Retiring from the Judgement Seat

One of my younger daughter's cats spends most of her day sitting on the back of the couch, looking with disdain on the goings-on in the living room. For a while a sign hung behind her which read "The Judgement Seat." It was really very funny. Lately I have been catching myself with the Judgement Seat well ensconced in my little mind. What tripped me up on myself was the level of anger I got into about something that was none of my business and had no bearing on my everyday life in the least. I considered briefly the idea of tattooing Judgement Seat on my forehead but I moved to a cooler part of the house and the moment passed.


Throughout this long, too hot summer I have had power and nominal AC throughout, which hundreds of thousands have not, but the fact that the day revolves around getting and/or staying cool got really old, really, really fast. I have to think the mental wear and tear contributed to the judging-ness, but it brought me to an awareness of what judging does to me as I am doing it and it ain't pretty. The inner tirade gets on a loop that replays, and replays, and replays itself, keeping a false righteousness burning but who gets burned by it? Only me.

As I am aligning myself more with art-making during more of my days, I find myself catching on to mental habits like this one. When life is really busy there is less time to observe oneself, thinking just happens and not much scrutinizing of the habits that are getting set into place. I live alone, well, it's me and the cats, and I spend a lot of time in solitude which I actually cherish. I'm working on keeping a balance between my "out there" time and my solitude. You'd think my house would be pretty peaceful, but I'm seeing not so. The cats have a hundred ways to get under my skin-they're old and I'm getting there. When it's a hundred degrees outside nobody wants 3 cats sitting on them, shedding, hair sticking to sweat. Not. Pretty. So I yell at them. A lot. The black cat has no idea that she is invisible underfoot but she persists in getting stepped on multiple times a day because she insists on being near me. I yell at her about how she'll kill me one of these days. (Careful what you're putting out there, Msu.)

So at some point the other day when my mind was ranting about something another person was doing that was none of my business I stopped myself and asked why was I so angry about this choice? A light bulb went on over the Judgement Seat sign. Who was I to judge? We all do the best we can and we make choices that make no sense to other people. But do they have to? The only life I am in charge of is my own and many of my choices have baffled even me in retrospect and I judge myself harshly for them. Hmm... is there a pattern here?

One of the things encouraged by one of my art mentors is to "Make bad art." Not on purpose, mind you, but in the process of learning to make better art, in establishing an art habit, bad art will be made. Doesn't have to be shown off, but as long as any art is being made, bad or good, the artist is being nurtured and encouraged. Another of my mentors discourages being harsh in front of your art, or pointing out its faults. Every piece, every brush stroke is a teaching in itself. I am far less self-critical of my efforts now than I was when younger. I had huge expectations of making greatness all the time. Now I crave the calm focus I have when I work on anything, even when I'm not as focused as I might like. I have even begun to use it as a tool; if the cats are making me crazy (read "if I am making myself crazy about ___") I get out a sketchbook, head for the sewing room or get out the paints. I lose myself, and all the chattering in my head, as I make choices about what I'm making, what colors do I want, what papers will I add, watercolor or markers, bold and bright, or soft and muted... I let the clock go on its own way and let the joy of making sink in deeply.

It is very good to be developing this awareness of what my mind does, how it does it, and how I can bend it away from harsh judging of myself and others. I find it enables me to set aside old tapes that do not serve me. Some things will never be resolved and that just has to be okay as it is. It is not worth disturbing my own potential peace of mind. I cannot sledgehammer the mind but I can guide it. Art, bad and good, will be made.

Hello, Sweet Springtime!

In college I took one studio art class and one art history survey class. That was (mumble, mumble, mumble) years ago. In my "what are you going to be when you grow up" years, in my most secret heart, I was going to be an artist or a mystic, and had little clue as to how one got to be either, or how intertwined both identities were with each other. I wanted to have "visions." I thought "visions" would be something along the line of hallucinations in which God would reveal the secrets of existence to me. A latter day Joan of Arc. It just felt like me.

So fast forward to my post-child-bearing, post-divorces, post-RN, re-collection of those identities, the goals still intertwined, and still fitting who I wanted to be when I grew up. I had a better idea of what those identities meant and I still very much wanted to be the artistic, mystic self so dear to my heart. It no longer mattered if I was a great artist,  an all-knowing mystic. The recognition wasn't the point. I only wanted to be true to who I knew in my heart of hearts, was Me. So I began teaching myself how to grow up to be Myself, and I began seeking out the best teachers I could find to lead me toward that goal.

One of those teachers is my exhuberant granddaughter for whom creating art is like breathing; she has no rules or restraints. No paper? Draw on the wall. She was about 3 years old when I signed on to learn "Art" from her. She was, and is, simply compelled to color, paint, draw, 24/7 if she could. I realized how often she drew the same picture over and over, and I remembered doing the same thing as a child. Perfecting a particular curve of sidewalk from in front of the house, the look of the house itself painstakingly drawn day after day after day, never quite exactly the way I wanted it to look, but until the next picture took over the spotlight, I made the same picture over and over. I tirelessly drew, painted, colored just as she does, just as I had, for years, until the whatever happened that ended the career of the Artist.

The Mystic was less easily lost and re-found. There was no trail of paper and paint to follow that gave her away. Nor were there rosaries, or milagros, or even breadcrumbs. My heart stayed true, and when I got off track I knew how to get myself back on it. Until I forgot. Losing the most important piece of myself was a singularly "bad trip." Will. Not. Do. It. Again. So recovery brings a person back to the "on" track and I'm not really where I left off but I have something under my belt that I will hang on to for dear life because it is my lifeline. The past year has been full and fulfilling and I am rediscovering the woman I was, left behind, and have thankfully returned to find actually is still there. Getting to know myself over again, shedding the skin of who I was not, is truly a blessing, a journey I will not take for granted again.

I regard it all as part of the life school, forgive myself for what I see as a loss of direction and all that came from it, good and bad, and the good is that it has deepened my thinking and my heart. So this artist/mystic is stepping out in new ways, trusting my inner guidance above all else, knowing that I have to follow my deepest heart's urgings above all else. It is the joyous path after all. Less Joan of Arc, but much more Me.