Revisiting Book of the Night

9 February 2012

In September 2011 I started Book of the Night, the extreme art journalling course run by Juliana Coles...

At the time I started I was in a dark place where I was trying to find meaning in my life after the sudden death of my brother when he accidentally drowned.  

Before the course really started Juliana suggested that I work through some of my thoughts surrounding death and loss on my own, so that I had started to look at the feelings that I had buried inside...

I found this an difficult thing to do...  but ultimately very enlightening and inspirational...

Having worked steadily on my book of the night, which had now become two books of the night, I stopped in mid December to go to England to spend time with my family...  with of course the intention to start straight back into my art journalling on my return home in January...  

Towards the end of January, I began looking through the pages that I had worked on and a couple of them really mean something to me...  often in different ways to my initial thoughts regarding them while going through the process...  The Light Up My Life page as I call it in my mind was worked during the "Descent"...  On spending time looking at these images I have been inspired to walk more frequently, not having a dog anymore has lead me to horribly lazy ways... and to improve my diet...  Which is something I am going to use this blog to develop further...

The "Chinese Tomb Sweeping" exercise brought home to me, as has rereading some of my old journals, that I have had a long time need to write...  to express my thoughts and to develop my stories...   it also brought me to realise that my current website didn't allow me to do this...  that the time needed to plan, design, create, make, photograph, and hopefully sell, the finished pieces took very long hours and I had buried my head in the sand, regarding how much I might actually earn per hour...  

I also realised that I need to have my independence with my own earnings so I decided to embark on a new web venture...  I have pulled together enough funds (some of which will arrive gradually with the sale of part of my beautiful doll collection - which has been very difficult to do), but the new website is almost designed, the banner has been worked out, the domaine name has been bought and I have contacted yarn suppliers...  now I have spent much of the last couple of weeks working out detailed lists for what I want to order now, and what I want to order when the money from doll sales gradually begins to come in...

I have also spent many hours knitting and developing interesting blog posts for my Colour Choices blog so that I can develop it into an interesting knitting blog...  

So for me, January 2012 has been a very positive month, where I have made difficult decisions and I have also begun moving forward in positive ways towards my Quest for Adventure...

I also find, that I am now feeling ready to complete Chapter 5 and begin Chapter 6...