REVERB15 (Day 21) 2016 MANIFESTO: Celebrating wholeness and igniting it perpetually

MANIFESTING WHOLENESS. In my daily creative practice, I draw each day. If there is time for coffee, there is time to create. Here I am drawing my cast of characters but with a subtle difference. In 2016, I plan on manifesting WHOLENESS. Read on to find out more. (Photo by Tony Martin at Sweet Cottage Savannah)

Hallelujah to MANIFESTING! Hallelujah to bidding one year (2015) good-bye with love and welcoming another (2016) in with vision and grace!

Here is Kat McNally's last prompt for REVERB15! (Day 21): 

"Your last challenge for Reverb15 is to write your manifesto for 2016. 

 
If you’re not sure where to start, I'd highly recommend checking out Alexandrea Franzen's 5 ways to write a blow-your-mind manifesto! For bonus points, make it into a work of art." (see the complete prompt at the end of this blog post)

   

2016 MANIFESTO for HALLELUJAH TRUTH

(A Work in Progress)

I, Hallelujah Truth (aka Ruth Schowalter), pledge to experience my WHOLENESS in body, mind, heart, and spirit. “I AM ENOUGH,” is my 2016 Manifesting Motto (thank you Carolyn Renee).

WHOLENESS. This image resulted from the dream I had December 18^th, 2015, after celebrating my 11^th wedding anniversary by attending the performance of Langston Hughes’ “Black Nativity.” During the performance, I felt my “bodyspirit” shift. When Mary and Joseph were turned away from the refuge they were seeking at the Inn, Joseph was thrown to the ground. Pregnant Mary looked on helplessly. Present in my mind were the Syrians who are likewise seeking life-sustaining refuge. My heart hurt. Then it opened. What can I do to love more? To nurture? To help those in need?

This heart-opening shift towards others in needed impacted me psychologically. That night, I dreamed of “crossing the waters” to return something to a young man, a former student of mine from Saudi Arabia. My “crossing the waters” successfully depended on his assistance. Without his help, I would have fallen in.

This young man is glad to see me because he wanted to ask me about our father and grandfather. Although he was “foreign born, we shared the same lineage! Embracing him, I massaged his heart. Upon waking, I feel my animus to be more developed and multi-dimensional.

This image reflects this heart-opening shift in the animus depicted in my drawings. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

My 2016 Manifesting Practice is to perpetually EMBODY my experience or “bodyspirit”—to move, to speak, to shape, and to be still—with ease and joy.

In relation to my community, I pledge to witness your experience with love, patience, acceptance, and forgiveness. I will continue to practice applauding your journey and to know how precious it is that we are all connected.

HEART-OPENING ANIMUS SHIFT. Marriage offers me the opportunity to cultivate BALANCE. I love being married to my Chiboogamoo and am so grateful for the opportunity to be present in this lifelong partnership. My sweet husband has impacted my perception of men and what that masculine force might be enacted in my psyche. I believe if we were all cultivating LOVE, KINDNESS, and ACCEPTANCE for ourselves, we would have the PRACTICE of offering that unconditional love to the OTHER. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

As I continue my SOJOURN into the UNKNOWN MYSTERIES in 2016, I promise to say YES to you, and everyone else, and opportunities that affirm me and the skills I have to offer the World.

And YES to ABUDANCE. Abundant health, friends, travels, discoveries, and wealth!

YES to perpetually igniting CREATIVITY in myself and others!

COMFORT. Part of my trilogy is the Wallaby. This warm furry animal offers the power of unconditional love. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

That’s Coffee with Hallelujah! SOUL BLOG with me and tell me about your 2016 Manifesto (or see the alternative prompt at the bottom of the page)! And, I always welcome LOVE and APPLAUSE for my proclamations. Thank you!

