Category: Contemplations

Truth time!

I wasn’t a cool kid.

No kindergarten meant I started first grade knowing my abc’s and 123’s. Period. (I was okay with having missed the nap bit!)

I had to stand in the corner in gym class because I couldn’t climb the rope. The one attached to the ceiling!

We never lived anywhere long enough, when I was small, for me to have a forever friend. Except the other Sue I saw once every couple of years. They let me visit even though I couldn’t eat the beets! (I tried!!!)

Then, I was taller and/or smarter than most of the boys, which wasn’t a path to popular in those days.

And I always felt like my head was a whole lot better place to hang out than my body! (There are early trauma stories that go with that conclusion. I’m betting you can do the math.)

Fast forward through my early adult years. They weren’t much fun, but I got a fabulous kid out of the deal!

Not much money. Not much sleep. Lots of student loans.

The bottom line is… we made it! Dave and I. And, the weekend I graduated from seminary, Bill joined the tribe which was – and is – very good news!

The 1990’s, however, were still not a great time to be a closet liberal finding her voice in a pulpit in the southern United States.

Maybe my voice found me!

And, in many ways, my body bailed, for the next decade became the knee surgery era. Survival, it seemed, meant pretending the pain wasn’t there. And that pretty much meant not existing from my neck, down.

My ears still worked, though. Listening to clients. Helping them sort their stories. To find the pictures in the jigsaw puzzles of their hearts.

It’s been a few more years since then and I am surprising myself!

First, you need to know that I have a thing for labels. Well, technically I like questions better, but sometimes we do need labels and I like choosing them! (For me. You choose your own!)

Anyway, my personal label just got a bit longer. And, yes… I’m still painting Apothecary! (Or is it painting me???)

This label thing has been a little scary lately. I’ve been claiming more of me. And late last night I figured out why!

A month or so ago, I started signing my name, followed by these words:

Gnostic Judeo-Christian Mystic walking the Way of Love.

Last night, after a huge day of writing and painting and – most of all – listening as deep as I know how, my label insisted on getting a bit longer!

At least, it will… when my tech buddy helps get it flung all over the auto-things which often feel like they’re trying to take over my world.

And, yes… it’s coming. Just as soon as I acknowledge that there are a whole lot of traditions rolled into this label. Traditions which are all mine in some ways, though not all of them obvious.

There’s just one more thing you need to know before I sign this.

I’m so thrilled and present in this moment that the very trustworthy tears I keep wiping away, lest I cry in my laptop, are confirming that I’m all in. Body. Mind. Spirit. Vision. So…

Dr. Sue Boardman

Gnostic Judeo-Christian Mystic Medicine Woman walking the Way of Love (aka The Fiercely Compassionate Fairy Grandmother, for Rent!)

ps… I want to help you get to your version of this centered, empowered place, too! It has a lot to do with editing our maps of reality. Kind of like the photo, above… which will take a bit of explaining one day! It’s a whole-person thing!!! The first step is you and me in a Zoom room with whatever is calling to the real, deep you. The calendar elves will hook you up with 45 minutes. On me!

pps… shhh!!! There’s another new pair of fabulous leggings coming soon at FierceArtWithHeart and you’re going to want to be first in line! (The handprints are symbols of power!!!) For today, check out the cool art mugs!

Okay… this is a true story which all happened in the last 24 hours and six years! (Well, closer to 36 hours and six years, by the time you read this!)

I got up Wednesday morning and fixed my tea.

Dog out. Dog in. The whole exercise bit, which Phoebe thinks is about treats but is actually good for her hips. (And, just possibly, not hurting mine any, either!)

YouTube music. It’s International Women’s Day, so the choice was obvious. Joan Baez!

Then, my daily meeting with my calendar. Find out what’s when. Check messages and email and all the rest. See what needs to change. Decline, intentionally, to shop. Post some stuff. (You know the routine!)

And, along the line, a question from my wise friend, Samantha Bennett…

According to all my astrologically-inclined friends, this is a great time to make a wish – so… what would you like?

I’ll tell you my answer in just a moment, but first…

Mattering Matters, the new Intentional Creativity® Guild group my wise buddy, Natalie Moyes, and I are leading, had happened the day before.

Imagine a (virtual) room of marvelous creative women with big dreams and stuff on their paths from here to there.

Old stuff or new. Huge stuff or heaps of smaller stuff. Internal stuff or external. All of it feeling in the way!

Familiar???

As it happens, the painting at the top – which is farther along in not terribly noticeable, but hugely important, ways than it was on Sunday – was sitting behind me as kind of a virtual backdrop in the meeting.

And it helped me explain, in that moment, a thing about medicine painting which I had been living since 2017 but am only beginning to put words to as I continue to learn.

