seaking_light_feather_web

Where does it come from?

on May 8, 2012

The other day I was in my studio creating a new piece.

I was struck, once again with the awe and wonder of the process of making something that didn’t before exist.

Where did it come from and how did it get here?

 

People ask me all the time, “where do you get your inspiration?” or “how do you get these ideas?”

I’ve always been one to struggle with not enough time, instead of not enough ideas. I have a feeling that even if I had all the time in the world I could not create everything that came into my mind. I’m sure they wouldn’t all be good designs, but it sure would be fun! For now, I am just grateful that they are there, waiting for me to sit at my bench with a clear mind and tools in hand.

 

But I somehow don’t feel responsible for creating these ideas, as they seem to just show up.

Isn’t it interesting that we say ‘it came to me’

Musicians often talk about a song that comes complete in minutes vs. songs that you have to wrestle and pull into being like doubly impacted wisdom teeth.

It just occurred to me that maybe ideas are like cats, when they want to, they will curl up in your lap and you will easily and lovingly enjoy each others company. But if they don’t want to, you can see them out of the corner of your eye and get up to go pluck him into your arms and zoom – gone. You can chase that cat till the cows come home to no avail.

 

In the Buddhist practice the mind is considered to be a sixth sense;  that it can sense ideas out there or in here.

In her great TED talk Elisabeth Gilbert talks about creative ideas, or genius,  as a separate entity to us, an idea informed by Tom Waits and Greeks and Romans before the Renaissance. That it is something that is out there and might find you to land on, or it might be hanging around you waiting to come in, whether you’re ready or not.

Gilbert goes on to say that it is our job to be there working for it, when it does show up.

Pablo Picasso says “The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web”.

He also says “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.”

I tend to agree in some way. Of course the ideas that come to me and that I create are me – they are translated through my soul and dna to be a unique expression of me… that and something that I was brave and quiet enough to translate for. Perhaps they are things that exist already and they want to exist in the realm of being seen and touched – engaged with and related to.

I think people say they are inspired by nature because that is a place where we can be quiet and open enough to the subtle nature of ideas and creativity. We get out of our own way, we sink out of our heads and deeper into the realm of the heart and are receptive…. to what might be there, hovering around us asking to be made by heart and hand with silver or paint and canvas.

I have come to believe lately that these ideas that come to me are my teachers. They are the symbols I need to navigate through this wild and mysterious life.  They are messengers from the unknown, from the places that most of us haven’t yet learned how to navigate. I would even venture to say that some people call this being with God, or Spirit, or connected to the wild and wondrous nature that exists in us….. simply feeling alive

In that case it’s best to honour ones teachers… not let them go bound up and unspoken.

I try to listen to their wisdom

to translate it as best I can, and let it guide me.

Maybe by bringing it into being it may offer some guidance for someone else too.

Seeking light, accepting dark (in 2 parts)

Make me like a feather with it’s soft and supple strength,

pulling it’s host skyward,

sunward

using only the air beneath it.

And when I fall

 may I drift down lightly falling

from one direction to the other,

gently cradled by my own contours.

 

I fly towards the light,

I seek it like the hungry moth,

I reach for it, I yearn for it…

In easy, happy times,

But when I look only in that direction

I am easily tripped by that which I kept out of view.

The darkness, always, also the darkness.

This is when the moths come out.

When a cloak covers everything from the easy touch of sight,

and a light is at it’s brightest.

May my dark cloak be softly woven.

Protective, yet porous…

enough to let the light shine though.

In both directions.

This necklace is available here

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triangle2_web

perfectionitis

on April 7, 2012

I have been suffering from a severe case of perfectionitis.

It is a terrible thing to have caught. It really works it’s way into your bones, makes them heavy and hard to lift a finger in the creative realm.

I’m sure you know what I mean. It’s almost as common as a cold.

Sometimes we don’t know why this little devil comes over and plops it’s self righteously at your table.

