How To Reappear

How To Reappear: Listen To Your Heart Beating, by Rowena Murillo

The process of coming back from a fallow creative period can be very difficult.

Uhm, like, REALLY difficult.

I think we do a lot of self flagellation over not being able to create. Hand wringing, hair pulling, shirt rending. Metaphorically, I hope.

If you're an artist, shouldn't it be EASY to create? Shouldn't it come naturally? Shouldn't it be something you want to do and like doing? Shouldn't it be fun?

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. It should.

Except for when it isn't. Because sometimes creating is hard and it's like pulling teeth and you want to avoid it because it is facing things you really don't want to confront and it's not fun at all because, goshdarnit, it is hard work! And that is just as it should be, too.

So, yeah. I've been in a deep creative funk, at this point for a couple of years. I'm always trying to get it back, I'm often doing projects and writing novels and snapping photos and writing in my journal and taking workshops  and doing challenges and these are all good ways to get your mojo back, but in some ways, I've lost my direction.

At some point, I have to pull all my little projects together and make it mean something. Something for myself, give it a purpose.

But what happens if I don't know what purpose I want to have?

I wonder, maybe, if this is the reason for my creative slump.

Maybe instead of spending my time with figuring out what projects I want to do, or how I want to do them or when I have time to squeeze them in, perhaps I need to spend some time working on WHY I want to be creative.

Why? What is my purpose? What fills my life with meaning? What is that something that keeps me going?

Another problem.

How the heck are you supposed to figure out that?

To answer that, I refer back to the drawing. Follow the things you love. Follow the things that fill your heart with gladness. Follow the things that make your heart say "yes." Just keep following them.

Take real steps to make those things a part of your life. Find the "yes," say "yes" to it. Do.  Don't imagine it, don't say "oh that's really nice, I should try that, what's playing on netflix?" (btdt)

Do.

Create.

Shooting in the Dark

Shooting in the Dark

One night, past sundown, I was sitting in a lovely little waterside bar, with my new camera beside me. I had missed the sunset, arriving just a bit too late. It was getting darker and there wasn't much to see.

My plans for capturing the sunset had failed, but I said to myself, "self, what do you have to lose?" And I picked up the camera and took a picture. Even though it was too dark to really see. Even though I'd tried dark shoots with my old, crappy camera, and it was always a crap shoot.

And then I looked at the picture I had just taken.

Water!
Egrets!
Boat!
Pilings!
Nature Preserve!
Deep blue with just a touch of pink!

Now, I am not a professional photographer. I just like to play with pictures and capture pretty things. I consider it a hobby and a tool, and myself an amateur. I couldn't tell you why this camera takes such better pictures although my uncle the photographer tried to explain it to me. I can't explain anything about apertures or shutter settings. I forgot that after my long ago high school photography class. I am relieved to not have to deal with developing or chemicals or any of that stuff from the last generation. I just like to be able to play.

And I can also recognize when an image sizzles.

Here's the lesson I learned.

Take the chance. Even when you are not sure what might come out, what the results might be. Even when you feel like you don't know what you're doing and you have missed your opportunity. You have nothing to lose. Take the chance. Even though you feel like you are going blind and don't understand anything, trust yourself and take the chance.

It might not end up like what you expected.

It might be better.

I May Wander But I Am Not Lost, Turning Failures into Something New

Sometimes, when I am printing up one of my paintings that someone ordered, something will go wrong. The ink will splotch or an unnoticed spot will appear or the colors will be off or I tried to use the wrong paper or something will smudge or the printer will break down or it just won't be right.

I won't send those prints out. I will stick them in a box and pray the next print comes out. Every once in a while, that one doesn't, or the next one doesn't. So every once in a while, I go through my boxes and files of failures and look for something that I can take and do something with, make something of.

I had a whole series of prints where the color was off. I finally just took them out and chopped them up into little bookmarks. This is one. You can see the tip of a flying girl's foot right above the 'wander.'

I thought this was a kind of fitting metaphor for life, and a good illustration of Tolkien's quote.

I wander from my path. I fail in my endeavors. I get lost in the details or in the living. Then I unpack all my mistakes, and see what I have learned, how I have grown, what I can make from my failures.

Interestingly, I'm doing the same thing with writing. I'm doing Nanowrimo in a few days where I will write 50k words in a new novel in the month of November. I've done nano for the last 7 years. I dropped out last year because life was just in too much upheaval, but even the two years before that, where I met my wordcount goal, I wrote stories that were failures as stories. The first of those stories didn't work, so I tried again the next year, and that one didn't work either.

They wandered. They wandered terribly into places that didn't make sense and didn't seem to get me where I needed to go, narratively speaking. I explored paths the story wasn't ready to take, and so the "novels" I wrote never went anywhere. That would be 100k words of a novel that wandered, without ever getting where it needed to go.

So here I am again, getting ready to write that novel that I failed at twice before. Unpacking those hundred thousand words, reading them, salvaging what I could.

And I chopped that sucker up, just like the bookmark. My new outline starts with the one scene that worked in the first novelistic failure.The same scene that I started again with the second novelistic failure. After reading both drafts, I realize that my second draft improved greatly on the first draft of the scene, so I got ONE thing out of rewriting it twice.

My new outline for this twice attempted book is taking an entirely different direction. The book, while it has the same characters and basic premise, will have an entirely different flavor. I believe it will be richer and smarter and darker. It will mean more.

