Do or do not. There is no try.

Hello online friends,

Truth be told, I have been incredibly swept up in life lately. For the past month I have been in the middle of my dissertation trying to answer the question, "Who is my community?" which then lead naturally to the question "Who am I?"

Why do I always ask such charged questions? I'm not sure, but I think it is because we all tend to ask questions that we really want to know the answer to--so this past month I have really been exploring just that...who...am...I?

What is to be said of that experience will be put together in words and in art form in the next few weeks, hopefully days if I can really push myself to DO it.

While I recognize that I am constantly changing and that it will only be a snapshot of myself right at this very moment, it has still been quite the task to attempt to answer such a question for me. It has been incredibly challenging and for the time being, my answer to the question, "who am I?" is "Procrastinator."

"Who do I want to be?" is another question that has come into play in this discourse...while I am trying to define my community and myself there is a lot of thought surrounding the future and who I am to become. Which leads me to who I presently want to be in this moment today: Yoda. If I was more like Yoda I would not be on here typing about my anxiety for writing and creating but would be persevering!

"Do or do not. There is no try." Good advice for me this week, and maybe for you readers out there?

Finding myself going back to the drawing board

Use it or lose it has never had more meaning in my life than right now.

Trying to get back to the gym and lifting weights has been a struggle, and its funny to realize that after all of these years I still can only lift the bar. What happened to my progressive side?

Now I am setting the intention to be able to add some weight to the bar and keep it there. Baby steps. Means I will have to hit the gym...tomorrow. Riiiiiight. No really, in all seriousness, I will.

Additionally, being back on board the creative train makes me realize how angry my inner artist has been for holing her up all these years. While I was never someone dedicated to art on an intentional basis, I had my run with it in elementary school through high school. I took a few classes in college, but my artistic endeavors were limited to crafting and beading and unfortunately my beading took a huge plunge once I went away to college. Sad, but true.

Well now that I am "doing art" again on a daily basis I am enjoying drawing again, even though I am not necessarily the most accurate of drawers. Check out my little self-portrait of my user pic. I think I need to add some more hair to make my face look less large, but I might just have a big head. I am pretty sure the latter is more than likely the case...which means perhaps my drawing is more accurate than I give credit :)

Anyway, I bought some amazing colored pencils so I was happy to try them out this morning on my first page of my "visual journal" that I am making for one of my graduate studies courses. This journal is supposed to visually tell my story so naturally my first page that describes me provides a visual representation of myself.

I tried to write a poem that I was going to put around the picture, but this morning my inner poet was nowhere to be found so I'll have to postpone it for another day.

Until I write my own words about myself here are some quotes about identity--a theme I always find myself coming back to throughout my life and a theme that has resurfaced through the creative process.

We will discover the nature of our particular genius when we stop trying to conform to our own or to other people's models, learn to be ourselves, and allow our natural channel to open. - Shakti Gawain

Since you are like no other being ever created since the beginning of time, you are incomparable. - Brenda Ueland

There is a vitality, a life force, an energy, a quickening, that is translated through you into action, and because there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique. And if you block it, it will never exist through any medium and will be lost. - Martha Graham