Time between the Years

I love these last days between Christmas and New Year's - quiet, gentle days of nothingness, of introspection... what I call the "time between the years..." when I look back on what this past year has been, and gaze forward into the delicious possibility of the year ahead.

What do I want 2014 to be about? How do I want it to feel? Some of the year is already scheduled: the first two months a hard slog to bring to completion eight months of bookkeeping that took over my life last summer. It will be good to have that behind me (and I am still working on being grateful for all of the many lessons and insights it has given me...)

I am signed up for Carla Sonheim's Year of the Fairy Tale which I am beyond excited about, thrilled to devote an entire year towards illustration and story telling with a wonderful teacher and some fun and inspiring fellow artists. It may be just what I need to finish my Children's book now...

I am fine-tuning some other art goals, returning to some, expanding on others. Keeping a Visual Journal of the year as usual, which in turn helps me improve my sketching skill I'd also like to re-learn the basics of watercolour painting for sketching purposes.

I'm considering working through all of Julia Cameron's books back-to back, starting again for the umpteenth time "The Artist's Way" while all the time acknowledging the sheer enormity of the task I am considering setting for myself...  still one of my greatest life lessons... pacing myself...

I am still searching for my word of the year... although I know that HEALTH is ultimately what it will be about. But the word alone feels incomplete, it doesn't have enough action in it. I still don't own it and thankfully I have a few more days to deliberate. Walking, stretching, juicing, drinking lots of water, and healthy, homemade meals are just a few of the things that will inform my days.

Yes, there are still priorities to set and decisions to be made. Thank goodness I have five more days...

But in these in-between days, when one year is undergoing completion and the other not yet begun, I am deliciously suspended in time, and free to let my thoughts wander and pick and choose from the myriad of possibilities of how I want the next year of my life to unfold,  while all the time knowing, whatever plans I make, none will be as wonderful as what life truly has in store for me in the year ahead...

What lies ahead for you? What are your dreams for 2014? What do you want to feel?

I'd love to know...