In this episode of the Deep Rooted Healing podcast, I share how I discovered I am a highly sensitive person, what that means, how it has shown up in my life and my art practice. 

I talk about Dr. Elaine Aron's book, The Highly Sensitive Person which changed my life. 

I also mention a class I took with Myree Morsi, a spiritual healer and trauma therapist who taught a class on being a highly sensitive person. 

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online art and writing classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠⁠⁠

Website: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠⁠⁠

Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠⁠⁠

Facebook: ⁠⁠⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠⁠⁠

YouTube: ⁠⁠⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing⁠

In this episode of the Deep Rooted Healing podcast, I open up about my spiritual awakening, healing journey, dark night of the soul experiences that happened over 5 years. I share how those deep experiences shifted my art practice in profound ways. I talk about discovering all kinds of uncomfortable things during this process including attachment styles (I was avoidant to a T), emotional regulation, distress tolerance, highly sensitive people, anger and different emotions and my relationship to them, codependency, conditioning from family structures, society, culture, and media and the impact that conditioning has on our entire being, coping mechanisms, limiting beliefs, nervous system activation, inner child, reparenting, self-soothing, alcohol as a coping mechanism, the unconscious mind, shadow work, abstract and concrete thinking, childhood emotional neglect, enmeshment, emotional addiction, physic realms/abilities, empathy, past lives/akashic records reading, spirit guides, states of change, the ego, disassociation, OCD, fear, trauma, people pleasing, social anxiety, epigenetics, mysticism, spirituality vs. religion, visual guided meditation...so many things!

I discovered intimately how art can be a deep healing tool and healing experience. 

Resources:

-Dr. Nicole LaPera, The Holistic Psychologist on Instagram and her website

-Myree Morsi, trauma therapist and spiritual teacher

-The Highly Sensitive Person by Elaine Aron

-The Dance of Anger by Harriet Lerner

-The Dark Side of Light Chasers by Debbie Ford

-Therapy Chat podcast

-Information about attachment theory

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online art and writing classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠⁠⁠

Website: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠⁠⁠

Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠⁠⁠

Facebook: ⁠⁠⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠⁠⁠

YouTube: ⁠⁠⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing⁠

In this episode of the Deep Rooted Healing podcast, I talk about my love of textiles and fibers and all of the different ways I have explored them within my life and my art practice. I share my favorite materials and books on textiles and fibers that I love. 

Etsy Shops I buy supplies from:

-I get many of my Japanese sashiko and Kogin embroidery threads here: https://www.etsy.com/shop/kimonomomo

-I get beautiful handmade papers from around the world from this shop: https://www.etsy.com/shop/tornedgepaper

-Hand dyed recycled rope and other interesting fibers: https://www.etsy.com/shop/UnfetteredCo

Textile and Fiber Books I talk about:

-Rug Money:How a Group of Maya Women Changed Their Lives through Art and Innovation by Mary Anne Wise and Cheryl Conway-Daly

-Women Artisans of Morocco: Their Stories, Their Lives by Susan Schaefer Davis

-The Hand Stitched Surface by Lynn Krawczyk

-Layered Cloth: The Art of Fabric Manipulation by Ann Small

-Three Dimensional Embroidery by Janet Edmonds

-Poetic Cloth by Hannah Lamb

-Embroidering within Boundaries: Afghan Women Creating a Future by Rangina Hamidi and Mart Littrell

-A Textile Travelers Guide to Peru and Bolivia by Cynthia LeCount Samake

-Sheila Hicks / Lifelines

-The Intentional Thread: A Guide to Drawing, Gesture, and Color in Stitch by Susan Brandeis

-Joomchi & Beyond by Jiyoung Chung

-Natural Processes in Textile Art by Alice Fox

-Slow Stitch: Mindful and Contemplative Textile Art by Claire Wellesley Smith

-Bojagi and Beyond II by Chunghie Lee

-Threads Around the World From Arabian Weaving to Batik in Zimbabwe

-Kigami and Kami-ito: Japanese Handmade Paper and Paper Thread by Hiroko Karuno

-Stamp, Stencil, Paint by Anna Joyce

-Hand Dyed by Anna Joyce

-Lotta Prints: How to Print with Anything from potatoes to linoleum by Lotta Jansdotter

