Reshaping my life over the last year has been both a big success and a huge red herring. I want to share this with you because it might save you some of the confusion I’ve contended with.
I like big decisions, huge changes and fast action. I also like safe homeliness, consistency and time out. It’s always a challenge balancing the two but they can coexists in one life. The confusion comes when one disguises itself as another.
Let me be more clear. Recently, my hubby and I looked at a holiday home in Wales. I thought this outer container, this new place, this away-from-it-all zone, would be the answer to my need to settle. It’s hours away, it’s by the sea - I could hide there, escape and just be.
Then as I took the time to feel into it, I realised that I was creating a binary life. A here or there, Wales or Derbyshire, this or that option. I was starting to compartmentalise my life into quiet and calm in Wales, busy and responsible at home. I was trying (subconsciously) to create order and my theme for the year is iridescent chaos.
I’m a born roamer. I grew up on the travelling fair from generations of Showmen, Roma and Irish Travellers. I am not suited to a binary lifestyle - I’m seasonal, in motion and cyclical. I’d forgotten that in my rush to create something statically beautiful and protective.
Our creative selves are not made for standing still. They are made to seek, search and explore. That looks different for each of us and for me it means an actual physical movement. But you can’t go away without a return.
Returning to self, to home, to ideas, to passions is the underpinning of all our external searching. It’s there to help us embody and comprehend all we’ve seen and experienced. Without returning there would be no real knowledge.
So, we’ve decided against the holiday home. We’ve decided to return and root into where we live, to go out and roam, and to do it all again, in a never ending, life-feeding cycle.
This is my creative self cycle. It might help you understand your own unique creative cycle (because you will have one).
So, next time I start to fixate on an idea that will change everything (and let’s be honest they rarely do!) I am going to remember this. I’m going to remember that beauty can be dangerous and that disorder can be beautiful.
More iridescent chaos please!
I can relate to this so well -- I grew up in a military family with a lot of moves, so many if someone asks where are you from, I don't know how to answer! But I learned from this that I need a secure base, and then I still at 80 love to go adventuring, knowing Home waits for me when I am done. The trouble with a holiday home is that then you feel obliged to only go there, and miss out on so much more! But I am currently itching to have some days in a caravan by the sea somewhere, just me and my sketchbook and a few supplies..... Having moved to Derbyshire from Cornwall, the sea is what I miss.... But also like the chance to just go to a city or town I haven't been to before, and see what's there.....