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: Others I would like to thank include: Kat McNally for hosting #REVERB15 and the theme of alchemy. The prompts were thought provoking and nurturing. Gratitude to the Hartzell’s for hosting my Chiboogamoo and me in Savannah. Without Lesly Fredman and Matt Huffman, we could not leave our beloved felines, Tao and Sapelo, to make our travels. My REVERB posts were written in Dectaur, Georgia (my home); Auburn, Alabama (my mother’s home); Gainesville, Florida (my aunt’s home); Savannah, Georgia (Hartzell’s home); and Sapelo Island (writer’s retreat).  And  Big Love to my husband, who supports my Wholeness with unconditional love and lot of laughter.

Alternative prompt from Kat McNally for REVERB15 (Day #21) 

"If you're still stuck you could always follow the model of the past two Reverbs i.e. complete the following sentences as fast and furious as you can:
In 2016, I am open to...  

In 2016, I want to feel... 

In 2016, I will say no to...  

In 2016, I will know I am on the right track when… 

But when I find myself veering off course, I will gently but firmly… 

In December 2016, I want to look back and say...."

REVERB15 (Day 19): Flaming the fire to make the soup

SUNRISE GEORGIA COAST, December 20th, 2015. Thinking about light and heat and cooking things up in my life. Focusing on "light" on this cold December day along the Georgia coast on one of the shortest days of the year amuses me and motivates me. (Photo by Hallelujah Truth)

Hallelujah for the soupy mix of our lives and for turning up the heat to make it hot! One day late, here is my response to Kat McNally's December 19th writing prompt that made me think about light and heat.

REVERB15 (Day 19) Prompt: “Today I am wondering what would happen if I allowed a little more out-of-control-ness in my life. So I invite you to consider: where could you (like me) consider turning it up a few notches in the new year?”—Kat McNally

FLAMING THE FIRE

What a lovely invitation this REVERB (Day 19) prompt is! To increase the intensity of something in my life that is ready to manifest! What FIRE needs to be stoked? How bright does the light need to be?

INTO THE SOUP

On the stove and in the “soup pot,” I see preparing the ingredients and cooking up a three-month program to ignite and guide myself and others on a creative path using the tools and principles of InterPlay. 

In fact, as I write this blog post,  I’m in the kitchen cooking! Sitting at a table of my writer’s retreat to design this course, with a view of the Sapelo marsh, I’m observing the fire of the setting sun glow golden on and above the Spartina and below the blue sky. Something is heating up for sure ! Turn up the dial and increase the temperature! Intensify the light!

GOLDEN MARSH GLOW. The alchemy of light, fire, heat! This view from my writing table at Sapelo. I am working alongside my husband. During the day, I am his field assistant and by night, a writer, creator, artist, and InterPlayer. (photo by Hallelujah Truth)

Other items I want to throw into the soupy mix of my life and add fuel to the flame and light of my life are the following:

InterPlay Art & Soul Creativity Coaching. Continue to articulate the service I offer as a creativity coach, using play to support authenticity and develop confidence and joy. Attract new clients.

ARTiculate my ART. Motivated by a fellow artist, to begin speaking up for my art, I am making 2016 a year for speaking my truth as well as making images to express it. Whenever given the opportunity, I pledge to stand up and speak out.

Receive and Celebrate Abundance. In 2016, I envision working and connecting with others meaningfully whether it is through my InterPlaying, Creativity Coaching, Art Making or Teaching American English Fluency. I see me being paid well for this rewarding work.

Health. Now is the time for me to really commit to a healthy regimen of diet and exercise to complement my creative work.

SAPELO SUNSET. I am happy and do not feel the nostalgia that generally accompanies the setting of the sun. Instead, I feel imbued with the light I gathered today while I roamed the natural wonders of this Georgia coast island. (Photo by Hallelujah Truth)

That’s Coffee with Hallelujah! Soul Blog with me and tell me what FIRES you plan to FLAME. What SOUPY MIX of LIFE are you cooking?

REVERB15 (Day 18) : Accessing new worlds through creative portals

PORTALS, PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE.  I see you! Do you see me? Do you see yourself? Are you at a threshold? (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

Hallelujah for DOORWAYS, OPENINGS, or PORTALS that become passageways for transformation. Hallelujah for knowing when to cross the threshold or to acknowledge that you have indeed stepped into another world! 

