Goal: An open invitation to all Creative and Innovative Women. An open space for artists to share, be inspired and have a safe place to be surrounded by like minds.

We started out with this goal last January and now this year we are taking that goal into a new form. A form of intentionally 'led' discussions and more structure to give a better space and time for the more unstructured tangents that creatives can fall into.

©2014 Nicole Payzant

The Rabbit Hole of Wonderland is often how I describe these tangents to myself. They are everything we should want to fall into as artists, to capture the magic of thought, discussion, ideas and projects. The question of Rabbit Holes, is how to take the time before the fall, to enhance the wonderland experience by allowing intentional discussion?

We opened up the night with a question. "What gets you off the couch/inspires you to create?"

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©2014 Nicole Payzant

The answers we found were varied and many:

• Group projects, collaboration inspires: Sharing what is learned. 
• Words of Inspiration 
• Music, mood music
• Coffee! Talking with people about ideas, helping me develop them.
• Being around passionate people.
• Relating to people
• Changing it up: Challenging self in different styles/ventures
• Meanings not yet quantified, the journey to understand the not understood. 

©2014 Nicole Payzant

Creative and Innovative women/people and even those who haven't identified themselves as such yet, all have dreams, goals and visions. Those things may be identified and at other times may be somewhere inside yet still unknown.

Setting aside the time to work on one of those few things can be the ultimate gift for your inner-self. Even if you don't have a vision yet, taking that time, to write, paint, doodle, list, bake, sing, etc more routinely is an excellent way to spark the energy of the goal. 

We ended with a challenge. The challenge to dig deeper into dreams and visions and write them down. Putting words to your own goal or project, 'Titling' as I called it in an earlier article is exactly what will kickstart creatives and innovators to working and producing.

We delved into sharing and had a wonderful time of honest reflection on each woman's work. Some of us are studying, others are grappling with the inner-creative, and others are coming upon projects that need to be named and focused in on.

What I have learned from this month, is that no one can predict what will happen when you get creative women in a room and start discussing and asking. Falling down the Rabbit Hole to Wonderland is inevitable. My challenge and question now for this group, will be how to direct these evenings in a way that makes the Rabbit Hole to Wonderland a productive journey for all those in the room.

Setting up a flexible structure that every woman will feel safe, challenged, supported and uplifted.

©2014 Nicole Payzant

Everything has a title.  Everything has a name of some kind.  

Anything that is a story has a title, and every title is attached to a story.  Titles can be hard to find, and fear of the 'thing' to be titled is the reason that projects and stories alike stay un-done.  Untitled.  

©2014 Jeremy Lai

Untitled is a lack of commitment, a fear of what the 'it' contains.

Lack of commitment.  

A reason for any relationship or project breakdown.  

Stare at a blank screen, knowing...deep down, that to give 'this' a title means to commit to it.  And committing is hard, in fact, it is one of the hardest things to overcome.  If commitment was easy, then everyone would be perfect examples of success. 

Because to commit is success.  Success isn't acknowledgment or to be known for a piece of work.  It is the commitment to the inspiration that landed in your mind and spirit.  It is the denial of fear and the ability to title what may seem scary to title that becomes the success.

byamygrace didn't happen overnight.  It was the inspiration of prodding over a long time, but committing to a title for this website has changed it's purpose, drive and focus.  

Titles bring clarity, and clarity brings hope.  Hope is the light which filters into ones spirit and all souls rejoice with hope.  It breathes free and wants to live.

So really, a title is about life.  

To be untitled is death.  Death of a project, death of a story.

Titled is life. 

To Title means it lives.

Words make up a sentence.  A sentence makes up a paragraph, and a paragraph makes up a page.  All those pages make up something, someone thought was worth reading.

Why read?  Why put anything down at all?  

Words on page put something we dare to attempt uncovering, discovering, and demystifying out in the open. They become accessible, tangible, real, raw and honest.

Word : (noun) a single distinct meaningful element of speech or writing, used with others (or sometimes alone) to form a sentence and typically shown with a space on either side when written or printed. 

oneword365.com has given a concept to grow through a 365 day journey with just one word.

"One word that sums up who you want to be or how you want to live. One word that you can focus on every day, all year long.

It will take intentionality and commitment, but if you let it, your one word will shape not only your year, but also you. It will become the compass that directs your decisions and guides your steps.

Discover the big impact one word can make." - http://oneword365.com

For this writer, a word has emmerged, before I knew of the one word vision.  Before I knew that there was a movement to intentionally one word, one was already being chosen. 

FIRE (noun) combustion or burning, in which substances combine chemically with oxygen from the air and typically give out bright light, heat, and smoke

As a writer, fire doesn't mean death, it means everything that is risked when you walk into fear.

FIRE burns artists into gold.

FIRE ignites truth

A 365 Day journey into refining this writer.

Risking it all for the refining of fire.

©2012 Nicole Payzant

When things shift it is necessary to turn a page.  This first post is a written realization of a page I turned that didn't continue.  In fact, it ended.  And the next page was a new chapter.

As a writer I am very aware of chapters and what they may mean.  A chapter pulls a story further ahead, it is the continuation, but also the conduit for the next 'thing',  

Starting byAmyGrace has been the unfolding process of this new chapter and I have been working hard to reign myself in.  To make sure that I am staying focused on my theatre training, projects and personal life.  Recognizing a need for a place to work off from has created byAmyGrace into a website and an idenity.  

In every chapter there is usually a discovery, something we didn't know.  This has definitely surprised and delighted me, giving a great deal of direction and definition into my next words.  I could not be writing this if it wasn't for my inspirational team that drive me forward.  Jasmine Alexander, Jeremy Lai, Nicole Payzant and Tyler Bennicke are all various artists who have helped me define and hone in on what my vision is.  Their work is sprinkled throughout my own and I would be remiss if I didn't acknowledge and thank them for their continued support. 

Each week I will be writing about what discoveries, struggles and thoughts I have through the process of being an artist and pulling other artists alongside me in these initiatives.  Join me as I attempt to put words into thought, thoughts into ideas, ideas into concepts, concepts into projects and projects into action.  

No artist can do it alone, and I clearly recognize the need to be intentionally interactive with those around me.  

This chapter will be the beginning of many chapters to follow, and that, perhaps is the most exciting concept of all.

Since the beginning of 2014 I began writing two nights a week on a concept that has been simmering for a year.

 All writers need to protect their work and give it the space and time it needs but I hope to bring you all with me in the process of this story.  This is an attempt at a fictional look of light and dark.  What it means to be deceived, live a lie, and then learn to live the truth and tell it. 

To date, I have experienced five "Write Nights" and have been surprised by every turn these characters have taken.  I am continually amazed by how showing up to write brings this concept to a more vibrant place than I could have imagined. 

I look forward to sharing this experience with you. 

©2014 Jeremy Lai