 It’s been awhile since I sent out a blog. It’s been awhile for a lot of things, actually—some that matter, some that don’t. Big changes in my life over the past several years along with the tragic narrative of our nation right now made me stop putting myself out there in ways I was accustomed to. But that’s okay. Because here I am—I’m back. I took an accidental sabbatical from this blog, from offering my monthly transformational circles, and from working on my Red Thread book. (I had finished it about three years ago.) Pivotal shifts in our lives are good times to reflect, take a break from our routines, and assess what no longer serves us or fits . . . to explore and try new things. Transformational times can be good for detours and what might feel or appear to others as the wrong way to go. In this interval I wrote less. I walked a lot and found yoga again. I took on a teaching job through the University of Wisconsin, Madison. I became a proud member of Al-Anon. I moved to Mount Horeb from our forty acres outside Spring Green. None of these are better or problematic, right or wrong, just paths taken. Along with our sabbaticals and breaks in routine, I find that we may make choices that look wrong and are certainly a detour from our usual path. For example, I realize that sometimes compassion has a fist. Sometimes we need to risk being in the wrong company so we can sit at their table and remind ourselves that we have nothing to prove but everything to share and learn. We don’t need to be with people (for very long) whom we don’t like. (And it’s okay not to like someone!) Be yourself even when it makes others uncomfortable. We don’t owe anyone anything (and vice-versa). We can allow people to come and go as they choose. It’s also okay to try something out only to reject it; to start something up and decide to not finish it. We can break promises and move on. A few months ago, I decided to reclaim my place in the bigger story. And no matter how discouraged or tired I was, to bring something to the communal table. I also needed to let myself do things the wrong way. (What others might consider the wrong way.) On my walk through Stewart Park the other morning we (my dogs and I) were detoured to a path that had signs that read “WRONG WAY.” We went on this detour because the path through the marsh was being reseeded. So, in order to do the right thing, to protect the regeneration of the marsh, we had to go the wrong way. This got me thinking (and writing this blog once again), on just how important it can be to take a detour from our typical way(s) of doing things. Even if a path has been made for us, we can give it time to reseed before we walk it. I believe it’s important for each of us to stay active in our own personal narrative as well as the national narrative and not to become numbed or silenced because the negative overwhelms or discourages us. Or, we feel that we have to become like the monsters that we fight. And there are monsters. Over the course of my life I’ve learned how to confront and challenge my internal monsters, however, the outer ones at this time appear undeterred and relentless. Our republic and our democracy is at a very real risk of failing. Violence is on the rise and racism and hate have larger platforms than ever before. In the past I’ve found ways to navigate relationships with those who are narcissistic and vengeful. Now we have a sitting president whose ugliness brings out the ugliness in us and around us. He also mirrors our internalized racism, which no one in America has escaped. What do I, what do we, do with that? What can we do? To deal with the bullies in our lives, to let the good get reseeded, and to remain in the conversation we may sometimes have to take a detour and go the wrong way for the right reasons. To get a seat at the table (or to keep one), to be a voice in the room, to make a difference (or at least try)—these are my reasons for writing you, for sending this blog. This is one small way I reach out and make contact. This is part of my process of reseeding my path so that I may walk forward on it. After some time spent in detour mode, I finally did get a publisher for my Red Thread book, which will be released in April of 2020. I am starting up my monthly transformational circle based on that book this September (see below), and I am finding ways to be part of the needed reseeding that our communities and country need. We can't; I can't keep taking the worn path. In all of this, I’m keeping my seat at the table and finding new paths to take, both on my own and together with others. Join me! Monthly Transformative Circle: The Red Thread: Touching Reality (and being Heroic) in our Everyday Lives at Healing Services on the River in Prairie Du Sac. Learn more and sign up. Starts this September 12th. TO BREAK A PROMISE Make a place of prayer, no fuss, just lean into the white brilliance and say what you needed to say all along, nothing too much, words as simple and as yours and as heard as the bird song above your head or the river running gently beside you. Let your words join one to another the way stone nestles on stone, the way water just leaves and goes to the sea, the way your promise breathes and belongs with every other promise the world has ever made. Now, leave them to go on, let your words carry their own life without you, let the promise go with the river. Have faith. Walk away. TO BREAK A PROMISE from THE SEA IN YOU:Twenty Poems of Requited and Unrequited Love’ © David Whyte and Many Rivers Press Now Available at davidwhyte.com The Long Night Moon I cast my spell on this eve of the Long Night Moon To be graced with recognition of you of us as we truly are This moon knows me well. How I have prayed to Her decades ago to end my stretch of sorrow. A spell this time to be known And graced My feeder with chickadee And Her song To be graced and lit to be met half-way in darkness and in light with stranger and friend. to know you and be known fully round The spell is cast the door opened I prepare my life for your arrival. A meal for two or more An empty coat hook yours, A pair of house shoes, your size And my heart set next to the built-in writing desk A place for you and you and for The Other too when you arrive. “Long Night Moon Ritual” by Julie Tallard Johnson 
