A Little Bit of Week Eleven

I've spent a few hours with the book, reviewing the tasks for this week, and am left with two to do. - The letter to myself, which I will do, and one other, which escapes me now... Oh, yes, the list of five ways I will change. Couldn't pin that down at all. I taped myself reading the Basic Principles (did I feel silly!), and the week 8 essay on Gain Disguised as Loss (I got into that as I read). For me, the most interesting task there was the Creativity Notebook. That caused me some confusion last time I did Artist's Way. I bought the notebook - a really nice little hardbacked, beautiful paper sketchbook, followed the instructions and wrote my ten wishes in each of the seven categories, and thought "Ah, she'll tell us next week what to do with it next"... I'm not spoiling anything for you when I tell you she doesn't. I actually scoured back through week 11, and read week 12 twice looking for some instructions as to what to do next. And I was very perplexed.... Ok. Write your wishes. Yes... What next? What's meant to happen? What's the point of that?

In the absence of further instructions, I left the notebook in a drawer, forgot about it, and forgot about it, and a couple of years ago, picked it up idly, saying "Oh, yeah, that's the silly thing she forgot to give us the rest of the instructions for", and what do you know? Reading the lists, there were wishes that had come true! Just like that! For your interest, the current count (of the wishes I made in 1998) is as follows

• Health - 9/10 achieved
• Possessions - 4/10 achieved (but the other 6 aren't things I want any more)
• Leisure - 7/10 achieved ( with one to be completed in May, and the other two still remain possibilites for the future)
• Relationships - 8/10 achieved (one of the two failures there relates to my marriage, the other has a possibility of being improved still)
• Creativity - 4/10 achieved (The four were all major for me, and a couple of the failures still remain distinct possibilities, though they aren't strong wishes any more)
• Career - 8/10 achieved
• Spirituality - the one I can't judge success or failure with. It's not measurable, so I can't say.

Considering I'd forgotten the exercise, and was making no conscious investment in these wishes, I think that's a pretty impressive rate of return! What effect this awareness will have on today's list, I don't know. Hopefully, I'll be able to just forget it, and be equally pleasantly surprised in a few years time when I find the notebook. I used the same notebook, a new seven pages, and a far freer hand in writing them this time around.

A nice synchronicity from today to share: There are a few dreams I've had that have stayed with me as strongly meaningful - powerful dreams, and I've set myself a task of making SoulCollage cards to honour those dreams. For months now, I've been looking for the right image of a pineapple to represent an element of one of those dreams. The meaning of the dream is about being willing to accept the riches and nourishment being offered to me - and being willing to pay the price for it. The image presented itself in a Sunday supplement this morning, and it just told me I'll now be able to honour that dream in the way I've been wanting to. So now I can make my card.

That's some bits of week eleven's work. So I'll be starting week 12 tomorrow. Good luck to all on the last week!