In birth as it is in any creative act...too much safety and structure scares the heck out of me. I think the thing I had to realize early on when my disorderly painting style began to emerge, is the fact that many people will not think my work is pretty or want to hang it on their walls. It is not whimsical or particularly inspiring. *sigh*
That being said, there is no real "purpose" to my work besides the act of doing it- which I find immensely gratifying, as in no strings attached. But what came first? Purposelessness at the onset or necessary surrender so that it could be the ugly or messy thing it usually wants to be?
I suppose that if I hung my hopes on people liking my work, I would truly starve! Thank goodness my husband has paying work! Feedback is fun, but I do believe that, for me, it is not necessary in order to feel glad I did the work. This is a relief.
I feel a certain wildness when I'm painting. I make a strange face that is focused and not attractive at all. I drop things repeatedly and spill things on the counter that I don't wipe up until I'm out of my trance. I snack like an animal. I unconcsiously forget I'm not wearing painting clothes and wipe my hands on my pants, but don't care much in the end.
Okay, that's not exactly wild, but I'm not functioning in my conscious body, and that feels different from how I normally operate.
Giving birth to M felt the same way to me. At home, there was no one badgering me to sign papers while riding out a contraction, no one securing wires and blood pressure cuffs on me while I was trying to do my hippy dippy Rainbow Relaxation. There was no incessant beeping of monitoring machines, tapping out reports on little tapes beyond my door in a nurse's station. There was no one looking at the clock and expecting me to perform and making me anxious. And in that place of total surrender without expectation, my baby arrived: smoothly, harmoniously, very messily and right on time. Though I did yell out, "What time is it?" as soon as his slippery body was out-because who knows, he may want to have his chart read someday...*grin*. Important stuff.
That darn flash. If I weren't burning the midnite oil to eek out time in the studio, my photos would surely appear a bit better. But then, who cares, right? :)
"When there is too much predator and not enough wild soul, the economic, social, emotional, and religious structures of culture gradually begin to distort the most soulful resources, both in spirit and in the outer world. Natural cycles are starved into unnatural shapes, lacerated with unwise uses, or else put to death. The value of what is wild and visionary is denigrated, and dark speculations are made about how dangerous the instinctual nature really is. Thus stripped of authentic sanctity and meaning, destructive and painful means and methods are rationalized as superior." --Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Ph.D, Women Who Run With the Wolves
