What's Your Passion Project?

Today I had a wonderful conversation over lunch with my dear friend, Susan, and among many inspiring topics, we talked about the term, "passion project" that I've heard several times recently. I think I first read this term in Oprah's magazine, which I collected several months worth for my recent collage sessions. There was an article about Drew Barrymore and how her passion project was finding hearts in nature and photographing them. She then made them into a book. And just yesterday, Facebook advertised a new animated film coming out based on the very famous book, The Prophet. When I read about it further, I discovered that this movie was the passion project of Salma Hayek. 

I feel really inspired by this new term and also inspired that famous people, like Drew and Salma are giving back through their inspiring art and passion. 

Susan and I thought it would be neat to ask people we first meet, instead of the common "what do you do?" question, what their passion project is. I'm curious what we'd find out. I mean, I just heard this term but I've been intrigued by it and have started to think about how I'd answer that question too.

I think ever since my participation in the Fun-A-Day project in January, or since I began to write weekly blogs last August, I have been developing my passion project. And learning to own my gift or dependable strength of creativity through my Dependable Strengths training in October acted like a propeller for me! I think there is a creative or reflective process, at least for me, of naming my project, and now that I look back, I can see how it's grown and gotten more defined through my experiences.

Really, when I look back, I began this journey way back. Recently I was looking back on the time when I had a volunteer internship in Quito, Ecuador and I worked with young children who were working to help support their families. I remember teaching workshops to help boost their self-esteem, and I still have a picture of the posters the children made on "Que significa la felicidad?" or "What does happiness mean?" This work was very meaningful for me, and still is. After offering a collage workshop nearly two weeks ago and an introduction to Dependable Strengths workshop last week, I have heard very inspiring feedback, which leads me to believe that this work is also helping lift individuals' self-esteem, and that fills me with happiness.

That means I'm meeting my number 1 goal of helping lift people up and helping them feel better, even if just for a little bit. A little bit here, a little bit there starts to add up. That is how I started really studying stress management and wellness. And at a certain point, I decided to fully dive into this work and learn all I can. Now I'm beginning to see the budding fruits of my labor--or studies, and my creative energy bursts are growing in frequency. 

I can't wait to see what comes next!

So you're probably asking: what exactly is my passion project then? All this talk and I haven't named it quite yet. And I'm learning, through the power of daily affirmations, that naming what you want in life is key. 

So here goes--back in February I think, I was brainstorming creative ideas with my bestie, Andrea while at the Korean women's spa--a great place for inspiration! And the idea of offering a series of creative stress management techniques emerged. 

I love being creative and I also find it extremely helpful in managing daily stresses, and I enjoy researching wellness and stress management topics, so this felt right to me. 

My first official workshop in early May at Edmonds Community College was entitled "Creative Stress Management Through Collage Art." I decided to name it with my passion project idea in mind, and it became much more than a passing collage session I offered on a professional development day at work. It became the first part of my Creative Stress Management workshop series. :)

So my suggestion to anyone thinking about their passion project: get started! Do one small--or big--thing towards your dream. Don't wait for the perfect time or place. Just begin. If anything, you'll learn a lot from trying something out. And you may get further inspiration for the next step.

My next step? I would like to invite interested friends over soon--set a date, Marita--within the next month to share stories through the beginning part of the Dependable Strengths process and then collage about our strengths. I'm still working on the title, but it could be something like "Creative Stress Management Through Storytelling." Plus collage. But for my friends, I'll probably call it a "Strengths Collage gathering" or something like that. :)

What's your passion project?

*Photograph taken in Lake Forest Park on beautiful Lake Washington near where I blogged today from my iPhone. 

Self-Esteem is a Delicate Muscle That Must Be Trained Constantly

I think having a positive self-image might just be one of the most powerful tools we can invest in to ensure true contentment and kindness in this world.  I recognize the importance of building self-esteem, especially as a chubby, four-eyed child who could be a bit clumsy and wasn't involved in any team sports, but then I found dance. And dance literally changed my life. The summer before I started high school, I became a part of a team of strong young women, in the not-always-well-known dance sport of colorguard, through a jazz dance class first and then through four years of choreography, stretching, pilates--before it was popular, and performing together all year round, and these women helped lift me up throughout high school and many of them still do, either virtually or on the occasional visit with dear, old friends. I was given the opportunity to cultivate my creativity and express myself through movement and that helped me feel better about myself in so many ways. I found my flow.

Although I haven't performed in a colorguard since my freshman year in college, dance has continually touched my life and the experience of expressing my creativity through movement has helped me overcome many obstacles. When I begin to feel lost, I can almost always pinpoint the feeling beginning when I stopped dancing.

So you can imagine how difficult it was then two years ago when my regular zumba classes at the gym began to make me nauseous and cause pain to rattle down the left side of my body. It was horrifying. Maybe almost worse than having to actually live with the chronic pain, because dancing is my life force.  I considered chair dancing and looked into Nia and other dance forms I could possibly try while suffering from this pain, but it can be very difficult to get motivated when your mind is running wildly with all the possible explanations for what's going on inside your body and how you can fix it. I lost my rhythm and my self-esteem has suffered greatly as a result.

But like mangos, I CRAVE dance, and my body and mind and spirit constantly cried out for movement throughout my recovery, which doesn't just include the "recovery" of 6 weeks that the doctors talk about--it includes the last year and a half while I've been slowly regaining my strength and spirit after going to hell and back.

Last week I finally couldn't take it any longer and although I don't have a gym membership and have a hard time getting motivated to leave the house after I get home in the evenings, I decided to just go for it and start dancing in our living room with our cable company's available fitness videos. And now only after a week, I'm already looking forward to coming home in the evenings to put on my pretty pink coin scarf and shake my body to belly dancing for 15 to 20 minutes in the living room. It doesn't sound like a lot of time, but it's just what I needed to help me feel more alive and more in touch with my creative spirit. All the writing and picture-taking and art that I create help fill me with positivity, but they truly can't compete with the sheer joy that dancing brings me and has always brought me.

So I've really begun to realize that our self-esteem is a very fragile, delicate muscle that must be trained and massaged and worked or expressed constantly in order to thrive, just like our other muscles. I feel lucky to have found an activity that helps me work this all-important muscle.