Hi! Posas here. A few weeks ago on my instagram story, I shared some OLD artwork from when I was a teenager (see below). My reflections on old bodies of work and my journey as an artist gained a lot of interest and engagement from friends and followers. One friend who has collected a lot of my paintings over the years pointed out that I should really start a blog - because I had just shared some parts of my story that even HE didn't know about - and we have been friends for 10 years!
... So here I am, doing the thing. I have always enjoyed writing, so I'm looking forward to sitting down and sharing more about myself and my creative process, reflections, and inspirations.
reminding myself it doesn't have to be perfect:
I can be a perfectionist. I want everything to be the best that it can be,
and to do things to the best of my abilities. I was an achiever in school, getting straight A's throughout high school and college, taking lots of advanced classes, and taking on leadership positions in clubs and sports (mainly cheerleading).
I was first chair flautist for many years and would diligently practice my flute almost every day. I always followed the rules, never partied or got in to trouble. My perfectionism is probably the reason why I spent my entire childhood and adolescence trying to make my drawings look exactly like photos... because to me, that was a "perfect" piece of art.
I am even a perfectionist when it comes to journaling... or in this case - blogging! I have a thing for pens and journals.. I am always buying more but never filling up the old ones. A big problem with me not filling up the journals is that I take so dang long to write on the first page!
The first page feels like a big deal. It needs to be pretty. No mistakes in the writing or drawing. The first page is the first thing you see when you open the journal and it needs to set the tone and "match" the theme of the whole rest of the journal ( for example: what is this journal for? is it a prayer journal? something for taking notes? a journal for my goals? a journal for logging dreams?). Even when I take so long to consider the future purpose of the journal, what happens most of the time is that the journal ends up taking a different turn from where it started... and I feel compelled to rip out the first few pages that don't "match" the rest of it. It's so silly because no one will be looking at it except for me, but I just can't control the urge to make things look good.
I found myself having that same "first-page" mindset with starting this blog. Even though I like to think that I have toned down the perfectionism over the years (it has served me well in some areas of life, but holds me back in others), it still creeps in. Instead of sitting down and blogging what was on my mind, I took several weeks to think and (try) to plan out a visually pleasing and conveniently organized schedule of posts and themes.
I finally realized that I just needed to sit down and get the dang thing started.
So here I am doing that. I know that at least three people will read this and that's enough for me. I solemnly swear not to over-edit this into perfection.
Welcome to the unpolished thoughts of an artist.