Happy #YogaMonday!
What happens to you when you practice yoga?
Read what happens to me below.
Tag: That Which Awakens Me: A Creative Woman’s Poetic Memoir of Self-Discovery
Happy #CreativityThursday: Writing E-Books
Happy #CreativityThursday!
I’ve been writing books since 1992. I started with poetry chapbooks which opened the door to women’s creativity workbooks. All of this writing laid the foundation for blogging which began 10 years ago and the publication of my first novel, Love’s Troubadours – Karma: Book One in 2007 and my two memoirs, That Which Awakens Me in 2009 and Digital Sisterhood in 2013.
For the next six months, I have decided to write and publish a series of e-books. Today, I found a great article about publishing e-books on my digital sister and fellow author/blogger, Shonell Bacon’s LinkedIn page. It gave me some great tips for publishing my e-books. Click here to read it.
Do you have any plans to write an e-book? If yes, what resources are you using to write it?
What creative projects are you working on this spring and summer?
Happy Creativity Thursday: Creativity Conversations, 4/30 DC Event & 5/15 Online Workshop
Happy Creativity Thursday!
April has been a month filled with creativity conversations. Yesterday, I hosted the DC Digital Sisterhood Network’s Breakfast Meet Up at Teaism, a woman-owned tea house (see photo above). Learn what happened at the meet up by clicking here to listen to the podcast I recorded with Valerie Trammel, founder of Trammel Communications. Valerie was the first person who arrived at the meet up. She won a Digital Sisterhood mug filled with Tazo Passion tea bags and chocolates. She also received a complimentary 20 minute creativity coaching session (which we had today). We had a great time chatting about creativity and overcoming challenges with Nia, founder of Karat Cakery, a DC Dessert Food Truck (makes the best carrot cake in the universe!!!!).
Two weeks ago, I hosted a creativity conversation during the Atlanta Digital Sisterhood Meet Up held at Proof and Provision, a bar and restaurant located in the Georgian Terrace Hotel. Click here to listen to the podcast I recorded with the amazing women who attended the event.
If you are in DC on April 30, join me for the DC Digital Sisterhood Meet Up: Sip Tea & Coffee, Eat Dessert & Chat About Creativity from 7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at The Mediterranean Spot, 1501 U Street, NW, Washington, DC (located on the corner of 15th and U Streets, two blocks from the U Street/Cardozo Green/Yellow Line Metro). Click here to register for the event on Eventbrite.
Do you know what creativity looks like in your life? Do you need to open your creative heart? Do you know what your creative voice sounds like? Are you able to access it? What is it telling you? Are you ready to give birth to your creativity? Do you need support and tips on how to give birth to your creativity or navigate your creative process?
If you answered YES to one or more of these questions, join me on Thursday, May 15 for the “Giving Birth to Your Creativity” online workshop from 8:30 p.m. EST to 10:00 p.m. EST. The online 90 minute workshop will offer a small group of five participants the following:
- Creative Self-Care Practices (breathing exercises, guided meditation, affirmation, and kind and gentle office yoga for your eyes, hands, mouth, and shoulders).
- Ice Breaker Exercise and Sharing Circle.
- Talk on “Giving Birth to Your Creativity with a Creativity Recipe.”
- Journaling Exercises with Sharing Circle and Creativity Coaching Feedback.
- Action Planning Steps and Tips for Giving Birth to Your Creativity.
- Two creativity coaching email check-ins (one in June and one in July).
- A special discount on creativity coaching sessions and packages.
The workshop is based on exercises and information contained in my book, That Which Awakens Me: A Creative Woman’s Poetic Memoir of Self-Discovery (available on Amazon). It will be delivered via conference call. So all you need to participate is your telephone. Once you register and pay $26.26 ($23.95 workshop fee and $2.31 Eventbrite fee) for the workshop, I will email you an agenda with handouts, the special discount on creativity coaching sessions, and the telephone number for the conference call. Click here to register for the workshop.
Happy Creativity Thursday: Sign Up for 4/24 Online Creativity Workshop
Happy Creativity Thursday!
Do you know what creativity looks like in your life?
Do you need to open your creative heart?
Do you know what your creative voice sounds like? Are you able to access it? What is it telling you?
Are you ready to give birth to your creativity?
Do you need support and tips on how to give birth to your creativity or navigate your creative process?
