design your life

Life coaching with Jessica McGregor Johnson
Happy New Year!
It's funny, I have been writing this blog for over a year now but what with the breaks and holidays this is the 53rd blog I have written, appropriate don’t you think for the first one of the year?

jessica_2007_small.jpg
Did you read the one just before Christmas (see below) with the exercise of doing a year review in a painting? Well I did the actual painting – more of a stick men drawing actually as you can see above - and I had a really interesting experience. Once I got started I found I had lots to draw in, I literally went through my diary and it was a continuous ‘oh and then that happened, and then that, oh and then that”. I found it great fun and it felt like a great big rampage of appreciation.

However what was interesting was that many of the things I thought I would want to tippex out didn’t actually feature. Why not? Because they were, more often that not, things that I had wanted to happen, but they hadn’t. How can you draw in something not happening? In fact I began to see that these elements were just things that I would like to draw into 2008.

Talking with others about the exercise some did have a few people or events they would like to say goodbye to for 2008 and a few unfortunate incidents that they didn’t want to repeat but in general the overall feeling was that the good hugely outweighed the bad, and the bad was a thought rather than an event. Lesson – focus on the things that happen rather on the stuff the doesn’t.

So, if you didn’t get around to your painting then I heartily recommend that you do. I took 4 hours drawing my year and as you can see you don’t have to be a master artist to do it, little stick figures are great, if you fancy actually drawing it. If you have friend who would like to have a go do it together, it is great fun as a group project too. Go on, have a rampage of appreciation for a 2007 and then go draw all that you want for 2008 – that’s my next step this Sunday – 2008 with all the things I wanted last year drawn into this – plus some!

Happy 2008!
 


©2008 Jessica McGregor Johnson