Hello and welcome to the Artist Morning Podcast.
My name is Darius and I'm so grateful that you and I get this time together.
If you're new here,
This is sort of an unorthodox podcast.
We have less than 20 minutes together and we're going to break it into a couple parts.
Part one is a story and a lesson.
Part two is a guided meditation to allow us to go deeper with that lesson.
And part three is a writing exercise intended to help us expand and integrate that lesson.
In our lesson today will be particularly interesting to you if you are on a writing,
A creativity,
A self-expression journey.
Maybe you're catching us on Substack.
Maybe you know about the Artist Morning Writers Club and you've already joined.
And you have this intuitive hit that there's some sort of writing,
Some sort of story,
Some sort of wisdom that's looking to come through you and be shared with the world.
If that's you,
You are in the absolute right place.
Thank you,
Universe,
For delivering these amazing humans here now.
So at some point in your writing and your creative journey,
You're going to think about the question of what do I create?
What do I write?
What stories do I tell?
How do I ensure that these are honest?
These are helpful.
These are meaningful to me and perhaps others.
Wonderful questions.
And I want to change the perspective for a moment.
I think somewhere along the line,
Things got a little confusing,
Probably in the last 20-30 years.
I want to remind you that as a species,
We have been writing for 5,
000 years.
Writing has been an incredible,
Important aspect of existence on planet Earth.
Think about it in your own life.
How many books?
How many passages?
How many poems?
How many songs?
How many newspaper articles moved you,
Significantly moved you?
And where it's got confusing and confused is social media.
The last 20-30 years showed up,
And I don't think anyone intended it to be this way.
And we've started pouring our writing onto Instagram,
Onto Facebook,
Onto LinkedIn,
Onto Substack.
And somewhere along the line,
We got confused.
And writing went from this deeply meaningful,
Sacred practice to content creation for gigantic tech companies.
So that we can get some sort of validation,
Some sort of like,
Some sort of heart,
Some sort of comment.
And it feels good.
Let's not lie.
It feels good when someone out there says,
I like what you wrote.
And there's nothing wrong with that,
Except if we're not careful.
And that becomes the reason we are writing,
To get validated,
To get approved.
And so the notion that forever changed my life when it came to writing was this realization that writing is not content.
Writing is communion with my soul.
Writing is not content.
Writing is communion with my soul.
It's wonderful when other people get something from the writing.
But when I slow down,
I meditate,
I ground my energy,
I open my channels,
And I really,
Really listen to what's alive,
What's accessible,
What's here now.
And I write from that place for an audience of one,
For me to learn about me,
To learn about life,
To share sincerely.
Those are the pieces.
Those are the pieces where I can clearly say that I came from an honest,
Sincere place in my heart and my soul.
And I don't always get there 100%,
But I actively do my best,
Creating routines,
Rituals,
Creating practices that remind me,
That allow me to slow my mind,
Ground my energy,
Open my channels,
And get real about what's honest,
What's available,
What's accessible to me here and now.
And of course,
The hilarious thing is when I let go of all of you,
When I let go of the algorithm,
Whatever that is,
When I let go of the trends,
When I let go of meeting something back,
Those are often the posts that resonate with my community the most.
And so it's an interesting phenomenon.
You need to let go for the thing to organically find its way back to you.
The world has never been noisier.
And so if you are looking for guidance for what to write,
If you are looking for guidance for how to tell honest stories,
Meaningful stories,
Look no further than your soul.
Just take a moment to let that sink in.
Writing is not content.
Writing is communion with my soul.
It's wonderful.
It's wonderful when your substack grows and your newsletter grows and your community grows.
Yes,
It's wonderful when the algorithm decides your content needs to be distributed and shared with the world.
It's wonderful.
You can somehow get to that bestsellers list wherever the list is.
It's wonderful.
And there's something deeper,
Something more connected to purpose going on here.
And your soul,
Your spirit,
Your being,
There's an opportunity to listen and connect and remember,
Remember,
Remember who you really are and why your spirit chose to come here now.
Before we can commence this communion,
We need to clear,
We need to ground,
We need to open our channels.
We need to clear,
We need to ground,
We need to open our channels so that we can receive Let's take a few deep breaths.
I've said many things.
We're about to go into part two,
Our guided meditation journey to help us bring this lesson deeper.
Let's go nice and slow.
So if your eyes are open,
I'd like to invite you to close them now.
Nice and slow.
I want you to feel your feet beneath you.
Feel how solid the floor beneath you is right now.
The floor,
The ground,
The earth will take whatever you no longer need.
Any noise,
Any distractions,
I want you to imagine it's leaving your body,
Working its way down,
Down,
Down,
Down.
And the floor,
The ground,
The earth will absorb it gently,
Easily.
Sitting with a tall,
Gentle spine,
Allowing all our chakras,
All our channels to be open and aligned.
I'm taking a few deep breaths into your heart,
Allowing new,
Fresh energy in through your inhale,
Letting go through your exhale.
Now we are clearing out through the ground.
We are clearing out through our exhales.
Tall,
Gentle spine,
Feet grounded,
Heart expanding with our inhales,
Taking up more space here.
Connecting with your voice,
Feeling the vibration of your voice as you inhale and exhale.
Voice,
Bold and brave.
Your head,
Your crown is tall and open,
Ready to receive.
We are clear.
We are grounded.
We are ready to receive.
Feel that energy in your body.
Something shifted right there.
Did you feel it?
If it was subtle,
Maybe you felt it loudly in your body.
Spirit is here.
Your spirit,
Your soul is here,
Ready to commune,
To communicate.
Take a nice deep breath,
Crown open,
Voice open,
Heart open.
This is our last song this morning.
I'm going to stay quiet and allow your creative spirit to connect,
To communicate,
To support you,
Dear artist.
Continue taking deep,
Gentle breaths.
Just listen.
Bravo,
Dear artist.
Bravo,
Dear writer.
You made it through parts one and two of our journey today.
Let's take a nice deep breath here.
Come back to your body.
Come back to your seat.
Come back to the room in which we started.
We're going to move into part three of three for our episode today,
Which you will find a writing exercise intended to help integrate our theme today.
You'll find it in the description below.
Thank you for listening to the Artist Morning Podcast.
My name is Darius,
And I will see you next time.
