Thriving Mindfully as the Real You!
Yesterday I learned that BlogHer published its 2012 study of women and social media. What timing! I was hoping the study would come out in time for me to include in my last chapter of my Digital Sisterhood book. The Internet geek in me is jumping for joy. Time to read the study and learn more about digital sisters!
Guess what? I am so excited about BlogHer coming to New York City in August. Why? Because I get to speak about one of my digital loves — Podcasting 101 with several dynamic women on August 3 from 1:15 pm to 2:30 pm at the Hilton New York in NYC City. I am also excited that this year’s conference will mark my fourth BlogHer adventure! WOOO HOOO!
Great news! I will speak about my work with wounded warriors as an artist-in-residence for Smith Center for Healing and the Arts at The Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on March 15 from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm at the Veteran-Civilian Dialogue Project held at Smith Center in Washington, DC. Veteran-Civilian Dialogue is a project sponsored by Intersections, a New York-based non-government organization that works at the intersection of communities in conflict The Project brings together veterans and civilians to discuss the impact of war in their lives and others.
I started working as an artist-in-residence for Smith Center in 2000. My first residency was based at Howard University Hospital where I served people living with cancer, HIV/AIDS, and other health challenges from 2003 to 2009. Click here to learn more Smith Center’s artist-in-residence program.
The morning of my BlissDom session on February 24 began with meditation, prayer, yoga, and Reiki healing touch in my lovely room at the Opryland Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee. During my morning spiritual practice, I focused on opening my heart and surrendering to Creator’s highest good. I made sure to say a prayer of thanksgiving for blessing me with an opportunity to share my gifts as a creative professional with an amazing community of women and men bloggers. Afterwards, I got dressed, packed my conference bag with my workshop materials, and headed to breakfast.
Breakfast was yummy! I ate plenty of delicious fruit and two chocolate muffins as I watched the powerful opening video and listened to the “Bliss Chicks” Allie Worthington, Paula Bruno, and Barbara Jones welcome everyone to BlissDom. The morning got better as I sat writing notes during author and blogger Jon Acuff‘s keynote address. It ended with entrepreneurial inspiration from Allie and Ana Roca Castro’s introduction of Picha Global, a social media business they formed with Barbara Jordan and Megan Jordan.
The positive BlissDom brekafast energy followed me into Jeannette Kaplun’s amazing session, “Living (and Embracing) the Best of the Life You Have Created for Yourself.” Jeannette reminded me to choose joy, grace, gratitude, ease, acceptance, forgiveness, and peace in my daily life. What a beautiful gift!
The morning events filled my heart with so much joy and positive energy, and affirmed that BlissDom was indeed the perfect place for me to share my insights on how I discovered fierce living from my creative heart during my afternoon session.
Before I began my session, I took a minute to take in the faces of the BlissDom attendees. I smiled inside and outside. Why? Because we were about to learn and grow together!
My session began with the following introduction.
Welcome to “Fierce Living from Your Creative Heart.” Fierce Living is a journey worth taking in 2012. It begins with an open heart in the present moment. When you breathe intentionally and deeply, you invite yourself into the present moment. You also create space to discover who you are from the inside out and what’s happening in your creative heart. So let’s get started.
The yoga teacher inside of me always makes sure that breathing exercises are included in my workshop sessions. Check out the breathing exercises I shared with the BlissDom family.
Join me in taking 10 deep breaths. We inhale through our noses and exhale through our mouths. Feel free to make sounds like hah as you exhale. You can get loud too.
In this sacred place, quietly set an intention for your session today. An intention is a statement about what you want to experience. When you are done, open your eyes.
The next exercise focused on one of my favorites: six-word memoirs. I asked the group to write a present moment six-word memoir which is composed of six words that expressed how they were feeling in the present moment. During the group sharing circle, I listened to the authentic, beautiful, creative, and vulnerable statements people wrote. It was powerful to witness!
Check out the six-word memoir that Katherine Malone, founder of Buckhead Betty … on a Budget blog, wrote: Energized, ready for a new adventure. Click here to read her BlissDom blog recap.
Beth Zimmerman shared her six-word memoir @betzimmerman on Twitter. See below.
