Celebrating The Good With A Garden

With spring approaching, I think of all the beautiful flowers that are the first to arrive on the scene. I also, think of how lovely it would be to have a garden. I do not claim to be a gardener, but I have a great respect for the practice of being an active participant of something like a garden that has a natural cycle to it. Whether we are tending the earth, our children or our jobs. We watch what we tend with an inquisitive eye as it changes, takes on new forms and guides us in new directions.

The act of gardening is a true example of this change we can be a part of as things in our life fall away only to reveal what is budding deep within. The exercise of working the land and working with one’s hands not knowing if what we plant will come to life. But, planting it anyways. Being quiet, and caring for something outside of oneself where one finds clarity and greater meaning.

There is planning involved where just like the blank canvas, the gardener busily plans in the winter months what will be apart of their landscape in the spring. Flowers, bean plants, potatoes, raspberry bushes. There is anticipation and excitement in the planning of what will be. The act of planning, putting our dreams “in action,” by putting a part of ourselves in the world. With a hope and a knowing that after the long months of winter spring is sure to arrive.

As an artist, I understand the connection to a place like a garden. Whether it be in our garden or the studio there is a place where we do our inner work where we plant the seeds of what we hope for in our life  and then wait. We go back to this inner place, or go underground when there is heartache, grief or loss. We till the earth, plant the seed in the empty places in our life and wait for the budding of new life to show itself to us once again. We take its cue, we take care of this new life and make sure that it is not overtaken or overcrowded with the life around it. We protect it, our creative life from that which will pull us away from it all together. It is our place where we say YES– I am willing to put my story into this and be part of what it has to teach me about death, growth , and renewed life.

Having this place like a garden can be where we see more clearly the “good” that we have in our life or that what we contribute to others. This “good” has beauty and importance and something that we may have discounted  from our life all together. The “good” that you do in the world, where it may seem small has a greater meaning to others than you can imagine. The “good” work that you do in the world has a story, and a place where it flowers. It is up to you to recognize this inner beauty within yourself and how it feeds those around you. IT is important and should be celebrated.

Celebrated in a place like a garden, or in a piece of art where all our senses are taken in and we are in complete awe of how beauty often arrives where we least expect. Yet, it also arrives in the places where we put on our apron, roll up our sleeves and put our whole heart and soul into. There is inherent abundance within a well kept garden, where we see truly what we have in our life verses what we have not.

 

The Unfinished Canvas- Being True to Who We Are

“Ambiguous Rose”- Unfinished Oil on Canvas (work in progress)

Inspiration, fear, the unknown. All describe the moments before putting paint to the blank canvas. What the blank canvas represents can all be a state of mind. We are either fearful of the unknown or feel inspired by what could be. What I have learned recently is that new ideas suddenly emerge when they are in right relationship with one another. Often when we think something is out of place it can really be in perfect harmony if left alone in its natural place.

Without the right context it doesn’t make sense. I learned this first hand this week while working on a new oil painting of a brilliant pink rose. There is always that moment while I am painting where I get lost, not seeing the whole. With my nose literally right up in the canvas I  am at a loss at which way to go. Do I add more pigment here? Was I too bold there? Are my values in harmony with one another?  Often when I get to this stage it is the white space or the unknown surrounding the image that I work on next. Because, I tell myself that without right context like in the case of the “ambiguous rose” it does not look like much of anything but a smattering of pink on white canvas.

So, I start adding context.  I think of what I may have done in the past that pulled a painting together. Waiting to be led and wondering if there will be struggle. Will there be obstacles along the way or will the path be clear? Most likely the struggle will surface but there will also be moments of pure clarity and knowingness how to proceed. Without giving much energy or emphasis on the “I think I may screw this up,” category but instead maybe just letting things be.

Sometimes by letting things be we think we are in the procrastination mode. However, there may be something deep within us that knows that even in the messiness or out of place something may look it has a place somewhere or somehow it’s just we can’t quite put our finger on it yet.

The unfinished canvas is in all of us. We are all beautiful and messy all at once. That is to change who we are or to subvert to someone else’s idea of who we should be is forgetting our own relationship to the world. The bigger picture. We all want to matter and feel that we fit somehow in all the aspects of our life. Yet, like the unfinished canvas we are all works in progress. Looking for ways to receive all those life giving elements needed to feel that sense of completion or wholeness within ourselves.

To change who we are for convenient sake or for someone else is like cutting the roots from a tree. All life-giving elements disappear in an instant. Often we subvert because we think we are being too bold. We tell ourselves to stop being who we truly are because it might just be too much. We conform because we think it is the only way to get through this world. Yet, few transformative experiences in life are tidy, neat and make any type of sense in the moment. They take time and often need that messy process of getting to know ourselves and our relationship to those around us.

When I look at a painting, it is in the relationship of color next to color that helps the image make sense. The interplay of each unique brush stroke having a life of one’s own but also contributing to overall pattern of the painting.True original expression cannot be planned in advance. And neither can we. As creators in our life and in our work the best we can do is to remain true to ourselves and open to what is moving in and around us. Without cutting ourselves off from what feeds us, fuels us, and allows us to be bold. Bold as defined by who we are without conforming to who we are not.

So, I will continue to work on my “ambiguous rose,” letting her take shape, not cutting her at her roots. But, allowing her to grow in context to her surroundings. Right where she is at in the moment, changing, evolving and occasionally getting the sense that she is right where she belongs.