This is a little secret between us: The watercolor background of this piece was made over four years ago, then I tucked it away, bringing it with me for all of my moves, but still, not knowing what to do with it, I even thought of throwing it away a few times. But something always made me hold on whenever I was considering getting rid of it.
This piece in particular represents the power of time, moreover, the importance of returning to center… whatever center that may be.
For me, returning to my center was painting with my watercolors late at night in my dorm room while threats and chaos both outside and inside made higher bids for my attention that I simply could not pay. For me, returning to my center was allowing my focus to shift from the familiar style of painting and allow new forms to take shape with the intention of my breath blowing colors into a space. It was having the patience to feel significance within the piece itself and also holding place for the frustration of wanting finality. A few months ago is when I finally saw the final stages that the piece needed and I started to work on it accordingly, thinking once I had the form down, the piece would be finally complete. But the piece acted true to its character and still needed more — but refused to be more clear about what more in particular needed to be done (despite my offers of a few different options that could be added). It wouldn’t budge. So, resisting the urge to dispose of it, I set it aside and waited until I could listen and have the audacity to do what needed to be done. Finally my will and pride were broken and I submitted to the idea I had initially heard one of my peers scoff at. It’s what the piece needed. I had to be reminded that it wasn’t about the opinions of someone who hadn’t spent so much time with this piece. It was about making the piece as great as it could possibly be.
I think one of the biggest assets we can attain in life is to learn to recognize when to trust ourselves with what we’ve been working on, and to know when to let go. And that ultimately is our center, checking in, understanding intention, desire, and needs and moving along with the best of our intuition and knowledge. More straight to the point: it’s a heart thing.
What our hearts need aren’t always going to make sense and/or be what we think we want at the time, but when we practice returning to the real center we’re given the chance to gain something beautiful.