Category: creativity

I Hate Computers, Sometimes

Yeah, yeah, I know, I should be finished with this Artist’s Way stuff already.  Slowly, slowly, I continue on.  Well, it’s interesting stuff and helping me to be creative more ofter and feel good about it, but it’s  s  l  o  w. And it’s slow, because I’m so slow on the uptake here.  Ok, give me a break.  I’m getting there. 

My computer is not co-operating today.  I’m sitting at my desk waiting for it to move along, like me I guess.  I was trying to comment on another blog and the computer wouldn’t let me.  How many times did I have to enter the stupid password so the comment would post?  Ack!  So while I was waiting I was tweeting how annoyed I was.  Yes, I’m Miss Social Media now.  And since I couldn’t post my comment fast enough I went over to facebook to look at that.  Finally I decided I’ve had enough, closed down the computer and turned it on again, only to find out that I needed some new add-on or I won’t be able to comment on anything!  Fun!  Turn it on, turn it off, re-start, slap the monitor, let’s go already!  Do I need this?  All I want to do is make my little connections, laugh a little bit, update some stuff, write my post and be outta here!!!  Is that possible?  Huh?

No, the computer says.  You must close down and restart to resume.  Oh lucky me.  I’m thrilled to pieces.  I do it and here I am, late to my own party.  I like getting things done early.  I like waking up early and getting on with my thing.  But today it’s not happening.  Nope!  My morning is wasting away.

I wanted to write about what I read in Walking in This World.  If I could only finish this and be doing what the book says, but I’m not finished and I’m still not doing everything.  I guess it’s no big deal, who’s going to give me an “F”?  Maybe me.  I can’t get out and walk no matter what the book says.  And the Artist’s date thing?  Can you call a trip to the nearest Marshall’s discount store an Artist’s Date?  How about food shopping?  I don’t think that’s what they meant.

The section I wanted to discuss was about insecurity.  The author writes that sometimes we don’t think we’re as good as we are, or as the next guy, and it could make us hostile.  We can become overwhelmed with our state of creativity, but the Universe is not.  There is always endless supplies Plan B. As an artist, we’re encouraged to like ourselves just the way we are.  I guess there’s hope for me after all.  When we’re insecure we end up with self-pity, and that’s not great to wallow in.  Feeling pity, or sorry for one’s self is a little like a self-inflicted drama, poor me thing.  It’s frustrating.  As I read I agreed that “self-pity is born of fatigue and a rest or a nap is beneficial daydreaming.” 

After this long, slow morning with the idiot box I’m playing with I could use a bit of creative daydreaming.  I’ll see you all later, I’ve got things to do!

Hey, Who Used my Creative Checkbook?

Gregory Waiting (c)2010 Dora Sislian Themelis Pen and Ink
I’m still moving along in the latest Artist’s Way coursework with the book, Walking in This World, by Julia Cameron, albeit very slowly.  Some days I read the next chapter, do some tasks, and other days I forget about it altogether.  I blew off the morning pages Sunday morning, not because I didn’t feel like writing, but because I went to church for Palm Sunday with my family. By the time I realized I didn’t write my pages it was late afternoon and time to plan dinner.  Too many people were around (my husband and my son!) for me to sit in my favorite spot without having them ask me what I’m doing, what’s it about.  “Just go mind your own business” doesn’t work and having to defend myself gives me stress.
Today I wrote the pages.  Afterwards I read chapter 5, Discovering a Sense of Personal Territory: Caretaking vs Sexuality.  It’s not what you’re thinking, ok.  It’s about the feeling you can’t stay away from creativity, the excitement, adventure and even the dangerous quality of wanting to create, and doing it again and again.  Well, it’s an interesting point.  You get the idea.  If we, as artists, are asked to “mother” our friends/family/colleages we become desensualized, neutered, and feel used.  Our relationships with others can either make or break our relationship with our art.  We need that good mirror for our art to flourish. 
As I read on there was alot of putting ourselves first talk.  Being ‘selfish enough’ is being ‘self protective’, as in saying no to invitations and situations that don’t serve us.  Now things were starting to click about here.  I came to a paragraph entitled Energy Debts, and read “any relationship that risks your artist’s identity is not self-loving”.
Bingo!
Recently I connected with a “Crazymaker” who, for years, I allowed to effectively keep me from my art.  I won’t go into why I made the connection, but I did.  Rather than have all kinds of bad things said about me behind my back I casually connected.  Probably won’t stop talk from happening, but whatever.
While always praising my creative ability to no end, they may have been jealous of it, and distracted me from it.  I let it happen thinking we were good friends, having fun, helping each other through things, but when it comes down to it I wasn’t painting or making time for me and my art while they were around. 
I realize now that I was not spending my time wisely, didn’t have a good mirror in this relationship, and was not authentic to myself.  Yeah, this person liked to prop me up and tell me how good an artist I was, but it wasn’t real, it was control. I started to say NO and they were put off by it. 
Slowly, quietly, I began to step back.  Did I really need to hear from them 5 times in a day or each time I logged on to the computer?  No.  Did I need to get swept up in their drama?  No.  Was it worth it losing my time to run around with them doing everything but painting?  No.  They were using me for their own agenda and when I woke up from that fog I began to set boundaries.  And I’m a bad person now?  I don’t think so.
Things with a Crazymaker will never get set to rest, just pushed to the side where it belongs, not in my general vicinity or else the whirlwind of that drama-filled stuff will try to take over again.  Why “give someone without scruples, your creative checkbook so they can run willy-nilly spending it all?”  I’m not buying that cheap stuff any longer.  When you wear Manolo’s, there’s no going back to PayLess, get it?  Ain’t happening.
I deserve better than that which I allowed myself to endure for the sake of pseudo friendship.  Done, so done.

