~ God told me to be an artist weeks 5 & 6.
Friday 6th January 2023.
So this is a double whammy, two weeks of blog for the price of one! I'll keep it fairly brief though, I feel like my brain has been working overtime and needs to lie down for a while to restore itself and come back to life. These past two weeks have been a whirlwind, with some intruding thoughts, uncertainty and unexpected arrivals.
If I'm completely honest, I've felt a bit adrift. Disconnected and disillusioned, like I'm wading through treacle, not sure if I know how to pull myself out. Not drowning, but not free - does that make sense? A bit stuck. It's actually more than feeling stuck, it's a standing still, the place just before panic. You still have your faculties, you can still think but as you spin your head around you wonder how to take your next step. You start to realise that actually can't comprehend how to make any sort of move.
It's like being at a crossroads but someone has taken down the sign. There a re few paths ahead but all of them look the same and there is no way of knowing what's on the other side. The lack of clear options can increase the heart rate and fluster the mind. This is a familiar place for most creatives, some experience blocks, some overwhelm, some a lack of energy. It's not long before panic rears its head when the impending doom of uncertainty appears. But weirdly I didn't seem to cross over into the place of panic this time, I just felt halted by an invisible quicksand, not sure where to turn. It was as if my internal world mirrored my frozen legs.
Everything stood still.
Whilst stood still in this metaphorical quicksand I had two options to do nothing or to do something. After a deep breath I relinquished control and leaned into the discomfort of standing here in this space, halted, frozen and unable to move.
It's a weird sensation, being or feeling halted. It quickly caused me to retreat into my mind and become extremely reflective. Now, I don't mind a bit of self reflection, I kind of love it usually but this was deeper. This was moving through all the layers of my mind, heart and soul.
It was almost spiritual.
At times I wondered if I was having my next existential crisis, generally an annual thing for me, but it didn't feel the same as any previous experience.
This was new.
I wasn't spinning on the top layers of self deprecation or longing for answers to the big questions, I was excavating my internal world, archeologically sifting through the dirt and finding foreign objects that had long been forgotten.
As I surrendered to this process I was presented with the following question,
What is my art for?
This may seem like a fairly straight forward question, comprising of a few words, surely an artist could answer this.
But it stumped me.
I spent some time allowing this question to wash over me.
It was pretty confronting realising that perhaps I didn't quite understand the depth behind what I was doing or why I was doing it.
So I decided to start identifying the things I did know, and work back from there. Finding some grounding in some certainty.
Did I feel God had called me to creativity? Absolutely.
Did I feel a deep connection to the prison community and value my work in this institutions? Definitely.
But the question remained, What is my art for?
I wish I could say I had some magnificent epiphany. That the quicksand that had held me hostage melted away and everything became clear. Unfortunately this was not the case.
This seemingly insurmountable question lead to many more...
What does my art do?
Who does my art help?
What does my art reveal?
And on, and on and on.
I'd done business plans, and mission setting in the beginning of pursuing self employment but perhaps this was the 3 year review. Maybe this line of questioning was something I urgently needed to revisit in order to move forward.
Was the only way out of the quicksand to stop fighting and to stand still for a while, conserve ny energy and have a good old think?
I still don't have all the answer. Not at all. But what I do know is that I need to ponder these questions a little longer. I think God is inviting me to sit in the discomfort that comes with transition into a new phase or progressing to another level.
I feel a strong sense that my pruning season must continue and in order to come into alignment with my purpose I need to explore the why behind the what.
I'm glad I had no idea God would take me on such a lengthy and convicting journey of understanding where he needs me to be, it's painful, I'm not sure I would have agreed to it.
But here, in the thick of it I know one thing, he is with me and he will show me what I need to understand and where he wants me to be, for my good, and for his glory.
Hallelujah.
See you next week, Cath x
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