Art

Recently, everywhere I look (facebook, IG, pinterest...) it is all about ART and it has got me thinking about how I feel when I am not creating. When I am writing, it feels like breathing. When I take pictures, its like seeing everything for the first time. Doing art projects with kids and taking pictures of them enjoying the process fo creating...is a high unlike, Well...I don't really have any personal experience with being "high" so...you get the point.

Lately, I have not been doing much in the way of creating. What I have been doing to trying to "rest", Which kinda feels like drowning. I found myself desperately reflecting over the weekend as I paced my house looking for a project to complete, because keeping four kids happy and alive wasn't enough.

I needed to accomplish something tangible, have my work be visible...I needed something to be acknowledged for.

So many thoughts ravaging my mind.

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I started this post a few weeks ago but stopped because...life.

Tonight a find myself with a few moments while Ryan starts the bedtime battle.

I love sitting here. The feeling of being an "adult", the sound of the keys is cathartic as it slows my heart and silences my mind while my soul takes deep breath and speaks. I've thought more about writing in the last two weeks than I have in years. I want to write...but I am afraid.

Like I love to watch babies discover...but I can't make a living doing that.

I want to make a difference in this world...but I don't think I was created for this. I think I was created to help others make a difference. Which is hard...I will never get "credit" for my work.

Because I don't need it.

I am enough. As I texted a friend today and some painful words were regurgitated from the abyss of my memory, I had a revelation.

So many times before I have based the value of my existence on others happiness, or rather my ability to make others happy. Parents I have worked for, kids that I cared for, boys that loved me, friends that validated me...

What makes us valuable is what we do for others, but if we are only doing the nice thing for the recognition and validation...one action cancels out the other.

 Now that I am looking at a summer of free time I intend to spend some serious time sorting through my years of  failure lessons and figure out how to stop the insane hamster wheel that seems to be my life.

I have to make some changes. Starting with...

Making time to take my vitamins. I realized a good part of my kitchen wandering is due to my body craving vitamins and the fact that nothing I have in my fridge or cabinets will fill that craving. So, # 1 on my list is take my vitamins. This will make me feel better, behave better, sleep better...Be better.

Be active. Walk, skip dance...Run only if I feel like it. Be outside for at least 15 minutes a day. It is amazing what sunlight and fresh air can do for a body.

Create, write, paint, sing...worship.

Invest. In people, relationships. Mainly my children. I have limited time with each of them and I want to be present. This is the trickiest of my goals. In order to invest in them...I have to invest in me. To set the example, to be full of love so I can pour into them. We cannot love others if we do not love ourselves.

I have so much more to say, and I hope to come back and elaborate on some of these things as I make progress, This is list is a good start.

In time I hope my writing will return to where it used to be and not be repetitive dribble. But for today...I am content to have sat for a few minutes and written a few words.

Reminding myself its not about the product, it's the process. :-P