Astound yourself

January 18, 2013

“Maybe I am taking all of this too seriously!”

The thought lit up the dark corners of my mind and I saw … oh, any number of things!

“I can’t be an artists, I did not go to art school!” was big, bold, staring me right in the face. “No, it has to be original, if you repeat your own design, if you rework what you’ve done already, that is cheating” was hiding right behind it, next to “it has to be new, original, creative and meaningful!”

“No one wants to listen to you” peered at me from the dark corner. That one was hiding still, half concealed in shadows. “You have no right, no credentials, no authority to show anything to anyone” was there too.

How much more? I wondered, as I looked into the cave full of stories, how much more sits there hidden, unseen, stopping me, tripping me, pulling me back, tying my hands, biting at my heels. How much mess do I have in there?

But, I thought, maybe it doesn’t matter all that much. Maybe I don’t need to be heard, maybe I don’t need to be a great artists, an original artist, or any artists at all. Maybe it doesn’t have to be big and special.

Maybe I can just … do what I want. Just that.

Maybe I am taking it all too seriously, too profoundly, too deeply.

Maybe I can just draw. Maybe I can just write.

Just because I want to.

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