I had this conversation with a customer and it made me reflect. Yes, it is hard to find the time to create. Especially for me, Spring, Summer and Fall are times of creating life on the farm. It means early mornings, long days and late nights. My hands get rough and my back aches. In-spite of this, it offers moments of beauty in so many ways. Dewy plants. Mothers nuzzling newborn lambs. Rich colors getting plucked from dark soil.
These moments feed my soul in a different way. They go in a reservoir where inspiration draws from for the colors that get painted across my art. Moments get tucked away and become stories such as these I tell to you.
Yet the need to create is always there. So I must find the time.
Many times, I can only find the time when I instill upon myself a deadline. These make me push aside all other priorities and put my art first. It's really hard to do! Really, really hard to do. So many things vie for attention. However strong the pull, I know that unless I put art first, it will not get done.
As I started to create, something wonderful happened. I felt a calmness and yet a surge of energy pass through my system. I found myself thinking less about everything else and focusing on how the fibers felt in my hands. How the colors blended. How rhythmic the rolling was.
Creating
swept
me
away.
It took me out of the moment, out of the stresses and transformed me.
I was expecting to be stressed by the anticipation of having to create for an upcoming deadline, and instead I found just the opposite effect. We so often cannot find creativity on our own. We need a little nudge. For me it was a deadline. For someone else, it might be coming to a class here at Esther's Place. Others, it might be a knitting group, like our lovely Friday ladies that come to work on projects. In any shape or form, motivation to seek after creativity sometimes comes from outside yourself.
So in reflection, I am learning more about myself and my art. But one thing I do know and have always known. Creativity was something planted in me by the Creator of every good and perfect thing. It makes me feel like I'm fulfilling a little purpose in my life, which in turns, brightens my corner of world just a little bit more.