-Mending Matters by Katrina Rodabaugh

-Every Thread a Story: Traditional Chinese Artisans of Guizhou Province by Karen Elting Brock, Linda Ligon and Wang Jun

-The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery by Zeng Li

-Anni Albers On Weaving

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online art and writing classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠⁠⁠

Website: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠⁠⁠

Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠⁠⁠

Facebook: ⁠⁠⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠⁠⁠

YouTube: ⁠⁠⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing⁠

In this episode of the Deep Rooted Healing podcast, I interview Lauren Oland of Mezame Designs who is a sustainable textile artist and zero waste weaver based in Austin, Texas. 

Lauren is passionate about sustainability and runs a zero waste studio where she uses only remnant fibers and fibers made or grown by small farms and artists. She creates wearable, functional weavings including bandana cowls, jean jackets with her weaving put into the back, shawls, tops, coasters, patches and mending kits. 

In this interview, we talk about:

-Her background studying apparel design and being a freelance teaching artist

-How she discovered weaving and developed her style that was influenced by learning the Japanese style of free form weaving called Saori

-How she approaches color in her work

-How her weaving connects to her deep musical background that runs in her family. She played piano for 12 years and find that weaving is like playing the piano. 

-The ways weaving and creating help her heal and process emotions and connect to a deeper place within herself and to the world

-How the pandemic and a move from the Twin Cities of Minnesota to Austin, Texas have impacted her art practice and business. 

-She shares that she is part of the LGBTQ community and how being raised in a strict religious home and not being fully accepted for who she was within the religion made her seek out more open spiritual expressions in her life and her art. 

Lauren is passionate about sustainability and runs a zero waste studio where she uses only remnant fibers and fibers made or grown by small farms and artists. She creates wearable, functional weavings including bandana cowls, jean jackets with her weaving put into the back, shawls, tops, coasters, patches and mending kits. 

You can find Lauren on Instagram at www.instagram.com/mezamedesigns.

Her Etsy shop is www.etsy.com/shop/mezamedesigns. 

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online art and writing classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠⁠⁠

Website: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠⁠⁠

Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠⁠⁠

Facebook: ⁠⁠⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠⁠⁠

YouTube: ⁠⁠⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing⁠

In this week's episode of the Deep Rooted Healing podcast, I talk about my obsession with color and how I love to tell color stories in my art. I share my strong feelings and opinions about colors that goes back to my childhood as a sassy little kid. I share the techniques I use currently in my art practice, how I play with colors across different mediums and what I do to continue to expand my color horizons. I love to tell color stories in my art and thinking about them as stories makes it really playful and fun. I don't like using color theory or color wheels because they feel too intellectual and not intuitive enough for me, however I understand why they can be helpful as doorways into exploring color. 

I share how I use color in my mixed media collages, fabric meditation books and drawings and how play and experimentation are essential for me to move forward with my work in general and with my color language. 

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online art and writing classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠⁠⁠

Website: ⁠⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠⁠⁠

Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠⁠⁠

Facebook: ⁠⁠⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠⁠⁠

YouTube: ⁠⁠⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing⁠

In this episode of the Deep Rooted Healing podcast, I share how I discovered slow stitching, how I create my fabric meditation books full of stitches out of repurposed fabrics and textiles including dish towels, sweaters, shirts, shower curtains, napkins and curtains. In addition to stitching, I add textile and fiber collage to the book pages. I find inspiration in Japanese Boro textiles and Indian Kantha blankets, the hidden layers within stitches and textiles that I wonder about and how healing and meditative stitching is for me.  I hand stitch with cotton sewing threads, Japanese sashiko threads, and Japanese Kogin embroidery threads. 

You can see examples of the fabric meditation books I make here: www.deep-rooted-healing.com/art-projects.

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Emma Freeman is a queer mixed media artist who works with textiles, fibers, collage, printmaking, book making, drawing, and cyanotype. Her art process is experimental, playful, meditative, and contemplative. She makes abstract art full of texture, color, pattern and movement. You can see her art at www.emmafreemandesigns.com. She is based in Wisconsin in the United States. 

