Class 4 ~ BE Grateful

Sometimes it’s really difficult to talk about these topics without falling into clichés. I heard a quote once: clichés became clichés because they’re true, which is probably a cliché itself since so many people have been quoted as saying it.

But, cliché or not, here’s the thing about GRATITUDE. Until you experience it deeply in your own life, you really don’t get how much it can change things.

One day I realized the quickest and easiest way to feel grateful is to imagine losing everything.

In fact, do that right now: close your eyes and imagine it ALL gone ~ the life you know just isn’t there anymore. Home? Gone. Loved ones? Gone. Your ability to move? Gone. Favourite books, favourite bowl? Gone, too. Everything gone. Even the chair you’re sitting in. All of it gone, gone, gone.

Now ~ open your eyes and drink it all in again. That is gratitude.

Imagining everything gone is a breathtakingly harsh way to learn to love your life the way it is. I get a wave of this gratitude when I get home after being away for anything longer than a day. I think this comes from my childhood where lots of things I loved got lost in the shuffle along the way. I didn't really appreciate them when I had them. Over the years we’ve all lost things. And not just things, people, and places, too. Like the song says: Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you got till it’s gone.

I'm not sure it's possible to be grateful 100% of the time, but I do consciously try to do it several times over the course of a day. Even the things I didn't want to be grateful for ~ the tough things I wished would go away. At a certain point in my life, I realized that without those tough things, I wouldn't be the person I am, and I'm pretty grateful to be who I am at this stage of my life.

There's much more info on the following handouts, and after that we'll take a look at some of the Thank You cards we made during the class ...

On hand during the class we had some materials for making Thank You cards ... here are the ones I made, with some brief instructions if you want to make your own ...

A small regular motif repeatedly stamped over a blank card front is easy to do, and you can choose your own ink colours, and have it match whatever scrapbooking paper you have on hand.

To make the grid for placing these flowers, I cut a piece of paper the same size as the front of the card, and then drew a box 1" away from all four edges, and then drew a line down the center of the box. I laid the piece of paper over the blank card front, and then pierced the front of the card at each corner of the drawn box, and also where the center line met the edges of the drawn box. When I removed the piece of paper, I had holes punched in the right places to form a grid of flowers.

Another group of artist friends that I organize creates and trades Artist Trading Cards (ATCs). I always make more than I need, and they're the perfect size to create my own Thank You cards. This card ("A Parliament of Owls") was made by stamping a patterned background in gold, a piece of torn painted paper for grass was added. Then some rubber stamped owls were cut up, painted and rearranged on the ATC. Using some "speech bubble" punches, I punched out some text from a discarded book of a French play, and then painted around the speech bubbles, too. 

The ATC used in the top half of this page was made when I carved my own rubber stamps from dollar store erasers. I wanted to create an "above and below" set on a nautical theme, so I drew my ideas on the eraser with a pencil, then carved it out using carving tools. I wanted to have the whale going one direction and the coat going the other, so it turned out quite well, I think. To make this card, I stamped the images on off-white paper, then glued them with a little space between them. To make the Thank You card, I glued the ATC on top of a piece of scrapbooking paper using double-sided sticky foam that lifts it slightly off the page, making it look like a framed print.

We have *two* bits of homework from this class. The harder one is on page 4 of the handout ~ think about three people in your life who have inspired you by the way they live their lives. If you can, make and send them each a Thank You card telling them how they've influenced you.

The easier exercise is to make three very small Thank You cards, carry them in with you and give them out to people you don't know, but have seen doing something positive out and about in the world. Write a few words about what you saw and try to slip it to them unobtrusively. I've created a page in my journal where I'm tracking how I gave out my three cards (two down, one to go!). These small cards are made by simply folding a bit of white cardstock (5" x 3.75") in half, and gluing on a small piece of scrapbooking paper (3.5" x 2").

And finally, one more page of quotes from the class handouts. For the background on this one I used a piece of wrapping paper ... 

I can't possibly leave the topic of GRATITUDE without thanking a bunch of people who make what I do teaching this class possible: for their generosity with supplies for this class, I want to thank Catherine (blank cards and envelopes, punched flowers), Kathy (rubber stamps and brads), Mary (scrapbooking paper), my work (paper offcuts to make blank cards, Angela (for teaching me how to carve stamps), and Kate (for giving me an opportunity to share creativity as a tool for health). I'd also like to thank my partner (for transportation to class, and knowing much sharing means to me and) and Elizabeth (for transportation home). And I'd like to thank all of you who come out and take part in the class, and let you know that whatever you do with creativity, I hope it will bring you as much joy and peace as it brings me.