The Spirits Made Me Do It...

Do you consider yourself to be a creative person? Well regardless of what you think, we are ALL creative beings. We just have different ways of expressing our creativity. In fact, the more we get out of our own way, the more creative we become. What do I mean by that?

What is Creativity?
Creativity has a truly spiritual quality to it because it is something we tune into when we are grounded and open. We are hard-wired to be receivers of this creative energy that flows all around us. Our universe is infinitely creative, and we are no different. When we remember that we are spiritual beings having a human experience; when we open our hearts and minds and let go of the idea of a little me that can screw up; and when we release our expectations, our fear of judgement and our need for validation, creativity and inspiration flow through us like a raging river. What a sweet, intoxicating feeling!

My Spiritual Team
I believe that we receive daily assistance from the spiritual realms. In fact, I would go as far as to say that I have an executive team on the other side that guides and directs my creative endeavours. It may sound a little crazy and spooky, but I see it as a form of telepathy, or intuition, only with beings that are not in a physical form like us. I used to call these creative urges my inspiration, but now, I am less attached to the "my". I'm just the receiver of this creative information that wants to be expressed. I can feel a big difference between ego-driven creativity and this spiritual inspiration that I seem to be receiving more and more.

Creative Overload
For example, I just recently created some new conscious living guidance cards for adults. Today is Thursday. The cards have been printed, cut, laminated and available for download on my website since Tuesday (I manage everything on my website, including form-integration). Big deal, right? Well, what's interesting is that this past Sunday, creating these cards was really the farthest thing from my mind! I had no desire to do any kind of work, actually. So what happened?

I think my executive team had a job for me! I was casually making myself some coffee Sunday morning when the typical bolt-of-lightning of inspiration hit me. I have learned to recognise this energy. It always feels good -like a brilliant idea that doesn't really belong to me. The high energy motivates me to take action and I feel no personal attachment to the outcome -no concerns with success or failure.

Creative Channelling?
So I sat down with a notepad and the ideas started pouring on the pages effortlessly. At this point, I still had no clue what form this intense wave of creative energy would take. I kept an open mind and left it at that. On Monday, the dictation continued as I sat in my garden with my notepad. Then I suddenly felt like it was time to stop writing, and I felt a nudge to go down to the computer and figure it out. It's hard to comprehend just how smoothly things went from there. After just a couple hours, the 56 guidance cards were completed. I integrated them into my website and everything was finished by Tuesday!

What About You?
Have you ever had a creative experience like that? You probably have, but maybe you're not aware of it. This kind of detached creativity always feels very good - like a passion. It's generally spontaneous and unexpected. Very often, the final results have a somewhat divine quality, and you know that you can't take all the credit for it, because it simply flowed through you from another realm.

Wishing you an intoxicatingly creative week!

P.S. You can download these free, printable, divinely inspired cards here: http://www.lisevilleneuve.com/guidan

Lise
www.lisevilleneuve.com

My Obsession Finally Revealed!

Before we moved to Edmonton -almost four years ago- we lived in a small apartment in Montreal and I had never gardened in my life. I was a city girl and I knew absolutely nothing about gardening. I didn't know what I was missing.

Now that I've been gardening for almost 4 years, I can't imagine a life without it! I find gardening to be the most grounding (pardon the pun), calming, nurturing and creative activity! I love growing our own food, it tastes SO much better than what you find at the store. And the best part is that you don't even need that much space to grow plants -just a few pots can do the trick. Any other gardening enthusiasts out there? I thought I'd share a little bit about our gardening adventures this summer through some pictures.

Not only did we have our "regular garden" in the yard this year, but the kids each designed and planted their own gardens on the outside of our fence. I was amazed at their enthusiasm right from the start. They didn't mind digging out the grass even though it was a pretty big job.

Here is the vegetable garden inside the yard in May:

Vegetable garden in August:

Here are the kids' gardens outside of the yard (May and August):

I was surprised by how much the people in our neighbourhood loved the kids' gardens (that are in full view). Some mystery donor left us 4 lovely tomato plants. Two ladies came by with their chairs and started sketching the sunflowers. We called the police. Just kidding. Everyone who walks by comments on how well everything is growing. I love how the morning glories made a wall of leaves and gorgeous flowers all around the garden!

Somehow, the corn seeds I saw at the Dollar Store used their mind control powers to convince me to plant a corn maze on the outside of our fence. It's now getting tall enough for us to hide in it. Soon we'll be able to jump out and scare the heck out of unsuspecting neighbours walking by. I can also go there and curl up in a ball whenever I need a break from the kids -or not.

The weather has been absolutely perfect for the plants this summer -very hot, with a lot of rain. 

Here's Emma in her own personal jungle.

Needless to say, we have a LOT of food this year and just recently I've given myself a crash course on canning, freezing and drying the harvest. Yup, we bought a deep freeze and a water-boiling canner so were are SET for the apocalypse!

 Don't ask why Precious the cat is out there is her pj's.

