram dates back to the fourth century and is a spiritual tool as much as a psychological one. It sets forth nine personality types, with many, many variations and nuances that help you know your strengths, weaknesses, tendencies, and approaches to life. I am a No. 1, the Idealist or Perfectionist, so you see how this ties into the seam ripper!
What I love about the Enneagram is that it doesn’t pigeonhole me and leave me there. Rather, it makes me aware of how I typically respond to stress (I withdraw and become more like a No. 4, the Romantic, like Mary Magdalene) or to feeling secure (moving toward No. 7, the Enthusiast, like The Woman at the Well). It helps me understand how I challenge my husband or kids when I’m imposing unrealistic standards, being critical, or listening too much to my Inner Critic. Armed with awareness, I’m better able to get around my pitfalls, to recognize and renounce my demons.
Surprise 1: The Imperfect Attracted Me Most
From Nora’s to the Crash Pad began with a romantic dinner at Restaurant Nora when I accompanied my husband on a business trip to DC in 2015. We practically missed our dinner when our flight was delayed, but we were determined to go there even when we didn’t land until almost 9 pm. Nora’s had been our favorite splurge when we were dating in the early 80s, and my husband used to save up for visits there about once every other month. When we walked in now, decades later, the part of me who became a quilter about ten years into our marriage was thrilled to see the walls adorned with an impressive and varied collection of antique quilts.
Of all the quilts, the one opposite my seat was the one that inspired my newest quilt. After the diners who sat beneath it had left, I went up close to admire and photograph it. I was stunned to see how wonky it was: the decorative stitches you’d find on old crazy quilts were irregular. The seams were in odd places. The shapes weren’t uniform. The fabrics were inconsistent. Points of triangles were cut off. Straight lines were out of alignment. And there was embroidery in some places, not balanced by similar embroidery where it would be expected. I was charmed! I decided to make something like it for a bed quilt for our San Francisco apartment, which we call “the crash pad” since our principal residence is 110 miles north along the coast.
I’d learned over and over (but still tend to forget) how being perfectionistic can help me or hurt me. Perfectionism helps me when I remember to strive for excellence rather than unattainable perfection, and it’s served me well in academic and professional circles. But it hurts or hinders me when I procrastinate rather than doing a job that I fear won’t meet my standards. It’s awful when it gets in the way of loving acceptance and honoring other people’s approaches, when it harms my relationships. I’m sorry to say that it’s been the source of many a disagreement with my husband, who is not a perfectionist. (Fortunately, he’s let me train him about how best to load a dishwasher.) And it was hard for my kids, who I now know felt criticized and often not good enough, just as I had growing up with my parents’ high standards.
I’m no longer addicted, but I call myself a recovering perfectionist. With Unbound prayer ministry, I renounced the lies that live in No. 1 territory: that I’m not good enough; that I must do everything myself if I want it done right; that if something’s worth doing, it’s worth doing your very best; and so on. So I brought my recovering perfectionist self to the making of From Nora’s to the Crash Pad.
Surprise 2: Imperfect Beats Never Finished
Not having a pattern, I had to design and enlarge this quilt and I wanted to “fix” some of the original’s wonkiness, but I ended up with some wonkiness of my own! I appliquéd the center section together, thinking I’d cover all the mitered corners with eight radiating lines like the original had. So I didn’t worry about those miters being just so. Only later, I decided I wanted just four spokes, so some imperfect miters are left exposed. Not all my 90-degree angles are square. I got a new quilting machine with which to quilt this and didn’t have time to practice on a smaller, less important quilt first. So the quilting has many zigs or zags that wouldn’t be there on a perfect quilt. And I bought the wrong amount of backing fabric and had to choose something else from a small local offering, so the back is solid cream and it shows all the stops and starts and a little thread barf and even some blood from a cut finger. So what!? On the bed, who will care? Even hanging at the show, with the placement I got up high, the five-foot rule is automatic. No one can even see those imperfections without a giant stepladder! Had I held out for perfection, or wielded the seam ripper more than I did, this quilt might have lost not only its chances of completion in my lifetime, but the joy it gives me in the present!
Surprise 3: Meeting a Challenge with Excellence Highlights Priorities
Powering through a week of almost non-stop production toward the end of this project, I felt the love of quilting again. I was delighted that I’d traded in a sewing machine I didn’t like for one I now love – even though that meant admitting that I’d made a wrong decision when I bought the other machine ten years ago. You see, wrong decisions are a significant fear and embarrassment for Ones. I had to prioritize and not even try to please everyone else as I put my creativity ahead of service, which is also unusual for a One who tends to overwork and fall short in the self-nurture category. Creativity is, for me, a top form of self-nurturance! Even when I work late into the evening, I quilt with Spirit, go to bed happy, have sweet dreams, and wake up enthused.
