lists – Mixy's Art Blog

One of the things I want to achieve in 2016 is a greater sense of cohesiveness.

A few weeks ago I adopted a new (to me) method of ordering my days, weeks, things, lists and such: Bullet Journalling the ‘analog system for the digital age’.

While I reside on the edge of digital geekfulness where I appreciate I nicely formulated spreadsheet, some tidy code, but all too easily get weighed down in flipping between fonts pixel to pixel tweaks, and then endless subdivided minutiae.

Unlimited possibility in limited time.

But I’m also the girl who drools at the thought of the stationery store, giddily thinking about books, the kind I can write and draw and scribble in….. Mmmmmm… and All Those Pens. In All Those Colours.

The type of rules and systems I like are the flexible ones that adapt and evolve in a forgiving fashion.

And lists appeal to my sometime dithering confusion of too much to do/can’t remember if I did it/had an idea that I put down somewhere and can’t see it now for all the shit and kerfuffle that heaps up in my head….

And so far bullet journalling is fitting my contradictory character and fulfilling pretty much all the hopes I had for it. Organised chaos, checked off detail by detail. Coupled with an inconsistent colour-coding system that I reckon might figure itself out over time.

Many, many part-duplicated lists, notebooks, digital documents, scribbles on envelopes, diaries, journals, sketchbooks and whatnot occupy my world. I’m gonna keep them, but they’re going to rest quietly for future reminiscences while this episode plays out.

The current paradigm is one in which all the brain-dumps are contained between the covers of this delicious A5 turquoise leuchtturm 1917. 6 weeks and 51 pages in, me & book are getting along swimmingly. I’m enjoying the process of joining the dots of my thoughts, skimming back through old notes and scavenging usable information, ongoing plans and wishes.

… Lists of Lists … Things To Look Up … Art To Make … Projects To Begin … Projects To Complete … Books To Read … Places to Go … Bands to Explore … Quotes That Inspire … Universal Reusable Lists … Posts to Blog …

All these sandwiched between pages of What To Remember in annual, monthly & daily sized chunks.

The magic of it is: once they’re in the book they no longer take up space in my mind.

Week 7 turned out to be a wordy week. And full of stuff : New (super) Moon, Valentines, I hit my weight lifting target that I set at the start of the year…. All in all, a week of giddying goodness. And…..

My Birthday, which involved coffee, cake and kitties at Lady Dinah’s Cat Emporium in Bethnal Green. I am soppy in the extreme about cats and since my home has been empty of furry friends for a few years now… you can imagine this was like the ultimate in birthday fun for me!

When I saw this list I knew right away it had a place in the book of 2015 : these are the things that matter to me:

To Be An Explorer of the World:

Always be looking (notice the ground beneath your feet)
Consider Everything alive & animate
Everything is interesting – look closer
Observe for long durations and short ones
Alter your course often
Notice the stories going on around you
Notice patterns: Make Connections
Document your findings (field notes) in a variety of ways
Incorporate interdeterminancy
Observe movement
Create a personal dialogue with your environment: Talk to it
Trace all things back to their origins
Use all of the senses in your investigations.

It sits neatly alongside the list of new moon intentions (which tbh are not much different from the last few intention lists. Basic stuff I’m trying hard to hammer home in the subconscious).

Love is in the air: Love and Be Loved

I guess it’s fitting that my love of words and lists is really prominent this week! These things that bobbed up on my horizon this week (would love to credit where they came from, but only there long enough to scribble down before getting buried in a million tangential thoughts and surfs and immediately-pressing-need-to-knows that the www sends my way.) The second one is more mantra/affirmationy:

I’m neither doomed nor completely free
But I’m creating my future with every word, every action, every thought.
I find myself in a very dynamic situation with unimaginable potential,
I have all the support I need to simply relax and be with the transitional, in process quality of my life. I have all I need to engage in the process of awakening.

Thank you to whoever put those words together and sent them into the internet ether. I get where you’re coming from and I wish you happy adventures.

So that was last week… a scattering of butterflies (more next week – new project I’m about to launch into later today), and again with the eyefish. What’s with the eyefish? Srsly?! X