Hallelujah for NEW WORLDS being accessed! Today's REVERB15 prompt comes from C. Streetlights and celebrates the ALCHEMY of gateways!

REVERB15  (Day 18) Prompt: Haven’t you ever been caught in a moment, a magnetic swirl of a moment, when you knew – just knew – that something magical was taking place? You might feel as if a portal into Something has opened at your heart to release a sort of energy into your own private universe, telling you, “Remember your magic…” 
Think of three important portal points – one in the past, the present, and one you hope to have in the future – and join them together into one powerful and personal gateway into 2015. Where will walking through this gateway lead you in this upcoming new year?

DANCING THROUGH PORTALS.

People have always provided important passageways for me. As an educator, I used to repeat to my students: 

"Remember, it is the people that you meet in your life that matter and will transform it. You never know who it is going to be, so keep your eyes and heart open! You will do the same for others." 

In my life, there have been many significant human beings discovered in books, movies, travel, on the bus, in the park, at the gym, in a lecture, at a dance, around the corner, and on the Internet. I cannot name them all here.

Instead, I will concentrate on how they have appeared in my life through structured CREATIVE PORTALS (yes, created by women) that have significantly impacted who I am as the SPIRITUAL ART PILGRIM, Hallelujah Truth. 

This pink photo of me stepping into the UNKNOWN was taken by my boon companion and husband, Chiboogamoo at the children's section of the Jepson Museum in Savannah, Georgia, while I was playing around with clothing with symbols on November 17, 2015.  Symbolic play is one way to step through DOORWAYS.

PAST CREATIVITY PORTALS
My experience as the founder and leader of "Spiritual Art Pilgrims," which lasted three years, was the culmination from engagement with the resources or past creativity PORTALS listed here. Explaining how they helped me cultivate my creative practice is a lengthy discussion, perhaps a book to be written or a course to be taken with me. 

Writing Down the Bones (1986), Natalie Goldberg

The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity (1992), Julia Cameron

Artist Conference Network, founded by Beverly Cassell in 1983)

It was empowering to hunger for and create the "Spiritual Art Pilgrims," a group founded for three years as a way to explore creativity through different modalities. This important PORTAL creation was also influenced by Shaun McNiff and his book, Art as Medicine.

PRESENT CREATIVITY PORTALS
These present PORTALS are the creative engines driving the dance of my life currently and forging new ones:
 

Coffee with Hallelujah
Begun in 2009, this blog is my PORTAL to the world community in my search for like-minded SOULS. When one's surrounding community doesn't seem big enough to find creative companionship, look farther outside its perimeter, I tell myself. 

My GOALS? While developing my voice through image, word, and persona, I connect with other CREATIVE SOULS. If you have fifteen minutes for a cup of coffee, then you have time to create! I've been successful in sharing my daily creativity with others through this blog.

The Daily Creative Practice
Understanding that my blog, Coffee with Hallelujah, was like an isolated island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean unbeknownst to anyone, I knew that I needed to go to New York City (Facebook) and invite CREATIVE SOULS back to my island. Thus in 2013, I gave birth to the PORTAL, The Daily Creative Practice on Facebook, which now has more than a 1,000 members. 

In addition to connecting my blog island to a big city on FB, I have also succeeded in creating a warm online community, one in which there is support for each other's unique offerings and everyone receives a "hurray"!

Women's Caucus for Arts Georgia (WCAGA)
What a delight to discover this PORTAL in my own metro-Atlanta community in 2009! The members comprising WCAGA are compassionate caring creatives who are feminists deeply engaged in their own work while connecting with others and fostering social justice.

InterPlay 
Hurray for my beloved InterPlay and its co-founders Phil Porter and Cynthia Winton-Henry! This improvisational system has transformed my life, by allowing me to integrate my body, mind, heart, and spirit all together in what is expressed by the word "bodyspirit"!

