committment

it takes committment for me to grow

it takes focussed effort

i can't just flit from one thing to another

as filled with tempting baubles as the internet is

i committ to my creativity

i committ to practising every day

i committ to the juiciest deepest part of myself that has stamped her foot and said enough

i will feed her with the joy that comes from making things that come from my heart - not imitations of the work i admire in others

but my work
my soul
my connection to God, Goddess, All That Is

right there in front of me on the page, canvas, peice of silver

and if in that process other's are moved or touched i am blessed

but selfishly

and gloriously this is a committment to me

reverb10 Suzannah Conway's prompt

my brave goddess self from BIG


Prompt: Wisdom. What was the wisest decision you made this year, and how did it play out? (please note i have a big girly crush on Suzannah Conway - she is brave and alive and creative and hormonal and funny and kind)

The wisest decision i made in 2010 wasn't a single epiphany like "I am going to leave my husband/run a marathon/be a buddhist nun"... although all of those flit through my mind from time to time

my decision was more like a leak of wonderful soaking into my pores

pores that were thirsty (almost to death)

pores that a lot of other things had opened sorrow, self doubt, emptiness, exploration, courage...

and the moisturiser that has cured my souls wrinkles is creativity



It began by discovering how much i wanted to do an art course when i did abc's 100 creative goals list.

So i (after much prevaricating and difficulty in stepping out and saying i wanted to spend hard earned money on something as ephemeral as an art course) bravely chose to do an art course on-line.

i did a Suzi Blu course - the Goddess and the Poet - how could i not do a course named that right? i learned much and explored a lot but mostly found how absorbing and addictive a pencil and paper and mark making can be....

and then i took another - not so good this time... i wanted to explore art that was fermenting in my gut not reproducing a facsimile of other's art...

then God pointed me towards Connie Hozvicka and the needle on my soul's compass went "TWANG"

it shivered

and stopped pointing straight at her

she asked for a bold committment to ourselves and to following up this process and because i am a good girl and i do what i am told

i made that committment

and of all the things i have done this year this has contributed, more than one other single thing, to the sense of increasing wholeness i am experiencing

i am learning to embrace mistakes, be alive to possibility, be curious, be less attatched to outcome, to pleasing others

and i get to fiddle away in my workspace and feel alive as often as i make time for it

and that is the single most wonderful thing i have done for myself in years

reverb10 - the time i felt most alive this year

the times i felt most alive were when i was creating something

painting

silverwork

gardening

words

taking them all in my hands and my heart and placing them,

sometimes with care, sometimes with hope, often with courage

out there for the world to see.

yes i admit the being seen helped me to feel alive too,

but the act of making something,

having that something appear from work that came through me,

well that never fails to make me feel plugged in

makes me feel alive

trying new things and being still

(my first journal page background courtesy of art journal love letter's tutorial with Connie)

i am 45

i guess that makes me an old dog

but i am proud to say i am still trying new tricks

with Connie at DirtyFootprints Studios i am exploring more BIG painting - we are looking at balance in painting - and then exploring balance in work.....

i am also part of her ArtJournal Love Letters

With Connie and her open heart, and the members of "the tribe", i am constantly trying new things - some of them grab my heart, some of them slide right by....

I want to honour that by opening myself up in this way, i am still learning, not barricading myself up in the fort of what i already "know".

This keeps me alive.

In Big we are looking this week at space... having been so sick and feeling so weak has meant i have had to look my busy-ness in the eye...

i didn't like what i saw.

mostly i was busy scurrying around doing things for other purposes.

the driving force i have to create and learn and experiment was being elbowed to the side by duty and shoulds.

I know with my deepest wisdom that in order for me to create something truely soulshifting i need to be quiet.

i need to be in nature.

i need to relax.

and instead, all i do is bustle-bustle-bustle......

mostly to show that as a "nonworking" mother, i am still valuable.

so i say to that busy-ness "This no longer serves me".

i am committing to quiet, to creation, to honouring what is deeply moving me.

after all (and i found this quote this morning)

It is because of its emptiness that the cup is useful....

the starving raving artist archtype

i think i am facing up to one of my fears

that is if i open to the creative side of myself , fully, deeply

i will end up an artist -

a crazy starving artist.

