Bazoomba awesome bunch! :) A Word of caution.€¦ · being to protect you and keep you safe (with deplorable methods, yes, but still, the intention is positive!) * Remember that

Bazoomba awesome bunch! :)

Welcome to July! And another month of Life Book,

another theme and hey, a new PDF layout, you

likey? I do! :) Easier to do (sort of) and 'cleaner' for

zhe eyes, perhaps.

We are half way through the year and also half

way through our Life Book journey! Isn't it flying

by?! :-)

Well, for the next 3 months, we are going to focus

on the theme of 'healing'. I deliberately scheduled

the healing part of this course later in the year

after 'celebrating and reflecting/ honouring' so

that we wouldn't start with the 'heavier' task of

healing straight up. Some of the healing exercises

may well bring up some old hurts for you or even

new hurts, so I wanted us to start our healing

journey after having dabbled in some of the

personal development stuff already.

Now that you've got a 'taste' of the themes, I'm

hoping that the deeper healing stuff won't shock

you or trigger you.

A Word of caution. If you have had a difficult past or present and you

know that doing some of the healing exercises

might trigger you or upset you and you have no

support network around you; please avoid doing

the healing exercises and focus on the art alone. I

strongly implore you to only do the healing

exercises if you have exactly what you need

around you to be able to cope with any emotional

issues that may come up for you.

If you are in emotional distress in relation to any

of the Life Book exercises you can always come

and connect with people in the 'emotional support'

thread here: http://willowing.ning.com/group/life-

book/forum/topics/emotional-support

But please understand that the support you may

receive in that thread is not meant as a substitute

for professional therapeutic support, nor can I

guarantee that the support in that thread will

adequately tend your emotional needs.

Our pesky, frustrating, debilitating inner critic. Oh

gosh, what a lady, man, witch, party-pooper he/

she is! Always there with the: 'not good enough',

'lose some weight', 'you look old', 'you can't do

anything right', 'just sit in a corner eat your muffin

will you?' etc etc.

One of our worst enemies is ourselves, our own

inner thoughts. At times, our inner monologue can

become so negative that it can be come stifling

and paralysing, depressing, even.

But the inner critic's words are merely thoughts

we've come to believe. They are mere echos of

what our parents told us or our teachers or other

authoritarian figures. And these thoughts, we don't

have to believe them. :-)

So, let's see what we can do about this frustrating

inner critic who won't let you just be!

I have created an 'enquiry' process based on 'The

Work' by Byron Katie. To find out more about

Byron Katie, go here: www.thework.com.

Please refer to the 'inner critic transformation

worksheet' PDF for the in depth exercise

concerning our inner critic's thoughts.

If you are ever in severe emotional distress and don't

have anywhere to go for support, do not hesitate to

contact me on [email protected]. Understanding the Inner Critic

* Remember that the inner critic has come into

being to protect you and keep you safe (with

deplorable methods, yes, but still, the intention is

positive!)

* Remember that you, your inner critic has

awesome taste! Ira Glass reminds us:

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish

someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get

into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap.

For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not

that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but

it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the

game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work

disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase,

they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative

work went through years of this. We know our work

doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have.

We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or

you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and

the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work.

Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will

finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of

work that you will close that gap, and your work will be

as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out

how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna

take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just

gotta fight your way through."

One of the harder portraits to create, the profile

portrait can be tricksy, but with a few handy tips

and guidelines you'll be doing them too in no

time! :)

1. Start with an oval (yep, even now too!)

2. Add a corner to the bottom of the oval,

creating a 'petal-like' shape.

3. Draw a square box around your petal

shape.

4. Draw a horizontal line through the middle

of the petal.

5. Draw a horizontal line through the middle

of the bottom half.

6. Draw another horizontal line through the

bottom of that half too.

7. Start the nose on the second horizontal

line by drawing a small line upwards no

more than about 45 c slanted.

8. Curve your nose inwards (also at about 45

c) stopping at the first horizontal line.

9. Out of the nose comes the 'philtrum' and under

the philtrum comes the mouth. The profile view of

the lips are like 1 side of a butterfly wing (or

slightly more pointy if that's preferential).

