How can you make your inside voice match your outside voice? Because I am damn sure you wouldn’t be saying the things you say to yourself out loud to other people.

Welcome to the first in a series of video tutorials about how to create dreamboards! In this tutorial, we cover what dreamboards are and how to create your own in low tech version: using scissors, glue and old magazines.

In this tutorial I mention:

Using music to set the mood for dreaming! Try out some of my 8tracks favourites.

Jamie Ridler‘s wonderful dreamboarding workshops.

Cheap Ikea frames for dreamboards.

Also: I mention upcoming tutorials on using Pinterest to create vision boards as well as desktop wallpaper!

Happy dreaming!

AND: if you want to double-down on the creative journalling/visioning process, check out the wonderful Lucy Knisley‘s video on how to make graphic travelogues!

These days, I am wondering who doesn’t have difficulty staying on task, getting things done or feeling like they got enough done (or the right things, or, or, bloody or…). In the words of sweet, dreamy, Ben Harper, “I’d rather find out who you are than who you are not.” Or, in non-musical terms, let’s find out what you aredoing, not what you aren’t.

Because a never-ending to-do list will drive you to the LOL cats.

And paying attention to what you are accomplishing, working on, and getting done (instead of what’s left on the list) will keep you fuelled up.

Here are two cool tools that are so simple, they stick.

• 10 things to do everyday to stay organized via @orgjunkie contains tips so easy you can’t help but do them.

P.S. I would bet, that even though you may not feel like it, you are doing the best you can.

I am very excited to be launching into video blogging! Welcome to the very first episode!

In this episode, I mention:

The Pinterest Vision Board Desktop Wallpaper tutorials that are coming up on May 6.

Getting excellent advice from my pal Mica at Crema Communications.

Taking art classes on Mondays at New Moon Gallery.

I really like to self-learn technology as it comes across my path, like Photoshop when I started to spend more time focusing on photography and WordPress as my blog required it, and even HTML last week (holy crap). One of the things I have been hankering to play with is iMovie and thinking about it as a communication tool gets me all giddy! I have started sending people video messages because they are way more fun than a rotten ol’ email. (That part is  Shiny Nickel Syndrome, and will fade slowly.)

Anyway, long way around, what a better reason to dabble in iMovie than creating a quick tutorial about how to use Pinterest and Photoshop to make inspiration/dreamboard screensavers. Dreamboards + Technology = Bliss.

So, taking a page from the Skillery  (if you haven’t seen them yet, they are making a lot of cool things: literally!), I will deliver an online self-directed tutorial called: Pinning Down Your Vision: Using Pinterest and Photoshop to Create Inspiring Screen Savers beginning on April 6 under the Full Pink Moon (that one is for you Jamie!).

If you want to be reminded about this launch, join our mailing list: we will send an update at launch!

In the meantime, if you have any specific questions or feedback regarding what you would like to see in the tutorial, I want to hear from you!

the pink cosmos are excited to get growing

Have you caught a whiff of it? That sweet spring dirt smell?

Those bulbs and seeds you planted in the fall, slowly peeking above the surface. Cleaning up stray leaves and snipping back rose bushes to make room for new growth. Reinforcing stone walls that took a tumble with the winter snow.

I love the garden as a metaphor for life.

Are you starting to see tender small seedlings from the things you have planted in your life?

If not, it might be time for a clean up, weeding out things that don’t reflect the life you want. Or you can foster some of your most sacred seeds inside until they are ready to stand on their own in the world.

The spring is just beginning, think of all you could do this season to cultivate the life you want.

*the post title will make sense if you watch this pretty funny, pretty honest, and very realistic TED talk.

Stop shifting the happiness bar in accordance with “when I” (get that job, have a successful business, lose weight, buy a house, have that kind of relationship). You have reached some of the past-you’s “when I” benchmarks already: let those carry you forward instead of the next carrot.

Now go on and spread those sparkles, unicorn.

This past Saturday evening, I had a brainstorming session with my lovely friend Jenn. One thing led to another (as storms of the brain are wont to do) and it led us to calculate how many weeks we have until we turn 90 years old.

90 years old: what does that look like for you? What have you accomplished by then? Who is that person with all of those years under their belt?

Think about it for a second.

Likely you have thought of it before: the 90-year-old version of yourself. Perhaps you have tapped into that wisdom by asking: “What would 90-year-old me say/think/feel/do about this?” It’s a great perspective shifter.

But back to the weeks. I don’t know about you, but I have pissed away days. I have pissed away whole weeks, caught up in one thing or another that did not contribute to the wine drinking, painting, wise + wild, ass pinching, sass-fuelled Cynthia that I want to be at 90.

Like it or not, our time is not infinite. In fact, if you are 30-ish and hope to live ’til 90, you have about 3000 weeks.

To see what you want to see. To do what you want to do. To make the impact you want to make.

Suddenly, this week has a weight to it.

No time for wasting.

Time for being in the moment, enjoying myself, and doing great work, but no time for wasting.

How might this week change knowing next week will be number 2,999?

I was working a heavy ostriches metaphor into this post: how in cartoons they bury their heads in the sand but how in reality they are super fast and lay the largest egg of any living bird. But that really is what wikipedia is for. Read to your heart’s delight about ostriches there.

Hiding behind that metaphor was the real message: that we all bury our heads in the sand at times. Especially change-makers, leaders and creators, who face big choices and scary turns on their un-blazened trails. It’s comforting, muffled and quiet in the sand, so who can blame us?

But here’s the problem: refusing to think about an unpleasant situation, hoping that it will improve so that you will not have to deal with it rarely works in the way you want it to AND it burns as much energy as actually making a decision and taking action.

It leads to burnout all of its own. Anxiety. Guilt. Ultimately: giving into perfectionism, procrastination, and really, fear, does not a trail-blazer make: you know this.

So here’s what I suggest:

• Identify areas of your life and work where your head is in *ahem* the sand.
• Pull it out.
• Brush your little peepers clean, take a few deep breaths.
• Look around and really see what’s around you.

There might be a whole landscape, big puzzle pieces, or oncoming vehicles coming at you. Look for those things and feel your feet in your shoes and take action. A micromovement. Start a conversation. Write yourself a note. Do Something. Do your thing.

What is the thing that you are burying your head in the sand about right now? Pulling it out just might be the just thing that clears the next few yards of your trail.

Tally-ho!