Harvesting Inner Beauty Day Long Retreat Sunday March 29, 2020

COME OUT AND PLAY WITH TWO CREATIVE PROCESSES: SOULCOLLAGE(R) AND INTUITIVE MOVEMENT.

SUNDAY MARCH 29, 10-4:30

$85 - EARLY BIRD SPECIAL SAVE $20 -

REGISTER NOW! www.jenniferboire.com

watch this video to find out more about what Kim and I are offering. Our true beauty is shining within us, if we have the eyes to see!

Fall Equinox and revamp

SoulCollage(R) card: Colour Life Art

Dear readers,

What a hot summer we have had in Montreal! I have also done some traveling outside of the country, on an artist's residency in France and on a week long retreat with Prem Rawat https://www.premrawat.com/, but I'm back in town, getting ready for the new fall season.

Happy Fall Equinox by the way! I can feel the cooler air and see the geese already winging south overhead. It makes me feel a bit melancholy to hear that honking, as the wheel of the year turns, and we head into fall and winter.

But with a new season comes a new look for my website - you'll probably see it at the beginning of October. I'm very excited about the new video, and can't wait to show you what I've been working on!

Apart from the revamp, it's been a little quiet from the blog and newsletter (haven't sent one out in a year!). Nada! you must be wondering what I have been up to.

All will be revealed, very soon, in a few weeks.It still involves SoulCollage(R), journaling and sacred self-care and seasonal retreats, but I'm stepping away from offering weekly classes. Hoping for more down time, more inward musing time, perhaps more writing time, who knows?

In the meantime, here's a poem by Meister Eckhart to whet  your whistle.

A human being 

has so many skins inside, covering the depths 

of the heart. 

We know so many things, 

we don't know ourselves! 

Why, 30 or 40 skins or hides, 

as thick and hard 

as an ox's or bear's, 

cover the soul. 

Go into your own ground 

and learn to know 

yourself there.

Autumn colours 

That is the lesson our life journey brings us, doesn't it - how to know ourselves.

Please stay in touch!

xxxxx

Jennifer

www.jenniferboire.com

www.soulcollage.com

Jennifer Boire, author and poet

Creative soulfulness for Women

How does one begin to be creatively soulful? And why does it seem so imperative at mid-life to find our creative flow?

I use the word soul the way I've heard it used in Jungian texts and psycho-spiritual books I've read to mean the animated, inner essence of a human being that appears to feed us, and also need nurturance.

What feeds the soul? Contact with nature, according to Carl Jung. Getting our hands in the dirt and gardening, for instance. Letting our love of the night sky draw us outside to stare at the myriad little dust particles of light in the dark. Swimming at midnight on a quiet lake listening to loons. All these simple and yet magical experiences touch a part of us that is non-rational, non-business like, unconcerned with the bottom line, rent due and bills to pay. It brings us a deep feeling of satisfaction, of awe and wonder. It brings us back into a conversation or contact with our feeling 'soul'.

What else feeds the soul? Beauty in whatever form appeals to you. Beautiful colours at sunset, patterns and textiles, wallpaper and carpets can feed my daughter's designer soul. My artist soul likes to play with images and photos and make collages. My poet's soul likes to play with rhyme, metaphor and juxtapositions of neat sounding words. My musician's soul loves to sing harmonies, listen to soothing music, go to Blues concerts and lose myself in the rhythms of djembe classes.

There are so many ways to feel a connection with the soul. Seeing any human being smile touches something in my soul, but newborn babies especially so. having someone on the street stop and notice me long enough to smile and say Hello is also soul nurturing, especially in the city where we tend to walk on by, striding purposefully to our next appointment.

Creative soulfulness therefore is something I am developing as a way to offer space and sanctuary for classes and retreats, so that in your busy schedule, your over-filled days and weeks, you can pencil in a little hour or two, or maybe a whole day or weekend, to feed your need for Soul Food.

the tools I use have not changed, but I am expanding my learning this summer. So far I have taken a Creative Journaling class with le journal creatif teacher Alexandra Leroux, filling up my art journal with doodles, collages, drawings and poetry; a mandala class at the Musee des Beaux Arts de Montreal with my daughter, using compass and ruler and paint and coloured crayons to find the still center in the middle of a circle; and later this summer I'm headed to Colorado to study with the author of Women Who Run With the Wolves, Dr Clarissa Pinkola Estes in a facilitator training called Singing over the Bones. I'm very excited about that, to integrate her teachings and storytelling techniques into my creative soulfulness.

Stay tuned for a website tune-up in the late summer, and new class offerings for September 2015 as well as details on a winter retreat in Costa Rica in February with myself and yoga/chi gong/shamanistic leader Brigitte Bauhart.

Namaste, and have a great summer
Jennifer
xxx aka Musemother

Creating Your Own Mini-Retreat

Jenn Retreat from jennifer boire on Vimeo.


How I make a mini-retreat:

Some days, I am at a loss at where to start, what to do, to jump start my creative projects or just to ground myself and begin my day. 

Especially on a Monday, it helps me to center and focus if I set aside 30 minutes to an hour for a Mini-Retreat in my bedroom.

This short video shows where I begin.

Namaste,
Musemother/Jenn