Flying Girl and the Fairy Lights, or Seek the Magical

Flying Girl and the Fairy Lights, or Seek the Magical
2/26/09
Golden Fluid Acrylics

Yesterday, I started my day by Twittering a message to the world:

a fresh new day. new ideas buzzing around in my head. where will I go today? Life's an adventure, right?

Which is atypical in my drink-a-gallon-of-coffee-and-put-one-foot-in-front-of-the-other morning just trying to keep my kids and myself on an even keel.

And then that day, in my usual perusal of google reader, I found a million things to be amazed and inspired by. And when I put my kids to nap, strangely, I stumbled out into the garden and made a fairy house. I had no plans to. I just did. Did the fairies kidnap the ToDo list in my head? The one that keeps me on edge?

And I practiced on my baby blue acoustic guitar with the heart shaped, abalone inlaid opening, playing Love Me Tender and Ode to Joy. And I made myself a fresh picked, fresh squeezed key lime margarita. And I laughed at G's disdain for dinner saying, "I hate Fwegeghi." (that's spaghetti to everyone else.) And I enjoyed watching Ivy try to fly-- I mean jump, as she tries to propel her body into the air and dance on her feet at the same time. And I did my work and I fed my kids and a dealt with diapers and bedtime and all the other things I have to do in a day.

It was a good day, despite the tantrums (parent's and children's) and I tried to catch a hold of that magic as it came. Did I wish it into being?

When I sat down last night to paint, it was another night where I had no ideas in my head. No where to go. I knew that the fairy house had been magical, but I really don't need to paint fairies, not with flying girls flitting about everywhere. I didn't want to go there. Then a commercial flashed on the tv. A tree full of lanterns, and off I went.

If you seek it...

I think it comes.

Flying Girl Feels the Stirrings, or Spring Always (Yes) Comes

Flying Girl Feels the Stirrings, or Spring Always (Yes) Comes
2/25/09
Golden Fluid Acrylics on paper 5x8"

[Hurry before the kids wake up!]
I had no idea what to paint last night, but I wanted something light and bright. I really have been on a green and orange kick. So not my usual colors. I guess I am thinking Spring although it is still February. Granted, I live in Florida, so winter doesn't have the same bite as back in NY, but the Winter mind is still prevalent. It's easy to get stuck in that dark when the sun goes away for so long.

This thought of Spring always cheers me up, even... especially when things are the darkest.

I remember once in college, a great time in my life, but I was going through some tough things at that moment. I remember being in love with someone who was not in love with me, although he thought I was, gee, just swell. I'm pretty sure there was other sadness involved, and I'm positive there was mass quantities of cheap white wine. There was a party, and a desperate need for escape from said party.

I ran outside and slid down the building to squat by some leafless bushes and cry. One of my girlfriends came out to make sure I was okay.

I remember her looking at the seemingly dead, Winter bushes and saying:

"The lilacs will be blooming soon."

And all of a sudden, my upset evaporated. I imagined the fragrance floating through my window, and the tiny lavender florets appearing everywhere, and I knew it would all get better.

The boy never fell for me, but I got over it. I forever tried to stay away from sweet white wine and, oddly, melon flavored anything. (yegh, I still remember that bad wine.)

My life got better and better. Sometimes it got worse.

But Spring always (yes) came.

Flying Girl Pushes Her Way Through, or Trust Your Instinct

Flying Girl Pushes Her Way Through, or Trust Your Instinct
2/23/09
Golden Fluid Acrylic on Paper, 5x8"

I am really coming to believe that most of the world's problems stem from a deep insecurity.

Why do we cause wars, start fights, hurt people, deny others, deny ourselves, cause misery, hoard things and resources, eat too much, starve ourselves, take drugs, become jealous, put others down, use people, run away from our biggest selves and all the other ills of the world?

Because we don't think we are good enough. We don't trust in ourselves or our own powers. If we have enough, are enough, believe enough in our selves, we don't need to take anything away from anyone else.

Simplified? Sure. But sometimes simple shows the heart of the matter.

It's also not so easy to trust yourself, to believe in your powers or to know that you are enough.
I painted this picture about trusting your instinct, for Illustration Friday, but I struggle with it.

How do I know when it's instinct speaking or fear of not being enough? There are fears that are valid instincts... self preservation, for one... but so many fears come out of the small place. How is one to know the difference?

I don't know. I'm all scared of the big things that I want. Revising my novel and putting it out into the world. Opening my shop. Risking the uncertainty of a small business and freelancing over the relatively secure weekly paycheck.

But i want to show you some frightening things that happened while I was painting this painting.

First of all... I really like the last one, and was afraid of the disappointment that might come from trying a new painting. It seems whenever I knock one out of the park, the next few are duds.

And then, this is what I first came up with.
Ack!

