The theme for this month’s practice series is INTUITION.
Have you ever had trouble getting your discursive monkey mind to give you a break so you can tap into a sense of deeper knowing underneath?
As a rather left-brained woman who can easily get caught up in thinking, planning, and doing my way through life, I've found it helpful to engage in nonlinear activities to open to my intuition. Collaging is my go-to practice when I really need to engage my right brain and drop into a softer, creative, more inclusive wisdom space.
To give it a try, set aside a minimum of 15 minutes, gathering the materials needed ahead of time: a few magazines, paper or cardboard for backing, scissors if you like (ripping is fun, too!), gluestick, and journaling materials.
Practice:
- Choose your theme. If there’s something specific you’d like to explore to tap into some guidance or deeper understanding, choose that. If nothing feels particularly compelling, let your theme be opening to guidance in the moment.
- Gather your images. Take 5 minutes to flip through magazines. Without second-guessing yourself, let 5-10 images attract you. Rip or cut them out, setting them to the side. Try to keep your mind clear, not analyzing or looking for particular images, but rather following and trusting a sense of internal resonance as you scan quickly through.
- Arrange your images. Take a look at what you have gathered and let the images show you how they want to land on the paper—some might want to be next to each other, touching or with space in between. Play around, sensing what goes where intuitively, following an inner sense of rightness or “yes.”
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Once you’ve glued them down, put your guidance into words. Here’s where we invite the left brain in—to help us contain and learn from our more wordless intuition. Considering the collage as a whole or focusing on specific images (colors, shapes, movement, juxtaposition of images), speak or write a few words about how it affects you, using these questions as a guide:
• What do you sense in your body, feel in your heart, receive in your mind?
• Is the collage asking something of you?
• What meaning arises from deep within?
We’d love to hear from you after this practice: What guidance have you received from collaging? How did it take you deeper than your mind’s thoughts alone? Please share below!
Collage by Katy Taylor
