Welcome to Joie de Vivre!

Hi, everyone! I am so excited to be launching my new blog! Welcome to Joie de Vivre! Thank you so much for joining me on this unique journey of reflection and inspiration. Joie de Vivre is inspired by love of Paris, the City of Love ;) and my desire to create a healthier lifestyle for myself. I have been toying with the idea of starting a blog for a while. I have been stalking a few blogs and found it quite interesting to be so engaged and inspired by other people's lives, no matter how ordinary or extraordinary their happenings may be. I tend to stalk scrapbooking blogs, so I can learn new techniques and look at some of the beautiful work these talented scrappers were creating - such awesome stuff :) I have kind of run into a scrapper's block and haven't had the creative juices flowing in a while. I thought starting a blog would help jump start my creative flow again. I also wanted to work on my journaling. Journaling is my weak point in my scrapbooking and in life. I want to be more creative and descriptive with my writing, so I thought the blog would be perfect to help me improve my writing. I can practice my writing on a daily basis (hopefully) and apply my new and improved skills to my scrapbooking.

I am also using this blog as a way to change my life. I have been trying to lose weight for many years, and have found it extremely difficult to maintain the weight loss. I have tried every diet under the sun without success, and am hoping my latest attempt will be my most successful and sustainable. Another inspiration for my blog was Julia Cameron's book, The Writing Diet. Julia is a writing teacher, that teaches writing techniques that help to unblock your creativity. She believes all people are creative, but life keeps getting in the way of that creativity. She teaches that writing can keep life in check and restore one's creativity. Writing can be a way for you to vent, so all your emotions are not bottled up (very therapeutic) and positive energy can keep flowing, or it can be a positive form of creative expression - maybe you are a closet poet. I know I sound like I am preaching and trying to sell a product, but I am not. I will be the first to tell you, I absolutely HATE, HATE, HATE any form of writing! I hate it! But I have been doing this Writing Diet for two weeks, and my creativity has been recharged! I want to scrapbook now, and have completed a really cool mini-album, which I will post at a later date. So what is the diet? Interesting . . . She says you can write the pounds off. She says that many of her students, who started her workshops a little on the heavy side, shed pounds throughout the course of the workshop. Writing helped them to control and cope with their lives, so that they didn't turn to food as a coping mechanism. It sounds logical because most people are emotional eaters, which is why the weight keeps piling on. The whole premise is to grab your journal and write about your life or eating habits, so you will forget about the food and not eat, eat, eat. She also has you keep a food journal, so you can examine your eating habits. Like I said, it makes sense, but will it work? I don't know yet. It has only been two weeks. I have been doing a lot better with my eating habits because of my writing. I am accountable to my writing and feel so guilty when I have to write down food that I know I shouldn't be eating. I also feel like I am in better control of my eating with the journal. No weight loss yet, but will keep trying. With a new exercise regiment, and my journal in hand, I am going to make my Writing Diet work. Writing in my journal everyday, has really unblocked my creativity and has paved the way for a healthier me. I hope blogging will be able to provide added support throughout my weight loss journey. This blog is an extension of my writing and journaling, and just me! Boring old me! I wonder who is actually reading this ;)

Thank you for taking the time to read through my ramblings! If you have a second, please leave me a comment and let me know what you think about my blog or ramblings.