Because the thing is, I have learned things over these last three years of failed noveling that have actually gotten me past the struggle I was having with writing the new story. Some of those lessons are about writing and character and plot, but some of those things are about myself, living, love, fear and pain.

I am very optimistic about my writing for this nano, and about the story I am going to tell. Is it because this time I put my energy into planning and outlining instead of winging it like I tried for the last three years? Quite possibly. Or is it because in my wanderings I have grown and am now ready to write the story that needs to be written? Maybe that, too.  I may wander, but I am not lost.

Write. Just Do It.

Write, or Pink Smith Corona

To reach your dream, you have to make a commitment, a real, solid, painful commitment, much like a marriage. It's a better or worse kind of scenario. It's the kind of commitment where you forsake all others, and give up other things to stay true to the dream. If for instance, you dream of being a writer, you may think only of the wild and alive story that you have brought into the world, the glories of publishing, the swagger of being that writer with the pen in hand and the journal, sitting at the cafe like some Parisian bohemian, drinking strong black coffee and pouring his soul out onto the page. But being a writer is often a lot uglier than that. It's struggling with the days when the words don't come. It's a deadly dull day job or grinding financial struggle. It's rejection letters. It's fear and insecurity. It's isolating. It's the hundreds of pages that you have to delete because you were just going down the wrong track. It's your laptop dying when you didn't save, when you had finally figured it out, and were *that* close to the masterpiece of your dreams. It's that moment when you say, "Forget it. I give up. It's too hard."

A lot of the time, when we think about our dreams, we only see the hilights, the pretty pictures, the golden light streaming through the windows and the joy of achieving what you have worked for all that time.

But the truth is, dreams are hard work and they have shadows, too. They are full of struggles, confusion, failure, drudgery, dust bunnies, neglected children, neglected health, being broke, lonely days, detours, breakdowns of many varieties, long stretches of silence, block and giving up.

But if this dream is really your dream, if you love the journey, not just the idea of accomplishment, if you love the work, then trust yourself, trust that when you come back, your dream will be waiting for you and you can climb your way back onto the path. But, it's hard. Don't think it will be easy. If you really want this, and you have lost your way, you will have to claw your way back, regain the ground that you lost inch by inch. But believe in your dream and believe in yourself, because it's that belief that makes the dream possible, even when it seems like it isn't.

PS  This is my 1000th post. I think that is why I've had such a bloggers block this year. I knew this momentous post was coming up and I wanted to make it a landmark, important. I made the stakes too high and it kept me from writing. One Thousand blog posts. ONE THOUSAND. Even thinking about it kind of blows my mind. So perhaps, instead of making this a special post, I will just quietly go back to writing my blog, one post at a time, the way I wrote every one of those thousand entries, without trying to make it momentous. Maybe I'll reward myself with a new sweater. Or a cake. Cake is good.

PPS I'm also doing nanowrimo this year. Is anyone else taking the challenge? I am rosymamacita over on nanowrimo if you want to buddy up.

PPPS I have prints of Write or Pink Smith Corona up for sale in my shop. You notice it says "Write" not, "Hey, why don't you think about writing and avoid the blank page until you are absolutely 100% sure you have it all perfectly down and will not make any mistakes and really really know what you're doing and are totally confident and the circumstances are just perfect and you're not tired or stressed out or don't have to go deep clean the kitchen." Just write. Do it.

PPPPS Yay me for sitting down and writing this blog entry instead of just thinking about it for more weeks on end. 

Reintegration and finding yourself not lost

Reintegration by Rowena Murillo

There are times on our journey where we might find ourselves lost.

The answers that we are accustomed to do not address the questions that we are being asked.

We might find ourselves confused, and aimless, at a loss.

What now?

Here's something that I have learned over my long journey.

These times of crisis are not a failure, they are part of the process.

The important questions will be asked again. The important answers will have meaning again. And the important paths are the ones we are still walking, even though the signposts no longer show us the way.

Keep going.

You will find yourself again.

In Which The Psyche Throws A Temper Tantrum

YES (nononononononono...)

I've been thinking about this post for a while. And each time I think about it, I don't do it.

It's about resistance.

We've decided that we are going to do something. We are going to change our lives. We're going to reach for our goals. We're going to go for that thing that we've always wanted but haven't been able to do and then, we say YES, now it's time for me to achieve.

And we make our goals and set up our tasks and shoot for the stars.

And then we come upon the resistance.

We choose not to sit down and write. Or we pick up that bag of cookies. Or we turn on the tv instead of making those phone calls... whatever it is.

Part of this process of changing our lives and taking action on our dreams is facing resistance.

When we make our commitments, the little angry, scaredy cat inside of us all of a sudden gets really loud and demanding. It doesn't like the idea that it is losing power. The 'no's get louder. The 'yes'es get overwhelmed. It finds its ways to be the center of our attention, to stop the forward momentum that will leave it behind, to be in control of your life.

And this is part of the process.

We all face resistance. We all back slide. We all have roadblocks of our own device. We all have fears and anxieties that flare up and take over like a toddler.

It's okay. You don't have to let the the resistance win.

When my kids have a temper tantrum, I tell them that it's okay for them to feel their upset, to be angry or afraid or hurt, I tell them that their feelings about things are valid, but it is not okay for them to take out their upset on other people, or use that upset to control the family. I send them to their room to feel their anger. I sit with them and talk to them about it.  I ask them if they're ready to move on. I talk to them about what they could be doing now if they weren't having a temper tantrum. I ask them what they'd really like to be doing. And when they are done being upset, they come out of their room and we move on with our day.

