Regaining
Focus
“If
you've lost focus, just sit down and be still. Take the idea and rock
it to and fro. Keep some of it and throw some of it away, and it will
renew itself. You need do no more.”
Clarissa
Pinkola Estes
As a writer and
craftsman, I know at a cellular level what Clarissa Pinkola Estes
means by these words. The process of creativity is, at least for me,
not a left brain activity—I can't think it into being. Whatever
is being created comes of its own accord, slowly incubates, and layer
by layer, emerges. Meeting other artists yesterday, and for the first
time, being part of that tribe, I realized what a strange way of life
it is. One man who was there makes incredible jewelry from odd things like old
piano hammers and radio tubes; another paints gorgeous watercolors of
other people's pets. The woman whose booth was across from mine had
worked the words Standing Rock into the background of several of her
otherwise dreamy acrylic paintings to honor the Sioux who are
protecting their land. The owner of the historic house where the show
was held makes beautiful stained-glass mandala windows worthy of any
cathedral, but also dips wooden walking canes into layers and layers
of paint so that they appear to be dripping colors.
Where do all these
strange ideas come from? Who looks at an old radio tube and
thinks—oh, that would make a nice piece of jewelry? Only someone
who's willing to sit with an idea, and “rock it to and fro” while
it incubates. The operative attitude has to be one of non-judgment;
of trusting that something is emerging that comes through you, but
has its own reasons for being. One of my quilts, one that was
inspired by my great-aunt Ruth's old, ceramic-faced gas heaters, is
going to hang in a condo in Richmond, VA. The person there is moving
to the city from her rural home and hopes it will keep her in touch
with her country roots. Another, featuring an African woman with a
water jug on her head, is going to Ecuador as a gift to a woman who
served as a Journeyman teacher in Africa years ago. Quilts always
have a story, and art of any kind has its own life.
In this busy, chaotic,
maddening world, it's easy to lose focus no matter what we do. We
humans get into some sort of manic fugue state, and forget who we
are—the same species who drew those amazing running bison on the
cave walls in France. We go and go and go, and then wonder why we're
tired all the time. There's no better way to slow down than to place
yourself in a creative frame of mind. Allow an image to emerge
within, and just trust it to take you where it needs to go. Rock it,
turn it, let it fade in and out, change shape and form while you
simply watch and wait. Eventually, it will present itself fully
formed and then your hands can begin the work of delivering it into
the world.
In the Spirit,
Jane
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