I’ve been talking with Scott about some stuff (as always). I don’t have the right words yet so this will take some work. Sometimes, I get a clear picture of what life would be like without restrictions on possibilities. It’s like creating a list of goals knowing you have all the time and money you need to make it happen. I can wave a magic wand and remove all of my obstacles. That is the space of infinite possibilities.
If you could do anything you wanted to, what would it be? What would you learn? Where would you go, live, work?
What happens to the mind when it sees possibilities instead of obstacles? Dreaming opens the mind to expansion instead of contraction. It is an empowering process that employs creativity and enables us to look for ways to make things work. It is a completely different mindset from what most of us maintain on a day to day basis. Take the time to open up to this on at least a daily basis and change your basic mindset. Many of our decisions are based on ego and judgment; decided out of fear. Through the process of practicing expansion, thoughts based on “limiting beliefs” will become more obvious. This enables us to make choices based on the type of response we choose to make rather than making an automatic choice out of fear.
If we want to be in charge of our lives, we MUST be aware of the criteria used for our decisions.
As an artist, this has huge ramifications as well. If I fear a subject, I won’t paint it. I’ll stall, dither, look at hundreds of images on the internet, anything I can to keep from beginning something I see as difficult. (This shows up in self-talk as, “I’m not good enough to do that, I’ll make a mess of it, I don’t know how, that’s beyond me.”) When I fall into this mindset, I limit my scope of work and my growth as an artist stalls or stagnates. It is precisely working on these more challenging pieces that I learn the most from my efforts!
It is almost impossible to paint well from a place of judgment. Critical thinking, as in problem-solving or actively working through issues is a very different place than judgment. It is the difference between “this is bad” and “what will make this a better painting?” It is the difference between focusing outward on your work, and inward at what you perceive as your own failings.
One more thing about judgment from a different angle, and then I’ll stop, for now. The original paintings I have liked the least have sold, and I continue to sell prints of those paintings because they are so popular. All I can do is shake my head and keep going. I have a feeling that we are rarely the best judge of our own work.