Fierce Living via @digitalsisterhd at #Blissdom – My 6 Word Memoir: blessed, happy, tired, achy, wondering, grateful
After the six-word memoir writing exercise, I gave a five-minute talk that discussed my 2012 wake up call and realization of fierce living from my creative heart. It is also an excerpt from the last chapter of my next book, Digital Sisterhood: Fierce Living Online for 25 Years (2012). See below.
My 2012 Wake Up Call (Copyright 2012 by Madelyn C. Leeke. All Rights Reserved.)
On the first day of the new year, I wrote in my journal: 2012 must be different from 2011. I must return to the deep, juicy space of creativity that I discovered in 1992, the year I baptized myself in poetry, meditation, journal writing, self publishing my own work, art, daydreaming, museum and gallery visits, and travel adventures. I must come home to myself. How? How do I come home to myself? Through fierce living from your creative heart. What’s that?
As I wrote in my journal about the meaning of fierce living from my creative heart, an acronym emerged. It has become my personal theme for 2012 and a reminder of what I need to do to come home to myself.
Fierce Living is
F- Finding your
I – Inner women inside of you by
E- Exploring who they are and
R- Receiving them into your life as your
C – Community of
E- Expression and
When you tap into your inner women be sure to
L- Listen to them because they offer
I – Intuition
V – Vulnerability
I – Imagination
N – Nurturing and
G – Growth opportunities
During January, I reconnected with my eight inner women otherwise known as archetypes and personalities. We’ve known each other for many years now. They include Ancestor, my wise woman; Ananda, my spirit woman and mystic; Kiamsha, my creative woman; Madelyn, my CEO woman; Cheryl, my balanced woman and peacekeeper; Puf, my girl child and Black American Princess; Sapphire, my warrior woman and sexy vixen; and Broomhilda, my inner critic. We spent time reconnecting and getting to know each other through mindful meditation, Reiki healing touch, yoga, journaling, collage making, writing an intention statement, playing with six-word memoirs, going on creative adventure dates and walks, reading magazines, listening to music, shopping for our favorite things, and playing dress up in our closet. This investment of time helped me deeply listen to myself. What I discovered was I needed to do a better job of taking care of myself. I discovered I needed to practice self-compassion. I discovered I needed more ME time to just be, to rest, to daydream, to imagine, and to create. I discovered I needed to set better boundaries with my time, energy, resource sharing, and relationships. I discovered I needed to say no to certain people and requests so I could have space to say yes to the people and things that nourish my creative heart.
The session continued with more breathingand writing exercises that invited each attendee to explore what their creative heart looked and felt like, what their creative heart needs and wants in 2012, who their inner women are and what they want them to know, and their definition of fierce living. The group engaged in deep discussion after each exercise. Aha moments, tears, sighs, laughter, joy, and a range of emotions and thoughts were shared. At the end of the session, my creative heart was filled with humility and gratitude for each person in the room. The experience reaffirmed my calling to do creative coaching and write and publish my books.
SESSION COMMENTS FROM THE TWITTERVERSE:
Aminah Hanan 
Britton Edwards Britton Edwards 
Liz Kelsay @lizkelsay – Love this quote from @digitalsisterhd, “I must come home to myself” #Blissdom
“@TheGreatAskini: Right?!? RT @postpartumprogr I’m already in love with @DigitalSisterhd. This session is amazing. #blissdom“
ash 
Mocha Moms, Inc. 
Megan Tietz 
Tina LeAnn Erdmann 
SPECIAL THANKS:
Many thanks to Holli, founder of AWonderingSpirit.blogspot.com a/k/a @thegreataskini on Twitter, for sending me the photo she took during the session.
RESOURCES:
1) Check out my #BlissDom12 Fierce Living from Your Creative Heart Pinterest board for creative writing exercises, videos, and images that can help you tap into the power of fierce living from your creative heart.
2) Visit my Inner Women Pinterest board to learn more about my inner women and to get inspiration on tapping into your inner women or men.
3) Watch a 19 minute video of my Inner Women talk given in January 2011.
4) Learn more about my journey as a creative woman by purchasing my book, That Which Awakens Me on Amazon.com.
