The Artist's Way Archives - Page 2 of 4 - Dora Sislian Themelis Art

Decorating Old With New

Sometimes I jump start my creativity by cleaning up my art space. The Artist’s Way, by Julia Cameron, suggested re-arranging a room to spark ideas. Doing something methodical like vacuuming a carpet, or mopping the kitchen floor can release pent up energy and while doing the repetitive motions the brain can trail off and daydream. Why not? Works for me!

As you can see by my photo I’ve been very busy redecorating. It’s kind of freeing in a way, my brain can get away of thinking about the art process, how/what/where/ to paint, or not, and the guilt with not.

So maybe after it’s all said and done I’ll feel like getting back to that painting I’ve left behind for the moment? Not sure. But looking at fabric, colors, shapes that are pleasing to me has had it’s wanted effect.

This was such an enjoyable project! Where and what is this? Well! I have set up my sons’ crib, which I kept, in his old bedroom. On a shopping trip to the baby store with Gorgeous we picked out this bumpers and sheets set that blends nicely with the existing furniture in that room. And, it’s not Pepto Bismol pink! Comfortable colors and shapes on this set make it a cozy haven. I know my granddaughter won’t have a clue, but it’s comfy to me!

I’m ready to receive my precious one. And I had better get organized or I’ll find myself scrambling!

The Time of the Crazymaker

The weather has not been cooperative here lately. Rain, clouds, cold, more rain, so not to my liking. Someone I know said something about the weather being “crispy.” Nope. Crispy weather is hot and humid, the way I like it. People like New York in the fall, and the winter time, but my favorite is a New York summer. You know, you can keep “Autumn in New York.” I like the way Frank Sinatra sang it, but I just don’t want to think about what’s coming around the corner.

So I’m having a tough week. Annoying watercolor painting and lousy weather, a horrible combination. To top it all off, the Crazymaker has made an appearance again. Not gonna be fun.

When I was reading The Artist’s Way course and Walking in This World, there was the mention of the Crazymaker, how to deal with him, and keep fighting resistance. Those courses helped me stay in creativity mode and to remember it’s the process not the result. But there are those that upset the proverbial apple cart, the individual who can throw you off your art path.

The Crazymaker, the Opportunist, makes your life not your own. One spends time with them and not working the creativity. Sound familiar to anyone? They act supportive, but it’s a ruse to usurp your talent. If you mentioned it they would balk and say “Who me?” A whole day can be ruined while on a wild goose hunt. The pay-off is you don’t work and remember the things you wanted to create that day and didn’t. They are not your good mirror.

It’s been a long while and my brain has been quiet, happily so. My time is my own. No running, long phone calls with nothing being said, or wasted time. Time away turned into artist dates with myself. I chose whom to spend my time with or be alone. I breathe. I am creative on my own terms. Had it continued I would not be as creative as I have. I feel good. I feel strong. Privacy is a good thing.

There was a reason and they appeared. I could ignore or give in. If I pick up again I’d be the stupid one. There is no way I’m going backwards at this point. Moving forward is the only option. When you taste freedom you just don’t want to go back to jail. I’ll ignore.

Thought for Thursday

“Whenever we indulge in what might be called ‘paint by numbers’ art, we are engaging in cynicism and skepticism. We are on a subtle level out to ‘fool’ people. We are looking down at our audience and saying ‘If I just feed them what they are used to getting, I can fool them.’ Does this mean that we must always and willfully break the mold? No..we are always engaged in a delicate balancing act. We both know how things ‘are done’ and we must strive to listen accurately to see if that’s how our particular piece of art wants to be done.”

~Discovering A Sense Of Authenticity, Walking In This World, Julia Cameron

Musing on Morning Pages

It’s been way over a year since I started writing Morning Pages as suggested in the course, The Artist’s Way. Three full pages are expected, written longhand in the early morning hours before the day gets under way. In all that time I may have missed only a couple of days of writing. I never thought I would be so drawn to write in my black and white marble notebook every single day. The writing has never been a chore and, in fact, as I come to the end of the third page I think of more things to write!

The author of The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron, writes that great ideas start to come forth by the middle of the second page of free thought writing, and this is true for me, too. I could be out of sorts when I start writing and by the time I’m plugging on the second page my pen is flying with thoughts.