My BODYSPIRIT is comprised of infinite DOORWAYS that can be accessed through movement, voice, story, and stillness, alone or in community with others.

FUTURE CREATIVITY PORTALS
So! FUTURE PORTALS are opening, incorporating all that I have learned from the past and present PORTALS. 

In 2016, I see my creativity coaching business, InterPlay Art & Soul Creativity Coaching, expanding to online coaching and group play. 

Also using the deep and rewarding improvisational system of InterPlay, I will forge a CREATIVE SOJOURN which will be a quarterly journey inspired by my deep experience with the Artist's Way and Artist Conference Network. 

And, yes, I will launch my website, that has three PORTALS through which others can reach me.

That's Coffee with Hallelujah! SOUL BLOG with me about where you intersected with me, which portal you came through and what we have created together. Or tell me about your own portals!

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS: Gracias to my beloved Chiboogamoo, who makes so much magic possible in my life. Today, we are celebrating our 11th wedding anniversary. Kisses!  And without Lesly Fredman, friend and creativity coach, I would probably not have named myself Hallelujah Truth and started this blog. 

PERUVIAN HONEYMOON 2004. Happy 11th Wedding Anniversary Darling!

 

REVERB15 (Day 17): Purple crayon blessing

GROWING PEACE FOR 2016. Using a purple watercolor crayon and pencil, I began growing peace for 2016 through my drawing and painting. Peace is something I would love to CREATE for us all in 2016. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

Hallelujah for the BLESSINGS that our IMAGINATIONS bring! What does the color purple stimulate in your imagination? What would you CREATE for 2016 with the swoosh of a purple crayon as Kat McNally's prompt below invites us to do?

REVERB15 (Day 17) Prompt: "One of my daughter’s favourite books is the American classic Harold and the Purple Crayon. If you haven't had the good fortune to come across it, it’s about a little lad called Harold, whose magical purple crayon enables him to create the world around him. Whenever I read it to her as a bedtime story, I spend the rest of the evening pondering what I would create if I had a magical purple crayon of my own. Imagine one such crayon would be bestowed upon you on New Year’s Eve 2015: what would you draw to ensure 2016 had everything you need?" --Kat McNally

As 2016 looms in front of me, I hunger for PEACE. Personal peace. Spousal peace. Familial peace. Peace in my local community of Decatur, Georgia. Peace expanding out to the entire state of Georgia, the southeast, and all of the United States of America. Can my purple crayon draw WORLD PEACE? 

PEACE IN PROGRESS. I wonder if we all began to imagine peace, sing peace, draw peace, and dance peace. If we could CREATE more of it in 2016? The act of creating is a valid and worthwhile act, enough in and of itself.

When I think of the BLESSINGS of the IMAGINATION and the opportunity this REVERB15 prompts give me to create, my HEART goes immediately to this topic:

CREATIVITY 2016
A "Purple Crayon Blessing" for creativity in my life and that of everyone in 2016 is the word ENOUGH. What and who you are is ENOUGH. Therefore, what you CREATE is ENOUGH. 

The very ACT of CREATING is ENOUGH.

What you CREATE does NOT need to meet any of the following outcomes:

BE GOOD. According to your or anyone's else sense of aesthetic, the work you create does not have to be named "worthy." It has merit because you made it, and you are ENOUGH.

BECOME A PRODUCT. Your ACT of CREATING something is something to be celebrated. I invite you to celebrate BEING PRESENT in your life with the dance of your bodyspirt. Please accept the permission to let CREATING BE CREATING. The ACT does not have to result into a product that you submit to a show or journal or sell. 

BE COMPLETE. Your CREATIVE ACT does not need to be finished. EVER. What you make in the MOMENT is ENOUGH.

PEACE IN PROGRESS.

Yes! In addition to PEACE and CREATIVE ACTS BEING ENOUGH, I yearn for other purple crayon blessings:

One hundred percent health
Meaningful relationships
Meaningful work that brings an abundance of wealth
Getting paid to play

That's Coffee with Hallelujah. SOUL BLOG with me. I appreciate your support of my purple crayon imaginings and want to know about yours.

