Vision Statement

Reflection – Reclamation – Restoration


To awaken people to their possibilities, remember their true selves, and transform their lives using art, imagination, and other ways of knowing.

 

Caryn I. McLaine, Artist & Teacher

Creative Bridge-Building and Transformation


For many years I walked tightropes juggling money, fear, anxiety, responsibility and relationships. I would reach the other side of a tightrope only to find myself standing on another precipice at the beginning of the next tightrope. One day, prior to the next juggling walk, I reflected on the many times I almost fell from the rope. What happened? How did I manage to not fall? Well the answer is complicated. Good fortune, guides, guardians, and ancestors – all of the above. This is when I began to consider my tools and my calling.

I am adept at transforming tightropes into bridges. It’s much easier to walk or run on a bridge rather than a tightrope. I build communication bridges between groups of people, transition bridges from one life event to the next as well as bridges to forgotten selves and passions. On the bridge, I facilitate sacred circles and assist individuals and groups to create visual pathways.

I am inspired by the writings and work of Alice Walker, Toni Cade BambaraAudre Lorde, and June Jordan. I am further inspired by the art of Carrie Mae Weems, Tamara Natalie Madden, James Van Der Zee, and Gordon Parks. I am fortunate to study the Intentional Creativity Method® of painting with Artist and Maestra Shiloh Sophia McCloud and through her I now belong to a lineage of artists, beginning with Lenora Strauss and Sue Hoya Sellers, who create using contemporary symbolism for healing, transformation, and joy.

I earned a B.A. from Vermont College/Union Institute & University and completed my M.A. in Transpersonal Psychology at Sofia University, formerly the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology, where I am currently writing my Ph.D. dissertation on the influence of reading fiction on spiritual development.

My tools include intuition, writing, intuitive painting, and reading fiction. I am a Reiki Master in the Usui School of Healing. I have 30 years of experience in my preferred form of divination – Tarot, and a lifetime of experience in other ways of knowing. As a certified Coach and Teacher of Intentional Creativity®, I am called to awaken people to their possibilities, to remember their true selves, and to transform their lives.

 

 

Community

I live my life in widening circles       
That reach out across the world.  

                 Rainer Maria Rilke


One of my goals is the creation of Community using Intentional Creativity. This may become one community or overlapping communities with the common goal of using creativity to heal, transform, and empower. One of those communities will be made of my Heartfolk – those women who experience racism and sexism on a daily basis, who are told that their reality is not credible, that their history does not exist, and their lives do not matter. My Heartfolk are emerging adults who have no clue, who are scared, angry, and do not know what they don’t know. My Heartfolk are the silenced women who give to others, but forget to live their own lives and express their creativity. My Heartfolk are those in poverty who are told that they caused and perpetuate their poverty. Within Heartfolk I will facilitate sacred circles for women of color – regardless of ethnicity or ancestry. These circles will be a space for discussion, healing, education, creation, and transformation where we can safely work on topics that directly impact us as individuals, families, and communities. Topics will include, but not be limited to, internalized racism, shifting, and survivor guilt.

In addition, I will also facilitate sacred circles, Red Thread Sessions and workshops to guide others to the realization that 1) dreams are not impossible; 2) traveling through the dark tunnels is a part of becoming whole in body, mind, and spirit; and 3) life between 18 and 29 does not have to be painful and extraordinarily confusing.