Caroline Allen
My core passion is what I call the Empowered Creator. As a coach, artist and novelist, I'm fascinated with how we empower our creative voices. What opens our creative doors? What gets the juices flowing? What shuts us down as artists? What blocks us? This has been my fascination for decades. Over the past couple of months, I've been going through a thick depression. I use tools like shamanism, tarot, acupuncture,…
From my Dissolve Series: Cave Painting III. Almost every evening here in Oregon, a family of deer appears in my front yard. I watch them out my living room windows. "Deer TV". Recently two fawns have joined the full-grown deer, trailing happily behind their mothers. I was walking from the house through the woods to my yurt studio one morning, and on the path was one of the fawns. Its stomach…
A few weeks ago, I met up a social worker in her 40s in Portland who worked with at-risk youth. She was interested in writing a book. We talked about the writing process and she told me a bit about her work with addicted teens. "I admire that you're able to do that kind of work. I've tried, and it emotionally overwhelms me," I told her. "Oh no, you could do…
In WATER, my fourth novel, I describe my own dark night of the soul more than 25 years ago, and how finding my voice as a novelist and mystic helped pull me out of it. Today, depression, and anxiety are skyrocketing as the world goes through an unprecedented shift. Just as meditation, yoga and exercise can help during dark times, so too can a disciplined, ongoing creative practice. Here are some tips…
For more than two decades I’ve been honing the scheduling around my creative practice. And I’ve been helping book clients and others do the same. As a novelist, visual artist, and coach, I’ve had to learn the magic of transition from helping others to working on my craft. I’ve had to figure out the best schedule for my creative energies on a daily, monthly, seasonal, and annual basis. And as is the…
I grew up in rural Missouri with conservative parents. Almost every lesson I learned as a girl (knitting, sewing, cooking, cleaning) was how to run a household and how to support a man.I wanted out.I wanted to find own way.I wanted a real voice.First, I had to reach escape velocity.Once I did, once I was out, I was left alone. It was fine to do my own thing, as long as…
Painting by Caroline Allen. I was at the beach at Nehalem Bay in Oregon a few months ago. A 5-year-old girl was doing the worm in the sand, her mother standing nearby. "Is that the worm?" I asked her. "Yes!" She wormed some more. She jumped up and ran up to me and my dog Atlas. I held his leash tight. He's twice her size and weight, and I was worried…
Clearing the Residue of Past Lives Can Help You Own Your Creative PowerI am lounging in a lush green recliner in an office near Greenlake, Seattle, a narrow pillow over my eyes. Urban mystic Judith Laxer has one hand on my ankle. In the other hand she's shaking a small gourd rattle. Her eyes are closed. Every once in a while she opens them to write notes on a pad. Photo by Estee Janssens,…
Excited to announce that my fourth novel, WATER, has won an Indie Publisher Gold Medal for Visionary Fiction. Pearl Swinton is drowning in a dark night of the soul. In the depths, she hears a cry to purpose, but to what? A former journalist who has spent years trying to outrun her psychic visions, Pearl meets a mentor in an urban mystic named Rayne, who introduces her to the concept of…
As a coach, I'm seeing more and more people going through a spiritual awakening. Here I explore the signs, symptoms, and solutions to dealing with such an awakening, using my own experiences. My journey is detailed in my fourth novel, WATER. Even though it's part of a series, the book can be read as a stand-alone novel. You can get a copy here. 1. Sudden openingNot all but many people going through a…