HARD VS. EASY

As I sat down this morning to try some new things, I had enough ideas that I did a written grid with some prompts about each one to help me decide which to move ahead with. Ideas like “Which is exciting?” (all qualified!) and “Which is scary?” (two out of three). I did a little exploration on what was scary about them, and the idea came up that part of my approach was going to be “hard” for me. Meaning a “stretch.” I dwelled on that for a moment, because I’ve run into it before with some of my work, deciding for the “hard” and against the “easy” – but for what purpose?

When I started my practice in earnest, I knew the “hard” or the challenge had been keeping me away from painting, and accepting that was what finally allowed me to start. The unfamiliarity, the unknown, the untried, and all the emotions that came along with them. It’s been a fascinating process for me for sure, but it’s not like it’s always upward and onward. Today, I realized that categorizing approaches as hard or easy was a form of judgement. Why do I feel the need to judge myself and my decisions? Why do I even need to categorize? Art just IS. It doesn’t have to be one way or another — or even if it is, does that make the other bad? It’s certainly nothing to beat myself up about. When trying new forms of expression, like I’m doing now with collage, there’s no net, and not necessarily any facility with the new form. Kindness needs to go hand in hand with the new, with a dose of bravery. I also prefer the idea of “stretch” since it implies being limber, reaching a little farther than where you might be right now. I’m going with that today.