Lead so I can Follow

The two paintings below are the same one but they could be two separate ones.  On the left is like daytime and the other could be evening.  It is just what happened as I began laying down paint. They are also about one week apart.

Still on my Arizona holiday in the sunshine and enjoying the bright skies my mood may have been reflected in my work. (because of several wind storms and plenty of rain)

One picture is light, airy, pretty.  The other is dark, brooding, deep with a bit of light peeking through the clouds.

Perhaps I painted on one of those dreary days.

Perhaps it reflected my mood but I can’t really say – it simply became what it was.

Then, I didn’t paint for two months.

The Arizona holiday ended late November, the painting packed away and while not forgotten about, was put aside.

 

Then came January and the painting created something entirely different.  I had to go where it led.

I’ve become curious about how much my environment, sunshine, rain, location and seasons of the year dictate my performance, energy, creativity and even the direction of my life.

It used to be that when I wrote, I wrote.  I didn’t paint.  When I painted, I painted. I didn’t write.  Now I have learned to do a little of both.  I’m discovering how to blend the two.

 

Though I loved my babies and enjoyed their development years I had times I believed nursing them was going to be my new normal – forever, or that they’d be toddlers for all time.  I wondered if the teen years would ever end.  They did.  Now, I have adult children with lives of their own – like the average person I wonder where the time has gone.

As I ponder now – what was the rush and where was I in such a hurry to get to anyway.

I wondered how to stop the days from moving so quickly, how  to slow down the wrinkles and grey hair and how to anticipate the senior years.

Well, they are here…at my local recreation centre where I obsessively play Pickleball, the age of 55 is considered the senior years.

I’m no longer in such a hurry.

There are so  many people who are lonely, angry, hurt, lost, who race through days, who’ve been ill, have cancer, have died…

I struggled my own way through a vast desert of years of doubt and life choices, what I’d done with my adult life and with some regrets until I worked it through to a point of reconciliation with myself, God and others.

I’m allowing the present and future lead me to new places and though I’m not in a hurry, I have some things to do.

At my core is the belief I am being led by God – if I’m listening and following.  Far from perfect I’m taking faith steps forward, hesitatingly at times but at least I’m moving.

Where once I was too afraid to try, here I am writing and painting, taking the time and learning how, growing, being stretched, falling down and getting up again.  It’s the same in my friendships, in my marriage, in my fun and play and where I can be of service to others.

Even in the whispers of perfectionism and doubt.

Join me in my quest to follow the painting to completion.