If you answered YES to one or more of these questions, join me on Thursday, April 24 for the “Giving Birth to Your Creativity” online workshop from 8:30 p.m. EST to 10:00 p.m. EST. The online 90 minute workshop will offer a small group of five participants the following:
- Creative Self-Care Practices (breathing exercises, guided meditation, affirmation, and kind and gentle office yoga for your eyes, hands, mouth, and shoulders).
- Ice Breaker Exercise and Sharing Circle.
- Talk on “Giving Birth to Your Creativity with a Creativity Recipe.”
- Journaling Exercises with Sharing Circle and Creativity Coaching Feedback.
- Action Planning Steps and Tips for Giving Birth to Your Creativity.
- Two free creative coaching email check-ins (one in May and one in June).
- A special discount on creativity coaching sessions and packages.
The workshop is based on exercises and information contained in my book, That Which Awakens Me: A Creative Woman’s Poetic Memoir of Self-Discovery (available on Amazon). It will be delivered via conference call on FreeConferenceCall.com. So all you need to participate is your telephone. Once you register and pay for the workshop, I will email you an agenda with handouts, the special discount on creativity coaching sessions, and the telephone number for the conference call.
Click here to register and pay the workshop fee of $23.95 on Eventbrite.
PS: The “Giving Birth to Your Creativity” online workshop will be offered again on May 15 and June 19 from 8:30 p.m. EST to 10:00 p.m. EST for $23.95. Stay tune for more details on how to register in the coming weeks.
Happy #CreativityThursday: Using Creativity to Serve Others
Happy #CreativityThursday!
Have you ever used your creativity to serve others?
How does it make you feel?
When I use my creativity to serve others, my heart opens and fills up with gratitude.
Click here to listen today’s podcast and learn more about how I use my creativity as an artist-in-residence for Smith Center for Healing and the Arts at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center to serve others. A poem from my book, That Which Awakens Me: A Creative Woman’s Poetic Memoir of Self-Discovery is included. Enjoy!
PS: The photo collage includes artwork made by military family members at Walter Reed.
Opening Your Creative Heart Coaching Special Discount:
From February 1 to March 31, I am offering a special discount package on my creativity coaching services. See details below.
My Creativity Coaching Practice: Click here to read more about my approach and background as a creativity coach.
Discount Period: The creativity coaching packages must be purchased via PayPal by March 31, 2014. They must be used by July 31, 2014.
Fees and Services:
1) 1 one-hour session with 2 email follow ups – $99.95 (original price – $139.95)
2) 3 one-hour sessions with 4 email follow ups – $359.95 (original price – $389.95)
3) 6 one-hour sessions with 7 email follow ups – $769.95 (original price – $799.95)
4) 9 one-hour sessions with 10 email follow ups – $1,169.99 (original price – $1,199.99)
5) 12 one-hour sessions with 13 email follow ups – $1,569.95 (original price – $1599.95)
Contact Information: If you are interested in one or more of the packages, please send me an email at kiamshaleeke@yahoo.com to schedule a free 20-minute consultation call (available via telephone, Skype, and Google Hangout).
Happy Creativity Thursday: Opening Your Creative Heart & Coaching Discount
Happy Creativity Thursday!
I believe we are all filled with the energy of creativity. It is such a powerful force that allows us to share amazing gifts. Click here to listen to today’s podcast that features a recording of my poem, “Creativity” (published in my book, That Which Awakens Me: A Creative Woman’s Poetic Memoir of Self-Discovery – available on Amazon).
Sometimes my creativity is blocked by fears. When I allow my fears to suffocate my creative courage, my creative heart closes. In 2011, I allowed my fears to close my creative heart. During the first week of 2012, I made a commitment to re-open my heart. My commitment turned into a full-fledge creative heart journey that began with a series of breathing and journaling exercises (it continues today).
I think opening your creative heart is a journey worth taking in 2014. It begins with an intention to come into the present moment. When you breathe intentionally and deeply, you invite yourself into the present moment. You also create space to discover and witness what’s happening in your creative heart. So let’s get started.
Breathing and Journaling Exercises:
Join me in taking 10 deep breaths. Get ready to inhale through your nose and exhale through your mouth. Feel free to make sounds like “hah” as you exhale. You can get loud too!
- Take a deep breath and inhale self-love. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you experiencing it.
- Inhale self-care. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you experiencing it.
