When I was little…I loved to create things. I loved to sing out loud at the top of my lungs. I painted pictures with abandon. I made up stories; yarns a mile long. I made mud pies with fancy flower toppings. I dreamed and imagined and got lost in the creative. I played house; made up scenarios; played war; built forts; raced and danced and laughed until I peed in my pants.
A few things happened along the way that sucked the creative out of me. As I am taking stock of my life and the lives of those that went before me, I am searching to understand the turns that I made along the road.
The first thing that I remember was about the singing. A ‘performance’ in front of family resulted in commentary like,
“well, she sings loud…”
and, “welp, she doesn’t have her grandma’s beautiful voice.”
I think I was three. (ouch) But, I remember…
The next thing was about the ‘stories’. I was five. Sharing at school was an opportunity to have the stage. I delighted in spinning tales for my classmates. Their enthralled faces and laughter drove me on. The stories got better and better, I thought…. The well-meaning Kindergarten teacher asked me, mid story, if that was true….I had to confess that I had embellished a bit…Perhaps not kindergarten words but, I was sufficiently put in my place and slunk back to my seat without finishing the tale I had begun.
The last, and crowning blow to my creative bent was when my artistic ability was compared to my aunt who was an accomplished artist. You know the comments where people look at your drawing or painting and say, “Oh…that’s nice…what is it?” I was encouraged to do something that I could ‘make a living at’ rather than pursue the art that drew me.
I spent a summer term in Washington D.C. in 1976, at an art school in utter heaven. Every day was an exercise in becoming the artist that I desired. I actually had a vision and was pursing it. But alas, the practical, the declarations, the words spoken over me as a child had done their work. I finished the term and left to go to school to get a job I could ‘make a living at’. I never looked back…
Until now.
So, tentatively, I step into the studio…I am afraid.
The lies of my past seem to reach up and choke me. I cannot seem to get by them without them seeing me.
I am afraid to begin. I am paralyzed. I am constantly getting ready to create but cannot seem to jump in.
The clay sits there next to the wheel. The paints are all lined up according to color next to the stack of canvases. The sketch books lay dormant. The studio is too hot, or too cold. The ‘other things’ need to be done first. I am easily kept from the creativity by the necessary. The cleaning, the cooking, the gardening, the serving, the caring for others…I delight in these things so it is easy to put the art on the back burner.
And then there’s the lies. I see the inadequacy, the inability, the lack of talent. I feel the judgement. I hear the words of my aunt, my grandmother, my parents. I am shackled; hobbled; blind; lame; mute. I am afraid.
but God.
“He rejoices over me with singing.” -Zephaniah 3:17
I hear this verse in my head as I walk into the studio…He’s rejoicing with me…
He keeps calling me to be still and to listen. When I do, I hear him saying…”I have put all this in you to let out for the world to see and hear.”
” For we are God’s handiwork (masterpiece), created in Christ Jesus to do good works…”- Ephesians 2:10
How easily influenced I have been by those voices in my past…
And now I am climbing from a boat in the middle of a raging sea because He has called me out upon the water… to go deeper than I’ve ever gone before.
I look down at the waves and I sink into the past, into old patterns, into darkness.
I look up into His eyes and I walk with chin uplifted, arms held out, with confidence and joy… into the unknown and uncharted waters of creativity, where the Light is shining and everything glows.
