​Why is it essential that you are making your art now?
And why it is so darned hard to do it now?

Have you noticed that there is a lot of crap going on in national politics right now? And that it causes fear and anger and that it is easy to feel dis-empowered and disheartened?

​There is so much that can be overwhelming and cause us to stick our heads in the sand. Better than pacing around the kitchen fuming and not knowing what to do.

I don’t know about you, but I have been carrying a lot of extra tension and anxiety feeling like I am not doing enough and I have no idea how to take it all in. I do not want to live a life of anger. I did that in my 20’s and I made a conscious choice not to live that way. So now what?

This is the thing, as artists and creatives, we have two essential roles to play:

We nourish the soul- our work nourishes the soul. Our souls individually, but also the souls of the people who connect with our work, and by doing that we are nourishing the soul of our culture.

And we speak the truth- the difficult, unclear, complex truth that underlies all of the words that are being flung around.

When we do our work honestly, we are giving voice to the very real but inarticulate places in our being, the places of complex and challenging paradoxes that need growth and healing. By falling in love with those places- caressing them into visual form, we are bringing compassion to them and it is compassion that is the beginning of healing. And boy does our culture need healing right now!

We are in a time of fear and anger. There is massive distrust happening and being fueled by certain politicians. We are losing sight of our shared humanity.

Fear is not a healthy place to live, nor is it a wise place to base our actions and words. When we are in fear we can only see the surface of things, the simplistic versions of us and them, right and wrong, perpetrator and victim. When we are in fear we are not able to move with compassion and love, and we make the divisions deeper. We aim at retribution and punishment. Is that really what we want?

In order to live in a culture of compassion and healing we need to do our art work. We need to speak the truth with concern for the well being of the entire community. We must let ourselves tap into the creative unconscious, muck around in the unknown, unclear stuff of our collective unconscious, and draw out those most needful truths. It is essential that we bring all of our love and patience to this work. And that we do the work of getting it out into the public sphere.

Let me just say that I understand that this is vulnerable work. When the whole world wants us to act now, when fear and anger are pushing on us, to take the time to dwell in the not-knowing seems like inaction. It seems selfish. It seems too darned slow.

And yet we need to do it. We need to nourish our souls by being present with our very particular sense of what is compelling, and we need to allow time for the discovery of truth. Our very particular truth.

The hardest part of this is trusting that you have something of value to offer. When you allow yourself into that place of not knowing, are you really going to be able to find something in there that is worth it? Do you have anything to say? We doubt ourselves. Of course we do.
 
In order to do this work well, you have to let go of the surface knowing. And when you are in fear and anger you cling to what you think you know- clear, simple, didactic things that other people are telling us is the truth. It is the nature of fear and anger.

Our job as artists is to put those things that we think we know off to the side, and tap into a place of deeper knowing- a place that has no words and speaks in the subtle language of color, shape, texture, rhythm and line.

You will know it when you are getting there. You have been there before. You will recognize that place of quickening, of deep connection, of oh my god did this come out of me? It is a humble feeling even as it brings more confidence and clarity of self.

We do not need to make overt political art work in order for it to be of value to the culture. We need to make work that brings us back to our shared humanity. Maybe it is overt political work, and maybe it is a reminder of the beauty that we live in- a respite from the anxiety and fear- a place of gratitude and nourishment that helps ground our audience in the love and compassion that is so essential to healing.

Or maybe it is playful and light, another way to open the heart. Maybe it articulates the pain or disquiet of the inner being, and brings a sense of awareness and compassion to it.

Art functions in so many different ways, and you really do not need to know ahead of time what your intention is. All you need to do is let yourself be in the process.

It may be that on Monday you need to nourishment of yummy beauty and on Tuesday or later that afternoon, or a month from now, you are ready to let that anger and frustration come out with clarity and purpose. We are complex human beings- we have a full range of emotions and they are all real. We need to express all of it in various ways.

And others, (think of all those people who do not know how to access that deep creative place) need to be moved and challenged and held and nourished by your work. You need to find a way to let it be seen. When you are ready.

So please, Keep making art! 

If this speaks to you and you would like to know more, please check out my web site, Taproot Arts and Insight.  (https://taprootartsinsight.com) I am a coach for artists who want to make work that matters and I work with individuals and with groups. I am also available for speaking engagements.

And please help me spread the word by liking and commenting and sharing!!

​The good news is that you have been getting into the studio and making work, at least some. You are trying to get your creative work moving again and you have decided to go ahead and do short, quick studies- what I would call doodles. The key is that they are low pressure things- throw away work, nothing serious- just a way to get the juices flowing. I will talk more about this process in another post.

The bad news is that when you walk away from it, your inner critic starts yelling about how stupid it is, and how scattered your ideas are, and how you have no discipline or direction and you are never going to amount to anything as an artist. Ouch. It is hard to keep going in the face of this!
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I don't know if it really helps to know this, but it is completely normal. I go through cycles of this as does every artist that I know. And it can be very painful.

As frustrating and painful as it is, what is going on here is really good stuff!

Why can't I make real art any more?
Is this question familiar? It goes like this: You are frustrated because it has been forever since you have made any real art and you doubt that you still have it in you. You have always thought of yourself as an artist, but sometimes you wonder whether you can really claim that anymore. I have so been there! If you have been like me, there are things that you have done to try to be creative, and they have satisfied a certain part of you, but they go now where and end up feeling like dabbling. The feeling of really making art is like a distant memory. Art school is long since over and life kicked in- responsibilities took over and here you are 20 years later and you don’t really know who you are anymore. It’s like that old Talking Head’s song  “this is not my beautiful life, how did I get here...”. You do things to get yourself grounded and centered like yoga, walks in the woods, even taking a day to clean and organize helps sometimes, but there is something missing.
 

First I want to acknowledge that this is not actually small. It is a big issue. You and so many others like you have been able to keep on living and taking care of the stuff of life, but underneath it all- there is this