Happy Father’s Day!
On this special day I wanted to create a tribute to my dad to celebrate all the things I’ve learned from him.

My dad, Joseph Hollick, is an engineer. I grew up watching him design, build and construct things using his creative and logical mind.

When I started creating art, he taught me how to turn my imagination into reality. He instilled in me the necessity to use both the right and the left brain. I learned early on that if I wanted to create something it had to work both logistically and creatively.

Laura Hollick with her Dad, Joseph Hollick creating dragon sculpture. Photo by Sabrina Armani.

I often go to my dad with a sketch of one of my wild ideas and say:
“Can you help me build this?”
and he always says: “Yes”

I think he enjoys the challenge.

Every sculpture I’ve ever created has been influenced by my dad. Whether he was there building it with me or not, all of my construction knowledge comes directly from him.

Laura Hollick creating dragon sculpture with her dad, Joseph Hollick. Photo by Sabrina Armani.

During the creative process I can get a bit…..uhmmm…..crazy! (you know what I mean)
My dad always stays level headed and helps find a solution that fits.

Dragon sculpture framework, created by Laura Hollick with the engineering guidance of Joseph Hollick. Photo by Sabrina Armani.

This dragon sculpture would probably still be a pile of sticks if it weren’t for my dad.
When I was out hiking I discovered all these glorious sticks. I could see knees, legs and a head in them, but I wasn’t sure how to get it to stand up securely.

Dragon sculpture. Photo by Diana Wiggins.

It was a real engineering feat (and to be honest a complete experiment) to discover the dragon sculpture could withstand the Canadian elements. This sculpture was created for an outdoor exhibition I had at the Royal Botanical Gardens in Burlington, Ontario. It was during the summer that had many torrential downpours. This photo was taken on one of the very few sunny days that summer.

Pink Dragon. Photo by Kevin Thom.

This dragon has seen many transformations, as have I. But because it has a solid foundation it can continue to grow and evolve. This is such a metaphor to me. Growing up with my dad has given me such a solid foundation, I know I can be and do anything!

Thanks Dad!

‘The Black Fairy’, Laura Hollick. Photo by Kevin Thom.

The Black Fairy, also known as the Shadow Goddess.

Along the path of creating your True Dream you are likely to come across The Black Fairy. She is the one who recognizes the beauty of your shadow side. She is comfortable with the dark side because she knows it offers tremendous gifts.

When you are in the early growth stages of your dream, there is a sort of detox process that happens.  All  the thoughts, beliefs, habits and patterns that are not in alignment with your True Dream come to the surface to be cleansed.

Usually the first reaction is to ‘get rid of’ them or try to pretend they aren’t really you, or think something positive to avoid the real feeling. Every time you do this you deny a part of yourself and reject the gifts being offered to you. This creates a separation and disconnects you from your True Dream.

This is when The Black Fairy flutters her wings and says….

It isn’t about ignoring your shadow.   It isn’t about pretending not to be negative.   It isn’t about trying to get rid of your dark side.

It is about learning how your shadow communicates with you.  It is about receiving the gifts being offered to you. It is about including your whole Self and moving forward.

Here are 5 insights from The Black Fairy to help you on the path of creating your True Dream….

1. If you are feeling afraid, do you need to take better care of yourself?

2. If you are feeling angry, do you need to set clear boundaries in your life?

3. If you are feeling overwhelmed, do you need to take the time to get organized?

4. If you are feeling powerless,do you need to take a deep breath and remember who you really are?

5. If you are feeling lost and confused, do you need to get clear about your True Dream?

If you know it is time to GET CLEAR about who you really are and what you want to do with your life, be sure to sign up for my *free* teleclass Clarify your True Dream. Sign up here

Transform your dreams into reality with these 5 steps….

‘Follow your heart’ Laura Hollick. Photo by Kevin Thom

The dream of following your heart & making money is not as far off as you might think. Years ago when I wasn’t making money from following my heart, the idea of expressing myself and thriving seemed like a fantasy. It felt like a magical idea that I wondered if I would ever experience.