10. Out of the bottom lip comes the chin. First add a

bit of a dip and then the chin 'bulges out' a little

but not much further than the lips do (unless you

want to draw a 'wicked witch', if you do, make

sure to add a wart! ;P)

11. The forehead comes out of the top of the nose.

Curve the line slightly forward and then draw the

forehead outwards (how far you go out depends

on the type of face you're drawing, mine is pretty

straight and not that far out). The forehead is

unlikely, though, to go further out than the

furthest part of the nose.

12. The nose is created by drawing half a flat circle

(or the opera-house-in-Sydney-shape) a few

milimeters away from where you first drew the

first nose line. Out of the nostril, draw the 'nostril

flap' (correct biological term, yes! ;)). Draw the

mouth out of the butterfly wing shape.

13. The visible eye is roughly created about 1 inch

into the face from the top of the nose bridge.

Slope your line down about 10/15c. To draw the

eye, start with a triangular shape. The iris and

pupil are both flat circular shapes.

14. Above the eye is an eyebrow and at times you

might see some eyelashes peeking out from

where the non-visible eye is. You can also add

some lashes to your visible eye should you like

that.

15. When doing hair, remember that it doesn't lie

straight on top of the skull, depending on how

voluminous the hair, it starts a little higher than

the skull. I go for about half an inch (I believe).

16. Once you have shaded and painted your profile

face, cut it out making sure that you leave a flap

at the back of the head (you will use this later to

affix it to your other page).

17. Trace over your cut-out profile onto your blank

piece of watercolour paper and onto your extra

piece of scrapbooking paper so that you have a

silhouette.

Tips for shading/ painting the girl

* Add a symbol to the face somewhere

that represents the calm/ compassionate

space you come to after you have done

'the work' on your negative thoughts. I

chose a 'sun'.

* For an interesting effect to the hair, add

some interesting decorative rubber

stamping!

18. The silhouette on your watercolour paper will

represent your inner critic. The idea is that you give this

silhouette one colour (though you can add some of the

facial details), perhaps a darker more gloomy colour (I

chose a beautiful indigo blue). You will also be writing your

inner critic's thoughts on this profile. The negative space

(the background) on this page needs to be in contrast to

the inner critic colours as you will be putting your turn

arounds in the that section (I chose happy/ light/ pastel/

summery colours for the background). I also aimed to

make that colour scheme match my main profile portrait.

19. I used a black pen (Uniball) to outline some of the

facial features of my inner critic silhouette and then wrote

down my negative thoughts onto her hair. You can choose

to do 2 things with the negative thoughts: either you leave

them there, so that you can confront them and by seeing

them and confronting them and doing the work on them

their power -over time- diminishes. OR. You can gesso/

paint over them to imply a symbolic 'letting go'. Either can

be powerful, cathartic and healing. I chose to leave them,

so that I can go back, confront the feelings and this way

desensitise myself toward these thoughts.

Because we have been so deeply

conditioned in our life to think

negatively of ourselves, it is likely

that the same thoughts have a

tendency to come back. Each time

they come back, do the 'the work'

on them. The more you do it, the

more likely it is that the thoughts

occur less often and that their

power is less overwhelming.

20. The silhouette on your scrapbooking page is

meant to be used to write a letter to yourself

on. The letter you write needs to be from the

perspective of someone who you know loves

you deeply. For instance: your mother, your

partner/ husband/wife, your best friend,

your child, a pet. If you can't think of any

people/ pets in your life who love you,

imagine your God or deity, spirit or the

universe. If you find it hard to find anyone,

please consider me, I love you, what would I

say to you? Imagine that you told this person

all the negative things your inner critic says

about you and imagine their response. Write

their response down. NB. If you notice that

their response is also negative and critical of

you, please choose someone else who you

know would NOT agree with the negative

statements.

21. Continue to work on the background. I added

rubber stamps, stencils with ink, acrylics paint

with a brayer and doodles with a uniball pen.

22. Add your turnarounds to the background.

23. As the final step, tape the scrapbooking silhouette

to the back of the page by folding the extra flap

over and then do the same with your original

profile portrait so that it lies on the top of the

page.

And here it is! Another Life Book page finished! :-)

I hope you enjoyed this week's lesson! :)

Remember that negative thoughts are just thoughts. You

don't have to believe them, you can let get go of them and

be compassionate and gentle with yourself. Kindness and

gentleness will allow you to keep painting. Harsh thoughts

work as stifling and paralysing. You are good enough. Your

work is perfect for what it needs to be. At some point, you

will make paintings that satisfy your good taste. Keep

painting. Keep drawing. You are awesome and amazing! :)