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 “Authoritarian regimes, dictators, despots are often, but not always, fools. But none is foolish enough to give perceptive, dissident writers free range to publish their judgments or follow their creative instincts. They know they do so at their own peril. They are not stupid enough to abandon control (overt or insidious) over media. Their methods include surveillance, censorship, arrest, even slaughter of those writers informing and disturbing the public. Writers who are unsettling, calling into question, taking another, deeper look. Writers—journalists, essayists, bloggers, poets, playwrights—can disturb the social oppression that functions like a coma on the population, a coma despots call peace, and they stanch the blood flow of war that hawks and profiteers thrill to. That is their peril. Ours is of another sort. How bleak, unlivable, insufferable existence becomes when we are deprived of artwork. That the life and work of writers facing peril must be protected is urgent, but along with that urgency we should remind ourselves that their absence, the choking off of a writer’s work, its cruel amputation, is of equal peril to us. The rescue we extend to them is a generosity to ourselves. We all know nations that can be identified by the flight of writers from their shores. These are regimes whose fear of unmonitored writing is justified because truth is trouble. It is trouble for the warmonger, the torturer, the corporate thief, the political hack, the corrupt justice system, and for a comatose public. Unpersecuted, unjailed, unharassed writers are trouble for the ignorant bully, the sly racist, and the predators feeding off the world’s resources. The alarm, the disquiet, writers raise is instructive because it is open and vulnerable, because if unpoliced it is threatening. Therefore the historical suppression of writers is the earliest harbinger of the steady peeling away of additional rights and liberties that will follow. The history of persecuted writers is as long as the history of literature itself. And the efforts to censor, starve, regulate, and annihilate us are clear signs that something important has taken place. Cultural and political forces can sweep clean all but the “safe,” all but state-approved art. I have been told that there are two human responses to the perception of chaos: naming and violence. When the chaos is simply the unknown, the naming can be accomplished effortlessly—a new species, star, formula, equation, prognosis. There is also mapping, charting, or devising proper nouns for unnamed or stripped-of-names geography, landscape, or population. When chaos resists, either by reforming itself or by rebelling against imposed order, violence is understood to be the most frequent response and the most rational when confronting the unknown, the catastrophic, the wild, wanton, or incorrigible. Rational responses may be censure; incarceration in holding camps, prisons; or death, singly or in war. There is, however, a third response to chaos, which I have not heard about, which is stillness. Such stillness can be passivity and dumbfoundedness; it can be paralytic fear. But it can also be art. Those writers plying their craft near to or far from the throne of raw power, of military power, of empire building and countinghouses, writers who construct meaning in the face of chaos must be nurtured, protected. And it is right that such protection be initiated by other writers. And it is imperative not only to save the besieged writers but to save ourselves. The thought that leads me to contemplate with dread the erasure of other voices, of unwritten novels, poems whispered or swallowed for fear of being overheard by the wrong people, outlawed languages flourishing underground, essayists’ questions challenging authority never being posed, unstaged plays, canceled films—that thought is a nightmare. As though a whole universe is being described in invisible ink. Certain kinds of trauma visited on peoples are so deep, so cruel, that unlike money, unlike vengeance, even unlike justice, or rights, or the goodwill of others, only writers can translate such trauma and turn sorrow into meaning, sharpening the moral imagination. A writer’s life and work are not a gift to mankind; they are its necessity.” Morrison, Toni. The Source of Self-Regard . Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group. Join me and others for free retreats and writing circles. I have one opening in my Tuesday morning Writing Circle (meets monthly, begins in October).   My yoga studio closed down. I was left without my weekly yoga classes. And with this closure went much of my yoga community. Like identifying myself as a writer, I am also a Yogi. But it’s hard to practice yoga alone at home. I pull out my mat and do some asanas but not for the full hour I get from class. Also missing is the connection to the teacher (who was phenomenal), and the other yoga students who gifted me with community. There are also some postures that I just don’t like doing at home alone, sans support.