Now that I do make money by following my heart and have guided others to do it too, I know it is not only possible but probable when you take the right steps.

5 Steps to transform your dream into reality

1. CLARITY
You need to have a clear vision of what you want. You won’t be able to take any action if you don’t know where you want to go. Get clear about your dream.

What do you want?

2. DECISION
You must make a whole-hearted decision to go for your dream all the way. If you do it half way, it won’t happen, it requires your whole Self. Make the decision to go for it.

Have you made the whole-hearted decision to go for your dreams?

3. SUPPORT
It is important to seek out people and environments that support and encourage your dream. A turning point in my own transformation was when I invested in a high-level coach to help me go beyond my small thinking and into my big vision. I highly recommend finding someone who can take you further than you thought possible.

What or Who can support you to transform your dream into reality?

4. ACTION
You must take action! There is no way around this one. You must be willing to put your ideas, inspiration and vision in motion with your action. This means being willing to make mistakes and learn and keep going.

What is the most powerful action you can take now to move you in the direction of your dream?

5. ACTIVE SURRENDER
While you are taking action, let the magic of the journey guide you. Your intuition kicks in when you are in motion. If you want to access your inner guidance system you need to get moving.

Are you letting your intuition guide you?

Take this even further with the telecourse ‘Follow your heart & make money’.

Begin your transformational journey today!

To follow your heart & make money you’ll need to make some mindset shifts to ensure that you travel the full distance.

'Follow your Heart' Laura Hollick. Photo by Kevin Thom

Along the journey of following your heart you’ll experience some incredible highs and you’ll also be faced with some pretty steep challenges. This isn’t to scare you but rather excite you. Each challenge holds an opportunity.

As soon as you can reframe your challenges into opportunities the quicker you’ll be able to make money from your creative spiritual ventures. All it takes is a mindset shift.

The biggest mindset shifts I’ve noticed in myself and my clients is shifting from the employee mind to the entrepreneur mind.

Here are the Top 5 mindset shifts
to support you in following your heart & making money.

#1.
Employee mind: I work for someone else.
Shift to…
Entrepreneur mind: My purpose is to realize my dream.

#2
Employee mind: Time = money.
Shift to….
Entrepreneur mind: Money is a result of clearly connecting my dream with the people seeking it.

#3
Employee mind: Us against them. I have to guard my ass.
Shift to…
Entrepreneur mind: My ass is in motion creating & connecting my dream with the world.

#4
Employee mind: My schedule is determined by my job description.
Shift to…
Entrepreneur mind: I create my job description.

#5
Employee mind: When I retire then I’ll follow my heart.
Shift to…
Entrepreneur mind: Now is the time to follow my heart.

Learn how to make the shift for good and start creating, growing & harvesting your money tree!
Sign up for the 3 week telecourse ‘Follow your heart & make money’ Today.

NOW is the time to follow your heart!

Clarifying your Soul’s Purpose is like doing a dance with your spirit, you just have to learn the steps.  They are as easy as 1,2,3…

Laura Hollick soul dancing. Photo by Kevin Thom. Hair & makeup by Sue Upton.

6 tips for clarifying your Soul’s Purpose

1. Decide ~ Make the decision that you want to know your Soul’s Purpose.  Decide that knowing your Soul’s Purpose is important to you.

2. Request ~ Have you heard the saying “Ask and it is given”, it is true.  You have to ask for what you want. Make a request to know your Soul’s Purpose. Say it out loud  “I want to know my Soul’s Purpose”.

3. Listen ~ Once you’ve made a decision and a request, you have to listen for your spirit to respond to your request.  The way to listen is to notice spirit nudges and intuitive guidance. Notice when you feel drawn to something, notice when something glows with excitement for you.

