Last year, last February to be exact, I painted my first rock. Well, that’s probably not entirely true. I’m pretty sure I’ve painted rocks before last February, but never with the purpose and intent with which I began painting them in February of 2015. I had been cultivating a list of mantras for myself, of courageous and encouraging phrases to help me battle the demon Anxiety and her cousin Depression, two monsters I have fought for years now. Be brave. You are bigger on the inside. Don’t hide who you are. Words of power. Words that I desperately needed to grow and find the freedom and strength to do the things I dared with my life.
As wonderful and as meaningful as the phrases were I was collecting, I felt a need for something more tangible, more concrete to help me be reminded of the things I wanted to embody. Words on the wind blow away from you as quickly as the come. And so I painted my first rock. Love more.
Have you ever tried painting rocks? I highly recommend it. It’s great fun. Needless to say, between the powerful words and buckets of fun, I soon had quite a collection of “rock balms” as a friend of mine calls them. And for the past year they’ve sat on my counter, near the door, where I and anyone who comes into my home can see them and draw strength from them.
As with anything I make, at first I love it so much that I can’t bear to think of letting it go. And so the rocks have stood as solid reminders of the things I need to hear, the words I need to infuse my life with. Trust more. Let love in. Yes you can!
But last week, I could tell… I could just tell… it was time. And so I took three rocks on the walk with N and the dog, three mantras that I wanted to release into the world. Choose love. You have permission. Believe in yourself. I placed each of these rocks along the path that we took, left them for others to find. I hope that they’ll make their way to people who need to hear the words they carry. Or if they don’t, if they stay in the spots they were planted in, I hope that they’ll be noticed by people who will take the words to heart.
It was such a fun process that I know I’ll do more. I have quite a few rocks left in my pile and new mantras on my heart to write in stone and put out into the world.