- Inhale self-expression. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you experiencing it.
- Inhale self-discovery. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you experiencing it.
- Inhale vulnerability. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you tapping into it.
- Inhale intuition. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you tapping into it.
- Inhale imagination. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you tapping into it.
- Inhale inspiration. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you tapping into it.
- Inhale creativity. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you tapping into it.
- Inhale gratitude. Exhale anything that gets in the way of you expressing it.
In this sacred place, find a pen, a piece of paper, or a journal to write your responses to the questions below. If you prefer your digital devices, use your smartphone, tablet, laptop, or desktop computer to answer the questions.
- What does your creative heart look like?
- How does it feel?
- Is it open to new opportunities for growth? What are they?
- Does your creative heart energy need to be recharged or renewed? How so?
- Share one to three things you can do in February to open and nurture your creative heart.
Opening Your Creative Heart Coaching Special Discount:
From February 1 to March 31, I am offering a special discount package on my creativity coaching services. See details below.
My Creativity Coaching Practice: Click here to read more about my approach and background as a creativity coach.
Discount Period: The creativity coaching packages must be purchased via PayPal by March 31, 2014. They must be used by July 31, 2014.
Fees and Services:
1) 1 one-hour session with 2 email follow ups – $99.95 (original price – $139.95)
2) 3 one-hour sessions with 4 email follow ups – $359.95 (original price – $389.95)
3) 6 one-hour sessions with 7 email follow ups – $769.95 (original price – $799.95)
4) 9 one-hour sessions with 10 email follow ups – $1,169.99 (original price – $1,199.99)
5) 12 one-hour sessions with 13 email follow ups – $1,569.95 (original price – $1599.95)
Contact Information: If you are interested in one or more of the packages, please send me an email at kiamshaleeke@yahoo.com to schedule a free 20-minute consultation call (available via telephone, Skype, and Google Hangout).
Happy Creativity Thursday – Read Some of My Favorite Writing Wisdom Quotes & Writing Life Poem
Happy Creativity Thursday!
Today, I want to share some of my favorite writing wisdom quotes from writers I adore.
“I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear.” Joan Didion, European American author
“The ability of writers to imagine what is not the self, to familiarize the strange and mystify the familiar, is the test of their power.” Toni Morrison, African American author
“Writing becomes a way to embrace the mysterious, to walk with spirits, and an entry to the realm of the sacred.” bell hooks, African American author, poet, professor, and cultural critic
Here’s a poem about my writing life.
My Writing Life from That Which Awakens Me
#1
I’m a writer who writes even when she is asleep.
Right now I’m a writer who is in the midst of a long creative stretch.
One that involves birthing a book every two years.
My journey is both passion and paradox all at the same time.
At times it can consume me and keep me living on my own planet with enough rice milk, granola, ginger tea, honey, strawberries, bananas, apples, and split pea soup to last a lifetime.
This path has called me.
And I can’t begin to explain to folks what that exactly means because I am living it.
So I hope they can just get the meaning by watching me be me.
#2
I write because language chosen from deep within me liberates my hidden thoughts and gives life to my dreams.
I write because it is one of the best ways I know how to access freedom.
I am talking about the kind of freedom that brings all aspects of my existence into one room so that I can appreciate the fullness of my complex beauty.
The words that express my thoughts and describe my dreams make their way into phrases.
Some find homes in sentences that question and answer.
Others join the gospel choir in my mind and participate in call and response.
A few dangle as sharp, shooting fragments with meaning.
And then there are those that cast their net wide and paint wildly sensational murals on the canvas of my life.
They all embody the voice of my soul.
Happy Creativity Thursday – Read Poem About Being Poetry Virgin
Happy Creativity Thursday!
Here’s a lovely poem that shares the moment I lost my poetry virginity in the 1990s! Enjoy!
When I Lost My Virginity as a Poet from That Which Awakens Me
Before Busboys and Poets arrived on the scene, spoken word poets congregated at Soul Brothers Pizza on the corner of 14th and U in the early 1990s.
Two Morehouse brothas opened it up and kept it going for a few years.
Soul Brothers Pizza is where I lost my virginity as a poet.
It happened one night when my friend Kwame was hosting an event.
He had just helped me publish my first chapbook of poetry.
WPFW 89.3 radio host Grace Cavalieri had recently interviewed me on her show, “The Poet and the Poem.”
