I read it and I thought FINALLY!
I knew from the start that their art wasn't for everyone even though it was brilliant. I mean really, what does"everyone" know anyways? I mean, Everyone thinks it's a good idea to pay pro athletes millions of dollars a year while asking teachers to spend their own money on school supplies. Oops...sorry...that's a rant for another day.
This whole line of thinking brought to mind my "Things Mentally Strong Women Don't Do" series found Here, Here, Here, and Here. That series started a new theme for this blog...the idea that it's super important to keep yourself mentally strong if you are going to continue to create for a lifetime.
Ways to Create in Happiness
GRASP THAT YOU ARE ENOUGH
That's right ...repeat after me..."I am MORE than enough". You have everything you need to succeed in you and you don't need to go magically looking for it. Now, this is not to say that you don't need to study and practice more. It means that you have it inside yourself to do that. I love the quote, "Comparison is the thief of joy." Of course it is! Your inner critic is always going to be there to tell you that you suck! It's NOT true!! Ultimately, whatever you decide to study and practice and create is ENOUGH. Say it again..I am enough!
CREATE WHAT YOU WANT TO CREATE
Stop making what you think you should make and start making what you want to make. This is not supposed to be a job. It's supposed to be your passion. It's supposed to be fun. For me personally, most of the things the world thinks are fun, I personally don't. I like to do what I like to do. So do you! So create what you want to create, not what the latest trends tell you.
STOP SAYING SORRY
You do not have to make excuses about why you spend a lot of money on perfectly good fabric, cut it
up and spend hours sewing it back together. You do not have to feel guilty that you'd rather spend your vacation at a quilt retreat than on a beach. The hours you spend creating are productive and just as worthy as anything else you do in your life. Create guilt and apology free.
ACCEPT YOUR ART
Accept your art as a part of you..the good..the bad...the ugly. (Yes, I'm sorry. I'm a lifelong Eastwood fan). If you are looking for validation from outside yourself, you have a long wait. I remember someone saying to me that once she got into Quilt National she thought it would change how her work was perceived. That it would mean she had "made it". Since I thought she was joking, I laughed. I felt terrible for her when I realized she wasn't. Accept your art...it is truly amazing because it came from you!
Okay, that's this week's hug to you !!
So under this week's likes...
I got my tickets to hear Fran Lebowitz talk in the fall. Fran, if you don't know is an author/social commentator from New York City. I love how she's unapologetically outspoken on all sorts of topics. I love her insights on today's culture as well as yesterday's. It's not that we always agree, but I love how she takes the whole "Freedom of Speech" wholeheartedly. I highly recommend her Netflix DocuSeries, Pretend It's a City. It's hysterical as well as enlightening!
So What Have You Been Up to Creatively?
4 comments:
Great post! You made such important points about being creative. I once tried to have an Etsy shop for the jewelry I made. My intention was that anything I didn’t want to keep for myself, I’d put in the Etsy shop. But I soon discovered that merely the existence of the shop began to skew my work. I’d started wondering what other people like versus what I liked. That shop is long gone.
Thanks for this post - I think we all need that reminder, often1 I am my own worst critic, so it's good to be reminded.
Based!!
Excellent post. What's the point of creating if the product becomes more important than the process?
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