The Unexpected:
I‘m learning so much from art-making this year, and my biggest epiphanies are surprisingly, not of the technical kind. I’ve been drawing and painting in some capacity as a creative solopreneur for almost 5 years but the lightbulbs that have popped up since I stepped into my calling early this year has been nothing short of a grand fireworks show!
My first love since I rediscovered art a few years ago, has always been watercolor and recently, through a series of events, I am finally realizing why it bewitches me so. The meaningful lessons this classic medium has to teach me is starting to unfurl like a forest path appearing magically before my eyes.
The one thing I hear most about watercolor is that it’s a tricksy little thing. Watercolors do their own thing. And in the doing of their own thing, they often reflect the best of life back – of spontaneity, of organic rawness, of flow and delight.
Watercolors by its very nature requires deep planning because the moment of creation-when paint and water touches paper, is something that is so often unpredictable and fundamentally organic-so alive, that if an outcome is to be desired at all, it has to be meticulously planned for.
The important lesson I’m learning from working with watercolors is that life is just like that. We dream and we visualize in the beautiful, gossamer-wrapped haze of our imagination but in order to make something happen, to make that crossing from inner life into the outer world and create that enchanting piece we see in our mind’s eye, we have to set the stage. We have to plan. Multiple sketches. Color studies. Paper studies. Technique studies. We have to prepare, mentally, spiritually, physically.
But here’s what I had failed to see before that is now glowing bright white with its revelation:
We can plan and prepare and set the stage as carefully as we can but in that moment of creation, we have to loosen our grip and let go, let the watercolors do its thing. And we work with it. Be at Ease with it. We allow it to flow, just as we should allow life to flow: to happen, to delight, marvel and surprise us. And we don’t fight it. We trust that we can work with whatever gorgeousness that happened on the paper and in our lives.
It’s a kind of beautiful surrender, so symbolically intertwined with our aliveness, and I love it.
The Lesson:
I’ve been practicing this Ease as I settle into a natural rhythm of art-making while preparing for my very first show, and I’ve started to notice this Not-Forcing in the artists and creatives that I admire-this absolute harmony with one’s intuition and how it illuminates their personal journeys and it’s absolutely turning me inside out in glorious, unexpected ways.
I believe that sometimes when we want something so badly, we have a death grip on it and we suffocate the beauty that could possibly emerge. We are blind to possibilities, to doors and windows, and become slaves to frustration.
Does this mean that we shouldn’t have dreams, or we should just passively sit and let life happen? Absolutely not. As in watercolor painting, we dream, and plan and prepare to the best we can. But we also let art happen. We let life do its thing and we surrender to the process, to the moment, and trust that we are well equipped to make the most of whatever comes our way, when it comes.
On Ease:
Ease means Trust. Ease means not fighting, ease means everything has its time and will happen, ease does NOT mean being complacent, rather it means doing everything we can to set the stage for what we want and releasing our grip on the outcome. Ease means knowing we’re on our paths, always.
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What’s on my Bookshelf these days:
- Victor Frankl talks about Hyper-Intention in his poignant book Man’s Search for Meaning which explains Not-Forcing from his viewpoint as a concentration camp survivor. Profound. A must read.
- Language of Archetypes by Caroline Myss
- The Art Spirit by Robert Henri
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What are you fighting that could use more Ease? Is it a creative project? A Situation? Could you pretend a Watercolor Painting with it? Do let me know below, I’d love to hear from you!
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Happy Things To Come:
- Peekaboo! Series 2 is coming up, with completely new storytelling and pieces to collect, excited to bits about this!! (As promised, the theme will be a surprise!)
- My Very First Show at my favorite (art) candy store: Carter Sexton! It’s inspired by the fantasy and reality of what lies beneath the waters and I have three pieces in the show! Do come if you’re in town, it will be a fun little party and I’d love to meet you!
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If you want more ideas on finding ease and magic in your everyday lives, I made a short film and an adventure-planning pocket guide with audio narration. Enter your email below to receive it ♥