just keep going

I'm having one of those days where I get overwhelmed.  When this happens, I shut down and have to focus on a simple thought, to get rid of the feeling that I might implode.  Today's simple thought is,

  "Just keep going.  Just keep going.  Just keep going.  Just keep going."

I made good progress on the pod over the weekend.  I made a stand, so now it's a little more "plantlike."  I'm having a bit of trouble deciding on the final colors.  I spent HOURS trying to make an ivory/ecru out of the polymer clay I had on hand - and finally ended up with a fairly nice tan.  But now I have lots of muddy grey unsuccessful clay lumps that I guess will be used as structure for other things.  The way I'm going to decorate the stand is also morphing in my head into a jewelry idea...

Just what I need!  Another jewelry idea!

I also have played a lot with finial ideas, but I'm still in the play stage.

I worked on making buttons.  Hmmm, now I can't remember where this idea came from, originally - to make buttons.  I've been carrying it around in my brain for quite some time.  The last few days though, it seems I can't lie down and "doze" or I will have 2 or more ideas for buttons arrive fully formed in my head.

"Dozing" for me is that time just before or usually just after sleep where my thoughts aren't verbal, they are visual, and very free.  I get a lot of inspiration and ideas during this "dreamtime".

Anyway, I had this idea for a kind of "tribal" button, big (2 inches square), and the scarf I will knit to go with it - a simple shawl, draped around the shoulders.  As the idea has rattled around a little, the concept of the shawl and how the button can be used has changed.

But that happens.  My brain (all our brains?) is like a rock tumbler.  Put something in there, and let it tumble around a bit, you're never quite certain what will come out the longer you leave it bouncing around.

And yes, I ought to keep a journal by the bed (or wherever I am napping), and write these inspirations down, but I don't.  I should.  If you have seen the series art:21  <--- this link is to a segment on the artist Richard Serra, and around 6:30 in the piece he talks about how he draws, and the purpose of it, of journaling, sketching, for him.  It's good stuff, that series.  You can see four seasons of the show at www.hulu.com.


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messages, thoughts, and beliefs

I am ruminating about Shambhala, tumbling the words over and over in my head, which seems to resemble a rock tumbler...  complete with rocks.

There is a section in Chapter Nine: Celebrating the Journey, the part about the bow and arrow, and messages.  When I read it the first time, I had great trouble with this section, but it seemed very rich and full even though I didn't understand it, or know how to incorporate it in a practice.

I was thinking about messages, and thoughts and beliefs today.  I verbalized for myself the idea that it is not the thoughts that are troublesome.  According to this book, you just label them "thoughts", and allow them to float away.  To this end, I like to visualize my thoughts being written on little scraps of some sort of melty paperlike substance, and I catch them and pin them on the inside of my skull and let them dissolve, rather than let them float around.  It gets clogged in there if I don't pin them down.

But I have the habit of letting thoughts solidify.  They become rock hard, then immoveable.  Or sometimes they become brittle and then they break and become shards and stab me with their little sharp edges.  It's not the thoughts that are troublesome.  It's my habit of making them solid. They become beliefs.  Big, beefy, heavy, sharp, brittle, rocklike beliefs.  Even if they aren't true. Then I eventually do something neurotic because of them.

So, thinking these things, I went back.  I looked up "messages" in the index of the book, and found that section again, and there were these words that leapt out at me:

"You want to look at every situation and examine it, so that you won't be fooling yourself by relying on belief alone..."

Maybe I am absorbing some of this book after all!  That whole section now makes a kind of sense to me.  And it's great.  I love these kinds of books - so rich, and so deep, and you can go back to them year after year and discover something new.

In case anyone is wondering, this book does have something to do with creativity.  I'm not sure exactly what yet...  but I was originally introduced to it by one of my art teachers.  She assigned it as the text for a previous jewelry-making class, two or three years ago.  If I remember, I'll ask her when I see her next week (I am currently in another of her classes.)

If nothing else, I am hopeful that it will prevent me from making neurotic art.

To that end, work progresses; here is the lil boat today:

lil boat

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