Category Archives for Gratitude & Creativity

Can I Draw In 30 Days?

I’ve chosen the first book I’ll be using as a course to teach myself more about how to draw. I have others, but this seems like the one with the most straightforward instructions. It’s called ‘You Can Draw in 30 Days’ and the author, Mark Kistler, believes “Even if you have little or no previous drawing experience, and even if you don’t believe you have natural talent, if you can find a few pencils and twenty minutes a day for thirty days, you can learn to draw amazing pictures. Yes, you have found the right teacher. And yes, you have found the right book.”

You Can Draw In 30 Days - Mark Kistler

Instead of what I’ve been doing for the last 18 months or so (mindful doodling and jumping between random lessons from books and videos), I’m putting my faith in Mr. Kistler’s enthusiastically confident statement and taking the plunge to teach myself more about drawing. Why? Because I want to develop the talent to draw the things I see around me, and the things I imagine when I’m reading or writing. I feel like there are waves of creative energy building up inside me because the primary form of expression I use is language/writing and I know there are things I could better describe visually if only I hone the skill.

I opened a new sketchbook and sharpened a pencil. Before starting the first lesson, I read the introduction, which isn’t something I always do when reading, but I don’t want to miss any tips on how to use this book. The first lesson in the book is ‘The Sphere’. I know how to draw a sphere, but the simple breakdown of how and why in this book – direction of light source, cast shadow, shading – helped me feel confident and I probably drew the best sphere I’ve ever drawn because I understood why I was drawing each line. Then, within 20 minutes, I drew an apple that actually looks like an apple – at least it does to me.

Who would have thunk it? Maybe I can draw – easily recognizable things – in 30 days…

Draw In 30 Days - Lesson 1

 

Gratitude and Creativity: We Evolve

Even before the arrival of my illness, sleep was a difficult thing for me. Insomnia and I are old friends, but having to cope with it while dealing with high levels of pain is not an easy thing. When I was working, I used to take advantage of the times I couldn’t sleep by catching up on or completing work tasks early. In some ways it seemed like a blessing to be so productive, but of course there were the drawbacks of struggling to get out of bed many mornings and having to caffeinate myself to get my brain started and to stay alert sometimes later in the day.

When I can’t sleep now, I don’t feel productive, I feel restless, which makes my mind bounce all over the place during the longest stretches of the night. Sometimes I watch TV shows or movies to make the time pass more quickly. Other times I spend hours online poring over pages of articles, news, videos, and interesting writing others post here. Thankfully, many of the things people post here positively occupy my thoughts and lead to me being creative, which feels so much better than being productive.

In the dark, early hours of Thursday morning, a poem I found on Dave Kavanagh’s site, which he titled ‘Dark Eyed Woman’ sparked some creativity to help me pass the time. I was fortunate to engage with him through the comment section of his site and part of our exchange calmed the restlessness of my thoughts enough for me to write some poetry. In this respect – my creativity being sparked so I can write – I still see insomnia as a blessing sometimes. However, I know that sleep is the bigger blessing I need so I can better manage my illness.

We Evolve

 

Gratitude and Creativity: Death Comes

I was in a very dark mood yesterday because of the intensity of my pain. Unable to sleep – as I often am – last night I went searching through the WordPress community for interesting things to read. Sometimes I search through the list of blogs I follow in the Reader, while at other times I randomly select a tag to see what others are writing about under different topics. Last night, or early this morning, I chose to search under the tag ‘death’ because I had attached it to yesterday’s post.

What I found wasn’t as morbid or bleak as one might expect. Not that I didn’t find some heartbreaking posts, but I also found inspirational and philosophical writing from many members of the community. One of the posts I read was about an excerpt of a letter from Pier Giorgio Frassati a beatified early twentieth century Italian Catholic social activist. The letter was in response to a friend who had not heard from him for a long while, who wrote to him asking if he was dead. In his response Frassati wrote, “Dead – what does this word mean?”

He then details definitions of death for his friend, and goes on to say, “But if we’re talking about the word in its true essence, then sadly not only am I dead, but already resuscitated a number of times only – alas! to die again.” The post I read this in came from the site Contemplative in the Mud, whose author seemed to have had a bit of a day herself/himself, or at least was introspective about the ups and downs of life. The nice thing for me, after reading this post, was that it opened me up to write some poetry in the early morning hours, which distracted me, at least for a little while, from my pain.

 

Death Comes