Title: Our LandArtist: Sophia Elise
Media: Mixed media acrylic abstract in blues and greens
For Sale: at The Royal Easter Show, Auckland in April
I think fear has to be one of the strongest emotions we experience - obviously we need a certain amount of fear to avoid reckless decision making ... but of course there's fear which doesn't actually enhance our lives - like fear of failure. This fear can be so strong that it cripples us ... instead of moving forward - making a decision ...we stay stagnant. We think that it's somehow better than risking failure. However, we forget that through failure comes many other positive things - failure is never just failure - its a learning experience and will lead to positive outcomes in some way. And you never know by risking failure you may realise that in actual fact you succeed.
So where did this come from today? No this isn't about not knowing what to blog about last night - its about trying to decide what artworks to enter in the Royal Easter Show Art Awards and what categories to put them in. Yes - sounds simple - sounds easy - but for someone like myself just such a small decision can be overwhelming ... This fear of not putting the "right" artworks in or putting them in the "wrong" category - or worse still - not being as good as everyone else can be enough to stop me from entering things ... And what does not entering achieve? Nothing - just my artwork sitting at home .... what could I potentially achieve by risking entering - an award, sales, exposure ...... Whats the worst that happens if I enter and get it "wrong" - no awards, no sales - oh look at that - I still end up with exposure and maybe insight into better categories to put them in next year
Soooo ... today - I have filled out my entry form ... Paid my money ... made a commitment to 8 artworks in 4 competition categories and one artwork in the non competition section. I've done it ... and guess what - it feels like a huge weight has been lifted .... Now onto tackle the next task that seems so daunting ....
Making decisions can be scary if we have a fear of failure ... but we need to realise not making them is not progressing us ....
Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing, and being nothing - Denis Waitley
A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing - George Bernard Shaw
1 comment:
Fear of not measuring up... when we are our own harshest judges.
We support our friends, but are not so kind to ourselves. I wonder if we need to practise the De Bono "thinking hats", or maybe just have two chairs. Sit in one as ourselves, then move to the other and be our own best friend. Even then I wonder if we would give equal weight to our own advice from the "friend" chair!
Interactive Drawing Therapy (Russell Withers) has some excellent techniques which help me tremendously, both as support person and in my own life.
Post a Comment