I am in search of another yoga teacher and studio that works for me, where I can practice my yoga and build my community. I’m sure to find one because I believe that which I am searching for is also searching for me (be it a publisher, lover or yoga teacher). Everything happens through these connections. My writing and transformational circles are based on Parker J Palmer’s circles of trust and 30 years of my own research and work on forming safe and dynamic circles. My first book, published in 1989, included setting up healing groups for families and friends of those with chronic mental illness. I made sure that the publisher (Doubleday) didn’t use the word “cope” in the title. Getting drunk every day is a way to cope, just not a skillful one. I left a Sangha after a decade of participation when I realized it was community I truly sought, not enlightenment. They lacked the community element. In my writing circles we form bonds where we are able to explore our capacities as writers, get encouragement and guidance. Everyones writing improves as you participate in circle. A consistency of showing up to circle cultivates our writing (or yoga) practice. Showing up on the mat or to the page is elemental to our success as yogis and writers. Joining others helps us show up to the page. Join me and other writers in safe and dynamic circles. I have a few openings in my writing circles starting this September and October. (My Tuesday morning one in Mount Horeb is small with only 6 writers. I have room for 2 more). With my circles you give yourself community, encouragement, and some of the best mentoring and guidance from me, your Writing Sherpa. You give yourself accountability. I will give you some writing prompts along the way. My Monthly Transformative Circle: The Red Thread: Touching Reality in our Everyday Lives, which starts up this September and meets one Thursday evening a month, is based on my upcoming book. We gather once a month to support each other’s spiritual and creative lives. Also, I am offering my first yoga and writing retreat with Molly Chanson this August. The retreat is held at Holy Wisdom Monastery so you can choose to return home at night or stay the night at HW. (See below) Finally, come meet me and other writers at a free Writers' Retreat Monday August 19th from 10 it'll 4:00. Email me for details. Magic happens at these gatherings. Join us this August! Mind, Body, Word: 3 Days of Yoga and Writing If you haven't signed up, it's time!! If you already signed up, we are so excited to spend these days with you! We will explore and renew Self on the mat and the page. Yoga and writing combine as lenses to explore the True Self. Attend to deepen or awaken your yoga and writing practices! This is sure to be a magical 3 days and we hope to see you there! Register Here! Meet Molly Chanson Molly will complete her 200-hour yoga teacher training in July at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health. Molly has practiced yoga for over 25 years, and is writing her first book. Learn more about Molly here.  THE LIGHTEST TOUCH
Good poetry begins with the lightest touch, a breeze arriving from nowhere, a whispered healing arrival, a word in your ear, a settling into things, then, like a hand in the dark, it arrests the whole body, steeling you for revelation. In the silence that follows a great line, you can feel Lazarus, deep inside even the laziest, most deathly afraid part of you, lift up his hands and walk toward the light. David Whyte, - from EVERYTHING IS WAITING FOR YOU and RIVER FLOW Everything is waiting for you, for us. The completed book, the house, the relationship, the revelation, the peace of mind – the idea, is there. Here. For you. Even when the world seems to be revealing the opposite, and our heart may be breaking. Of course what shows up may not be what we expected or wanted. Work with that. Write from there. A fundamental truth (for us writers) is always here for each of us at every moment: to find that place where the internal landscape and narrative of our lives meets with the outer world experiences– this is the writer’s frontier. You don't ever leave it. What works, for me, is to stay in the conversation. When writing on a particular subject and theme – I listen and notice how these come up in my every-day life. This is how my writing practice has become part of my spiritual practice. Everything becomes material for me to work with (on and off the page). We have to rely on others, to ask for help, to give into the vulnerability of not knowing. We can choose to listen to and engage the uncertainty. We will have to open our eyes even wider to consider what we might do, where we might go. Listen to the internal conversation as much as to the outer experience. Like the advice I've given in sweat lodges -- keep your eyes open; there's much to see in the dark. Be curious. Get help. Stay in the conversation. Never leave home without your field notebook. Work with this. My view? That the very health and beauty of this world relies on us to do so. SOMETIMES Sometimes if you move carefully through the forest, breathing like the ones in the old stories, who could cross a shimmering bed of leaves without a sound, you come to a place whose only taskis to trouble you with tiny but frightening requests, conceived out of nowhere but in this place beginning to lead everywhere. Requests to stop what you are doing right now, andto stop what you are becoming while you do it, questions that can make or unmake a life, questions that have patiently waited for you, questions that have no right to go away..