A Year of Noticing - Day 1
Noticing fear of beginning
For the past 480 days I have been writing at least 750 words everyday…
750 words = about 3 pages, according to Julia Cameron’s wildly popular idea of writing morning pages… 3 pages of stream of consciousness every morning.
Honestly, I don’t write every day in the morning – but I do write everyday. And I would like to start to share my ideas… and I have had an idea percolating for the past few days… writing for a year, every day… and sharing my (mostly unedited) writing…
“What writing will give you peace?” was an invitation that was shared with me by the incredible author, storyteller and mentor, Richard Van Camp.
You see, I never (or rarely) have a shortage of ideas… and even that question brings to mind at least twenty different ideas.
Focusing on ONE idea, and sticking with it is often more challenging for me 😊.
As I was walking to school with my two children one morning, I was feeling curious and said, “I wonder what we will notice on the walk to school today?”
They quickly responded, “Everything is always the same.”
Oh, my child, I thought to myself… nothing is ever the same. During that walk to school I began to notice…. Tuning in to the world around me.
The things I could see, feel, hear, smell and maybe even taste. The five senses. One of the best ways to ground and just be present in THIS moment. Noticing each of the external, physical senses… the things around me.
I share the idea of using your 5 senses as a calming and regulating strategy with children, parents and teachers ALL the time, and I wonder what I might discover if I make this a daily practice and ritual. (Curious about the 5-4-3-2-1 senses noticing… check out my video and handout HERE)
Noticing and tuning into the natural world with my five external senses can bring me peace.
The natural world is vital to my existence right now and keeps me in the mindset of reminding me of the bigger world and our vital interactions… and I wondered if maybe I could put my daily writing on Substack and start a daily practice of taking action and putting my writing into the world in a low-risk way!!
A Year of Noticing.
Welcome here.
I look forward to sharing some of what I’m noticing, my ramblings, and maybe even my rants. Some days I may have a lot to say, and some days I may share very little. This is a grand experiment!!
As someone who likes to plan and know what is coming and what to expect, jumping into the unknown in this way is both scary and exciting. I feel exhilarated and petrified.
Yesterday was the fall equinox, and the day I decided I was going to start sharing. I missed that day because of other life things… it was going to be so easy for me to let this go as another passing idea! But I kept thinking about Brene Brown’s podcast about the F-ing first time. It’s hard and it’s not going to be perfect, do it anyways! And then I thought about how so many people (including me) talk about the fact that courage is feeling fear and doing it anyways!
So here I am – hitting “post” on my first post….
Here we go!
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