- apparently, add tags to posts written in this blog. Huh?

In any case, I am not allowed to:

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

I almost judged myself as not very ambitious, but then I reminded myself that just a year ago I couldn’t rely on the ability to walk from day to day, so this is actually kind of sweet.

My Ideal Day with My Life as it Is now

I get up, do my morning pages. I eat a sumptuous breakfast - eggs benedict if Mike is feeling ambitious and remembers he can use the blender for the hollondaise sauce. I then go and do my workout - all two hours, with only short rest breaks. Once I’m done, I grab the bags that hold my customer orders and head out. I dump the orders in the mailbox on the way to the neighborhood coffee shop. Over coffee, I read a magazine that sparks my creativity, and by the end of my coffee, it is flagged all over with post-its that have notes scribbled on them for ideas I can use in blogging, business or writing. On the way back to my apartment, I stop at the Indian grocery store and pick up spices for dinner and oils for work. I then go back to my magically clean apartment (because Mike decided to give it a try) and after writing two pages of a book, I go on to blog and catch up on my RSS feeds. Once I’m done, I get a call from a friend who is coming over for dinner, but first: a play date. We drive over to the botanica on Lake Street where I buy a few more candles and oils, this time for personal use.  We get back before Mike gets home for work, and plan out something witchy and fun for later that evening. By the time Mike gets home, I’ve started dinner - a paella, perhaps, or something terribly creative and vegetarian. We all eat dinner together while we watch the sun set from my balcony, and we enjoy the scenery and the skyline view. My friend and I sneak off to a park to do a little ceremony, and once we are done, Mike joins us across the street from our apartment for a game of pool. Maybe there is ice cream.

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

After serious reflection - and reading a snipped in Chapter 8 about using laundry as an excuse not to do something creative just as I was fishing in my head for such an excuse - it occurred to me that trying to “power through” the creative exercises in Artist’s Way would do exactly what they were trying to undo. I would be using them as my excuse for not doing my work, and well, that would get me nowhere. Just like giving myself the excuse that “I’m still unpacking” is also not valid for why I don’t write as much as I should. The brain can only process so much change at once - it’s why people who are given electroshock pretty much just lose memories and there’s no guarantee they’ll lose the right memories.

So, that said, here’s my exercise from chapter 8 thus far:

My dream: to become a playwright.

My true north: seeing the play produced.

I would finish a script for Fringe Festival (one I’ve had in my head for about four years now) and see it performed. In a perfect world, in 5 years I’d like to have completed the play. In the world I live in, today I can plot out the play and determine the ending. In a year I can have three acts written. In this month, I can write the conclusion and begin writing a scene or half a scene a day.

Color Exercise:

I am gold, reflective yet powerful, extroversion buried deep in the earth. I am the rays of the sun, illuminating, nurturing, casting shadow. I am rare. I am valuable. I am flexible, yet enduring.

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

While I have continued faithfully with the morning pages and in a half-assed way with the artist’s dates, I’ve fallen off my chapter work and I’m wholly dissatisfied with the choices I’ve made for my artist’s dates. Some of this is entirely forgivable: I just moved. I’m still unpacking my business, which I am totally revamping before I release it back to the public. I don’t even have a couch or silverware right now. Some of it is me cheating myself out of a misplaced sense of nobility. There are no rewards for self-sacrifice so I need to knock that off right quick.

I am spending the beginning of this week playing catch up - doing a few exercises from chapters 7,8, and 9, following up on my check-ins, and making it happen. This will make week 10 a little tight, but with only 2-3 weeks left, I’m OK with it - assuming it has to be all done in 12 weeks. I’m not totally unblocked yet, but I’m seeing progress. I started working out again, which is one of my “block” areas, and I’m also not feeling guilty when I reject something that looks totally cool.

But I haven’t quit, or wandered off, or gotten so scared by what I’ve revealed to myself that I’ve just stopped. I just moved, and had to stop for a bit, that’s all.

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

As the readers who hang out here know, I’m a co-leader of the Green and Clean Guild on Etsy. While we’re leaning more towards a guidlship than a Street Team, as we’re classified on Etsy, this post from the handmade network certainly brought up the biggest key point of them all: if you want to get something out of a street team then you, personally, have to participate. There just isn’t a way around that.

“Tip #1 – be an active contributor of the network. This means posting comments and adding meaningful comments to a discussion. I have seen so many times in the Etsy forums that people post simply “giving you a bump”. While this is good for the person who posted, it really does nothing for you! Even if you are just giving someone a bump, find something you like or just admire in their shop and post the link to it. You may not information to add, but you took the time to look at their shop. Most times people will reciprocate the action.”

Handmade Network: How to make a Team or Network work for you

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

This is an excerpt from an interview by Crafty Bastards where murketing blog writer Rob Walker is promoting his book, Buying In: The Secret Dialogue Between What We Buy and Who We Are. Walker’s insights into Etsy are pretty significant, and may give a few clues to us sellers as to what our customers are thinking and where we ourselves may wish to head with our respective businesses.

