Do you ever wish you could return to a specific time in your life and just live it again? Not to go back and change things or sort out regrets, just to live that time again because it was such a positive and good time in your life.
The summer of 2016 is one of those times for me. 2015 had been an awful year: work was very difficult, I was dealing with a lot of personal things, and then one of my oldest and best friends passed away fairly suddenly after a short illness. 2016 began in much the same way. It was a time of lots of confusion and difficulties in all areas of my life but somewhere around about this time in the year I discovered “The Artist’s Way” and morning pages. I bought a copy of the book and started to write morning pages each day. Within a few weeks things were starting to feel clearer. The difficulties I was having in my home/personal situation were sorted quite quickly once I’d given myself a good talking to on the page, and life just suddenly seemed to start looking up. By the summer time of that year I was feeling so much more positive.
I spent some of the summer in the Lake District which is one of my favourite places to be. I went to a friend’s wedding. I cleared out the kitchen and cleaned it from top to bottom. I cleared out the old porch (which has since been replaced by the conservatory) and I cleared out and sorted the big spare room (the one I’ve just done again recently). It was that summer that I decided to tackle the garden myself. During the Bank Holiday weekend in August my parents and a couple of friends helped me to create a patio/seating area in the garden. My camera roll from that summer is full of photos of all of those things, the garden, rainbows created by light shining through the glass items on the windowsill and then planner/art pages that I’d downloaded from various places or that I’d created myself.
While time has moved on and the photos of me will have changed a little, this year has a similar feel to it. Last year was challenging to say the least and the start of this year has not been great but I just have a feeling that things are starting to change. But that 2016 summer didn’t happen by accident. The themes that are running through my camera roll and my diaries are things like resetting, organising and planning, and creativity. 2022 was a similar time with decisions that made me feel like I was making some progress. But the creative side of me has been neglected quite a lot in the last few years. I’ve painted and drawn pictures occasionally but I haven’t really done a lot for quite a long time. The thought of picking up a pencil and sketchbook, or a paintbrush, has been there, but I always find something else to do. The big house renovations and decorating are all complete. This year I want to get back to that summer of 2016 feeling, with all the time in the garden and picking up my art supplies and allowing my creative side to see some daylight again. Perhaps one of the things about the summer of 2016 that made it special is that it felt like I had a bit of control back after a period of feeling like things were spiralling out of control. That’s where the planning comes in. I’ve mentioned before that I needed to pick up my planners again and I’ve used them a little more lately but still not consistently enough to make much difference. Looking through that camera roll to write this post has reminded me of people like Andrea Gomoll who used to create videos on YouTube showing her Hobonichi planner. Many of the downloaded 2016 pictures are of her artwork and more creative planners. I want to create more of that myself rather than just looking at the pictures of other people’s work on Facebook and YouTube.
Sometimes I wish I could just capture the feeling of a particular time and bottle it so that I could revisit it when I wanted. But each year brings with it its own unique challenges and joy. This year will be no different. As I look back at 2016 possibly with rose tinted glasses I think what I remember is the feeling of a new start, a new beginning, and just feeling like there was some order and purpose. So as I continue on through 2024 maybe that's what I should focus on a little more and try to spend more time on the things that make me feel calm and relaxed and that bring order and purpose to my life. A little more time spent on my creative hobbies would be a good start, along with some reading and a lot of time outdoors working in the garden. And perhaps in a few years’ time I can write another post about recapturing the magic of 2024.
If you could revisit a time in your life, when would it be and why?