But instead of scrapping it, I kept working at it. I kept trying. I kept thinking about how I could adjust and revise.
And in the end, I like what I came up with. I don't love it as much as I love the other one, but I like it and feel a resonance.

Most importantly, I am taking the lesson of fear... of facing the fear and diving into it. I am remembering that it is also about believing in your own ability to handle whatever it is you are afraid of.

My shop does not have to be perfect when I open it. I do not have to get everything right. There is room for adjustment and trial and error... in fact, it is required. The same goes for my novel. I get so confused when confronted with the pages I need to revise. I get lost in the tangled threads of plot and am afraid to dive in. I don't want to ruin it? I don't want to disappoint my own hopes, maybe? I don't want to find out that I can't do it after all? What if I'm really not a novelist because I can't handle revision?

I don't even need anyone else to tell me this is not a fear of self preservation, but the small fear, from the small place, that wants me to run away from my dreams.

My instinct says... I love stories. I love novels. This novel has what it needs to be alive. And I have the knowledge and skills to bring it to life. And if I don't have them right now, I will learn them on the way.

As for life... there is no way to get it right. There is no way to always make the perfect choices. And there is always room for rewriting your own story. So I make a choice that might make things tough for a while? Am I willing to put the effort in, to face the fears, in order to create a life of intention. My instincts say yes.

What are the small-place fears saying to you? What are they trying to get you to run away from? What is your bigger instinct saying? Which would you rather trust?

Just (Don't) Do It

Stuff my kids collected from the garden.

I'm taking a little break from Flying Girl. Not to worry. I actually am in the middle of one right now, but I need another session with it to finish, and I am making the conscious decision to not do it. Not today during nap time, any way. I've decided to not rush it so I have it to post.

Instead, I want to talk about choosing to not do.

I'm not talking about laziness, here, or procrastination, I'm talking about making the positive choice to just. not. do.

That novel? Why don't we just admit it and say, "I am not going to do my novel today. I am choosing to not do it." Use our time elsewhere-- bake a cake or teach yourself guitar. Do NOT guilt ourselves all day, beating ourselves about the heads and shoulders with all the things we think we SHOULD do.

I don't believe in shoulds. They just make us feel worse about ouselves and send us into a death spiral. Phhht. We don't need.

What we need is positive action. Positive choice. I am positively choosing to not paint this afternoon.

It isn't a contradiction. Life is full of choices. Whenever we choose to do one thing, we choose to let go another, if only for the moment. Even when we multitask, we choose to let go of the focus we might have if we did only one thing. So why not just admit that we are making a choice, instead of pretending we aren't, pretending we'll get around to it?

What that means is that I will not be avoiding my painting tonight out of guilt. What that means is I will not let the stress eat at me, ruining my day and possibly anything else I might get done today. What that means is I will not waste my day thinking I should paint, but leaving no room for anything else in my indecision. Because, today, instead of painting, I am going to go up to my desk and write for an hour... something I really have been avoiding.

Instead of saying I will write and busying myself with something else, like, say painting, I will just go write. No shoulds there, either. Just a choice. I've realized I can't do everything at once, so this nap time, I am choosing writing over painting. And I'm going to pack up all the other shoulds on my list, and put them away until I write for my allotted time.

When I'm done, then I'll re-evaluate my to do list and see what else I can choose not to do for the rest of nap time.

What can you choose not to do? What space does that open up for your day?

Flying Girl Lets Go, or Trust That The Seeds You Plant Will Grow

Flying Girl Lets Go, or Trust That The Seeds You Plant Will Grow
2/20/09
Golden Fluid Acrylic

When I was a student teacher learning how to teach, my teaching team was working on a poem with our 9th grade inner city students. Somehow, the lesson turned into racism pouring out of the kids from all directions and I left that lesson feeling terrible, hopeless, unhappy, defeated.

My partner teacher leaned over to me and said, "Shhh. Trust the process."

And I shut my mouth and shut my fears and agreed to hold on until we could work through it all.

When next we met with that class, something had happened. And I don't know if we did anything other than encourage their interpretation and discussion. The anger and fear that the poem had brought up had transformed into thought and understanding.

They had simply come out of the other end of the process.

So when I get all worked up that something in my life is not coming out the way I had expected it to, I remind myself to "trust the process." It give me some breathing room. It eases my panic. I releases the tight hold that I have on whatever it is I am trying to control.

Now this doesn't actually mean we shouldn't take care of our projects or developments. It does take attention, work and effort to get through the process, but we don't have to go through it in fear. All we have to do is trust the process.

It will all come out okay, and even if it doesn't, we are strong enough do deal and move on to the next process.

Oh yeah, and this post counts for the Thursday Sweet Treat prompt, Let Beauty Rain Down Upon, even though I couldn't add the prompt to the title because that would make it way too long.

