Call me Miss Direction

I decided that I was not a good artist. I decided it was too much of a hassle. I decided to give up.

It was stressful, anyway. I would feel good to get the weight of "being an artist" off my shoulders.

It didn't. Feel good, I mean. Not good at all.

And I think it was because I didn't walk away and leave it to die. I forced myself to stay. To watch. I watched my art die.

A slow death.

It might have worked if I had walked away. I'm not sure why I couldn't leave it alone.

The pain of watching a part of myself wither away from neglect was finally too much. I picked it back up and began to nurture it again.

And that's where I am right now. I don't know why I keep coming back to art. I'm no prodigy, I don't specialize in any medium or subject or style, and I have no direction.

I only know I can't let it go. It can't let me go. It needs to take me somewhere and I need to let my guard down and let it lead.

It seems like I should have learned something from this, but I'm still in the dark.

Do you have a part of yourself that you can't ignore? That calls to you, pulls at you, keeps you awake at night? I've never created anything that I would consider to be important, so why the urgency? The tenacity?
Maybe I have the capacity to create something important.
Maybe I overestimate myself.
Maybe I underestimate myself.
Maybe we're all in a chronic state of underestimation.

How about this?
How about I promise to do my very best, to honestly strive to hear what's in my heart and follow its direction. Wherever it takes me. No judgment, doubt, or self-sabotage.

Now you promise to do the same.

something Original!

I asked a guy once what it felt like to wake up.

I was sincerely interested in what his answer would be. Having Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, I sometimes forget what is "normal" and I wanted to gauge the difference between him and me.

He said (and I quote):

"I dunno. One moment I'm asleep and then I'm awake."

Seriously one of the most disappointing conversations of my life.

I've thought about it a lot since then. Which is why I wrote this:

heavy bones
broken thoughts
consciousness lost in dark tunnels of misty doubt

breathe. in.
and let it go.

light.

open eyes
hazy mind
pain to the edges of sensation and saturated to the soul

breathe. again.
hold it in now.

daylight.

weary heart
soft sadness
closed mind slowly pried away from the forgetful void of sleep

breathe. deep.
yet another morning.