Happy New Year Dear Friends 
How I love this time of year! New Years Day is the ultimate beginning isn’t it?
Full of promise and big release energy.
2021 has been a difficult and deeply transformative year for many of us.
This picture of me was taken on Magnetic Island this year, by my dear friend Maria from Zen Photography. It was a pivotal moment when I decided that I would never just “make-do” in life. That I would intentionally live in a way that aligns with my soul.
This has been the hardest time of my life and yet I’ve found the deepest trust in myself. A trust that I had never known before.
Having a double mastectomy is one massive exercise in self-acceptance. And what I’ve found is that I fucking love myself. Tits or no tits. Unconditionally. It doesn’t matter what I look like, nothing will ever stop me from being crazy happy to be alive and to be experiencing this precious world.
I want to ACKNOWLEDGE how I’ve changed in this last year…
I am so much more comfortable with being uncomfortable. Living with cancer hanging over your head really stretches those fear muscles. It’s like swimming in deep open water.
I understand that taking care of myself – good food, rest, boundaries… is vital. Without placing focus on these things, we struggle. We end up living a reactionary life instead of an intentional one.
I have learned that I cannot live this life being anyone but myself and I have nothing to fear about that. It really doesn’t matter if I fail or make mistakes. Or if people don’t like me. All that matters is that I am true to myself.
Listening. I have learned to be still, listen in to my own internal voice and knowing. I believe that I have the answers within me. That I will make the right choices and if I make a mistake… see the previous paragraph.
A few things I did in 2021 that I want to CELEBRATE…
I made it through nine months of brutal cancer treatment. I was handed my mortality and it woke me the fuck up. Life is short. Life is precious. It is all the cliches and damn it they are true!
I want to celebrate my strength and resilience in the face of a monumentally shitty situation. I am so much more capable than I have ever realised.
We are all stronger than we think and braver than we know. Not just me. All. Of. Us.
My 100 Bad Paintings. It has been wonderfully nourishing to give myself the gift of art in my darkest times. I set myself boundaries, to not follow too closely what anyone else was making and it helped me tremendously to hear my own voice and style.
I was a featured on on the BRAND YOU podcast and online magazine, created by Rowena from Preddy Creative. It was an honest and candid conversation that I loved being able to share my story.
My artwork and writing is featured in Issue #52 of Uppercase magazine. The theme is all about how we use ritual in our creative practice. Uppercase is my favourite print magazine so I am wildly excited to have my work published in it’s beautiful pages.
I did my first three day fast and it was life changing! Paradigm shifting and liberating!
I took huge steps toward getting in control of my finances this year.
I did Friday Art Dates and painted live on instagram. It is quite a challenging thing to do!
I created three awesome freebies on my website with more to come.
What happens next?
Now that we’ve acknowledged and celebrated 2021, it is time to set our intentions for the year ahead! Yay!!! I love this bit!
I have big beautiful dreams for 2022. I have heart’s desires that I’m going to bring into fruition.
Looking ahead, claiming my intentions and mapping my way towards my dreams is one of my favourite things to do.
Wings & Intentions is a short course which includes:
★ Creating an A3 poster to hang on the wall, featuring hand painted butterflies and intentions for 2022 set from your heart.
★Painting butterflies (the ultimate symbol of rebirth and transformation) using watercolour and mixed media techniques.
★ Listening deeply to our inner voice to create our own mantras/ affirmations to place on our poster.
This class is self-paced and available now.
What will you claim in 2022?
Wishing you all the inky mess and creative joy that the coming year could possibly bring!
Erin xx