Flying Girl Sends Long Distance Love, or You Have Wings to Fly

Flying Girl Sends Long Distance Love, or You Have Wings to Fly
2/018/09
Golden Fluid Acrylic on paper, 5x8"

This Flying Girl is not so much about my own creativity, as it is about wanting to support others in their creativity. Over the course of my life, I have been surrounded by so many creative folk, female, male, young, not so young, sure in their own creativity and insecure, experts and just starting out.

Life's tough right now. Finances, job security, housing, commerce-- all shaky. Things are folding left and right. It is a pretty tumultuous time, and it would be easy to lose the faith in yourself. It would be easy to fall off your own path as you get all wrapped up in the mess of it all.

But even when it's scary, we still have the power to deal with whatever comes our way. We can still create the life we are meant to life, even if it takes detours and delays to get there. Remembering that means remembering we don't have to let the tough times keep us from flying. Maybe we fly close to the safety of the ground for a while, maybe we fly alone, or slide into someone else's slipstream to ease our journey when we need help, maybe we even land for the night, to regain our strength. It's all good. It's part of our journey. And we are still flying.

As I read Jamie's post on the 7th secret, listening to our guides (in the 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women) I realized something new.

At first, I thought those secrets would be my spiritual guides. I often turn to the tarot cards, the Iching, the Medicine cards and other forms of oracles. In fact, I read for others, and many times the readings focus on the creative journey.

Then as I read, I remember those people who have helped me along... mentors of sorts. My parents and grandparents, my friend's parents, my teachers.

Also it came to me that other writers and artists have served as guides, in both their lives and their writings. I don't have to actually know these people to have them serve as guides. Even fictional characters can guide, at times.

Then I thought about my friends, my peers. All the people I have talked about art, or shown my work to. All the people who have supported me and urged me on. All the people with whom I went on artist's dates, or cooked, or talked about our creative dreams, or sat in cafes writing side by side. The people who came together into creative groups, whether geared towards writing or empowerment. My online friends, too, count in this group, as I have been inspired and led by their creativity over the last year or so. In the last 20 years, it's people like you who have opened the doors to my creativity.

After reading other people's posts on guides, I have to come back to my own role in this. I'm a guide, too. Sometimes I think it is one of my most important roles in life. I used to write and paint to entertain myself. That's not why I do it anymore. I write for other people. I paint for other people, to help them along on their journeys by showing mine. I still get something out of it, but to give it purpose, I need to give it to others.

While I can't help but want to help other people, I am also cognizant of the ways in which they guide me. How we switch places as leader and follower, and that's part of why it works, just like Amy said the other day. We are guides and we are guided in return.

So while I have the faith to give, I send it to you.

Some days, I need the reminders to believe in myself, and I just might need one of you to lead.

Flying Girl Follows Her Fear, or The Wolf and Red

Flying Girl Follows Her Fear, or The Wolf and Red
2/17/09
Golden Fluid Acrylics on paper, 5x7

Sometimes, fear is a signal that we are getting close to our dreams. We are afraid to reach that potential and then be responsible for our own success and failures. We are afraid to have people depend upon us, because we are afraid we might disappoint them. We are afraid we really aren't good enough for our dreams. We are afraid we will be revealed as a fraud.

We are afraid that if we have something, it can then be taken away from us, or leave us of its own free will. We are afraid that what we want was not what we really wanted at all. We are afraid that we are not who we thought we were.

We are afraid of the mysterious and the unknown, and we'd rather stay safe holed up in our little cottage. We are afraid of taking a wrong turn and getting lost in the brambles. We are afraid we are not strong enough, quick enough, smart enough, talented enough, nice enough, tough enough, good enough to live up to the challenges on our road.

That way goes through the deep woods. That way is haunted by dangers and ghosts and wild animals.

Stay to the path, they say.

But perhaps, those of us who hear the howl of the wolf leading us into the shadows, are hearing the wildness of our own souls calling to us.

What power might we find if we fly to meet that untamed part of ourselves?

Flying Girl Gets A Gift, or I Am Enough

Flying Girl Gets A Gift, or I Am Enough
2/16/09
Golden Fluid Acrylics, Prismacolor Watercolor Pencils on paper. 5x8"

This one makes me happy. Mostly because I had no inspiration when I started, not a bloomin' idea in my head, and then, once I started, I was sure this one would be a loss. It was hideous. My ideas were falling flat. The colors were not working. It was, to borrow a phrase, a hot mess.

But I didn't give up. I painted over messes. I added another layer. or two or three. I removed certain elements, changed colors, or tinted them another shade. I just kept on keeping on and then I ended up with something that made me smile when I looked at it.

So after all that, let me tell you where the inspiration finally came from. I should have learned by now to sketch down ideas in my journal as they come to me during the day, but I didn't. Instead, I turned to the internet or inspiration.

