~ God told me to be an artist, week 26.
Friday 2nd June, 2023.
May was a month! So much happened and, I think more importantly, so much didn't happen. As you will have gathered from following my blog, this is a season of change. A significant time of new opportunities emerging alongside the seasoned and familiar falling away.
I don't know about you but for me, watching familiar things fade away when it's their time to go is a challenging thing. That's life though right, seasons change, good and bad times eventually end and we have to keep moving. You'd think we'd all be really good at surviving change, apart from death and taxes it's the only other guaranteed thing right?
What I've come to learn is that as people, we do have a certain amount of innate ability to manage shifts in our internal and external environments. We are able to survive things remarkably well on the whole, despite our resistance we are able to adapt. Just look at the pandemic, it was unbelievably difficult and there was so much pain and loss experienced but many of us made it through and all of us did our best to keep moving forward with the resources we had.
When I think about it, the amount of emotional distress some people experienced through this global trauma it is incomprehensible and extremely admirable that they kept putting one foot in front of the other.
So the question remains, if we are so able to acclimatise to an ever shifting environment, why is it so hard and why do we fight change so much?
Maybe you don't struggle in this area, but as a recovering perfectionist, I certainly do. I find it especially challenging when change starts to appear in a comfortable or financially stable season. The relinquishing of control when life is at its most balanced feels impossible for me.
I've to come to learn about myself that control, specifically around finances and my diary/ ability to produce, is where how my brain and internal world is conditioned to want to be. This is where it feels most safe. So it figures that the call from God to follow him into a creative calling that requires me to be an entrepreneur feels at times like everything within me is fighting against his voice and instruction. It's a deeply conflicting struggle. I know God has up ahead what's best for me but my thoughts and nervous system are like, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?? THIS ISN"T SAFE!
As you can imagine, it's quite challenging to walk forward when your brain and body are screaming at you to go the other way. But then there are these amazing moments where breakthrough happens, I survive a challenge, I trust God through a test, I emerge the other side of what feels impossible and I know in that moment that with God, all things are possible and survivable.
In these moments my internal world is challenged massively and I start to ask myself quietly, maybe I can learn how to follow God into the places that feel unsafe? With his help, maybe I can keep walking in this direction?
I start to notice a curiosity emerge. It's like the Holy Spirit is a quiet internal cheerleader whispering, why not try something new? Why not let me help you?
With all this in mind, it's no wonder I've felt unbelievably tired recently, this past year especially. My internal landscape is in constant conversation and battle with an ever growing Holy Spirit presence asking me to travel another way and let him be a part of it.
It makes me think of the game whack a mole, have you ever played it? It's simultaneously fun and stressful all at once. It starts out as a reasonable game, you whack whichever mole pops up. At first, there are a couple of seconds in between each one. It's possible to hit them as they arise, you start to get a bit cocky, it's almost too easy.
But then, the moles start to appear to faster, basically the more you hit, the more the game challenges you by speeding up. The initial speed increase often feels possible, you get a little hot under the collar, you have to move quicker but still the adjustment is reasonable.
The increasing speed doesn't stay at this new adjusted level though, it continues to get harder, faster and ultimately impossible as multiple moles appear at once, making it insurmountable to hit them all with one mallet.
When I've played this game, every time without fail I try to hit all the moles even when I know it's impossible. I raise my mallet wielding arm higher and take a sideways stance like somehow this will make an impossible task realistic. I huff and I puff and pep talk myself, come on, we got this - embarrassingly I chant loudly to myself.
Inevitably, after playing for a while, the end result is I lose. The game ends with a big bell or a voice bellowing, you lose or better luck next time. Or the absolute worst, all the moles laughing at you.
I'm annoyed everytime, like somehow I thought I should be able to do it. I expect myself to notice and manage all the moles popping up randomly 100% of the time!
Thinking about what I must look like playing this game makes me laugh and cringe. Picture it, it's me jumping around, chanting with an oversized mallet in my hand believing this is the time I will beat the moles. As funny as this image is, I'm genuinely convinced everytime that this will be the time I will win, I think there is a voice inside that believes that I should be able to beat the game and feels shame every time I don't. My nervous system hates the randomness of the game whilst simultaneously expecting myself to amazing at it.
*face palm*
The fact that I can't beat an impossible game makes me feel as if I'm a bad person. Thinking about it, this is the most accurate picture of perfectionism I've ever used.
I think two different [yet overlapping] streams of thought are emerging here, the effects of change on our fixed internal systems/ responses and the predisposed desire to control outcomes through perfectionism. You can understand why we need a additional source of support and resilience can't you?
Life is like this game, and it's really really hard.
I don't think everyone would identify as a perfectionist, but bear with me, I think it may be a state of mind that effects each one of us, some of us just express it in a more obvious or 'typical' way. You may be like me, striving for perfection in achievements - trying to whack all the moles and cursing yourself when you can't. Or perhaps a bad outcome or the fear of not being perfect at everything you try may cripple you entirely, causing you to tap out - to walk past the whack a mole game without playing because it'd be too humiliating to lose in front of people, or even in front of yourself.
Between these two extremes are a plethora of other possibilities and responses, but ultimately, I believe we tell ourselves that holding everything together doing everything in life 'right' is the only acceptable outcome and everything else is a failure.
Ouch right?
Who knew whack a mole went so deep? [haha].
But...how about we get creative and think about things another way?
Picture this, you're playing whack a mole...
What if you were allowed multiple players?
Would the outcome be different if someone could help you?
Would your internal berating be less if you were partnering with someone?
Could you handle losing the game if you could share the experience?
Bit of a clunky example, but you see what I'm getting at right?
Things could change if we invite others into the tasks and situations we need or want to manage in our lives. Maybe we'd still lose at times but it'd feel less alienating or painful if we're sharing it with someone else?
Maybe, the new and challenging things that pop up in life [like those annoying little moles] could be noticed and worked through differently if there was another pair of eyes helping us out?
There's a lot we can speculate about when it comes to outcomes in out lives, but one thing I can be sure of is that if we want a partner, or another pair of eyes on our lives we all have that option.
Life has felt like a game of whack a mole for me for a while now and all I've known as a consistent source throughout has been the Holy Spirit moving alongisde me, holding the other mallet, or shouting, there's a mole to your left, on your right.
It's not just been life or change or even opportunities but mostly him alerting me to temptations or old familiar patterns rearing their ugly heads. Having another point out what I cannot see or handle on my own has kept my head above water.
I still feel like I'm in a game most days where things are popping up on my left and right and my attention is pulled in a million different directions, but there, without fail is another, right there alongside me whispering, give me the mallet, take a break, rest and come back when you're ready to go again.
The kindest, most patient partner.
I'm coming to learn that I need to trust Him as well as the process in this life and calling. Allowing some things to be missed, to fall away and to believe that new will emerge and He will guide me where to place my attention, resources and energy.
How did I ever think I could do this life on my own?
We all have our own versions of a whack a mole life, just remember it's an impossible game and there is someone who wants to help you and remind you when to rest and when to move.
Don't try and go it alone, you don't have to.
A new season is emerging and for the first time in many years I can honestly say it's okay that I can't beat the game, that I can't hit every mole that pops up it's face and I'm not a failure for being human.
Who knew a creative calling in partnership with God would lead to such an amazing process of internal inventory?
Painful but powerful.
Thank you God for never giving up on me.
Briefly in other news, just before I go, I'll be posting lots of art making in the coming weeks on instagram, and in my website portfolio as I get ready for a couple of exhibitions in October, so keep your eyes peeled!
See you next week, Cath x
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