Takes out a big ass newspaper, settles in with a bottomless cup of coffee and gets comfortable, for a long time. A long long time.

 It’s been months since I’ve written here.

I wrote in a song once (yes I used to write some music)

“Why do I do least what I want the most”

followed by

“I’m not afraid of fire, but I am afraid of smoke”

 I suppose that might sum it up.

Why are we stopped in our tracks from doing what our hearts and souls are crying out so loudly to do?

Good question right!

Well if I had a clear and logical answer I would simply answer the question and move along my merry way wouldn’t I?

I know it has to do with a lot of things, so maybe I’ll make a neat little list and attempt to move on…. “Move on?” you say – but we have not answered the question one little bit.

Well the thing is… I’ve spent so much of my life looking for answers to questions… so many questions.

And lately I’ve come to love the questions a little more and not shoo them out the door so fast. I‘ve come to believe that part of the answer is simply – the question.

What the heck am I talking about right?

Sometimes I wonder!

If I can accept the question and let it be there, then I can move on from the asking and into the doing.

Constantly asking ‘why don’t I get off my butt and just do some writing?’ just keeps me in the place of not doing – it keeps me with the asking… still with me?

So now I’m doing. I’m typing away and putting words on paper and even sharing them with you!

What is in the space in between the asking and the doing?

Some of it was letting go… maybe even a lot of it.

Letting go of the pressure of creating a masterpiece.

Creativity is not about creating a masterpiece.

Really!?! Isn’t it?

No, I don’t think it is.

Masterpieces are a beautiful symptom of something that takes a hold of you.

Sometimes the results of a gut wrenching process.

In order to create a masterpiece we have to give up the idea all together.

We have to be willing to make mistakes along the way. Lots and lots of them.

We have to be willing to have the courage to stand in the face of those mistakes as they shout loudly to us that we are not good enough to do what we are doing, and then DO it anyway!

Ouch, a bit of a punch in the face.

We have to be willing to tromp through some of the swamp of shame and doubt and all those self-sabotaging beliefs and say “hi, oh you’re still here hey. Well you and I might as well get to know each other so I can keep you in my sights to make sure I’m walking with you at my side or be behind me, rather than stifling my stride and tripping me up because so often you are right, freekin’ in front of me”.

Know your enemies right? Are we not our own worst enemies?

So invite them in.

Talk to that devil at your table.

Maybe make an agreement.

“ok buddy, I see you here, but listen up. You may be sitting at my table but you don’t get to run the show around here. I want the arts and entertainment section and you are limited to one cup of my fair trade, organic coffee and then you’ve got to go ‘cause I’ve got some work to do!”

Then do… pick up that body and go stand there, in front of blank canvas, page of paper or sheet of silver. Oooh it’s a scary place – flat calm in the middle of the sea with no motor and a broken paddle.

Where there is nothing…also known as pure potential to be anything.

And when we are courageous enough we will stand with our tools, be it paintbrush or jewellers saw, take a deep breath and be there alone.

And through the strong current of self doubt we will lift our hands.

We will create enough space to breathe in the wonder that is creativity.

We will apply movement to our paint or metal and we will transform it into something that never existed before.

And we will be filled with the beauty of being in it.

And before we know it our case of perfectionitis is gone.

Oh ya I forgot to write that list… I forgot to answer the question of why or what?

I dabbled in a few answers, thoughts really.

But here I am without any real answers and I feel cured.

Sometimes we are in the arena before we know it, or because we stopped asking for a way in.

We are there because we took a breath, we took a leap.

We stepped over that insurmountable pile in front of us.

How?

We just did.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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urchin_necklace2_web

sea urchin necklace

on December 4, 2011

under our shield of swords what fragile bone structure are we sheltering?

like a secret under the surface… covered in spikes only to shed them like the power they used to have over you.

what vulnerable core do we wish to protect?

now this delicate skeleton only resides, softly, like a shell- delicate and intricate…

making up the contours of my interior

containing some part of me softly wrapped, kept there for when I need to retrieve it, or heal it.

no longer shielding it from that which it most wants

to be cradled and carried softly

and to be known

 in it’s courage to be so delicate.