That's a child. Your own resistance is something different.

Breathe through it. Relax into it. Accept that your fears and anxieties are valid feelings, but may not reflect the reality of the situation. Acknowledge the resistance. Recognize that this is part of our defense mechanism that has served to protect us. It may not be what we need right now to move forward, so pay attention to the voices that are resisting your forward movement. Thank them for protecting you. And then tell them that you don't need them right now, you are quite safe already and are intent on moving forward with your goals.

And then do so.

Today Is A Day To Honor Who You Are, or Self Portrait With Eyes Closed

Self Portrait: Eyes Closed

One of the things we can forget to do when we try to step out into our dreams, is to remember who we are.  It's so easy to look at all the wonderful things that are out there, the beautiful paintings, the beautiful people, the talented folks, the successful business people, the brave and exciting and important paths that people take and think, "Oh, that is just not me."

We compare ourselves to everyone else and decide that we are lacking. They have it. We don't.

It's so easy to do. So easy to focus on the negative and the flaws.

So today, I'm going to look at myself as if I weren't me, as if I wasn't privy to all the fears and failures and missteps and dead ends that I've gotten caught up in. I'm going to look at only my own beauty and talent and success and bravery and adventures and contributions to the world.

I'm going to make a list of the things I am good at, the things I know how to do, the things I can speak with authority on. I'm going to list my successes, because for all my failures in life, I've had successes, too, we all have. I'm going to focus, today, on who I am as a positive force in the world. What I can give. The effect I have had. I am going to focus on my own power.

Try it yourself. Try making a list of all your strengths... without adding caveats and exceptions and 'buts' and trying to convince yourself that you're not that good. Write out the ways you are wonderful and beautiful and strong. Take stock of your own strength and power and abilities. Every time those negative voices come up, tell them, 'thanks for sharing, but we're only looking for positive qualities now.' Ignore the negative and move on to the next positive.

It takes practice to look at the positive aspects of yourself without that negative voice, without the pessimism and doubts and fears. So practice. Answer that internal 'I suck' voice with a new internal 'I rock' voice... even if you don't believe it at first. Keep focusing on your own greatness, and sooner or later, you might even start believing it.

Look Out Now or Flying Girl Makes It Through The Storm

Look Out Now, or Flying Girl Makes It Through The Storm
Pencil, Ink and Acrylic paint on vintage Alice in Wonderland book page
7 1/4" x 4 3/4" on 8 1/2"x 11"

This is my first flying girl in quite some time.

I'm not sure what the lesson here is, unless it's about learning how to breathe again after being buffeted about by the winds of fate.

Or perhaps remembering the lessons that I have already learned.

Or perhaps life is guaranteed to knock you around a bit, but if you manage to come out the other side, it is a lesson, not the doom that it felt like when you were caught in the middle of it.

That sounds suspiciously like "this too shall pass," but that's ok since that's one of my favorite old sayings.

Maybe the wisdom of getting older is learning to hunker down and wait it out, and understanding that there is  always going to be something better on the other side. Time goes faster than we think and we are stronger than we know.

Maybe this is just a reminder. It gets better. We get stronger.

Prints of this painting is for sale here:
https://www.etsy.com/listing/122841807/look-out-now-or-flying-girl-makes-it

There Are No Failures, Not Even This One

Yesterday, I had the sudden urge to carve myself a new shop stamp.

I love all things handmade, and enjoy the thought of doing it myself.

I took my old stamp and inked it onto the new stamp carving material. You see, you have to do the carving in reverse in order to make it work out right when you stamp on paper.

Did any of you catch my mistake?

Oh yeah.

I out clevered myself. Using the old stamp as my outline, I had reversed the reverse and thus when I stamped, it was all wrong.

Unless of course, you hold the paper up to the sun and look through it. Ah. There's my nice stamp.

I really like the hand carved, hand written quality of it. It's what I do, make things by hand, right?

Pardon my issues with things like left and right, reversals, and negatives and positives. It shows up with arithmetic and numbers and even letters sometimes.  It actually turns out that I have a learning disability that I never knew about until I was a grown up. It's called dyscalculia and is like dyslexia with numbers. I can usually logic my way through things, but every so often, my problems come out. Sometimes I wonder if my life would have been different if I'd known about this learning disability. I did pretty well in school, mostly by trying to stay as far away as possible from math, but what if I'd had learning strategies? What if I knew why I could never remember how to figure out the math problems at home, even if I'd understood them in school. Who knows what I would have been doing now if I hadn't spent my formative years avoiding math?

Oh, don't worry, I turned my mistake around, literally, and used the backwards stamp to stamp a NEW block of carving material, and this time, when I carved it, it was in the CORRECT direction.

I used it to stamp some cute new little bookmarks for my shop.

This brings me to my lesson for the day.

There are no failures.

There are just steps we take on our journey.

It could all be falling down around your ears, but if you keep going, if you fight your way through, and come out the other side, everything that fell down before becomes something to help you climb higher. Every mistake you make, every flaw you possess leads you to the positive outcomes of your life. Every struggle you fight through, even if you lose, makes you stronger for your next endeavor... which might not be a fight at all, which might be made easier, which might even be a pleasure, because of all the hard lessons you learned in your failures.

The stamp carving went smoothly. I already knew it would work. And I solved the problems of the previous attempt, and I was confident in my abilities, so the tension of tiny work was not there. It went faster and more smoothly.

