But I learned something about life (and rest) this week in a painting class I managed to take. I learned that even when it looks like things are totally screwed up, and there is no hope of getting things back to the way they were before, if you keep on going (blending, adding water, adding white, or just painting over it,) something pretty cool emerges.
While the above image is not the image we were painting, the sky is similar to what we were trying to achieve, and we were surprised by how hard (and easy) it was to do so.
Every day someone in our class would be trying to fix a mistake, and would cry out to our painting teacher, "Sharon! Sharon! I totally screwed it up! Help! What do I do?" And the first two days she gave us specific instructions on how to fix it. After that she said, "Just keep working it. You'll know what to do. You'll think you've lost it all and then all of the sudden the most beautiful thing will emerge."
And it did.
Over the course of the week, it seemed everyone in the class learned that we could either be vexed by our 'mistakes' (or lack of ability), or we could breathe, be patient, come back in a few hours with a different perspective. I think we all walked away with a deeper experience of process (journey) and patience from our painting class.
In terms of rest, I realize that:
a) I need opportunity to rest like I needed opportunity to paint. It doesn't happen 'over vacation', or during 4 hours when I have respite care one day. It's an ongoing project. Last Sunday I couldn't believe we were going to work on the same painting all week. But it took all those hours, and then some. I can't believe its going to take me more than 4 weeks to rest, but as indicated in this blog's subtitle, it is indeed a journey.
b) Its partly a mindset. When there is a four year old screaming bloody murder and trying to bite, kick, pinch, or headbutt either of you, its not a mindset. But after that storm has calmed, there is an element of choosing to be vexed, or choosing to allow flow to happen. And there's nothing wrong with walking away and coming back to it later.
Me partway through my painting.
c) I don't really know what this is going to look like in the end. I'm scared it will turn out horrible. I talked to a therapist friend of mine when I began my journey toward healing and rest and told her I was scared that after about a year of focusing on rest, I might not be better. Then what? She told me what I already knew, that was just fear talking. I could have used the same kind of fear to not start my painting in the first place.
d) To get a painting, you have to start painting. To rest, you have to engage in rest. Just do it. But for some reason its hard to initially engage in it. Similarly its hard to retract. It was often hard to stop painting, but my childcare had run out so I had to go. Same thing with resting. Once I start I could easily keep going, but I have to go back and forth because I still have to be a mom. That part takes commitment and work
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