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Opal_temple_web

Transition

on November 4, 2011

After my arrival home from Burning Man my life has been in transition.

I knew it was coming, i just didn’t expect it to be this challenging.

I’ve moved out of my home of 9 years in the city back to a town I haven’t lived in for 15 years.

I moved into a nice home, unpacked my boxes and then was told that i would have to move again…it’s coming at the end of this month. At a time when I usually allow exhaustion -after shows and during my most busy time of year.

I also haven’t found a studio space here yet so a weekly commute to or from the city marks the pathway of my continuing move.

I spend time on a boat every week carrying me between two bodies of land – floating in between, not really in either place and yet in exactly the place that I am.

To unfurl wings must be painful, to use muscles that were before unknown.

If a butterfly could know it’s self what would it think of those first few moments in which it’s back becomes the cradle for two great wings?

Transition is a shifting or a complete annihilation of ones physical foundations, which leaves us with nothing but what we are without it… possibly the only true version of our Selves. Suspended.

It throws me into a place of questioning…. My beliefs and faith – the things I need most at this time.

It is harder for me to live in the moment. I have more fear.

After some time, slowly, slowly, I move towards allowing trust and faith to reside in my body again.

Like a rope slowly unwinding itself from around my core, falling into a puddle at my feet.

Leaving me both less contained and more free – two sides of one coin.

To move through transition with grace requires a practice of release of control. A test of the ego. A surrender.

It is good for me, like a hard lesson.

I will try to practice having grace, doing only what I can do, day by day, moment by moment, and yet as is the nature of this ‘place’ there are no clear answers, only questions, a future to reach towards and a present to try and capture in every moment.

I no longer have The Temple to make pilgrimage to everyday when I am feeling unsure of things. I’ve been thinking about sacred space and what it is.

How I can keep it with me?….

The one of a kind temple Series:

 

Within me resides a sacred space

The walls are white and smooth and absorb the remnants of the chatter of my mind.

It is quiet enough to hear my own voice

Feel my own rhythm and take a step to it’s beat.

The space I create when I let what IS, be enough

Here I ask for the courage to act on the behalf of my souls calling

When I allow the messy charcoal mark of my darkness

And the brilliance of my light

reside within in me and make peace with one another.

When I take a moment to sort my seeds

…not important….important… essential… important….

By remembering gratitude

and putting aside my wanting

and accepting what i have with grace

It is in this place

that I am in my sacred space

My temple

star ruby, rose window, temple pendant

 

 

opal temple necklace

 

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Rites of Passage at Burning Man

Rites of Passage at Burning Man

on October 1, 2011

I’ve been on a big adventureTo the desert… dry and dusty… filled with sunshine and mystery


After years of deliberation this was the one that I was unmistakably called to go and experience Burning Man, one of the largest arts and expression festivals in the world

  The experience could be a million different things, for each different person who embarks on that journey.

 For me I always knew that I didn’t want to go 987987miles in to the desert to spend a week partying….and why go to a harsh, uncomfortable and unforgiving environment?

 I always wanted to go for the art. To be inspired to snap a thousand photos and wonder at peoples creative endeavors.

What I found there was much much more…..



On a personal level I knew that I had some work to do there too. I’ve had an incredibly transformative year and there were a few threads still hanging loose that I wanted to tie up tight… I wasn’t even sure what they were… or why i needed to go to that crazy place to attempt it… i just knew i did…. and i was right.

I think the most incredible part of it for me was to be in a place where people are so open, so fearless, so aware, so awake.

It’s not that there isn’t blind debauchery there as well… it just wasn’t where I was pulled to.