And voila. I have my stamp. It took a little longer than I wanted, but sometimes that's just the way life is. There are bumps and detours on our life journey.

Maybe it just makes us ready when we get to our destination.

Head of a Girl from the Past, and Changing

Head of a Girl from the Past
ink on moleskine


I have lost count of what number "head of a girl" this is. I've decided to go with names form now on, rather than numbers. What started out as an exercise to see what I could do with ink wash portraits has begun to take on meaning on its own, it's begun to become something of its own.

I suppose that's the nature of a series. It serves as a way for you to grow. You keep going back to the same theme or technique and you develop it with each following piece.

I don't know where this series will go. It's led me back to portraits, which I've always enjoyed, so that's good, and also drawing from references again, instead of making things up wholesale in my head. That's not a bad thing either.

In this season of beginning of the year resolutions I've been thinking about change a lot.

I think sometimes we expect to be able to change, just like that, make a resolution and that's it, quit cigarettes, lose weight, get published, go back to school... whatever the goal. But I don't think that change, real change really works like that.

Change doesn't happen all at once, it happens in stages and baby steps. Change is more like growth, or evolution. Change is something that happens inside of you first, that makes you want to take that small step, and the small step is what helps you get to the next choice, and making that choice convinces you that this is where you want to go.

Maybe change begins with an idea, "I can do that..." or "I don't have to be this..." A possibility. An idea. A realization that the dream is possible, an opening of doors, a willingness to take a chance, a first step out on that long journey, the beginning attempts at an exercise, even if they fail at first, and the commitment to keep trying, even though it doesn't seem like you will ever see that desired, whole-sale change or growth.

Maybe life is all about change. We have the illusion that things won't change or we will always be where and what we are, but the truth is, nothing stays the same and we are always in flux.

Perhaps part of our issues with making lasting change in our life is that we don't expect to fail in our attempts. We think that we make up our mind to change and that's it, it should be smooth sailing from then on in. But change is such a all encompassing thing, from the inside out, that it doesn't make sense that it would be all that easy.

There are going to be set backs. There are going to be moments where you are just not living up to your high ideals. There are going to be moments when you are scared and don't think you can do it. There are going to be moments where the old fears and bad feelings rise up again. There are going to be external difficulties, time constraints, people who don't support us, physical difficulties, unexpected disasters, whatever.

But in our journey to truly change, to GROW and develop and transform, we have to trust that the path we've set out on is the right one. And if it isn't as easy as we thought, we are still moving forward, despite stumbles or road blocks or detours. Sometimes, our journey might lead us into places we didn't expect, places we didn't dare hope for. Sometimes we might find we have to rest on our journey, or stop not quite at the end, or re-evaluate our destination.

Keep going. Don't give up. Expect set backs. Trust yourself. Trust the process.

Change is hard. Growth is hard. Life is hard.  Yup. So we might as well just keep going through.

Hush or Keeping It Inside

Hush, or Alice Keeps It Inside
4 3/4 x 7 1/2"
ink and acrylic on vintage Alice in Wonderland book page

I've taken a little blog break. You see, I've had a lot going on.

I know I was blogging last year when I was in the midst of a move and I was blogging all my art from my 100 days challenge but I think that I had a moment to stop and think about where I wanted to go and what I wanted to do... and in order to think about that with my blog, I had to stop.

What I've thought about doing lately is making my blog more intentional, and I haven't quite figured out how I'm going to do it yet.

Sometimes there is virtue in being quiet.

In quiet, we can start listening to our internal voices, and these voices can whisper very silently sometimes. We have to stop talking, stop declaring ourselves, stop shouting to the world, just so that we can hear the whispers of intuition, emotion, idea, belief, desire, fear, hope, story, inspiration.

I know that it can be hard to be quiet and still, to not jump right in to actions or decisions. Sometimes, when you get that initial idea, it can be so exciting that you want to race to the finish line and go all in.

But the truth is, very often, the initial idea, or even not so initial, needs care and silence and darkness in order to grow to fruition. I've seen it with story ideas, for sure. I get a great idea and I want to start writing, but something in me tells me to hold on, let the idea germinate, let it grow and become stronger, let it feed on different thoughts and experiences, mull it over in the darkness. I sit with it deliberately, jot down a few notes, go to sleep with the idea in my head, throw in another intriguing concept, stir them up a bit and still... still hold on to it, silently.

There is no need to rush to speak it.

Not yet.

Hush. There is time to let it grow.

The Evolution of a Doll, Creating Yourself

 Every day, I feel like I am creating myself. Who I am as a mother, as an artist, as a friend and partner and sister and daughter. Who I am as a thinker and a doer.

It's an evolution not unlike creating... art, crafts, food, novels, business plans, outfits, papers... whatever.

Dolls.

Like this here doll I made my daughter for Christmas.

Here she is, nothing but a sketched out pattern and some upcycled t-shirt material.  I took my scissors to it and cut away everything that she was not.

Leaving her with a basic, disassembled, empty shape.

 In this scene, my doll has been sewn up and filled with stuffing. I've begun to MAKE her, to take the ideas of her and put her into reality, give her form and shape. She's a doll now. Anyone could look at her and say, that's a doll. (Here she's sitting next to another gift, unformed, which turned out to be a pink kitty.)

