Do you wish to slow down?
To deepen?
To share in community with like-spirited folks?
Join the 100 Day Artmonk Challenge and establish a daily art practice — even if you’ve never successfully done that before.
Discover your unique daily art practice that is also spiritual practice.
Overcome your roadblocks with the support of a sincere community.
100 Day Artmonk Challenge Fall 2023
September 23, 2023 to January 1, 2024
8 live online sessions with Founder & Abbess Suiko
Join Art Monastery Founder & Abbess Suiko McCall for a 100 Day program series that could very well change your experience of yourself as a creator and as a practitioner.
sliding scale $100 / $325 / $575
You’ll walk away with
- a greater sense of confidence in your artmaking & creativity, a clear sense of yourself as a creator
- an experiential & personal understanding of what your unique spiritual & creative practice looks like
- the foundations for an unbreakable daily practice that nourishes you (even if you’re really busy)
- an authentic connection between your spiritual practice and your creativity
- lower stress levels, increased focus, and more access to creative flow
- techniques for building consistency and depth in your practices
The program includes
- 8 live sessions (twice a month for the duration of the 100 Days)
- recordings of the 8 live sessions
- email encouragement & inspiration between live sessions
- a wholehearted Artmonk Sangha pod of 4-6 like-spirited Artmonks to be in daily contact with for mutual support & accountability
- the opportunity to participate in a mass collaboration led by award-winning playwright Erik Ehn (see 100,000 Praises below)
How does it work?
- You choose what you’d like to do as your daily practice. You are invited to work with the theme of PRAISE (see more below) if that is interesting or supportive.
- If you’d like support choosing your practice, rsvp to the optional Pre-Challenge Strategy Session – Sunday, September 17, 10-11am Pacific by emailing info@artmonastery.org.
- You’ll have an Artmonk Sangha Pod of 4-6 people. As a group you’ll choose how you’d like to be in contact and how often (groups often create a thread on their platform of choice: text messages, slack channel, What’sApp, etc.). You will then engage with each other throughout the 100 Days, encouraging each other and perhaps sharing the whatever your practice has yielded.
- We will gather twice a month on Zoom to discuss themes of artmaking and practice.
This from Erik:
Praise is maybe: a return of language to its source… A response to creation that leads in grateful overload to spill; a letting go that leads to decreation… How may we break open our media through ecstasies of generosity, spurred by generous encounters? Can we reflect together on our “you” and on the hope (often hard, often lined with challenge) of our becoming?
1,000 artists make 100 gestures each
These gestures can be microscopic (a five-word play), a physical physical move somehow notated or recorded, a few lines of a song, a sketch… A poem of a hundred words? A prose piece of a hundred reflections? A drawing made with a hundred strokes? A hundred breaths on an ice shelf?
The math is arbitrary and held out as a motive. 100K is a vest pocket version of Revelation’s “ten thousand times ten thousand angels;” it lines up with The Hundred Thousand Songs of Milarepa.
In February, we’ll see what we have, and ideally, put up a durational representation in one or more locations by the end of that month (February 29, 2024 is a leap-day).
So this theme of praise is offered out to you as a possibility. You may choose to engage with it or not. Feel into it and see what resonates. I find it interesting to ponder: What is praise to you? How does one practice praise? What do you praise?
One possibility is to frame the entire Challenge with praise — that the 100 Days is a container, wholly dedicated to exploring, expressing, embodying praise. Should you choose to engage that view, then whatever you create in the 100 days meets Erik’s invitation.
Notice if your energy goes up when you imagine this…
We will explore themes of creativity & practice:
Week 0 : How to design an excellent daily goal
Week 1: Intention, Attunement & Praise
Week 2: Cultivating Inspiration
Week 3: How to Show Up Consistently: The Inner Work
Week 4: Dealing with the Inner Judge
Week 5: Navigating Resistance
Week 6: The Wise Heart: Self-Forgiveness
Week 7: The Open Heart: Self-Acceptance
Week 8: Integration & Sustainability: How to keep the practice going
What have previous participants said about this program?
“I cannot tell you how much this commitment helped me! I am feeling so good about my relationship with my art practice now, and confident about continuing.”
“I now know — KNOW — that I can and will engage in art making in this way. Confidence! Joy! And relief from many ‘shoulds’.”
“Thank you so much for offering this opportunity — the depth of connection was beyond imagination.”
“I have a sense of confidence in my ability to be consistent that I definitely didn’t have before! Also a sense of forgiveness for the days I didn’t do my practice — which is very much tied up in the group support and insight I felt during our calls & group chat.”