The act of writing is art. When I first started journaling I hadn’t yet read the course. I was writing whatever came into my head, for a page if I was bored, for more if I had something to get off my chest. The marble notebook I began writing in had no lines for some reason. How I found that kind of notebook I have no idea. I must have picked it up for my boys when they were still in school. I decided I liked the idea of no lines and just wrote the words and marveled how they looked on the page. Then I began to write without wearing reading glasses I use. And that was interesting to me, how the words looked in the lines they made on the page. It was cool to me that I couldn’t really see the words the pen made, making it seem more like drawing than writing.

Then there’s the pen. While I write I need the pen nib, the ink flow, and the way it meets the paper to be just right. Many pages I wrote have three different types of pens until I got one that I enjoyed writing with. My favorite is my old Mont Blanc pen that my father gave me many years ago. Right now it needs an ink refill, but using it was like a ritual. The pen and pencil set came in a zippered leather case. I’d get out my notebook, open it to the fresh page, unzip the case and remove the pen from it’s elastic loop holding it in place, flip the lever to reveal the writing nib and go at it. Besides the fact that it’s a lovely instrument to write with, I remember my father when I use it.

While I write what pops into my head I get more ideas for this blog. I could be huffing and puffing in the Pages and while I’m writing I think to myself, could this be a blog post?

That’s what happened today and what I’m yapping about here now. I was thinking about the usual things and goings-on when it dawned on me that someday, if I keep these notebooks, my family will stumbled on them and read about who I am, was, whatever. Will they think, she’s nuts? Who knows.

It seems my mother’s father kept notebooks about his life in this country, in the late 1890’s I guess. He came from Greece as a youngster with his brothers and somehow ended up out west building the railroads. Interesting stuff I’m sure, but shortly before he died of a brain aneurism he burned his books. What was he thinking? I would have loved to read his words. I thought of the story The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, who aged backwards. After his death, as an infant, his wife had her daughter read to her from the diary he kept and the how and why of what it was. That scene just made me think of my own writing in the Morning Pages.

Anyway, I don’t think my thoughts are as interesting as some, but they’re mine and that’s that.

The Piggybacker

In the Mirror Self Portrait ©1977 Dora Sislian Themelis
Oil on canvas

Quite a few posts back, when I was reading The Artist’s Way, I wrote about someone who I identified as the Crazymaker, which was a term in that book for a friend who takes up your time and saps your energy for their own gain. In Week 8 of Walking in This World the author talks about discovering a sense of discernment. In plainer terms, trying to stay focused on making art not making it, and the difference between opportunity and opportunists.

In this book, the Crazymaker term is applied a little differently as to the opportunists and is called the Piggybacker. And Wow, is that a true visual! I knew I had a Crazymaker on my hands, but to think they were also a Piggybacker makes the whole thing more real. True to the term, this person was an opportunist, riding my wave at every turn. What I did, they did too.

If I said it, they said it. If I tried it, they tried harder. If I went to a place they had to be there. And everything was their idea. Even now, that I’ve stepped back and away, they’re still trying to hang on to my coattails. Someone once said to me “You’re the real deal, they’re just hanging on that some of it may rub off on them.”

The Piggybacker, as described in this chapter, is an opportunist who offers an opportunity by saying “I can help you” instead of “I need your help.” The better we become as artists, stronger and more visible, these others are that more attracted. “They divert our creativity to light their own path.” This is so true.

The problem is they go along undetected, undermining our direction until we finally figure it out. As in my case I had no clue! I thought this is a friend I’d known a long time, a fellow artsy type, with which I had similar interests. Not until lately did I get it that they were hanging on me for their own benefit. What a dope I was!

Flattering, persuasive and dangerous, they can choke us like weeds do flowers. They would say “This will only take a minute” and their minute could take forever to detox from, which costs us our creative focus. Done! As open souls as some of us artists are, well me anyway, if we agree with the crazy Piggybacker we could fall into something we didn’t bargain for!

Real opportunity feels good, feels special and right. Opportunists come with pressure and impulsiveness. How true! I know because I lived it.

You can’t understand how free I feel that I’ve unshackled myself from that oppression. The only thing I feel now is stupid that I allowed that to contine. Since leaving that angst behind I’ve moved so far forward it shocks me. But how and why did I stay friends with the Piggybacker for so long?

Finish Something…Tomorrow

Since I went on hiatus for the Easter holiday I haven’t been able to start a new project. Here and there I found some time to knit at least. And even that has been hit and miss. I was excited when I bought Arches watercolor paper to try, but I’m looking for the next thing to paint so I can work with it. Nah! Resistance is peeking at me from around the corner, again. A tough cookie, that resistance.