I’m excited to be going to the opening reception for the quilt show tonight, sharing it with my husband who loves this quilt. I’m delighted to have re-discovered how expressing my creativity is not a luxury but a necessity in my life! The creative process allowed me to ponder the Enneagram once again, reconsidering both how and WHY I do what I do and what I might wish to do differently. I’ll bring its insights with me into my freedom, healing, and deliverance ministry.
If you’re interested in finding out about your Enneagram type to help you identify some of your penchants and to gain personal benefits from its wisdom, I recommend reading The Road Back to You or other Enneagram books. I’ve got a library of them, and each sheds more light on the illuminating subject of how we are. I’d also recommend Unbound ministry or 5 Keys to Freedom in Christ prayer ministry to help you break through your compulsions, fears, or bad habits, and to open you to greater creativity, a process which I describe in my eBook, Freedom from Hurts, Fears, and Unhealthy Habits.
Your comments are always welcome!
by Lorelei Low | Feb 13, 2017 | Blessing, Creative Expression, Encouragement and Inspiration, From the Heart, Life Stories, Sacred Calling, Spiritual Direction
I’m basking in the joy of two recent Love Trips: a week in Mexico with my daughter Kacie, during which we finalized the design for a multi-generational wedding shawl; the other a visit to see my parents, during which my Mom and I started making that shawl. Not only is this bridal gift now in progress; I also learned a lot along the way. If you’ve been wracking your brain for a special gift idea, you know the challenge of coming up with a gift that truly shows your feelings. It could be just the time to brainstorm unique ways to honor a loved one for an upcoming occasion, whether you express your creativity in tangible or intangible ways!
Mom & I on Day One of the Wedding Shawl project, practice piece on the left.
Sometimes it can feel impossible to give a meaningful gift to someone like my husband, who has everything he cares about and wants nothing material. And what can you give an older person who’s been giving away her belongings and isn’t as active as she used to be? We’ve all faced the gift challenge with someone! But let’s move our focus from the material world to the experiential and spiritual world and see what happens.
A blessing by John O’Donahue says:
“May the light of your soul bless the work you do with the secret love and warmth of your heart; May you see in what you do the beauty of your own soul; May the sacredness of your work bring healing, light and renewal to those … who see and receive your work; May your work never weary you; May it release within you wellsprings of refreshment, inspiration and excitement; May you be present in what you do.”
I am feeling that soulful, beautiful, sacred, exciting blessing with this bridal shawl!
My mother taught me to sew from my toddlerhood! She was a sew-at-home seamstress, helping support the family by taking in dressmaking, drapery-making, and slipcover fabrication. She’d work hours a day with me standing on the back of her chair with my little hands on her shoulders watching her at the Singer. When I was a little older, she taught me hand sewing so I could make doll clothes, and then taught me to sew simple tops from patterns by 7. So it was like old times when we pulled out the white Swiss batiste, the bone-colored Radiance with cotton on the inside and silk on the outside, the silk bridal satin ribbon, and the white pearl cotton last week to measure, cut, and start sewing the shawl.
The wedding shawl was Kacie’s idea. She wants to wear something that the three other women in our immediate family put themselves into—her maternal grandmother, her mother, and her sister. It’s not decided whether she’ll wear it with her not-as-yet-selected wedding dress or will make it a part of her rehearsal dinner outfit. With bone and white, she has flexibility, and oversized shawls are her style. (This one will be 86” x 34.”) She’s a romantic artist with a love of textiles. Her fiancé Ted is sentimental and artistic, too (he’s finishing up a master’s in landscape architecture). And they’re getting married just weeks before my parents’ 70th wedding anniversary. So, coming up with creative ways to make their ceremony touching is a high priority, warming the hearts of multiple generations, reinforcing these . . .
7 reasons to let your light shine by giving creative gifts from the heart.
1. Some of our best gifts are only released when we slow down!
My mom played golf until she turned 90 and still plays bridge, does Bible study, enjoys an active social life, and entertains often. Thank God she’s in good health except that severe scoliosis has diminished her balance. This slowed her down after some falls produced fractures that forced her to sit more. Now when I visit, I too slow down. I need and benefit from it! My best gifts flow from my morning quiet time with the Lord. My priorities for the day are set during that time, and the Holy Spirit often guides my writing, prepares me for my speaking or teaching events, and inspires me in my quilting, decorating, or other creative undertakings. During my time with my parents—and my sister who lives near them—slowing down allowed for some deep conversations and shared intercessory prayer, as well as discussions about how to make the shawl. My mom voiced her concern that her hand sewing would not be as steady and her stitches not as small and perfect as they once were.
2. Gifts from the heart will likely be received with heart, so process and message outshine perfectionism and product focus.