 Burning Man seemed to me like humanity magnified… there is so much beauty and a lot of darkness too. I think the difference is that there people don’t hide from their darkness so much. They express it through hours of primal dancing and howling at the moon or shouting and screaming into the honest desert night if need be.

People release their fears and grief by writing it on the walls of the temple or an installation, by looking into it’s dark eyes and saying ‘you don’t scare me anymore’.

Within that place of accepting our darkest pieces, we accept our wholeness, and whole is how we are meant to feel. Within a sense of wholeness we can connect to that which is whole in others. We see our own humanity reflected in their pain and flaws and also immense beauty.

In finding that wholeness in ourselves and in others we begin to see it in everything.

I’ve been struggling for a long time to embrace myself as whole (are we not all?)…

To embrace things about me that scare me but make me alive as hell, that light my heart on fire.

The theme of this year was rites of passage. Someone asked me which rites of
passage I was thinking about or connecting to…. I had to say it was birth and death, death and birth. I’ve done some dying this year… yes, things in me died, but things that were festering and aged and ready to be let go of… and i did a lot of being born as well. I shed many layers of the chrysalis and began to spread my wings.

Flying is wild and scary and wondrous.

I was blessed there – to be provided with exactly what I needed. There is a saying- ‘the playa provides’… and I believe it is true. I do believe that we get what we need in life and like everything at Burning Man, that axiom is magnified.

I owe much gratitude for the people who surrounded me in that process, I can only hope that I also was a conduit for what they needed as well as what they gifted to me.

What i needed is hard to describe though. I needed to get out of my head and sink deeper in the kind of knowing that resides only in the heart and in the body ( a fine resonance of the souls soft whispers), out of doubt and to accept parts of my life path that I’ve been resisting.

I needed to remember beauty for beauties sake

 and creativity for creativity’s sakeLove for Love’s sake and letting go….for goodness sake

One of the most powerful musical experiences I’ve ever had was my nightly pilgrimage to stand under the Earth Harp and feel the resonance of it’s strings rush through my body. I was keenly aware of how much of my body, mostly made of water, was being affected by the sound waves of this incredible and majestic instrument, and by what I let in when I really listened.

Those vibrations wove their way into the caverns of my heart.

I could feel them reaching in and gently untying the knots  that had been hiding there.

Slowly unwrapping those tightly bound places – freeing them, showing them how to breathe again.


It seems to me that life’s deepest truths lie in paradox.

Within impermanence lies the interconnected forever-ness.

 To see something so beautiful and full of reverence as the temple, to honour it, to fall in love with that place, and then watch it burn and let it all go was an experience I cannot explain.


Before the temple burned I circled it twice, saying prayers and sending them into that most sacred and beautiful place

Finally I sat on the ground, prepared to watch one of the most wondrous creations I have ever seen burn to the ground.

The burning of the temple is a very reverent experience. thousands of people sit in silence to watch their place of exalted warship and release become engulfed in flames.

Which it did. it took only minutes for the structure and everything in it, material and etheral, to be wrapped in tongues of fire.

I sat and watched in revery as all that letting go went up in smoke. And i did let go. I sat and cried the for a long time. I let the tears well from my eyes again and again. I let them fall from me and take with them, my past, my pain, shame, guilt, resistance, hesitance, and fear. I let go. I watched my prayers, and those of 50,000 others go up in smoke.

I walked around the smoldering flames after the fire cooled a little, I dipped in and out of all the sacred spaces people had created encircling the burn, people shared their personal stories of letting go. And as I approached the slightly cooled inferno to throw in a little package I had prepared as part of my ritual of the evening, i found it gone. I smiled to myself as I realized that I would also have to let go of how I planned on letting go.

Rarely in my life have i felt so connected – to everything. To the natural wonder of the world and to the people within it. My experience at Burning Man reminded me who I am, like a child discovering the world around them, seeing it for its wonder and with the awe it deserves.

 

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