REACHING FOR PEACE. I will post this work in progress. As I am called out into the day, I wish you "purple crayon blessings." May you CREATE today a little more easefully and joyfully than if you had not visited me here at "Coffee with Hallelujah." (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

REVERB15 (Day 16) Embodying the MAGIC OF BEING through creativity

ALCHEMY OF BEING. This image is my language. I speak HALLELUJAH. These figures are symbols that I dance, draw, and tell stories with. Do you speak HALLELUJAH? Do you speak your own private language? (Art by Hallelujah Truth, aka Ruth Schowalter)

Hallelujah for the MYSTERY and bowing before it! Launching a snake boat into the unknown and sailing off into the UNKNOWN. Hallelujah for faith and spirit to journey into one's life. This is my practice. This is my life. This is creative magic. I am a Spiritual Art Pilgrim--transforming before my eyes and your eyes too! Today's REVERB15 prompt about the magic we carry in our lives resonates with my Hallelujah-ness! How about you?

REVERB15 (Day 16) Prompt: "Ancient alchemical texts are things of beauty – filled with allegory and symbolic language; things hidden in plain sight; and plain things promising transformation.  If we were to peek into the book of your year, what might we find?  What magic do you carry that people need to look a bit deeply to see?" --Deborah Weber

I am the ancient alchemical text telling my STORY in the "Cosmos of Hallelujah," through image, dance, and story. As a visual artist, I have BIBO-ed (breathed in and breathed out) the improvisational system of InterPlay, EMBODYING the MAGIC OF BEING in 2015. I speak the language of the HEART and a COURAGEOUS WAY OF BEING. 

GUIDE TO THE COSMOS OF HALLELUJAH.  We are all PILGRIMS embarked on such an amazing journey. What text has your SOUL asked you to write? Mine spoke to me and gave me this cosmos. These figures are the stars of my soul.(Art by Hallelujah Truth)

Transform. Create. Be. Live. Magic make. Dance. Draw. Paint. Write. Friend. Love. Forgive. Heal. LIVING IS MAGICAL! Creating is Alchemical!

As 2015 withers naturally to a close and 2016 blossoms, I plan on learning another language. I have been speaking HALLELUJAH for about six years now and I am interested in learning how to translate my HALLELUJAH language into another language that others might be more interested in or able to comprehend more joyfully. 

HERE I AM! Do you see me? If you do, I count your perception of me as MAGIC! Now, let's dance! Let's share our stories in a language we both understand! (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

As HALLELUJAH, I have cultivated an internal/eternal strength. Shedding shyness, I crave discussion, collaboration, and community, during which I see you and you see me. What new language might this be?

That's Coffee with Hallelujah! SOUL BLOG with me and give me suggestions for a way to communicate HALLELUJAH. What is the language of your HEART?

FLOWER POWER MOUTH. I speak Hallelujah and my language is exuberant with lots of dashes of flowers, snakes, polka dots, and Wandjinas. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: Thank you Kat McNally for hosting REVERB15 and engaging such wonderful prompt writers as Deborah Weber. I'm eternally grateful to Cynthia Winton-Henry and Phil Porter, co-founders of InterPlay for this deep and life informing improvisational system. Here in Atlanta, there is Jennifer Denning, the co-founder of InterPlay Atlanta, who has provided a strong foundation for our community to find the MAGIC IN PLAY. Her organization and structure allowed me to achieve certification as an InterPlay leader in 2105, in a relatively short period time (2 years). Great appreciation to Christine Gautreaux for her idea of Manifesting Mondays and suggestion that I find people to manifest with by posting on Facebook! Karen Phillips, Carolyn Renee, and Matt Blodgett--my Monday Manifesters (Coffee with Hallelujah) have supported my spirit and motivated me to action. So much of the MAGIC of my life are the PEOPLE. Acknowledgments must always including the BIG LOVE I receive from my husband and boon companion Chiboogamoo and dear dear friend and creativity coach, Lesly Fredman. Finally, I'm so grateful to the redeeming love of my mother and sister that has nourished me deeply this year.