- David Whyte, from EVERYTHING IS WAITING FOR YOU and RIVER FLOW JOIN ME AND OTHER WRITERS for a a FREE WRITERS’ RETREAT: MONDAY August 19th from 10 am till 4:00. Email me for location (near Barneveld) and for other details. julie@julietallardjohnson.com (For those who are wondering if I got my novel done - YUP! Now for some serious revision before I send it out to an agent.)  We are all in need of transformation. We may use other words: to be reborn, to awaken, to obtain enlightenment.... to become one with the Tao or to harmonize one's will with Nature. Or to lose ourselves in the Oneness. To know who we are and to fulfill our purpose. We seek big experiences. And so do our readers. Our readers seek transformative experiences like a woman whose hair on fire seeks a pond. They seek answers to big questions, even when they are not aware of the question. When our writing is transformational for us as we write, the reader will get a dynamic and life-changing experience too. I'm not talking fireworks. Transformation is a given when we allow ourselves to be vulnerable and courageous. Nature reflects this well in the transformation of an acorn to an oak tree, or a caterpillar to a butterfly. Or how a blade of grass pushes through the hard dark earth. Remarkable really. Everything relies on the transformative nature of reality. We are here to be transformed and to assist in each other's transformation. As writers all we really have to do is open ourselves up to what is possible. Bring ourselves to the page (or computer screen) and write what matters to us. Be vulnerable. Don't get caught up in trying to prove anything to ourselves or the reader. Let the emotions, the resistance, the epiphanies, the questions, and ideas spill out of us onto the page like honey from a rock. Share what you got. First for yourself and then your readers. I head off to my 5 days of writing retreat, solely dedicated to finishing this draft of my novel. Just giving myself this time is transformative. It's been awhile since I went on a solo writing retreat. As I shared last week, I hope to encounter the villain in my story. And I hope to have the transformative experience of finishing this book. My protagonist starts out not knowing her capacities and who she truly is -- surely this reflects my own metamorphosis and awakenings in life. Who among us knows who we truly are? What we are truly capable of? As I write this book, my life is changed. And as I rework the story of the my characters, my inner and outer world transforms. My protagonist is a shape shifter. And so am I. SAVE THE DATE: Free Writing Retreat on Monday August 19th outside of beautiful Blue Mounds, WI. More details to come.  I'm setting myself up. Again. Typically this reference is negative -- we are setting ourselves up for disappointment, rejection and failure.
Yup. I'm at the place in my life where rejections and failures are benchmarks for future successes. Something is going to happen; I'm going to end up somewhere. I'm going to get a yes or a no. And all rejections have led to the remarkable life I find myself in now. With my writing clients I remind them to write forward till the projects done. Spend a little time on re-writing what you wrote the day before then have most of your writing be new material. Keep getting the stories down. There will be a lot of messes and misses. Good. Just so in life. Keep living forward. Where contemplation is fundamental to a fulfilling life, too much reflection on the past keeps you in the past. Review the present in leu of the past while living forward. Set yourself up for as many failures as possible. Join in. Jump in. Eleven books later, this signing up before I feel ready, or smart enough, or good enough has worked well for me. Send out the query letter. Finish the darn book. Call her. Apply for that job. Take the long shot. Attend the meeting. Speak your truth. Write and post that blog. Sing outside the shower. Declutter your creative spaces. Set yourself up. So, I'm setting myself up with 5 days of writing on my novel. I'm going to spend the entire time focused on writing forward and finishing this final draft. (Final draft is a bit of an oxymoron, don't you think?) I'm headed to Pepin Wisconsin, next week. I'm staying at an airbnb out in the country, surrounded by restored prairie. I'm hoping the villain in my book shows up. I expect to get to the end of my book. How's that for a set up? See you on the other side. Mind•Body•Word: 3 Days of Yoga & Writing at Holy Wisdom Monastery YOGA & Writing Retreat this August, 2019. August 27, 28, and 29. Explore True Self on the mat and page with yoga teacher (and blogger) Molly Chanson