You see the thing is, nothing we create will ever get to BE anything until we actually start, until we put it through that sewing machine, and take it all the way, see what happens with all that machinery and sharp pointy things and fears of what might go wrong or how the machine might break down (mine did) or how we might forget how to use the mighty machinery (I didn't) or maybe my doll might not look like what I wanted her to look like (she didn't really look like what I imagined at all, she became her own thing.) You just have to do it. Put yourself out there and say, YES, I will do this thing.

Once you have the basic shape of your doll, that's when you can start putting your personality into her. That's when you can start giving her the colors, trying out different ways of making her look. Here, I'm giving a go to see how the different colored felt pieces might make her look, trying out some placements for her cheeks and eyes and lips and hair. This was not the first combination I tried. I held up different colors, cut out many little circles, tried different shapes and sizes. And this was not the first time I'd made this kind of doll face, either, she is just another variation on work that I've already done.

 Here I have committed to my choices. I've gone and pinned them down. Made them real and permanent. There's no more changing my mind on the color of eyes or lips. Again, did she turn out like I thought she would? Not quite. But in the sewing, in the doing, she became her own thing, not just an idea, but a doll. This doll.

 Then I tried some of the stuff I'd never tried before. Always in the past, I'd made hair with yarn or embroidery floss, but this time I knew I wanted to try felt. How would it work? I didn't know. It was an experiment, something new to try, a risk. And I gave it a shot.

 Here she is with face and hair, after all my giving it a go and planning and making my ideas come real and trying out different variations and committing to my choices and stitching it all down and making it real.

She's a doll.

 I like her.

Originally, she was inspired by two things... the scrap fabric I had, aka brown t-shirt, and the vintage doll dress. I made the original pattern so that she would fit into this dress. After that, I allowed myself to be inspired by the various dolls I have seen and loved and by what I had already done with doll making. I mean, this is why you have a daughter, right? To make girly stuff for them?

It doesn't matter that she didn't like the yellow dress on this doll and made me make her a pink dress out of scrap fabric, right?  Or that she'll probably change the scrap pink dress, even though she designed it, and put her in a different vintage doll dress.

What matters is I went all the way in and trusted my abilities and my judgment and gave it a go. What matters is I took it to the end of the journey and didn't give up. What matters is I made it. I thought of it, dreamed it, planned it, trouble shot it, detailed it, put it all together and then put it out into the world, I mean, gave it to a five year old.

Make a doll. Make a craft. Make a painting. Make a novel. Make a home. Make a business. Make a life. Create yourself. Those things are not you, and yet, the making of them makes you.

What are you making?

Head of a Girl 14 or Marilyn in Rose and Dreaming

Head of a Girl 14, or Marilyn in Rose
ink wash on watercolor paper
4.5" x 6"
1/6/13

I've been thinking about dreams lately... not the close your eyes at night kind, the big kind, the kind that get you up in the morning and get you moving. The kind where you envision a life that you'd love living. The kind that are about goals and wishes. Those kind of dreams.

Marilyn Monroe was a dreamer. She put herself out there and she was hurt. She never stopped being vulnerable and I think she achieved her dreams... although perhaps sometimes those dreams ended up being painful and sometimes she had to sacrifice for them and she definitely experienced loss in their pursuit.

When you commit to your dreams... what happens?

When you take steps to achieve your dearest goals... how does your life change?

When you accept that this is the risk you are willing to take and this is the cliff you are willing to leap from... how do you learn how to fly?

btw Marilyn is for sale in my etsy shop
https://www.etsy.com/listing/119788654/head-of-a-girl-14-marilyn-in-rose-ooak

Learning How To Say Yes 72-77/100 in 100 days

Yes (gold and silver)

pencil and acrylic

72/100

One of the things I have to practice is saying yes to life. My first impulse is always to say no. The farther out of my comfort zone things are, the more likely I am to say no, or just clam up and hide.

I've learned to get around this impulse. I make myself little reminders, like this painting of YES. Or I try to change my automatic internal dialogue into something more positive. I ask myself, what's the worst that could happen? I join blog challenges to do one brave thing a day. Sometimes, I just hold my breath and jump in.

Another thing I do to help myself learn to take chances and try new things and go for my goals, is to take baby steps. For instance, I wanted to do more portraits, try something new, really get into it. So I started small. The earlier recent portraits are an example. The first ones were a bit over 3"x5.5". Note paper size. And then I moved up to vintage book pages at about 4.5"x7". The scrap paper and left over book pages are not only small, but because they are "scrap" the stakes are lowered for me. This enables me to take chances, to risk things not working out... because it's just experimenting.

 

 Head of a Girl 9
ink on vintage Alice in Wonderland Page
4.5"x7"
73/100
Here my experiments get a bit larger. Practicing with the same image, trying new things, learning the technique, branching out.

 Head of a Girl 10
ink on paper, moleskine
5"x8"
74/100
Now on plain paper. This is not watercolor paper and it absorbed the ink strangely. Something I actually thought was interesting, so I decided to try something a bit more challenging

Ivy
ink on paper, moleskine
5x8"
75/100

I painted my daughter. I always find painting kids to be very challenging, because the features are so soft and rounded. But after experimenting with these vintage portraits and the ink, I went for it anyway.

I decided that I like the stronger shadows better. Gives me something else to grab onto with the sepia ink, but all in all, I don't think this is a bad attempt, for a first attempt. Usually, when I do portraits, I do myself... since I am always there and I don't complain when I model. And since the advent of digital photography, I don't even need a mirror, I can just snap a picture and paint it from my camera.