REVERB15 (Days 14 & 15) Pleasurable transformation through dance and visual art

TRANSFORMATION 2015. The top figure is how the Protector first appeared to me in my drawings. Hallelujah (me) is reclining at her feet and made vulnerable in her nakedness and surrendering posture.  (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

Hallelujah for TRANSFORMATION and...PLEASURE! Today I will combine the two prompts below and write about PLEASURABLE TRANSFORMATION and cultivating more of it!

REVERB15 (Day 14) Prompt: What has changed? You? The world? It can be a change that happened this past year or one you're looking toward in the time ahead. It can be a broad sweep obvious to all or a more subtle shift that only you know about. Tell us about transformation.

REVERB15 (Day 15) Prompt: What small pleasures gave you moments of intense joy in 2015? What more could you cultivate in 2016?

TRANSFORMATION. 
I danced TRANSFORMATION in 2015. Regularly, I danced with my "flaps up," opening my heart wide to the world and then danced with my "flaps down," embracing myself and my personal inner world. 

FLAPS UP! TRANSFORMATION. Here Hallelujah has gained some perspective on her Protector. Dance has propelled her into her own creative sphere. Now the Protector is forced to change. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

While moving in dance, creating shapes, and holding stillness, I contemplated my "psychological" PROTECTOR, embodied HER, drew and painted HER, and TRANSFORMED both HER and another part of me, the ONE being PROTECTED.

This solo psychological dance and visual art PROTECTOR project  GREW and TRANSFORMED into a collaborative project with my friend, writer and dancer Lynn Hesse. She wrote a poem and created a dance about the archetypal mother and incorporating feminine animal images from my drawings and paintings. We named our performance piece, "Embody the Mother." (See this blog, BEGINNING THE DANCE: Embodying the Mother through performance with community as our witness)

Daily for several months, I painted 3 images a day on large newsprint paper after and inbetween dancing. Using brushes and then my fingers and the palms of my hands, I danced and painted my way to TRANSFORMATION. This process was immensely PLEASURABLE. I did it alone, then with my partner, and also within the structure of Fieldwork, refining our dance, poetry, and painting for performance with the observation of others. (See these blogs for those quickly painted images: here, here, and here.)

Through this CREATIVE process, I shifted psychologically in 2015. In InterPlay, we would say the shift occurred in my "bodyspirit," since we keep our body, mind, emotions, and spirit all together. My rather stern and restrictive PROTECTOR, softened, became malleable and let ME become MOTHER.

TRANSFORMATION AT THE CELLULAR LEVEL. A new dance has emerged. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

Without more detail, this response to the REVERB prompts must sound rather vague and extraordinary. MOTHER SAYS, "That's okay. This is such an honest answer!" 

Cheers to LIFE's PLEASURES. May we all have the good fortune to TRANSFORM again and again.That's Coffee with Hallelujah! SOUL BLOG with me about your transformations and pleasures. Can you combine the two words and tell me about a PLEASURABLE TRANSFORMATION?

REVERB15 (Days 12 &13): Naming fear and practicing exformation with the new moon

NEW MOON POSSIBILITIES. As the new moon waxes, it is an alchemical opportunity to prepare for new life, new goals, new possibilities. (Art by Hallelujah Truth, aka Ruth Schowalter)

Hallelujah for reflections on topics that feel tabu! FEAR! And EXFORMATION! Halleujah for the invitation to explore and play with these topics as part of an ALCHEMICAL process. Let's transform ourselves and our lives by embracing what it is we FEAR and "shaking out" or "EXFORMING" that which needs to leave our bodyspirits!

SOMETHING DIES. SOMETHING IS BORN. (Art by HT)

Yesterday's and today's #REVERB15 PROMPTS offer this opportunity for reflection:

(Day 12) Can you think of an instance in the past year where you have been successful at making fear useful? What fears do you hold about the year ahead? And how could you use the energy of those fears in a different way?

