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Feeling Rejuvenated

Friday, July 10th, 2009 by Alyice

Since the beginning of May, I had essentially quit working. Sure, I did the extreme minimal to keep what is left of my writing business afloat—thanks to our current economic situation, but that’s it. I hadn’t sought new freelance writing gigs. I hadn’t marketed my online magazine, The Dabbling Mum. As for my career as an artist, there has been absolutely no marketing, no new projects in the works, no techniques practiced, and no books read. Anything art-related has been limited to playing with photographs in Paint Shop Pro X2 and uploading to Zazzle.

And I have to tell you that it was the best decision I could have made for myself.

I had been burning the lamp at both ends since 2001, adding more and more to my plate with each passing year and never giving myself a break—never fully appreciating what I had accomplished. Never truly seeing what was right in front of me; always seeking to be better, to do better, to reach yet another goal and all the while trying to find some type of balance.

That balance, however, always came with a cost because it was always a balance between work and family. There was never any “me” time and there was definitely never any “down” time. I suppose it didn’t help that I was a control freak who liked to make sure that everyone’s lives were running as smoothly as possible, even if that meant I went without.

Now, I know that not everyone can manage to take two months off from work—and truth-be-told, we really couldn’t afford it either. But after battling a very strenuous year in our personal lives, it was truly essential to my mental well-being—and quite possibly, my physical well-being, too.

I knew that if I was going to move forward with my life and move beyond the depression, I was going to have to just stop and “rest”. So I talked it over with my husband and got his blessing.

It wasn’t a difficult decision considering my business had nearly tanked due to the economy and local jobs are scarce. I had one of two choices: use the time to re-coop or stress myself out trying to save a dying business. It was also no surprise when my husband said, “Do what you need to do to feel better. Do what you need to do to find some peace. We’ll find a way to make it work, we always do.” We’ve always supported each other when life altering changes were necessary for our own, personal well-beings.

At first, doing absolutely nothing was hard. I felt guilty for not working and found myself applying for jobs I knew I’d hate—just to have a steady paycheck again and because that’s all there was in the area—and feeling extreme relief when they filled the spot without ever calling me in for an interview. Then I found myself apologizing every time there wasn’t much left after we paid the bills. Then I found myself downsizing our “junk” and feeling such peace about the process that I soon began restructuring and reorganizing our home, and two months later I’m still at it—husband’s even gotten in on the act of unloading our “junk” via Craigslist, “we buy used” shops, and garage sales.

In the two months that I haven’t worked, I’ve discovered that:

asking for help is not a sign of weakness,
life goes on whether you participate in it or not,
most “urgent” or “do now” tasks on a to do list can wait,
it is vitally important that we have down time to do absolutely nothing,
it’s not the end of the world if everything isn’t put back in its proper place or there’s a load of laundry waiting to be folded,
we waste tons of money buying crap we’ll only use once simply because an ad got the better of us or it looked cool or it filled a void at the time,
expecting too much of ourselves can cause us to be too uptight and no fun to be around, and
knowing success doesn’t always come in dollars and cents is hard to believe when the world keeps cramming that point down our throats.

And I have learned that happiness truly does come from within.

As much as we’d like to believe that happiness comes from the people that surround us, a location, a job, material possessions, or even wealth, it doesn’t. True happiness comes from how we perceive things. It’s not circumstantial. It’s how we choose to live our lives despite the circumstances. It’s about finding the blessings that surround us each and every day and acknowledging them. It’s about appreciating the here and now and not about looking to the future or living in the past. It’s about sharing the load with those that matter most, and not taking on the world alone. It’s about realizing that perfectionism is overrated and success truly is in the “eye of the beholder” and it’s time we stop letting outside forces dictate otherwise.

For the first time in over a year, I feel as though I can breathe again and I have no intention of jumping back into my old way of life. I like the freedom that comes from living without so many high expectations and I hope that in time I will grow to truly love myself again.

Give thanks…

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Cut That Masterpiece

Tuesday, April 14th, 2009 by Alyice

Ann Baldwin is an amazing artist. She is definitely someone I admire when it comes to creating beautiful collage paintings and mixed media art. So when she said not to be afraid to cut up your masterpiece if the composition isn’t just right, I listened.

In fact, I listened so well that the more I pondered my emotions piece, from last week, the more I wondered if it wouldn’t serve the viewer better if I cut it up—into two separate pieces.

At first, I was intimidated by the idea. I was terrified that I’d cut the piece and regret the decision; especially since the piece, as a whole, really reflected my heart’s message. But the more I stared at the couple, the more I realized that they might have been just a bit too small for the composition as a whole. Then I found a beautiful antique looking frame that said, “I belong to that couple and that couple belongs to me”. So I bought it, I cut up the piece, and this is the result.

Keep Creating

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Weekly Art Challenges

Monday, February 23rd, 2009 by Alyice

I love the idea of weekly art challenges. The problem is that I can never quite meet the deadlines. I’m not sure if it’s time constraints, being told that I only have five to seven days to complete the task, or because I tend to work intuitively. All I know is that I’m no good with tight deadlines like that—when it comes to art, that is. I often need a couple of weeks to a month to finish just one creative project—unless of course, it’s one of my art jars.

Sometimes, I will begin creating a piece of art, have the entire background done, and discover that I cannot press forward because something just doesn’t feel right—something is holding me back. I’ll stare at the paper and think, “What do you want from me? What is it that I’m not seeing? Where do you want me to go?” Then, instead of forcing the art to come to me, I’ll simply put it aside and move onto something else, until the right time presents itself. Other times, things seem to flow effortlessly and I can get a piece done within two days.

I’d like to change that, however. I’d like to be able to produce works of art faster, more efficiently, and skillfully while still listening to my creative spirit. But being the realistic person that I am, I know that forcing myself to do a weekly challenge will only stifle my creativity and, as has happened in the past, cause me to flake out of the challenge altogether.

So with that in mind, I decided to allow myself the flexiblity to create art on a monthly basis; to create art that speaks to the soul–and not worry about how fast it’s created.

Let’s create art!

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AlyiceEdrich.com
I'm a freelance writer, mixed media artist, SMVA, and the owner of The Dabbling Mum.

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