Yesterday I went to my studio just to look at it. I decided to rearrange my desk and worktable, again. Flopping the areas to be a little more Feng Shui this time. I don’t like working with my back to the door, but then I like being able to see out the window too. Having my back to the door felt worse than not seeing outside so I moved my desk. Now if someone is coming toward my space I’m aware. My table is under the window and that felt comfortable. That darn light has been out now for a couple of weeks. Watch when I get someone in to fix it, it will light up! The light and I have a love/hate relationship.

Before, light on

After, light off (darn light)

Something about rearranging the space made me feel good. I know I’ve said it before, but it’s true that cleaning and straightening gets the creativity going. I don’t know why, but it does. So I’m feelilng kind of good about doing some painting again.

I read Week 7 in Walking in This World this week and it made me feel like I was on the right track. The last section in Discovering a Sense of Momentum was entitled Finish Something. Don’t we all have half done things hanging around? At least I do.

Whether it’s photos that need to be in a book, or artwork left undone, there’s always something that needs finishing. The author, Julia Cameron, writes that to keep the creativity flowing we need to finish things we’ve left off.

It can be as mundane as cleaning the medicine cabinet or straightening up a room. She calls it a small pat on the back and a shove forward to moving our creative energy along. Mend the socks. Hang the curtains you bought. Sort your CD collection. Those things half done help us to drag our feet. Finish things and the universe increases our efforts behind our back.

I have been trying to get that studio in order since I carved out that space for myself. Reading this chapter gave me the incentive to keep going. I planned to visit IKEA for some much needed storage for the studio. With the push from rearranging the room the day has come and it’s…tomorrow! Today is just too busy with some other things I need to do. But tomorrow is D-Day and I’m really excited about it.

The chapter ends with this: “Finish something-anything!..It’s an inner order: ‘Now, start something’ finishing something says.” Here I go!

Not Now…What a Concept!

I found some time to read Week 6- Discovering a Sense of Boundaries in Walking in This World, even with the whole Easter/Lent thing. Only one day did I completely forget the morning pages. I know this course advocates taking a daily walk, but I’m not doing it. It’s not winter any more, the weather has become beautiful, and I still haven’t walked. I’ll get there, eventually. But I feel the need to keep studying so that’s what I continue to do.

This chapter talked about the practice of containment, finding the right “mirror”, and keeping creativity safe. Not easy. Keep ideas to yourself instead of talking to just anyone about the work we’re doing. Talking to the wrong people uses our creative power and it may not be appropriate to discuss work with just anyone. Our ideas are valuable and if you show a project too early or hear the wrong comments, we may ditch it. Art needs a place to live, a safe container, a roof and walls for privacy, so shut the F up about what you’re working on. Basically, that was the idea.

Besides containing our ideas, we need to protect those fledgling ideas from the outside world. People, activities, to-do lists, can be overstimulating and the result is stress from sensory overload. Bells were going off while I read this.

How many times do you get a chance to read in print what was happening to you in real life? Like I said in that previous post, Bingo! Again and again! We need to find a way to cope with the “ceaseless inflow and outflow of distractions, distress, attention and emotional involvement” of people, places, things. This is so true. There was way too much chaos and static in my environment and my head.

The chapter goes on to say that artists are generous people, but we can be susceptible to others’ pain and need. We can try to pull away, but feel guilty and risk our “creative energy to ebb out of our life and into theirs”! Is this a Wow moment or what? “This creates exhaustion, irritation and rage.” I could relate. Whether aware of it or not this shut down my own art working.

Setting boundaries is the focus. Contain and protect ideas and creative energy. Dump the bad stuff and the hangers on. Get a secretary to shield time and space like executives do. Well, I don’t think I’m getting a secretary any time soon, although it sounds great. I’ve stepped away, but if I knew then what I know now I may have protected my sanity, my art and just said “Not now”.

Hey, Who Used my Creative Checkbook?

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.

The "F" Word

Despite the fact that I’m in the middle of reading two books about artist’s block, resistance, whatever you want to call it, I’m allowing all that to continue right about now. The only positive thing is that I can identify it for what it is. And what it isn’t is the big “L” word: lazy. Lazy is not an acceptable term in the Artist’s Way and War of Art vocabulary. Not acceptable. The acceptable term is the “F” word: fear. Why fear, you might ask? Fear takes many forms, some of which seem like lazy, bored, tired, distracted. All of this stems from fear. Fear is the really big “F” word.