(Day 13): What are you going to shake off with fierceness before you enter the new year?


FEAR
To rid oneself of FEAR, we are encouraged to jump into the middle of it, in action, fully acknowledging that we are, indeed, afraid. 2015 has been a year of jumping and then jumping again, and again, again. Failing to make a living wage and all the while succeeding because I stayed in MOTION, despite my FEAR. 

For those of you who know me, you are aware of my daring in 2013 to leave a successful 20-year career as an ESL instructor at the Georgia Tech Language Institute to pursue additional training, broaden the communities that I work with, and to deepen as a creative person.

Fluency Workshop for HCCA.

Experiencing discomfort is said to be a sign of "stretching," a positive expansion. As I said "YES" to creating a workshop for the Hispanic Corporate Council of Atlanta. This is was my first opportunity to offer my American English Fluency work using InterPlay methodology to an entity outside of Georgia Tech and Emory University. I was thrilled and frightened. I did it for free.  

Another project implementing InterPlay in collaboration with Lesly Fredman and her improvisation expertise at the Georgia Tech business school, took four months to bear fruit. Preparation took learning about the specific program, writing a proposal for three workshops and pitching it to the director and his assistant, teaching a model workshop, meeting for negotiations, and then actually conducting the workshops. All of these steps were novel and anxiety producing. Having taken these steps (wish they had felt more like dancing), I feel more confident and have credible experience under my belt for making a living wage in 2016 since these workshops paid well.

In addition to these workshops, I created a curriculum for teaching a "Creative Communication" course at the Clarkston Community Center using InterPlay as the structure to engage 17-year-old refugees who had self-elected to take free  courses to enhance their high school education. Stepping into ownership of my new InterPlay certification and incorporating it with my skills as an educator has triggered uncertainty, brought me up against roadblocks, and challenged me to find solutions that are not totally satisfying.

For the wider metro-Atlanta community, I struggled with the unknown of how to offer the improvisational system of InterPlay.  What did I bring to my community that the founder of InterPlay Atlanta wasn't already offering? I tried to get into the Decatur Recreation Center. A long story, but that was not successful. I tried the library system and was offered two unpaid opportunities to provide InterPlay to Seniors. I visited Emory University's Department of Play and provided a free class without any follow up from my contact. I went to Agnes Scott and facilitated a InterPlay session with the college's counseling staff. Fruit may be forthcoming from this campus that is a 15-minute walking distance from where I live in Decatur.

THAT'S ME! There I am at the center of REBIRTH. December 2015 is bringing to a close an arduous yet celebratory year of my stretching, growing, assimilating, striving, experiencing dis-ease, achieving, and fearing. (Art by Hallelujah Truth)

As this year concludes, I want to own the courage I exhibited for conducting classes and offering workshops using InterPlay. I succeeded in creating and teaching two 8-week InterPlay courses, "Alchemy"(see the testimonials here), and once-a-month Friday classes, "InterPlay Lift." However, a living wage was not earned. Participants pay what they can afford, which often means nothing is made after paying for the rental space.   
EXFORMATION
What would I like to "shake off" or "exform" with fierceness before the new year begins? FEAR! DOUBT! DISTRUST! One of InterPlay's tools is "exformation." We take in so much information both good and bad. And to maintain our bodyspirit, we need to move some of that information out--hence the term "exformation." 

The snake in my images and part of my "Cosmos of Hallelujah," represent shedding of old skin, old information and ways of being that are no longer serving me. "SHAKE OFF" that old skin! 

My Hallelujah snake is at my feet, symbolizing the foundation upon which I stand. Instead of the concept "Don't tread on me," is the loving acceptance of change. CHANGE is constant. I choose to experience it without fear, but to do that I have to embrace it! Oh! Hallelujah! Wish me courage.

That's Coffee with Hallelujah. SOUL BLOG with me and send me courage to live with the fear I have and to cultivate less of it.

CONTINUUM (Hallelujah Life Series). (Art by Hallelujah Truth)