Personal Poetics - Dec 2024
Cave Time
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Every year I try and give myself a retreat, some uninterrupted time to enrich my creative practice, a period of days set aside for dreaming, visioning, and connecting with my inner world. Sometimes this respite is hard to come by and last year I didn’t get my much needed pause. I feel backed up with ideas and thirsty for the exploration that a retreat provides. I’m gearing up for two weeks off starting January 1st and as I prepare myself to use this time wisely, I thought I’d share an overview of what I’m planning just in case you or someone you love wants to develop a self-guided retreat in the coming months.
1. Tell your people that you’re going into the cave.
For me, retreat time is cave time. It’s a hibernation of sorts and even if I’m electric with creativity, the whole goal is to be buried in it, undisturbed and dedicated. I’ll let friends and family know that coming up, from January 1-15, I’m offline and unavailable. This helps me hold myself accountable and encourages others to support me during my time away.
2. What will you work on?
I love making lists and I don’t go into retreat time without a plan. This year I want to be free to explore my imagination, meditate a lot, and really just enjoy the space of visioning, but I also have lists of projects that excite me just in case I want to wander down a specific pathway. I have my journals from the past three years that I need to go through. It’s different if I’m writing a book during my retreat, which I may start to do this time around, because then I’ll set some goals for myself with page counts and such. This year, for these two weeks, I hope to recharge my creative well and with that as my focus I’ll look to a selection of books, my body and movement, and my altar where I meditate. It’s less of a get stuff done time and more of a moment for nurturing clarity.
3. Make a schedule.
Building a loose schedule for my retreat time helps ensure that I greet each one of these sacred days with intention. Two weeks will go by so quickly and I want to enjoy my rhythm as soon as I begin. Anything that has to do with creativity must be treated without exactness, so I know this schedule will shift and change as I move along. Having a baseline to return to if I get lost in my free time is soothing for me.
This year my schedule looks something like:
-Wake up early and write in my journal, drink tea, read, meditate.
-Do some kind of movement practice and then eat breakfast.
-Write for a few hours, no busy work or work for others.
-Meditate again.
-Read through journals and collect ideas.
-Archive work.
-If it’s nice out, go on a walk. If it’s not nice out, maybe take a bath.
-Make dinner and read to close out the day.
4. Make some rules.
I’m not much of a rule person, but I do love creating parameters when it comes to my creative practice. I also love experiments and applying rules to my retreat gives me the chance to see what works best for my routine when I return to my daily life as a professional writer. It takes a lot of effort to make these retreats happen for myself and I don’t want to squander any of my time with distraction. In order to go as deep as I can into the cave, I have to honor it fully. I know for a fact that I’m craving a break from my money-making mindset. I’ve been hustling hard and I need to quiet that part of my practice for a while in order to properly revive it later.
This year my rules look something like:
-No social media.
-TV once a week.
-Yoga every day.
-No long phone calls.
-Leave phone in designated spot.
-Minimal social engagement.
-No busy work.
-No money-making mindset.
-Sleep alone in studio most nights.*
*If I’m trying to get weird and introspective, sleeping alone can really help me delve into my personal dreamland. If I wake up in the night, I turn on the light and start writing without the thought of bothering my partner.
5. The body comes first.
It’s easy to get caught up in the work of retreat time, but I always remind myself that as important as it is to reconnect with my imagination, it’s always best to let my body lead me. If I need to sleep for a few hours in the middle of the day, so be it. If I need to dance and stretch for the entire morning, I’ll do that. I’ll eat well, I’ll drink a lot of water and tea, and I won’t forfeit my body’s needs just because I’m on the creative cave clock. Over the years I found that if I put my body first, the bounty of creativity that follows is so much greater than if I ignore my aching back for an extra hour at the desk. This year, I have an exercise bike to support some cardio in the cave and I’m really excited to play around with incorporating that into my schedule.
We’ll see what happens! I’m so excited to turn off and tune in to my wild inner world. It’s been asking me to pay attention and I’m delighted to do so without interruption for days on end. I hope you all get the rest and revitalization you need this winter. I’ll see you on the other side with whatever offerings come pouring out when I return recharged and renewed!