There are times when everything seems to go wrong… when life seems unbearably hard. There are times when heaps of unfortunate happenings pile on top of each other… kind of like dominos… one thing fails, then another, then another… and you find yourself scrambling for some stability and hope for a better tomorrow. People are fallible. Cars are fallible. Cameras are fallible. Money is fallible. This world is fallible. Life happens and there’s nothing anyone can do about it but keep pushing forward. “Just keep swimming,” as my fishy friend Dory once taught me.
Every morning, the sun rises out of the dark, cold night, and wakes us up. The light slowly creeps into the room, alarm clocks go off, and consciousness fills your mind and body. On good days, I find myself chipper and excited to start my day… to get as much done as I can and live life with a smile. On bad days, I find myself lagging… longing for just another 10 minutes of unconscious bliss in my warm and comfortable bed so I don’t have to face reality. What gets you out of bed? What motivates you? How do you cope with the reality that everything is fallible?
The hard thing about being in a profession that’s contingent on creativity is you have to be creative whether you’re feeling it or not. What about those days when you feel the weight of the world on your shoulders…. how do you muster up enough creativity to live up to your standards with clients? What about those days when you feel no motivation to do anything because it seems it’s all in vain anyways? Lots of hard questions… and something I’ve found to be a downside/upside to being in a creative profession. You read that right… I’ve found the problem of creativity a downside as well as an upside of being a professional creative person.
The downside is that, like I was saying earlier, there are “those days” and even though I’m not feeling it, I have to be creative and perform to the standard with clients. If I have a wedding and I’m not feeling particularly creative or motivated at all, there’s no room for it and I have to squeeze it out of somewhere. The upside is… see if you can follow this… the upside is, I have to be creative in how I’m creative. On “those days” I run, I sleep more, I research, I look at art, I go to the beach, I talk with a long lost friend, I write, I take pictures of my cat, I read, I bake, I clean, I paint, I make stuff… I do anything I can to fill myself up before I go to work. I have to be creative with how I find inspiration, and with how I find hope.
Today, was one of “those days”…. in fact, the past week has been “one of those days.” …. when I let the weight of the world affect me. So I got up this morning and decided I needed to get out of my funk. So I cleared a spot next to my window, laid an old sheet down, pulled out my art boxs, and I painted… ALL DAY. I needed inspiration and I found it in the colors and the forcing of creative juices. A day of painting is what I needed to put the weight of the world back in perspective.
Folks, this life is going to be hard…. there’s no getting around it. The kingdom of this world is in constant tension with the kingdom of heaven…. and by tension, I mean teeth gritting, blood sweating TENSION. The other night, Christopher reminded me of of something REALLY important to remember on “one of those days”… Remember whose arms you’re in.
Remember who promised to be with you always.
Remember who has called you His Beloved.
Here’s what today yielded… 
And as some of you have requested, here’s some shots of the latest button rings I’ve made… I love them…. let me know what you think!