More testimonials...“It actually worked! I missed maybe 3 days out of 100? About 50 days in, I was heading to my studio to work and I realized it was no longer a question of “oh, I have to remember to do art.” It had become a habit, something that I did without thinking. This is huge for me, as I have a ridiculously hard time creating consistent practices of any kind.”
“I’m better at drawing than when I started! I’m easier on myself.”
“Because of the challenge, I now have confidence in my capacity to make art, the value of my work, my connection with creative spirit and others through art practice.”
“I have recommitted to regular creative practice, and expanded and deepened my creative practice.”
“I love the daily practice I developed through this class.”
“I woke up to my deluded perception of time and I will continue practicing writing daily. I know how to make the practice sustainable now.”
“This kind of format is such a great tool for personal growth.”
“Supportive. Transformative. Lovely.”
“I would definitely recommend it, because it helped me so much to have the accountability.”
“Several people were so interested in what we were doing and could see how much difference it was making for me! So many people are so minimally aware of their gifts and abilities and I would wish for them the chance to discover that. I recommend that everyone do this challenge!”
“This has been a very positive presence in my life and I have deep gratitude for everyone involved.”
LIVE CALLS
DATES for the 8+ Live Sessions
Session 0 – optional Pre-Challenge Strategy Session – Sunday, September 17, 10-11am Pacific
Session 1 – Day 1 – Saturday, September 23, 10am-noon Pacific
Session 2 – Day 14 – Saturday, October 7, 10-11am Pacific
Session 3 – Day 28 – Saturday, October 21, 10-11am Pacific
Session 4 – Day 42 – Saturday, November 4, 10-11am Pacific
Session 5 – Day 56 – Sunday, November 18, 10-11am Pacific
Session 6 – Day 77 – Saturday, December 9, 10-11am Pacific
Session 7 – Day 84 – Saturday, December 16, 10-11am Pacific
Session 8 – Day 100 – Monday, January 1, 10am-noon Pacific
FLOW of the Live Sessions
10-10:10am PT – Grounding meditation
10:10-10:45pm – Short presentation by Suiko on the week’s theme followed by discussion
10:45-11am – Optional artshare, dedication of merit
SLIDING SCALE
Are you ready to invest in yourself, your creativity, and your depth of being?
sliding scale $100 / $325 / $575
BIPOC folks pay what you want.
Truly, no one turned away for lack of funds.
Scholarships available. If the bottom of the sliding scale is prohibitive for you, please reach out and we will find a solution
Our experience is that if you invest financially at a level that requires some energy from you, you are significantly more likely to complete the challenge and reap the deepest benefits.
Make a donation of your choice using the button below.
Your donation will serve as your registration for the course.
ZOOM LINK
The Zoom links and other course information will be emailed to you after you register.
QUESTIONS?
Common questions are listed below. If these don’t cover your question, shoot me an email. I’m happy to help! suiko@artmonastery.org
Do I need to attend every live session?
No. I understand that we all have busy lives. It IS important to attend the Kick Off session live because that is where you’ll join an Artmonk Sangha Pod and decide how to be in contact with each other. Because the Sangha Pods are a really important part of the program, it’s important to make that first contact. If you absolutely cannot attend that call but reeeeeally want to be in the program and promise you’ll be really engaged and active with your pod, then email suiko@artmonastery.org to discuss.
The live sessions are a beautiful time to come together, connect, share, and unpack some of the themes that tend to arise as we move through the challenge. They are there to support you. You can certainly watch the recordings afterward.
Do I need to be a professional artist to participate in the challenge?
Absolutely not!
This is fundamentally a life-change social sculpture about TRANSFORMATION
- transformation of how you see yourself
- transformation of your understanding of what you are capable of
- transformation of your definition of spiritual practice and of art making
Do I need to be a visual artist to participate in the challenge?
Nope!
YOU determine what your daily goal is, what the shape and scope of your practice is. Your creative expression is utterly unique to you and will likely shift over the course of the 100 days. In the past participants have painted, drawn, photographed, wrote poetry, journaled, collaged, collaborated with their toddlers, designed tarot cards, found inspiration in the I-Ching, incorporated nature walks, played the same song on guitar every day, sung with a metronome, and more.
Do I need to be an experienced meditator or a Buddhist to participate in the challenge?
Not at all!
While the Art Monastery is deeply rooted in Buddhism and mindfulness meditation, we passionately acknowledge that each individual’s spirituality it their very own and constantly evolving. This program is about connecting with your own authentic practice and making a bridge between your spirituality and your creativity.
sliding scale $100 / $325 / $575
A video from Suiko’s first 100 Day Challenge
