The first white flower popped open on the plum tree outside my kitchen window today. Yesterday, there was nothing but stark gray-brown branches. By days’ end, it will explode with life. There’s no holding back this creative force. It runs deeply in each one of us. It is Nature, and thus our nature, to grow and expand – to let life come through. It is instinct to survive.
Neglecting our “selves” cuts off this life force, and when we do, it can turn on us and morph into something unrecognizable – anger, depression, disconnection. What was once the high energy of creative consciousness pools and stagnates, lowering the vibration of our feelings and experience, and eventually, our bodies. Our health suffers. We suffer.
As you wake from the slumber of Winter, ask yourself: “What part of me is longing to express itself?”
Do you have an “art” you let go of, or always wanted to try? Whether you color with your children or rebuild an engine, bake a cake or mud pies, paint a mural or paint your fingernails – creativity wants to move through everyone. How did you love to play as a kid? What you’ve neglected is still there. Think back. Let yourself day dream – don’t edit yourself, allow.
As a child, I loved to dance. I begged my mom to put records on the stereo, and then shimmied and shook my way across the living room in wild abandon. It occurred to me recently how rarely I even listen to music when alone. I’ve become too content with silence. As Spring unfolds, I’ll make time for my Dancer self. I’ll dance with my daughters in my grown-up living room, or bravely go to that conscious movement class I just heard about.
How can you let your neglected expression appear? Start with your body – slow down, turn your attention inward. Breathe. Ask what wants to come through. The more you tune into your body, the more your creative instincts will rise up. Pay attention, be spontaneous.
The more you allow creative life force to express through you, the more your intuition – that direct knowing without knowing how you know – pours through to solve problems, inspire, and reveal who you are and “what matters” to you. There are answers to things the logical mind can’t resolve that flow easily through creativity.
As the season shifts with the Spring Equinox, make a date with your Self to create with abandon. It just takes one small step toward opening – one bloom, and a bit of sunlight – and suddenly the whole tree is alive with color.