 Selfie
ink on peper
5x8"
76/100

Like here. A painting of a snapshot. This is definitely not my best self portrait, but I'm okay with it. Remember, part of this whole series, aside from getting my numbers up on my 100 in 100 challenge, is to take baby steps towards the harder challenges. Experimenting. Trying new things. Lowering the stakes and the pressure that I put on myself to get things right, and be perfect.

The process of trying out new things with low stakes is also a process of being open to whatever comes... whether it is a surprising aspect of a medium or a new idea of what I might try next.

Head of a Girl 11
ink on paper
5.5"x8.5"
77/100

(does anyone else find it funny that my page sizes are going up in half inch increments?)

This last painting was done this morning when I had a brilliant idea to use acrylic on top of my ink paintings... except I liked how this turned out, with it's strong shadows and pretty girl, so much, that I didn't want to touch it with the experiment.

You see? I stopped the willingness to try new things because I got attached to this "perfection." Not that I think it's perfect, but that I didn't want to "ruin" it.

Luckily, with this series, I am gaining enough facility in the medium and style that I can paint another head of a girl and experiment with that one. Maybe I should go back to my usual head of a girl, so that I can feel more comfortable with trying something new without ruining the existing work.

Being an artist does not mean you are always confident in what you create. Taking chances is part of the territory. Every blank page is the chance to make a masterpiece or a disaster that will make you climb back into bed and hide under the covers.

Learning to get out there, becoming comfortable with the risk, trying things that you've never done before... facing your fears... this is part of being an artist. This is part of being a human, actually. It's a hard lesson, and sometimes you have to relearn it.

Pulling it Together 67-71/100

 Head of a Girl 8 (Tilly Losch)
ink on vintage Alice in Wonderland Page
67/100

Like I said before, I am trying to put my house together, trying to pull together all the pieces of myself and my art and make it whole again.

It's remarkable how confusing and disorganized things can get. Or sometimes maybe we just need a break. Maybe we just need to step back and get some distance so that we can look at things and say "yes, this is what I want," or "no, this is not where I want to go."

So sometimes it helps to stop the go go going and be silent, to see what once was there, what is there now, and what you want to be there.

Found Still Life
(flowers, pencil, miniature houses, toy leash, and vintage contact paper on the counter)
68/100

This one is a case of looking and seeing what is already there.

I looked down at the corner of my craft cabinet counter, and saw this little still life, just sitting there. I gasped and grabbed my camera and started snapping away. It's where I'd tossed a few things that I was done with, the little houses from yesterday, the handful of garden flowers that my daughter gave me, whose stems were too short for a vase, the yellow pencil, and the broken purple toy leash that I told my daughter I'd fix.

It's interesting, because although it took me a few tries to frame it right, and I did remove extraneous items away from the composition, when I tried to "make it right", when I took away the junky purple toy leash, the composition went flat.

It was there. And I needed to pay attention to it, to see it for what it was, a snap shot of life, color, line and texture. Movement in stillness and discards. There's something about those bleeding heart flowers that seem to me to be always moving, even when they are just sitting there, wilting.

"Day" Flying Girl Articulated Paper Doll
acrylic on paper, metal brads
69/100

And then, sometimes, you have to work and think about something, plan it out and put it together.

I've been thinking about making a Flying Girl Paper Doll for a while, but never got around to it, because I knew it would be a bit of work and commitment.  Sometimes life is like that. You take ideas from the past and finally sit down to work on them, make them into something, even if you're not sure that they really will work out.

 Reveal
Pen and watercolor on paper
70/100

Here's a sketch I made, without real plans, just allowing it to come to be, although, again, I am pulling on past sketches and motifs.  I don't think that everything is actually revealed, here, even though it's called reveal. Perhaps time will be the big reveal.

Belated Bunny with Big Legs
Repurposed velour, cotton knit, buttons, thread, polyfill
71/100

And here's the stuffed bunny I started almost three years ago and never got around to finishing. It went three years without eyes or legs.

Even now, my daughter tells me that the legs are wrong and I need to make them smaller. I guess she's right, they don't really fit this bunny.

Belated Bunny (detail)

But she's kinda cute anyway.

Well, I continue to try to pull together my house, and my art and my writing. I'm working on my synopsis for my novel and my query letter... something that has needed to be done for quite some time.

Like I said, sometimes it takes a commitment to pull together all the disparate efforts, all the history and the knowledge and the ideas. And sometimes it takes a re-commitment, after a period of silence.

We shall see.

How To Never Give Up (Except When You Just Give Up)

Below by Rowena Murillo

acrylic on paper.  

5.5"x8.5"

30/100 in 100 days creative project

I give up.

Except I don't.

I have made the decision that nanowrimo is not right for me this year. I'm not going to try to write a 500k word first draft of a novel (good or bad) in the month of November for the first time in seven years. It doesn't mean I am giving up, it just means I am giving up on this.

Because what I need to do in a time like this, a time of transition and responsibility and to do lists that are miles long and feeling like I am underwater, is refocus my goals, not to the short term commitments, or the ones I think I "should" do, but to the serious who-I-really-am-and-what-I-really-want-to-do-with-my-life goals.

Sorry nanowrimo, but rather than writing a new novel that I don't really have a plan for and don't really care that much about and which is not really ready to be written, I have a novel (from nanowrimo 2009) that needs a final rewrite and also needs to go out looking for an agent. 

So I give up on nanowrimo 2012.

But giving up does not mean you give up. 

