Dear reader, it's been nearly one and a half years since my last blog post.
Confession: I have been hoarding words all this time.
And sentences, and images, and concepts, and curiosities. I cannot stop archiving. I have been indefatigable in tucking away sketches, objects, notebooks, photos and other digital files as prompts for the days when I am free to create and share unencumbered. I finally spoke to my analyst about it this week, about the compulsive aspect of grasping at the the evidence of my lush inner world by writing down, screen-shotting, photographing, and filing it all into labeled folders so as not to lose track. I said, "this incessant behavior is the madness behind my method, not the other way around."
I also told her I have decided it's fine, the manic quality that my aggregating, collating, and sorting can take on. I can accept it for the time being, as I build trust in my collaboration with the big-C Creative source.
Why deny behaviors that are so intrinsic to my place in the world? Ingrained behavior 1 and 2 are making art and writing. Number 3 is educating. I've been learning and sharing with equal voracity for as long as I remember.
In fact, it's more than fine that the three practices have reclaimed the alliance that got deformed in the march into adulthood. But hoarding isn't healthy so I promise to share the gems I have been collecting.
So much has gone on in the year and a half since I last posted on this blog. The last four years, actually, have been so intense, so dense, that I get frightened about how much of it I may have somatized already. There are a few sensible reasons for not having shared much of it all publicly yet: protecting the innocent, protecting the guilty, observing some 'conflict-of interest' concerns, and - simply not having the mental and emotional energy.
Confession: I am no longer willing to split myself in three. The three chief activities I engage in - making art, writing, and educating - are inseparable. The practice of keeping them in different buckets, the constant context-switching between and across them has expired.
Something cool has started to happen during this pause on the blog though: the nature of my daily journals has shifted. The usual recordings of dreams, nightmares, joys, grievances, and affirmations have become mingled with uncorked ideas for books, creative teaching tools, spiritual reflections, and sketches for sculptures. The merger has begun.
Once I changed the title on my social media accounts to Creative Archivist, I felt a distinct settling in my body, a sense of relief in my shoulders combined with a physiological sigh that whispered, finally.
And thus, if I do nothing else today, I promise myself to write a blog post and tap 'publish'.
Good day and take care.
PS: photo by me of neighbor's cats Lucy and one of the twins.
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