Today on the Deep Rooted Healing podcast, I share reflections on all of the ways that my art practice and I shifted throughout 2020 and how I am thinking about this year, what I am carrying forward with me and what I am leaving behind. 

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, poet, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online creative classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠

Website: ⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠

Instagram: ⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠

Facebook: ⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠

YouTube: ⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing

Today on the Deep Rooted Healing podcast, I am sharing a beautiful poem I read this morning at my art table after a night of dreams full of worry and anxiety. When I read it to myself, I cried and something released. I thought I would read it to you and see if it releases something within you too. 

I am finding so much solace in poetry during this pandemic and find myself seeking it out to be a light and give me some guidance and hope in different moments. 

"A Morning Offering" by John O'Donohue from his wonderful book, To Bless the Space Between Us. 

I bless the night that nourished my heart
To set the ghosts of longing free
Into the flow and figure of dream
That went to harvest from the dark
Bread for the hunger no one sees.

All that is eternal in me
Welcomes the wonder of this day,
The field of brightness it creates
Offering time for each thing
To arise and illuminate.

I place on the altar of dawn:
The quiet loyalty of breath,
The tent of thought where I shelter,
Waves of desire I am shore to
And all beauty drawn to the eye.

May my mind come alive today
To the invisible geography
That invites me to new frontiers,
To break the dead shell of yesterdays,
To risk being disturbed and changed.

May I have the courage today
To live the life that I would love,
To postpone my dream no longer
But do at last what I came here for
And waste my heart on fear no more.

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, poet, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online creative classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠

Website: ⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠

Instagram: ⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠

Facebook: ⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠

YouTube: ⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing

In this interview, I talk with the amazing human and environmental artist, Natalie Koffman.  Natalie Koffman is a wise, deep, contemplative dreamer. In this conversation, we talk about Natalie’s incredible project, 1 Seed 1,000 Dreams: The Artist Woods, a dream to buy land in the UK where she lives and plant trees to create a woodland that would be protected forever. She imagines having artists of all kinds participating in this project and dreams of creating artist residency opportunities on the land and inviting many kinds of creative collaborations with nature there. We also talk about her storytelling project called, “Inverted Ark” which had me completely captivated. I felt like I was listening to a magical children’s story that has a powerful call to action for the environment. Natalie talks about her artistic and creative path through exploring photography, a Masters degree in Social Sculpture, working in mental health and some of the challenges she has found along the way. Natalie lives and works in London. I really hope you enjoy this conversation. 

This was my first interview with another artist and I was nervous and met an edge within myself by doing it but I am glad I did. 

You can learn more about and support her woodland artist project at: https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-artists-woods.  Her website is www.nataliekoffman.com and you can find her on Instagram at www.instagram.com/1seed1000dreams/. 

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, poet, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online art and writing classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠

Website: ⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠

Instagram: ⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠

Facebook: ⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠

YouTube: ⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing

In this episode, I share how circles have been showing up in my art practice, on my body as a tattoo and in my spiritual practice. I talk about enso practices in Zen Buddhism and Zen Philosophy, some of the many meanings of circles, how I have been exploring them spiritually and reflections I am having on them lately. 

I share two wonderful books, Enso: Zen Cirlces of Enlightment by Audrey Yoshiko Seo and Zen and the Art of Photography: A Guide to Mindfulness in Creativity by Douglas Beasley. 

I also open up about a deep visual meditation that I did with Lacy Phillip's (www.tobemagnetic.com) work and the powerful healing experience it was for me when I walked into my subconscious and met a circle of younger and older versions of myself. 

I have this quote on my art table that connects so beautifully to circles and their role in my life and art:  "Flow down and down in always widening rings of being." -Rumi

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Emma Freeman is an artist, writer, poet, Licensed Massage Therapist and Reiki Practitioner. She teaches online art and writing classes at www.deep-rooted-healing.com. She is a sober and a highly sensitive person. She lives in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. 

Online creative classes: ⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com/classes⁠⁠

Website: ⁠⁠www.deep-rooted-healing.com⁠⁠

Instagram: ⁠⁠www.instagram.com/deeprootedhealing⁠⁠

Facebook: ⁠⁠www.facebook.com/deeprootedhealings⁠⁠

YouTube: ⁠⁠www.youtube.com/@deeprootedhealing⁠