There is an understanding somewhere in me that what an artist is is someone odd

so blown around by the winds of their inspiration that they are distanced from the planet,
their hair and clothes always askance,

their minds constantly whispered to by voices unseen....

as a small child i heard a voices constantly which told me things i knew others didn't hear... it made my life hard as a child, to always be elsewhere in my head...

i remember the day that i asked the voice to leave

i chose normality over those whispers and the imagination that i swam in.

With Connies BIG FEARLESS PAINTING COURSE we have been meeting Fearless women who painted BIG.

most of them scare the shit out of me

they are odd, fearless, cantankerous, difficult

but i am drawn to them like a little peice of iron filing to a magnet

despite myself i think of them over and over, Helen Frankenthaler pouring her paint so lovingly onto the canvas, Susan Rothenburg chortling over herself and the big bold beauty all around her, the haunting realness of the people that Alice Neel forced the canvas to acccept... all of them present in their process,

some of them not enjoying the work, but turning up anyway

just putting down what they see

being bold

taking the chunk out of life that they desire and making it theirs....

i want that fearlessness

but i don't want my children to be wounded (Susan Neel's son broke my heart when he said he was damaged by his mother's bohemianism)

i don't want to run off to the South of France like Joan Mitchell...

or maybe i do

maybe that is what scares me

maybe the pull to be myself (and as i sit here early early in the morning so i can get this out before the families' life demands my presence, i look like a dishevelled weirdo!) to be this creative-driven-follow-the-muse-wherever-the-hell- she-leads-me kind of woman is so strong

and maybe i have to choose....

or maybe if i choose love i can have them both

This week we did memory painting and i began by painting memory that was both painful and creative - there was a lot of visible anger on the page...

and now i have been drawn to create a memory painting which is so much more than just anger and fear.. it is the complex sustaining web of love which my grandparents gave to that odd little girl who lived in fantasy....

the beginnings of it are above ... maybe my answer is if i keep coming back to love i can have it all - the creative life and the family life, the voices in my head and the non dishevelled hair ...

maybe i can be saved by love.

WHAT ARE THE STORIES YOU'D LIKE TO HEAR?

this is one of my peices from BIG FEARLESS PAINTING which people found lots of stories for....

Ronna Detrick has a great site called Renegade Conversations - it is ostensibly about woman and spirituality but really about life...

today she asked "What are the stories you'd like to hear?"

As you may know, i am a story-o-phile (apologies to Tanya Batt .)

I believe in the power of the spoken and written word to send our soul the nourishment it needs, to skip through time and forge a path for us to walk when we get there, to heal, to challenge and to bring joy.

I loved how Ronna's stories have come true (how could they fail to with such a loving heart behind them?)

So i write mine here and encourage you - you band of delicious souls who come here and see into my heart - to write yours too!

Stories i would like to hear:

i am loved beyond measure.

My girls grow up to be strong, loving, generous women, surrounded by love and connection to spirit and abundance.

My work finds a place in people's hearts and changes their lives.

i am leading courses in creativity and seeing ripples of this throughout my community.

I travel extensively and with great joy.

I have true and loving friends who treasure me.

your turn

invented mothering

preliminary sketches

it is no secret that i have mother issues

ha

i have been through long periods of berrating myself about not being able to fix it

not being good enough

not being mature enough

of being petulant, wounded, mean and self denegrating about it.

i have to cut her out of my sphere, even when i am in the same room with her and talking to her - i just can't look at her.

but lately i have come to the place where i see her from a distance.

Like looking down the wrong end of the binoculars - seeing this unending dance and seeing the immense sadness and waste of it all.

but not being too wounded.

and certainly not tearing myself down over it.

I still have grief about not having someone to turn to - an older woman with whom i can be myself and share things safely.

But i am still mostly whole after an encounter with her.

This constitutes a massive victory.

i am tooting my relationship vuvuzela.

As part of my BIG creative leap, i have been making time for meditation - this is a true act of self love and never fails to deliver bountiful juice...

and last week, my meditation gifted me the idea of creating an artwork which allowed me to have a sense of the mothering i wish i had, the mothering i long for...

i saw i could make a mother for myself

and by creating her i can have her there to draw on and nourish me...

part of me feels like a dick ... i mean, inventing someone to be kind to me - what kind of a wierdo am i???

