January 1 "Compass Readings"

 

So, as noted on Facebook, I did find time on January 1 for my semi-annual taking stock "compass readings"...not MUCH time, but a bit. 

 

I've been doing that on New Year's Day and my birthday for maybe 30 years now. I don't make resolutions or set goals; life offers pressures and challenges enough, really. I don't need to pile more on my plate.

This is one reason I don't do "challenges," either, those lists of art ideas, or weight loss challenges, or writing challenges, or 30-whatevers-in-30-days things, or fitness challenges; FitBit is a tool, not a bludgeon, and I don't care to shame anyone or BE shamed.  

(And okay, yes, tempted by the Whole 30 idea, but...maybe not.)

 

I need room for flexibility and spontaneity. I need to be open, to listen.  I've always felt constrained, trapped, even, by too many things on the schedule, even if they're likely to be pleasurable.

 

So my compass readings are simply looking back over the past year, from the vantage point of this reading to the last, and considering where I've been.  If it feels right.  If I feel I'm still going in the right direction.  Conscience, family, creativity, work, love, satisfaction, all figure into those "feelings."  

 

Sometimes I get "direction" as to course corrections I might need to make.  Sometimes simply confirmation that this is right, for me.  

 

Almost always, the BEING there is confirmation in itself.  As I added on my note, above:  "Here.  Here.  Always HERE."  Not Watkins Mill lake per se--though that's been a frequent destination--but OUT there.  In nature.  Listening.  Being.  

 

Yes.

Nurturing Creativity

Playing with carving my own print blocks

I suppose we all have the occasional dry period when nothing seems exciting, when we just don't feel like picking up a brush, when we're tired or overwhelmed.  And in fact I have a whole post in the pipeline that will be a follow-up to this one, addressing those things that kill creativity--or at least inhibit it to the point of entropy.

And honestly, when it comes right down to the nitty-gritty, what inspires us--what nurtures that mischievous and elusive muse--is as individual as we are.

Often, what works for me is to make a list--well, two of them really.  One list of those things that feed my soul, and one of the things that definitely do NOT.  I have done this little exercise time and again through the years...it helps me take compass readings and make sure I'm still on course, as well as where I need to jettison some cargo or turn the wheel a bit to starboard.

Who wouldn't wish to see a few more of those stars like silvery eyes in a velvet sky, eh? (And yes, of course my sailor husband would remind me that starboard isn't up--work with me here, all right? I'm sailing this imaginary sloop...)

I've been doing a lot of jettisoning, lately.  Simplifying, getting rid of excess Stuff--belongings, ideas, occupations, imaginary or outworn obligations.

Making room for Creativity.  For life.

For we ARE creative beings.  That's what we do. Whether we create a piece of art, a symphony, a happy child, a balanced budget, a good meal or order out of chaos, we are fulfilling that urge. I once wrote an article suggesting that that is what we have most in common with the Creator; I still believe that, and I'm more grateful than ever, 25 years later.

Dip pens cut from feathers or sticks

So.  What nurtures creativity?  What inspires me?

Here's my list--this week.  Make your own.  They may be quite similar, they may be entirely different, but they must be honest, straight from the heart. 

• An open mind
• Paying attention
• Meditation
• Listening to what really matters to me
• The light on my sleeping husband's face
• Quiet
• Time
• Books
• Textures
• Joseph's hands
• Flavors
• Play
• New places
• Old ones...heart homes, near and far--places that have touched me
• Music
• Rest
• A new tool--a new pigment, a fountain pen that's smooth of nib, a vegetable peeler, whatever!
• Paper I love to work on
• Beauty
• Nature
• Light
• Color
• Learning
• New ideas
• Reviving old ones that work 
• Taking time for me (if I give it all away, I have nothing left for any of us)
• Honesty
  
• Friends who "get it"  (Get what, you say?  Well, that's as individual as we are, as well.)
• Art--seeing what others have done or are doing can spark a conflagration
• Rembrandt sketches, Vermeer's chiaroscuro, Winslow Homer's watercolors...
• A new direction (the stamps above were my balance from too many weeks of the same kind of thing)
• A different medium--almost but not quite the same as above
• The grace and antics of cats
• A quiet chat with an old friend
• A new discipline
• Old photos
• Time for memory
• Interaction with others...for me, sparingly, but still...
• A quote that speaks to me
• That One Perfect Word--you know, the one that strikes the ear and makes everything different  
• The sure and certain knowledge that there is no one right way when it comes to creativity

A friend's recent art on used teabags inspired these two...thank you, Palma.

My own technique was different...but her work let me take off from there!

And once I have my list?  I do more of that.  Whatever it is, whatever I have time for.  What bubbles to the top, what serendipity throws my way.  What insists I pay attention.

Synchronicity.

This.

Now.