Fearless Creating

I am working on something.  I am working through something.  I am working with something.
At least I am working.

A few days ago I walked by a bookcase that I pass by a million times a day and a title jumped out at me.  Seriously, I continued through the house but the title stuck in my head and I was compelled to return and get the book.  I took it up to my studio and began to read.

I bought this book years ago, more than ten years, read the preface standing in the shop, was intrigued and bought it.  Then promptly tucked it away and forgot it.  So why did it call out to me today, I can't answer that question.  I am just so grateful it did.

Maybe it's the title, "Fearless Creating" (by Eric Maisel) because I have been fearful about creating.  We have the ideal situation--we farm, so we work six months of the year and then we have six months off to create.  This year I started off brilliantly, one week into our down time I took a workshop with Roxanne Evans Stout.  Please refer to my prior post--great work, so inspiring, I loved every second of this project. Then look at the date--yeah, October, and it is now late January and I have frittered away most of my "creative" time.

I finished a big piece, entered a few shows and tried a few fun things but I just was not enthusiastic about my art.  I was so inspired working on "A New Genesis", I always am excited, on fire, when I am working on multi-media projects but I can't find the same passion for what I shall call "painting".  For me, that is watercolor.  I am a skilled painter, I love color and love the process of mixing, layering and painting.  I can spend hours making puddles of color, I love it.  And I can totally trance out listening to music, moving a brush around on paper...but my work doesn't thrill me.  Technically it is good, visually pleasing, beautiful--just not thrilling and I want to be excited to create.

This book just might help me find the passion I crave, the passion I know is within me, within all of us who yearn to and do create.

Just a few pages into the introduction the author seemed to be describing my problems and addressing them, addressing me!  The author, Dr. Maisel, is a psychotherapist who works with artists--all artists, performers, writers, painters, poets...you name it.   In the first few pages he describes the anxieties involved in creating--the huge anxiety to create, the excitement and passion that urges all of us to make something, to create.  And the anxiety attendant in all acts of creativity--is it good enough, am I good enough, can I do it, will I fail, etc., etc., etc.  All the anxiety that has allowed me to distract myself with other creative acts--I cook, I knit, I sew, I do yoga, I teach, I have grandchildren, I blog, the list goes on and on.  Sound familiar?

The author puts into words and actions his idea of the creative process and he tries to convey these ideas with activities.  There are short "assignments" throughout the pages.  The first assignment was to stop reading and do half an hour of creative work--which I did not, thought about, but then kept reading.  He's good, and knew this would happen and addresses it immediately in the very next paragraph, made me feel guilty and I did stop reading and started to work...and then something magical happened.

I started a small sketch and was about to start painting and knew it was just more of the same old, same old.  I was not excited, I was just following the assignment.  I scrapped it and went in another, entirely different direction.  I put a clock in my studio--not to time my half hour of work, but to limit the time I would allow myself to sketch.  I wanted to put down a few lines and get to painting as soon as possible.  Down and dirty, fast and loose.  I cut up some illustration board, threw down a sketch and grabbed my brushes.  I then started with this clear intention, I was not going to "paint" this piece, I intended only to make beautiful marks on the paper.  Every so often I said aloud to myself, "Just put beautiful marks on the paper."  When I stopped between washes to consider the piece and the next move I reminded myself to make beautiful marks on the paper.  An hour and a half later I came out of a creative trance transfixed!  Excited!  Euphoric!  Thrilled!  Thank the gods that be!

I approached the studio the next morning so excited to work.  I can't adequately describe urgency to get in the studio but you all know what I am talking about.  I left my new piece up to look at and after reading another section of the book, realized that the values I had placed were not saying what I wanted to say.  I needed to lay in some darker values to be satisfied, but, I had specifically chosen a very unstable surface to work on--hot press illustration board can be like painting on wax paper, the work underneath can slip up and mix with subsequent layers, making mud--so that I had to work fast and intuitively and not overwork.  The section I had just completed urged the following:

Paintings, Not Pictures

Surprise Yourself

Feel, Don't Think

Rishks, Not Ideas

Don't Be Afraid to Fail

Break the Rules

Ideas Are the Trap

Don't Know

Alive, Not Right

No Fear, No Failure 

Don't Be Afraid to Fuck It Up

Power & Passion

Who Am I?

Encounter

Don't Give In, Never Give In

One Surprise Is Worth a Thousand Ideas

Waht is a Mistake?

Don't Be Right

Okay, this one really got me...Don't Be Afraid to Fuck It Up...so I grabbed the brush, mixed up some puddles, took a deep breath and laid some values!  I love it.  I just love it.  Nothing melted, no one died, it's just a piece of paper and...AND...I didn't fuck it up...I made it just right.

I read and study and paint every day now and I am working my way through this incredible book.  I want to invite you to join me.  Grab a copy.  Let's do this together!  I long to share this experience with others, I crave feedback and I want to share.  Anyone interested out there?

I will continue on and keep you posted.  Please, please, if you are the least bit intrigued, please join me.