Picture This.

An on the eve letter.

When I was young I would sit on my bedroom floor cutting out little Ralph Macchio figures from my sister’s teen magazines. I then would glue them onto a piece of paper and then tuck the paper under my bed so no one would find it. I loved him. Loved. My first true crush.

In college on the dorm walls I would tack up notes, photos, cut outs, words and phrases, a collage wall filled with dreams and thoughts and inspiration. My friends would add to it, and it was a gorgeous collaboration of visions.

I made my first vision board on a cork board in my kitchen after my third baby was born. I was lost, seeking, I needed a tether, some hope, some faith, some longing. I broke the board down into categories and on the Aries New Moon I collected my cut outs and tacked them to the board creating a vision for my year.

I remember my body pulsing with aliveness and filled with desires. Each picture, each word purposefully chosen, though some were mysteries to me. I used that board to guide my year, to help me when I needed to think about something difficult.

Each year I would begin to collect magazines and spend the night of the Aries new moon tearing and cutting and organizing my board. The old pictures would come off and I would begin again. I began to see patterns and prompts emerging, little guides that I was using. In 2013 I began teaching a course called Spirits of Joy and we began to create vision books. Each page devoted to a prompt, a guide to vision around.

I still get emails from women who made a book and found that their life began to follow the magic held inside of these books. We were weaving spells of magic. Those books held our deepest longings, our mysteries, our desires, our secrets and the spells we might not have even known our spirits held.

These books become little pieces of art, guides, a telling of our longings and dreams. They hold a magic that belongs to only us, their magic would never work for another. A vision page becomes a story that may not have happened yet. A vision page is a deep desire and calling. A vision page is secretly instructional. A vision page is beauty as a tool.

The simplicity of it is like that of my younger self on the bedroom floor cutting Ralph Macchio heads. But we do not have to hide away, tuck our books under our beds. These books can sit on our nightstands and our coffee tables. We can carry them in our bags and add a page in while we fly on a plane or sit in a coffee shop. These books are a magic that will teach us of our becomings and integrate our pasts.

For years I stopped dreaming, right around the time the world shut down and everything changed. One of my kids was facing mental health struggles that consumed our family and made everything future focused feel impossible. There was no Aries new moon pulsing. I would acknowledge the day and then let the energy wash over me. I couldn’t tap into it. I felt lost.

It is hard for me to imagine so many years have passed with my life untouched by visions and guides and magic. Longings aren’t present. Desires dried up. Peri-menopause was consuming my body and mind and sobriety had changed me. These years have been the most challenging and filled with changes so wild that I could not feel my roots any longer.

Who am I? Who have I become? The questions began to settle in, just as they did back when my third baby was born. Lost. Seeking. Looking for something to tether me back.

Then I remembered that New Moon, the start of the astrological year, the one that always brought me back to myself. I thought about the prompts, the pictures, the books, the visions, the magic. I felt ready to step in and weave the spells of my life once again.

You know when someone says, “Picture this…” and you see a vision of it in your mind’s eye? I never knew people could actually ‘see’ the thing or the face or the image. I thought it was just an expression. I have aphantasia which means I can’t see images in mind’s eye. So for me visioning must be done on paper, with photos and words. I can’t close my eyes and imagine something. For those of us with aphantasia, this visioning helps us to ground into the visual world of imagination.

For those who can picture things, you might get a glimpse of a page you want to create, you might read the prompt and then see an image form, ideas and colors. You can use that image to guide you. This imagining can be another layer for you to use as you vision in your books.

The course begins tomorrow (April 7th) and for preparation on the eve we gather supplies. Magazines, a blank book or paper, glue sticks or mod podge, string, ribbon, scissors, markers, paint; anything we want to have for our creations. I went to an actual bookstore and chose magazines that fit who I feel I am becoming. I like to use a long shallow tray to hold my supplies so that I can take up space on our table and then move it away for dinner times. Currently my visioning station is taking up half of our eight foot table. When the kids were younger they would vision alongside of me, I’ll be interested to see if any teens join in.

I teach how I learn, simply. Bare bones. A simple daily email filled with photos and a story with a prompt. Each day for 30 days. Nothing more. I am experimenting with SIGNAL for a gathering of the community where we can share daily photos of our books if anyone chooses. I say experimenting because I have not used this before, so we will learn and try it out together. I like to stay open when trying something new and not put any pressure on its’ success.

The New Moon will move into the eclipse and I imagine we will be filled with the energy of it all. I would love for you to join us, registration closes tonight. (Please understand this is a non-refundable sign up, so please take some time before joining to read carefully through the sign up page.) Together, let’s weave the magic of our lives and give this year ahead the gift of our attention, integration and visions.