Obviously, i am a weirdo who is willing to fight for the mothering she needs...

and that's ok with me.

creation and home - another version

I am in a constant struggle with my creative self

actually that is not true

i think my creative self is in a struggle with my conformist self and i am on the sidelines watching with that quick tennis match action (look to the left, whip head, look to the right, whip head, repeat)


"I really want to get this onto paper/canvas just out there somewhere I am thinking colour I am thinking unrealistic but bold I am thinking..."

"Now hang on just a minute... who the fuck do you think you are? You are not trained, your sense of line is shit, your colour ideas always turn out badly..."

"Yes but this feeling...."

"Feeling schmeeling, stop talking over me... I think you have forgotten how embarassing it was for you when you were trying your hardest and then it looked so amatureish..."

you get the picture

Anway i went to another painting class today with Brett a'Court I was quiet and struggling and feeling not good enough in the company of some quite accomplished artists

Brett took each of us aside asking where we wanted to go - at first i tried to think of the clever things i could say

but then i chose to be truthful

i told him what i connected to in painting was the feeling - Frida Kahlo's intricate tiny work didn't light my fire but her pain and passion did, Van Gogh's subjects didn't always make my eyes light up but his passion and courage did...

i told him i wanted to express in that way but i didn't have the technique

i know he felt my dejection

He said that to paint that way needed to have the courage to put myself out there without protection in the world. That it wouldn't always be pretty (but of course i quoted Elizabeth Cunningham at this juncture) but it would be real and full of feeling.

I said i wanted that.

and for the first time in a long time i felt a click of really wanting something.

Brett told me to paint sloppy and big and fast

and i took courage and trusted myself and i got the BIG canvas out of the car and i painted this still life

and i cried.

i know it isn't Frida or Vincent.

but holy crap it feels like me.

this creation brings me home.

to the home inside myself.

as much as i have that home i long for without time and space,

i am beginning to see i can trust the home inside myself

and the more i express that inner feeling outwardly

creativity is a bossy friend

I have already established that i have a girlycrush on creativity

But i also want to be honest about what kind of friend she is...

there is no other way to say it

she is bossy

She comes into my life when she feels like it

She interrupts conversations, dinner, showers even a trip to the toilet

she demands my immediate attention

otherwise she stalks off in a huff.

i need to be ever ready to carry out her whims, at the very least writing down or sketching her demands,

because if i don't have time right when she shows up she cuts me off.

What she says goes. She is the the one who calls the shots wears the pants holds the reins...

Oh, there are times when i really want her to come over.

I send out invitations,everything is set up to make her comfortable, make her feel welcome...

her favourite brushes ready, nice clean canvas, tools all sharp, peace and quiet

and she is just busy elsewhere...

(someone more interesting or capable i tell myself more than a little jealously)

because she does taunt me with her relationships with others...

skill and ideas and new ways of doing things that appear so effortless to other artists (i mean real artists of course - because seeing her flirt outrageously with others always makes me feel down on myself) always let me see that she is showering her love on someone else...

ok so i am pouty with her sometimes

but i am still willing to be her friend even if she is flirty with others, even if she gets all the attention, even if i am in her shadow ...

because bossy, demanding, unfaithful and snooty as she is

she makes my life better

this is what stirred me up so much

it is called motherhood

creativity - the dangerous friend

do you ever feel like creativity can be a dangerous friend?

you know like the one at school that always seemed more streetwise

who would smoke in the feild at school

who would have sex because it felt good

who would know more than the teacher

and let them know it.

I feel like a bit of a sychophant to creativity at the moment.

I talk about her and think about her alot.

I do courses to find out more about her.

I feel like i have a crush on her.

But this wanting to be friends with someone more knowing than i am, more adventurous than i have been,

someone who will lead me away from nice and pretty and tidy

into places where dark things lurk

has me on edge...

literally i am on the edge of stepping onto another place to stand

what will i find?

what will come with me?

what will i leave behind?

and how will i feel inside my life when i have recovered my footing after such a big leap?