Done with the Course, on with the Process

I’ve finally closed the book, so to speak, on The Artist’s Way.  I re-read the last chapter, answered the Week 12 questions and the tasks, and did the check-in.  It’s been a great motivator and there are things I did during the course that I believe I will continue to do for a long time. 

The three pages of free thought journaling every morning will definately stay.  It’s been wonderful to write down the stupid things I think I do, how dopey I think I might be, and be done with it.  And the artist’s date is a must-do, whether it’s an hour or a whole day thing.  Anything I can do to keep the creativity coming. 

Just showing up at my desk with no agenda has allowed all kinds of ideas to flow.  Once I’m there I start thinking about something and suddenly I find myself painting for hours, where I had no intention to do so.

The Artist’s Way has allowed me to be creative in whatever medium I feel like using at the moment.  If I knit I don’t feel guilty that I didn’t paint.  I know I’m  “doing” anyway.  I’m more comfortable knowing it’s the process not the outcome.  Show up and do, rather than think about it and don’t.

So the last few days have been a little hectic and I didn’t get to paint.  Besides, the light in my studio keeps shutting off for some reason and it’s caused me to avoid the space.  I hate sitting at my desk in the middle of something and the light shuts off.  I’ll have to get that fixed, but in the meantime I was knitting.  I finished another pair of socks for the online shop, worked a pair for a gift, and started another.  While I knit I think of colors, shapes, textures, ideas, designs, it’s great.  Knitting was a mini artist’s date with myself and the process of creating.  It’s a must.

I was Right, it’s the Process, Stupid

As I mentioned before, I’m working toward more art and less housework by reading The Artist’s Way.  Remembering to do the tasks is an effort. It’s not that the tasks are difficult, not in any way. I just can’t remember to do them. I think about it while I’m writing the Morning Pages, which is 3 pages of journaling and has become a habit I’m enjoying.

Being able to empty my thoughts on paper has helped declutter my brain-junk. You know all that yapping that goes on in there? Well, I’ve got alot of it.  Do this, did you do that, why, is it, isn’t it, you idiot, and on. Journaling helps that, but somehow the tasks escape me.

This week I allowed myself time and now I’m in Week 8, “Recovering a Sense of Strength.” As I read yesterday I was having “Aha!” moments. The author writes, “Creativity occurs in the moment..” She suggests that we not pay attention to the final form and don’t ignore the fact that “creativity lies not in the done, but in the doing.”

So I’m reading this thinking about my post yesterday and how I wrote the point of my painting was the process not the result! I really didn’t care about the painting I ended up with. The objective was the action of painting, using the materials and tools, getting the thoughts on the paper in color.

The idea that you need to have something to show for your effort stops that excitement to create. Focusing on the process allows that little sense of adventure. If I let myself  think I have to come up with a masterpiece, I’m done. Just playing with the paint or cleaning the desk area helped me to take a small step rather than a scary leap!

To read these ideas in a book that just yesterday were my thoughts was a revelation to me. I feel like I’m on the right track. Another painting session is on the horizon, as long as I’m not distracted by laundry, which is a whole other ball of wax.