and writing sherpa and counselor, Julie Tallard Johnson Three days of attending to mind, body and word in a beautiful, natural setting. Includes meals, writing prompts, retreat time, time to write, yoga for any level, inspiration. $150.00 To register contact: Molly Chanson at molly@soulma.com. 773-259-1202 Book Release!! The Red Thread: Touching Reality in our Everyday Lives will be released in April, 2020 by Shanti Arts. I offer ways to touch reality through simple practices like Hosting The Edge, the Inner Labyrinth, and other simple tools to discover your truest self and greatest potentials. This book is based on the teachings and my conversations with Parker J Palmer. I have room for a few in my writing circles. One opening in my Tuesday morning Mount Horeb circle.  I was in my late twenties. Still wore highheels. Newly to Minneapolis with my first Social Work job. I took on a volunteer-training position at one of the local hospitals that specialized in sexual addiction. Within the first week I found myself in a group where a girl of 10 years was to confront her father on his sexual abuse. He was in jail for this crime. They released him to attend this group. He sat next to me, a tall white man with dark edges that matched his dark hair and eyes. Even in my highheels he loomed over me. The hospital social worker started the process by speaking for the girl, and confronted the father. He denied it. I wasn't given any particular role but knew what I had to do. While the other professionals (at least 4 of them) continued to confront the perpetrator, and he continued to deny it, I spoke up.
I looked at the young girl and said," I need you to know something." I waited for her to look back at me. She did. The room thickened with silence. "I want you to know that I believe you." She kept her eyes on me the rest of the time. For me, that's all that mattered that day, that she knew she was believed. In my work with writers, many write stories of past trauma and transgressions, some for the first time, some as the result of years of recovery and healing. Everyone of them at some time or another worries that the reader won't believe them. "Who will believe that this much happened to one person?" someone recently asked in one of my circles. Here is my response to each and everyone of you: First, believe and trust yourself. Do the healing work that attends to the pain and abuses (either as you write your trauma stories or/and before). Then, as you write, your job is to make your stories believable to your readers. Of course they are true. Tragically true, but true. Fathers abuse their daughters. Mothers too. Alcoholism destroys families. Children witness horrific events. Some lives are strewn with loss, abuse and trauma. Typically the perpetrators deny their transgressions. Yes, there will be those who want us to shut up. Not sharing our stories of course makes it easier for these true stories to be denied. Your work is to make your abuse story believable to readers. Not a small task by any measure. That's the job of all writers. That is done the same way we make all our meaningful experiences meaningful to our future readers. We write. We read. We write some more. We study others' writing. We join in safe writing circles. We write some more. All my work with writers is about helping with this daunting but worthwhile endeavor -- to take hold of your reader like that 10 year old did of me in the above story. This makes us all brave. You can do this. And must. Without your courage to share and confront through the written word, the world will be a less beautiful and safe place. We need your stories. I believe you. Your readers will too. "Just a minute," said a voice... by Mary Oliver "Just a minute," said a voice in the weeds. So I stood still in the day's exquisite early morning light. and so I didn't crush with my great feet any small or unusual thing just happening to pass by where I was passing by on my way to the blueberry fields, and maybe it was the toad and maybe it was the June beetle and maybe it was the pink and tender worm who does his work without limbs or eyes and does it so well or maybe it was the walking stick, still frail and walking humbly by, looking for a tree, or maybe, like Blake's wondrous meeting, it was the elves, carrying one of their own on a rose petal coffin away, away into the deep grasses, After awhile the quaintest voice said, "Thank you." And then there was silence For the rest, I would keep you wondering. Mount Horeb Morning Writing Circle (Next one begins SEPTEMBER, 2019) Meets monthly on the 3rd Tuesday 10am - 1:00pm through Sept., 2019. This circle will be a smaller circle of 6. FULL Madison Evening Writing Circle (Next one begins SEPTEMBER, 2019) Meets monthly on the 1st Tuesday 6-9pm. join us. Prairie du Sac Evening Writing Circle (Next one begins September, 2019) 595 Water Street, Prairie du Sac Meets monthly on the 1st Wednesday 6 till 9pm. I invite you to join.  Cliché’s are dead metaphors. They are overused and therefor don't offer up anything authentic or original. They are everywhere of course, in life and in our writing.