The phrase "naked and bleeding on the Jericho road" from Maevensong seems most appropriate... and runs over and over in my head

i just hope creativity is prepared to take me into her temple and bathe my wounds in the spring like Maeve

and not leave me in the middle of the school quad, looking like a dork, with all the cool kids laughing at me....

tough decisions

Pataua estuary 2009

i find it tough to make decisions about whose needs i should meet...



and usually i make the decision to delay/postpone/ignore my needs



i have great training and credentials in that department, i could probably cross credit to get a masters somewhere...



but i am in a space now, of reflecting on where that has got me...



where all this self denial, craven pandering to other people for approval, wanting to be a good girl, being nice, punishing myself has got me...



and the answer is here... where i find it hard to even identify my needs



and so i am going to make a point of really questioning those decisions from now on...



last night i offered to mind my friend's 4 children while she went to the hospital to try and get some answers from the medical fraternity about her ailing health (she probably has fibromyalgia but doctors don't like that illness much so it doesn't get much airtime - mostly coz they don't have any action they can take... those dis-eases are most unpopular amoungst doctortypes)



i have been concious of her pain.



i have been concious of her exhaustion.



i have been concious of her daily struggle.



But i have actively avoided offering to be a babysitter - oh i am an ear (although she has been doggedly trying to be positive so she just can't entertain the idea of saying just how hideous it all is...)



But i need this time and space to create...



for ME to feel alive



I have done my running around meeting the needs of small children time (and i still haven't recovered fully from the time with my own...)



and Fuck it feels traitorous - to one of my good friends...



but i have to be a good friend to myself... to be the one i choose



i will continue to be here for her when she needs a cup of tea but i will also be here for myself...



this is a tough decision but my gut says YES...



Do you have tough decisions like this???

st terese of Avila

the important thing is not to think much but to love much and so do that which best stirs you to love

i have recently been thrown into a world of saints and sinners, love and redemption, history and herstory...

and one of the threads that have been given to me, that i am beginning to weave with is that of this Spanish nun.

Turns out she was outspoken, stroppy, difficult, visionary, and confounding... and she said things, like the quote above which just make my heart sing....

apparently she used to levitate (but disliked the showiness of it so got other nuns to sit on her)

she challenged the male dominated church

saw past the divisions that gender created in her day

and believed in the power of love

and the gift of love that she has given me with this statement is profound

i know when i paint and make jewellery i am filled with fire

i know that when i come back into my daily life, from this time i am calmer, more balanced, more able to give...but justifying that to my strong training as a martyr is difficult...

i hear echos of selfish and thoughtless and.....

but when i listen to St Terese i hear her nodding at my heart and telling me the fire is right...

just listen to love - and then act....

3 little birds

3 little birds is that great Bob Marley song that always makes me feel held and rocked..

"Don't worry about a thing

Coz every little thing is gonna be aright"

when i hear it i see his beaming face and those dreads flying and i think about his shininess and how when someone allows themself to believe they will be alright....

no matter what comes

Now that song has another significance for me - my daughters and i went to Playcentre - a parent lead organisation for early childhood learning in NZ which honours parents as first teachers and children as creative geniuses!

There i met, and admired a woman called Leigh. She was smart and funny and as a Department of Conservation worker, passionate about the environment. She taught the kids so many things, organised trips to island sanctuaries, joined in whole heartedly and with imagination into the games and fantasies of the children. Did i mention i admired her???

Well Leigh's youngest son, Rory has a brain tumor.

He is recovering, just had his last round of chemo and is still in hospital.

He is learning to walk again (the surgery damaged some of the parts that make his movement).

He is weak and tired.

And Leigh writes a blog about their journey

http://www.rorygardiner.co.nz/

(it is heart rending and inspiring and filled with love)

and in one of her early posts Leigh talked about her and the boys (she has two sons) singing Bob's 3 little birds in the car.... i had such a strong picture of them singing strong and being held by the words....

Last week i was asked to make some minature peices for an exhibition (i usually make big) so i bought a song book of Maori songs from a second hand shop, tore out the lines about a warrior coming home from a war and drew Leigh 3 little birds...

When someone goes through something as unimaginable as watching your child endure cancer and the equally hideous treatment for cancer it is impossible to know how to help when you aren't intimately involved...

so i have to beleive that creating and holding them up with energy and love is enough...