The Art of Conforming to Myself

I’m not sure what to write about today, but I feel like I need to get something out before I continue working on the show.

Ah yes, the show. There’s a new show concept in the making. Something with a strong foundation, something with legs, something that already fully exists in real life (as does the audience). All that’s missing is the capturing, the packaging, the presentation.

I feel like the majority of our family members, and perhaps some of our friends, are eagerly awaiting the day that we give up on our artistic pursuits. Throw in the towel once and for all. “Conform. Grow up. Get your head out of the clouds. Join the ‘real world’.” (I have a special fondness for this last one. It’s such a common saying, but so utterly abstract. My real world is different from your real world is different from everybody else’s real world. We’re all living in our own versions of reality.)

I spent the better part of this year exploring what my life ‘could be like’ if I stopped pursuing an artist’s path in this life. I tried to place myself in other career possibilities, tried to imagine what I would go back to school for. What kept surfacing were other artistic desires. And the more I tried to shut them out, the sicker I became. The more I shut off any belief in the outward manifestation of my creations, the less I wanted to live.

And everything, everything, stopped.

I’m extremely hard on myself, always have been. But this year has been extremely hard on those who love me, too. I’ve pushed a lot of people away through this process of conforming to myself, through this journey of denying myself, through this process of revealing myself to myself. Countless times, I turned to others for help, to ease my pain, to give me answers. There was some alleviation, but my appetite for aide was too ravenous and it became increasingly unfair to those I was seeking relief from, to those I was draining. So I closed more doors, and I sat with myself.

Of course, nobody can every truly ease your darkest hour.

In their defense I can understand where they’re coming from. They love us. They want us to be happy. They want us to cover all of our basic needs. They want us to prosper. But it isn’t the artistic path that is preventing these thing from happening. It was our own inability to truly believe in ourselves as successful artists that was tripping the circuit.

It’s not the art that’s causing me pain; it’s my resistance, my hesitance, my fear.

For the record, it’s not the easiest lesson to digest: the fact that my own uncertainties are what’s put the penetrating break-through in limbo. By mid-summer I had solved the equation right before the answer was written on every blackboard in the classroom of my mind. “Oh, God. What if the only thing holding our projects back is the fact that we don’t fully believe they’re worth it?”

Worth. Value. Substance.

It was easier at first to place the focus of the belief on the projects. But it was only a matter of time before I realized that all I had to do in order to see the full imagery was to replace the word ‘project’ with ‘myself’.

Son of a bitch.

Higher-self chuckles through the clouds of a recent snowy hail storm and says, “You asked for it. You drew up the contract. Remember?”

Yeah, I remember.

So, battered, beaten (self-inflicted) and worn, I emerge from my cavernous hibernation. I start writing again and the Universe rewards me by dropping another project in my lap. I’m wounded and full of discomfort, but find the alleviation through creation.

So I graciously accept the challenge of the new project. It grows, it develops. It gains momentum and interest.

Higher-self inquires, “Now, are you ready to believe?”