This is what I'm learning about never giving up, believe me, it isn't easy.

Stand by Rowena Murillo

acrylic and graphite on paper

5.5"x 8.5"

29/100 in 100

Life doesn't always care what your intentions and goals and dreams are. Things go wrong. Other things become more important. You don't get where you thought you would get. People say no. Failure happens. You try and try and try and do everything right and you get nowhere. You mess up and make poor decisions and don't always do the right thing and are imperfect and generally human. Your hopes and expectations are dashed.

This is the point where you can decide to give up. Period.

Maybe that's okay. Maybe it's not the end of the world if you give up on your past dreams and let go of where you thought you'd be and just make peace with who and where you are. Maybe you've grown out of your dreams and find other things more important. Maybe you're holding onto those dreams just because you've always defined yourself by those dreams. Let me tell you, you are actually more than your dreams. And you can always find new dreams. You can refocus and discover new goals and passions. There's nothing wrong with that, because there are a kajillion worthy dreams out there and a bazookillion wasy to reach those dreams. 

So give up. I give you permission. If giving up is what you decide is right for you.

Mom by Rowena Murillo

graphite on paper

5.5"x8.5"

31/100 in 100

If, however, you decide that giving up is just not right for you, if your dreams are too integral to your happiness and you just can't bear to let go of them, then let's figure out this not giving up thing.

So okay, it's been hard. 

Things haven't worked out the way you thought they might. Life took over. You feel your dreams slipping away. And, dammit, you are not going to let them go without a fight. What do you do? What do you do?

Figure out where you are right now. What is working? What is not working? Where are you putting your energy? What is feeding your energy and filling you up? What is draining your energy? What do you need? 

What are the absolute, non negotiable necessities in your life? Make sure you have them.

What are the priorities? What has to come first, no matter what? Put them first.

What fills you with joy? What recharges your batteries? Make room for that. You might have to give up other things in order to do so. Think about what is non essential in your life, or things which are destructive even. You can let go of those, even if it's a habit and hard to let go of.

What drains you or weakens you? Either get rid of that or find a way to fix it. (warning: this might take an investment of time, energy and/or money.) 

This is about evaluating your life for what is working for you and what is not working for you. This is about re-evaluating your dreams and goals and needs and the path that you are on.

  

Incandescent by Rowena Murillo

acrylic on paper
5.5"x 8.5"
32/100 in 100

You need to figure out what are the things that fill you up, the things that give purpose to your life, the things that keep coming back to you, no matter how many detours in life you take. Figure out those things. Make them part of your priorities.

 I'm going to be honest.

I do not speak about giving up and not giving up lightly. This is hard work. It is hard to let go of things you were holding onto. And it is hard work to recommit and dig in and make those dreams work, too. But either way, it's worth it

For me, I've decided that I can give up on the exercise of nanowrimo. But I am not giving up on my writing. I am refocusing on my current novel, I am refocusing on my blogging and other non fiction writing. I am also committing to finish my 100 in 100 days creative project, even though I am a month behind. I'll be posting some artwork heavy blog posts, for a while, as I catch up on 100 days project, both posting things I've already done but not documented and new work.

I'm kind of excited to get back to painting, because for me, painting helps me focus and be creative... and this is what I want to be doing.

Inside, Outside, Upside Down, 11-13/100 Days Creative Challenge

 The Other Side of the River
acrylic on paper, 9/10/12
moleskine
012/100 in 100 days creative challenge

Boy, I am having a challenge keeping up with my 100 in 100 days creativity challenge. I was doing really well with the painting/drawing portion, going off on binges of paint and ink, and then...I just got stopped. The chaos of life and necessities of things I have to do and unexpected twists and chores and the paying kind of work and kids and blah.

But I never said this challenge would be easy, or smooth, and while I have gone through periods of painting every night like clockwork, day after day in a routine that kept me productive and creative, that is never a guarantee and sometimes, it's really hard work to get to that point.

I know life can get in the way.

The point is not to do the challenge without ever being challenged, the point is to meet the challenges, and find a way around them.

 Inside (drawing)
ink on recycled menu, 9/10/12
4"x8"
011/100 in 100 days creative challenge

I'm doing a lot of examination of my life and my art I think, trying to figure out where I want to go with it. Trying not to have the answers. I suppose what I am painting now does have more questions than answers. Is more mysterious, less about illustrating a point. I don't know where it is going, but I am trusting myself to be able to continue on in my journey, to be able to handle whatever is thrown at me.

The things that I thought would be easy are not so easy. The things I thought would be the main struggle are not an issue at all.

the light inside
acrylic on paper
8.5"x 5"
013/100 in 100 days creative challenge

I think I am in a blue period, like Picasso's, just by chance, because those are the colors I pulled out of my paint bag, and those are the colors I have been using for the last two weeks.

The last few times I did this challenge, I would pull out three or four different paint tubes and let my nightly painting be inspired by the randomness of the color scheme. I was surprised and delighted by this painting prompt sometimes, and came up with some of my favorite paintings out of it. Of course, sometimes the painting sucked, but that's ok.

This way of going at it, using the same color scheme again and again with different emphasis on the colors, using some similar techniques, using a limited palette, well, I kind of like it. It feels more poetic and less illustrative to me. It goes deeper. I don't mind. I find myself picking up additional paint tubes or media to add to my three tubes of paint. I don't mind that. As an exercise, I like the ability to become fluid within my constraints.

