I am sitting here on this cold blustery day contemplating what it is I want to be when I grow up. I do this a lot. Hayden will start pre-k in the fall and that will leave me with a bunch of time on my hands. I need to figure out what I want to do with that time. I have to admit that I have been pondering this question even before I had children. I guess I've never really pictured myself being good at anything. I just live, I suppose, without a purpose or meaning.
My children gave me great purpose and fulfillment that I don't think I could have captured as completely with a career. I am pretty good at it and I'm very proud of my great kids. They are my greatest and most precious part of my life along with their supportive and strong father. I am blessed to say the least. I am not blind to my own strengths and talents; however, outside of being a mother.
I come back to the same set of qualities and talents that I seem to have possessed since I was young. Art, writing, and my tender heart. I may not be a genius in these areas but it's all I know. It's all I've ever been really good at. I've leaned on my talents ever since I could remember and because of my tender heart it was my saviour. It is who I am and I have continually turned my back and neglected this part of myself over and over again. I have rejected and abandoned myself over and over again.
Who would I be without my art and my poems and writings? I don't know but at this time in my life I shudder at the thought of it. I am once again embracing these talents; though, this certainly isn't the first time I've recognized that I am truly an artist. I can't imagine being anything else. No matter how hard I try to be something else I always come back, for the first time in my life I am actually feeling like I'm home but with one very strong difference. I must stay true to myself this time around.
I am ever trying to please other people. I am constantly trying to make other people happy. I have been willing to stray so far from myself to gain the affection of others that I have made myself miserable. I can't make everyone happy, believe me I have tried. I have done nothing but disappoint people and worse of all stomped on my own spirit. I see now what I am and what I need to do to come back to center. I have to please myself and do what makes me happy.
I will always have a very tender heart. I care deeply for the feelings of others. I am also very outspoken with my feelings. This will never change and believe me I've tried to change it. I have resigned myself to this quality in myself and now see it as a great strength.
I will always be an artist. This is something I have also tried to change. How easy would it be to just toss it aside and be a librarian or a some other something or other. It's not easy and I can't do it. It comes back. How many people would give a limb to be an artist of anykind. I didn't want it for the longest and would have gladly given it up. I can't do it.
I surrender.
This may sound all very dramatic and exagerated but I can tell you it's not. I know other artists who feel the same. It's a blessing and a curse. The curse being the constant feeling of having to make people happy. The constant feeling of not being good enough. I have learned that to be truly successful these thoughts must be abandoned. So, I surrender to it. I have to, it's who I am. I can't live without it and I'm not hanging out in my closet anymore.
I'm not going to make everyone happy. I can't write, paint, draw or be what everyone else thinks. I have to write, paint, draw and be myself. My art may not suite you, it may not be what you think I should be. My tender heart may break and I am prepared. I am prepared for the first time in my life to take the good with the bad. I will stop apologizing for not making everyone happy. I will stop stepping outside myself to please the individual. I am what I am and that's all that I am and what a wonderful am I am!