What’s fear got to do with resistance to create? The obvious fear is of failure. The talking in one’s brain that says “Why’d you put that color there? What’s up with the composition? How come you didn’t think before you messed up that painting? It was coming out so well and you went and ruined it. Dang!”

On the same track is the fear of success. Now that’s a heavy one! Feeling good about a work and having others agree brings the fear of being out there, the fear of the next piece not being as good, the fear that now the artist is the focus. And that scratchy voice starts saying, “What’s your big problem, you idiot? Get your stuff out there!” Big thing, that fear.

I can’t wait until the morning so I can write the Morning Pages journal to tell the voice to shut up.

Then the blocking comes in and all work is at a standstill. The play stops too. The excuses not to continue begin and that annoying voice starts yapping anew: “The light in the studio stopped working altogether. Until I call that guy to fix it I can’t work on the painting. I have to pay a guy to come and fix the light and money is tight right now. I’m tired of all the snow, I may as well have another cup of coffee and watch the flakes fall. I feel blah. I’m annoyed at so and so. Maybe that work is not as good as they, or I, think it is, what do they know?” Get the picture?

Oh yeah. I’ve become well aware of Resistance alright. I know it, I can feel it, I’ve identified it, and I still can’t move through it, even by the process. The War of Art, as kick butt as that book is, is not kicking my butt hard enough! Do I need to have someone put a garbage can on my head and bang it while kicking my butt one foot after the other?

Something clicked on in my head while painting my son and his bagpipe, and I know that fear took over. I was too happy with the way it was coming along. Anytime I feel really happy and good, something happens to squash all the good vibes. He began to have an issue that came to light since I started the work and I think I’m feeling resistance to continue because somehow, in my mind, I feel, I don’t know if this is the right word but, responsible for it in some way. It’s a long, stupid story, but what he’s working on, and having a problem with egos, involves him playing that bagpipe. So the primitive side of my brain says it was my fault he had to confront someone by standing up for himself and his art.

Is it realistic? Nah, probably not, but my brain may be using that as the block of the moment,(that and my other to-do’s.) Sure, why not? Looks like Resistance is hanging around longer than I’d like. He’s outstayed my generous welcome and the time seems to have come for me to kick his butt out the door. (Notice I’ve given it a male gender.)

Anger is powerful, too. Anger is action. And enough is enough.

The War of Art

While on my latest Artist’s Date at Barnes and Noble Booksellers I came across a book I’ve been hearing about titled The War of Art, by Steven Pressfield. Since reading and using The Artist’s Way series to try to figure out why I have such a hard time going to the studio, this other book kept popping up. Seeing it at the book store felt like it was meant to come home with me. Even though I really enjoy borrowing books from the library, this one in particular was one I wanted to own. I know this kind of book is the kind that I need to go back to pages to re-read, crease the spine, pencil in notes in the margins, a well used book.

When I opened the book to skim through at the store I knew it was for me. Same idea as in The Artist’s Way, but more in the style of New York City street talk. Tough and to the point language. The Artist’s Way is a more cerebral, ethereal, methodical, useful course, which I am totally enjoying and it’s working for me. The War of Art is plain in the sense that in way fewer words and pages, it lays it all out in straight out English. It’s a quick kick in the pants to get you in the creative mode, fast. Boom!

The author, Steven Pressfield, has written The Legend of Bagger Vance and The Gates of Fire, among other books. In this book he’s talking about the artist having a hard time sitting down to do their art. He calls it Resistance and his book is about the secret to overcoming it. Resistance is what keeps us separated from our calling, whatever that happens to be. He asks why do we have to hear the doctor say “You have six months to live” to do all the things we always wanted to do in life?

Why “does Resistance have to cripple and disfigure our lives before we wake up to its existence?”

“If tomorrow morning by some stroke of magic every dazed and benighted soul woke up with the power to take the first step toward pursuing his or her dreams, every shrink in the directory would be out of business. Prisons would stand empty. The alcohol and tobacco industries would collapse, along with the junk food, cosmetic surgery, and infotainment businesses, not to mention pharmeceutical companies, hospitals, and the medical profession from top to bottom. Domestic abuse would become extinct, as would addictions, obesity, migraine headaches, road rage, and dandruff.”

Mind you, this is just the introduction! This is going to be a fun read I can tell you that right now. It’s a take no prisoners, no B.S., sharp as a tack approach to the artist’s block.

Taking these two different approaches together, I think, is going to be powerful. I’ll let you know how it goes as I continue reading this. Wish me luck!