Your Back Stage Pass

Anxiety. Stage fright. The proper word for "worry."  Not quite fear or paranoia, but the little nagging feeling that you're going to be judged by something or someone with power, that this judgement will be negative, and that your work is substandard and weak.  It doesn't matter that you actually enjoyed the process of the work, the outcome may in truth be absolute junk.

Don't believe it.  If you take care of the quantity, God will take care of the quality.  Think about that for a minute.  Especially if you have children.  People are literally filling the earth with new babies right now...and God is responsible for the quality.  My first attempt at making a paw came out looking like road kill, but I kept making more...and am happy that the result of letting go of the desire for perfection brought me here.

The cure for anxiety in creativity (or whatever work you do) is to let God take care of the quality while you work on producing the quantity.


For someone who feels blocked creatively, I needed this cure. (Have you noticed how few of my posts actually relate to the shop?)  There are two reasons. The first is that I'm not really producing new items. This comes directly from anxiety, a kind of long term suffering that says I need to slow down on the making of insignificant stuff and get to work on other things.  It's like having a psychic virus.  I worry that people will think I'm a complete fool for doing what I do.  The other reason is that readers don't want to be advertised to.  I respect my friends here so much that I do not want to offend them with spammy ads.  So I have a dilemma.

How do I include my creative work here while writing the bits and pieces of my reflections?  I have decided to create a new blog page and to keep filling it with pictures and thoughts about the material items I'm sharing.  It is my hope that you will check that new page now and then to see the many changes that I feel are on the horizon.  This page will be called  "Your Back Stage Pass"  Behind the daily monologue you read here, things are going on behind the curtain that will fuel and sustain this blog, my life and my career. 

So far, no one has actually come out and said that I am a complete fool, except me!  In fact most of my wonderful friends here are incredibly supportive of my journey and understand the deeply rooted conflict I feel about being an artist mom at home versus a professional in an office or classroom.   I am happy to share that yesterday I knew for certain that being an artist mom at home was the best possible gift!  There was no conflict for my attention; my family ended up hanging out with me on the couches and chairs around my work station.  It felt like family togetherness and a business and fun all at the same time.  We listened to music and talked about wishes and the Japanese translation of Ribbit (kero kero kero, guap guap guap!) and simply enjoyed one another.  Today I am excited because I have more ideas to create and list in the shop. 

I hope you are filled with energy and happiness, and that something good will happen today.