First there was the idea on Pecannoot, a new blog about abundance by Jess Gonacha. She suggests we should be using the ideas of abundance in our art work, because in this world of panic and fear, we could all use abundance. Then there was CED, where Leah has suggested "words" as a theme for the month of February. Lastly, but not least, there was the theme for thursday sweet treats, run by Natasha. Let me tell you, I was stumped by that one. The theme is "colors" and colors are so integral to my work that I couldn't narrow down an idea.

So in the end, I let the colors do the deciding. I reached in my bag of paints and pulled out a color, two, three, four, and a white. It gave me a fright when I got cobalt teal and sap green hue, but then I pulled iridescent bronze and burnt umber light and I began to get an inkling of an idea. The white was my favorite titan buff. As the colors started making sense, the painting came together. I followed the colors, mixed and layered them

Flying Girl and Thief of Hearts, or Fear

Flying Girl and Thief of Hearts, or Fear
2/14/09
Golden Fluid Acrylic

I like to think of this blackbird flying away with her heart as a part of Flying Girl, herself. Where is her other glove? That thing that cradled her and kept her warm and holds her scent? Oh, it flew away as a bird, taking her courage with it.

I'm thinking about secret #6 in the 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women, and this is is my saboteur. Myself. My own doing. Giving away my power by giving my fear power.

To tell the truth, I am doing SO much better than I used to. I am recovering from my external saboteurs, and my fears. I have been working at it a long time. The more I can identify them, the less power over me they have.

The fear of being successful and of failure. The fear of criticism. The fear of being powerful. The fear of money. I am working on all of these things so hard. Often I can't address them head on, but have to go around the other side, sneaky like.

If I focus on doing my business cards, which I have been struggling with, and I go back to it 4 times, will I fool my fears into thinking each baby step is smaller than it is and I am not going to have to actually work my way up to owning my creativity, my business, my power?

If I stop revising my novel where I am stuck, and instead print it all out and go over it again, maybe with some coffee out in the garden while the kids are playing and the meatballs are on the crockpot (my first attempt at this, I'll tell you how it works out) will my gremlins get caught unawares?

If I keep painting every night, and build up a body of work, will my fears get pooh poohed away when I finally do get the shop opened, and all of a sudden have dozens of pieces for sale and I will actually be in business, instead of just thinking about it?

When Flying Girl catches that rogue blackbird and dons the power again... will she be able to use that power of fear to help her fly?

You know what? I just realized I am farther along in my process than I thought I was. I thought I was just being lazy, wasting my day and not working on my novel. But I've been doing work behind my own back.

Take that you mean old gremlin/blackbirds!

Flying Girl and the Heart, or Hide and Seek

Flying Girl and the Heart, or Hide and Seek
2/13/09
Golden Fluid Acrylics on paper 5x8"

I believe in synchronicity. I believe that we are all connected to the universe and to eachother, and things actually happen for a reason. It may not be a reason that is nice and happy for us little people scurrying about, but it's a reason, all the same. Sometimes, if you can tap into that synchronicity, those rhythms and patterns and intuitions and alignments and coincidences, then you can make something from them. Maybe you can make some sense. Maybe you can just make a painting.

That's what happened with this one. I get the feeling there's some deeper meaning here, but really, it just came about through coincidence.

First, Ivy was hiding in her room behind the curtains, which are wine colored. She was wearing a lavender nightgown, the wall was white/shadowed, and the trim was black. The color combination struck me, and I wanted to paint it. Then, I realized it was valentines day, and I should try to make some tiny effort to incorporate that into something, despite the fact that I don't celebrate the hearts and flowers holiday. (hey, yo! you wanna buy some long stem red roses? Only a hunnerd bucks a dozen!) So I thought she should be carrying a heart.

Sometimes love seems like that, to me. Hide and seek. Pull away, go into shadows, open up in joy. Really love of anything. The up and down in and out of love. Can it just go calmly and smoothly in one line? Can it stay the same and never change? I don't think so. It's always peekaboo. Sometimes we have to go hunting. Sometimes we have to call olly olly oxenfree. Sometimes we have to end the game and say, "here I am."

Looking at other incidences of synchronicity, Karen at Beelieve points out

Forty years ago, the intuitive words of a song called Aquarius, brought the dawning of the new age into our collective awareness:

When the Moon is in the seventh house

and Jupiter aligns with Mars.

Then love will rule the planets

and peace will steer the stars

At dawn on 14^th February the Cosmos actually embodies this perfect alignment to support our collective manifestation of love and peace and dawning of the Age of Aquarius.

Yes. It is finally the age of Aquarius, a time for enlightenment and inclusiveness, not the polarity of us vs them, but the holistic WE.

The thought makes me sing, "let the sun shine, let the sun shine, the sun shine in...." which leads me back to yesterday's post.

Sing it with me folks.