Category: Resistance

This is Harder Than I Thought

What can I say about this new WordPress thing, website, blogging platform except, Man is it difficult!

Who can paint when there’s so much to learn? When will I be able to get back to the drawing board, or the easel, or whatever I was doing when I decided I needed to switch it up here. Blah.

By the time I rearrange, think, renew a theme, learn new language I am utterly exhausted. It’s fun, and it’s not so much fun. Add a blizzard to the mix, and nothing creative is happening anywhere near here.

I had a lovely looking theme that I just had to switch up because, well, it made me dizzy to try to make it do what I wanted it to do. This one is meh..it will do for now. The other was prettier, but more difficult to navigate. Look, I had to invest a couple of bucks in an online class to learn my way around.

Let’s see what happens next. I need more than a little luck.

Art Language is Easy, Computer Language, Not so Much

Navigating to a new blogging platform is becoming a “thing.” There’s new language to learn, first off, and working is ridiculously difficult if you speak English and “they” speak Swahili, if you catch my drift.

Greek Dish, 9×10 Watercolor ©Dora Sislian Themelis

Managing this present blog is easy. However, the look of the new site is much nicer, and a bit more professional. If I could figure it out I’d be golden. It’s going to take some time. Learning a new language isn’t as easy as they say it is.

The language of art comes naturally to me. Thank goodness, or I’d be toast. The vocabulary I need to learn are the words that will kick out Mr. Resistance from my space.

Now that’s a tough cookie.

Resistance, Distraction, Unbearable, Oh My

Resistance is in full swing here this winter. Coming out of this one is going to be like wrestling with spaghetti: messy. “Doing” was a good idea, but doesn’t look like one that’s going to get a lot of traction. 

Apples on Cloth, Watercolor,  9×10 @Dora Sislian Themelis

Goals? Resolutions? Doing? All a distraction from actually working on anything.

It’s the end of January already. Is this what the year ahead is going to look like? If so, it’s going to be a rough ride. Better buckle up.

Ground hogs, bears, and all manner of beast that hibernate through the winter have the right idea. Let’s just sleep through the whole thing, and wake up when the sun is high in the sky making the weather bearable. I have had enough of winter.

However, Mr. Resistance likes to visit in nice weather, too.

Like I said, better buckle up. Mr. Resistance is very chummy with his good friend Mr. Distraction, and they like to get together often, it seems.

I am going to need ammunition, tools, plans. 

Knitting. No, Not Painting

It’s about time I showed you what I’ve been up to lately. I know, I know, I should show you the last painting I was working on when Hurricane Sandy stopped me cold, but I don’t feel like it.

That doesn’t mean I haven’t been busy in the creative department. No. Believe me when I tell you I have been wandering around the studio eyeballing that painting. I’m just giving in to Resistance for the time being, and I think it’s a healthy move. Why push it?
Just leaving it alone for now and getting my fill of color and productivity by knitting. Besides, there are a couple of holiday shopping events on the calendar and I want to have some pretty things to bring besides my paintings.

Hand Knits @Dora Sislian Themelis

Nice, thick, plush and cozy big knit stitch cowl/neck warmers up top and baby/toddler hats on the bottom of the photo, are keeping me busy. One of the cowls came up short after I knit it up so I had to rip back, and I’ll get to it later.

The Storm, The Debris, and No Art

Feel like seeing some photos of the destruction after our lovely friend ‘Sandy’ came to visit us on Long Island? Just my backyard..don’t worry, nothing wild in the pictures. Only electric workers trying to reconnect our house to the world and tree debris. I didn’t take many photos at all, like other times we’ve had crazy weather. 

This is what I was working on when we were so rudely interrupted by the hurricane and then the blizzard. I added more color to develop the background, but haven’t felt like getting back to it to even photograph it. 

If I can kick myself into gear, maybe I’ll show how it looks. 
Maybe. Excuse me, Mr. Resistance is knocking, again.

Resistance is Really Not Out to Get Me

Resistance Is Impersonal

Resistance is not out to get you personally. It doesn’t know who you are and doesn’t care. Resistance is a force of nature. It acts objectively. Though it feels malevolent, Resistance in fact, operates with the indifference of rain and transits the heavens by the same laws as the stars. When we marshal our forces to combat Resistance, we must remember this. 

Steven Pressfield, The War of Art 

How lovely to be acquainted with Mr. Resistance and know, for a fact, that it isn’t out to get me. Personally. Oh, how nice.

Well it seems like it is, you know, evil. That’s just my opinion. So it’s nice to know it doesn’t know who I am, nor does he care. Ooh, even better. I’d like “him” to leave then. Now.

Session 3

Resistance is annoying, but what can I do about it? Just move on. Admit to falling through the rabbit hole once again, and get on with it.

After all, it’s nothing personal. Just business.

The Enemy Within

Resistance is Implacable

Resistance is like the Alien, or the Terminator, or the shark in Jaws. It cannot be reasoned with. It understand nothing but power. It is an engine of destruction, programmed from the factory with one object only: to prevent us from doing our work. Resistance is implacable, intractable, indefatigable. Reduce it to a single cell and that cell will continue to attack. 

This is Resistance’s nature. It’s all it knows.

The War of Art, Steven Pressfield

im·plac·a·ble
adjectivenot to be appeased, mollified, or pacified; inexorable: an implacable enemy 

  [im-plak–uh-buhl, –pley-kuh-]


Red Leaf ©Dora Sislian Themelis, Watercolor on Canson paper

Yes, I had to look up the word “implacable.” Mr. Resistance is that word and every one of it’s meanings. It’s an enemy, a foe, an army bent on destruction.

No wonder I can’t get any work done around here.

Where Inspiration Comes From

All this web based business stuff is giving me a big headache. It’s hard enough to keep pushing away resistance, and now I’ve made life tougher by trying to decide on my next cyber move: Paid web hosting vs free hosting. I played around with the free site thing and have concluded I might as well use the more professional looking paid site because free is just as much work. I’m websited out.

Can’t I get a break and just paint?  I did start another painting though, and even had a second session. Working the next watercolor work on large paper, with a large brush, is having a calming effect.
And if you want to have a good laugh, guess where my inspiration to get down to work came from? It didn’t come from the obvious source: reading The War of Art. 
A two year old’s work and my sketch of her while she paints
To be perfectly honest, it came from watching my 2 year old granddaughter paint. That kid is funny. She demands the “colors” and I have to oblige. I’ve shown her how to dip her brush in water, then on the watercolor cake I had from years ago, then to the paper. She’s a pro now, and paints with such abandon, it’s infectious. I love it! 
Next painting

Session 2

This was such a productive day. Two different sessions of working and I was trying some new ideas in applying the paint. While the work was drying I was on such a roll that I made two bracelets at  my work table. Thanks to my grandbaby, the real artist.

When the motivation is there, and the brain works it’s a good thing, as long as it doesn’t blow up, like computers.