Once again, I learn a valuable lesson from my kids- on vacation no less!  My oldest daughter has had a fear of fish for quite some time.  Whenever we were vacationing at the ocean she was so preoccupied with the threat of fish that she missed out on the bliss an ocean brings.  She sucked it up and last year got over her fear of fish.  While we were floating in the blue waters of the Caribbean Ocean, she exclaimed, “I get it now. I get why you love the blue water so much!”  On all our other trips she was so focused on her fear (the fish) that she missed out on the joys.

How many times have I done that?  Too many to count.   How many times has my fear while painting, inking, stamping, creating shut me off from the joys that were there?  Even when a piece of art is going in a horribly ugly direction, there is at least some element that is “good” or “useful”.

I pulled out my art journal and my little bag of supplies on the beach and started to journal.  I let go of any fear and just started arting. An interesting thing happened, I didn’t like the final page but I loved the process.  I became totally and completely absorbed in the process.  Actually, I think I became addicted to that feeling because it was like flying.

Now that we are home from vacation I find I still don’t like this page BUT it does remind me of the feelings I had while making it.  So, I guess I have to say that I now love that page because of how it makes me feel.

Have a few minutes?  There is plenty of inspiration at Creative Every Day, Just Journals and Inspire Me Monday!

I could write a book about what I learned in Jesse Reno’s class not only from  the techniques he taught but from the stories he told and the example he set.  I so wish I had a tape recorder capturing all of his tales.  Oh, I just showed my age by saying tape recorder.

Jesse was able to get the right and left sides of his brain to work together with the use of just one word.  Why.

Why?  That word?  That word that meant a long essay answer on a test?  That word that was so hard to deal with when your parents asked you why you forgot to clean your room? Yes, that word.  That word helped me analyze what my “creative” side liked so I could understand what worked for me in my painting.  The more I understood what worked and why I felt more confident in my choices.  Why is such a powerful word!

He encouraged us to do what we liked and then ask ourselves why we liked it there.  As I did more and more of that throughout the day I was more aware of what was needed in parts of the painting.  Weird, the more I did something the better I got at it…haven’t I heard that before…oh wait, I tell it to my kids all the time!

Here’s a look at some of the stages of development.

Just getting the paint down with our hands only- and I began to notice shapes that I have been drawn to over the years.  Why those shapes? I liked how my hand felt when I made them.

More paint layers.  Why?  Because I had almost all the same movements on the canvas and I needed more variety.

Blocking out areas- this was the scary part- completely covering over something- no going back.  Keeping only what I truly loved and getting rid of some things I kinda liked.

Starting to see something in it.  Beginning to find the meaning in it.

Trying to decide if these are the colors I want in it…

Nope, not those, but a bit of green, now that makes me happy!  Why?  I like the memories and feelings green brings up for me more than what red brings up in me.

I had to add some text to it, I just can’t call something “done” unless it has words somewhere.