“Q: In your book, Etsy founder, Rob Kalin says, “It’s the Baby Boomer generation that fell in love with the mass-produced aesthetic,” continuing to call Etsy a resurgence with it’s growing customer base indicative of the backlash against the Wal-Marts of the world. Where is the declining economy in this equation? Is he ignoring the fact that it costs more to shop handmade? Is his vision sustainable?A: Even Kalin wouldn’t say that Etsy is going to turn back mass production. But … what made me want to write about the craft/DIY world (which Etsy is part of) in the book is that there is sort of built into it a different way of approaching consumption. And it’s not just about spending more money.To me what’s intriguing is that so many participants in that world bring to material culture a different implied critique, having to do with basic questions like: Do I need to buy this — or can I make it? If I do buy it, what can I learn about how its made (what’s it made of, and by whom)? The handmade world can answer those questions in ways that are less alienating that shopping at a mass merchant, where there’s no one to ask, and you can maybe Google up some report but it’s hard to decipher, etc.It’s certainly true that plenty of people end up on Etsy for totally unrelated reasons — they just see something cute on a design blog, and they want it. That kind of thing may well suffer in a down economy. But if you’re thinking on an individual level, to me the issue is: Whatever brought you into contact with the handmade world, isn’t it getting at some pretty core issues that are worth considering? Our consumer choices really do matter, both to our own personal satisfaction, and to the broader culture (via ecology and labor practices etc.)It does zero good to just sit around and complain that “we’re all too materialistic.” Nor do I think is denial of the pleasure of the material a practical strategy. So I’m very much a believer in the idea that change happens on an individual level. Maybe it means ending up with fewer things — that are ultimately more satisfying. More satisfying individually, and socially. It’s just a different way of thinking.”

Washington City Paper: City Paper - Crafty Bastards Blog - Rob Walker Answers our Questions About Hello Kitty, Etsy & Buying in

Tags: etsy, marketing

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

This week’s exercises kind of made me laugh just because 1. creating a wonderful smell is a little too apt of a job for a perfumer and 2. everything is a little harder scheduled around a move. I’m not even sure when/how I’ll be able to do my artist’s date - apparently I signed up for a library lecture this week, and I have to do a house blessing at that time.

So, since it’s the lightest of all the tasks, here is my list of 5 favorite movies. I knew what they had in common before I wrote them down:
1. Finnian’s Rainbow
2. Pump up the Volume
3. She’s All That
4. 10 Things I Hate about You
5. Black Snake Moan

Each one speaks to, in some way, causes of social justice and has characters finding ways within and without a given social system to define themselves. They also all have, more or less, happy endings - they send the message that good isn’t easy, but it can prevail. They all also have highly assertive female characters, whether they start that way or not.

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

I’m going to preface this by saying that in my path to creating a sense of abundance, I really have to undo a lot of messages embedded into my being about scarcity. This was a highly volatile week, and on top of it, I’m stressed out over a move where Mike and I must take stock of every single thing we own along with very expensive things we need, raising my guilt about the fact that he’s supporting me despite a pretty clear demonstration that my health and the divine wants me doing what I’m doing.

Also, because I felt pressed for time, I feel like I half-assed my Artist’s Date, even if the result was a nice blue dress I look adorable in.

So, on to the check-in:

1. 7 out of 7 pages. Mike’s even started planning our days around giving me time to do them. I didn’t really use them to find ways to create luxury - I used them more to examine where my sense of scarcity comes from, and I was unsurprised to discover most of it rests in my issues with my body, health and self-image.

2. I did do my artist’s date, but I feel very guilty that it wound up being clothes shopping. Given that I’m a fashion blogger and I love clothing, it makes perfect sense but I feel like I was somehow cheating. This makes no sense - fashion IS luxury, especially since decent clothing was something I was denied as a kid. Gee, more foibles and digging deeper right here right now. I think it comes from family attitudes/accusations that fashion is shallow. Fashion can be shallow, but mostly it’s not. Fashion is actually a highly complex way of presenting power and social status, and manipulating other’s perceptions accordingly. Personally, I think my family just didn’t get it and that they still don’t, but rather than just admit that, I was made to feel guilty about something I have a real passion for.
It’s mini-Me syndrome, and part of why I spend a lot of time informing people “I am NOT your mirror.”

3. The Goodwill incident was very synchronous, especially since that night I did a full moon ritual with Joel where I was informed “here’s what you’re writing.” Urban Wicca. This will be entertaining, reviled…and worth it. I’ve been increasingly alienated from other neopagans because of what I see as a lot of circular exploration - no one around me really seems to develop, they just loop-de-loop on the same shit over and over again. So now I’m off to commit heresy, just to see if it gooses any forward motion.

