Being Creative Every Day

At the very end of last year I read a book called Women Who Run with the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Ph.D. I think I might have listed it as one of the best books I read in 2020.

It was one of my favorites because it opened my eyes to the power we have as women and how we can tap into that power.

One theme she emphasized over and over again was how important it is for women to take time to be creative. Through writing, drawing, painting, cooking, singing, playing an instrument, anything that helps us express ourselves.

This is something I started to feel out on my own since last summer, this urge and need to create and have some sort of outlet for myself. After I read the book, I understood where it was coming from and why it was important.

So since then, I’ve been trying to do something creative every day. Recently, that has been working on fleshing out my novel. But I’ve also been exploring my creativity through crocheting Harry Potter characters and practicing tarot. I’ve taken a break from drawing and learning graphic design but that’s something I definitely want to get back into once I feel good with where I’m at with my novel. I even try to make my space look “creative” or at least make it a place that inspires me to be creative.

I’m also challenging myself to figure out how I can be creative at work. Or recognize when I’m being creative. Because creativity doesn’t always mean being artistic. A lot of my tasks can feel mundane and normal, so I try to think about how I can make create something new to help our workflow or reframe my thinking about the task as something creative.

I realized last summer that I need to be able to be creative, because that’s when I feel the most satisfied, the most complete. Like I’m doing what I’m supposed to do.

I’m not going to lie, there are days when I don’t want to work on my novel and I rather check out and binge a show after a long day at work. But I tell myself to spend 30 minutes towards working on it and I am always glad when I do.

If you’re losing motivation to be creative, or you don’t know how, I recommend to read Women Who Run with the Wolves. It’s a dense book but you won’t even have to finish it before you get the urge to start looking around you to see how you can bring more creativity into your life.

I also recently heard about a documentary called The Creative Brain and watched it. It dissects what it means to be creative and how. Obviously, being creative is not something only women can do, men are also very creative. It’s part of being human.

Challenge yourself to be creative every day and see how you feel. I know you’ll feel something!

Happy International Women’s Day!

March is Women’s History Month and today, March 8th is International Women’s Day.

I want to share who my personal woman hero is and that is my grandma, my mom’s mom.

My mom has talked a lot about what my grandma has done to get her family to be as thriving and flourishing as it is now.

She was the driver of moving her family from Mexico to the United States. She was the one who sold everything they had, including the house, so that they can make the move to a whole new country that speaks a completely different language.

A move like that is always a risk and she was willing to take it because she knew things would be better here.

When I reflect on my position in life, I send thanks for all that she did to get me here. It is truly amazing.

Of course, I’m grateful for every woman in my life. My mom, sister, aunts and cousins. They all bring something that has helped enhance my life.

And here are some other women in history and today that I look up to for inspiration and strength:

Mindy Kaling
Stacey Abrams
Shonda Rhimes
Alexandria Ocasio Cortez
Roxane Gay
Cassey Ho (Blogilates)
Adriene Mishler (Yoga with Adrienne)
Frida Khalo
Corinne Fisher & Krystyna Hutchinson (Guys We F*cked Podcast)
Beyoncé

I Love Alone Time & Alone Time Loves Me

A lot of unfortunate things have happened during quarantine and because of quarantine. But for me, one of the things I’ve been enjoying is the alone time I have at home.

Seriously, I’m wondering how I’m going to schedule regular social activities with all the alone time I’ve gotten used to. Because the list of things I do when I have time to myself has gotten pretty long already.

For example, lately I have been:

Reading
Following the moon phases using my Moon Planner
Editing my book (crossing my fingers to release a full version this year!)
Working out (Running, yoga, Blogilates videos)
Crocheting characters from Harry Potter (pics at the end of the post!)
Reading tarot
Meditating
Doing The Chakras Activity Book & Journal
Figuring out what to write for this blog 😬
Trying out different brands of pistachio ice cream – I’m seeing pistachio food everywhere now, are you?
Doing my best to keep up with current movies and shows

Plus, soon we are putting a bathtub in and I already bought a couple Lush bath bombs and planning what I’m going to do while taking bath. Can’t wait!

If you’re spending more time alone recently, what have you been doing?

Spent some time making these characters! Harry, Dobby the Free Elf and Norbert the Norwegian Ridgeback! Currently working on crocheting Hermione.

How Real is Reality TV?

Reality TV usually gets consumed by people looking to, ironically, tune out and veg out. It’s about watching messy drama unfold and be glad that you get to watch it happen, rather than being the one it happens to.

And the ironic thing about reality TV is that it gets deemed as fake.

Fake because it’s obvious the producers forced an incident to happen. Fake because the participants are only on there to gain followers on social media and to start their influencing career. Fake because editing causes us not to get to watch the whole story unfold.

However, I’d argue that consequences are real for the participants and the themes (yes, reality TV has themes) are taken from society itself.

A prime example is The Bachelor franchise.

In the course of a Bachelor/Bachelorette season, there is aways someone edited to be the “villain”. Within the show, the “villain” suffers the consequence of being sent home, however they also suffer the backlash from viewers on social media.

But you don’t even have to get the villain edit to be affected by the show on social media by fans of the show. You just have to be person of color. And if you’re a person of color who also gets a villain edit, well then the consequences are even worse.

Furthermore, The Bachelor explores themes we actually experience in society. Of course, the show shows us a journey to find love, so it covers themes about marriage and relationships. It explores the social constructs of what makes a “good” wife and what a heterosexual relationship should look like. There are ideas about what makes someone “ready” or “qualified” for marriage

But we can also learn about how the patriarchy and racism are harmful in society from The Bachelor. We watch how women get pitted against one another for the affections of one man. We see how people of color continue to get ignored and/or stereotyped.

The Bachelor franchise, or any reality show, doesn’t have the ability to solve all of society’s problems, but it does have a responsibility to make an effort to spread inclusive and progressive messages. Additionally, viewers tend to take the idea of reality TV being “fake” too far and treat participants like they’re not real people with real feelings.

And sure, what we see go down on these episodes of reality can be heavily produced. But these ideas are not just made up by the TV gods or syphoned from the void. TV is a reflection of society and society likes to watch TV and reenact what it sees. It’s been proven that it directly affects those who go on the show. On a broader scope, it will, and does affect the rest of us.

So how real is reality TV? It’s pretty real, in my opinion.