I just returned from the Big Magic Retreat in Cleveland, Georgia with the brilliant writer and one of my all-time favorites, Elizabeth Gilbert. The retreat was a birthday gift from Daniel, and what a gift it turned out to be. I met phenomenal women from all over the country – Hawaii, California, Ohio, Georgia.
We learned new mindfulness practices to help center my intentions for creative work, moved my body in new ways thanks to the African Movement dance class, threaded together beads and string in the ancient japa mala technique, walked and sat in nature amid crisp Fall air, managed to get quiet and still, and reconnected with my inner child thanks to the rustic sleep-away camp setting.
The experience introduced me to a new layer of myself and generously filled my cup. I have begun submitting query letters to potential agents and am anxious/freaked/energized to be able to introduce my debut novel to professionals in the industry. One of them will be my agent who guides me through the journey of publishing and sharing my work with the world. What a magical realization!
The process of pitching my manuscript is thrilling and humbling, filled with equal parts rejection, terror, opportunity, and hope at every turn. Speaking of hope, I hoped this retreat would fuel me with renewed curiosity and confidence to do this “brutiful” thing (to quote Glennon and Amanda Doyle) of putting my work out there for critics to consume. And it did exactly that.
Now that I’m back home, I have recommitted myself to daily quiet in scripture, blank paper, prayer and meditation. For my meditation this morning, I chose to sit on my patio rug and listen to the Ignatian Saturday Examen prayer, which invites you to reflect on the previous week and the guidance you seek for the week ahead.
Then I transitioned to the Daily Trip meditation led by Jeff Warren. The theme today was about tapping into a state of wonder, imagining that you were born in this moment and experiencing breathing for the first time. What would you notice? What would you see?
I rounded my back and let go of my posture, completely relaxing into my seated position. I imagined being able to see my lungs inflate and deflate in their real, anatomical shapes. Then I imagined them as a single round balloon inflating and deflating inside me. Then, the clearest visual came to me as I sat and breathed.
A butterfly. Its wings displayed an intricate pattern of purple, white, black, and gold. They flapped slowly up and down in rhythm with my breath. All around the butterfly was inky black night, yet the butterfly was lit by brilliant sunlight.
As thoughts and distractions arose, as they inevitably do each time during meditation, I checked back in with the butterfly and found it still perched inside me but keeping its position with some difficulty now. Its wings were now rippling as if in an unseen wind. Then, as I recentered my focus on its movement, the wind ceased, and the butterfly’s wings began to gently rise and fall, once again safe and secure to be there and dance. I smiled and opened my eyes.
This meditation was a beautiful reminder that the moments in our lives of pure tranquility are often fleeting and fragile. I am grateful I was able to round my body in stillness this morning and for a moment, observe, reflect, and just be present to beauty. Elizabeth Gilbert calls moments like these “enchantment” – where you find yourself in “the warm, vanilla pudding hum of wonder and well-being” grateful you were there, in that moment, aware and present to the experience.
One of the journaling exercises we did at the retreat was to write a letter from our enchantment, using the prompt: “Dear _____, I am your enchantment, and this is what I want you to know. I love it when…” and then begin each sentence with “I love it when” and see what came up.
I’ll jump to the end and share that my letter from enchantment ended with “I love that we had this conversation and that we’ll be seeing a lot more of each other from now on.”
… and this morning, see each other we did. 🦋
swimming toward the shark 