To boil it down for this conversation, the canvas is the context where the questions and answers and vision get to dance and become!

As you might imagine, my walls are filled with such magic portals!

So, back to this morning, after a night of the Grandmother Moon portal whispering, as she so often does, in the ear of my consciousness.

You – wise friend – guessed it!

Yesterday’s meeting and last night’s whispering and this morning’s question all went poof in the big blue stock pot on the canvas and a new ah-hah! strategy appeared… in my heart!

Part of my path… of my walking the Way of Love is to help ready people just like you to paint their own medicine.

And another part of my path is to paint commissioned medicine paintings for gifts or celebrations or just because it’s time… in conversation with those who are not quite ready yet. And, quite possibly, fabulous medicine clothes, too!

(You have to squint to see it, but there’s a huge reason that the big, blue stock pot has the essence of the Filters adventure marked on it!!!)

And, just in case you’re wondering… yep! It did, indeed, happen just this way! (Plus a few zillion ah-hah! moments along the path…)

For now, though, back to the world where my actual stock pot is planning a big adventure in healing for the next couple of days…

And I have an appointment at the magical place my son used to refer to as The Fix Hay, which is hair salon to most of us. (Not totally unlike medicine painting…)

ps… so, what would you like??? Let’s talk… on me!

pps… and, in honor of amazing women everywhere, take an extra 10% off on an original painting at FierceArtwithHeart! Just enter the code Women’s Day when you check out! (Hurry!!! Now through Saturday night!)

ppps… after the Fix Hay adventure, which is kind of a closer-but-not-quite-there situation, I opted for a brief nap. Shouting and sirens from an ER re-run woke me, with my pulse racing. Major chemical contamination. Evacuate the ER. People stuck in an elevator… and my first thought, when I figured it out, was that once upon a time, I did that kind of medicine. Medicine Painting feels much more hopeful these days. We’re just going to need a whole lot more of us onboard to help outweigh the challenges around us!

Or, sometimes the evil elves might actually be helpful… at least with learning.

It’s been a bit of a week!

On Wednesday, the blog elves were AWOL. (Long, not terribly interesting, story.)

By Saturday, with a lot of help from my Wizard Buddy, Veronica, they were back and even speedier.

They were, also, apparently hungry. The draft of this story, which began on Friday, got eaten. (It may have had something to do with my not knowing which finger to move to get the next right thing to happen…)

The topic for our time together, though, has not changed.

First, an old trick from my years as a Camp Nurse… Freddy is fine!

In this case, Bill is fine. Though he has some totally unplanned new foot/ankle complications going on. Ace bandage – at which I am quite the expert – and a follow-up doc visit this week.

Part of me, though, has been having nightmares about life with two of us being stair-avoidant in a house not built with 2 adults, 1 very large dog, and 3 businesses as intended residents.

Enter, blessedly, medicine painting. Specifically, Apothecary, in the land of Intentional Creativity®.

Or, in my lingo… a fabulous tool for Unsticking Stuck Stuff! We began on Saturday. And I am honored to be one of the support team/camp counselors, in addition to being a participant in the adventure.

This is one of those journeys in which process is way more important than outcome. As in, we are not trying to match the couch! (Though it could happen, depending on your interpretation of match!)

And, just between us, it’s a challenge – still – to pick up a brush and have no real idea what will appear on the canvas!

And, that, dear hearts, is a pretty great way to understand the magic.

What would it take for us to set aside all the decades and generations of emphasis on outcome and best and grades and reputation and having hated physics to open ourselves to learning a new thing???

I’ll give you a hint… the first thing it takes is choice.

As in consciously choosing to value the journey…

Now, no need for panic! You don’t have to give up all the familiar stuff forever! Just long enough to see what it’s like for you in a particular context and a particular moment.

Then, if you choose, you can practice some more… later!

All of which is a good chance for me to practice the modeling thing. You know… me showing up real-deal and trusting that there might just be more value to you in that than in me showing up in my perfect suit.

You see, the painting won’t be done when it’s time to push the button on the blog tonight which leaves you with close to the beginning, at the top, and where I am now, just below.

It’s not much to look at.

And, it’s a whole lot of learning going on!

I can tell you the big message, though. It’s not a totally new message for me. I heard it first at the beginning of my Color of Woman journey in 2018. And I didn’t intentionally fish it out of the basket for this moment.

Well, not consciously.

My hand did the choosing. A personal code you won’t even notice hiding amongst the layers. A code which means this:

The chains which bound me are broken and I am free, already.

The only question which really remains is what I will do with that message!

ps… even if there is furniture moving involved, it will be easier for remembering this!

pps… interested in a similar adventure??? I can help! Grab a cuppa and some red thread if it’s handy and let’s talk!

ppps… the basket comes next!