[If you have a problem downloading this picture, you can find it in my Facebook AEDM 2010 Album here. Click on”down load high resolution” on the right under the picture and color your heart out! Then be sure to come back here and leave a link.]
In a post from March 26, 2007, I talk about this energy thing. If we listen to our inner voice, if we follow our inner feelings, our passion will lead us and where it takes us is where we are meant to go. Following our passion makes us who we truly are, with no “shoulds,” or “oughts.” It is a map that leads us out of the maze of cultural molding. Following your passion is the birth canal to a serene and centered self.
I have learned not to fight this. To fight where the energy wants to go is just crazy making. Ultimately, it will go where it wants. This is the marvelous beauty of clay. I am a midwife. Some days it’s pretty spectacular.
There is a process here that brings me back time and again to myself. I have an idea (not necessarily to do with clay; an idea about where I’m going, say). I head out. I almost get there, or, in some cases, arrive just where I thought I wanted to be only to have something shift. Because I have become attached to a particular outcome of a particular idea, that shift isn’t always welcome. It has taken me a long time to recognize that in the interstices of transition, great gifts are born. Clay teaches me to take a breath, not get rattled, and wait patiently for what is trying to emerge. It is an on-going process. Some days I remember to take the breath. Other days I remember, but only after I’m red in the face from exertion without taking a breath.
When Husband and I worked together in live sound – loading in our PA system, doing a gig, and loading out again (one a night, sometimes after one in the day) – he used to always have to remind me to breath when I was lifting. Same thing. And with Husband, at the end of the gig, when we were wrapping up microphone cords and putting things away, we would always get giddy. Some of it was exhaustion. Some was knowing the hard part was over and we could rest. These are the things I try to remember when change sparkles in the air.
Wylde Women’s Wisdom
Make no mistake. Serene does not mean unchaotic. It means understanding the process and flowing into it instead of fighting it. It does not mean easy, but it is easier when you understand that process.
A clay vessel that has not been through the fire cannot hold much without disintegrating. It is the fire that creates the sacred container and gives the clay the power it needs to serve itself and others. Tammy Vitale
9 Comments
[…] It means I’m growing!” Now you’re ready for “why.” Your why is your passion. Your why is the reason you are trading minutes, hour, days, weeks of your life birthing your […]
oh these are wonderful!
love your wild womans
Julie – thanks for the kind words
and for stopping by and “chatting!”
What a great post, wonderful words of wisdom.
B – hope you do (and then share!)
Julie – yep yep – that fire thing has a way of cleaning up frayed edges!
hey tammy ~
this is such a great post – this is where art truly comes from, i think. it’s not about no chaos, it’s about being in the midst of chaos and knowing it’s working out before you can actually SEE it working out.
we can trust our paths – and the fire – to always get us somewhere enlightening!
I love your colour page image. Might need to think about using that in my art journal some time.
I love this: Following your passion is the birth canal to a serene and centered self.