The Artist’s Way - Week Five

“Pray to catch the bus, then run as fast as you can.”

I’ve been working on recognizing and receiving gifts from the higher power. Trying not to look a gift horse in the mouth, if you will. I think my biggest issue - and I’m sure I’m not alone in this - is that I expect the gifts to come with no assembly required. A sort of ask and it will appear situation. I don’t anticipate any work that will need to be done on my part. Usually, however, assembly is required, and the gifts do not come in the most straightforward packages.

When those “ask and it will appear” situations do befall me, I almost always assume it is too good to be true. I wait and expect the other shoe to drop. I am unbelievably grateful for the gifts the universe has given me in the last six months. My life is borderline unrecognizable from what it was in January. There is a part of me that is convinced it’s almost too good to be true. I need to learn to let that part of me go.

As far as my creativity goes, I am guilty of holding onto ideas for months - even years - without doing anything about them. Or I’ll get really excited about the potential of a project only to convince myself I’m not educated, experienced, or well-connected enough to actually execute it. Those ideas and that passion are a gift from a higher power. Acting on them, seeing them through, is an act of worship.

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I find it delightful when the reading echoes something I’ve written in my morning pages earlier in the day. This most recent instance, I had briefly written on my fear that change in some areas of my life will negatively affect other areas that I don’t necessarily want to change. Like a new job contributing to changes in my romantic life, or new friendships influencing certain goals of mine. It’s a very difficult anxiety to describe because it is almost always a little convoluted, but I feel it often.

This chapter responds to that fear a little. It encourages us to embrace the current of change in our lives, to look at it as the flow of grace moving us in the right direction. One way to do that is, of course, through the morning pages. The pages allow us to loosen up our thinking a little bit. Cameron also credits listening to the artist within ourselves - allowing that voice to feel safe and be heard - as well as trusting that being solely dependent upon your spiritual creative force frees you from other dependencies for helping to lessen the fears we have in regards to change and intimacy.

I have noticed that I am more confident and self-dependent on my creative force. I have noticed how the pages help me work through my thinking. I have not quite let go of my fear of change and have not become completely comfortable with the vulnerability of intimacy. I have a deep desire to control things in my life. Change and intimacy aren’t things you can control. I’m sure I would be a lot happier if I could learn to let that desire go.

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Alone time is the key to creative healing. An artist must have downtime to recharge. I know that to be very true.

For most of college, I had very little alone time. I was always in class, with a roommate, with a friend, at work, or with my boyfriend at the time. I could have said no to plans with the boyfriend, but I didn’t want to upset him. I wanted to be the good girlfriend. Once we broke up, I could have opted to stay in and recharge, but I wanted to be the fun friend.

When I moved back in with my family after college, I felt alone because none of my friends lived very close; in reality, I never gave myself true alone time. I love my family, but the condo my mother lives in is not exactly conducive to quality alone time. For six months, my days would consist of me being at work all day and/or night, then going home and trying to force creative productivity.

Then I moved to New York. I knew no one, with the exception of my roommates and a few friends who moved here right after college. I had to find a way to fill my days. So I started taking walks around my neighborhood. After a week or two of this, I felt reinvigorated. I was finally reminded how important it was to just be with myself. It forces you to get to know yourself and starts to block out all the outside voices in your life that, while trying to give well-meaning advice, make you second-guess yourself.

I know I could have advocated for more impactful alone time over the past couple of years, but I was too focused on what was expected of me. I wanted to be good and available for everyone else. Now I overhear my boss refer to me as “a good girl” because I’m flexible with the schedule and good at my job, and I bristle. I don’t have to be good. I do have to give myself space to recharge. I need to be whole.