Monday, December 28, 2020

Sacred Margin

 Sacred Margin

The week ahead is my favorite week of the year. This week between Christmas and New Year's Day, for me, is always a time of slowing down, reflecting and planning.

Author Shelly Miller called time like this a sacred margin- "A sacred stretch of time between what was and what is yet to be." It's the in-between time. The current year is closing and the new year stretches out before us.



I think most of us are ready to say goodbye to 2020. I confess, with some embarrassment, that while watching the news the other night the announcer said we have five days left of 2020, and I got so emotional - tears forming, lump in throat emotional.  It's been an emotional year with death rates closing in on the highest in U.S. history. I am exhausted from the political divisiveness and from the hate filled and unkind words and behavior that everything from politics to mask-wearing to racial injustice have brought out in us. Exhausted and saddened. I want to turn the page on 2020, even though I know these things won't change for quite a while. I'm weary and saddened that when we faced an event that should have brought us together as a nation, instead we turned on one another. 

This all leads me to my word of the year for 2021: Rhythm. It found me quite by accident. I was seeking another word all together, but it dawned on me on Christmas day that I had been using this word a lot recently. Especially through the Advent season. You see, during Advent I realized how comfortable and welcoming it was to embrace the familiar rhythm of Advent in the midst of the constant change and chaos that 2020 has held.

Here's what I want to do most in 2021: I want to study the rhythm of Christ's life, His "unforced rhythms of grace" as the Message calls them in Matthew 11:29. And this passage of Scripture, Matthew 11:28-30, has popped up often as I have read back through my journal for 2020. So that will be my theme verse in 2021.

Some things are changing for me as I plan the year ahead. For one, the Living Your Word group I have co-led with Bernice Hopper and Valerie Sjodin for the past three years will come to an end on January 1st. We have all reached a point where the other projects we are pursuing will leave little time for us to continue that group. All good things come to an end at some point and it's always best that they are ended on high notes.

So, as I look ahead to 2021 and figure out what I am going to do I find that I am drawn to connecting more with the things that I am and have been most passionate about. Words, Bible study, making journals, playing with paper, finding vintage paper and office supplies and books, connecting with nature, and being creative. Nothing new for me, but things that at times have not received as much attention and focus as I would have liked.

This week I will focus on making some of those plans and will share them more in-depth on Friday, along with my plans for my 2021 word. My plans will include word studies, living out my word of the year, commonplace book practices, and word challenges to name a few things I want to do. I intend to spend more time in my Words Art & Faith group on a regular basis rather than simply reserving that group for Words challenges....but there will be challenges!

To start I was looking back at some of my art journals last month and came across the journals I made for the Documented Life group that Roben-Marie Smith used to co-lead. Leafing through those journals reminded me how much I liked the practice of journaling about my week. Yet I'm not really interested in scrapbooking or recording events in a calendar planner manner but more in a commonplace book manner - a visual commonplace book. Less about daily activities and more about capturing memories of my daily life and the things I like. Recording the bits of life that make up who I am - favorite quotes, things I read, Bible study and sermon notes, bird watching notes, song lyrics, things I find when I go thrifting, things I'm grateful for, little bits of collage, memories of events I want to hold on to, etc. The rhythms of my daily life.

I started playing with a format for my journal through the month of December. I'm going to continue on in my Leuchtturm journal from 2020 until I fill it up. I even turned my hand lettering into a font the other day and made up label stickers.











This week I'll set up my 2021 word journal and work on some of the plans for the months ahead and, as I said earlier, I'll post about those plans on Friday. I will do weekly updates here on my blog and in my Words Art & Faith Facebook group. You can join the group here

May you enjoy the in-between time this week.:)






6 comments:

  1. HMMMM - you got me to thinking. I've kept a regular journal for decades, but this year, because we don't DO anything, it's pretty slim. Maybe a more visual, tactile journal would be more fun right now. It would help me focus on all that is good in my life.

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  2. You should sell your font (or give it to your envious followers who admire your lettering). Sorry to see the Living your word group end, but excited to see where this leads in Words Art and Faith group. I don’t journal artistically, but have been considering. I need a way to make the mundane more beautiful. I need a drivel book where I pour it all out (that I will throw away once filled) and a gems book that I distill my thoughts down into. But thanks for always being inspiring.

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    1. I like your ideas of a drivel book and a gems book, Brenda. Although I keep all of my journals (written and art) as I like to go back and read them occasionally. It's a good way to see your growth - hoepfully! It also helps spark my memory.

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  3. I love that description: The Sacred Margin. What a beautiful thought! I love your lettering, too. I wonder if you have your prompts for Word of the Year available anywhere that I might glean from them? I am doing this for the first time this year and would love some direction. Thank you and Happy New Year!

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    1. Julie, I love that you are embarking on the journey of having a word of the year! I will begin posting about what I am doing (prompts)this weekend. I will then post weekly. This month is all about exploring your word!

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  4. I love this post! Such insightful documentary of wonderful you! Thank you for sharing your life, yourself with us. Thank you for your vulnerability, honesty, transparency.

    I love your letterIng and will be downloading for practice. Thank you.

    I find myself noticing birds native to my area since following you.🙂

    I am grateful to know you, Marvelous Mary!💙💙

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