Golden and Eternal

First and foremost, I want to say a BIG, HUGE, GIGANTIC thank you to my friend, Boo, for all the beautiful napkins she sent me!  There were scads of them in the envelope...she is an expert napkin packer for sure!  I am super excited about the Joker one, which she used in her art HERE and which I ADORE (both the napkin and her piece...I LOVE how she used the Joker!) more than I can say, but there are so many other gorgeous ones that she made it hard for me to pick a favorite!  I'll just have to say that they are all my favorites and let that be that! :)  I'm a little excited...can you tell?  I can't wait to play...

Thank you, Boo, for all the napkin-y goodness!  You made my day!!!  Smooch!  Smooch!  SMOOCH!!!

Today, I have my Journal 52 page ready to share with you.  The prompt this week, which you can read more about HERE, was "Take inspiration from stars or the night sky".  And here's what I made:

"On soft spring nights I'll stand in the yard under the stars - something good will come out of all things yet - And it will be golden and eternal just like that - there's no need to say another word."
-Jack Kerouac , from"Big Sur"

I took a little inspiration from Van Gogh's "The Starry Night", although I don't know if it's readily evident...but I liked the swirl in his painting, and that made me attempt a swirl in mine...you'll have to decide for yourself if you see any similarity: 

I secretly think of Van Gogh as an art journaler...I know his work is looked at now as profound and amazing, but in my head, if he were living in this time period, he'd totally have a blog and be an art journaler almost exclusively...it's my imaginary world, and that's how I see him...I don't know why, but I can't help imagining each painting is another page in one of the most fantastic art journals ever...

As I look at my girl, I am noticing some things I didn't do (like shade the hair and add the eye glint) and now they're irritating me...I'm gonna have to go back and fix her a little...  Plus her nose reminds me of Michael Jackson...hehehe...poor girl!  I still like her and all...but once the MJ nose has been seen, it can't be unseen...

On the positive side, don't you just love that quote?  I'd like to be like that...to think that good will come out of everything...to be able to look at ordinary things and see magic.  

Part of me can...the creative part of me, for sure.  I think artists/creative types notice things other people don't and I think there's a good deal of magic in that.  We can see an ordinary thing for more than what it is...and we want to capture that 'more' on the page.  I think a good artist makes people take a second look at those ordinary things.  I think, if they had the chance to see just the right artwork for them, that there's not one person who could NOT be profoundly affected by that art.  Then again, maybe I'm a little biased...

On the opposite side, there are parts of me that are still slow to see things as 'golden and eternal'...at least the eternal part of that...  I am very good at being content...with however much or little I have.  Pretty well happy-go-lucky, I suppose.  I am ok with my life right now as it is...I've been in much worse situations mentally, physically, and emotionally...and yet, when I stop for a minute and clear my mind, I find myself thinking "I don't want it to be like this forever".  

A huge piece of me feels guilty over that...I know that people deal with much, much worse than I do...honestly, I used to be one of those people myself.  But things are better for me now...and so I think to myself  "How much more do you need?  What's it going to take?  Be happy with what you have, because you know there's worse out there.  Quit being so greedy for your ideals."  This has to do with how I was raised, I think...I don't know that I heard 'you can be anything you want to be' as a child...I heard that ambition is bad...that certain things are just not meant for me......maybe that's not how it was meant, but it got translated into my head that way.  The opposite side of that lesson was work hard and be happy with what you have...so it wasn't all bad, you see.  But I think it's a big part of the reason why I'm having such a hard time now...I'm a fantastic 'settler'...I'll settle for anything, work my butt off towing the line, and have a goofy grin on my face the whole time...

The more I learn to be my own person, though, the adult person...the decider of my own life and way of thinking...the more ambitious I become.  I think now that ambition is not all bad...blind ambition, yes, I imagine it is bad for anything to be all-consuming, have to get it, damn the consequences to those around you...  

But I believe if I wasn't at least a little ambitious, I wouldn't have made any improvements.  I wouldn't be making art.  I wouldn't be writing this blog.  I wouldn't be doing anything that I have come to love.  I wouldn't be learning and growing and getting to be a better version of myself.  Ambition has been good to me so far.

But it scares me a little too.  Because where do you stop?  Do I have the right to say I'm not happy...content, yes, but not quite happy...with a life that isn't bad?  I never thought I would be where I'm at...it was too much to think about...but I've come this far...should I hope to go farther?  A tree puts down roots and still it stretches towards the sky...but if that tree gets too tall, it'll tip right over.  In other words, where is the line between healthy growth and being a danger to yourself and those around you?  And how much should you care for the consequences your actions have on others?  If someone doesn't turn out to be who you thought, do you just ditch them?  Should you let other people stand in the way of your happiness so that they don't get hurt?  You can't let other people dictate your life, but can you just go around leaving scars in your wake?   Do you let a decent life go for a chance at what you think will be a better life?  You don't know that it will be better on the other side...do you risk it? What do you think?  What's the right answer?