I’ve been know to get things done quickly. You’ve probably caught the typos here. Know thyself, right? The funny thing is that I will work a piece for a very long time, and then rush the last detail. I’m cultivating a both and approach. Have you ever tried watercolor? I started last year as a part of my both and approach and undoing the boundaries concept on artist.
One of the most fascinating aspects for me is watching how water works with the paint and the page. You can’t rush it. All the elements change the creation. You work with the water across the page. I was riveted.
My first attempt, I followed the artist video instruction immaculately and learned so much. Step by step, I was delighted with my created mountain scape. Next was a free-form mimicry of a card from art teacher’s nature cards. That’s when I learned you really cannot control water color. The more I tried to make a form the less it looked like mu intention. Roots became too big. Colors ran away — too bright, too dark, too much.
I had to give the paint time. I had to slow down, work the layers. Work with the white space. White space is integral.
A few nights ago, curbing my own social media habit, I lit a candle and took out the water colors. This time, I loosely picked another of Kat Ryalls’s cards: Mother. It’s a bird, wings open sheltering a nest. I did a mock up of the nest and played around, then turned to a new, white open page. Let’s just play, I thought.
I let the paints flow. Very simple, and maybe this is an over eager novice, share, but the messaging works. When I thought about how to make the face, the beak, how to dot the eyes so that they don’t become black splooges across the page — which has happened numerous times before — I heard: Wait.
Oh, right, I remembered. This is for fun. There is no rush. I put the paint brush down and let the colors rest until morning.
Do you see the face and the beak that emerged from the white space? Head bowed. I keep looking at this painting and wondering how did this happen? Is this what happens when you trust the Creator? When you do you and not overthink the rest?
Is this what patience is? Or faith? When you listen and wait. When you let go and what comes back is delightful.
I’ve been noodling a piece to write here about why writing or creating what you can now is more important and powerful than anything else.
Modern life is evolving quickly and with a lot of optics, but optics don’t nourish our souls. Watching color across a page can, or little toes in sand, a wink from a grandparent, an unexpected lunch with a beloved, these are the pocket gems that make a life.
I was on a call yesterday with a successful friend and business mentor, explaining how there is a misconception about how many iterations it takes for an online course to hit its stride. She pointed out a misconception that a voice on YouTube’s rarely solo, and may also have a team of twenty, with scads of failures until they’ve soared to current success. She said this to underpin one point — keep going! Wait, before you decide what you have created didn’t work.
Another part of this message that I am working out is that the intention of the creation and the mindset that you can manage to maintain dials in the possibilities; however, without patience, and with the assumption that only you, alone can do it and it needs to have been done yesterday, well, that’s when I get black splotches where there could have been infinite white space.
So create.
🔗Meditate, a wonderful way to make white space between your ears and let a whole other level of possibilities whisper to you.
You can also create your day, and your perspective. You can choose kindness again and again, before you move to quickly, you can choose to wait and see what comes.
Enjoy the day and if you are reading this on Friday the 13th, take some time with Nature. Look up, speak with kindness and expect the world to follow your beautiful example,
Kate
I have a meditation space tomorrow short, friendly, and free to all. Register for the link. It is honoring the changing energies right now, by acknowledging the interconnection of all mater, matter, mother. Both Earth, human, and internal. The meditation’s focus is to open our capacity to more love. I can’t think of anything more needed these days. 🔗 You can join us. October 14th at 12-12:30 EST Register here.
If you are thinking of joining us for 🔗 Sit in Our Center: A Space for Mothers, I encourage you to hop in on this circle.