4. Decipher ~ As you listen within, you need to be able to decipher what is your spirit talking and what is something else.  Your spirit speaks in joy, aliveness, health, invigoration, and relaxation.  When you feel these you can rest in knowing your spirit is present with you.

5. Respond ~ When you hear your spirit you must respond to it.  If your spirit guides you to do something you must do it. If it is true spirit guidance you will feel awakened by the notion of doing what is asked of you, even if it seems challenging. Respond to your spirit by acting on your intuition.

6. Trust ~Trust your own rhythm and you will waltz right into your purpose.

*Take this a step further and discover your Iconic Trait,  which is like your Soul’s Purpose magnified!   Listen to the free audio called ‘Discover Your Iconic Trait’

*To take it even further you can begin your ‘Create Yourself’ Soul Art journey and transform your life & business into a work of art.

in-JOY!

I believe our spiritual purpose on earth is to create ourselves as the full embodied expression of our spirit. Those who do this with totality radiate with a magnetic presence, it is undeniable.

Everyone has a unique inner spirit essence. When you express your unique inner spirit essence you activate your Iconic Trait and put your true path in motion.

When you travel down deep into your spirit, you’ll find that one of the deepest desires is to BE your Iconic Trait.
In fact you are designed to be it, but it does require a bit of physical, spiritual and creative work (or I like to think of it as play!).

This is the journey of creating yourself as your Iconic Trait.
The beginning of this journey starts with knowing what your Iconic Trait is!
If you want to discover yours, you can listen to this FREE audio called ‘Discover Your Iconic Trait’

Once you know and understand your unique Iconic Trait, then you are ready to consciously take the journey to ‘Create Yourself’.

To stir up the energy of few creative sports joined me to re-create one of Jackson Pollock’s Iconic Masterpieces. Hope this inspires you to explore your own Iconic Trait and begin the journey to ‘Create Yourself’.

Are you ready to start your ‘Create Yourself’ Soul Art journey today and step into your Iconic Trait?

Get all the details about ‘Create Yourself’ here

Included in this video (in order of appearance): me, Grace Kaya, Mark Wedderburn, Matteo Ciavarella, Sue Upton, Alison Braithwaite, Shara Ross. Photography and editing by Kevin Thom. White body painting on Laura Hollick, Sue Upton. Music ‘Under the Kadam Tree’ from stockmusic.com

In the art world masterpieces are the pieces that clearly express the iconic expression of the artist.  They capture a quality that we can spot  instantly as if it were a letter in the alphabet of our collective unconscious. Can you guess the artists that created these?

To understand and explore iconic traits Kevin Thom and I decided to re-create old masterpieces from art history with a Soul Art flair.  We wanted to explore their iconic traits and come up with new creative ways to capture it.

As a research project we have been digging into what makes something iconic and how can we spot it, capture it and express it.  Can you guess what artists are being expressed here…

Somewhere in the deep crevices of our being we all want to be iconic, because we know that we have something so unique and so brilliant to offer the world and we want to find our way of expressing it so everyone else can experience it.

This is part of our spiritual journey~ we are here to connect with and understand our own unique essence and express it in the world.  When we connect with our own unique essence we tap into our own iconic trait.

The act of expressing your iconic trait instantly transforms your life into a work of art.

Are you ready to discover your iconic trait?

*Be sure to sign up for my free teleclass called ‘Discover Your Iconic Trait and transform your life & business into a work of art’.

The above masterpieces: Lichtenstein’s comic style art; ‘Mona Lisa’ Leonardo da Vinci; ‘Birth of Venus’ Botticelli; ‘Les Demoiselles D’Avignon’ Picasso.

Re-created masterpieces by Laura Hollick and Kevin Thom: ‘Les Demoiselles D’Avignon’ Picasso; Lichtenstein’s comic style art; ‘Birth of Venus’ Botticelli; ‘Mona Lisa’ Leonardo da Vinci.

Connecting with your spirit is one of the most powerful things you can experience.
When you are connected with your spirit your purpose becomes clear and your life transforms into a work of art.