I had a lot of fun painting these cement blocks one day, when it was about 400 degrees. There's Mitsy who jumped into the picture. She's a kitten we found back in April -the absolute sweetest kitten in the world! Precious (pj cat) hates her, she's SO jealous.

And here is the perfect ending to this gardening love story: delicious homemade goodies (hopefully!) that will last all the way through the winter months. I'm crossing my fingers we don't die from botulism.

We had to make some room for the jars so we pulled up this shelf from the basement. We may need a bigger house once the 15 tomato plants and gazillions of ground cherries ripen! I see a lot of salsa and jam in our future.

So there you have it. That's what I've been up to lately. Now for the philosophical part. You ready? It's deep, oh-so deep. I realised that I went from being a city girl to becoming a city farmer. Yup, it may not sound glamorous, but I'm a conscious farmer and I love it! I'm quite obsessed by gardening, actually. I admit it.

Planting seeds, tending to the garden, harvesting and canning are all wonderful opportunities to be fully in the moment and gently aware of all the mental chatter that may be going on inside. I look forward to practising mindful eating. Thanks for reading! What are some of your favourite grounding / calming activities?

Lise Villeneuve

Creator of Conscious Kids -an online mindfulness course for families

www.lisevilleneuve.com

Look What I Made! :)

I've never made real jewelry before. I didn't even know it could be an activity I'd enjoy...until I tried it this week! Not that I'm particularly skilled at it, or want to make a sudden career change, but I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed getting lost in the colourful world of beads and crystals! There was no pressure to perform, I was simply playing, experimenting, enjoying the process...and now I have 11 new pairs of earrings! Emma was super eager to jump in and participate, and as a result of this little experiment, she decided to get her ears pierced a couple days ago!

I've had a growing interest in real crystals and their different properties. When we were in Cancun last January, I talked to a few Mexican jewelry makers and I was really drawn to many of their beautiful earrings, bracelets and necklaces. I bought amethyst, rose quartz and turquoise pieces, and I just love how they feel. What are your favourite stones?

I just wanted to mention how good it feels to express our creativity, to give ourselves many opportunities to just play and explore, even though we may not know what the heck we are doing! Our purpose should ultimately be to follow our bliss. At the end of the day, our success should be measured by the amount of joy we experienced.

Warmly,

Lise
www.lisevilleneuve.com

I Don't Care What You Think...

I know that title sounds a little harsh, let me explain. I'm usually pretty shy about my songs and very reluctant to make them public like the one here, especially considering the very amateur nature of this video I made last night. But whatever, I decided to take a chance today and just put it "out there" even though it's far from perfect. Why? Because true creativity expresses itself without caring about what others think.This is a good lesson for me. The more people "thumbs down" this video on Youtube, the more I will get to practice detachment! (I'm not encouraging you to hate it, though!:) I also wanted to give you something really personal because I feel very grateful to now have over 300 members on the Conscious Living Solutions facebook page.

The song you will hear is called "Vers Toi" and it's about how truly interconnected we all are. Even if you don't understand French, you can still see what arises in you when you experience this song. Maybe it will be a sort of meditation for you. Special thanks to Hubble telescope for the amazing pictures of our universe!


Warmly,


Lise Villeneuve

www.lisevilleneuve.com

A New Business Idea...Out Of The Blue!

Creativity is truly mysterious. I believe we are all creative, but creativity doesn't just willingly come out of our brains, it flows through us when we open ourselves up to it. We channel creative energy when we quiet our minds and allow it to inspire our souls. We really can't force it, we can only make more space for it to enter our awareness.

Personally, I've noticed that before a truly creative idea comes to me, I go through a period of chaos. By chaos I mean that my thoughts are scattered, my energy is unfocused, I feel a general sense of restlessness in my life, like I can't control things despite feeling like a big change is coming. I suddenly need more space and quiet time, even more sleep. Well, I just experienced that unsettling chaos a couple days ago, and I had no idea the outcome of it would be... a new business! Conscious Living Solutions was born...just like that! 

It's really quite strange how this came about. It's as though I can't explain what's going on in my brain, only that a bunch of ideas, feelings, emotions and desires need to get consolidated somehow. That's where the creativity comes in. Boom! It suddenly, unexpectedly spits out a 'solution', when I never really knew what the 'problem' was. 

It's not like I thought "I really need to think of a new business idea." I was quite content with my current status as a student, future Health Coach and homeschooling mother. It's not until Conscious Living Solutions came to me in a flash that I started to analyse what happened in my brain to determine exactly how this idea was born. I was then able to put into words the 'problem', or question that was bothering me : "how can I live in a more conscious way on a daily basis and how can I inspire my children and others to accelerate the evolution in consciousness our world so desperately needs?"

I confess, I have no business plan, I'm just going to follow my heart day by day and allow that magical creativity to lead the way into a more conscious way of life for myself and others. Your feedback / ideas / comments are always appreciated.

Warmly,

Lise
www.lisevilleneuve.com