Kacie’s sister Brenna had wisely passed on to me a conversation she’d had with Kacie about the shawl. Accordingly, I was able to reassure my mother and myself that Kacie didn’t care about the perfection of our stitches! Once we got that cleared up and cut the shawl body and borders out, I decided to use some of the leftover fabrics for a smaller practice piece. Having a chance to practice was reassuring. Kacie had asked to have us fill the borders with sashiko-style stitches to mimic waves, a motif chosen because of our family’s coastal living. My mom’s wavy lines and mine were quite different, but once we pressed the border, we saw the lovely effect and felt free to stitch our imperfect wavy lines onto the real border! Being freed of perfectionism encouraged us to focus on the WHY and the LOVE and the HEIRLOOM nature of what we’re making, to relax and enjoy the process.
3. Collaboration allows us to connect where our kindred spirits align, which is an affirmation, a blessing, and a joy.
As mentioned above, my mom and I have a shared our love of creative handwork, and so do Kacie and Brenna. I felt true joy while sitting on a loveseat in the warmth of my parents’ Florida lanai, with Mom stitching on the border of one end of the shawl and me stitching on the other! I was thrilled that we were doing something so meaningful together, something that unites us! I felt gratitude on so many levels: for my mother’s life, health, and happy marriage, for the sewing talent she’s shared with me, and for the understanding of how much this gift means to Kacie.
4. Infusing a gift with prayer makes it truly from the heart and soul.
My mother and I spontaneously began to pray together out loud for Kacie and Ted and their marriage as we sewed. We prayed for their wedding planning to go smoothly, for the joy of it and for the stress of that task to be dissipated, especially as the couple is currently in their final thesis semester of 3-year grad school programs. We prayed for their careers and good jobs. We prayed for their relationship and a long, happy marriage, and for them to be blessed with healthy children. And on and on. All these prayers are now stitched into that shawl, and Kacie will be wrapped in them when she wears it!
5. Flexibility in the process, especially when coordinating with multiple generations or skill levels and diverse locations, enhances a creative and cooperative approach.
I was only in Florida 4 full days this last trip, so we got a great start but there’s lots more to do on this shawl. Working on it together was far better than trying to mail the shawl cross-country with instructions about what to do! But flexibility is a must. What aspects of the project Brenna will do, what Mom did, and what I will do has changed and is not yet fully known. When I get together with Brenna to work on it, we’ll see what parts she’s most drawn to. Coordinating among family members who live in three locations demands flexibility, adding creativity and cooperation to the means of accomplishing the goal.
6. The heirloom nature of what’s being created is empowering and enlivening.
The impact of this gift will reverberate—now in the making, this fall in the use of the shawl during wedding festivities, and likely on to at least one future generation. I have a baby blanket that was used when my father was an infant, a flower girl dress I wore at age 2 or 3, made by my mom. As much as I like a decluttered home, those textile heirlooms and this shawl are likely to keep sparking joy and not be decluttered soon! With that expectation, the handwork enlivens us and feels like a privilege. Imagine coming generations getting to see this photo of their great- or great-great-grandmother stitching this heirloom.
Not only this shawl will leave a legacy. My father’s 40+ year career was in magazine publishing. He is a great writer and public speaker, an awesome lector proclaiming the Word at his church. He and my mom will talk about what to include in the talk he’s been requested to give at the wedding, and he will draft it, polish it, and deliver it with heart (and maybe even a tear or two)! His creativity is being honored, as well as the legacy of Kacie’s grandparents’ long and happy marriage, since their 70th anniversary is just weeks after her wedding!
7. Your best gifts, the ones that are most uniquely YOU, proceed from your gifts, talents, and life experiences.
All our contributions were requested based on who we are and the special gifts God bestowed on each of us, and that is very empowering! If you’re looking to create a heart-touching gift with impact, start brainstorming with a look at your own giftedness (Link to a freebie for email), what makes your heart sing, your own sacred calling.
Gifts that draw on your creativity entail giving of yourself, from your heart, intended and likely to touch the recipient’s heart. This doesn’t mean every gift you give needs to be a months’ long masterpiece, like some quilts are. Maybe you love to cook and can prepare a special meal or give someone your special granola. Maybe you like to forage and can pick, dry, tuck in some recipes, and wrap up some dried porcini. Maybe you compose or sing and could record some of your music for loved ones to enjoy. (Each of our daughters has given us a CD of herself singing and I love listening to these time after time—a gift that surely keeps on giving!) A video of yourself dancing? Poetry? Ceramics? Painting?
If you don’t yet know why you’re here and where your creative genius lies, you’re not alone! The good news is that when people figure out what God intended and equipped them to do, it brings new meaning to their lives and helps them make good decisions about how they spend their time, talent, and energy, and what they have to share. If this sounds intriguing, I suggest you listen to my 20-minute recording, Discover Your Sacred Calling. If you’d like outside assistance, consider Spiritual Direction that could include ARTbundance™ or Creativity Coaching. Then use what you discover or know about your gifts and talents and let your light shine through them to bless and delight those you love! I know you can do this!
What creative gift are you making or giving to someone special?
