I’m happy to report that this has been the best Gift Show yet for me. It helps that this is my 4th show. People come by that have written orders in the past to say Hi! even if they aren’t ready to write another one yet. Others who have talked to me before but didn’t write have come by this time and written an order. Plus I’ve written lots of new orders so all in all the days, though not completely zipping by, are at least moving by at a reasonable clip. And, thankfully, the show is only 4 days rather than the marathon 5 day Atlanta show. So tomorrow is the last day and a short one at that (9-3 instead of 9-6).
Best thing, today I was talking to Amara, the buyer for East West Bookshop in Mountain View. I thanked her for encouraging me to write a proposal for a workshop last year telling her that I had created my “Moving through Transition with Creativity” Workshop that I did not only at East West in June but also Brahma Meditation Center, here in the city, in September. In sharing how much wisdom flowed from everyone as we shared experiences from the writing/drawing exercises, she came up with an idea for us to do a workshop together! She said she loves yoga and teaches it and has wanted to find someone to do a joint workshop…opening up with the yoga and then moving to the art/creativity piece. I got very excited as I shared with her my experience of doing just that in a workshop years ago in Seattle. I used to do a “words and watercolor” workshop at Cancer Lifeline in Seattle. One time I had the chance to do a shared workshop with a yoga instructor. It was open to people from Cancer Lifeline so both cancer survivors and family/friends that were the support people attended. What I marked difference, I noticed, in doing a drawing/painting class with people who had done yoga first…they were so much more “open” and didn’t worry about not being “artistic” or “creative” after the yoga practice. I got so excited about doing this again…Amara said we could easily do this at East West but if I have any other places to introduce it she’d be open to other venues as well. Yeah!! I told her that yesterday I had talked to the Center for Spiritual Living in Petaluma and offered them the “Moving through Transition with Creativity”. They were thrilled with the idea as was the Center for Spiritual Living in Santa Rosa.
Also today Colin, from Flora Grubb, came by and said Hi. He asked if I had gotten another date to do a drawing/painting class with them. I said I hadn’t tried yet. He loved my new Anytime cards and said it would be fun to do another one and he’d order more Anytime cards before my workshop. (I did a fun drawing/painting with watercolors class to 20 people last August at Flora Grubb). He suggested I get in touch with Jim again and then let him know when we get a date set. I also had some email interchange last week with another Nursery that wanted me to do a spring “class” on drawing/painting.
I smiled after Amara walked away with the realization that Lucy Pond was so right in suggesting to me to claim what I wanted by putting it on my business card! It was in August when I had a session with her last year and she suggested that…probably a bit later that I had my business cards reprinted and added the “Artist, Entreprenuer, Workshop Leader, Inspirational Speaker” label on to the backside of my card….it’s working! My vision becoming my reality!!! Thank you Thank you Lucy!!
An aside, I just went to Lucy’s website (looks great!) and was much impressed! If anyone wants to learn more about Lucy (she’s wonderful) go here: http://www.lucypond.com/. One last Lucy story, I was jogging down to meet Mark at the gym last Friday listening to my iPod. One song ends and rather than a new one beginning (on shuffle), I hear Lucy’s voice. The recording that I had downloaded into iTunes begins and I jog along listening to our interchange from early January this year. Amazing. I can already see how the recommendation she provided on an issue was right on. I listened to about 1/2 of it on that run and this morning listened to the reminder as I once more jogged to the gym. Love being able to relisten to readings!
All in all, the SF Gift Show is good…as is LIFE!!