During the BlissDom 2012 conference, I had a chance to spend time with Tawanna Smith (a/k/a @WorldTravelMom on Twitter), founder of MomsGuideToTravel.com. We talked a lot about what it means to tap into the power of fierce living from your creative heart (the topic of my February 24th conference session), writing, intentions, and setting boundaries when completing goals. She and Lucrecer Braxton, founder of Art Slam, also stopped by my BlissDom book signing and purchased a copy of my memoir, That Which Awakens Me. We had a great time discussing creativity. After I signed Tawanna’s book, she invited me to do an interview on her Spreecast video show. Now that’s Digital Sisterhood in real time!
FYI: Tawanna will be interviewing me about “Fierce Living from Your Creative Heart” (includes a discussion about my book, That Which Awakens Me) on March 12 at 8:30 pm ET. Click here to watch the live interview. If you miss it, you will be able to watch the recording.
While I was at the BlissDom 2012 Conference, I had a chance to learn about the Child Hunger Ends Here campaign sponsored by Feeding America and ConAgra. After speaking with the campaign representatives, I decided to record a video to support their efforts. Click here to watch the video.
FYI – Here are several key statistices about child hunger in the United States.
1) More than 1 in 5 children in the U.S. don’t know where their next meal is coming from.
2) More than 16 million children in the U.S. face hunger
3) The face of child hunger is different than you might think. It’s not just starving or homeless children. Often, it’s a one- or two-income family that has suffered from the economy and have depleted their savings.
For more information, visit the web sites below.
PS: Check out the photos of the great swag and information I received from ConAgra and Feeding America at BlissDom below.
Today is International Women’s Day (IWD)! In honor of IWD, I created a Pinterest board that features women’s empowerment and rights campaigns, issues, photos, and videos. Click here to see it.
How are you celebrating IWD?
It’s been a week since I attended BlissDom 2012 at the Opryland Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee. Since then I have been marinating in the beauty and memories of the amazing conference and community. In the midst of all of this marinating, I was able to:
What fun I have had! And there’s more blog posts with photos and audio blogs to come in the next days and weeks. In the meantime, check out the links to my Flickr photos and audio blog recaps on Cinchcast below. Enjoy!
2) Cinchcast Audio Blog Recap #1 discusses the meaning of BlissDom (includes an acronym I created to explain BlissDom).
3) Cinchcast Audio Blog Recap #2 discusses the PichaGlobal.com business by and for women that offers social good and photography opportunities in a sharing community.
4) Cinchcast Audio Blog Recap #3 discusses the takeaways I received from Jeannette Kaplun‘s session on Living (and Embracing) the Best of the Life You Have Created for Yourself.
5) Cinchcast Audio Blog Recap #4 discusses the takeaways I received from Diane Cu’s session on Storytelling and Embracing Imperfection: Empower Your Visual Voice with Photography and Video.
Great news! I will be speaking about “New Media Marketing: Understanding Pinterest” at the SistaSense Power Circle Telesummit for Web Entrepreneurs on March 1 from 8:00 pm to 9:00 pm ET. The Telesummit features 12 sessions with amazing speakers. Check out the fantastic video. Click here to learn more about the all-day event. You will also need to register and pay $45 (early registration fee) for the event. It is a great investment! Many thanks to LaShanda Henry for including me in her SistaSense Telesummit series.
2/29 Update: Here’s a link for my Pinterest resource board for my talk on understanding Pinterest. Enjoy!
http://pinterest.com/anandaleeke/ananda-s-3-1-understanding-pinterest-talk-for-sist/
The #BlissDom12 Conference is two days away. I AM SO EXCITED!!! It’s my first BlissDom experience! I am gonna have big fun meeting new people, seeing old blogging friends, networking with brands, hanging out at the great events, listening to the keynote speakers, and learning a lot about video and photography from some amazing speakers. I am also facilitating a workshop session on “Fierce Living from Your Creative Heart” on February 24 from 2:30 pm to 4:00 pm.
PS: I will be signing copies of my novel, Love’s Troubadours – Karma: Book One on February 25 at 11:00 am at the Barnes & Nobles booth at BlissDom. If you are in Nashville, drop by. Click here to purchase the book on Amazon.com.
Ananda Leeke 