Tag Archives: Awareness

Stop Waiting. Just Start.

Leave a reply

I was stuck for a long time. Essentially, I had writer’s block for at least 20 years.  I was waiting for someone else to judge that I was good enough and give me permission to start. I waited for a fully formed great idea to come before I could start. And when I did have ideas, if I discovered that someone else had already done something similar, I’d give up on it. I had to earn it, be good enough, prove myself, get permission, and have a really great and totally original idea first, before I could start, so I just kept waiting.

Image from Free FotoI have since realized, not in a single flash of understanding but through a lot of hard work and excavation, that the only thing getting in the way of me having the life I wanted, doing the work I wanted, being an artist, was me. I could give myself permission, get out of my own way and simply start.

I can only know what the project will be by starting it and being fully present and mindful as I work. This became clear as I was working on my heART Exchange art swap project, because that’s the way it happened. At first, I had plans to paint something. I recently took a painting class with a group of friends, and I liked it so much, I bought some canvas, brushes and paints. I’m not very good, but given enough time and patience, I’m not horrible.

But somehow I got confused about how the process of the art swap would work, and got it in my head that I’d have plenty of time to start after I got my partner’s name and address, so I waited (this always gets me in trouble). When I got the name, I realized I only had five days to make something before I had to mail it, and I was working four of those days. I would never have enough time to paint something, and it would be a stressful experience, not a creative work filled with love and joy. I had to think of another idea.

I looked around my studio (I just made the decision to call it that, to admit that this space I work in is no longer an office, it’s an art studio) to see what I might make. I remembered the fabric I had left over from when we made Kelly a quilt, (here’s the blog about the process). Here’s the square I made:

The leftover fabric is special, can’t be used for just anything, so I thought about what I might make with it for my art swap.  I got an idea, and that idea evolved into something completely different as I worked on it, (I’ll post more about the project once my swap partner receives it).  I made myself stay with each step of the process: stitch all the gold thread designs before stitching the silver, sew all the buttons on before writing the words, etc.  There were five similar pieces in the project and instead of finishing one completely, to check and make sure it would “work,” instead of rushing and pushing and judging, I stayed with each step, fully embodying that part of the process, understanding and finishing it before moving on, instead of jumping around in fits and starts, and resting when I got tired.

In this way, the magic of the process manifested a finish project I could have never predicted if I had tried to decide it before I began.  Here’s a sneak peek:

So I have learned that you have to simply start, and be mindful and present as you work.  I have also realized that I am a messy artist. I used to assume that meant I didn’t know what I was doing, because “shouldn’t I be in control of the process, know what is happening, direct it?” But no, I just do the thing right now that feels like it needs doing, should be done, is right without needing a clear reason or plan.  I do that for a long time, one step at a time, step after step, and at some point the whole becomes clear, comes into focus, and it makes sense what I’ve been doing and how it will work and what it might mean.  This awareness often happens just before the project is finished.  Not until it’s fully formed and done do I understand what I’ve been working on.

I explained this to my friend yesterday and she said “that takes a lot of faith.”  Yeah.  To trust it will work out, make sense eventually, and that you just need to keep moving, working through that unknown territory without a map or any instructions, trusting your gut and your intuition and the process.  In that way, it’s so much more about the act of creating than the creation, the product.  To make art is to be in it, embody the process, life evolving as part of the practice.

I am not one of the lucky ones who can make a plan, outline the steps ahead of time.  I have to show up every day and do the work, be the work, and trust that it will all lead somewhere, and even if it doesn’t, being present for the doing, the mindful creating, is what ultimately matters.  Because, in the end, I am not only making art, I am making a life.

  • What are you making?

Fill Your Journey with Joy!

3 Replies

I took Thursday off from blogging, planning to make a post on Friday morning.  But then, on Friday, I left the house at 6:30 am and didn’t come back until 9:30 pm.  I slept fitfully that night, and woke up Saturday with a fever and upset stomach.  I spent the first half of the day in bed, then moved to the couch to sleep for the afternoon, and at some point in the evening, watched a bit of Grey’s Anatomy Season Two that I got from the library last week, even though it seemed a bit too bright and loud.  Because I couldn’t keep anything down all day, I was also going through an unplanned caffeine detox.

Photo by Rachel Titiriga

I feel better today, weak and hollowed out, but better. Along with eating, I couldn’t write or read yesterday.  It was hard to take a whole weekend day “off” when I hadn’t gotten any of my own work done on Thursday or Friday either.  Not only had I missed blogging, but I am again a full week behind in my Ordinary Courage class, with only one week left, laundry needs done, and the pile of receipts and bills on my desk remind me that I still haven’t balanced the checkbook this month.

There isn’t enough time. Whenever my nieces complain that they are bored or I hear other people talk about how they don’t want to retire because “what would I do all day?,” I grit my teeth and want to scream.  There is so much I want to do, and I want to do it all, NOW.  Which, in part, is why I ended up sick. It starts with my inability to pace myself. I push because there is so much I want, and I don’t listen to myself or pay attention to what I need, don’t care for myself when I am doing too much.

And right now, the situation is more intense. I am trying to maintain a full work life–you know, they call it “full time” for a reason.  If you have such a job, it takes up all of your time.  You are either working it directly or preparing for it or cleaning up after it or resting up from/for it.  Yes, you might have evenings and weekends away, but I find that those are spent in recovery or preparation. Making sure we have clean clothes and groceries, the dogs are cared for, we aren’t defaulting on our bills, and we see our family and friends enough that they’ll remember what we look like is all I can manage on my “time off.” Add to that my my life-rehab, and my desire for a full creative life.  How is this ever going to work?

When my book group met with author Laura Resau on Friday night, it was one of the questions I asked her.  She’d been an academic, a graduate student and teacher, who eventually quit to write full time.  A few other people in my group are writers, one of them who has published multiple books but maintains a “day job.”  I asked Laura what the tipping point was for her, when she gave up the other paid work to write for a living/life.  It’s not so important how she answered the specific question, when that was for her or why, but rather that in answering, she reinforced that you take the steps, no matter how small, you start and keep going, keep showing up, and maintain that faith and trust, that deep knowing, that this is what you want, what you should do, that it is right and true.

Wings I noticed a shift in myself as a writer with my question to her.  As a more immature practitioner, if I had the opportunity to ask, the questions were always about “How do I get published?” Now I want to know, “How do you give yourself permission to write, to be a writer full time?” Maybe for other writers, the question really is how to publish.  For me, it’s about a whole life. It’s not just that I need to write and submit, but that I need to learn how to live, and the writing is part of the process.  I can share during, and then when I figure out some stuff, I can polish and publish it, share it with others who need the encouragement and resources.

Laura signed my copy of her book, The Queen of Water, “Fill your writing journey with joy!”  Today, feeling weak, hollowed out, and tired, with so much to catch up on and do, I am hopeful, committed to showing up, but also learning to pace myself, learning to live full time, with joy, and sharing the process.

Picture by Erik Sagen