Of inky fingers and paint-smeared hands
Embracing the seasons of creativity, one word and one brushstroke at a time.
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Before I was an artist, I was a writer.
Words were my currency of expression. In my 20s, I wrote poems that won awards and penned numerous articles for newspapers and websites.
But as the years passed, my job slowly leeched away my writing skills. I was so enmeshed in writing and editing for business publications that my creative writing skills, even my writing ideas, started to dry up.
That’s when I discovered art — and it saved me.
From the ravages of stress, heartbreak, and various sundry fears, painting helped me find my way back to myself, to my center.
But now that I’ve quit the 9 to 5, slowly, the words are coming back to me.
Flashes of inspiration that lead to blog posts; interesting turns of phrases that show up in my journals.
I sit down to write, and the words start to flow.
Some pieces almost write themselves and I find that they have little need to be refined and polished. Just little touches here and there. Its almost feels like I caught a wave of inspiration as it was passing through the ether and simply channeled it.
Sometimes, I start with a brain dump, and in 5-10 minutes, the words begin to flow.
But into this current of words, I must remember to swirl my paintbrush.
There are days when I’m tapping away at the keyboard and I lose all track of time. So fresh is my joy at finding my words, that my art practice has taken a bit of a backseat in recent months.
Initially, this worried me; but now I know that our creative expressions never really leave us. There may be seasons to them, but what ebbs does flow again.
Looking at my planner, I see that I’ve spent a few days at the painty table every week in January. Already, things are looking a lot better than they were in the last few months.
And I am beginning to sense these two creative expressions are ready to do the tango: one may lead for now, but eventually, they will move in tandem, to a rhythm that is all their own.
Let’s chat!
I love chatting with you in the comments or via e-mail. Here are a few questions to help us get the conversation rolling:
Do you have multiple creative expressions?
Is one of your creative expressions more urgent or alive than the others?
How do you balance or juggle your creative expressions/creative practices?
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Drawing is my primary creative place, and then others come in, modelling, printing, making, pouring, painting, collages and eventually words. I do have to make more effort to write, and I struggle to see a value in my words. But I’m plugging away at it and, if nothing else, it’s a record of my muddled thoughts in the moment pen ran across paper.
I used to have competing interests: painting and music but now am comfortable with painting as my primary focus and music just for sheer enjoyment. It's nice to have secondary outlet where I feel no pressure to succeed or be excellent.