Your spirit is communicating with you all the time, the trick is knowing how to listen and decode the messages it is sending.
Check out this mini-video where I talk about spirit connection and invite you to experience a complimentary 15 minute ‘Spirit Connection’ call with me!

To set up a complimentary 15 minute ‘Spirit Connection’ call with me, send me an email with ‘Spirit Connection’ in the headline.
Email me at laura@laurahollick.com

I was just watching the Olympics and noticed how every pro athlete had a coach who was invested and committed to them which enabled them to reach peak levels. All of us need a coach if we want to reach the full potential of our creative spiritual expression. I would love to be that coach for you and guide you to transform your life into the full expression of your spirit on earth.

Take advantage of my complimentary 15 minute ‘Spirit Connection’ call and discover your next soul power step.
Set it up today, contact me at laura@laurahollick.com

One of the places I go for ‘Spirit Connection’ is the forest! Here I am connecting with my spirit as I transform into the ‘Red Tree’.

'Red Tree' Laura Hollick as red tree. Photo by Kevin Thom

This beautiful image is a collaboration with photographer Kevin Thom.

All of my art and ideas come from the same place.  They come from channeling spirit.

When I’m in nature I often get visions and flashes of ideas that put me in direct communication with spirit. To honour these experiences I do what I can to make the visions a reality.

I had a vision of merging my body with a bird body, which is the basis of the ‘Red Bird Body Painting’ piece.  I approached body painter and makeup artist Sue Upton to see if she would collaborate with me on this project. She is a powerful creative force, so I knew that we could come up with a way to make this happen.

Here are some of the preliminary sketches as we try to figure out how this idea is going to become a reality…

Once we figured out a pose and a composition for the piece, we had to figure out what the bird would look like. Here are some of the sketches showing the various birds that were considered before finally deciding on the final one.

Here is the final bird painting…

This is a life size canvas bird painting, which serves as the backdrop for the body painting.

Although I am a painter myself, I felt it was important for Sue Upton to paint the bird so that it would match her body painting style.  She did an excellent job.

Creating this piece was a two day job.

There was a lot of preliminary work involved in figuring out the details for this piece.  The actual photoshoot was quick considering all the prep. time.  The final image was photographed by Kevin Thom.

Here I am as the Red Bird….

‘Laura Hollick as Red Bird’. Photographed by Kevin Thom. Painting& body painting by Sue Upton.

Body Painting is a unique creative process where the body becomes the canvas and the ground for an idea to take shape.  There is a quote by Henry Miller, that I’ve really taken literally:

“Whoever uses the spirit that is in them creatively is an artist. To make living itself the art, that is the goal.”

To me, this means that the true art is to become a living breathing expression of your spirit.  Body painting is one of the ways that allows me to become the art.

Do you want to see more body painting pieces I’ve been part of?

Check out when I was transformed into a tree with birds CLICK HERE

See how I was transformed into a blue forest CLICK HERE

Flipping through magazines is a choreographed passion of mine.  I quickly fan through seeking something that will  ignite my next creative idea.

When I saw these images of girls dancing, I cut out their bodies and filled them with ink lines and drawings because I was inspired to capture the energy of the movement.

These magazine cut outs became preliminary sketches for a photoshoot I wanted to do. Originally I wanted to do a dance sequence of myself and then cut out my own body and sketch shapes and patterns to express the energy of the movement.

So I went ahead and planned a shoot with photographer Kevin Thom.  I liked the images we created so much I’ve left them as they are for now. Who knows maybe I will still cut out the body shapes and sketch something in, in the meantime I’m enjoying the energy of the sequence.

Laura Hollick dancing. Photo by Kevin Thom. Hair/makeup Sue Upton

Can you feel the energy in this dance sequence? Do you think adding the sketches in the body shape would add another dimension to the images?
I’d love to hear your thoughts! Creativity is becoming a much more collaborative experience these days