The Art Of Life

Sometimes during its creation a piece of art is just NOT WORKING.

It's flat, too busy, too much going on, there's nowhere for the eye to rest.

It might be that the composition is off, the pattern is boring, there's no contrast between the various elements or colours.

Maybe there's no textural interest. Perhaps it's perfectly pleasant, but there's nothing to draw you IN, nothing to catch your breath and give you tingles.

Sometimes life can be like this

It's FLAT, too busy, nowhere to rest, boring, no contrast, nothing catching your breath and giving you tingles.

When a piece of art is feeling like this, it's my signal to take a beat. Stop. Review. Really LOOK.

Whats working? What's NOT working? What needs to be subtracted - covered up, over painted, enhanced, or obliterated?

In rare circumstances, there is nothing to be done but burn the thing. To let GO. The energy of the piece and your suffering through its creation has reached a distinctly dead end. But that's not the case too often.

Mostly, one bold stroke, one scary "this will either fix it or f@$k it" move is all it takes to shift the whole piece.

Life is really no different. Occasionally, there's nothing to do but burn it all down and start over, but more often than not, a small change here, a new habit there, giving up a habit someplace else, begins to improve things in big ways.

The 'this isn't working' piece of my own life

That time I got wrapped up in anxiety so tight I found myself in hospital with a suspected heart attack was a notable 'This is not working' moment. I had let my life get like that painting: Nowhere to rest, too busy, not a shred of contrast and definitely nothing giving me tingles (unless you count the room-swimming-dizzy spell that put me on the floor one afternoon because I had been pushing myself through back to back marathons of trying to jam 711 tasks into two hours for MONTHS)

Guess what fixed it?

It's probably not what you think.

Kindness.

Learning to be the sweetest, kindest most compassionate person I could be TO MYSELF. It sounds simple, and it is. But simple doesn't mean easy. Rewiring my self talk to compassionate after a lifetime of critical took some time and practice. But all things worth getting good at do.

Other things helped too - committing to a regular practice of taking time to create was really important, as well as keeping a journal, and putting myself in the way of nature, beauty and lightness.

What you find though, is that it's much easier to add those life enhancing elements to your life when your default internal setting is kindness - it's easy to choose the creative practice, the exercises, the feel good things when being kind to yourself is the primary intention.

How about you?

If your life was a painting, what would it look like? And what would you ask the artist to add or take away to make it perfect for you?

Here's the thing: YOU ARE THE ARTIST. Go make art with your life.

---

Got no idea how to answer that last question? There's an exercise in The Two Questions That Can Change Everything workbook that will help you figure that out. CLICK HERE to check it out