I know a lot of people think that being an artist is about being free and having no boundaries, but I think the truth is, it's often about it's often about looking through that one inch frame and seeing how infinite you can make that tiny space.

Well, I've run out of time. I have to get ready for work. Before I go, I did want to tell you that I have gotten back to my novel. I am up to chapter three in the revision in my first week of working on it. I don't know how quickly it will go or how consistently I can manage it. I've already found it a challenge to get back to it. I guess we'll see if I can manage to juggle my life of kids and work and chaos and painting and writing. Perhaps the painting and writing can give structure to the chaos.  We shall see.

Grow/Sun and Shadow. 04/100 Days Creative Challenge

Grow/Sun and Shadow
acrylic on paper
9/4/12
04/100 days creative challenge

I am taking this challenge as an organic one. Much like this drawing. Each day will grow out of the last one. Each painting will come from the last one. Each one leads to one. Like baby steps, leading to the end of the journey.

I don't know where I am going when I take my first step. At each step I look and evaluate where I am and what looks like the next best step. I ask myself, do I like where I am going? Does where I am going feel right? If yes, I continue. If no, I take a look and see if there is anything that I DO like about where I am. I go off in that direction. Or I see if I can adjust it somewhat to fill my needs.

Or I scrap it and follow some other dream/desire/necessity.

I don't have to know where I will end up. I just have to know who I am, what is most important to me, and that I will keep going until things start working out and making sense.

Yes?

Yes.

Babysteps get us where we want to go. We don't need to have the whole journey figured out when we start.

You Know The Answer

You Know The Answer

You know you do.

That thing that you know you need to do to make things work out... you just gotta do it. That choice you have to make? That step you have to take? Just do it.

It doesn't how we talk ourselves out of it, how hard we convince ourselves it is, how impossible it might be. My personal favorite excuse is "Oh I'm so tired, I can't." But the truth is, I know what needs to be done. And I can, even if it's hard and I have to break it down into baby steps and accept that results won't appear right away and maybe not even ever, but I still have to do it.

Putting it off doesn't make it better. It doesn't make the task ahead any easier. It doesn't make us happier in the long run (although, we might be filling our procrastination time with things that make us feel good in the moment).

You know the answer.

Yes, that's the answer I'm talking about.

The scary one.

The one that is really what you want, in your deepest of hearts. The one that you know is the truest of true.

The one that you really have to rise to reach, to be the person you know you want to be.

The one that is all about your dreams. All about your soul.

The RIGHT answer.

Do it.

Everything Changes, thoughts on life and non-attachment

everything changes
acrylic and pitt artist pen on paper
5"x8"

I'm not really sure where this came from. I drew it last night in my journal and then painted it this morning.  Well, I painted over it because I didn't like how it turned out.

I was looking at a video of Maira Kalman and I think she inspired me.  I've seen her work before, but I don't think I ever really thought about the woman herself or her philosophy. Anyway, after watching her video and looking at some of the illustrations that went with it, this is what popped into my head. Actually I think I had a different idea, but it was really late and the idea that came to me first would have entailed taking out all my paints and setting up my palette and it was really late. I didn't actually have time to start a whole painting unless I wanted to be up until past 2 am... which I didn't.  So I grabbed some pitt artist pens and started drawing whatever came to mind.

This was the original drawing. I didn't really like the pink-y raindrops and as soon as I added the purple ones I knew I'd made a big mistake.

So this morning, I looked at it again, thinking I might have to scrap it all, and stopped.

I didn't have to accept it as a disappointment. All I had to do was adjust it.

I had that power.

I took out my white paint and painted right over it. A couple coats and it was gone, with only a shadow of the original mistake to prove that I'd learned something.

Then I added my familiar hatchmarks/raindrops/time ticks.

Do I love it? Well, it's not my favorite. But it doesn't have to be a masterpiece.

It reminds me that I am not doomed by the mistakes I have made. It reminds me that every day is another day where we have the ability to act and interact and adjust things and make them work better for us than they do today. The world does not have to remain where it is. In fact, the world never ever remains where it is. It's always turning, always changing. It might seem as if life is static, but that's an illusion that we like to keep because it makes us feel comfortable.

This whole post might seem to contradict yesterday's post where i talk about accepting the season you are living, but in reality, I don't think it does. The thing is, if you accept your life for what it is, you can then work on changing things that actually are there without all the emotional resentment and attachment to the outcome.

I do think that this is the Buddhist concept of non-attachment. It is something that I have struggled with my whole life, really, since I first remember watching an old Sinbad movie, where Sinbad asks the genie what wish he would grant if it were his choice, and the genie grants Sinbad happiness. I remember thinking, "But no! What if his life is no good?  He can't be happy with it! He has to change it!"

But there it is. My journey with the concept of non-attachment started with an old Sinbad movie-- or was it Aladdin? Anyway, I think I've started to come around to realizing that non-attachment does not mean you don't want anything, but that you are not attached to the outcome, your happiness is not dependent upon a certain result. Because the truth is, even if you get that desired outcome, it will never stay. Because life is not static and everything changes.

Everything changes, the good and the bad. If we accept that, and if we accept life as it changes, whether we are directing the changes consciously or just letting it happen, then we can find happiness, even as the world is spinning in seeming chaos.

Well. Those are deep thoughts for the morning. I now have to run and get ready for work. I hope I'm making sense. I'm not sure I'd make better sense if I sat for hours and struggled over every word.  I'm not really sure I have it completely straight in my head, but the thoughts are a process, too, and they too can change.