Yes Mr. Disney, how right you are!

I have been planning a project to submit for consideration to a juried show in Washington D.C. in the fall. The theme is diaspora – the dispersion of a people from an established ancestral homeland. I have been thinking and thinking about this project, for far too long. It was defiantly time to begin doing.

Of course the usual cast of characters showed up, fear, anxiety, self doubt. But, once I began doing, little by little, it got easier. As the weeks progress, I will share the process and the vision for this piece.

I have come to accept my original plans as only a starting point. The more time I spend creating, the more I find myself having bigger ideas and different plans. Which is why I whole heartedly believe in Mr. Disney. Begin doing, get started, things change, but you are on the right road if you have started.

This is where it began.

I was stitching on an embroidered table cloth. I have my way of quilting, tiny and intricate. In this case, it simply was not working for me.

Change of plan.

I changed fabrics and went with a much simpler pattern. This is working so much better for me.

The deeper I delve into this project, the less time I have for fear and self doubt. I am on a deadline. This story is an important one, even if at this point you only see lines on a tablecloth. Stay turned, more to come.

I was reading through Lilla Rogers book I Just Like To Make Things and read this line:

Enjoy being a beginner

I have spent quite a bit of time mulling this over. We have all been beginners. I thought about learning to walk. I don’t remember that experience, but I’m sure there was some fear, some incredible excitement, a sense of pride when that foot moved. And so it is with beginnings.

In Bloom 2007 one of my beginning pieces.

It is somewhat like falling in love. That beginning, that apprehension, the excitement and emotion.

When I floated the idea of an online presence, I felt all of those beginning emotions. My website launched in November, I was relieved and excited. What an incredible amount of work. I had no idea! As well as the relief and excitement, I felt somehow vulnerable and exposed. It was a beginning.

Five months into this I still feel like a beginner. I still struggle with aspects of technology – but I have learned so much. I still have moments of feeling fear and vulnerability and doubtfulness. But oh, the joy, the excitement of a letter of acceptance for your work or the thrill of a kind comment on a blog post. None of the joy would be possible without beginning, taking the first step, being brave enough to put yourself and your work out there.

Be brave, simply begin.

I was almost six years old when Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon. I remember watching it on TV. Big, clunky, console TV, offered two colors, black and white. Had a switch to turn it on and turn up the volume. The dial to change the channel went as high as twelve. It came complete with rabbit ears!

What I didn’t know then that I know now is what an incredible feat of technology it must have taken to get this man to space, get him out on the surface of the moon, and send pictures of that walk back to earth!

And so technology goes. We had a rotary dial, non cordless phone. No call waiting, no caller id. When you made a call, you were in that location until the call was complete.

Fast forward forty four years.

I am watching the Sochi Olympics live on channel 601 in my home in Saudi Arabia. While I am watching the games, I can send an email, write a blog post or spend time on facetime with my daughter who lives halfway around the world. Amazing!

I surf the web, read tweets, stay in immediate contact with friends from home on Facebook, pay bills, transfer money, shop. There are many things I do very well on the internet!

But wait….a glich!

Last week as I attempted to upload a new piece of work to my website, I deleted the entire gallery. Horror of horrors!!! I know what I did, and I will never do that again, however, it was very stressful for me. Apparently I hadn’t totally eliminated the gallery and my website designer at  alliecreative.com fixed me right up. I am actually starting to feel very technically challenged. This is all new for me. And I want to learn it, really I do.

So now we are back to a place of fear. I need to set aside a day and go through the instructions again and attempt to update my website. And I will. Right after I figure out how to send this blog post to the people on my mailing list in mailchimp!

And I know I am not alone! This part of technology is difficult for me. It is time consuming because I am unsure, uncertain, and, yes, fearful!

But I haven’t given up on technology. I think of all the changes in my lifetime, and I marvel at the advances. If they can put a man on the moon, don’t you think I can put a picture on a website? I hope so! Stay tuned!

Share with me your technology triumphs, or your favorite technology! Facetime wins with me!

In 2005, my husband and I traveled to Jordan, a land full of history and so many exciting sights. We were on our way back to Amman from the Dead Sea when we stopped at an ancient Crusaders Castle, Kerak Castle. It was amazing. I took a tour of the Castle with a very kind Arab man. As we worked our way through the Castle, the big finale was to have this picture taken, me sitting on the high wall of the Castle.

What you don’t see in this picture is my terror, my incredible fear. I sit down, I can hear the traffic moving below, I can hardly breathe, the blood is pounding in my ears, I’m feeling dizzy. I am terrified that I am going to fall from the wall into the traffic. Then, my body moves to paralysis. I have no clue how I am going to move away from this wall. You can see my hands almost attempting to hang on to the wall. This all happens in the time it take to snap a photo. The kind tour guide finishes taking the picture and puts his hand out to help me up. I am certain I could not have gotten up from that wall unassisted.

It was then that I realized I had a fear of heights, a fear of falling, particularly into traffic. It was one of the most fearful moments of my life.

The most common time I feel fear is around creating art. Of course, it is not as frightening as the fear of falling into traffic!

I spent much of last week sitting, paralyzed by the fear of starting, fear of making a mistake, the fear of failing. This talk carried on to snowball into questioning if I really wanted to be an artist, and, well, I’m sure any of you who have experienced “creative” fear know where this continued to lead. Finally, I knew I had to start. I knew that if I continued to sit, the paralysis would just simply become permanent.

And so, I began.

I am using Daler Rowney Arylic Artist Ink. I like using this paint because it offers a few options on fabric. If the fabric is wet, it will run and pool and give you interesting patterns. It does work well dry if you have specific areas to paint, however it does take a lot of ink to get a deep color.

Once I started, it felt better. Once I was in full paint mode, my mind started to explore other possibilities. And instead of saying, “I can’t”, I began to question “what if?”

I finally got the painting finished and it was forward on to the quilting, my favorite part! Because I like to stitch in specific areas, I start and stop in those spaces, and spend quite a bit of time burying the thread ends by hand, into the piece. It is labor intensive, but I am so much happier with the results!

The piece is almost finished and will go off to the framer today. I have to keep moving forward!

I would love to hear how you overcome your creative fears.