The In Plain Sight episode, Don of the Dead, was also highly resonant with me. It used my until-now least favorite character to talk about abandoning dreams and giving up when you realize you’re just not good enough. The end response from the character? “I’m good enough!” This was highly resonant for me.

4. As to my development - exercise and food are very much scarcity/creative block issues for me, and I may need some extra help working them out. I don’t think that traditional diet programs are the way to go; their very psyche offends me because I’m not really seeking acceptance. But along with getting into way more exercise classes (water aerobics, yoga, bellydance, and maybe if I can scrape up the cash, Aikido) I may seek out a counselor with a specialty in eating disorders. My health is not in danger because of my weight, but my weight is a symptom of deep-seated psychological issues and I’d like them resolved, soon. I don’t want to keep carrying the weight of my problems, I’d like to get it down to the weight of my body.

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

My artist’s date was a haphazard affair, in part because my plan A, to lay out somewhere and look at clouds, was met with oppressive humidity and an absence of a blanket that I’d be OK throwing on the ground. I love my area parks, but I know what goes on in them: I’m not about to lay on the ground without a blanket.

So, I headed out to Axman after dropping Mike off at the U (I get the car one day a week now, Fridays.) I had loosely intended to get some packaging stuff for my sale and then to go home to check the theater listing and take myself to see a movie, since watching movies alone had been a favorite solo activity of mine for years.¹ Instead, I found myself turning off by the Goodwill on University. As I was parking, I actually heard myself thinking, Hey! I didn’t plan on going here!

Go in, said the Voice.

I entered the store. Go look at the books. I looked in self-help. I half expected to see something by Julia Cameron on the shelves. Surprisingly, I rarely do see The Artist’s Way in used sections. Other books by her, yes, but not that one.

Keep looking. I wandered around the aisle, and finally heard a Stop. Here.

Sitting on the shelf was a book in reference, titled You Should Write a Book.

Don’t buy it! said the voice. You’re probably allergic. Say, didn’t you say you wanted some new clothes?

So now I’m sitting in a pretty blue dress that I bought on clearance, paired with some surprisingly high quality no ride-down underwear.² And I’ve been told by exactly who I most needed to hear it from: I should write a book.

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

1. I can watch movies alone but I can’t get myself to go to a bar alone, ever. Not even for the sake of dancing. I have no idea why I’m wired that way. [↩]
2. For all women, this is a find. [↩]

I haven’t been blogging much this week because the exercises involved aren’t exactly out of my way. Most of it involves purging excess or working with what you already have. I’m moving, so guess what I’ve been doing from the get-go? It’s all about visualizing my new space AND moving out as much of my old stuff as possible.

I have been experiencing some odd behaviors and synchronicities that have gotten increasingly strong over the last two weeks. First, is that there are very clearly people that don’t want me doing this. Not a lot of them, but one or two who want to interfere for their own very selfish reasons. Apparently the idea of me at my full creative potential is frightening to the narrow. Good.

But, annoyance and interference aside, the divine has stopped just short of lightning bolts to say “go here” to let me know I’m on the right path and that I should stick with this - and 6 weeks is some pretty serious sticking with, I’m really hoping I do make all 12 weeks because I really, really want to see this through and I was scared that I wouldn’t.

Yesterday’s synchronicity? Joel and I were running to a couple of occult shops in town so I could assemble a few things I needed for my house cleansing/blessing.¹ We saw, on Lake and Grand, an Ecuadorian/Colombian restaurant, and Joel was curious so we agreed we’d have dinner there on the way back from Present Moment. When we came back to the restaurant, we noticed a big sign next door to the restaurant: Botanica.

Once again, Minneapolis has an authentic botanica. Since my early witchcraft practice is founded in folk magic based on brujeria and a love of the Spanish language, this had me over the moon. Every obscura root magic conjuring you could want is there on clean and neatly lined shelves. There were more muerte candles than I thought was strictly necessary, and alas, no traditional house blessing candle, but I’m sure I can work with it. The owner was a bit odd - he’s got to be a mojo man himself, but he acted as though he were terrified of me. I can guess why - Guadalupe-cult brujas have a “take the seed and throw away the packet” attitude towards men and can be scary bitches. Maybe it’s an act to lull me into a sense of security. I plan to spend my money there, be almost bubbly-friendly with my bad Spanish, and otherwise I will not engage. A good magic worker doesn’t, especially ones that sometimes have to do the harsh stuff.

It was a very good day with Joel, although the next time the weather requires all the gorgeous men of Minneapolis to have most of their clothing off, I’m driving.

All materials are copyright Diana Rajchel and Magickal Realism (TM) C 2007 (TM) C 2008 Magickal Realism (TM) is a trademarked fragrance brand.

1. The guy who lived there before us gives off so much sad sack energy I think it might need a little extra work. [↩]