From Saudade to Pronoia, A Work of HeArt: A Creative Work of Connection and Healing
What have you endured during this pandemic that you’d like to release and let go of to make room for something new?
What have you longed for, allowed your soul to crave, knowing you can’t have it yet but are so close?
What have you spiritually and cosmically created that will soon bloom?
Send me your scraps of paper and notes to self. Send me your Hail Marys and your 3am angst and the fabric that literally held you together through endless dark. Package up those small-enough-to-mail reminders of what you’ve suffered, lost, given up, longed for, reached and grasped for, mindfully created to keep your sanity in relative place, and the totems that have held your hopes and dreams for the future.
I’m creating a painting, a work of heart, with you, that will hold it all.
Saudade Portuguese, [saʊˈdɑːdə], is a deep emotional state of nostalgic or profound melancholic longing for an absent something or someone that one cares for and/or loves. Moreover, it often carries a repressed knowledge that the object of longing might never be had again.
Pronoia is a neologism coined to describe a state of mind that is the opposite of paranoia. A person experiencing pronoia feels that the world around them conspires to do them good.
Think: Honoring the gorgeous, sacred, and soulful Japanese art of Kintsugi, where we will put the broken pieces back together with gold, as a metaphor for embracing our collective past and future. Help me create beauty and hope out of our collective trauma.
ACTIVELY SEEKING
Collaborators: I will need a volunteer(s) to help with creating a web-based map of the painting. If you’re called to the work, let me know.
Contributors: Small items to adhere to canvas. Must be mailable. You must be able to let go. You won’t ever get it back again because it will be transmuted into something new, something bigger. What you will receive is room for grace and healing and the support of being seen.
Please complete your submission by smailmailing:
Send to:
Leah Blooms
A Work of HeArt
PO Box 322
Bellevue, WA 98009
Brandelyn (she/her) is a queer femme passionate about relationship-building, especially as it relates to understanding each of our own blind spots. She works in academic medicine ensuring that patient experiences are central in program and policy development. A certified trainer in Crucial Conversations®, part of Brandelyn’s work includes training staff and providers on navigating challenging situations that include intersections of fear and bias. She is a frequent presenter and has published work on the topics of including patient voices in research and rebuilding trust with patients following medical error.
Leah (he/they/she) is a mentor, writer, and artist who is passionate about learning, sharing, and empowering others to live their best lives. Their mentoring focuses on intimacy, mental health, gender, sex, and practical self-care. He helps clients understand where these major components of life converge and how responses to them impact our ability to be successful. Leah uses a variety of healing modalities in their mentoring practice including reiki, practical self-care/self-discovery, kink, mind/body connection, craniosacral, emotional processing, and aromatherapy.
Daily Ritual Creation + Self-Tying as Self-Care
Parts 1 & 2 of a podcast I did with 
