In reading the latest of The Artist’s Way books, Walking in This World by Julia Cameron, I had a light bulb moment. Yes, that weird feeling when suddenly things seem very clear. I could feel a “pop” go off in my head. I looked up and around me with a start. You know the feeling when things seem to come together and make perfect sense? That sometimes happens slowly, like a gradual awakening, the fog slowly lifting and you say to yourself, “Yeah, I see. I get it.” No, that’s not what happened to me. I had a rush, boom, clang, got hit on the head moment. Ouch!
Before you think I lost my mind, I should explain. As I’ve been stuck in resistance lately and I had put off the latest Artist’s Way course book, I decided it was time to re-direct, take a U-turn and pick up where I left off. I’ve been very good about writing the morning pages, not so good at keeping up with artist’s dates, but here and there doing small things to stay in the loop: looking at old work, fussing with that bagpipe work, knitting on socks, ordering yarn. Yesterday I picked up the course book and started reading again.
Chapter 3 is about discovering a sense of adventure to gain a greater feeling of freedom and open mindedness. One of the tasks was called Draw Yourself to Scale. Interesting, I thought. The task involves sketching. Nice and easy, right? To paraphrase: “Sketch each moment and enter adventure..The coffee mug, the doctor’s office..Don’t need to sketch well. The adventure of life rushes past us in a blur. Velocity is the culprit. Velocity and pressure. A sketchbook freezes time and is a form of meditation to focus on every moment.” And here I was thinking I had to sketch myself.
CLICK! The light bulb over my head popped really loud!
A couple of months ago I bought a teeny sketchpad and filled my old rapidograph with ink. I don’t like to carry a large handbag for the weight of it, but okay, the one I have right now can fit a few things. So there’s the sketchbook and pen, handy and ready. When I had some time, and no knitting with me, I’d pop out my things and doodle. Most of the time I forgot I had them with me in my bag.
POP! Light bulb! I have doodled waiting at the doctor’s office! CLICK! I drew a little girl in my teeny book after allergy shots in the waiting room! SNAP! I pulled out the little book last week at a coffee salon and sketched the live musicians while my company sipped their coffee! I’m in the loop after all! Where I thought I was out of the game, I really wasn’t. Maybe I was coasting along the whole time? If I hadn’t read this chapter I may have continued thinking I was still in resistance mode. Talk about synchronicity! Things were just falling into place of their own accord. Could it be I just wasn’t really paying attention to myself?
Boy, that was some light bulb.