Despite these accomplishments, I was nervous.
I had never read my work in a public venue before.
As soon as Kwame introduced me, I could feel my hands trembling.
By the time I reached the makeshift stage, my mind was playing tricks on me.
My five senses soaked up the scene.
The second hand smoke made my eyes itch.
Conversations at nearby tables overwhelmed me.
I stood looking into the small crowd and wondered if they would even listen to anything I had to say.
Just when I thought I was going to sit down, words tumbled out of my mouth.
They were rushed.
Some folks stared at me for a nanosecond before returning back to their conversations.
The volume of table banter increased.
Kwame asked the audience to quiet down.
A few moments of silence emerged.
I closed my eyes.
That’s when I offered a few lines of my poetry.
After I uttered the last word, I opened my eyes and stared into a sea of blank faces.
I wondered if they understood my poem’s meaning.
Maybe it was too deep
Or maybe they just wanted to keep talking and eating.
Happy Yoga Monday – Read Yoga-Inspired Poem About Present Moment Acceptance
Happy Yoga Monday!
For me, yoga begins and ends with the breath. When I breathe in and out consciously, I come into the present moment. That’s the place where everything is happening. It’s the now space I strive to be in 24/7/365. Today, I want to share a poem I wrote about breathing and being in the present moment. Enjoy!
Present Moment Acceptance from That Which Awakens Me: A Creative Woman’s Poetic Memoir of Self-Discovery
All I can be is here right now.
Present. Standing still in mountain pose. Grounding myself in Mother Earth.
Knowing that all the stuff that clamors for my attention is just stuff.
That’s it … just stuff that can be paused for a moment with a deep breath.
So I breathe freely and release through my mouth.
HAH
HAH
HAH
HAH
HAH
HAH
HAH
My deep breathing slows down.
I return to normal breath.
The air comes in and out of my nose.
My shoulders relax.
My neck settles into a softness it has not always known.
My chest area feels more open.
My core supports me with additional strength, giving way to a lengthened spine.
I remember the mantra and say it quietly.
All I can be is here right now.
It rearranges itself.
I follow its lead and repeat it in its new order.
Right here now is where I am.
Right here now is where I am.
Right here now is where I am.
Where I am is holding all my stuff that continues to clamor for my attention despite my long deep breaths.
The mantra reappears.
All I can be is here right now.
It establishes a call and response.
I call.
#DigitalSisterhood Wednesday News: Ananda is sharing her creativity coaching gifts with Blogalicious in October!
Happy Digital Sisterhood Wednesday!
Blogalicious is one of my favorite communities and conferences because it celebrates diversity in the blogosphere. It embodies the spirit of Digital Sisterhood and Digital Brotherhood! I have been a fan since the first conference in 2009 (have attended all four conferences too).
This year, I am excited about celebrating the fifth anniversary of Blogalicious. Why? First, I adore the theme which is “Create. Build. Fund.” Second, Stacey “Justice Fergie” Ferguson, Blogalicious co-founder and chief curator, and her Blogalicious team (Jazzy Jones, Xina Eiland, Thien-Kim Lam, Jana Pauldin, Terence Gaines, and Joe Ferguson) know how to plan and host signature conferences and events that leave me with an abundance of information, inspiration, and Instagram moments filled with deep connection and friendship that remain etched on my heart for years.
Third, I’ll be providing short one-on-one creativity coaching sessions to conference attendees that will help them begin the process of:
-
Identifying, understanding, and embracing their inner critics, the inner voice that tells them they cannot or don’t have what it takes to create, build, or fund their dreams, ideas, and endeavors.
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Confronting and overcoming their fears, doubts, and obstacles that prevent them from creating, building, and funding their dreams, ideas, and endeavors.
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Mapping out their goals and timelines.
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Developing a strategic plan to accomplish their goals.
Click here to learn more about my creativity coaching practice.
Be sure to check out my Creativity Thursday blogs and Creative Inspiration Pinterest board to see what’s bubbling in my creative world.
For book lovers, my book, That Which Awakens Me: A Creative Woman’s Poetic Memoir of Self-Discovery (my original artwork is on the cover and featured throughout the book), gives an inside look at my creative journey through artwork, poetry, and reflections. It’s a great summer read (available on Kindle too)!
Hope to see you at Blogalicious!
Ananda Leeke 