Cliché’s may be keeping you in a trap – the starving artist; no one will believe you; writing is a waste of time; I’m too old and it’s too late; family secrets should remain so. – all these can hinder your creative flow. Identify one from your life. One of my clichés was accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative. For me this meant: don’t speak up about the dark truth, don’t be so sensitive, and, let the shadow aspects stay in the dark. This cliché alone gave me a lot of writing material! Search and destroy clichés in your perceptions and writing. Beyond cliché lines, what perceptions, beliefs and story lines do you hold that are also cliché? Facts can be cliché, rules and formulas – but our truth, and our experiences, which are the narratives of our truths bloom with authenticity and originality. So, take the meaning of a cliché (which is also cliché) and challenge it – question it. Write about at least two clichéd beliefs, assumptions or formulas that have shown up in your life and/or writing -- especially around your chosen subject and theme. Clichés deprive us of genuine details. And our stories are often in the detail. Can we have our cake and eat it too? What does it mean “to not look back?” Do we really marry our mothers? What does it mean to be ugly? Why shouldn’t we bite off more than we can chew? What does it mean to be the center of attention? (Is this a good thing?) What does it mean to be told to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative? What clichés both structurally (in sentences) and in theme show up in your writing project? How can you liven these up? Which ones seem to come up a lot for you? What’s a live metaphor or detail that could tell us more? Be willing to search and destroy all clichés. To write metaphors we can start with finding our clichés and transforming them into something alive. Want to buy this Writing Sherpa a cup of coffee? Here's how: Click here: A Cuppa Java for Julie. OPENINGS IN MY FALL CIRCLES Mount Horeb Morning Writing Circle (Next one begins SEPTEMBER, 2019) Meets monthly on the 3rd Tuesday 10am - 1:00pm through Sept., 2019. This circle will be a smaller circle of 6. join us. Madison Evening Writing Circle (Next one begins SEPTEMBER, 2019) Meets monthly on the 1st Tuesday 6-9pm. join us. Prairie du Sac Evening Writing Circle (Next one begins OCTOBER, 2019) 595 Water Street, Prairie du Sac Meets monthly on the 1st Wednesday 6 till 9pm. I invite you to join. Hello All, I'm teaching at Write by the Lake this week in Madison . . . one of my favorite weeks as a Writing Sherpa.
Wish you were here. Maybe next year. Consider joining me and other writers in one of my writing circles (openings this September): Madison Evening Writing Circle starts September 3rd Holy Wisdom Monastery, Madison WI Meets monthly on the 1st Tuesday 6-9pm. Free parking. Prairie du Sac Writing Circle continues on September 4th 595 Water Street, Prairie du Sac Meets monthly on the 1st Wednesday 6 till 9pm of join Molly and I at this summer retreat: Mind•Body•Word: 3 Days of Yoga & Writing at Holy Wisdom Monastery YOGA & Writing Retreat this August, 2019. August 27, 28, and 29. Explore True Self on the mat and page with yoga teacher (and blogger) Molly Chanson and writing sherpa and counselor, Julie Tallard Johnson Three days of attending to mind, body and word in a beautiful, natural setting. Includes meals, writing prompts, retreat time, time to write, yoga for any level, inspiration. $150.00 To register contact: Molly Chanson at molly@soulma.com. 773-259-1202 We tend to put ourselves through more unnecessary distress and suffering than anybody else could possibly inflict upon us. Most creative people encounter what I did in my late twenties as I ventured out on my own to build my private practice and write my first book. I felt like a big fake. Who was I to counsel people? Who was I to author a book? This is known as the imposter syndrome and is understood clinically as the psychological phenomenon in which people are unable to internalize their accomplishments. We just don’t know our own capabilities! We doubt our capacities. We are constantly limiting ourselves or letting outside circumstances limit us. My spiritual teacher at the time said that he would be worried about me if i hadn’t had these internal struggles of inadequacy. He assured me that this phenomenon is common and that we should be reluctant to trust someone who doesn’t have such internal conversations.
