Monday, November 29, 2010

Butterfly Eggs

It's T-minus 2 days until Christmas and butterfly eggs are not at the top of my list at the moment. But I've been mulling them over for a while now, so here they are....

Lifestyle
Increasingly, I want my time and energy to be spent on things that matter to me. I want to have time to develop artistic and creative impulses. I want time to hone my spiritual practice and I want to live in closer harmony with the earth and its cycles. I feel a calling to help others find peace and healing through artistic and creative pursuits. This egg is already pretty clear, but it leads to.........

Personal Financial Health
No small part of the equation. After 20+ years in education, and more recently the third consecutive year of a furloughed salary, the coffers aren't exactly brimming over. In fact, the coffers are coughing - I'd go so far as to say they're gasping for breath. But hope springs eternal. There are things I can do, and my son is flying the nest even as I type, so I will begin to get a clearer picture of how much it costs me...just me...to live. One big step in the right direction would be.............

Tiny House
It's rare that I catch on to a wave way before it crests, but it would appear that's the case with this whole tiny house thing. Is the movement gathering more momentum lately, or is it just that now I'm more attuned to it? I don't know. Either way, I'm seeing more and more about it in mainstream forums. And it's surprising how much the idea seems to resonate with others I talk to - that, I didn't anticipate. So the incubation of this egg involves further research into house plans, locations and architects/builders.

The next eggs have to do with Establishing a Business of my own. My son keeps urging me to think about a business plan that doesn't involve a bricks and mortar location. At first I didn't see how that would be possible, but I'm starting to catch on and I think he might be right. I'm fully aware that something like this takes time to get off the ground, and additional part-time employment might always be necessary, but the good news is that I can get started on this part of the program while I'm still employed full-time. So far the knitting business eggs include:

Shows and Festivals


Knitting Instruction


Knitting parties, excursions, etc.


Knitting as meditation


Knitting for charities


Creating a web page


Starting a business related blog


Knitted products


So there it is - the framework. Now I'll spend the winter fleshing out all these ideas, and that will make me happy.

Everyone have a Happy and Blessed Holiday - whichever one you celebrate!

Peace,
Krista

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Butterflies Are Free

A few months ago I went to the monthly meeting of a local women's group. The theme for the evening - fittingly enough - was Native American, The Butterfly Moon. Each of us was asked to liken ourselves to a butterfly in some way. I said that I thought my activities of late could be compared to the purposeful meandering of a butterfly; that what, at first glance, seemed to be the fanciful but erratic flight of a butterfly actually had an underlying intent. That right now in my life I'm trying to lay the foundation for a metamorphosis (another butterfly analogy), so I'm sampling. I'm flitting from here to there, a little of this, a little of that, a nip or two across the way. It's not wholly undirected, and each stop provides me with a little more information, a bit more nourishment.

The past couple of months I've been doing quite a lot of that. In late September I went on a four day spiritual retreat in the Pocono Mountains, along with 45 other like-minded souls. In early October, assisted by my friend Kelly, I took my first stab at setting up a knitting booth at the Chesapeake Celtic Festival on Maryland's Eastern Shore. Somewhere in there I embarked upon a course offered by the Craft Yarn Council that will certify me as a knitting instructor. I've been thinking a lot about what seems to be missing in people's lives and about what I can contribute. I've stayed on the trail of the tiny house. I've been reading, researching, networking, and jotting down ideas. So... good. Nice work. I've been a busy little butterfly. Now what?

Now the days are growing shorter and colder, and I'm tired and feeling disorganized. How do I make order out of all the bits and pieces accumulated over the past weeks? That's where I think the butterfly analogy continues to serve me. Let's say that each of those areas I've sampled becomes a perfect little butterfly egg. I will lay them all down and over the dark months they will continue to incubate (and yes, I know that's not really quite how the butterfly gestation thing works, just stay with me) as I flesh them out more in my mind. Some may not make it through the winter. In the spring some caterpillars will hatch and a few might get picked off, but the strongest will hopefully have survived. And then it will be time for those butterfly caterpillars to get busy again!

So what, you might ask, is the caption underneath each of those little butterfly eggs? Determining that will be my task for the next post. I'm happy to be back!