Tag: inspiration

Thankful Tuesday on Wednesday

I suspect you’ve been extremely busy this week, getting yourself ready for Christmas and making plans for days to come, completing tasks that had to be done.

Life has been hectic for us too in the last few days and Tuesday disappeared under specialist appointments, quick drop-ins to friends, school matters and joint learning.

I have, therefore, only a humble gratitude point to share this week. I am thankful today for good moments that we spontaneously initiate.

The photo below was taken at a farm nearby. I will forever remember my son cheekily running after a pheasant that proudly strolled around the field and my frustration that I couldn’t stop him (my son, not the pheasant). Young, energetic, stubborn. As most of them are at that age, I think.

The photo above was taken during a solo walk around our local woodland, Stanhope Woods, near Trent and Mersey Canal, Stenson, Derbyshire. I thought that I’ll share this with you before winter replaces autumnal decor with its frosty brush strokes.

So today I am thankful for spontaneous ventures that turn into memories captured and revived in photographs.

What is on your gratitude list today?

MyCake, Her Cake, and Your Cake

6j8a36256j8a3667-kopia6j8a37276j8a3600

6j8a36086j8a3604

A while ago I wrote a post in which I was telling you about my friend, Dorota, who is a wonderful fairy and turns everything around her into beauty. A week ago I had a chance to photograph her at work. She’s been always a very creative soul, capable of making magic. The cakes presented here are her art and below you can see her preparing another one for a very hungry customer.

I read somewhere a while ago that “True art is control over passion.” I think you can see it all in her work. Dorota has always been a great inspiration to me and I will be forever grateful to her for showing me that I do not need a permission slip to create. But imagination and perseverance.

If you are interested in Dorota’s cakes, contact her through Facebook at MyCake. Dorota is based in Poland in the region of Wielkopolska. Her handmade cakes have travelled long distances before so just get in touch with her if the idea of combining art and food appeals to you as much as to her.

6j8a3459

Walk with me

6j8a16016j8a16346j8a16136j8a16396j8a16046j8a1635

6j8a1595bw-swiatecznie-1-of-1

autumn-2016_5

autumn-2016_4

autumn-20162

There was a time in my life that nothing could have made me jump out of bed more than the promise of reading a blog that one wonderful woman was writing on the other side of the globe. I have never read or seen anything that would create such a strong reaction in me and was really never as compelled by someone’s writing as much as I was then. The words were cutting right through to the heart and the mind, giving me the education that I needed and reaching me where I was in my life at the time. At times I gasped in awe, and totally puzzled, I stammered in disbelief: How… how on Earth does she know how to meet me there? How on Earth does she know that I need to read what I am reading to transform? At times I was so spooked that I honestly looked around my own room in search of surveillance cameras feeling oddly exposed but at the same time totally understood in someone else’s writing. Have you ever experienced anything similar? Have you ever felt like that? Strangely capable of seeing yourself in other people’s experiences?

When Autumn ends, when the golden colours disappear and the grey and dullness start to seep in, I crave for inspiration, but what is truer is that I crave to be assured that the beauty will return, that the sun will shine strong again – and this is perhaps what inspiration does to our internal landscapes – it’s the sun that lights up our grey surroundings. It’s the sun that lights up the whole of you and it may come from outside but I have now learnt that it may come from within too. It’s almost a decision, or a pact with oneself, that even if there is nothing that inspires me now I will walk in its way… I will walk where the light is.

autumn-2016_3

The blog that inspired me so much was Inked in Colour. Go and visit the site.

Brave magic

1a4h2a8h5h6h

9h

10h
‘Dzielny Prosiaczek’ Brave Piglet

3h

No one knows it better than children that darkness can be  beautiful and exciting. That shadows can have their charm. That solitude can bring up our creative spirits and make them hear voices that naturally disappear during our daily ramble of routines. No one knows it better than children that the unknown is always a promise of discovery, that the scary can easily be turned into the unusual or the magical.

Sometimes we need a bit of help to tread into the unknown and to become childen whose curiosity is stronger than fear, we need to be helped with going through the darkness of self-discovery. During our darkest moments we rarely resemble children who are interested in observing or making the magic happen. During our darkest moments we are utterly confused, stuck in the difficulty. And this is when we reach for somebody or something and this is usually the time when many of us start to pray again – or to pray for the very first time ever. The prayer works, mostly when we understand that

“The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays.” Soren Kierkegaard

It’s when we start to smile at darkness that the magic begins. It’s when we take the responsibility for making the magic happen, that it does.

Change the pattern

img_9710

“Notice everything. Appreciate everything, including the ordinary. That’s how to click in with joyfulness or cheerfulness. Curiosity encourages cheering up. So does simply remembering to do something different. … You can … just go to the window and look at the sky. You can splash cold water on your face, you can sing in the shower, you can go jogging – anything that’s against your usual pattern. That’s how things start to lighten up.” ~Pema Chödrön