When the imposter syndrome is activated we often put our life on hold; we tend to put things off because we don’t believe in ourselves. Since creativity relies on one’s efforts, you could say everything responds to this creative effort. But we resist such efforts and come up with many reasons for putting life on hold—an aversion to risk, fear of the unknown and of exposure, and the intimacy of the creative life. When feeling inadequate somehow we seek to keep ourselves safe in the norm of inactivity or business. In his book The War of Art, Steven Pressfield explores the battle between the unlived life and the life we live. “Between the two,” he shows, “stands resistance.” we put our lives on hold because we have to heal first, or get into the right relationship, or have enough time or money to create our masterpiece, or find the perfect space or home that will sustain our creative life. You get this, don’t you? Clutter is often a manifestation of this agreement to put our creative life on hold. As the piles of paper, waste, and stuff accumulate; it gives us more and more things we have to get to before we can get to our creative lives. then, the door closes and it is too late. Many people share that they feel selfish when pursuing a dream or a passion. this feeling may actually point to how they are finally taking care of themselves. From then on I took this psychological phenomenon of feeling like a fake as a pointer to just keep going. (This syndrome rises up with every new endeavor of mine, though, less intensely). No one knows fully where personal inspiration originates. Most scholars and experts at critical junctures of creativity feel as if they don’t know what they are doing. But they keep going anyway. And each of us can too. Just keep going; keep writing. Anyone doing something truly inventive or creative will encounter this imposter syndrome or some flavor of resistance. The method behind creativity and success relies on our willingness to keep moving. This reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from don Quixote: “until death it is all life.” Want to buy this Writing Sherpa a cup of coffee? Here's how: Click here: A Cuppa Java for Julie. Mind•Body•Word: 3 Days of Yoga & Writing at Holy Wisdom Monastery YOGA & Writing Retreat this August, 2019. August 27, 28, and 29. Explore True Self on the mat and page with yoga teacher (and blogger) Molly Chanson and Writing Sherpa and counselor, Julie Tallard Johnson Three days of attending to mind, body and word in a beautiful, natural setting. Includes meals, writing prompts, retreat time, time to write, yoga for any level, inspiration. $150.00 To register contact: Molly Chanson at molly@soulma.com. 773-259-1202 Monthly Transformative Circle: The Red Thread: Touching Reality in our Everyday Lives at Healing Services on the River in Prairie Du Sac, WI Meets monthly on the 2nd THURSDAY evening of each month, 6 to 9 pm starts AUGUST, 2019. Gather together with others once a month for a year to explore what is truly meaningful and possible for you. We will use two of my books: The The Zero Point Agreement: How To Be Who You Already Are, along with, The Red Thread: Touching Reality in our Everyday Lives through Contemplation and Action. THE RED THREAD BOOK's publication date: April 2020! The Red Thread book and circles are based on the core teachings and Circles of Trust by Parker J Palmer. Connect more strongly to what matters to you. This is my 3rd decade of offering such circles. This circle is open to 11 participants. Learn more and sign up. LAUNCHING NEW ON-LINE COURSE: (How to) BE THE CAUSE OF YOUR LIFE (rather than the effect). Starts Friday June 14th. Take any time, and at your own pace. This course is an invitation to increase your authenticity through strengthening your personal boundaries and developing your courage. There is so much that hinders us in accessing our inner truth, trusting our experience, and living freely. How to BE THE CAUSE OF YOUR LIFE series is a way to ignite or reignite your truest, most authentic self. The course gives you simple means to be yourself, to be the cause of your life. This course is a means to develop and trust your intuition, your inner-knowing. Where all lessons are simple, they are also quite profound in their transformative abilities. You will awaken more to yourself, your confidence and your knowingness through the application of these lessons. You will know what is yours to deal with and what is not yours. We start with a free-20 minute phone consultation. Learn more and sign up. |
All Write Wednesdays: World into WordAll Write Wednesdays is a blog about living the writer's life. Everything in our lives is material. Read all of the All Write Wednesdays posts.
Zero Point BlogThe Zero Point blog shares my teachings about living your life from the inside out and becoming the cause rather than the effect of your life. Read all of the Zero Point posts.
Support this blogA CUPPA JAVA for JULIE Your support helps keep this Sherpa writing and helping others. Please consider a donation.
Julie lives in Mount Horeb WI where she walks her dog through Stewart Park, gardens her corner lot, attends yoga at Bliss Flow Yoga in Madison and waits for spring 11 months of the year. She is author of The Zero Point Agreement & ten other books. She also writes for the local Mount Horeb paper and in her free time listens in on others' conversations at Sjolinds.
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