Visioning® Solutions

It is mid-January, do you know where your goals are? If you are happily moving towards your intention, then HOORAY, keep going! But if you are like me, you are still figuring out which one of your many desires to actually commit to paper.

In addition, I've often found that setting a goal had the opposite affect. That is, I give up because my desire seems too big, too far away or takes too much energy. Esther Hicks, co-author of the Abraham-Hicks series of lectures and books explains goal-setting this way, 

“There is something in the attitude of trying that makes you turn and go the other way (against the current that leads to your dream.) But it is something different if you just let go. You call it surrender, but we don't mean giving up. You can't give up on your desires because your dreams are eternal.”

As a long-time visionary, I know that we set goals because we believe reaching them will create happiness. But I want peace and joy regardless of external circumstances. This intention, combined with Visioning®, will itself lead to my desire.The reason is that Visioning® is the solution when we are in the middle of a stressful situation. In chapter 11 of her book, Visioning: Ten Steps to Designing the Life of Your Dreams, Lucia addresses the topic of work and career. She sites specific case studies of others who solved issues through collage and journaling. One case addresses dealing with difficult people on the job—specifically the manager from hell. Having the manager of hell as a boss doesn't seem like the path to peace.

Photo from LinkedIn.com

“Visioning is a highly effective method for dealing with such situations from the inside out. Why? Because it is possible to safely express emotional buildup through a picture of “what is” and then move on to visioning “how it could be.” The release of tension through collage and writing frees up tremendous amounts of creative and physical energy. Worries and anxiety can be dumped out onto the paper, clearing the way for the vision of a positive future.” page 175, Visioning: Ten Steps to Designing the Life of Your Dreams.

Of course Marissa, the visionary in the case-study successfully arrived at a solution through Visioning®, but you'll need to check out the chapter yourself if you want to know the specifics.

So, 2014 is going to be all about applying Visioning® to situations that keep us stressed out, instead of blissed out. Learn the method firsthand Sunday, January 19, 2014 from 10am to 5pm in San Luis Obispo, CA., by joining Lucia at her Visioning® workshop. The cost is $100.00 and space is limited. Register by calling 805 546-1424 or by emailing luciacapa@aol.com.

For more information on this workshop or Lucia's other 2014 workshops, click to go to her website.

Dorothy Segovia is a writer, musician and certified Visioning Coach. She welcomes your questions, comments and suggestions about this blog. Contact her through her website at www.writeinside.com.

Visioning Step 4: Composing the Design

When I am facilitating a Visioning (R) workshop, this is the step where I end up taking someone's glue away.

After all the photos are collected, after the words are in place, now it's time to place the images together on the page. This is designing the composition—and because we are the designers, there is no wrong answer!!! But designing and gluing are two different steps. Here's what Lucia has to say,

In putting your Vision collage together, you'll let your creative conscience lead the way. You'll mix and match individual elements, fitting pictures with words to find meaning. Like Alice in Wonderland, things will mean what you want them to mean. The significance you assign to the pictures will be personal and specific to your heart's desire. When you have the right match, your heart will say, yes. When the pieces of your dream find each other, you will feel it in your body. - page 91, Visioning: Ten Steps to Designing the Life of Your Dreams.

Ann Beazer explained it like this in the following excerpt from her letter to Lucia.
(Minor editing for continuity.)

“In the visioning session you led in June 2001 when I first met you-- I recall being so thrilled with my collage - something I had never done before - because it was a pleasure to look at.  That was a break through beyond my inhibitions of drawing or painting.   I realize that I still feel the same today having made dozens and dozens of collages since. Since the invitation to attend that event was from someone who leads a nutritional organization for women I had assumed our June 2001 evening would be about health; not so for me.   The focus phrase of my vision board was My New Future. That evening I immediately decided that I wanted to learn with you - so I took details of your CJEA accreditation and was with you in Cambria in March 2002.  The rest is history as they say!  I have never looked back. I love teaching Creative Journaling and liberating people from all the rules and releasing them from the boredom of writing all the time.”

The wonderful thing about this letter was that Ann actually put Lucia's logo in her collage (image at the top left) before she knew what the Creative Journal logo was.



Ann Beazer's collage: My New Future.


Click here to see Lucia's logo at the top right.

Step Four is about allowing your heart's desire lead the way to the design of your life.

Ann Beazer is a Certified Creative Journal facilitator and Visioning (R) coach.in the United Kingdom.Her core workshops are Creative Journal, Work with Passion, Visioning and Living Well. Each workshop is supported with complete sets of materials to use during the workshop and afterwards. Contact her at ann.beazer@me.com

Dorothy Segovia is the Visioning Coach blog manager and certified  Creative Journal facilitator and Visioning(R) Coach. She specializes in collaging your way through obstacles. Her how-to book with music CD, My Body, My Car: How to Coach Yourself Through Life's little Accidents, is available at www.writeinside.com.

Visioning® in Community

Creating Group Collage Mandalas

One of the most exciting and fun ways to do Visioning® is with your friends, family, club, class members or co-workers. It is being used in church groups, at conferences, with school children, and in business for team building. Any kind of community can create a shared Vision and empower their dream. There is strength in numbers.

The photo at the right was taken at one of my Creative Journal Expressive Arts Certification Training intensives. We first walked a labyrinth on the grounds of our El Rocio Retreat Center in Mission, Texas (www.elrocioretreat.com)and then went into the studio to make 2 mandalas (8 pieces each) with the focus phrase: "Visioning® my year of CJEA field work." For more information on CJEA training which includes group mandala work, go to www.LuciaC.com and click on "professional training". There are also guidelines in my book, Visioning: Ten Steps to Designing the Life of Your Dreams, for couples and groups wishing to "dream together."

Visioning® Peace

A few years ago a group of us in Cambria got together, under the leadership of veteran Visioning® artist, Jennifer Star, a graduate of my Creative Journal Expressive Art Training Program. We were given pie shaped pieces of art paper and, after journaling on the five senses of peace (sight, smell, taste, touch, sound), each woman was asked to create a visual interpretation of what peace looks like. From the combining of these pie shaped collages we created a Peace Pie Mandala. In fact, we created two of them, and mounted them for display.

Jennifer took the mandala out into the community of Cambria and spoke at a Rotary Club meeting where she displayed the mounted mandalas (back to back). Her website, www.peacemandala.com features a kit that can be purchased for $25 (including shipping in the U.S.) consisting of:

• 8 pieces of white drawing paper
• 1 template for an eight-piece 4 foot diameter mandala (like the one shown below)
• 1 sample invitation to participate in a Peace Pie Mandala Workshop
• instructions and list of materials needed for putting on a workshop
• templates for a variety of mandala sizes and numbers of pieces are also included

In the summer of 2007 Jennifer was invited to be a presenter at the Third International Women's Peace Conference held in Dallas, Texas. She presented "Peace and the Divine Feminine" to a group of 20 women from around the world. The group created 5 finished mandalas of 4 pieces each. One of the conference coordinators, Jo, bought Jennifer's Peace Pie Mandala kit and produced a mandala with other conference coordinators which was on display at the event. Many women reported feeling very moved by the experience, especially family members who were there creating mandalas together.

You can see the mandalas from the Peace Conference at the mandala gallery on www.peacemandala.com. For more information about creating collage mandalas with groups of any kind, contact Jennifer Star at jstar@peacemandala.com

If you would like to bring a certified Visioning® Coach to your community to lead a workshop, contact us at:
www.VisioningCoach.org